TABERNACLE Quick Facts no.2
How many people were served by the priestly ministry of the tabernacle in the days of the wilderness wanderings? Estimates vary, but it is likely that including the women, children, and the remainder of the mixed multitude who left Egypt, the number of people encamped around the Tabernacle was somewhere between 2,500,000 and 3,000,000.
It could not be easy to move with a multitude like this. Nor would it be a simple matter to set up camp and provide access for the people to the priestly ministry. Adding the animals the Israelites brought with them from Egypt made this a huge encampment, to say the least. One author estimated that the encampment around the Tabernacle extended approximately 12 square miles.
It has further been suggested that the provisions needed to meet the needs of the people and animals were in excess of 30 boxcars of food and 300 tank cars of water per day. If the people traveled 50 abreast when the encampment moved, the procession would have stretched for 40 miles.
Any way you want to look at it, that is a lot of people, and yet everyone could bring their offerings for sin. Everyone could be availed of their need for intercession by the priests before the God of Israel. This was an ongoing daily need of the people. Obviously the priests’ profession was a busy one.
There is both a contrast and a comparison to be made here. The contrast is that unlike the days of OT Israel we no longer need to go through a human mediator to have access to God. We no longer need a human priest to intercede on our behalf. Our great High Priest is Jesus and the Bible says “For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;” I Timothy 2:5. The comparison demonstrates that both in the OT tabernacle and in this present day, God has made provision to meet the spiritual needs of all His people. We never need to worry about His sufficiency to hear our prayers, to forgive and cleanse us daily, and intercede on our behalf. Consider the scope of this great verse, “Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them. ” Hebrews 7:25
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