Presentable

Today’s Bible Reading: EXODUS 37:1-39:31

Exodus 38:8

He made the laver of bronze and its base of bronze, from the bronze mirrors of the serving women who assembled at the door of the Tabernacle of meeting.

We have things in our life that we deem necessary. We find these items essential for our existence. The children of Israel were no different. The women who had been bound in slavery were now free. Things that were unattainable were now accessible. Items of luxury were now standards for living.

One such item was their bronze mirrors. In captivity mirrors were an unaffordable extravagance. It is very unlikely that anyone possessed one. But now they had them. They most likely attained the mirrors when the Egyptians lavished upon them tremendous treasures during their Exodus from Egypt. With them they could gaze at their fairness and gawk at their flaws. It was their mirrors that God used to make the bronze laver.

Mirrors reflect our image. They reveal our beauty and our blemishes. They help us to complement our features and correct our faults. They aid in our adornment and fixing our flaws. They display our true image and enable us to improve on our imperfections. They help make us presentable in public.

The Israelites fashioned the wash basin in the tabernacle from bronze mirrors. The bronze laver was positioned between the altar and tent of meeting where God dwelled. (Ex 30:18). The tabernacle had no floor. The wilderness sands were its foundation. As such, the priest’s hands and feet would become soiled throughout their day. God’s Holiness demanded that those who served Him were clean before Him. The purpose of the Laver was to allow them to regularly remove anything that disqualified them from serving the Lord. The water from the Laver would remove any defilement from their hands and feet so that they would be cleansed to continue serving the Lord. Failure to do so meant certain death (Ex 30:21).

The bronze mirrors would help the ministering women be presentable in public by declaring their beauty and divulging their blemishes. Similarly, the Laver fashioned from their mirrors declared the beauty of the Lord and detailed the blemishes of the Lord’s servants. At the Laver His Holiness was magnified and their unholiness was made known. They were purified and made presentable to serve the Lord by washing their hands and feet at the Laver.

The Laver is a picture of the eternal cleansing from sin that we receive when we come to Christ. His blood is the agent that cleanses us from iniquity. We are washed in His blood. It is also a picture of the daily cleansing that we need from the defilements of the world. The Word of God is the agent that cleanses us from the contamination that comes upon us. We become soiled saints, dirtied by our own depravity and that of those around us. As the priest routinely returned to the Laver to be cleansed so we need to regularly read God’s word to be cleansed. His Word reveals His beauty and our blemishes. As our sin is exposed, we entreat Him to cleanse us and restore us. He does. Thus, we are purified and made presentable to serve Him through the cleansing of our Savoir and the Scriptures.

Today rejoice that the blood of Jesus cleanses us from sin. Thank Him for the Scriptures that exposes our sin and daily enables us to be cleansed from sin. Thank God that the women who gazed at themselves in their mirrors turned their gaze upon the Lord and found Him to be of more value than their mirrors. May you find Him so valuable.