WE SAW how that Moses took the tabernacle, or tent, and pitched it without, and afar off from, the camp. There the pillar of cloud came down, and there the Lord talked with Moses face to face. When the people saw the cloud, they all rose up and worshiped. Only a short while ago they were worshiping the golden calf, but how good it is to see them worshiping their own true God again, though for the most part they remained in the camp.
Moses went back into the camp, “but his servant Joshua,... a young man, departed not out of the tabernacle.” Moses, as the mediator, is the type of Christ, ever ready to meet the sinner where he is, or even a saint who is in a wrong position. Joshua is the type of Christ in spirit as the leader of His people. How sweet it is to faith to know that there is an outside place where the Lord is in the midst of His own!
As a result of Moses’ pitching the tabernacle in that outside place, afar off from the camp, we notice that which would be an encouragement to any true-hearted child of God who desires to follow the Lord — there was a nearness between the Lord and His servant never enjoyed before; next, Moses’ intercession secured a blessing for his people such as was never granted hitherto.
Moses now urges a new plea. God had said He would not go up with Israel because they were such a stiff-necked people. But Moses pleaded that because they were so faulty and failing that this is the very reason why they needed the Lord’s presence with them.
The boldness of Moses’ faith here is wonderful, but it was really because he had learned in a large measure the grace of God. He had been with God in the mount those forty days, during which he had received those wonderful communications respecting the building of the tabernacle, all of which spoke of Christ and coming glories, with blessings for His people, in spite of all their waywardness and failure. Now in the tabernacle, outside the camp, Moses was near enough to God to get a better view of His grace than he ever enjoyed before.
And so it will be with us, dear young reader, as many have already proved, that if we are willing to follow the Lord even to that outside place where He is seen with His own gathered around Him, a place of reproach though it be, yet we will experience a deeper communion and richer sense of His grace and truth than we have known before.
It was the very failure of the people and a sense of God’s glory that moved Moses to take that outside place, yet Moses in the tabernacle outside the camp had no less love for his people within. We shall see how this love for his failing people wrought for their restoration and blessing. This was the spirit of Christ in Moses and may we too have more of this heart of Christ which shows itself in love to His people. They belong to Him, no matter how badly they might have failed, and He will never give them up. May we be found seeking to show faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and love unto all saints; may we be willing to love and serve them for His sake until He calls us to our home above.
ML-03/07/1971