Sermon Tone Analysis

There are three arks that are mentioned in the Bible.

Noah’s Ark

Ark of Bulrushes

Ark of the Covenant

When an ark is mentioned or built, it is said to be pitched.

To pitch is to layer the inside and outside so that whatever you put in it will be preserved.

God gives specific instructions to Moses to build the ark.

God is an architect.

He is a master designer.

He didn’t build any of the arks, he just designed them and instructed those who did build the arks.

God gives the plan and if you follow the plan, you will be preserved.

Everything about the ark of the covenant is a shadow and type of Jesus.

Each year on the day of atonement, lambs were slain and offered to God for the sacrifice of sin.

The blood was sprinkled on the mercy seat to forgive the sins of the previous year.

This was a process they repeated every year until Christ (The Lamb of God) came and paid the debt of sin.

He didn’t just forgive the debt, He paid it in full.

The lamb is innocent but pays the price of the guilty so that the guilty could live as if they are innocent.

As the shittian-wood was one that never rotted, it was a most appropriate emblem of the ... It is indeed striking to find that in the Septuagint (the first translation ever made of the Old Testament—into Greek) it is always translated "incor- rupible wood."

Strong, hard.

The wood points to Christ’s humanity.

The gold points to His divinity.

The Ark was wood and gold.

Jesus is all man and he’s all God.

The ark testifies of the Holy Trinity.

Four rings:

The Ark always went first:

The Ark’s Contents

The Ark of the Covenant contains things that reflect God’s holiness and His faithfulness.

Inside of the Ark are two tablets of the Decalogue or the Ten Commandments, a pot containing manna, and Aaron’s rod which had budded.

The symbolism of the tablets is that God is a holy God and requires obedience to His Law.

The manna was from the days when God miraculously sustained Israel in the Wilderness and has future implication of Jesus being the Bread from Heaven, the Bread of Life (), and the rod of Aaron’s that had budded and even produced almonds speaks of God’s sovereignty in His choosing leaders and that this leadership must come from God and not from man and that men do not choose themselves to be saved and placed into leadership positions but they are chosen by God.

The Ark also contained the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Old Testament written by Moses.

The Ark represented the presence of God and by their careful treatment and handling of the Ark, Israel had to be strict in their adherence of all that God required so that they might live (; ).

The Ark and God’s Presence

As I have written before, the Ark represented the presence of God because the contents reflected God’s nature and His attributes of faithfulness, holiness, and sustaining of life for those who are His own.

The Ark is mentioned over 200 times in the Old Testament in 22 different designations.

The Ark is sometimes referred to as the Ark of the Covenant (), the Ark of the Testimony (), the Ark of Yahweh (), the Ark of God () and sometimes simply the Ark () but one of the main purposes for the Ark was that of God’s being present or dwelling with His people and when the Ark was missing, so too was God’s glory.

When the Philistines captured the Ark () the glory was said to have departed from Israel () but the Philistines suffered from several plagues when they had it (, ).

When Israel crossed the Jordan River with the Ark the waters miraculously stopped () and Israel was able to cross over on dry ground ().

The significance of the water being stopped is that water sometimes represents God’s judgment and when God is present and a person or a nation lives in obedience to Him, the judgment of God is withheld.

The many historical accounts in the Bible clearly show that the Ark of the Covenant was real and not fictitious, even though no one knows where it is today.

The Ark’s Symbolic Meaning

The Ark of the Covenant was placed behind the Holy of Holies since the Ark represented God’s presence and no one but the high priest could have access to the Holy of Holies and then, only once a year (on the Day of Atonement or Yom Kippur).

Anyone that came in to contact with the Ark, besides the high priest, would instantly die since no one can see God and live ().

The Ark and the temple is an earthly symbol of the heavenly sanctuary.

The top or lid of the Ark was appropriately called the Mercy Seat and pictured the Lamb of God by Whom we have all obtained mercy ().

The lid had two golden cherubim angels which protected the Holy of Holies just as a cherub angel guarded the Garden of Eden once man had fallen and prohibited them from returning to it and partaking of the Tree of Life.

These two cherubim protect and magnify God’s glory.

When the high priest entered the Holy of Holies on the Day of Atonement, he sprinkled blood over it representing Christ’s shed blood that would be shed for the remission of sins.

At that time, it only covered the people’s sins but could never took them away () but when Christ shed His own blood, He took away the sins of those who trusted in Him ().

This was where the blood and the mercy of God (on the Mercy Seat) meet in the form of the blood of the Lamb of God, shed for us who have repented and trusted in Him.

We get what we do not deserve (called mercy) while not getting what we truly do deserve (called mercy).