God's mercy seat
“And thou shalt put the mercy seat above upon the ark; and in the ark thou shalt put the testimony that I shall give thee. And there I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee from above the mercy seat.” ( Exodus 25:21-22 ) In the “holy of holies” of the tabernacle, God would meet with Israel ’s high priest once a year to commune with His people at a meeting place called the “mercy seat.” The Hebrew word was derived from the word for “atonement,” which in turn meant essentially a “covering” for the Ark of the Covenant . On the great day of atonement each year, the high priest was commanded to sprinkle the blood from the sin offerings on the mercy seat ( Leviticus 16:14-15 ) to make an atonement for all the people. This annual ceremony, of course, merely prefigures the full atonement that Christ would make one day when “by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us” ( Hebrews 9:12 ). Since this blood has been sprinkled