Ever since the founding of the ancient nation of Israel in the time of Moses, to which the Christian church can trace its spiritual and biblical roots, the people of God (YHVH Elohim) have been constructing magnificent buildings in which to worship their Creator. We now refer these buildings as churches. This is not a bad thing for a number of reasons, the least of which goes back to YHVH’s original plan. Did he not “plant” the first humans in a paradise called the Garden of Eden where they could walk and talk with him in an idyllic setting? How is a church different than this, except it has walls and a roof, which is a propitious concept especially when it is cold and raining outside!
What is more, and few Christians realize this, one of the first things that YHVH instructed the children of Israel to do after exodusing Egypt was to build the Tabernacle of Moses—a portable church building where they could gather, praise and worship him, and learn about his ways in a multi-dimensional and sensorial, experiential way. Not only that, YHVH told them that he would dwell among his people in this glorified tent.
And let them make Me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them. According to all that I show you, that is, the pattern of the tabernacle and the pattern of all its furnishings, just so you shall make it. (Exod 25:8–9)
This tabernacle took a year to build and employed highly skilled craftsman and artisans who used copious amounts of precious metals, exotic woods and specially died animal skins and colorful tapestries in its construction. The Book of Exodus contains chapter after chapter of detailed instructions that YHVH gave to Moses pertaining to this construction project.
A few hundred years later after coming into the Promised Land, YHVH instructed his people to construct him a more permanent house in which he might dwell among his people. By then, after hundreds of years, the Tabernacle of Moses tent had worn out, and a more solid and permanent structure was needed for the nation, which had greatly expanded in population and territory. This building was called Solomon’s Temple. It contained 100,000 talents of gold and one million talents of silver (1 Chron 22:14). If a talent is equivalent to 75 pounds, then that is 750,000 pounds or 3750 tons of gold or 46,875 ounces of gold. If gold is $2,500 an ounce that comes to more than $30 billion that went into the temple! That was only the value of the gold. Add one million talents of silver at $30 per ounce and that is another $5 billion. This does not include the bronze, wood, stones or other construction materials or the cost of labor to build the temple. The world has never seen any building like this before or since. YHVH Elohim is worthy of the very best!
To this day, YHVH’s people—both Jews and Christians—have been constructing amazing houses of worship. No cost has been spared, the construction efforts have been monumental, amazing methods and machinery invented, engineering feats accomplished, the world’s top artists, craftsmen and musicians enlisted and, at times, construction has continued for decades, hundreds of years and even up to one thousand years as is the case with the Chester Cathedral in England. To this day, in Barcelona, Spain, the Basílica de la Sagrada Familia, is still being constructed having been started in 1882. When completed it will be one of the largest churches on earth boasting the world’s tallest tower at 565.9 feet tall. Presently, it is Spain’s top tourist attraction with 4,707,367 visiting it in 2023 including yours truly. Monumental and costly efforts to build houses of worship for the God of the Bible go on to this very day.
As a frequent world traveler, I’ve had the privilege of visiting Catholic and Protestant basilicas, cathedrals, churches and chapels on five continents in nearly 40 countries over the past forty five years. As a Bible expert who also has a broad knowledge of Western religious and cultural history, and is an academically trained artist, these monumental edifices, constructed at great effort and expense ostensibly for the “glory of God,” have captured my fascination. Their extravagant beauty, the artistry and craftsmanship that went in to their construction before the age of modern machinery is beyond impressive. When one steps into a Gothic cathedral, for example, it boggles one’s mid and leaves spell-bound starring upward. And I’m obviously not the only one who is perennially impressed. The great Christian churches, basilicas, cathedrals down to the lowliest chapel and village church all over Europe in nearly every city are often the top tourist attractions, even to this day in our agnostic, secular humanistic, rabidly materialistic world and even anti-Christian culture. Why this fascination with things religious? Suffice it to say, perhaps despite a secular society’s efforts to eviscerate the God of the Bible from the hearts and minds of Westerners, there is still a God-shaped hole in people’s hearts. Beyond that, this a discussion for another day. What I will discuss here is, more importantly, what does Elohim think of these architectural endeavors of men to reach him? Are these a sort of man-made ladder trying to reach the gates of heaven?
My ventures into cathedrals and churches over the past forty-five years be they Romanesque, Medieval Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, neo-Gothic, Art Nouveau or modernist, have occurred all over the British Isles, the European continent, Africa, Central and South America and the North American continent from Alaska to Quebec and southward. The more notable houses of worship in which my feet have echoed include Notre Dame Cathedral (before and after the great fire of 2019) and Sacré-Coeur both in Paris, St. Paul’s and Westminster Abbey in London, and the Lausanne Cathedral in Switzerland. In Italy, I have marvelled at San Marcos in Venice, the Duomo di Firenze in Florence, the Cathedral and famous Leaning Tower of Pisa and, of course, St. Peter’s in Rome), and ornate churches Palarmo in Sicily. And I cannot forget massive Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, Spain and the nineteenth century French church in Carthage, Tunsia in Africa. And then there are the churches in Mexico, South America and New York City and elsewhere around the U.S. that I have visited. When in Israel, I viewed many ancient churches and synagogues that go back for nearly 2,000 years. I have viewed some of the largest church buildings in world including Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome which can hold 60,000 worshipers as well as the smallest Catholic church in the world on the tiny island of Guernsey in the English Channel which measures only eight feet by 16 feet in size. I Barcelona’s Sagrada Familia whose tallest tower, when completed, will reach 565 feet into the heavens making it the tallest church in the world, a church that doubled as a Medieval fortress in the mountains of northern Spain, Europe’s most famous Gothic cathedral, the last church that the ill-fated Titanic saw, the abbey where 1,000 years of British monarchs have been crowned, the church that was the birthplace of the Italian Renaissance and a church in Pisa that took 400 years to construct and another in England that has been a construction project for a thousand years. Typically, when visiting most of these churches, I have merely been a curious tourist taking in the sights, learning the history and marveling at the artistry and labor that went into building them. But now in my mid-60s and having reaching a more philosophical stage in my life with a aerial view of life that only age and time can provide, I am now seeing these churches from a little different perspective—from, I think and hope, a more heavenly, kinder, even loving heart of YHVH Elohim one.
My first trip to Europe was in 1980 where I spent a year studying in Switzerland. During spring break, I ventured into Italy where I spent several days in Rome. By this time, I had visited many cathedrals including Westminster Abbey and St. Paul’s in London, Notre Dame in Paris, and St. Mark’s in Venice, but nothing prepared me for St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. Upon arriving in Rome, I fought my way on foot while braving the terrifying melee of cars to cross countless interminably wide and often crosswalkless boulevards to finally reach St. Peters Square in the Vatican, the headquarters of the Roman Catholic Church. I nonchalantly meandered into St. Peter’s Basilica and was immediately overwhelmed. My jaw needed a crutch as it dropped to the exquisite marble flooring and my eyes remained transfixed looking upward. I was unable to move not unlike one of the numerous marble statues that adorn the place. After what seemed like an eternity, I collected my overwhelmed senses and sat down on a simple wooden, nondescript chairs (in stark contrast to the wealth and opulence that surrounds them) set out for worshippers, where I remained motionless and almost spell-bound drinking in the awesomeness of the place. My emotional response struck me as strange, since neither I nor my family are Catholic, and, quite frankly, I, at best, had been apathetic toward that church, and even harbored a certain level of antipathy toward Roman Catholicism. After 45 minutes of just sitting there, I remember thinking, “I can’t take all of the immensity and opulence of this place in at one sitting,” and suffering from cognitive and emotional overloading, I resolved to come back the next day to absorb the rest of it. And I did. The majesty, immenseness and artistry of it all was too much to fathom on my first visit. I have been marvelling over the beauty and majesty of church buildings ever since.
