The striking thing about the instructions for the oil used to light the seven-branched lamp in God’s sanctuary is where the instructions occur. They do not occur in chapter 26 when we learn about the lamp. Nor do they occur later when we learn about the incense used in the tabernacle, or when the fragrant anointing oil is described. The instructions for the oil that powers the oil lamps is given to us after the instructions for the perimeter fence and before the instructions for the priestly clothing.
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When we think about the order in which the furnishings of the tabernacle are given, we find a certain motion. For example: the first thing described is the Ark of the Covenant, after which we move to the table and then the lamp. Then we get the tent itself and move on from that to the bronze altar outside the tent. Anybody who knows about the furnishings of the tabernacle will realize we haven’t had the smaller incense altar yet. That is something that goes inside the tent, and yet it is not described when every other item within the tent is. Clearly there are associations being made. This is what we need to do with the oil. We need to associate it with what surrounds it fully to understand what it means.

Once we are in the outer perimeter, which is what comes after the bronze altar and before the oil, we are in the area in which most of the priestly work was done, but not all. The priestly work also included a daily trimming of the lamps. With that daily trimming, we will eventually learn, there also came the offering of incense. But before that we have to have a priesthood.

So here is the order of events:

1. The furniture of God’s house come first: the chest, the table, and the lamp.
2. The house itself is then given.
3. Then comes the altar which consecrates what is coming from beyond God’s house and being offered to God.
4. Then the perimeter between God’s and the people’s camp is established.
5. The oil which has to do with the lamp in God’s tent is next.
6. And last in this present accounting comes the clothing of the priesthood, prior to the consecration of two related things: the bronze altar and the priesthood itself.

The oil is a way of connecting that which is continually harvested and continually brought through the camp to God’s dwelling, with the inner dwelling. It represents the best of the olive crop, the bounty, and it has a high and holy function: to shed light on the table in God’s house all night long. “The pure oil signified the gifts and graces of the Spirit, which are communicated to all believers from Christ the good olive, of whose fulness we receive (Zec. 4:11, 12), and without which our light cannot shine before men.” -Matthew Henry

Bringing the oil to its place is something only the priesthood can do, and so it is associated with them. It is something that must be constantly renewed, that comes from without and fuels the ongoing light and splendor of that place where prayers are offered up symbolically in incense by the high priest morning and evening when he trims the lamps. “This office God enjoins upon the priests, because they ought to be ministers of light when they are interpreting the Law, which David calls ‘the lamp of our feet, and the light of our paths.’” -John Calvin

The perimeter fence of the tabernacle enclosed a space that was 150 ft. by 75. It consisted of linen curtains suspended from posts which were 7 ½ ft. high and set 7 ½ ft. apart. The posts were placed in bronze bases, and the curtains were attached with silver hooks and rings. The enclosure had one entrance 30 ft. long which was designated by more decorative linen curtains. No doubt there were also cords stabilizing the posts: we learn that the pegs were made of bronze.

Bronze was the level that touched the ground. The Tabernacle was where God came to live with his people. They pitched their tents and lived their lives on the dusty floor of the wilderness. God joined them, and the place where his habitation met the camp was at the base of this perimeter tent: the bronze level.

The bronze altar was where what they brought was consecrated to God’s purposes, and the threshold of the sanctuary also was made of bronze. The threshold of the inner sanctuary, the space crossing between the holy and the holy of holies, was of silver, just as the higher fixtures of the post were. And the whole pictured an ascent, in three stages, to the place where God rested between the Cherubim.

The perimeter fence traced the outer boundary between that which was common and daily, between where God’s people lived and that which was consecrated, the space where sacrifices were made, cleansing was obtained, and God’s holy presence sanctified the lives of his people. It was a porous membrane, we could say, that allowed the people to approach God and obtain pardon and cleansing in his holy presence.

It reminded them that they must approach God on his terms, and “the majesty of holy things was shewn them in this type, in order that they might reverently approach the worship of God; and they were reminded of their own unworthiness, that they might humble themselves the more before God, and that fear might beget penitence.” - John Calvin