The Sea and the Water Carts in God’s Temple (1 Kings 7:23–39)

First Kings chapter 7. We want to pick up the reading at verse 23.

You will recall that Solomon called to Jerusalem to help in the construction of the temple a very gifted artisan from the city of Tyre whose name was Hiram. He was apparently an expert in metal craft and in the construction of metal objects. He was, you recall, the son of a Gentile father but a Jewish mother. So it was ideal for a man like this to work in the temple which was designed not only for Israel but also for Gentile peoples.

In the section that we’re going to read today we’re going to find, first of all in verses 23 to 26, that he builds what is called in the text the sea. But what this was was a gigantic basin. We might almost call it a reservoir. Some writers do call it a reservoir that contained a huge amount of water.

Then in verses 27 through 39 we’re going to read about what can be called ten water carts. These were carts each of which had a basin in their center and which carried water. They were mobile carts as we shall see.

So just to give you an idea of what’s coming in the description here, we have that huge bowl called the sea and we have ten carts. Let’s read the text.

Then he made the sea of bronze, ten cubits from one brim to the other; it was completely round. Its height was five cubits, and a line of thirty cubits measured its circumference. Below its brim were ornamental buds and it was cast in two rows all around. The buds were cast in two rows when it was cast. It stood on twelve oxen: three looking toward the north, three looking toward the west, three looking toward the south, and three looking toward the east. The sea was set upon them, and all their back parts pointed inward. It was a handbreadth thick; and its brim was shaped like the brim of a cup, like a lily blossom. It contained two thousand baths.

He also made ten carts of bronze. Four cubits was the length of each cart, four cubits its width, and three cubits its height. And this was the design of the carts: they had panels, and the panels were between frames. On the panels that were between the frames were lions, oxen, and cherubim; and on the frames was a pedestal on top. Below the lions and oxen were wreaths of plaited work. Every cart had four bronze wheels and axles of bronze. Its four feet had supports under the laver; the supports were cast bronze, each beside each. Its opening inside the crown at the top was one cubit in diameter, and the opening was round, shaped like a pedestal, one and a half cubits in outside diameter. And also on the opening were engravings, but the panels were square, not round. Under the panels were the four wheels, and the axles of the wheels were joined to the cart. The height of a wheel was one and a half cubits.

The workmanship of the wheels was like the workmanship of a chariot wheel: their axle pins, their rims, their spokes, and their hubs were all of cast bronze. And there were four supports at the four corners of each cart; its supports were part of the cart itself. On the top of the cart, at the height of half a cubit, it was perfectly round. And on the top of the cart, its flanges and its panels were of the same casting. On the plates of its flanges and on its panels he engraved cherubim, lions, and palm trees, wherever there was a clear space on each, with wreaths all around. After this manner he made the ten carts. All of them were of the same mold, one measure, and one shape.

Then he made ten lavers of bronze. Each laver contained forty baths, and each laver was four cubits. On each of the ten carts was a laver. And he put five carts on the right side of the house, and five on the left side of the house. He set the sea on the right side of the house toward the southeast.

This is not to be confused with taking a bath in another day and another bath, but that was a measurement of liquid content. So two thousand baths. In fact we might say pints or gallons, that sort of thing.

Now the next section deals with the carts.

You may recall that when the Lord Jesus Christ engaged in that famous conversation with the Samaritan woman at a well outside of the Samaritan city of Sychar, that during the course of the conversation she tried to change the subject on him a little bit. And she said to Jesus, “Our fathers worshiped on this mountain.” She might even have waved her hand in the direction of Mount Gerizim where the Samaritans had their temple. But she said, “You say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship.”

Now that was a potential opening for a religious argument: Samaria or Jerusalem, Gerizim or Mount Zion. Our Lord’s response to that was interesting. He said, “You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews.” Salvation is of the Jews.

Even though all of us who are seated at this table are aware of that fact, it may be that we have not thought of it very long or very seriously. Salvation is of the Jews. The Jewish nation was the nation that God set apart for His own purposes and through whom the salvation of the world was to be made possible. And even though there’s not a Jew sitting around the table today and even though a great majority of Jews do not even believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, the fact remains that the role of this nation was to bear the weight, so to speak, of the revelation of God by which men might be saved.

It seems to me that that truth is one of the things that is represented in the passage that we read just a few minutes ago. You will notice that in this passage there is a very large bowl, if you can call it a bowl at this size, called the sea. As I said, we can call it a reservoir. It was fifteen feet across from one brim to the other and it was seven and a half feet deep. That’s a fairly good depth. Its circumference going around the edge here was forty-five feet. It contained two thousand baths of water which computes out to something like eleven thousand five hundred gallons of water. There was a lot of water in this reservoir.

Now you will notice that this huge reservoir containing this very large amount of water stood on the back of twelve oxen. Did you notice that? And almost everybody recognizes the twelve oxen undoubtedly reflect the twelve tribes of Israel. You will notice however that the oxen are pointed in all directions. Three of the oxen faced north, three of the oxen faced east, three of the oxen faced south, and three of the oxen faced west. And on top of them is this huge, huge reservoir of water.

It seems to me that one of the things that is represented by the reservoir sitting on the back of the oxen is the truth that we have just stated: that the nation of Israel is serving as being the support for the divine revelation through which man can come to a knowledge of God and can come to an experience of salvation.

And both the river and the basin speak of cleansing, as we know. In the Jewish temple and in the Jewish tabernacle water was used to cleanse all sorts of things. And one of the things we should remind ourselves of is that when you and I trusted the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior we got a bath. Remember what we read in Titus: “not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, by the washing of regeneration.” We might translate it as a bath of rebirth.

Remember also that we read in Ephesians 5 that Christ loved the church and gave Himself for it that He might sanctify and cleanse it by the washing of water by the word. So whether we think of ourselves individually or that we think of ourselves collectively as the church, I’m talking about the whole universal church, we’ve all had a bath. That dirty old self of ours that existed the moment before we trusted Christ was bathed and reborn and cleaned and justified.

So here is this huge laver representing the tremendous capacity that God has to cleanse human beings. And notice the oxen are pointed in all directions. He can cleanse people to the north, He can cleanse people to the south, to the east, to the west. And God expected and hoped that men would come from all corners of the world in order to worship here at the Jewish temple, in order to come to a knowledge of His provision for cleansing and salvation.

So first of all I would say that this huge laver with its water sitting on the back of the oxen represented the enormous capacity that God had to cleanse mankind and to enable them to approach Him and worship Him.

That brings us to the water carts. And let me tell you right now that the section that describes the carts is kind of hard. If you were trying to understand it as we read through it you may have had some problems. I don’t blame you if you did. This is a difficult passage. The difficulty is because the Hebrew of the passage is difficult. The reason for that is apparently there are a lot of architectural terms used in this passage with which we are not familiar today so that we don’t know the meaning of them exactly. It’s hard for us to pick up the picture that the writer was trying to describe even though in his own day, in fact I’m sure this was crystal clear.

I don’t claim to know everything about these carts. I should tell you before I try to explain in general what they look like that it occurred to me that this was a golden opportunity to revive my attention for object lessons. And I haven’t given an object lesson. Next I think I gave an impromptu one one day when I was using salt, pepper, and cups, but that doesn’t count. This is a pre-planned object lesson like I used to give to the kids.

So first of all we start with this part of the object. I hate to tell you that this box contained a free ashtray. And with every two-pack purchase I want to know... I did not purchase two packs of cigarettes. A guy that is very friendly with me at a gas station gave it to me as a gift. He didn’t know I didn’t smoke and I didn’t disabuse him of the notion that I would smoke them. And so I said, “What in the world am I going to use that gift for?” And I laid aside the ashtray and I’m at least using the box in which it came.

Now this is supposed to represent the general form of these water carts. There’s one thing that this has going for it: it’s about as long as it is wide so it’s almost a square. And what we find out in the text here is that these carts were approximately six feet long and six feet wide. They were squares. However the height was not quite six feet. It was probably somewhere between four and a half to five feet, something like that. And so this is not too good an object but you’ve got to think of this as being deeper than this. Can you give me that much slack in the object here? This is square, just about square. It’s supposed to be deeper than it is.

And apparently these bronze carts had frames. And we would expect the frames to be in the places where these pieces are obviously, but that would be poles in the sides, right? I worked hard to get those holes in there. And into the holes in the sides were placed panels. A panel in here, a panel in here, a panel in here, and a panel in here. The panel all the way around. I don’t know whether these panels were bronze. It doesn’t seem that we’re told. Or they might have been of wood. And on my object the panels had designs on them. They had lions and they had oxen and they had cherubim and they had some kind of hammered work at the top both above the lions and oxen and cherubim and some kind of hammered work at the bottom. They’re called wreaths here but that may not be exactly wreaths.

So we had the thing paneled on four sides. Then of course it had wheels. These were mobile carts and the wheels had resemblance to chariot wheels. It says that as to the sockets and the rims and the hubs and everything that goes with wheels. So the idea was that the cart could be moved.

Now the original position of these carts before I continue with the description: the original position of these carts, five of them were lined up along one side of the sanctuary building, five of them were lined up along the other side of the sanctuary building. But obviously they could be moved to any part of the temple court on their wheels where they were needed.

Okay, now we get to the hard part. And this is what I make out of this, folks. There was what is called in our text a crown. It happens to be a word that is used for the top part of a pillar like the pillars we studied last time, Jachin and Boaz. And as far as I can tell it was either a square or a rectangle like my diamond... well I kind of think it was square so let’s imagine that it was square. And this thing, I understand we paneled it on four sides, right? But the top is open, right? This thing sat down in here like that.

Now there’s a description of some supports that apparently came up from the bottom up from each side of this cart and kind of supported the thing in there. So really it kind of sat like that. But since I couldn’t develop the supports I’m gonna have to let it sit down. And now it apparently stuck up above the top of this cart by about a cubit, maybe one and a half, something like that. And then there were some panels. And what I make out of this is that these panels were on top and these panels had flanges on them which means handles. So I don’t know whether there were two or four but it was somewhere. For the purposes of the object lesson I don’t have to make two of them.

So these panels went on top here like that. You with me? And notice that they kind of stick out over the edge. This is where you grab the cart I suppose. Whoever was moving it, this bigger cart with this much water on it probably had more than one person trying to move it. This was not a one-man cart. So anyway apparently there were panels on top of it surrounding this crown as it’s called in our text. And on these panels they were also designs and this time there were lions and oxen and palm trees.

Now as near as I can tell folks this crown that we’ve stuck in the middle here was square and it had its own designs around here. But if you looked at it inside here like that you would have found it was circular. The reason for that was this is actually the laver, the water drawer that was put here. So tenuous. I couldn’t do all this. I’m doing as well as I can. So obviously I didn’t make something in there that was round but I’m picturing the round inside there and I’m putting it down here. It’s supported by those supports that I told you. It’s got the panels on it like that. And then the laver each cart had a laver and the laver sat down in there and the laver held water. And the amount of water that it held was apparently close to two hundred and thirty gallons of water for each water cart. A lot of water, a lot of water.

Now are you with me on the water cart here? And I said what in the world were all this for? Well we’re not told here but in the book of Chronicles we are told that the sea, that big big laver, was for the priests to wash in according to the commandments established in the tabernacle. When a priest went on duty the first thing he did was to go to the laver of the tabernacle and wash his hands and his feet.

And then the Chronicles tells us that the water carts were to wash the burnt offerings which the priests offered up in the temple court. Because if you will read the first chapter of Leviticus it was required that the priests when they offered a burnt offering, and by the way a burnt offering was given entirely to God, nothing was left that the priest could eat, when they offered up the burnt offering then the priests had to wash the innards of the animal and its limbs and so on.

Now try to imagine this. Okay we’ve got a big temple court here and at the time that Solomon dedicated the temple there were thousands of animals for sacrifice all over the court. The whole court was to hold all the sacrifices so he sanctified the whole temple court and apparently they slaughtered the sacrifices all over the temple court. And if these happen to be burnt offerings then the priests over here needed some water to wash the innards and the limbs and the priests over here needed some water to do the same. Priests over there needed some more to do the same. So they pushed the carts all over the temple court and undoubtedly they had smaller vessels on top here from which they could get used to draw water out of the larger vessel. You’re not going to lift up a 230 gallon laver and pour it on anything.

So what did the priests do? They used these carts to draw the water from the lavers and they washed the sacrifices that they offered to God.

Let me draw a very simple lesson from this and wrap it up that way. Notice two things: the priests had to be clean and the sacrifices that they offered had to be clean. I repeat that: the priests had to be clean and the sacrifices which they offered had to be clean to be acceptable to God.

Now as we sit around here according to 1 Peter chapter 2 we are all priests. This is a church that doesn’t believe that any small group of men are priests. Lewis is not a priest. I am not a priest when I preach this morning. But we all are priests. We all have access to God and we all can come near to God.

Now in the Jewish temple of course the priests had limits on how far they could go. They could go into the building but they had to stop at the veil. They had to stop before the holy place because there was a big curtain there. And even the Jewish high priest could go in only once a year with blood. The epistle of Hebrews tells us that we are to have boldness for entering into the holy place, that is through the veil which is His flesh, Christ’s flesh. And then we are to draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our bodies washed with pure water and our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience.

When we come here folks like this we should be conscious of getting directly into the presence of God. There’s no curtain between us and God. We can come directly to God as believer-priests. But how should we come? Clean. That means that before we come to this table or before we participate in the elements of this table we should ask God to cleanse us from any sin that we may have. We should come here and be sure that as far as our conscience is concerned we have asked God for forgiveness for our sins and we are clean in His sight.

Just as the priest went into the temple having washed his hands and his feet, he didn’t need a bath again. He got that when he was consecrated as a priest. So every time we come here I hope we all do this. I hope we all are conscious that we don’t just sit down here with that vague thought about whether I’m clean in the sight of God. We sit down here with the thought, “I want to be clean in the sight of God. If there’s anything that I need to confess then Lord I confess it.”

So the priest has to be clean. But so do our sacrifices have to be clean. It’s surprising how easily a sacrifice can be defiled. Have you ever thought of it? I’m praying at the Lord’s table and I want to impress everybody by how well I can pray. I’ve defiled my sacrifice. I’m trying to show off to people. When I sing I’ve heard people pray prayers when they gave an exposition of Scripture that I think God was listening to. I’m not sure they really cared. I think they prayed for people’s ears. We need to remember that when we come to God we are sincerely grateful to God. We’re not just going through the motions.

We can defile the offerings that we make by just going through a motion that is too formal for us rather than as a sincere and honest expression of gratitude. Remember that the New Testament teaches us that as far as physical food is concerned we can eat everything. For all things are good and nothing is to be rejected, it says, because it is sanctified by the word of God with prayer. So when I bow down over a meal and pray and know that God has said that’s all right for me to eat, then I have sanctified the food. In the same way it seems to me that our prayers and our praises at this meeting have to be sanctified by prayer. They have to be pure and holy prayers. They have to be sanctified by the word of God. They have to conform to the word of God. We need to be sure that our worship of God is the kind of worship He wants.

Remember again coming back to the woman at the well, Jesus said, “God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth.” What does that mean? It means that our worship to God has to be according to this book. It has to be according to the word of God and it has to come from the heart. That’s what God wants.

So the question we can always ask ourselves when we sit down at this table is: Am I as a priest clean? Have I washed my hands and feet? And are the praises that I’m offering to God at this meeting in my heart, even if I don’t pray out loud, are the praises that I’m opening my heart with clean in God’s sight? Are they genuine, sincere, and in accordance with the word of God?

Lots of people and lots of churches go through the motions of worship and God isn’t interested in just going through the motions. He is interested in reality.

I close with three verses of a song that I have always liked. I’ve been in group singing this song ever since I was growing up in Chambersburg and I’m sure I’ve sung it quite a few times out at Believers Bible Chapel. It’s a song that in these circles is sung particularly at the Lord’s table. It captures the essence of what we’re doing at the Lord’s table in terms of worship. Let me just share it with you a little bit.

Because, Lord Jesus, we seek Thy face, within the veil we bow the knee. Oh let Thy glory fill the place and bless us while we wait on Thee.

Notice how the song right after the idea we’re coming to You inside the veil, we want Your glory to be seen there. Somewhere else it says, “Shut in with Thee, far, far above the restless world that wars below, we seek to know Thy truth, Thy love, Thy wisdom and Thy grace to show.”

So here he says we’re cut off from the world. Now that we’re up there with You we want to know about Your love and Your grace.

We thank Thee for the precious blood that purged our sins and brought us nigh, all cleansed and sanctified to God, Thy holy name to magnify.

That’s a really great verse. “We thank Thee for the precious blood that purged our sins and brought us nigh, all cleansed and sanctified to God, Thy holy name to magnify.”

I hope that something of this spirit will grip us perhaps even more than it has in the days ahead. That we are really in the very presence of God in the Holy of Holies with Him. We are there by the virtue of His shed blood. We should be there clean and we should want to glorify Him. We should want to see His glory. We should want to make Him feel the reality of our presence. That’s what the water carts and the reservoir are all about.

Okay, let’s have any comments or questions that you might have.