Gifted and Skilled

Gifted and Skilled

Exodus 30: ³⁴ And the Lord said to Moses: “Take sweet spices, stacte and onycha and galbanum, and pure frankincense with these sweet spices; there shall be equal amounts of each. ³⁵ You shall make of these an incense, a compound according to the art of the perfumer, salted, pure, and holy. ³⁶ And you shall beat some of it very fine, and put some of it before the Testimony in the tabernacle of meeting where I will meet with you. It shall be most holy to you. ³⁷ But as for the incense which you shall make, you shall not make any for yourselves, according to its composition. It shall be to you holy for the Lord. ³⁸ Whoever makes any like it, to smell it, he shall be cut off from his people.”

 

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GOD gave Moses strict instruction on how to make the incense.

 

My Observations:

• GOD gave certain people gifts and skills to make perfume.
• GOD wanted a smell sensory experience for the priest.
• GOD also wanted the smell sensory experience for the skilled worker and the surrounding people.

 

Anyone near the tabernacle would be able to smell the incense when it was burning. This mixture was sacred to GOD and was to be used as a reminder of the atonement of sins. We forget GOD easily. That is what free will is. GOD used the sense of smell as a reminder to focus on HIS grace and mercy for just a moment.

 

If someone tried to make the mixture for a casual purpose, that person was supposed to lose the protection that GOD provided. They would not die, but their choice would leave them on their own, away from GOD. Everyone had to be warned about this. GOD prepared everyone for HIS presence.

 

Challenge

• Why does GOD remind Moses about the specific instructions to make the incense?
• Has GOD ever given you very specific instructions to further HIS relationship with you?
• Have you reflected on the great lengths GOD has taken to be with you?