God's Footstool, Christ's Throne Text: Exodus 25:10-22
Introduction: Heaven Touching Earth
We now come to the heart of the tabernacle, which is itself the heart of Israel's camp. After the grand deliverance of the exodus and the thunderous giving of the law at Sinai, God now provides instructions for how He, a holy God, will dwell in the midst of a sinful people. This is the central question of all Scripture. How can a holy God live with unholy men without consuming them? The answer is covenant, sacrifice, and a designated place where heaven and earth meet. That place, for a time, was the tabernacle.
The modern mind, when it reads passages like this, tends to glaze over. We see measurements, materials, and strange furniture, and we think it is little more than an ancient inventory list. But this is a catastrophic misreading. Every detail here is dripping with theological significance. This is not just interior decorating for a desert tent; this is a blueprint of the cosmos. It is a scale model of Heaven. It is a tangible gospel, a pre-incarnate whisper of the Word who would one day tabernacle among us.
The book of Exodus has three major movements: deliverance, law, and tabernacle. God saves His people, He gives them His standard, and then He moves in to live with them. This is grace upon grace. He doesn't just save them from Egypt; He saves them for Himself. The tabernacle is the visible manifestation of God's presence with His people. And the very first piece of furniture described, the piece that will occupy the Holy of Holies, the very center of the divine presence, is the Ark of the Testimony. This is the foundation stone. Everything else in the tabernacle is oriented toward this one object. To understand the Ark is to understand how God relates to man under the old covenant, and to see a glorious, sharp-edged shadow of how He relates to us now in Christ.
So, we must read this not as interior decorators, but as theologians. We must see that God is teaching His people, and us, about His own nature, His justice, His mercy, and the coming glory of His Son. This is not a dead artifact in a museum; it is a living oracle pointing to the ultimate reality, Jesus Christ.
The Text
"And they shall make an ark of acacia wood two and a half cubits long, and one and a half cubits wide, and one and a half cubits high. You shall overlay it with pure gold, inside and out you shall overlay it, and you shall make a gold molding around it. You shall cast four gold rings for it and fasten them on its four feet, and two rings shall be on one side of it and two rings on the other side of it. You shall make poles of acacia wood and overlay them with gold. You shall put the poles into the rings on the sides of the ark, to carry the ark with them. The poles shall remain in the rings of the ark; they shall not be removed from it. You shall put into the ark the testimony which I shall give you. You shall make a mercy seat of pure gold, two and a half cubits long and one and a half cubits wide. You shall make two cherubim of gold; make them of hammered work at the two ends of the mercy seat. Make one cherub at one end and one cherub at the other end; from one piece you shall make the mercy seat with the cherubim at its two ends. The cherubim shall have their wings spread upward, covering the mercy seat with their wings, with their faces toward one another; the faces of the cherubim are to be toward the mercy seat. You shall put the mercy seat on top of the ark, and in the ark you shall put the testimony which I will give to you. There I will meet with you; and from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim which are upon the ark of the testimony, I will speak to you about all which I will command you for the sons of Israel."
(Exodus 25:10-22 LSB)
The Box of God's Law (vv. 10-16)
The instructions begin with the construction of the ark itself.
"And they shall make an ark of acacia wood... You shall overlay it with pure gold, inside and out... You shall put into the ark the testimony which I shall give you." (Exodus 25:10-11, 16)
The ark is a chest, a box. Its construction materials are significant. It is made of acacia wood, a common, durable wood from the wilderness. This represents humanity, the created order. But this wood is completely overlaid, inside and out, with pure gold. Gold in Scripture consistently represents divinity, purity, and glory. Here we have a perfect picture of the God-man, Jesus Christ. He is fully human (acacia wood) and fully divine (pure gold), the two natures joined in one person, yet without mixture or confusion. The humanity is not eradicated by the divinity, nor is the divinity diminished by the humanity. It is overlaid, inside and out. His deity permeates His humanity.
This box is designed to be portable. It has rings and poles for carrying. God is on the move with His people. He is not a static, localized deity like the gods of the pagans. He is the sovereign Lord who leads His people through the wilderness. And notice, the poles are to remain in the rings permanently. This signifies that Israel must always be ready to follow God's lead. The presence of God is not to be taken for granted or treated as a stationary good luck charm. When the cloud moves, you move. Hophni and Phinehas later forgot this, treating the ark like a mascot, and paid for it with their lives.
And what goes inside this glorious box? "The testimony which I shall give you." This refers to the stone tablets of the Ten Commandments, the written law of God. This is why it is called the "Ark of the Testimony." It is a container for the covenant law. The law is the foundation of God's relationship with His people. It is His standard of perfect righteousness. The very heart of the tabernacle, the center of God's dwelling place, contains His unbending, holy law. This immediately establishes a problem. God is dwelling in their midst, and at the center of His presence is the very standard that condemns them all as sinners. How can this be good news? It is like living with your own death warrant locked in a golden box in the center of your house.
The Place of Atonement (vv. 17-21)
The solution to the problem of the law is found in the lid that goes on top of the box.
"You shall make a mercy seat of pure gold... You shall make two cherubim of gold... The cherubim shall have their wings spread upward, covering the mercy seat with their wings, with their faces toward one another; the faces of the cherubim are to be toward the mercy seat." (Exodus 25:17-20 LSB)
This lid is called the "mercy seat," or in Hebrew, the kapporeth. This word is from the root kaphar, which means "to cover" or "to atone." This is not just a lid; it is the place of atonement. It is made of solid, pure gold, with no wood. This points to the sheer divinity of the act of mercy. Man can provide the box, but only God can provide the atonement.
At either end of this mercy seat are two cherubim, hammered from the same piece of gold. These are angelic beings, guardians of God's holiness. Cherubim were posted at the entrance to Eden to guard the way to the tree of life after the fall. Here, they are guarding the holiness of God's law. Their wings are spread upward, but their faces are looking down, toward the mercy seat. What are they looking at? They are looking at the place where the blood will be sprinkled on the Day of Atonement (Leviticus 16). Once a year, the high priest would enter the Holy of Holies and sprinkle the blood of a sacrifice on this mercy seat. The cherubim, representing the host of heaven, are fixated on this act of substitutionary atonement.
The mercy seat is placed directly on top of the ark. Think about the arrangement. You have the law of God inside the box, crying out for justice and condemnation. But on top of the box, covering the law, you have the mercy seat, the place of atonement. The blood on the mercy seat covers the law. God, looking down from His throne, does not see the accusing law; He sees the blood of the substitute. His justice is satisfied not by ignoring the law, but by fulfilling its penalty through the shed blood. This is propitiation. The wrath of God which the law demands is absorbed by the sacrifice.
The Meeting Place (v. 22)
The result of this atonement is communion. God can now meet and speak with His people.
"There I will meet with you; and from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim which are upon the ark of the testimony, I will speak to you..." (Exodus 25:22 LSB)
The ark is sometimes called God's footstool (1 Chron. 28:2). His throne is in heaven, but His presence comes to rest here, on the mercy seat, between the cherubim. This is the designated meeting place. God does not meet with man on the basis of man's goodness or his attempts to keep the law. He meets with man on the basis of a blood-bought atonement. He speaks from above the mercy seat. The word of God comes to us from the place of grace, the place where sin has been covered.
Without the mercy seat, the ark is just a box of condemnation. Without the blood, God's presence would be a consuming fire. But with the mercy seat, sprinkled with the blood of the covenant, the throne of judgment becomes a throne of grace. The place of terror becomes the place of fellowship. God can meet with man because His justice has been satisfied by the sacrifice. This is the gospel in gold and acacia wood.
Christ, Our Ark and Mercy Seat
As with all things in the tabernacle, this points us directly to the Lord Jesus Christ. The writer to the Hebrews tells us that the tabernacle was a copy and shadow of the heavenly things (Hebrews 8:5). Jesus is the reality to which the shadow pointed.
Jesus is the true Ark of the Covenant. He is the perfect union of humanity and divinity (acacia and gold). He perfectly kept the law of God; the testimony was not just in Him, it was His very character. He is the embodiment of God's righteous standard.
But more than that, He is our mercy seat. The Apostle Paul uses the very Greek word for mercy seat (hilasterion) in Romans to describe Jesus. "whom God put forward as a propitiation (a mercy seat) by his blood, to be received by faith" (Romans 3:25). Jesus is not just the box that holds the law; He is the blood-sprinkled lid that satisfies the law.
On the cross, the justice of God, symbolized by the law in the ark, was meted out upon Jesus. The wrath of God was poured out. And the blood of Jesus, the perfect sacrifice, covered our sin. God's law is not set aside; it is fulfilled. His justice is not compromised; it is satisfied. The cherubim of heaven look down upon the cross of Christ with the same intense gaze, seeing the ultimate act of atonement.
Because of this, we can now meet with God. We don't need a high priest to go into a holy place for us once a year. The veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom when Christ died. We now have bold access to the throne of grace, which is the true mercy seat. Hebrews tells us to "draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need" (Hebrews 4:16).
The throne of God is no longer a place of judgment for those who are in Christ, because the judgment fell on Him. It is now a place where we meet with our Father. It is where He speaks to us. The entire system of the tabernacle, with its glorious and fearsome center, was a magnificent object lesson pointing to this reality. God dwells with His people, not because we are good, but because He is gracious, and He has provided the perfect sacrifice, the perfect mercy seat, in His Son, Jesus Christ. He is the place where justice and mercy kiss.