"You shall make a table of acacia wood. Two cubits shall be its length, a cubit its breadth, and a cubit and a half its height. You shall overlay it with pure gold and make a molding of gold around it. And you shall make a rim around it a handbreadth wide, and a molding of gold around the rim. And you shall make for it four rings of gold, and fasten the rings to the four corners at its four legs. Close to the frame the rings shall lie, as holders for the poles to carry the table. You shall make the poles of acacia wood, and overlay them with gold, and the table shall be carried with these. And you shall make its plates and dishes for incense, and its flagons and bowls with which to pour drink offerings; you shall make them of pure gold. And you shall set the bread of the Presence on the table before me regularly.
Exodus 25:23-30
Moving outwards from the innermost sanctuary to the next compartment of the Tabernacle known as the holy place, we find three further articles of furniture, the table of shewbread, the golden candlestick (described in 25:31-39), and the altar of incense (described not at this point, but much later, in 30:1-10). We learn from Leviticus 24:5-9 that the shewbread - 'the bread of the presence' - consisted of twelve cakes or loaves laid in two rows on the table every Sabbath day, with frankincense on each row. The symbolism here is various. That there were twelve loaves is surely meant to speak of the twelve tribes of Israel, and of the fact that they were ever before the Lord, and upon His heart. This again stresses the note of fellowship, and God's desire for His people, a note further emphasised by the symbolism of the table itself. 'Thou preparest a table for me', says the Psalmist, 'in the presence of mine enemies', and this table in the wilderness is the eloquent assurance from God that His people will never want through all their pilgrimage. The details of the preparation of the bread given in Leviticus 24 are 'typically' suggestive; the wheat harvested and ground at the mill into the fine flour required speaks of Christ, our God-appointed wheat (John 12:24), sifted by suffering, ground and bruised fine in the mill of God's judgment against sin so that He might become the bread of God's presence (Fuller), the bread of life for all His people (see John 6:33-58).