Tailgators are not mythical creatures. Nor are they a pregame parking-lot party.  Tailgators are coworkers, or perhaps strangers, who follow you through access restricted doorways without presenting a code, badge, or retina.  Under the pretense of expediency, efficiency, and even courtesy, tailgators pass undetected and unauthenticated through restricted entries.

Tailgating is the number one entry point for hackers.   We think of hackers as sinister teenaged eastern-European computer geniuses.  In our imagination they operate from a babushka’s basement and wear only black hoodies. But the truth is much more mundane.  Often security breaches begin with a tailgator, passing through a secure door on the coattails of another’s politeness.  Southerners are particularly vulnerable to the tailgator’s nefarious pretense.  We love to hold the door.  After gaining physical access, the hacker finds an empty cube and a helpful administrative assistant and poses as ‘the new guy’ who needs network access.

Companies spend millions on network, data, and physical security to prevent unauthorized access but often fail to eliminate the threat posed by an artful insurgent.  Such is the hazard of a free society.   Though with the proliferation of AI and facial recognition defense against such artful insurgency is improving.   Yet no human system of access control is fool-proof.   The only fail-safe access control ever constructed was the system of access God built for his covenant people.

The Exodus, and indeed the larger story of redemption, was never a story of deliverance out of oppression.   It is a story of deliverance into an abiding relationship with a Holy God.   God told Moses to tell Pharaoh, “Let my people go that they may worship me.”   This was no ruse or pretense.  God’s purpose all along was that they would know Him, serve Him, dwell with Him, love Him, glorify Him and enjoy Him. 

The biggest barrier to this plan was never Pharaoh’s hard heart, but the deceitful hearts of God’s people.  Sin is a completely effective barrier.  It forms an impenetrable access restriction to a holy God.  And our presumptuous, pagan attempts to gain access through moral or ritual works will never open the door to our return.   As Jesus noted, “with man this is impossible.”

But Jesus also said, “But with God all things are possible.”   God makes covenant with Israel at the foot of Sinai.  The terms of this covenant are outlined in the moral, civil, and ceremonial law.  The demands are overwhelming.  Yet the people respond, “all that the Lord has spoken we will do.”  Their promise far outstripped their power to obey.   In a few short days, they would shatter every command and craft a golden calf.   And Moses would shatter the tablets containing God’s promises.  

If the covenant depended on perfect obedience, their access would be forever denied.   But even before they built that calf, God gave Moses plans for something better to build.  A tent of meeting where God would dwell among them and provide access through the means He appointed and accomplished.   And to illustrate this, God begins the blueprints for the Tabernacle with instructions regarding the Ark of the Covenant.  

First things first.  God did not command the tent then plan its furnishings.   The focus of the Tabernacle was not its covering, but the Ark which provided a covering for something else – man’s sin.   The ark was the key to man’s access to God.   The ark was the authenticator that gave man the access to God that no good deeds, ritual, or incantation could possibly grant.

The ark was, however, a picture of the gospel.  An illustration of what was to come.  It presents the clearest explanation of Christ’s work anywhere in the Old Testament.   In the ark we see man’s condition, his need, and God’s gracious provision.  God’s law placed within it, God’s presence enthroned above it and at the point of intersection the atonement cover where unholy men are given access to a holy God.  Ultimately the New Testament tells that Jesus is the mercy seat, the one who makes atonement. 

In Romans Paul writes, “God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith.” (Romans 3:25)  The word for “sacrifice of atonement” is literally the Greek word used to describe the atonement covering the Ark of the Covenant.  And again, in Romans 5:1, Paul writes, “Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand.”

Tailgating is frowned upon where you work.   Everyone’s access depends upon their own credibility.  But with God, access is never granted because of our credibility.  The only way for us to enter is to follow Christ through the door.   The badge of his perfect and final sacrifice is the only credential that can get us through that door.   As one theologian noted, the Tabernacle has numerous doors, but they all say ‘keep out.’   Yet God designed perfect access to his presence through our great high priest and a day of atonement.   The author of Hebrews captured it perfectly.

Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin. Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. 

Hebrews 4:14-16.

Join us this week as we examine Exodus 25:9-22 and consider God’s instructions to Moses regarding the Ark of the Covenant and unpack its promises for us.   We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship.  Get directions here or contact us for more info.  Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP or YouTube.