There is "much ado" these days about legal citizenship in my Earth country, the United States of America. At the beginning of my life, the requirements for entering this country were quite strict. People who were not natural-born citizens of the USA, yet who sought legal citizenship, had to go through a lengthy, difficult process. It was ingrained in the process that the legal immigrant would assimilate him-or-herself into the culture, laws and moral fabric that distinguished this nation for its first 150 years. Over the past 75 years, or so, that process has severely eroded, bringing about much civil unrest in this formerly gleaming nation.
Google defines "citizenship" as follows: "the position or status of being a citizen of a particular country".1 To have dual citizenship, then, means that a person possesses citizenship in two countries. Now, generally speaking, since a person can only be in one place at any given time, the person resides most of the time in one of those two countries, perhaps visiting the other country on occasion. In most cases, the person had one citizenship conferred at birth, but went on later to earn a second citizenship from a different country.
In some cases, the two countries involved have many similarities. The citizens of each may speak the same language. The forms of government may be similar. In other cases, the similarities may be few. Often, people of Earth escape from one country of citizenship to seek asylum/refuge in another. They do this because of persecution, famine or other adverse living conditions in the "home country".
All living Christians have dual citizenship. Their first "country" is planet Earth; their second, and more true, citizenship is in a "country" they have yet to visit: Heaven. Although Christians possess citizenship in Heaven, they walk by faith to embrace it while dwelling physically in a realm that walks by sight. Heaven is a place the Christian eagerly anticipates, even longs for, because he/she believes what the Bible declares about it.
The other day I was reading a blog by a college classmate of mine who has for decades taught Bible in a Christian school. He was describing the most precious and wonderful moment of his teaching career. The lesson was about Heaven and that most splendid moment was the one where, without prompt, his students got so psyched about their heavenly country they began to cheer boisterously. You'll be blessed to read about it later.2
The writer of Hebrews uses the concept of "sanctuary" to illustrate the Christian's dual citizenship. He does this because God did it first. Warren Wiersbe did a masterful job of describing these beautiful parallels; so, be advised I will be borrowing heavily from his commentary in my meditations here and in posts to follow on this topic.2
The heavenly sanctuary, aka the throne room of God, and the various meeting places of the Hebrew people are two powerful evidences of the Christian's dual citizenship. When God gave the "specs" for creating the earthly places of worship, He mimicked his own heavenly sanctuary. Let's look at some of those specs today, and we'll continue with our investigation of these "buildings" tomorrow, lest I get too long-winded here.
1. Inferiority vs. Superiority
The old covenant "sanctuaries" were (as has been mentioned in this blog) first a series of fancy, portable tents (Tabernacles), and then later Temple buildings in the city of Jerusalem. When the Hebrews were nomadic and for a time after they settled into the Promised Land, a Tabernacle was erected by the Levitical priests (or under their direction). See Exodus 35-40. Years later, King Solomon was approved by God to direct the construction of the first Temple in Jerusalem, according to plans God gave to his father, King David. That Temple was destroyed when Babylon conquered the Hebrew people around 586 B.C. Nehemiah, Ezra and their contemporaries began to rebuild that structure around 515 B.C., and it stood until the time of the Herods, when that structure was significantly remodeled, greatly enhancing its splendor. This grandiose temple stood for less than 100 years, because it was razed when the Romans destroyed Jerusalem in 70 A.D.
Ok, history lesson over. The point is that these structures were inferior because, although they were copies of God's heavenly sanctuary, they were made by humans (Heb. 8:2, 9:11). At times, the glory of God filled the earthly structures. But, He did not make them His permanent residence. These physical structures were limited by time and space, neither of which limits our limitless God.
Still.....type. Here is a graphic of the major components of the earthly Tabernacle and Temple:3
The earthly structures were "types", representations of the heavenly. We are told this in Hebrews 8:5 and 9:23-24. Each of the furnishings in the picture above was specified by God, and imbued with its own special meanings. The heavenly temple is clearly referred to several times in the book of Revelation. For instance, in Revelation 8:3, we see the golden altar of incense and also God's throne. In Revelation 11:19, the apostle John refers to God's ark of the covenant within His heavenly temple. I won't digress and go into more of these Revelation ... er, revelations, at this point.
We'll examine the various components of the sanctuaries in the next post.
Sources:
1 https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=define:+citizenship
2 https://zockollkids.wordpress.com/2017/02/02/probably-my-favorite-memory-in-the-ministry/
3 http://www.jesuswalk.com/moses/images/tabernacle-flow-of-worship-2293x1251x300.jpg
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