Cnoc-a-Phobuill

Have you ever noticed how certain churches call one room a sanctuary, and begin to make it something special, like a little nest for the divine. Now we can call it whatever we want, I do not have a problem with a name as such, what I would like to do is answer two questions;

What is Sanctuary?

Where is Sanctuary located?

So first question and some sub points

What is Sanctuary?

Turn to Genesis 1:26
²⁶Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all^[1] the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth."

Now if we had the time we could explore and see that this verse and in fact just the first part of the verse have many aspects to it, but let me just put forward one aspect. The triune Godhead created mankind with the capacity to relate to the Godhead. The divine image within man means that God can enter into a personal relationship with him, speak to him, and make covenants with him, all of which man can choose to respond to in a positive or negative form. You see man is a relational being. Hence we read in Gen 2:18 that ‘It is not good that man should be alone.’ The creation was good and ‘very good’, but mans loneliness was ‘not good’. Move on with me to Gen 3:8 and we see that the ‘Lord God was walking in the garden in the cool of the day’. There is nothing within the text that can stop us from assuming that this was a frequent event; I like to think a daily occurrence, God walking and communing with His creation.

With that in mind we may wonder, is the Father walking through the garden of our lives, wanting to speak to us, communing with us on a daily, moment by moment basis?

So the first point to make is this, man is a relational being created for communion with the Father.

Move with me to Exodus 25:8

And let them make Me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them.

Here we see the divine initiative, it is God the Father that desires to dwell with man, the creator of the whole universe, majesty on high, wants to dwell with the people He has created.

So here we have part of the answer to my opening question, ‘What is Sanctuary’, it is a place where God, through His initiative, dwells with man.

Let us continue in Exodus 25:8. The term used here for sanctuary is from the Hebrew word ‘mikdash’ which means ‘a holy place’. Here we find Yahweh is proscribing the way in which He will dwell among his people. If we look at verses 9 and 40 we see the prescribed way

According to all that I show you, that is, the pattern of the tabernacle and the pattern of all its furnishings, just so you shall make it. // And see to it that you make them according to the pattern which was shown you on the mountain.

Similar phrasing is used as in Genesis 1:26. Man is made in the ‘divine image’, just as the tabernacle is made in the ‘divine pattern’. What is significant about that you may ask, well simply this, both the sanctuary in the tabernacle and the divine image in man were created for a purpose.

What purpose? To house and hold the glory of God that it may be a visible witness to the nations and to the people around it. Can I emphasise that…To house and hold the glory of God that it may be a visible witness to the nations and to the people around it. A Visible Witness, the relational, forgiving and reconciled community will be ‘the light on the hill’. It is never about what we do, but what we are. As a side issue this enables us to see the mission of the church more clearly.

For the mission of the church, is rooted way back here in the Creation and Exodus accounts. We must guard against a reductionist gospel, seeing our mission as church planting and the saving of souls. Our mission consists in those things, proclaiming and teaching, but also in healing and liberating, in compassion for the poor and the downtrodden. The mission of the church, as the mission of Jesus, involves being sent into the world – to love, to serve, to preach, to teach, to heal, to save, to free.”

John 1:14 says

¹⁴ And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

Two quick points, firstly the greek word behind ‘dwelt’ is tabernacled, and there is a great deal of imagery, symbolism and teaching that underlies this verse, and I feel somewhat amiss to not unpack this verse here, perhaps we should endeavour to look into this ourselves in our own time. Secondly the disciples beheld His glory, they did not just hear of his glory, Jesus ministry was of course words and deeds, but his words and deeds were given power by Him being ‘full of grace and truth’, an inward witness not just external actions. Jesus was the whole deal, fully man, fully God.

So I say, with the knowledge that I have left many precious gems of wisdom unopened, that the answer to the first question, what is Sanctuary? is

A holy place where God, through His initiative, dwells with man for the purpose of showing forth His glory as a visible witness to all mankind.

Question 2, where is sanctuary? Time dictates that I be brief so all I will say is this.

There have been tabernacles and temples in the past, so let us note where sanctuary is not so as to narrow down our search.

Lamentations 2:7 says

⁷The Lord has spurned His altar, He has abandoned His sanctuary;

The southern tribe of Judah had been taken into captivity, Solomon’s temple had been destroyed.

Herod’s temple was sacked and destroyed by Emperor Titus, son of Vespasian, probably on August 5^th in the year AD70. So sanctuary is not in a stone built temple

So what I am saying is this, there is no earthly temple anymore, the sanctuary is not an earthly concept bound up in buildings that man has made, now we could see this plainly from 1 Cor 3:16-17 or 6:19 or 2 Cor 5:1, but for now let us turn to Hebrews 8

Now this is the main point of the things we are saying: We have such a High Priest, who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens, ²a Minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle which the Lord erected, and not man.

Jesus is our High Priest and our King, He is the Mediator and the Minister within the sanctuary and that sanctuary is in heaven.

Does that mean we are alone, that God does not dwell with man anymore, have we returned to Genesis 2:18 where man is alone. For we can be sure that loneliness is one of the great killers in our western world, creation in reverse. God desires relationship; the accuser binds people in guilt, shame and isolation. So does that mean we are alone, that God does not dwell with man anymore, certainly not, turn to 1 Cor 3:16

¹⁶Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? ¹⁷If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are. You are the temple of God; you are the sanctuary where God dwells.

And Paul again says in 2 Cor 6:16

¹⁶And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you^[1] are the temple of the living God. As God has said:

"I will dwell in them And walk among them. I will be their God, And they shall be My people."

Paul here quotes from Lev 26:12, Jer 32:38; Eze 37:27, the last of these quotes, Eze 37:27 says

²⁷My tabernacle also shall be with them; indeed I will be their God, and they shall be My people.

The dwelling place of God is with His people. How can this be, well by the indwelling Spirit of Christ we are adopted into the family of God and God has become our Father, Abba. So the long awaited new covenant, promised through the patriarchs and the prophets arrived when the Kingdom of God broke through into this present evil age, and in this new covenant the Spirit creates a people with a heart responsive to the Father. Corporately the people who have had their hearts changed, are the temple of the living God, the sanctuary. Our life comes only from the life-giving Spirit who dwells within us. Corporately we are the living temple of God, indwelt by His Spirit because individually we are temples of God indwelt by His Spirit.
So in summary of the two questions

What is the Sanctuary? Where is the Sanctuary located?

We can say from a brief biblical study that the sanctuary is a holy place where God, through His initiative, dwells with man for the purpose of showing forth His glory as a visible witness to all mankind, and this sanctuary is corporately each gathering of believers because each believer of the One true God, the loving, merciful, reconciling, gracious and forgiving Father is a temple of God. We can also say that the biblical record gives a sure testimony, and that testimony tells us that the Father, our Father has an age-long desire to dwell among his people. He was not content to create man alone; from the very beginning He desired to dwell with and have fellowship with man in an intimate relationship of agape love. Sanctuary is so much more than a room, or building, the Sanctuary is where God dwells with us, and where the awesome Shekinah cloud of glory, the symbol of His abiding presence resides.