Week 45, Day 4: The tabernacle is completed

Today’s Reading:  Exodus 38:1-31

Some thoughts from the reading..

I am impressed by how much gold, silver, and bronze was required in order to complete the tabernacle.  We are told the amounts of each that were used to complete the construction.  What I am going to do is attempt to put these measurements in terms that we can relate to.  The shekel is said to be equal to “about a day’s wages” according to my Zondervan Bible dictionary.  There is not complete certainty about how much a shekel or a talent would be equal to in our weight system but I will use the estimates given by Zondervan.  Given that a talent is equal to 60 lbs and one talent equals 3,000 shekels, here is how the the amounts break down. 

The gold used:    29 talents = 1,740 lbs,    730 shekels = 14.6 lbs.

The silver used:  100 talents = 6,000 lbs,    1,775 shekels = 35.5 lbs

The bronze used:  70 talents = 4,200 lbs,    2,400 shekels = 48 lbs

It is impressive to me to think about how much of these metals were used to make the tabernacle.  I also am impressed to think about the job the Levites had when it came time to move all of these things.  The weight of everything must have been immense.  This was no small project that was completed here.

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