Do you often feel distant from God? Or maybe that you need to do more – perhaps spend more time reading your Bible or praying, or even be a better person – in order to gain continual access to His presence? Do you feel condemned when you fail at these things? Then what follows may be incredibly freeing for you.
There was a unique time in the Old Testament where open and free access to the presence of God existed. This was during the reign of King David. He brought the Ark of the Covenant, which was the specific place God said His presence would dwell, to Jerusalem, and set it up in a tent on Mt Zion. This is called the Tabernacle of David.
Up until that time, the Ark had been hidden away where no-one but the High Priest had access, and then only once a year. The tribe of Levi were set apart by God and assigned to look after the Ark and the holy things of God. They had to wear certain robes, go through certain washings, present certain sacrifices before the Lord in certain ways. But the rest of the people could only be “distant worshippers.”
This system, or the Levitical order, prevailed from the time of Moses, right through into the New Testament.
David’s amazing revelation
When David set up the Ark in a tent (or tabernacle) in Jerusalem, scripture records that he went into the tent and “sat before the Lord” – in other words, he sat down by the Ark of the Covenant (2 Samuel 7:18; 1 Chronicles 17:18).
Yet David was of the tribe of Judah. According to the Levitical order, only those of the tribe of Levi were allowed in the tabernacle. So how could someone of the tribe of Judah have this access and be able to sit before the Ark like David did?
The key is that David had an amazing revelation of a priestly order that was far greater than the Levitical order – the order of Melchizedek. In fact he wrote about it in Psalm 110. And this priestly order gave him free access to God’s presence at any time!
To put all the pieces of the puzzle together we have to go back to Abraham and his meeting with the King-Priest Melchizedek in Genesis 14 – and the explanation of this King-Priest in Hebrews 7. We’ll look further into this in the next couple of posts.
Levi verses Melchizedek
The thing is that the difference between these two priestly orders, Levi and Melchizedek, also impacts us today.
Under the Levitical order, the Levites had to follow certain regulations and stipulations in order to come anywhere near God’s presence. If we feel we have to “do” certain things to gain access to God, and feel condemned or shut out from God when we don’t do these things, then we have actually put ourselves under the Levitical order. We’ve distanced ourselves from God by putting the “doing” of certain things between ourselves and God.
The order of Melchizedek is completely different. We can just come. It’s a matter of simply walking in. That’s because Jesus is the High Priest under the order of Melchizedek (Psalm 110:4; Hebrews 7:11-17), and He has made the way completely open.
Gaining our own revelation
Our biggest problem is that we often feel we are not worthy, or that we have to earn the right to come before God. But that’s “Levitical order” thinking.
The truth is that we aren’t worthy – but that Jesus IS worthy. And we can never earn the right to come before God by ourselves – but Jesus HAS freely given us that right through His death, resurrection and ascension. And He is our High Priest.
As believers and followers of Jesus, we have joined ourselves to His priesthood and His priestly order, which is the order of Melchizedek – not the order of Levi. And David showed us one of the benefits of this priesthood when he boldly entered the tent and sat down by the Ark of God’s presence.
If you feel that you may have some “Levitical” thinking that needs to be changed, why not take time to read through Hebrews 7 and 8 today. Ask God to reveal the fullness of access that you have to His throne. But be prepared to let go of some old ways of thinking too. Your relationship with God will never be the same.
