The striking example of the Tabernacle women

Text Exodus 28:8 Date 12/04/15 Place Childs Hill Baptist Church

I would like to turn your attention tonight to a text found in Exodus 38:8. It comes in the midst of the description of the articles made for the Tabernacle in the closing chapters of Exodus. It says of the chief architect of the Tabernacle, Bezalel and his assistant, Oholiab, that

They made the bronze basin and its bronze stand from the mirrors of the women who served at the entrance to the tent of meeting.

The Tabernacle was the predecessor to the Temple built in Solomon's time. It was the special place of worship that the Israelites were commanded to make while they were still in the desert. It was to be a sort of pattern of heaven and the true worship of God and each part was full of spiritual meaning. It consisted of the most holy place of all where the ark was kept with the commandments in it and the Holy Place where the map and the table and the golden altar of incense were found. There was also a courtyard with a bronze altar where the sacrifices were made and other activities took place.

The verse itself raises three obvious questions and two less obvious ones.

1. What was this bronze basin that they made and what was it for?

This is explained back in Exodus 30:17-21 where we read that

Then the LORD said to Moses, "Make a bronze basin, (older versions use the word laver) with its bronze stand, for washing. Place it between the tent of meeting and the altar, and put water in it. Aaron and his sons are to wash their hands and feet with water from it. Whenever they enter the tent of meeting, they shall wash with water so that they will not die. Also, when they approach the altar to minister by presenting a food offering to the LORD, they shall wash their hands and feet so that they will not die. This is to be a lasting ordinance for Aaron and his descendants for the generations to come."

We also read in Exodus 40:30-32 how Moses

placed the basin between the tent of meeting and the altar and put water in it for washing, and Moses and Aaron and his sons used it to wash their hands and feet. They washed whenever they entered the tent of meeting or approached the altar, as the LORD commanded Moses.

This basin then was a place of washing for the priests. We are not sure how large it was or exactly where it was but it was somewhere between the Holy Place and the altar also made of bronze. Bronze is an alloy consisting mainly of copper with the addition of other metals (usually tin).

Much of the make up and ritual of the Tabernacle taught about cleaning in different ways – usually cleansing by fire and by water. This basin (later replaced in the Temple by a huge basin called a sea series of 10 basins on stands) was specifically in order for the priests to go through a cleansing ritual by water. It speaks of cleansing.

When we come to the New Testament, the only symbolic cleansing ritual that remains is baptism. The need to be clean in God's sight, to be pure and holy, remains nevertheless. The New Testament talks about the washing of rebirth, a new birth that is vital in order to enter the kingdom.

2. Who were these women who served at the entrance to the tent of meeting?

The text does not actually mention women but it is clear from the word used that these were females who assembled or served.

We are not totally sure who these women were. The only other possible biblical reference to them seems to be at the end of the wicked days of the judges. We read in 1 Samuel 2:22 Now Eli, who was very old, heard about everything his sons were doing to all Israel and how they slept with the women who served at the entrance to the tent of meeting.

Some have suggested that these women had no official role but were only godly women who liked to gather at the entrance to the tent of meeting and assist in what ever ways they could. Think of Anna mentioned in the New Testament who never left the temple but worshipped night and day, fasting and praying.

They may have served, however, in a much more official capacity. They could perhaps have served as doorkeepers at the tabernacle, assisting those who came in and out during the day and perhaps watching the door at night.

All this is conjecture, of course. These women may simply have congregated at the tent of meeting where Moses would meet with God in order to bring their offering of mirrors for use in the making of the basin. All we know for sure is that these were devout women.

3. How could their mirrors be used to make a bronze basin?

As for these mirrors, it is important to remember that the silvered glass mirror we know today didn't come in until the nineteenth century. Back in Moses' day people used highly polished copper or bronze or other metal for their mirrors. They would take a piece of metal usually round or oval and either make it with a metal handle or insert it into a wooden or stone one to form a hand mirror. Often the reverse side would be highly decorated, the idea being that there should be beauty on both sides – crafted beauty on one and the beauty of a woman's face on the other.

It is highly unlikely that these mirrors were simply arranged to form a series of reflections for the priests to look into when they came to wash. As one writer points out, they came to wash their hands and feet not their faces! No these would have been bronze mirrors that were melted down to provide the material that when reshaped and remoulded would have been formed into the bronze basin used at the tabernacle.

4. Did Moses have a lesson or an observation in mind when he made note of this fact?

This is not the first reference of this kind that we have in this part of Scripture. Back in 35:20-29 we read this

Then the whole Israelite community withdrew from Moses' presence, and everyone who was willing and whose heart moved them came and brought an offering to the LORD for the work on the tent of meeting, for all its service, and for the sacred garments. All who were willing, men and women alike, came and brought gold jewellery of all kinds: brooches, earrings, rings and ornaments. They all presented their gold as a wave offering to the LORD. Everyone who had blue, purple or scarlet yarn or fine linen, or goat hair, ram skins dyed red or the other durable leather brought them. Those presenting an offering of silver or bronze brought it as an offering to the LORD, and everyone who had acacia wood for any part of the work brought it. Every skilled woman spun with her hands and brought what she had spun - blue, purple or scarlet yarn or fine linen. And all the women who were willing and had the skill spun the goat hair. The leaders brought onyx stones and other gems to be mounted on the ephod and breastpiece. They also brought spices and olive oil for the light and for the anointing oil and for the fragrant incense. All the Israelite men and women who were willing brought to the LORD freewill offerings for all the work the LORD through Moses had commanded them to do.

Particularly notice the way people gave up their brooches, earrings, rings and ornaments and the way the women spun blue, purple or scarlet yarn or fine linen. In these acts there were great sacrifices and a willingness to part with things that the world hold in high regard in order to provide for a better ideal.

We know that Egyptian women would carry their mirrors with them to the pagan temples but this was not going to be the pattern in Israel – not because Moses made a commandment against it but because the women themselves were keen to give up their luxuries.

Matthew Henry says “These women parted with their mirrors … for the use of the tabernacle. Those women that admire their own beauty, are in love with their own shadow, and make the putting on of apparel their chief adorning by which they value and recommend themselves, can but ill spare their looking-glasses; yet these women offered them to God”.

He suggests that what lay behind this was either a spirit of repentance for the way perhaps they had abused them - “to the support of their pride and vanity”. Perhaps they were now convinced that their use of these mirrors was superficial and wanted in a new way to devote themselves to the service of God. “They thus threw away that which, though lawful and useful in itself, yet had been an occasion of sin to them.”

Alternatively, “In token of their great zeal for the work of the tabernacle; rather than the workmen should want brass, or not have of the best, they would part with their mirrors, though they could not do well without them.”

It is probably one or other of those two things that Moses is pointing to now. These women were certainly motivated by piety to do what they did. They turned their back on their own pleasure and denied themselves in order to serve the Lord and in so doing they have left us with a great example of sacrifice and other worldliness.

5. Is there a lesson for us here as well?

Now we are not involved in building a tabernacle like that of Moses. We all have plenty of mirrors at home, I'm sure, but it is hard to think of a project where they could be donated in a way that would do some good.

There are lessons here, nevertheless. In 1 Peter 3 the apostle writes to wives and says (3-5)

Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewellery or fine clothes. Rather, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight. For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to adorn themselves.

There are lessons here not just for women. The principles of repentance and zeal should continue in all and the example of these women should make us stop and think whether there is something we might do that has a similar stamp.

How are we spending our money, our time, our energies? Is the world creeping into our lives and into our thinking in a way that is drawing us away from the Lord? If so, we need to think again and see how we an better use the resources the Lord has committed to us to bring glory to his name.

If we are really devoted to God then it will show itself in specific acts of sacrifice. We won't all act in the same way but there will be something in us all. Remember how Hannah devoted her son Samuel to the Lord's service or how Mary used the expensive alabaster jar of perfume to anoint Jesus at Bethany in preparation for his burial.

If we are devoted to the Lord we will be encouraged to make such sacrifices and we will increasingly find ourselves weaned away from what the world holds dear. Personal vanity will grow less and less.

Perhaps one more lesson we can learn is the surprising one that F B Meyer draws out. Isn't this a call to us to abandon morbid introspection. Yes, there is a place for self examination but if we are constantly naval gazing, always thinking about ourselves, then that cannot be good. Rather, like these women we need to forget about ourselves and fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.

“These women became so interested in the service of the Tabernacle” says Meyer “that they were weaned from their mirrors. The better expelled the worse; the higher cast out the lower. Go out of yourself, find some work to do for God and man; seek in the laver the removal of the stains of human sin; find your centre in God and his plans; and you will abandon the habit of morbid self-scrutiny. For every look at self, take ten at Christ ….”