Exodus 39:1 And of the blue, and purple, and scarlet, they made cloths of service, to do service in the holy place, and made the holy garments for Aaron; as the LORD commanded Moses.
2 And he made the ephod of gold, blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen.
3 And they did beat the gold into thin plates, and cut it into wires, to work it in the blue, and in the purple, and in the scarlet, and in the fine linen, with cunning work.
4 They made shoulderpieces for it, to couple it together: by the two edges was it coupled together.
5 And the curious girdle of his ephod, that was upon it, was of the same, according to the work thereof; of gold, blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen; as the LORD commanded Moses.
6 And they wrought onyx stones inclosed in ouches of gold, graven, as signets are graven, with the names of the children of Israel.
7 And he put them on the shoulders of the ephod, that they should be stones for a memorial to the children of Israel; as the LORD commanded Moses.
8 And he made the breastplate of cunning work, like the work of the ephod; of gold, blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen.
The nation of Israel has been fixated on the priest’s garments for some time now. I believe they have all the garments ready. They just need the temple so that they can activate the priesthood and get going with their current ritualistic ideas. It will be some time yet before there will be a true priesthood established.
The antichrist will allow the Jews to establish a priesthood but that will not be ordained of God. There will be a religious ceremony to establish that priesthood, but it and the temple of the antichrist will not be blessed by God. It will be like many churches today. Paul wrote of the problem:
II Timothy 3:5 Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.
That was a problem already in Paul’s day and it is certainly a problem today. It will be a problem in the Tribulation time as well. The Jews that enter that time will be lost. They and the Gentiles will embrace the antichrist. The Jews will be excited to see the temple built and they will be ready to declare their priesthood. The antichrist will go along with this for a short time. However, he will be bothered by it and at the midpoint of the tribulation time he will declare himself to be god. He will put an end to the supposed religion of the Jews. He will do that to try to force everyone to worship him.
In our text, God was instituting the priesthood. Their garments needed to be made of the various colours listed here.
This again was a type of the Lord Jesus Christ. His deity, His blood, His royalty are all depicted in the priestly garments. The priests were to be sanctified for their service. The outward things were supposed to depict what was in their hearts. As we will see, Aaron and his sons did not do a very good job of submitting to the LORD.
For many centuries now, the Catholics have tried to rob God of the priesthood. They have a corrupt leadership which they call a priesthood. The head of that system is the Pope. The head of the Pope is the devil. That system is anti-God. They have their robes and their rituals, but they have no truth. Thousands of gullible people have believed in that system and are still a part of it today. The Protestant churches “broke away” from Catholicism, but many of them are accepting of that false religion today. The reason for this compromise is because most Protestants do not believe in an absolute authority. They accept the perversions and when you accept that you have no absolute authority. However, at death every individual will be faced with absolute authority. Those who reject the truth now will immediately be in hell. There will be no debating there. There will be no arguing with God there. Those who trusted in God will immediately be in heaven. There is also no debating or arguing there. Jesus Christ will determine the status of the saved person in heaven and that will be it.
Outward appearances without an inner heart cleansed by God, does not mean anything. At least we need to acknowledge that the N.E. pastors are showing who they truly are. They do not want to dress for the Lord. They want to dress for the world. They are demonstrating that their hearts are not right with God. The sad fact is that they are teaching their followers, that outward appearance does not matter. They can come looking like someone off the street and it is all good, in their eyes.
The spirit of rebellion is well engrained in most people’s hearts and lives. Most people take offence at the thought that there is a certain standard that Christians should live up to. Most people want an unholy God who accepts sin.
God showed in these instructions that there was to be a difference between the priests and the common people. The common people needed to be holy, but the priests were to teach the people what true holiness looked like.
There were items in the priestly garments that could only be worn by them. The ephod was an important part of their attire. There was also the curious girdle that they needed to make. The instructions for this ephod were given in detail. This ephod had special stones in it.
When the priest would put that ephod on, he would have the names of the twelve tribes written on it. The priest needed to be reminded that he was to represent the entire nation before the Lord. His was a special work. His outward apparel needed to reflect an inner consecration to the Lord. That was important to God. Its’ importance was often lost on the priests.
We see that God was very concerned about the details of these items. God wanted the people to see His holiness and the special nature of that “seed of the woman” that would one day come to bruise the head of the serpent.
As we mentioned earlier, the Jews today are very concerned about the priests’ garments. They are not currently concerned about the significance of these items. Because of their carelessness, they will embrace the antichrist when God sets him up. They will need to suffer under him for a while before they realize they are missing the real significance of the outward items. They will finally grow weary of their rebellion and they will come to know the true Messiah and Christ. That will be a blessed day for them. Gentiles also need to submit to the truth. Rather than going through some rituals, trust in the true God and serve Him.
Pastor Bartel