Some pitch tents for pleasure,
others flinch at the thought.
For Israel, a tent was home, canvas stretched thin
against the desert night, where God said, Build me a tent,
a holy space to live among you.
Three parts to His house:
Courtyard, Tent, Most Holy Place.
Like fire in a chamber, light within light,
close to the core, only the chosen few
can stand the heat, can feel that pulse
thundering like heartbeats.
Even angels shield us from the raw of Him.
Yet, all this—tabernacles and temples,
radiance guarded, steps measured—
is because He wants to come close.
To weave His heartbeat with ours,
to know and be known, to love
and flood us with peace.
So He sets up camp in our midst,
spreads His tent where we walk.
Why like this? Why a canvas divide,
curtains closed to most of us?
It wasn’t always so.
There was Eden once, a garden unbarred,
where He walked beside us, light and shadow entwined.
And if we listen close in the night’s stillness,
we catch whispers of Eden even in Exodus,
the ache for what was lost.
The Tabernacle was never the end; it pointed beyond—
to a temple, and the temple pointed beyond,
yet even there, our hearts wandered, cluttered
with gods of stone and silver.
We longed for something more, something whole.
The Tabernacle hints at Jesus, the God-with-us,
the shelter and light that enters skin and breath.
We—flesh, spirit, sinew—are now
small, wandering temples, where God still dwells.
And together, we become a church,
walls without borders, stones alive.
And in the City to come,
there is no tent, no need of shelter or walls.
There, the Lord God Almighty, the Lamb
will be the light within light,
and we will dwell together, forever at home.
Based on a sermon by Andrew West, The Bridge Church Macquarie Park
The Afterword 
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