Ezekiel
40 reminds me of my first visit to the University of Virginia. I
walked onto campus in the evening and found myself in the middle of
what most schools call “the Quad”. This now common central green
space was first used at UVA. Rather than one large central building
as had been the custom to that point, Thomas Jefferson designed the
Academic Village as a series of uniquely designed buildings connected
by a covered colonnade on both sides of the lawn. The professors
lived and ate with the students. At the top of the Quad was the
Library and at the opposite end, the Chapel. Imagine Jefferson
describing his design without drawings or pictures. In today’s
chapter Ezekiel is given a vision of the new temple in Israel while
the nation was still in exile. He is given the tour by “a
man whose appearance was like bronze; he was standing in the gateway
with a linen cord and a measuring rod in his hand“.
He is told, “Look carefully
and listen closely and pay attention to everything I am going to show
you… Tell the people of Israel everything you see“.
This angel of architecture proceeds to give every detail and exact
measurement of the entire Temple complex in this very long chapter.
Do you think God has thought more about a building than He has about
you?
Ezekiel
is first brought to the East Gate of the outer court, “I
saw a wall completely surrounding the temple area“.
This outer wall was massive, at least 10 feet high and 10 feet thick
with guard posts at each gate. No one entered by accident. The four
gates led to an area with rooms inside, facing the outer court. All
of the gates “had the same
measurements as the others“.
It is important to remember that Ezekiel had seen and visited the
Temple Solomon built many time before it was destroyed. It is likely
this Temple and the gates described were similar to the ones he knew
well from his youth. The lessons of childhood stay with us.
Deuteronomy 6:7 says, “These
commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts.
Impress
them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when
you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up“.
The
tour continues, “Then he
brought me into the inner court through the south gate“.
Unlike Jefferson’s publicly funded institution for the common man,
the temple became more restricted as you moved toward the center of
the Quad. The Inner Court was exclusively for the Temple priests.
Next he is shown “A room…
where the burnt offerings were
washed. In
the portico of the gateway were two tables on each side, on which the
burnt offerings, sin offerings
and guilt offerings
were slaughtered“. We begin
to notice more dividers, “within
the inner court, were two rooms… the room facing south is for the
priests who guard the temple…
the room
facing north is for the priests
who guard the altar“. What
separates Man from God? It is not walls and guards, but sin. The
guards were not to protect God. Finally Ezekiel is taken to the
center of the Quad, “And the
altar was in front of the temple“.
The Temple was a place of atonement and the place where God dwelt
with man. Hebrews 9 tells us the Temple was a “sanctuary
made with human hands that was only a copy of the true
one“.
Christ became out atonement so we can live together in this Spiritual
Village eternally. Jesus “offered
Himself unblemished to God, to cleanse our consciences from acts that
lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!”
(Hebrews 9:14) Our heavenly campus is now open, your tuition has
been paid, and you enter by faith.