02.26. THE ROBE OF THE EPHOD
THE ROBE OF THE EPHOD THE material of the Robe is not given.
“It was of woven work.
It was of one color—blue.
It was of one piece from top to bottom. At the top there was a hole by which the head might be slipt through, and this was bound round about in such a fashion that it could neither be torn nor rent.
“And thou shalt make the robe of the ephod all of blue. And there shall be an hole in the top of it, in the midst thereof: it shall have a binding of woven work round about the hole of it, as it were the hole of an habergeon, that it might not be rent. And beneath upon the hem of it thou shalt make pomegranates of blue, and of purple, and of scarlet round about the hem thereof; and bells of gold between them round about: A golden bell and a pomegranate, a golden bell and a pomegranate, upon the hem of the robe round about. And it shall be upon Aaron to minister: and his sound shall be heard when he goeth in unto the holy place before the Lord, and when he cometh out, that he die not.” (Exodus 28:31-35.) A robe is the symbol of position, office and character.
“My judgment was a robe.” (Job 29:14.) “Clad with zeal as a cloak (robe).” (Isaiah 59:17.) “The robe of righteousness.” (Isaiah 61:10.) As the robe was the garment of priesthood and our Lord is the Great Antitypical Priest, the robe sets forth both His office and character as such. The colors of the robe are the distinctive features of His character.
Blue is the color of Heaven. In the robe therefore you have a picture of Him as —The Heavenly Man. From Heaven He came, of Heaven He spoke, to Heaven He lifted His eyes, toward Heaven He walked, Heaven was continually in His thought and Heaven was the environment in which He lived.
He stands in contrast to Adam, the First Man, who was “out of the earth—earthy.”
He had no earthly dwelling place.
He had no earthly possessions. His riches and His store, all His treasures, were in Heaven.
“Heavenly” is the word and title befitting Him.
“Blue is the symbol of grace.”
He was the incarnation of grace.
“Thou art fairer than the children of men; grace is poured into thy lips.” (Psalms 45:2.) From these lips as from an exquisite chalice He poured forth the words that fell upon wounded hearts as the balm that” never was in Gilead.” In His first sermon at Nazareth all bore witness and wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of His mouth.
“The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.” (John 1:11) It was grace that brought Him from Heaven’s riches to Earth’s poverty; so that His grace is spoken of as:
“The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
He lived in grace and died because of His grace. His heart was moved at the sight of sorrow.
He healed the sick.
He forgave sin.
Grace and truth came by Him. Not grace alone—but grace and truth. Grace without truth is weakness.
Truth without grace is judgment. But while truth reveals and hurts, grace heals and comforts, Thus He was full and equipoised.
He had Heaven’s truth and Heaven’s grace.
Blue is the color of distance. The blue of Heaven reveals distance, distance on distance till there is no measure, there is only infinite extension.
He spoke as one who had no limiting horizon, no past that had a beginning, no future that had an ending.
He said He lived before the foundation of the world was laid; that is, in the unbegun eternities; and in those unbegun eternities He sat as a beloved Son side by side with the unseen Father, His visibility and glory.
There were times when His speech was simple and bounded by the locality in which for the moment He lived.
There were moments when His words had in them the accent of eternities and therefore unbounded. The robe as a symbol of Him is expressed in the terms of the prophet Micah: •
“Whose goings forth have been from of old—from everlasting.” (Micah 5:2.) The golden bells upon the hem of the robe sounded each time the priest walked. The sound of bells is equivalent to words. They have a meaning, a speech, a testimony. The pomegranate is perfect fruit. The pomegranate was hung between the golden bells. The golden bells are a symbol of the perfect speech of our Lord Jesus Christ.
“Never man spake like this man.” (John 7:46.)
If the bell be equivalent to words, the pomegranate as the perfect fruit in sequence of the bell gives us the perfect fruit of words. The fruit of words are deeds. In the pomegranate therefore you have the perfect deed that matched the perfect word. The people proclaimed a matchless fact in the history of humanity.
They said:
“He hath done all things well.” (Mark 7:37.) When the priest went inside the Holy Place he was invisible to the people. As he walked back and forth there was the sound of the golden bells. By the sound of those bells the people knew he was alive and acting before God on their behalf. The golden bells gave forth their sound by means of tongues. Our Lord Jesus Christ left this world two thousand years ago.
During all that time He has been out of sight. He has been invisible to His Church. He is invisible today.
Everything for us who believe in Him depends on His being alive in Heaven. How do we know He is alive; how do we know He is in Heaven?
If He is the complete Antitype, the actual fulfillment of the typical priest, then He ought to give forth a testimony from the Holy Place in Heaven, a testimony equivalent to the sounding of the golden bells upon the robe of the high priest.
He has done so.
He did it on the day of Pentecost. The disciples were gathered together in Jerusalem and waiting.
Suddenly there came from Heaven the sound of a mighty, rushing wind, tongues of fire were given to the disciples and they began to so speak that every man in the mixed multitude heard in his own tongue the wonderful works of God.
Whence came this startling manifestation? The Apostle Peter answers:
“This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses,
Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth (poured out) this which ye now see and hear.” (Acts 2:32-33.) The disciples were witnesses of His resurrection; but they could not know by eyesight that He was acting in Heaven as the high priest on their behalf.
He was invisible.
He sent forth these tongues as the tongues of the golden bells to announce that He was alive in Heaven; but, unlike the high priest on earth who was forced to stand in the holy places, who could stay only a moment, be had taken his seat on the throne of God a priest forever after the order of Melchisedec.
Pentecost was the answer to the ringing of the golden bells on the priestly robe of the ephod, a witness to the presence of a risen, glorified, immortal man in Heaven acting as our High Priest today.
It is preeminently important to lay hold of the fact that Pentecost was a witness to the Jewish nation that the Jesus of Nazareth whom they crucified, not only had risen and ascended to Heaven, but that in Heaven He was now upon the throne of God the Father and owned of Him as both Lord and Christ; as it is written:
“Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ.” (Acts 2:36.) That is to say, by the outpouring of the Spirit from the hand of the risen Christ, God the Father testified to them that He was not only their Messiah, King of the Jews, King of Israel, but the Lord God of the Old Testament, the Holy One of Israel. This manifestation of the Spirit was the begun fulfillment of the prophecy of Joel. He had prophesied that before the great and notable day of the Lord the Spirit should be poured out upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Lord should descend in glory, and deliver the city from the heel of the Gentile forever. When our Lord made this promise of the Spirit just before He ascended His disciples knowing such a manifestation was to be the precursor of the kingdom asked Him if He would at that time restore the kingdom. He did not answer them because He meant this manifestation to be a test to the, Nation. If they should turn to Him He would return from Heaven and set up the kingdom. They failed to meet the test, rejected Him risen as they had rejected Him when He walked the earth. The full detail of the prophecy of Joel was postponed, the Nation set aside and the Church brought in. Pentecost as Joel foretold it therefore is not operative in these days. (The teaching about the baptism of the Holy Ghost now and the gift of tongues is dispensationally false.) Pentecost became therefore a witness of Jewish national blindness, the parenthetic character of this Church age and the assurance to Israel that when the Church shall be translated at the secret Coming of the Lord, the Spirit will be poured out on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Lord will appear in glory and an elect remnant shall be saved.