Punishment Turned into Praise
I have a confession. I really find it hard reading Exodus 36-39. It has always been such drudgery to me. In Exodus 35 Moses tells Israel what God commanded concerning the construction of the Tabernacle. He goes into great detail. Almost as bad as an L.M. Montgomery book. Then for the next 4 chapters they repeat these details ad nauseam. So I wondered about the redundancy of this section. Why would God want it recorded? I believe that the phrase used at the end of each task gives us a clue: they did everything just as the Lord had commanded Moses. This continuing theme seems to show that God wanted a record of their obedience, especially following their failure to obey in chapter 32. God's anger had not completely subsided with Israel when Moses received his instructions. This detailed statement of the work that Israel did in preparing the Tabernacle of God was important for future generations to see. Following one of their greatest failures, they did everything the Lor...