Exodus 27:21

Tabernacle of the congregation. Literally, “the tent of meeting” (RSV). It was here that God met with Moses (Exodus 25:22) and that the people gathered to meet with God (Exodus 29:42; Numbers 10:3).

Before the testimony. That is, before the ark that held the “testimony,” or tables of stone containing the Ten Commandments (Exodus 31:18; 32:15, 16).

From evening to morning. Special care was to be taken that the lamps should not go out at night. Inasmuch as the charge, “It shall be a statute for ever,” does not occur often in Exodus, its use must indicate items of special importance. The “eternal light” (see Leviticus 24:2) was a perpetual reminder of Him in whom there is “no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5). Thus it should be with the church, which is ever to be “the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14). Its light should never go out (see John 3:19-21). The “eternal light” in the sanctuary represented the “true light,” “the light of men” (John 1:4–9; Desire of Ages, p. 464). It pointed also to the Holy Scriptures, which are a lamp unto our feet (Psalm 119:105; Isaiah 40:8). The olive oil is a type of the Holy Spirit, the source and means of spiritual illumination (Zechariah 4:2-6; Acts 2:1-4).

It was God’s purpose that Israel should be a light to the nations about them (Christian Education, p. 286). The “advantage” the Jews had was “chiefly” that “unto them were committed the oracles of God” (Romans 3:1, 2) — the prophetic word that foretold the coming of the living Word, the “true Light” that illumines “every man that cometh into the world” (Zechariah 4:1–4; John 1:9; Desire of Ages, p. 463).