Leaving Egypt: Acceptable Worship

Exodus 29: 35 - 46

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SPEAKER_01 0:18

Would you now stand for the reading of God's Word? Our passage this morning is Exodus chapter 29, beginning of verse 35. It's in page 76 in your Red Pew Bibles. If you didn't bring a Bible of your own, should be a Bible that looks like this right here. If you want to hunt one of those up and turn to page 76. Again, that is Exodus chapter 29, beginning of verse 35. We like for everyone to be able to see the passage as it's being preached.

SPEAKER_00 0:53

Do for Aaron and his sons everything I have commanded you, taking seven days to ordain them. Sacrifice a bowl each day as a sin offering to make atonement. Purify the altar by making atonement for it, and anoint it to consecrate it. For seven days make atonement for the altar and consecrate it. Then the altar will be most holy, and whatever touches it will be holy. This is what you are to offer on the altar regularly each day. Two lambs a year old. Offer one in the morning and the other at twilight. With the first lamb offer a tenth of an epha of the finest flour, mixed with a quarter of a hen of oil from pressed olives, and a quarter of a hen of wine as a drink offering. Sacrifice the other lamb at twilight, with the same grain offering and its drink offering as in the morning, a pleasing aroma, a food offering presented to the Lord. For the generations to come, this burnt offering is to be made regularly at the entrance to the tent of meeting before the Lord. There I will meet you and speak to you. There also I will meet with the Israelites, and the place will be consecrated by my glory. So I will consecrate the tent of meeting and the altar, and will consecrate Aaron and his sons to serve me as priests. Then I will dwell among the Israelites and be their God. They will know that I am the Lord, their God, who brought them out of Egypt, so that I might dwell among them. I am their, I am the Lord their God. The word of the Lord. Thanks be to God, you may be seated.

SPEAKER_01 2:34

Thank you, Ian. One of our deacons. Ian? Let me pray for us as we come now to God's word. Let's pray together. Father, we come now and pause and still our hearts before your word. In worship, Lord, we have brought our tithes and our offerings to you. In worship, Lord, we have heard you speak to us through the reading of your word, Lord. We have spoken to you in our prayers. And now, Lord, we pause and would ask that you would open our hearts and open our ears and open our minds, that we might hear from you, that you might speak to us through your almighty, all-powerful word, that we would see Jesus and that we would be changed. In Christ's name we pray. Amen. So, a question to get us started this morning, for young people, but for all of us. Have you ever been somewhere in your life, somewhere really special, maybe even a place that for many people feels off limits? But you find yourself in a really special place, and you have this feeling like, I'm not sure I should be here. Have you ever had that experience? Recently, well, this is about a year ago, uh, Bo and I, my youngest son Bo, we traveled down to Athens, Georgia, and my two oldest boys are on the Dade County football team, and they were participating in a seven-on-seven tournament down at the University of Georgia. This is a football kind of pass competition thing, and all these high schools from across Georgia will come together and and for all day long they're they're on the fields and in the practice facility at the University of Georgia, and they're there, and you get to go down, parents get to come and they get to watch, you know, the kids compete and all of those things, and it's an amazing experience, especially if you happen to be really torn up with your football team, your college football team, you know. I've heard that people are like that. I have no idea who they are, but so we go down and we were running a little late this morning. The the team and rode down on the buses, and they were already there. And so we get down there, and there's people everywhere, and we're trying to find how do we get in? How do we get into this place where we can we can see the team, we can see the competition, and and all the teams were in the large practice facility, and and so we couldn't find where the entrance was. And so I thought, well, let's go in the front door. And so we go into the front door of the football complex at the University of Georgia. It's called the Butts Mirror Building. And for certain people, this might be considered holy ground, like consecrated ground, okay? But we walk into the front, the the front entrance there, and it's begins, there's there's like a public area, it's like a museum there, and there's football offices all around, but then you can go through a special door that's usually locked, and you have to have a retinal scan and like you know, palm scan, and you know, get searched and all this stuff. And you go past that level, and then you can come into this other area where there's there's more things, and then then there's another set of doors you go through. And again, no more retinal scans and all this stuff, and you gotta have credentials, you gotta you gotta have things that show who you are, and that you have a right to be there, and that you either have to be a person on the coaching staff with access, or you have to be a uh sometimes a coach from somewhere in the state of Georgia can get that kind of access, or if you're like a five-star recruit, okay, you can get in there, but but somebody like me, no sir. But we walk in and the place was empty. The those double doors with the retinal scan, it's wide open. And I'm like, we gotta find the the team here. Come on, Bo. So we walked through the double door. And and my nervous level was growing because I knew, like, oh, I'm not sure if I should be in here, right? But there was also an intrigue. Like, I think I want to go in. And and as we passed each level, right, my my nervousness was going up. I was more and more like, ah, what if somebody catches us? We're not in the right place. What's my story? I have no credentials, what are we gonna do here? And then finally we find ourselves in like the intersanctum, okay? We're still not fine in the field, but we find ourselves in the football offices, like the coach's office. And we round a corner and there it was. Kirby Smart's office. And I just knew I was too deep. And we had to get out, like immediately, and I'm like, Bo, this is not it. We gotta go, we gotta go. And so we left the building, we ended up finding the field on the other side. Why do I share that? What I was feeling in that place, and what you may have felt if you've ever found yourself in a place that that felt like enormous importance to you, a place that that only a few can go, a place that you've got to have access to get into. That that feeling is called reverence and awe. That's what the Bible calls it. It's the experience of weight that you feel when you perceive something that has glory, whatever we assign that glory to. But that experience of like, how am I here? This is a special place. That is the experience of reverence and awe. And the Bible says that acceptable worship of God, this is the book of Hebrews, is worship that is in reverence and awe. That whenever we come in worship to God's presence, when we come and gather together, together to lift up our voices and praise the Lord, that we should come with a sense of reverence and awe, a sense of weight, a sense of like, well, we are in God's presence here. But so often in worship, it's very easy to forget about that, right? It's so easy for worship to just become an ordinary thing for us to kind of think, hey, I'm just doing what you do on Sunday, you know. I'm going through the motions, I'm going to church, you know, I'm checking a box, and we can come very nonchalant. We can come without recognizing what's really happening here and where we really are and whose presence we are coming into. It's easy to forget those things and just go through the motions. And sometimes worship just becomes about maybe a feeling that we want to feel, you know. I want to get, I want to get an uplifting message. I want to have some uplifting worship today. I want to have a positive message and encourage so that I'm going into the week in the right way. But we can forget that that's not what this is ultimately about. It's ultimately about what we come and bring in worship, namely our reverence and our awe before the Lord. It is so easy, especially in the worship in the American church, to lose the sense of God's holiness that we are coming into in worship. But here's what we'll see in our passage this morning. Through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus, we are purified and consecrated for the holy presence of God in worship. I'll read that again. What we'll see is through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus, we are purified and consecrated for the holy presence of God in worship. So let's jump in here together, and we are towards the end of our study of the book of Exodus. We're in the third part of Exodus, which is all about worship. Really, you can say about Exodus that this was the whole point of God's redeeming his people. That God rescued his people out of bondage in Egypt in order that he might bring them to himself, in order that he might bring them into his very presence as his worshiping people. Worship was the point of their salvation. And the same is true of us. God rescues us in Jesus that we might worship him. That is, in fact, what it means to be human. You were made for worship. And as a human being, you are going to worship something. The only question you really get is, whom will you worship? But we were made to be worshipers of God. And worship for the Israelites here in Exodus is all centered around the tabernacle. This was this tent structure that they were to build through which God would come and meet with his people in this place. It was a temporary structure that they would put up and take down as they traveled through the wilderness together. And God would come and dwell with his people in the tabernacle. And we've seen all of these instructions of how exactly how the tabernacle is to be constructed and designed and the materials to be used, and everything about the tabernacle was teaching them about what it means to worship God. But the whole point of worship, and we talked about this last week, that really at the heart of worship is encountering God's presence. That's the whole point. That God might bring us into his very presence, that he might dwell in our midst. Look at what he says in verse 45 as he describes here. It's the making it ready for worship. That's what we're looking at in our passage. But here's what he says in verses 45 and 46. Really, the whole point of the tabernacle, the whole point of their worship is this. Verse 45 then I will dwell among the Israelites and be their God. They will know that I am the Lord their God who brought them out of Egypt, so that I might dwell among them. I am the Lord their God. There it is. That's the very depths of God's heart, his longing for all that he's doing in the world and all of the story that he's writing in redemption for his longing and desire for each one of our lives is this that we might dwell in his presence, that he might dwell among us, that we might know him, that we would know who he is, we would know what he has done to rescue us and bring us to himself, that we would know him intimately. That's the whole purpose of it all. This was what God redeemed his people for, that they would become his worshiping people. But one of the most important things to understand, and the tabernacle shows us this, is that worship is not just an encountering God's presence, is not just an enjoying God's presence. Worship is encountering God's holiness. That's what we see throughout the tabernacle. All the descriptions and the design, it's all intended to show us God is holy. That to approach God, you don't just stroll in. You must be prepared to encounter God's holiness. You know, as Moses here is setting up worship for his people, he didn't say, you know, let's find us a tent out here and let's grab some guitars and maybe a smoke machine and something and let's get together and let's let's praise the Lord. That's not what they did, right? All of this detail and preparation for this place to be made holy. All of the everything about the tabernacle intended to show them that to come into God's holy presence, we must be made right. This idea of holiness is kind of a churchy word, and we hear that, maybe use it a lot. And what exactly do we mean by holiness? And really, in this essence, what it means to be holy is to be set apart and different. So to say God is holy means that he is one morally pure, holy in his righteousness in all that he does, but also this sense that God is set apart. He's different from everything in creation. That that to see God's holiness is to really encounter the weight of his presence, that who he is and all of his characteristics cannot be compared to anything else in creation. God is holy and set apart and utterly different. That is the sense of God's holiness. And one of the things that we learn throughout the passage here is that to enter into God's holy presence, you must be prepared. Things must happen. But because of our sin, uh because we are not holy, it is dangerous to enter into the holy presence of God. And so the only way for sinners to come into God's presence and worship, and that's the only kind of worshipers there are, sinners, the only way for that to happen is for them to be prepared by God to enter into his presence. What does that preparation look like? Well, it's clear in verses 36 and 37 that really this preparation that has to happen so that we can come into God's presence is two things. One, purification. Secondly, consecration. Okay, we'll look at what those are. Look at verse 36. Sacrifice a bull each day as a sin offering to make atonement. Purify the altar by making atonement for it and anoint it to consecrate it. For seven days, make atonement for the altar and then and consecrate it. Then the altar will be most holy, and whatever touches it will be holy. You see that description there. These sacrifices, this purification, this consecration. The tabernacle itself had to go through this process, these rituals by which it would be fit for the presence of God. And the same was true for God's people. They must be purified, they must be consecrated in order to enter into God's presence. We also see this in the idea of the priest. The priests were this whole order of those who would serve in the house of God, those who would be set apart, and those who would represent the people to God and God to the people. They had to have a mediator. They had to have someone who would step in between them and God and bring them together. Why? Because God is holy and they are not. And so the only way to enter into God's holy presence is to be purified. Now, what does this mean to be purified? It means to be morally clean. One of the words that's used over and over in the passage here, but also throughout the Old Testament, especially, is the Hebrew word kippur. And it's what we translate as atonement, this idea of atonement. And really, at the heart of the root of this word kippoor is to wipe clean. Satisfying justice, satisfying the debt that is there. And so, how did this atonement happen? Well, it was through sacrifice. Look again at what it says. Verse 36 sacrifice a bull each day as a sin offering to make atonement. That's what purified the altar. And then this description in beginning at verse 38 through 41 of the offering of the lambs every day. A lamb in the morning, a lamb at night, this makes atonement. The way that atonement was made, the way that they were cleansed, was through sacrifice. And the idea was that this animal, this sacrifice, is becoming a substitute. It is dying in our place. It is taking the guilt and the punishment of our sin upon itself. And by being sacrificed and shedding its blood, that blood now represents that that sacrifice has taken our place. And the blood itself brings cleansing. We got to be purified. We got to be cleansed from our sin, from our guilt, from our shame, in order to enter into the holy presence of God. Now here's the thing to see they could not purify themselves. And they weren't pure in and of themselves. So the only way for them to come into God's holy presence is through God making atonement for them. So they had to have purification, but also they had to have consecration. You see that at the end of verse 36. Anoint it to consecrate it. That word is popping up over and over and over throughout the passage here. Second part of verse 30. Well, look at verse 43. There also I will meet with the Israelites, and the place will be consecrated by my glory. Verse 44. So I will consecrate the tent of meeting and will consecrate Aaron and his sons to serve me as priests. What is this idea of consecration? The idea of consecration is to be set apart, to be dedicated. It's something moving from a common use to a very special use. A table in the tabernacle would be a table, an ordinary table. But in order for it to be fit for God's presence and God's use, it had to be consecrated. It had to go through a ritual where it would go from just a table to now, it is a table that is for only one use, that is the worship of God. That is consecration. See, to come into God's presence, to worship Him, one has to be consecrated. In other words, I go from just having all kinds of purposes in my life where in consecration, God is my purpose. I have an exclusive purpose. I now live for you before I live for myself, or I live for all kinds of things in the world. But when a person is consecrated now, they are totally dedicated to God. This is the idea of the ordination of the priest. Look at verse 35, the beginning of our passage. Do for Aaron and his sons everything I've commanded you, taking seven days to ordain them. Ordination is consecration. It's taking Aaron and his sons, and they're going through this seven-day ritual process where they get dedicated to God. They get consecrated. So now they are holy and set apart so they can serve God as priests. This idea of ordination, you know, Cody, one of our church planning apprentices, he just finished seminary. It's wonderful. I don't know if you knew that. Yeah. It's great. I don't know where he is. He was just said there he is in the back. Yeah. So Cody just finished seminary, but now he is starting this process of ordination. So he will be studying and he will be going through examinations and theology and Bible and all of these things. And then, Lord willing, in the fall, we're going to have this service of ordination, where he will be set apart from ministry to the Lord. Same thing happened in my own life. I got a picture in my office in there of my ordination. It was consecration, where you go, you're going from ordinary purpose in life to now you're set apart for the Lord. Our officers in our church, our elders and our deacons, they've been ordained, set apart for a special purpose. You see, this is what we see at the essence of worship. In order to enter the holy presence of God, we've got to be purified and we've got to be consecrated for the Lord. So the tabernacle teaches us so much about worship, but really at the heart that God is holy. That really has to be fundamental in all of our worship. That whenever we come into God's presence, that we are coming into the presence of one whose glory and worth and beauty and power is in a league of his own. That when we come into worship, that we come with reverence and awe, feeling the weight of who God is. And we recognize that in order for sinners like me and sinners like you to enter into the holy presence of God, He must prepare us. He must make us holy. So how does this point us to Jesus? Well, one of the things that we said last week, and this is huge to understand about the emphasis of the New Testament, is that Jesus is the fulfillment of the tabernacle. Now it's stunning. When you go to the New Testament, you read through this lens. It is amazing at how the New Testament writers are at pains to show you how Jesus brings all of this to fulfillment. All of the tabernacle. Jesus is the place you meet God. He is the tabernacle, the true tabernacle. The tabernacle, in fact, it was just temporary. It was just a shadow. It was just pointing ahead to something else. What was it pointing to? To Jesus. He is the meeting place of God. If you want to meet God and you want to encounter his presence, it's not in a building somewhere, it's not at a holy site somewhere, it's not even in a beautiful sunset. You can encounter God in all of those places, but the only way to encounter the one true and living God is through Jesus. It's the only way. That's what this means. He is the tabernacle. He's also the great high priest. He is the one who reconciles us to God. He is the one who represents God to us. When you encounter Jesus, you are seeing the fullness of God in the person of Jesus. So he brings God to us, and yet he brings us before God. He intercedes for us. Yet before, even now in heaven before the Father, he is interceding on behalf of his people as a great high priest. But also, he is the sacrifice. He's not just a great high priest who brings the sacrifice of something else. He is the sacrifice himself. Not the blood of a goat or a bull, but the precious blood of himself, the one and only Son. He is the sacrifice. The writer of Hebrews just uses this over and over and over. And Hebrews chapter 10, I think, is one of the most glorious descriptions of the gospel in all of Scripture. But I just want to point out what he, the writer of Hebrews is just making these connections. And he says this in chapter 10, verse 10, he says, We have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

unknown 27:29

You get that?

SPEAKER_01 27:30

You know, I talk about these verses, these places in Scripture where the gospel is just so clear you can't talk yourself out of it. It's important you know those. I would encourage you to take some of those and just commit them to heart. So that whenever you're feeling accused and you're feeling guilty and you're feeling like I'm just too far away, and I'm uh God, God is just kind of turning his face away from me. You need to, you need to have these verses where you can just preach the gospel to yourself. This is one of those places. We have been made holy. Us. Sinners like us, the ones who woke up this morning and sinned against God in some way, right? We have been made holy. Now that the tense of that verb is past perfect, a completed action in the past that has ongoing application of the future. That's the perfect tense. We've been made holy. It's done. We're holy in his sight. How? How are we made holy in his sight? Through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. And then listen to what he says right after that. He's comparing the sacrifice of Jesus to the ongoing ministry of the Old Testament priest. Day after day, every priest stands and performs his religious duties. Again and again, he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. It was only temporary. You know, the priest was constantly making sacrifice, morning and evening, continually, continually, continually. What was the message to God's people? I need continual washing. I continue to sin. I continue to come only through God's grace, but I'm constantly needing a sacrifice. I'm constantly needing something to take my place because I'm constantly aware of my own sin and unfitness for the holy presence of God. And so the priest, you know, he didn't have a seat in the temple or the tabernacle. There was no seat. He stood because his work was never finished. He was continually making sacrifice. You can imagine what the priest looked like, right? Just covered in blood. I mean, just wearing the sin and the shame of all of his people, right? But listen to what he says here. But when this priest, meaning Jesus, had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God. He sat down. One sacrifice. That's the power of the sacrifice of Jesus. There's no longer a need for any sacrifice. You didn't need to bring your goat in here this morning or your donkey or whatever, right? You didn't need to. We don't need to bring a sacrifice to cover our sin. Because he was sacrificed. You see, as you are united to him and you put your hope and your rest and your trust in his one sacrifice, you're made holy. We come holy. And that's the only way to come to God. You cannot come to God unless you are holy. Oh man, I'm not holy. Are you holy? The only way to be made holy and fit for God's presence is through Jesus. And that's exactly what he's saying. Through his one sacrifice, we are made holy and fit for the very presence of God. So what's the application here? How do we bring this home to our life? Well, you know, right after this, the writer of Hebrews says this, therefore, you know, anytime you see a therefore in scripture, you should ask, what is the therefore, therefore? In other words, what came right before it? Because it's continual thought. And he's saying, because this is true, here's what you should do, right? So we're all asking, what do I do? Okay, we got sacrificed. What should I do? Here's what he says. Therefore, brothers and sisters, he's talking to us, since we have confidence to enter the most holy place by the blood of Jesus. That's a stunning statement. Since this is true, see, he's just saying, because this is true, it's not up for debate. It is true. We have confidence to enter the most holy place. Why? Because the curtain was torn. The curtain was separated the worshipers from the very holy of holies, the presence of God. And it was this constant reminder that though God wants me near, I can't come all the way in. It's not safe because of my sin. But the sacrifice of Jesus has torn the curtain. That's what he says. The way has been opened. And so, what is the call? What do we do? Here's what he says, verse 22 let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and full assurance of faith. What's the application? Draw near. You see, the way is open through Jesus. Go in. Draw near, go all the way in. But because he has opened the way. You know, there's one application here for those of us that are here this morning that maybe never have gone in through Jesus. And the application is just this: the only way to God, and that is the ultimate question that all of humanity ought to be asking is how do I get to God? Because that is the only place where a human being will find life. And the only way to get to life, to God, is through Jesus. You know, John says He is the way, the truth, the life. No one comes to the Father but by Him. Now, why is that true? Why can there not be many ways to God? Many would say that today. Why can there not be more ways than that? Because God is holy. And unless you are holy, you cannot safely come into the presence of God. You must be holy. So we're not holy. What is the only way? Through the atonement of Jesus. It's the only way. Right? So the application here is that you cannot be acceptable to God through your goodness or your sincerity, your meaning well. You cannot be acceptable to God through doing the right things, checking the right box, knowing the right theology, or even by someone you're related to. It's very common in the Bible Belt to say, you know, my grandma, she was so devoted to God, so I'm good. Or even children to think my parents are so close to God, so I must be too. No. You must go to God through Jesus. It's the only way. Right? But for those of us who are in Christ, draw near. It's open. You go all the way in. You can encounter God's presence. He is with us. And amazingly, through Jesus, he comes to live inside of us through his spirit. I mean, my goodness, like we become the Holy of Holies. That's what it means. God is within me. Jesus is in me through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. It's just stunning. An Old Testament saint would be like, that ain't no way, man. What are you talking about? Right?

unknown 35:28

But it's true.

SPEAKER_01 35:30

God comes to live in us. So the writer of Hebrews says, well, just go on in. Go. Draw near to him because the way has been opened. You know, so many things hinder our worship. And we come into worship. So many things hang us up from going near. And sometimes it's the question of like, am I pure enough? Have I been good enough? Well, let me think about this week. Have I read my Bible enough? Have I struggled with that besetting sin that I keep going to over and over? How have I done with that? Well, I've done pretty good. Okay, I can go in now. Or no, I haven't. I better stay at a distance, right? We're always looking to something in us to say, Am I pure enough? But you can't be pure enough. He was pure enough. Or we want to say, Am I consecrated enough? You know, a big thing in worship is just to be like, Am I feeling it enough? Or we want to compare ourselves to other people worshiping? You know, and am I passionate enough? Am I enthusiastic enough? You know, we want to look around at other people in worship and be like, well, you know, they're they're they look really into it. I don't think I'm that into it. Am I worshiping at all? Do I really mean it? I mean, my I'm struggling this morning. Is that really worship? Is that consecrated enough? And the answer is no, not in you, but through Jesus, it is. Isn't that amazing? We can come just through Jesus right as you are. You don't have to look at yourself. You don't have to look at your worship. You don't have to look, you know, should I put my hands up? Should I not? Am I feeling it enough? You don't have to worry about it. Just come through Jesus into the very presence of the Father. So this morning, uh, you know, oftentimes in our application, we we we do discussion and interaction and everything. And again, this week I just feel like, man, we're talking about worship. We can't talk about it. We got to do it, right? So we're just gonna move right into worship. Let me go ahead and call our worship team up. And I just want to invite you in this time, as we move into this time, let's just apply this. You know, we're gonna close with two songs, and I just want to invite you to just, wherever you are, and it's not just individual, worship is not just individual, it's us together. But wherever you are, just in your heart, be just be thinking about the truth of what we've just read. That by his sacrifice, that we can draw near with confidence, the way is opened. You can go right into the Holy of Holies right now, that God is with us, that his spirit is within us, that his smile is over us because of Jesus, that that because of what he's done, we are fully acceptable to the Father, which is just nuts in light of who we are, right? So let me just encourage you in this time, let's just go and enjoy him. Let's just go and enjoy Jesus and the truth of what he's done. Let me pray and we'll move into worship. Lord Jesus, you are the once-for all sacrifice. You are the atonement, you are the Lamb. You're our purification, you're our consecration. And so the only way to the Father is through you, but we come through Him now to experience your very presence, to enjoy your holiness. Your holiness actually becomes accessible through Jesus. So we come in reverence and awe to just be stunned at who you are in all of your glory. Would you come and meet us in worship? In Christ's name we pray. Amen.