Exodus 31 — Filled With the Spirit for the Work

Today’s Passage: Exodus 31

For six chapters now the LORD has been dictating the plans of His dwelling to Moses on the mountain, gold and cloth and almond blossom, cubit by cubit, and a reader might well have begun to wonder who on earth could ever build a thing so intricate and so holy. This chapter answers that question, and the answer is one of the most surprising in all of Scripture. God does not merely command the tabernacle to be built; He names the man who will build it and He fills that man with His own Spirit to do it. Bezalel, a craftsman of the tribe of Judah, becomes the first person in the whole Bible of whom it is written that he was filled with the Spirit of God, and the astonishing thing is what that fullness is for. It is for skill in gold and stone and wood, for artistry and design, so that the hands that shaped the beauty of God’s house were hands the Spirit Himself had gifted. Then, as the long instructions draw to their close, God turns from the work to a matter of rest, and gives His people the Sabbath as a lasting sign between Himself and them, a weekly rest rooted in creation, that they might know Him as the LORD who makes them holy. And at the very end, the speaking on the mountain finished, He hands Moses the two tablets of the covenant, stone inscribed by the finger of God. Skill to build, rest to mark them as His own, and His own law written by His own hand: this is how the mountain time ends.

As you read, hold this: The same God who fills His workers with His Spirit to build His house also gives His people rest as the sign that He, and not they, is the One who makes them holy.

Exodus 31:1-5 (BSB)

¹ Then the LORD said to Moses, ² “See, I have called by name Bezalel son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah. ³ And I have filled him with the Spirit of God, with skill, ability, and knowledge in all kinds of craftsmanship, ⁴ to design artistic works in gold, silver, and bronze, ⁵ to cut gemstones for settings, and to carve wood, so that he may be a master of every craft.

Notice how personally God speaks. See, He says, I have called by name Bezalel, and He traces the man’s line back through his father and his grandfather, of the tribe of Judah. God does not summon a nameless workforce; He knows His workman by name, by family, by tribe, and He has chosen this particular man for this particular work. There is a great comfort hidden in that, that the God who fills the heavens should stoop to call a single craftsman by name and set him to the task He has prepared for him.

And then comes the sentence to linger over, the first of its kind in all the Bible: I have filled him with the Spirit of God (רוּחַ) ruach, pronounced ROO-akh. Strong's H7307, wind, breath, spirit. We have met these two words together once before, at the very beginning, when the Spirit of God hovered over the face of the waters and the world was made. That is what makes this verse so striking. The next time Scripture says a man is filled with the Spirit of God, it is Bezalel, and the same Spirit who brooded over creation now fills a craftsman to make beautiful the dwelling place of God. Between those two scenes lies a whole theology of the Spirit and the work of human hands. . Search back through every page before this one and you will not find these words written of anyone. The first man said to be filled with the Spirit of God is not a prophet crying in the wilderness or a warrior going out to battle, but an artist, and the fullness is spelled out for us at once, with skill, ability, and knowledge in all kinds of craftsmanship. The Spirit gifts him to design artistic works in gold and silver and bronze, to cut gemstones and set them, to carve wood, until he is a master of every craft. Do not pass over how much this dignifies the work of skilled and beautiful things. When a craftsman labors with real skill to make something excellent for the glory of God, he is doing what Bezalel did, exercising a gift the Spirit of God delights to give. The beauty of the LORD’s house came from hands the Spirit Himself had filled.

Weigh what it means that the first Spirit-filling in the Bible is for skilled work. It tells us that God counts the gift to make excellent and beautiful things a gift of His own Spirit, not a lesser thing than prophecy but a holy thing in its own right, given for the building of His house. It tells us, too, that no good work for God is done in mere human strength. Bezalel had learned his craft, no doubt, over long years, and yet the finished skill is credited here to the Spirit of God who filled him. So it has always been in the house of God. The ability to do the work, whatever the work may be, is a gift poured in from above, and the glory returns to the Giver. When the Spirit later comes in fullness upon the church at Pentecost, and gifts of every kind are distributed for the building up of God’s people, this old verse about a craftsman on a mountain is already teaching us the pattern: God fills His servants with His Spirit to do the work He has called them by name to do.

Exodus 31:6-11 (BSB)

⁶ Moreover, I have selected Oholiab son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan, as his assistant. I have also given skill to all the craftsmen, that they may fashion all that I have commanded you: ⁷ the Tent of Meeting, the ark of the Testimony and the mercy seat upon it, and all the other furnishings of the tent— ⁸ the table with its utensils, the pure gold lampstand with all its utensils, the altar of incense, ⁹ the altar of burnt offering with all its utensils, and the basin with its stand— ¹⁰ as well as the woven garments, both the holy garments for Aaron the priest and the garments for his sons to serve as priests, ¹¹ in addition to the anointing oil and fragrant incense for the Holy Place. They are to make them according to all that I have commanded you.”

Bezalel is gifted, but he is not left to carry the whole work alone, and there is wisdom in that for every labor done in the house of God. The LORD appoints Oholiab of the tribe of Dan to stand at his side, and then says something we must not hurry past: I have also given skill to all the craftsmen. A whole company of able workers is gathered, and to every one of them God has given the skill for his part, so that the tabernacle would rise not from one pair of gifted hands but from many, each man filled for the task before him. Notice, too, how God has chosen from more than one tribe, Bezalel from Judah and Oholiab from Dan, joining the strong and the humble together in the same holy work. The building of God’s dwelling was never meant to be the achievement of a single genius, but the shared labor of a people God had gifted for it.

Then the LORD lays out the whole scope of what these gifted hands are to make, and it is a fitting summary of everything the last chapters have described, running through the sanctuary piece by piece. The Tent of Meeting itself, and within it the ark of the Testimony with the mercy seat upon it, the table and the pure gold lampstand and the altar of incense, then out in the courtyard the altar of burnt offering and the basin with its stand, and beyond the furniture the holy garments woven for Aaron and his sons, and the anointing oil and the fragrant incense for the Holy Place. Every last thing is named, and every last thing is to be made according to all that I have commanded you. The gifted craftsmen are not free to improve upon the plan or to add their own flourishes where they please. Their skill, however great, is to serve God’s design and not to displace it, and in that submission of their art to His command their work becomes holy.

Exodus 31:12-15 (BSB)

¹² And the LORD said to Moses, ¹³ “Tell the Israelites, ‘Surely you must keep My Sabbaths, for this will be a sign between Me and you for the generations to come, so that you may know that I am the LORD who sanctifies you. ¹⁴ Keep the Sabbath, for it is holy to you. Anyone who profanes it must surely be put to death. Whoever does any work on that day must be cut off from among his people. ¹⁵ For six days work may be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of complete rest, holy to the LORD. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day must surely be put to death.

Now the subject changes, and the change is full of meaning. Having spoken at length of all the work to be done, the LORD turns at once to speak of rest, as if to guard His people from the very danger their new labor might bring. Surely you must keep My Sabbaths, He says, and He gives the reason plainly: this will be a sign between Me and you for the generations to come, so that you may know that I am the LORD who sanctifies you. There is the heart of it. The weekly rest was to be a sign, a visible mark upon the life of Israel that set them apart from every nation around them and declared whose they were. And what the sign was meant to teach them is the sweetest word in the passage, that it is the LORD who sanctifies them, the LORD who makes them holy. A people constantly at work might slowly come to believe that their standing before God rested on what their hands could produce. The Sabbath broke that lie once every seven days. When they laid down their tools and rested, they confessed that their holiness was God’s gift and not their achievement.

We must not soften the severity that follows, for the weight of it tells us how seriously God took this sign. To profane the Sabbath, to treat this holy day as common and to work through it as though God’s claim upon their time meant nothing, was a capital matter under the covenant, a breaking of the sign itself. Anyone who despised it was to be cut off from the people. Feel the seriousness before you rush to soften it. To trample the Sabbath was not merely to skip a rest; it was to deny the very thing the day proclaimed, that they belonged to the LORD who had set them apart. The seventh day was a Sabbath of complete rest, holy to the LORD, and to guard it was to guard the truth that God, and not their own toil, had made them His.

Exodus 31:16-17 (BSB)

¹⁶ The Israelites must keep the Sabbath, celebrating it as a permanent covenant for the generations to come. ¹⁷ It is a sign between Me and the Israelites forever; for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, but on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.’”

Twice more the LORD presses the same word, that the Sabbath is to be kept as a permanent covenant for the generations to come, a sign (אוֹת) ot, pronounced OHT. Strong's H226, a sign, mark, token. It is the same word used of the rainbow God set in the clouds as the sign of His covenant with Noah, and of the blood on the doorposts that marked the homes of Israel on the night of the Passover. Here the Sabbath is that kind of thing, a sign between God and His people, a mark upon their week that spoke of their belonging to Him. A sign is meant to be read, and this one, returning every seventh day, was to be read by Israel and by the watching nations alike, a plain and public token that this people kept covenant with the living God. between Him and His people forever. This was no passing arrangement for one wilderness generation, but a lasting mark to be handed down from parents to children as long as the covenant endured. And then, in the last line, God roots the whole thing in something older than Israel, older than the exodus, as old as the world itself: for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, but on the seventh day He rested. The weekly Sabbath was not a new invention at Sinai; it was woven into the very fabric of creation, when God finished His work and rested on the seventh day. So when Israel rested, they were falling into step with the rhythm the Maker had set in the beginning, keeping time with the God who made all things.

And notice what the sign was appointed to teach, for God tells us in His own words, so that you may know that I am the LORD who sanctifies you. The Sabbath was not chiefly about the ceasing from labor; it was about the truth that ceasing declared. Every seventh day, laying down their work, the people confessed that their holiness came from God’s hand and not from their own striving. That is a lesson the heart is always in danger of forgetting, in every age, that we are made holy by the LORD who sets us apart, and not by the sum of what we accomplish for Him. The rest itself was the sermon. To keep the sign was to remember, week upon week, that the God who made them was also the God who made them holy.

Exodus 31:18 (BSB)

¹⁸ When the LORD had finished speaking with Moses on Mount Sinai, He gave him the two tablets of the Testimony, tablets of stone inscribed by the finger of God.

And so the long time on the mountain comes to its close, and it closes with a gift laid into Moses’ hands. When the LORD had finished speaking, He gave him the two tablets of the Testimony, the two stones on which the covenant law was written. Do not miss the phrase that the Bible dwells upon: inscribed by the finger of God. These were not tablets Moses had carved and lettered himself and carried up for approval. The words on them were written by God’s own hand, His own finger tracing the commandments into the stone, so that what Moses now carried down was the very speech of God made permanent and sure. There could be no higher authority behind the law of Israel than this, that God Himself had written it.

There is something solemn and hopeful in the picture, a man descending a mountain with the words of God in stone held against him. And yet a shadow lies across it too, for we who know the story know what waited at the foot of the mountain while these very tablets were being given. The covenant written by the finger of God was about to meet a people already breaking it, and the tablets would soon lie shattered on the ground. But that is for the next chapter to tell. For now let the wonder stand on its own, that the God who filled a craftsman with His Spirit and gave His people a sign of rest also stooped to write His own law with His own finger, and to place it, complete, into the hands of His servant. The mountain time ends not with man’s word to God, but with God’s word to man, in stone.