Whether our path leads in just one direction or forks into many possibilities, we can be sure that the God who told exactly how many rings must fasten each curtain is the very same God who will dispense the wisdom we need to discern whether it’s best to stay or return, to accept or decline, to press on or turn back. No matter where God leads, we can have the highest assurance that through it all he is making us more like Christ and bringing glory to his name. For the Lord is our sun and shield and he bestows to his beloved nothing but favor and honor.

Before the tabernacle was assembled upon the plains, Moses received a vision of it upon the mountain. Before he directed the first weaving, the first stitching, the first forging, he had been given a detailed image of the completed whole. God led him in a comprehensive walkthrough and delivered to him a thorough set of instructions.

It’s for this reason that there are chapters in the book of Exodus that run in parallel. In chapter 26 God provides instruction: “You shall make the tabernacle with ten curtains of fine twined linen and blue and purple and scarlet yarns; you shall make them with cherubim skillfully worked into them.” Ten chapters later we read this description: ”All the craftsmen among the workmen made the tabernacle with ten curtains. They were made of fine twined linen and blue and purple and scarlet yarns, with cherubim skillfully worked.” Again, “You shall make fifty clasps of gold, and couple the curtains one to the other with the clasps, so that the tabernacle may be a single whole.” And so, a short time later, “he made fifty clasps of gold, and coupled the curtains one to the other with clasps. So the tabernacle was a single whole.”

Thus it went from the tabernacle to the altar to the table to the lampstand to the Ark of the Covenant. Moses had received clear and exhaustive instructions from God and to be obedient he simply had to do exactly as he had been directed. God’s will was clear and it fell to Moses to execute it.

We may wish that God provided this kind of direction today. Especially when we come to life’s trials and difficulties, its questions and uncertainties, we may wish that God would describe what it means to be obedient from start to finish, from beginning to end. We may wish that he would give us a vision of the whole before we set out and that he would give us a thorough set of directions before we take the first step. We learn quickly, though, that this is not God’s way.

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