02.04. THE BARS
THE BARS THERE were fifteen bars of wood covered with gold.
There were five on each side of the Tabernacle and at the back or western end.
They passed through and were held in place by rings in the boards.
Three were long. They were middle bars going through the rings from end to end of each side and back of the Tabernacle.
There were twelve short bars, four on each side and back.
Two of the short bars were above the middle one, two below.
Two short bars extended above and below the middle bar the length of The Holy Place. The other two extended above and below the middle bar the length of The Most Holy Place.
All this was according to the pattern and commandment of God given to Moses; as it is written;
“And thou shalt make bars of shittim wood; five for the boards of the one side of the tabernacle. And five bars for the boards of the other side of the Tabernacle, and five bars for the boards of the side of the Tabernacle, for the two sides westward. And the middle bar in the midst of the boards shall reach from end to end. (Exodus 26:26-28) And thou shalt rear up the Tabernacle according to the fashion thereof which was shewed thee in the mount.” (Exodus 26:30) The long bars went from one end of the Tabernacle to the other on both sides and from end to end in the back.
They were the beginning and the ending of the Tabernacle, the beginning ‘and end of the Tabernacle as the revelation of God among men. As such they are a fitting and perfectly illustrative symbol of our Lord Jesus Christ as the beginning and the ending of God’s revelation of Himself to man.
He declares Himself to be the beginning and the ending; as it is written:
“I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.” (Revelation 1:8) This is the Lord who is speaking.
He claimed to be Almighty.
He claimed it specially after His resurrection and just before His ascension.
He said:
“All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth.” (Matthew 28:18) “All power,” is expressed in the term, “Almighty.” That it is the Lord Jesus Christ who speaks in Revelation 1:8, is demonstrated by Revelation 1:11. In that verse the speaker introduces his phrase with the same terms: “I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last.”
“First and last” are equivalent to the “beginning and ending” of Revelation 1:8. That the speaker is our Lord Jesus Christ is demonstrated by the vision given to John.
He turned to see who it was that spoke with Him and beheld our Lord Jesus Christ, risen, glorified, clothed with the garment of His high priestly office and function as final judge. But it is said the expression with which Revelation 1:11 opens, “I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last,” is not sanctioned by the oldest manuscripts. That does not affect the fact (the truth is, the “oldest.” manuscripts are not always the most reliable. This is notoriously true of the Vatican and Sinaitic codices. The present text should be the most authoritative). Even if it were set aside, Revelation 1:17 gives the same thought as Revelation 1:11. In that verse the Lord says to John: “I am the first and the last.” As in Revelation 1:8, Alpha and Omega, the first and the last letter of the Greek alphabet were used to introduce and emphasize the phrase, “the beginning and the ending,” then the “first and last” of Revelation 1:17, is equivalent to the letters Alpha and Omega and the “first and last” of Revelation 1:11; and since our Lord Jesus Christ Himself claims the application in Revelation 1:17, “the first and last,” and this title is equivalent to “beginning and ending” of Revelation 1:8, then it is beyond all question our Lord Jesus Christ is the speaker in Revelation 1:8.
He it is who speaks and calls Himself, “the beginning and the ending––the Almighty.” When He says He is the “beginning and the ending, the first and the last, the Almighty,” He is saying He is the full and final revelation of what God is, ever has been and ever will be. That He is the beginning of the revelation of God is set forth in the essential title He claims for Himself: In Revelation 1:8, He speaks of Himself as––the Lord, the God (such is the full text). In the Old Testament the Hebrew is Yaveh—Elohim—The Lord God. In Genesis 1:1-31, God is introduced in His unit and absolute name––Elohim; that is, God. In Genesis 1:20, and succeeding verses, we find the expression, “God said.” To speak, to say a thing intelligently requires not only voice, but a word. In the third chapter the voice is heard and the speaker is described as the LORD God. In Genesis 3:22, the LORD God speaks and says:
“The man is become as one of––us, to know good and evil.” In thus speaking the LORD God declares Himself in partnership with another person on equality with Himself. The key to this pluralism is found in the fact that the absolute name of God is—Elohim, is plural and includes the coincident existence of more than one person in the being of God.
Since the LORD is the speaker of the Elohim, the only speaker, He is authoritatively and officially, the utterance of the Elohim and therefore the very Word of God. The Gospel of John opens with the significant statement:
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and God was the Word.
All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made.” (John 1:1-3) When therefore it is said in Genesis 1:1 :
“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth,” and we learn from John’s Gospel that God the Creator was the Word of God, and in Genesis the Word of God is the LORD God, then the LORD God of Genesis and the Word of God of John’s Gospel are One and the Same. As previously stated, the whole matter is settled by Genesis 1:26.
There one of the persons of the Godhead says, “Let us make man;” in the second chapter the person who “makes” man and is at the same time declared to be the Creator of the earth and the Heavens is seen to be the LORD God, the speaker, the Word of God. From John’s Gospel we learn the Word was made flesh, became incarnate as our Lord Jesus Christ. Since the LORD God was the Word of God, then our Lord Jesus Christ in His pre-existent state was the LORD God, and since the LORD God is the utterance of Godhead, the beginning of the revelation concerning Him, His mind and will, our Lord Jesus Christ is Himself that beginning of the revelation of God to man. And this is, indeed, the very statement of John. He says:
“No man hath seen God (God the Father) at any time; the only begotten Son (God) which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him (literally, revealed Him).” (John 1:18) Our Lord Jesus Christ as the LORD God of the Old Testament is therefore in all verity the Alpha and Omega—The First—The Beginning of the revelation of God.
All we know of God as set forth in the Old Testament has come through Him.
All manifestation of Him from eternity as recorded in the Old Testament has been by and through our Lord Jesus Christ in His pre-existent state; as it is written:
“But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from old from everlasting.” (Micah 5:2)
“From everlasting,” that is from eternity. From eternity He has been the outgoing, the forth putting, manifestation and expression of Almighty God. From all eternity He has been the visibility of God; as it is written:
“Who being in the form of God took upon him the form of a servant.” (Php 2:6-7)
If the form of the servant He took upon Him represents His visibility as a servant, then the form He had of God before He laid it aside to take upon Him the form of a servant represents His visibility as God. The truth is, God has never been seen apart from Him and never can be.
If He is the beginning of the revelation of God, He is the ending; that is to say, the completion of the revelation—the Omega of Godhead.
Henceforth God is to be seen and known in the universe through the humanity of our Lord Jesus Christ. The God who became man. The man who is God. The eternal God—man.
All there is of God is in–– Him; as it is written:
“In him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.”(Colossians 2:9) He is the beginning and the ending.
He is all between the beginning and the ending. He is both circumference and center.
He is extension and concentration. The long bars of the Tabernacle held it together. It might be truly said the Tabernacle consisted in the long bars.
Without them it would have fallen apart. In this the long bar is the logical symbol of our Lord; for it is written:
“By him (in Him) all things consist.” (Colossians 1:17) The verb form of the verb is, “sunesteeken,” it signifies, “put together,” “permanently framed together.” The verse therefore should read:
“In him all things have been permanently framed together.”
How wonderful this is.
All things have been put together, all things have been framed together, all things are held together––in Christ. The universe is held together in Him. The universe is therefore—Christo-centric.
Because Christ is, all things are; and because of Christ all things continue to be.
It is not the law of gravitation that holds all things together, but this God-man, our Lord Jesus Christ.
There are two words in Scripture that are measureless.
These two words are:
“In him.”
“In him is life.” (John 1:4) In Him is the purpose which God purposed from the beginning; as it is written:
“The eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Ephesians 3:11) In him, we who believe, are the very “righteousness of God.” (2 Corinthians 5:21) In Him, we who believe, are complete; as it is written:
“And ye are complete in him, which is the head of ail principality and power.” (Colossians 2:10) Think of that, will you!
He is the “fulness “of the Godhead. (Colossians 2:9) All there is of God is in Him. And we who believe are in Him.
Complete in Him––the word is—pepleeromenoi we have been filled up full in him.”
We are so complete in Him that in God’s sight we—lack nothing. In Christ we are absolutely perfect before the Father. The binding and holding together of the Tabernacle by the bars is emphasized in the two comer boards of the western end.
They are particularly described:
“And the two boards thou shalt make for the corners of the tabernacle in the two sides.
“And they shall be coupled together beneath, and they shall be coupled together above the head of it unto one ring: thus shall it be for them both; they shall be for the two comers.” (Exodus 26:23-24) The two boards were joined together above and below and lapped each side from top to bottom and bottom to top where the end of the sides and the back came together. These boards like a long—V––the base of the—V—placed on the ridge of the comers and the members of it extending upon the sides met the bars and with them held the Tabernacle together. Thus the corner boards in their relation to the bars emphasized and illustrated the declaration that “in him all things consist.”
These long bars were three in number. Three is the number of resurrection. The whole economy of God is held together, is framed together and permanently secured in the Risen Man.
There were twelve short bars, six above and six below the middle bar. The six above with the middle bar made seven. The six below with the middle bar made seven. As three is the number of resurrection, seven, completion, perfection, and as twelve is administration, you have here illustrated the truth that all things in Heaven and in earth are to be headed up in Him as the Risen Man, as the Eternally Incarnate God; even as it is written:
“That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he (God, the Father) might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him.” (Ephesians 1:10) This verse may be rendered:
“That in the dispensation of the complete filling up of the ages, he, (God, the Father) might head up all things in Christ.” When the world was remade after the chaos into which it had fallen, all things were headed up in Adam. God gave him dominion over all things, put all things “under his feet.” (Psalms 8:4-6)
Man fell, lost his headship and today is under the feet of all things, sin, sickness, sorrow and death.’ Our Lord came that He might meet the consequences of Adam’s sin, offered a sacrifice for the sin of the world, rose, ascended to Heaven and sits there now as the true Adam, the last Adam, and the second man. The time is coming, that hour called “the fulness of times,” the age toward which all times and seasons are flowing, when all things will be headed up in Him; when He will be seen and owned as the LORD God to the glory of the Father, owned and confessed by a prostrate universe as the Son of the Father, eternal Head of the universe, eternal visibility of God, eternally visible as—Man.
All the effort man is now making in the realm of applied science; all his effort to obtain the mastery of the world is simply .the involuntary endeavor to get back the headship of the first man. The deliverance of the world from sin, sickness, lawlessness, war and death will never be found by and through the natural man.
All his schemes for rebuilding the world and exalting natural humanity into the place originally ordained of God will fail.
Wherefore it is written:
“Now we see not yet all things put under him (that is, under the Adam man). But we see Jesus.” (Hebrews 2:8-9) By virtue of His death for the sake of which He actually became incarnate (as it is written: made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death) He is now crowned with honor. Seated at the right hand of the Father, He is the man in the glory, The head of that new race He is creating and through which He will rule the world, having all things under His feet. He it is to whom we are to look.
It is He in whom humanity is to find the fulfillment of its hopes. It is by and through Him the world is to be delivered, lifted up and dominion, mastery, eternal life and immortality given to all who are in Him.
All things were bound up and secured in the long bars of the Tabernacle.
All things that are to be permanent and glorious are secured in Christ. In Him all the shadows become substance, in Him who is–– The beginning and the ending.