Untitled Sermon
Learn How to Linger
Finding Your Meeting Place with God
The Tent of Meeting
7 Now Moses used to take the tent and pitch it outside the camp, far off from the camp, and he called it the tent of meeting. And everyone who sought the LORD would go out to the tent of meeting, which was outside the camp. 8 Whenever Moses went out to the tent, all the people would rise up, and each would stand at his tent door, and watch Moses until he had gone into the tent. 9 When Moses entered the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend and stand at the entrance of the tent, and the LORD would speak with Moses. 10 And when all the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance of the tent, all the people would rise up and worship, each at his tent door. 11 Thus the LORD used to speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend. When Moses turned again into the camp, his assistant Joshua the son of Nun, a young man, would not depart from the tent.
33:7–11. Moses and the meeting-tent. 7. Moses used to take the tent and pitch it outside the camp. God will not be in the midst of Israel, yet he will not withdraw his presence altogether. This is symbolized in the pitching of the ‘meeting-tent’ outside the camp, and at a distance from it. Sanctuaries were usually built a little distance away from towns in the ancient world: Israel has therefore lost her uniqueness, as the nation among whom God dwells in the very midst. On the whole question of the meeting-tent, see Hyatt: the imperfects must show customary action in the wilderness period. Every one who sought YHWH would go out. To seek the presence of God (for guidance, or prayer, or praise, expressed by sacrifice) a man had to separate himself from his own people (Heb. 13:13). But once here, outside the encampment, there was a possibility of fellowship with God, and that of a close and unique nature (verse 11, describing Moses).
9. The pillar of cloud would descend. This column or ‘pillar’ (literally, a ‘standing’ thing) of cloud, whatever its nature, signified the presence of YHWH, and whenever Moses entered the tent the sign of God’s presence was to be seen. Exodus 40:33, 34 seems to describe the same phenomenon in connection with the completed tent of later chapters, as a sign of God’s ‘residence’ (like the flag over a royal palace). It is not quite clear whether this section is an anticipation of what will follow later, after the dedication of the great tent of worship, or whether some very much simpler ‘meeting-tent’ was envisaged as being used by Moses even before the setting up of the main tent of Exodus 40. In many ways, some much simpler structure would better suit the picture here. Only Moses goes out to it, and only Joshua ‘serves’ at the tent, instead of the multitude of later Levites. There is not even a mention of Aaron and his sons acting as priests here. Further, Numbers 3 seems to postulate a tent set up in the middle of the encampment, while this one is pitched beyond the limits. Even those scholars of more critical views, who deny the existence of the elaborate tent of the later chapters of Exodus (seeing it as a ‘back projection’ of a later temple), usually admit the existence of this simpler ‘meeting-tent’ as being truly Mosaic. However (apart from other considerations) the numerous differences between the elaborate tent and Solomon’s temple make their denial of the existence of the tent unlikely. Perhaps therefore all this activity is to be regarded as in the ‘past tense’, and in connection with a simpler form of tent than that envisaged in later chapters (Num. 11:24 and 12:4 seem to preserve the same early memory). The common people, at this stage, do not come to worship: they prostrate themselves at their tent doorflaps, facing toward the meeting-tent from afar.
11. Face to face. Numbers 12:8 explains the meaning of this phrase. God will speak to Moses ‘mouth to mouth’, that is to say, not in dreams and visions, but clearly and directly. Moses had the gift of clarity of spiritual insight: he shared the very counsels of God. As a man speaks to his friend. Perhaps Christ was referring to this in John 15:15, where he says that the mark of the friend (as opposed to the servant) is that he knows the purpose and meaning of the commands given to him. In spite of this, however, the great title of Moses in the Old Testament is ‘the servant of YHWH’ (Deut. 34:5). He thus stands at the beginning of a long process of God’s revelation, which will culminate in the ‘suffering servant’ of Isaiah 52, and which will find its fulfilment in Christ.