The Second Habitation

The seed of Abraham is redeemed from Egypt and brought into the wilderness. Egypt was as the world, the polluted creation; the wilderness was as a spot outside of it and there in the midst of His people again He finds for Himself a "holy habitation" (Ex. 15:13). The tabernacle is reared to be His dwelling and He enters it.
But how did He enter it? He had of old, with evident delight, taken His creation. But now, the earth being defiled with a wilderness around Him and before Him and under Him, how does He take His place and enter His dwelling in the midst of His people? With equal delight as at the beginning, He enters the tabernacle reared in the wilderness of Sinai with His whole heart and His whole soul. The cloud abides on the outside or top of it, and the glory goes within but goes there with an expression of earnest, delighted satisfaction. Moses was not able to enter into the tent of the congregation, because the cloud abode thereon, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle (Ex. 40:35). God, as it were, would have the whole of it for Himself-at least for a season-as at creation. He enjoyed the work of His hands, and hallowed the seventh day and rested, before He shared His rest and His enjoyment with Adam.
This is full of blessing. It is an expression of the early desire of God to find a place among His creatures. If pollution separates Him from the earth in its common, general condition, it cannot separate Him from this purpose of His heart. He will purify a people that He may still dwell among His creatures. He will give them His Sabbaths, sanctify them as He did the seventh day and dwell in the midst of them as in the Garden of Eden.