I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Exodus 25-27.

    When I read the initial instructions God gave the people of Israel in the passage from a couple of days ago, I wondered how it would reconcile with the design given for the altar that was to go in the Tabernacle. At the time I thought I would wait until I got to the passage describing the altar for the Tabernacle. In the earlier command, God told them to make altars to Him out of earth, and if they used stones to only use uncut stones. Those instructions also contained a reiteration that they were not to make idols from silver or gold which might be worshiped in place of God. I took those instructions to mean that they should not build fancy, highly decorated altars. My recollection was that the altar design given along with the Tabernacle design was highly decorated. It turns out that my recollection was mistaken. The altar design given in today’s passage is a relatively simple, portable altar. The structural integrity of the altar is provided by wood. The wood is protected from the fire of the offerings by being encased in bronze. Overall, I realized that the design given for the Tabernacle was not as fancy and intricately decorated as my recollection of these instructions from previous readings.