Exodus 36: The Building Begins

The moment the building actually starts can feel messy, slow, and honestly a little overwhelming, and that’s exactly why Exodus 36 hits so close to home. We’re watching God take the tabernacle from detailed instructions to real-world construction, using Bezalel, Oholiab, and other Spirit-gifted craftsmen to turn raw materials into a place of worship and God’s presence. Along the way, something surprising happens: the people give so much that Moses has to send out a message telling everyone to stop bringing offerings. 

We walk through the story with practical Bible study clarity, then zoom out to the bigger takeaway for Christian discipleship and spiritual formation. God doesn’t just build something beautiful; He builds something strong enough to last and light enough to move. That’s the point of all those curtains, clasps, frames, acacia wood, and careful measurements. The tabernacle is built to endure the journey, and that becomes a mirror for what God is doing in us over time. 

If you’ve ever felt like your life is a pile of unfinished parts, this chapter brings hope. God can melt down what needs reshaping, strengthen what needs endurance, and keep you flexible enough to go where He leads. Our job is not to understand every step, but to follow the pattern in God’s Word and stay in it while He finishes the work He started. 

If this encouraged you, subscribe for the daily chapter breakdowns, share the episode with a friend who needs steady hope, and leave a five-star review so more people can find the podcast.

Transcript

Welcome And Daily Bible Breakdown

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Hey everyone and welcome to the Bible Breakdown Podcast. In this podcast, we will be breaking down the Bible one chapter a day. Whether you are a new believer or have been following Christ for a while, we believe that you will learn something new and fresh every single day. So thank you for joining us and let's get into breaking down the Bible together.

SPEAKER_00 0:23

Well, hello everybody. Welcome back to the Bible Breakdown Podcast with your host, Pastor Brandon. Today, Exodus chapter 36, and today's title is The Building Begins. The Building Begins. We are going to see all of this culminating in God telling Moses all about the tabernacle, what it needs to look like. It's everything down to the inch. And now it's finally going to begin. So get your Bibles, get your popcorn, get your coffee.

How To Support And Connect

SPEAKER_00 0:50

It's going to be fun. Make sure you also take just a moment to like, share, subscribe to the YouTube channel, and to the podcast. Make sure you leave us a five-star review on the podcast. It really does help. And make sure you're going to the Bible Breakdown discussion on Facebook. There's an amazing team of people doing devotions there every single day. And you can get links to all of that at the Biblebreakdown.com because the more we dig, the more we find. And I do want to say this real quick before we do anything else. Thank you so much to everybody who is continually sharing this podcast and YouTube channel with others. I cannot tell you how proud I am to be able to hear people who say, I've been a Christian for years, but I never really had anybody to walk with me through the Bible. And now I do. And that is just a testament to all of us that as we are reading God's word, as God changes our lives, we then want to reach out and send it to somebody else. And so thank you so much for providing me the opportunity as the honor of my life to walk with the Bible with you. And I still, from the very beginning, we've been doing this for a while now. I still think of myself as your friendly neighborhood Bible tour guide because I love it. I love that you love it. And truly, the more we dig, the more we find. So that being said, let's jump into Exodus chapter 36. If you

Setting The Scene For Exodus 36

SPEAKER_00 1:59

remember where we are in the story now, we've been through a lot together in the book of Exodus. And we are getting ready to get to the end of this book, but not to the end of the story. But where we are now, God has been telling them what to do and how to go about building the temple, or excuse me, tabernacle, and they're about to get started. And so we're going to read this as they get started, and then we're going to see what God's Word will say to us today. So

The Gifts Overflow For The Sanctuary

SPEAKER_00 2:21

if you're ready, Exodus chapter 36, verse 1 says this The Lord has gifted Bazileel and Aholeab and the other skilled craftsmen with wisdom and ability to perform any task involved in building the sanctuary. Let them construct and furnace the tabernacle, just as the Lord has commanded. So Moses summoned Bazileel and Aholiab and all the other workers who were specially gifted by the Lord and were eager to get to work. Moses gave them the materials donated by the people of Israel as sacred offerings for the completion of the sanctuary. But the people continued to bring additional gifts each morning. Finally, the craftsmen who were working on the sanctuary left their work. They went to Moses and they replied, The people have given more than enough materials to complete the job the Lord has commanded us to do. So Moses gave the command to this message, and this message was sent throughout the camp. Men and women, don't prepare any more gifts for the sanctuary. We have enough. So the people stopped bringing their sacred offerings. Their contributions were more than enough to complete the whole project. Pause. So you see how they have gone from just being, as the Bible calls, a stiff-necked stubborn people to now they are so excited to see the work of God that they are overdoing it. So it's just the way the Israelites are, man, it's either not enough or too much. But hey, you know what? They're trying until finally God says, okay, as enough. So here we go, verse 8. The

Curtains, Frames, And Careful Craftsmanship

SPEAKER_00 3:48

skilled craftsmen made ten curtains of finely woven linen for the tabernacle. Then Basilel decorated the curtains with blue, purple, and scarlet thread with skillfully embroidered cherubim. All ten curtains were exactly the same size, 42 feet long and six feet wide. Five of these curtains were joined together to make one long curtain, and the other five were joined to make a second long curtain. They had fifty loops of bright of blue yarn and put them along the edge of the last curtain in each set. The fifty loops along the edge of one curtain matched the fifty loops along the edge of the other curtain. Then he made fifty gold clasps and fastened the long curtains together with the clasps. In this way, the tabernacle was made of one continuous piece. He made eleven curtains with goat hair cloth to serve as a tent covering for the tabernacle. These eleven curtains were all exactly the same size, 45 feet long and six feet wide. Basilel joined five of these curtains together to make one long curtain, and the other six were joined to make a second long curtain. They had 50 loops for the edge of each large curtain. He also made fifty bronze clasps to fasten a long curtain together. In this way, the tin coverings was made of one continuous piece. He completed the tin coverings with a layer of tanned ram skin and a layer of fine goat skin leather. For the framework of the tabernacle, Basilel constructed frames of acacia wood, and each frame was 15 feet high and 27 inches wide. With two pegs on each frame, all the frames were identical. Then he made these frames to support the curtains on the south side of the tabernacle. He also made 40 silver bases, two bases under each frame, with the pegs fitting securely into the bases. For the north side of the tabernacle, he made another 20 frames, with their forty silver bases, two bases under each frame. He made six frames for the rear and the west side of the tabernacle, along with two additional frames to reinforce the rear corners of the tabernacle. These corner frames were matched at the bottom and firmly attached at the top with a ring, forming a single corner unit. Both of these corner units were made the same way. So there were eight frames at the rear of the tabernacle set in 16 silver bases, two bases under each frame. Then he made crossbars of acacia wood to link the frames, five crossbars for the north side of the tabernacle, and five for the south side. He also made five crossbars for the rear of the tabernacle, which faced west. He made the middle crossbar to attach halfway up the frames. It ran all around one end of the tabernacle to the other. He laid the frames with gold and made gold rings to hold the crossbars. He then overlaid the crossbars with gold as well. For inside the tabernacle, Basalel made a special curtain of finely woven linen. He decorated it with blue, purple, and scarlet thread with skillfully embroidered cherubim. For the curtain he made four posts of acacia wood and four gold hooks. He overlaid the posts with gold and set them in four silver bases. Then he made another curtain for the entrance of the sacred tent, and he made it of finely woven linen, and embroidered it with exquisite designs using blue, purple, and scarlet thread. The curtain was hung with gold hooks attached to five posts. The posts with their decorated tops and hooks were overlaid with gold, and five bases were cast in bronze.

God Forms Us For Strength And Movement

SPEAKER_00 7:34

Okay, so what in the world did we just read? What we just read was is God has been putting together all of these different places and things and gifts that people have made. Well, now he is taking these raw components, this gold, this silver, this wood timber, and all this stuff, and he is slowly making it into a house of worship. And it's one small piece at a time. And I love how the Bible says that the people were so eager to be part of what God was doing that eventually they had to tell them to stop. Like, thank you, but you have done too much. You know, now there's so much stuff here, we can't actually get any work done, right? So let us do our work. And slowly but surely, because you got to think, this wasn't just necessarily, you know, like a piece of gold ready. This would have been like earrings and and different other things where they'd have to melt them down and prepare them. So it would probably take just as long to prepare the material as it was to then build the material. And what God is doing is, is he is building it through, you know, basil and and all these other ones, that it is both strong enough to be used for years and years and years, but yet lightweight enough to be carried from place to place. And we're going to continue this over the next few days, but you know what I love about that is that it's exactly what God does in our lives. When we come to God, we come to God with all these raw components, all these different things in our life. And many times the things that God wants to do in our life, they're not fully formed. They're a piece of this over here and a piece of that over there. And what God will do is he will slowly begin to mold and to shape us into what he wants us to be. But at the same time, God is not making a museum or a monument out of us. He is making us so that we are strong enough to deal with any test that comes along, but yet movable enough so that he can still move us from place to place as he sees fit. Our job is to stay in it. Our job is to not give up. Can you imagine when Basilel first started this? The Bible said that he was eager to get going and all this, but what a huge undertaking. This had never existed before. He wasn't doing this and saying, well, we built 10 of these already, so let's just go with it. No, he had a list of instructions that God had given Moses, and then he had to figure it out along the way. His job was to follow the instructions and not give up. And as he did that, God was going to gift him to make it what God wanted it to be. And that's what God asked us to do. He says, I have a big idea for you. I want to make you and I want to mold you into a place where I can dwell. But I'm going to have to make and I'm going to have to mold you. I'm going to make you strong enough so that you can survive any difficulty, but I'm going to make you movable enough so that I can move you where I want you to be. Your job is to follow the pattern. Our pattern is found in God's word. So here's my question for you. Are you staying in it while God is continuing to shape and to mold you? Maybe he's having to, you know, to use a metaphor, melt something down so that he can reform it for his service. Maybe he's building you up in another area. Maybe he's trying to strengthen you by letting you go through things you wouldn't want to go through, but they're not there to destroy you. They are there to strengthen you. Maybe he's trying to move you and mold you and you're resisting along the way. It's okay to be human. You just can't give up on what God is doing. I want to tell you, the Bible says we can be certain that he who began a good work within us, he who started the construction in us, will continue that work until it is finally finished on the day when Jesus Christ returns. Can I tell you? God is making something out of you. And even if we don't always understand, it's like we were reading through this and we hear a number over here and a thing over there, and it doesn't always make sense. Just because it doesn't make sense to us, doesn't mean it doesn't make sense to God. Our job is to not always understand why. Our job is just to stay in it and allow God to make us into something beautiful for

Prayer To Keep Following The Pattern

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His service. Let's pray together right now. God, thank you so much for today. Thank you, God, that you are with us and you're for us. And Lord, just like you used Basilel and all these other craftsmen to make your house, Lord, I know that you are making us your house of worship to come dwell within us. I pray that you'll help us to continue to follow the pattern you set for us in your word, because your pattern leads to freedom. We celebrate you right now. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

Freedom Promise And Tomorrow’s Chapter

SPEAKER_00 11:54

Amen. Well, God's word says in Exodus 6, verse 6, it seemed like it was so long ago when we first read this. He says, I will free you from your oppression and I will rescue you from slavery. I'm so thankful to serve a God of freedom. I love you. I'll see you tomorrow for Exodus chapter 37.