Leviticus 24:5

"And thou shalt take fine flour, and bake twelve cakes thereof: two tenth parts of an ephah shall be in one cake. And thou shalt set them in two rows, six on a row, upon the pure table before Jehovah. And thou shalt put pure frankincense upon each row, that it may be to the bread for a memorial, even an offering made by fire unto Jehovah. Every sabbath day he shall set it in order before Jehovah continually; it is on the behalf of the children of Israel, an everlasting covenant. And it shall be for Aaron and his sons; and they shall eat it in a holy place: for it is most holy unto him of the offerings of Jehovah made by fire by a perpetual statute."

The typical nature of this weekly changing of showbread in which the old loaves were eaten by the priest and new ones provided is pointed squarely at the weekly communion of the saints in Christ at the Lord's Table in his kingdom. Note that it was not to be skipped, but observed continually on a WEEKLY basis. It was vitally a part of the covenant (Leviticus 24:8). Unger noted this as follows:

The frankincense was burned at the end of each week (instead of the loaves) in order that Aaron's sons might feast on the loaves, as we do memorially of Christ's death and second coming in the Lord's Supper.[14]

This showbread was referred to in the O.T., not only as the "shewbread," but also as "bread of the Presence," from being laid up before Jehovah (Leviticus 24:8), "bread of the pile" (or "bread of the arrangement") because of the placement of it in two rows (Leviticus 24:6), and as the "continual bread," as lying continually before God (Numbers 4:7).[15] This showbread was a constant, daily reminder for Israel and a ceremonial confession upon their behalf that, "all her temporal blessings came from God."[16] This was a flat denial and contradiction of the ancient pagan superstitions that their deities needed to be fed. The invariable teaching of the Law and the Prophets revealed that it was God who fed His people and that the people did not feed their God! Meyrick described how the loaves each sabbath were replaced by the fresh loaves:

"Four priests went in ... two to take off ... two to put on ... they faced each other two and two. Those with the new loaves stood on the north side, those who took off the old on the south side. They acted in unison so that always there were loaves on the table."[17]

It is difficult indeed to believe that any less caution was observed in the maintenance of the perpetual light as an inextinguishable blaze.

The type of the Lord's Day collection also appears in this passage. This Bread of the Presence was given and prepared each week, a procedure involving both the priests and all of God's people. "It was a weekly offering definitely and emphatically prescribed in the O.T. This is exactly what Paul urged on the Corinthians: `Upon the first day of the week, let every one of you lay by in store, as God has prospered him!' (1 Corinthians 16:2)."[18]