The burning heart of God is profoundly incarnational. Immanuel: God (is) with us. God condescends immediately following creation, walking side-by-side with his prized possession (Gen. 3:8). In the time of Moses, the Ancient Near East was obsessed with gods who ruled specific corners of creation: rivers, weather patterns, mountaintops and battlefields. The Exodus narrative speaks of a single God driving a chosen people into the most arid landscape imaginable, a place where no gods were believed to dwell.
The Exodus is not primarily the story of a people who journey from Egypt to Jericho, but of a God who against all odds proves his sovereignty by carrying and sustaining a stubborn would-be nation through absolute nothingness into promise. Poultry and flakes of bread fall from the sky, water gushes from rocks, and clothing fails to wear out. The majority of the final fifteen chapters of the book of Exodus describe in great detail the construction of the Ark of the Covenant, the Tabernacle, and the Tent of Meeting. In Exodus 25:8, God says, “And let them make me a sanctuary that I may dwell in their midst.”
Clearly, the function of this sacred space was to serve as a potent illustration, a symbolic representation of what has always been true–Immanuel. Immediately following the completion the massive Temple in Jerusalem (about 450 years after the Exodus), Solomon lifted his hands and confessed, “But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you; how much less this house that I have built!” (1 Ki. 8:27). And yet, here He is, walking with us in the garden.
The Ark of the Covenant traveled with Israel through the “great and terrible wilderness” of the Sinai, and eventually across the Jordan River. The book of Joshua has two distinct storylines. The first is read like a Mel Gibson epic: war, blood, destruction, and a series of ravaged cities left behind. But in the wake of the community of Israel’s glorious victories, a question emerges, “What does it look like to live in a community, to call this place home, to worship God in a settled place?” The Tent of Meeting (which held the Ark of the Covenant) eventually comes to reside in a place called Shiloh,
“Then the whole congregation of the people of Israel assembled at Shiloh and set up the tent of meeting there. The land lay subdued before them” (Josh. 18:1).
Joshua, likely stood here, facing the massive and uncomfortably close limestone foothills (typical of Central Ephraim), which would have served as bleachers for thousands of Israelites. The landscape creates the perfect place for a pre-electricity rock concert (or in this case, state of the union speech).
The tribes are admonished to settle the far corners of the promised land, but it seems clear that Shiloh is meant to remain meeting point, the religious center of Israel for the next 300 hundred years. The narrative of Judges moves swiftly as promised people learn quickly that conquering the entirety of the land is easier said than done, especially when one wavers so severely in their devotion to God,
And the people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the LORD and served the Baals. And they abandoned the LORD, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt. They went after other gods, from among the gods of the peoples who were around them, and bowed down to them…. (Jud. 2:11-13).
Shiloh became an afterthought, an off-the-beaten-path holy site where an ancient God was reverenced. Dust settles on the Ark at Shiloh, and the site only reemerges at the close of the book of Judges. The Benjaminites ravage an Ephraimite concubine, the other tribes are called to action, war ensues, and the Benjaminites are almost completely wiped out. Only Benjaminite men reamain. Leary of allowing an entire tribe of Israel to vanish (because it takes women to make babies too), the Israelites create a rather disturbing way of providing wives for the remaining men (see Jud. 21). The interesting thing about the story is the reemergence of Shiloh,
Behold, there is the yearly feast of the LORD at Shiloh, which is north of Bethel, on the east of highway that goes up from Bethel to Shechem, and south of Lebonah (21:19).
It boggles my mind that the route to Shiloh has to be described in such detail. I’m really good at getting lost, but not in places I frequent. It’s important to keep in mind that, as verse 16 indicates, the elders of the congregation are speaking to each other. These are folks who are supposed to continue the traditions, point people to the LORD, reminded Israel of the fact that their lives are held in the grip of the God who carried them across the Sinai.
Imagine the Pope asking directions to the Vatican, or a Orthodox Jew inquiring about how one might get to Jerusalem! Unthinkable.
The ancient walls of Shiloh
Everything has gone wrong. Shiloh is a forgotten place. The LORD’s mighty deeds have vanished from the minds of His people. Judges closes on an eerie tone that fits the forgetful hearts of the people of God, “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (Jud. 21:25).
It is clear that throughout the period of Judges, Shiloh remained the epicenter for the worship of the LORD, but the people had forgotten, embraced other idols, shinier gods, easier answers.
The saga of Shiloh is picked up in the book of 1 Samuel. Eli is the priest who ministers at the Tent of Meeting. His sons have wandered away from the LORD, and as the Philistines press into the Hill Country of Ephraim from their headquarters on the Mediterranean coast, the sons of Eli, misunderstanding the purpose of the Ark of the Covenant (likening it to an idol), march it into battle. The Philistines route the Israelites (1 Sam. 4:1-11) and take the Ark. The Psalmist laments,
Yet they tested and rebelled against the Most High God and did not keep his testimonies, but turned away and acted treacherously like their fathers; they twisted like a deceitful bow. For they provoked him to anger with their high places; they moved him to jealousy with their idols. When Hod heard, he was full of wrath, and he utterly rejected Isarel. He forsook his dwelling place at Shiloh, the tent where he dwelt among mankind. (Ps. 78:56-61)
There’s verb that lies at the heart of the Israelite predicament. The Ark is gone, what do we do now? If God’s an idol, then we have no hope. What do we worship?
The verb: remember
The psalmist begins his lament:
I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings from of old, things that we have heard and known, that our fathers have told us.We will not hide them from their children, but tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the LORD, and his might, and the wonders that he has done. (Ps 78:2-4)
Remember: The spaces where we encounter God are symbolic structures meant to point our hearts to the brevity of His incarnation.
Remember: The Spirit of God is just as thick in desert wastelands as He is in emerald landscapes.
An ancient Crusader church at Shiloh
Remember. Because in remembering the God who has carried us through so much, given us so much, and forgiven us so completely, we’re awakened to the reality that the idols we so easily embrace are worthless. We are cut from the cloth of a God whose glory cannot be contained by the expanse of existence, and yet, a God who has bent down, broken the boundary between heaven and earth, and walks with us in the cool of the garden.
May Shiloh always be remembered.
