The Approachable God

As I think about the impact of Easter, it is all about the God of the universe becoming more vulnerable. The God of the universe displaying His heart. How was God able to perfectly come to man in love.

I try to read through the Bible systematically each year and it sometimes is a struggle to get through some of the tedious passages such as in Leviticus and Numbers. God puts them in there for lots of reasons, but nowhere more than to demonstrate the contrast of the unapproachable God against the approachable God. The Israelite could not take the name of God upon his lips. We have trouble visualizing what that means because we approach God so flippantly. The tabernacle was not that way. Just consider just the ark of the covenant.

The ark was made of wood representing man. It is surrounded by gold representing kingship and deity. Gold and wood are together, but never mixed. In between is the mercy-seat. Christ is the perfect intermediary. It cannot be a mercy seat without the priest shedding blood over it. That is what makes it a mercy seat. Everything revolves around the mercy seat, which is made of infallible pure gold. The perfect Christ has blood shed over it so that we can approach God on the basis of the mercy seat. There are two cherubim that cannot look up, but must look towards the mercy seat.

There are objects contained inside the mercy seat. Don't miss this symbolism. If the mercy seat truly is everything, then the objects have to be contained inside it. In the ark is the manna which demonstrates the sustenance of life. Christ is the bread of life. Also in the ark is Aaron's rod that budded. This speaks of resurrection. Before God's involvement, it was a dead stick. Only by God's direct involvement did it bud. You were a dead stick but when you came to mercy by Christ's resurrection, you were budded. You could not bud on your own - you had to have God's direct intermediation to be budded. We are raised with Christ on the basis of His mercy and God's direct involvement. Finally there was the book of the law, the commandments which are inside. The commandments can only be a basis of mercy if they are covered by mercy. If the commandments were outside the ark, you would not be judged on the basis of mercy.

I pray you will see that you can only come to God through the mercy seat. In this Easter season, take the path to mercy.