Maine Conference: 2017
Table of Contents
Philippians 2:1-11
Garments of the High Priest
Address—Stan Allan
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I wonder if we could open our meeting this afternoon by singing 200 and 28228. Join all the glorious names of wisdom, love and power.
That mortals ever knew, that angels ever bore. All are too mean to speak his words, too mean to set the Savior forth.
We've seen #228.
Bring a prompt that is on my recall a fire and thus once the last time and and and and Andy. By the way, Lucinda Dieter always falls off in the middle of the 1003 hours bringing each other and can't be.
But I don't care what's going on everyone.
10-4, 110 minutes. And how about this battle? So much good summer speaking. It's never, ever known.
Umm, you know.
I have to turn out to scratch me through the armor and I'm afraid.
We gave you love thy shadow very poor and it's why it's all I can't give you. I fell from those $1000 in time thou sort of differences 1000 dollars from God my God.
It is being sailed in the clouds. It's called everything 777377.
We just ask God's blessing. Our God and Father, we just come before thee, and we thank Thee for this little hymn we've been singing. Join all the glorious names.
Of wisdom, love and power that mortals ever knew. And Lord Jesus, we thank you this morning, that this afternoon that we can be here to consider thee and all that thou hast done and all thou art doing for us at the Father's right hand.
We thank Thee that we can be together to encourage one another and to be occupied with Thy glorious person. And so we would pray that as we open Thy word this afternoon, we pray that Thou would direct what is said by Thy Holy Spirit.
We pray, Lord, that it might be a blessing to each one of us, and it might be simple enough for.
Even the younger ones to understand. And so we just ask thee for thy help, for we know without thee we can do nothing. And we ask in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
When my when our brother Ted asked me to umm, take this meeting, I was just wondering what the Lord would have before me. And about 3-3 or four weeks ago.
Uh, you'll have to forgive me. A brother tweeted me and he said, you know, I've just been reviewing the garments of glory and beauty of the Lord Jesus or the high priest. And I thought, oh, I used to really enjoy that subject.
And I have enjoyed it many times. And then I thought of a a comment that Ernie Wakefield told me years ago, and I'm sure many here heard it too. He said, make much of Christ, make much of Christ. And I thought, you know, we need to be occupied with this person.
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And I was wondering this afternoon if we could look at the garments of the high Priest, uh, in Exodus chapter 28.
You know we know those verses so well in in umm Hebrews chapter 4 where the Lord has spoken of as our High Priest.
Umm, and we know too how he referred to in, uh, first John Chapter 2 as our advocate.
And, uh, what a wonderful subject to bring before us the work of the Lord Jesus now, uh, as our advocate and as our High priest. And this chapter 28 brings before us, I believe.
Umm, a wonderful picture of the Lord Jesus.
And his work for us at the Father's right hand at this point in time.
It's a long chapter and umm.
Really, to read it all straight through might take a little bit, so we're just going to read, uh, a little bit at a time and maybe make a few comments that I have enjoyed.
We'll read the second verse first. Thou shalt make holy garments for Aaron, thy brother.
For glory and for beauty.
Uh, verse six. And they shall make the ephod of gold of blue, of purple and scarlet, and fine twined linen, with cunning work. It shall have two shoulder pieces thereof joined at the two edges thereof, and so it shall be joined together, and the curious girdle of the ephod which is upon it shall be of the same according to the work thereof, even of gold of.
Blue, purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen. And thou shalt make 2 Onyx stones. Engrave on them the names of the children of Israel, six of their names on one stone, and the other six names on the rest of the other stone, according to their birth. With the work of an engraver in stone, like the engravings of a signet, shalt thou engrave the two stones with names of the children of Israel.
Thou shalt make them to be set in ouches of gold.
And thou shall put the two stones upon the shoulders of the ephod, for stones, uh, of memorial on to the children of Israel. And Aaron shall bear their names before the Lord upon his two shoulders for a memorial.
Maybe I should mention right at the beginning that it's, I wish I had a large picture here of the high priest with these garments of glory and beauty here. It makes it a little easier, but there were actually three parts to his, his, uh, garments. The first one was the ephod. That was the outer garment. And then underneath it was the robe of the ephod. It's mentioned in verse 31.
Thou shalt make the robe of the ephod all of blue.
So it was underneath the ephod and then underneath the, uh, robe of the E5 we have what's in uh, verse, umm, 39 Thou shalt embroidery the coat of fine linen. Thou shalt make the miter of fine linen. So the, the, the umm, the code of fine linen was underneath the robe of the ephod. So to make that plain again.
There's the ephod, and then underneath it the robe of the ephod, which was blue, and then underneath that was the coat of fine linen. And I think if you keep that in mind, it makes it a little easier to understand. But you know, why has God-given us this wonderful description? It just seems like a lot of words in some respects. But you know, I believe it. It says here in the second verse that these garments were for glory.
And for beauty.
Actually, the high priest, if any, I don't know if he ever wore these garments of glory and beauty on the Day of Atonement. He wore a coat of fine linen. Uh, and that was the day, of course, that speaks of the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus, when the Lord went into death and, and uh, gave his life that we might live and that he had on that coat of fine linen. Why was that?
Well, you know the Lord, the fine linen.
Would speak to us of the practical righteousness of the Lord Jesus in his walk down here, the perfection of his walk. You know what tells us in Hebrews chapter seven? I think it's verse 26 that says.
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He is holy, spotless, undefiled, and separate from sinners.
That was the Lord Jesus in his walk down here. And because he was, uh, perf perfect in all his ways, he was the only one that could accomplish that work of redemption. And so on the Day of Atonement that speaks of his death, he, he wore that linen, that linen garments. But here it talks about the garments of glory and beauty.
And I believe this would bring before us more.
The present work of the Lord Jesus. There's a verse that I think that would help us in this in Hebrews Chapter 9.
I just refer to it for a moment. Uh, Hebrews Chapter 9.
And uh.
Verse 24.
Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands.
Which are the figures of the true, but into heaven itself now to appear in the presence of God for us.
So there's his present work. He's in heaven itself, and he appears in the presence of God for us. That's his present priestly work.
And I believe what we have here in this chapter brings before us of what the Lord Jesus is doing for us now. And so we find here in the sixth verse, it says that the that we're taking a look now at the ephod, that outer garment that the priest wore. It says it was made of gold, of blue, of purple, of scarlet and fine twined linen with cunning work.
Now, why would? Why were all these things mentioned?
Well, you know, the gold brings before us the divine righteousness of God and we know that the Lord Jesus, he went to the cross and he accomplished that mighty work of redemption. And uh, that work was perfectly accepted before God. And so it says here divine righteousness which characterized the Lord Jesus. Then it says blue.
And you know, blue is the heavenly color we look up in the sky on a clear day and we see that blue.
It makes us think of heaven and you know, it says no man hath ascended down from heaven, but he that that went up to heaven. I'm sorry. I better just uh, read it. I'm not very good at quoting uh, John chapter 3. We know the verse. It says this, uh, verse 13, no man ascend ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven.
Even the Son of man, which is in heaven.
So the Lord Jesus, that heavenly man came down here into this world and walked this very the very streets of the very world that we're in. And then it says purple. Now, you know, back in Roman times.
Rome, uh, purple was only worn by those who were very rich. In fact, it was really, uh, never worn until the days of the Roman Empire and the emperors. They wore that purple color and you know, Rome, it ruled not just.
The city of Rome had ruled the entire Mediterranean. All those various countries were part of the Roman Empire. And so I think when it mentions purple here, reminds us that the Lord Jesus is not only the king, but he's the king of kings and he's the Lord of Lords. The day is coming when he's going to rule this world and this universe supreme.
And it brings before us the royal color. And then Scarlett, of course, was the.
The color of the, uh, kings of Israel and some have said too that it really brings before us human glory. And you know, we were mentioning this morning about pride and how man loves to boast of all of he's accomplished, but you know, there's only one that can truly have human glory and who's that? It's the Lord Jesus. He's the only one that walked in this life in this world perfectly according to the will of God as.
We had, and so it says, scarlet here, and then the fine twined linen which brings before us, as we said before.
The practical righteousness of the Lord Jesus as he walked this world.
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And so we have all of these things intertwined. You couldn't say that this part was gold and this part was blue and this part was was purple and so on. It was all interwoven. And you know, you can't divide the glories of the Lord Jesus as the Son of God from the glories of him as the perfect man. It's all perfectly intertwined. And that's what we see here.
Well then it goes on and talks about the curious girdle in verse 8.
And I just make a comment about that. The girdle, What was the girdle? It was really like a belt that went around the ephod here and it was tied, umm, and so, and it was the very same, it was made of the very same things as the ephod itself. But what's meant by the, the curious girdle? Well, you know, there's two verses that I think would help us in that. If you take a look at John chapter 13, first of all.
Umm.
I think this was referred to briefly this this morning, although not the actual verses I was thinking of, but in John chapter 13 it says there umm in verse four he rises from supper and laid aside his garments and took a towel and girded himself. After that he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples feet and to wipe them.
With the towel wherewith he was girded. What is the Lord Jesus doing in those verses? You know, He's just what we were saying this morning. He took upon Him the form of a servant. You know, he's, he's not our servant. But voluntarily the Lord delights the service because He loves us. And here he was washing the disciples feet. You know, Peter couldn't understand why the Lord would do that. But the Lord was teaching Peter.
Important lesson, the need of feet washing. And here just imagine the creed of the universe stooping down and washing the feet of the disciples. Uh, how wonderful to think of the Lord as the the perfect servant. And then, you know, if you were to turn to loop 12, we won't just turn to it, but there we find the Lord again referred to as the servants and the one that will serve us forever.
He delights to serve his own, and so we find here the curious girdle would bring before us.
The Lord as the one who is serving us now in the glory, and we can be so thankful.
Well, then it goes on and talks about, umm, these two Onyx stones in verse nine and on them were engraved the umm, the 12 names of the 12 tribes. There were six on this, on this Onyx stone and there were six on this Onyx stone. And, uh, what would that bring before us? Well, you know, the first thing I'd like to think of is that they were engraved.
And umm, you know, and engraving is where you cut into the rock, into the stone, don't you? When it becomes permanent, you can't wipe it off.
It's there permanently. And you know, I think that the names of the 12 tribes, six and six, they could not be erased. And what is the teaching there? You know, every one of us here who know the Lord as our Savior, we're engraved on His shoulders. I've enjoyed that. You know, if we go to Luke 15, maybe we'll just look at it for a second. Luke chapter 15.
The story of the lost sheep.
It says there, uh, without reading the whole thing, verse five. And when he has found the sheep, he lays it on his shoulders rejoicing. So you can just see the shepherd taking the sheep by the two legs here and two legs here, putting it over his shoulders, and there the the sheep is secure. And so I believe.
That the thought of the soldiers is security. The thought of the Onyx stones on the shoulders is security.
And so the Lord Jesus took that sheep, as it were, and carried it all the way home. And the wonderful thing is the Lord is going to hold this secure all the way home. And we're engraved on his shoulders. Uh, we've often read that verse in Isaiah 49. And I think again, these are verses I'll just refer to very briefly. Uh, but it says there in the 49th chapter.
And the.
Umm 15 verse Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yeah, they may forget, but yet will I not forget thee? Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands, and so the Lord Jesus has our names engraved on his shoulders.
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And He's maintaining us in the presence of God until the day when He can have us with Him forever.
And so how wonderful that we have here, you know, there's just every name was on the same stone, the Onyx stone. And so we're equally there before the Lord. You know, some here, umm, have been saved a long time. There are others have only been saved a short time, but we're all equally secure.
All equally secure. Our names are engraved, they'll never be wiped away. And the Lord is there umm, and he has us on his shoulders. It's a place of security. I thought of this too. You know in in Isaiah Chapter 9, it speaks about him having the government on his shoulder. It only takes 11 shoulder for to look after the government. But when it comes to you and I.
He has us on both his shoulders. I think that's so wonderful. And so we, I think that's the teaching that we have here in connection with the Onyx stones. And one other thing I wanna mention. The Onyx stones were set in ouches of gold. Now I know that for the those who are younger here, you say what's an Ouch? Well, I think it was just like a setting.
I can't really describe it, but it was a setting and the Onyx stone went into the setting and it was made of gold.
Now we said that gold brings before us, umm, the divine righteousness of God. And you know, I like to think of that verse in Second Corinthians chapter 5, it says, umm, in him was uh oh, I'm sorry, I'm going to have to read it. I can quote it, but I get confused sometimes.
2nd Corinthians chapter 5, the last verse it says this, He hath made him to be sin.
For us who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. I like the last part of that verse. The righteousness of God in him. So the gold is the divine righteousness of God and we're set in Christ. You see that the Onyx stone with the names are in that.
Ouch of gold. And we are in him. We are in Christ.
You know, some people use the expression justified just as justified never sinned, and that's nice. But you know, that's not the whole thing. The the real reality of it is that we're in Christ, We're in Christ, we're in the ouches of gold. And so that's what we get in the Onyx stones. Well, then if you go on down to verse 13, we'll read a few more verses.
And thou shalt make ouches of gold, and two chains of pure gold. At the ends of recent work shalt thou make them, and fasten the recent change to the ouches. Umm. And thou shalt make the breastplate of judgment with cunning work. After the work of the ephod, thou shalt make it of gold. And blue, and purple and scarlet, and fine twined linen shalt thou make us.
Foursquare It shall be uh, being doubled. A span uh shall be the length thereof. A span shall be the breadth thereof.
And thou shalt set it in the settings of stones, even 4 rows of stones. The 1St row shall be a stardeus, a Topaz, a carbuncle. Uh, this shall be the first row. And the 2nd row shall be an emerald, a sapphire and a diamond. And the 3rd row a lager and agates and an amethyst, and the 4th row a barrel and on on it, and an Onyx and a Jasper.
They shall be in gold in their enclosings.
And the stones shall be with the names of the children of Israel 12 according to their names, like the engravings of a signet, Everyone with his name, uh, shall they be according to the 12 tribes?
We'll just stop there, I guess, for now. So we find now that on the front of the ephod right here, there was the breastplate. And you'll notice in verse 15 that it's made-up of the same materials that the ephod was made out of, and it's called the breastplate of judgment. Now why is it called the breastplate of judgment?
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Well, you know, it doesn't mean that the Lord is going to judge us. I don't think that's the thought.
The thought here is discernment and guidance.
We need. I'm sorry.
The thought is, umm, well, maybe we should just take a look at a verse. Psalm 119.
Some 119 and verse 66.
OK.
It says there teach me good judgment and knowledge.
So you see, the thought is discernment and guidance.
For I have believed Thy commandments teach me good judgment. So that's what's meant here by, umm, the breastplate of judgments. We'll talk about that again in just a few moments. But you'll notice here that, umm, in this breastplate there were 12 Stones. Each stone was different. And what do those stones represent? You know, I believe they represent you and me as individuals.
We have.
There's the 12 names. The tribes of Israel on the Lord's shoulders are on the high priest shoulders.
That speaks of security, it speaks of power. But now they're on his breast over his heart. And what does that re re remind us of? The fact that each one of us here this this afternoon are individually loved by the Lord. We're all different. You'll notice there was a sardius, a Topaz, a carbuncle and sapphire, and they were all different. You can't say that the diamond was more.
And the Ruby or the carbuncle, but they were all different. And the Lord knows we're different. The Lord doesn't expect us to be all the same. We're not. We're different. And he knows our disposition, He knows our weaknesses. And yet the wonderful thing is he's we are on his heart. We're on his heart. He loves us.
And that's why I chose that little hymn, you know, join all the glorious names of wisdom, love and power.
The Lord has us on His shoulders in power and strength. He has us on us, on our heart, on His heart because He loves us. And He's going to be and we're going to be there.
All through eternity on his heart and you'll notice here it says in the 16th verse Foursquare it shall be doubled. You know back in this these days the only nation that really knew the Lord at all or knew Jehovah was.
Was Israel, but you know when it says Foursquare you think of.
The four points to the compass, north-south, east, West, it speaks of universality and no doubt the Lord was was reminding himself the day was coming when he was going to have his own individual with him for all he turned from all over the world, not just Israel, but from the four corners of the world. So it says 4 score, 4 score square.
Uh, it shall be, uh, it shall be being doubled. Now, I, we're not really told, but I think the idea of it being doubled was, we'll say this is the, the, uh, breastplate and it was doubled. You see, like this, That's the way I take it. It was sort of doubled and in, in here where the, the Urim and Thummim, I, I just mentioned that in passing. I think that's what it means.
But it it says here.
The size of it. A span should be the length thereof. Now, what was a span? The span was the distance between your thumb and your little finger. That was a span.
It shall be the lengthier up, and a span shall be the breadth of. So it was this wide and this, you know what I'm saying? It was a span both ways. And what does that bring before us? And it says also being doubled. So we know you can't help but think of that little verse that we know so well.
I know my umm. I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
My father, which gave them me, is greater than all, and no man shall pluck them out of my father's hand. Isn't that double security? Isn't that the span, the length of the breads? And so it seems that over and over again the Spirit of God is telling us how secure we are, how secure we are and so.
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How wonderful, it says here it shall being doubled. A span shall be the length thereof, and a span shall be the BR. The the the breadth are rough.
And then it mentions the various stones. And as I've had before, we're all individually loved by the Lord. And those various stones that are mentioned here would be all different colors, wouldn't they? And you'll notice that in the high priest garments there were all these different colors too. And the wonderful thing is that the Lord has not made us all the same.
And one Christian might shine in a certain area, reflecting the.
The, the glory of the Lord in one little area and another, umm, Christian might, uh, shine in another way. One thing I've enjoyed too is that when would you see the, the wonderful colors glowing? When the high priest went into the holy place, there was the Candlestick. Remember the Candlestick? And when that Candlestick was lit and this high priest went in.
Then the light would reflect off those stones.
And you know, when we come into the presence of the Lord, we see those wonderful glories, umm, uh, shining out from those various stones. And so I think it's so wonderful to see that the Lord has us securely on his shoulders. He has us. He has us on his heart because he loves us.
And umm, so let's go on for a moment.
Uh, excuse me.
Maybe we'll just skip down to verse 26 to save a little time. And thou shalt make two rings of gold, and thou shalt put them upon the two ends of the breastplate, and the border they're off, which is in the side of the ephod inward. And two other rings of gold thou shalt make, and shall put them on the two sides of the ephod underneath toward the four part thereof over against the other coupling thereof above the.
Girdle of the ephod, and they shall bind the breastplate. I was thinking of this verse particularly. They shall bind the breastplate by the rings thereof unto the rings of the ephod, with a lace of blue, that it may be above the curious girdle of the ephod, and that the breastplate be not loosed from the ephod.
Well, again you can see the curious girdle came around here, and then the breastplate was here.
And it was fastened to the ephod. What does it bring before us? Security. Again, How is it that Christians can believe that they can lose their salvation? Over and over again? We're told here how secure these various parts were. The breastplate was fastened to the ephod. It couldn't be loosed.
By a a lace of blue and uh, the size of the breastplate again was a span in both directions.
And so we're perfectly secure, and I believe that's what this is bringing out. Well, then, it says Aaron shall bear the names of the children of Israel in the breastplate of judgment upon his heart.
Isn't that wonderful? That shows the place that we have when he goes in onto the Holy Place for a memorial before the Lord continually so every time the high priest went into the holy place.
There were the children of Israel individually on his heart. And how wonderful when the Lord there is in the glory in the presence of God, we know He is God, but there's a man in the glory, and he has this on his heart.
How wonderful. And it's we're there continually, it says here in this verse.
Verse 30 And thou shalt put in the breastplate of judgment the Urim and the Thummim, and they shall be upon Aaron's heart when he goeth in before the Lord. And Aaron shall bear the judgment of the children of Israel upon his heart before the Lord continually. And thou shalt, uh, make the robe of the ephod all of blue.
Maybe we'll just stop with that 30th 1St for a moment. So here we have the.
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The Urim and the Thummim mentioned for the first time, and I believe that's why it's called the breastplate of judgment.
In other words, the we're not really told much about the urine and the thumb. We don't know what they looked like and we don't know exactly how they were attached, umm, to the, the breastplate. But we do know that, umm, they were on the breastplate of judgment. And we said before that the word judgment here means discernment and guidance.
And so it would appear as if.
When a difficulty arose, umm, for instance, a king, if the king of Israel didn't know exactly what to do, he could go to the high priest and he would consult, could I say the Lord through Urim and Thummim. In fact, we have an example of this if you take a look at, uh, numbers chapter 27 for a moment.
Numbers, Chapter 27.
And umm, the 21St verse.
Maybe we should read from verse 18 for a moment. And the Lord sent him to Moses. Take thee, Joshua, the son of Nun, a man in whom is the Spirit, and lay thine hand upon him.
And set him before Eliezer the priest, and before all the congregation, and give him a charge in their sight. And thou shalt put some of thine honour upon him, that all the congregation of the children of Israel may be obedient. Now notice. And he shall stand before elegies of the priest, who shall ask counsel for him.
After the judgment of Urim. Urum Urim.
Before the Lord. And so they went, and they would consult the Lord through the Urim and the Thummim. And so I believe they went there for wisdom and guidance. And we don't fully understand it, but if you were to turn to First Chronicles chapter 14, you would find there too that David consulted the Lord before going up against the Philistines.
And it would appear as if maybe he went to the Urim and Thummim, uh, and there he looked for guidance. But anyway, what does Urim and Thummim mean?
It means lights and perfections. That's what the expression means in the Hebrew, lights and perfections. So what can we learn about this? Well, what I've enjoyed particularly is James chapter one.
James chapter one.
Can I read just two verses that I think will make it obvious? Verse 5.
If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God that gives to all men liberally and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him.
Now verse 16, do not earn, my beloved brethren, every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.
Now do you get the connection there?
Urim and Thummim means.
Lights and perfections.
And we find here that if we if we lack wisdom, where are we to go? Where to go? To the Lord? And back in Old Testament times, if a king didn't know what to do, what did he do? He went to the Lord, he consulted Urim and Thummim, and what do they mean? Lights and perfections. And so.
What does it bring before us? Well, I believe it brings before us the fact of God's wisdom. God's wisdom, umm, in all we do, you know, he's perfect, It says a verse in the Old Testament says, As for God, his way is perfect. He knows all about us. He knows every difficulty that we pass through.
And he wants us to go to him in those difficulties.
And he will give us the needed direction. You know, sometimes we don't always.
Appreciate his answers. Sometimes he says wait when we ask him for something, or sometimes he even says no. But the wonderful thing is that God knows what's best for us and he will always do what's best because he knows all about us. He's he's, he's light and he's perfect and umm.
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He sees everything and he knows what's best for all of us. And so how wonderful here that the Urim and the thumb would speak of discernment and guidance. It would speak of wisdom. And so I go back to that little hymn that we were singing. Join all the glorious themes of wisdom, love and power. That's our high priest today. He's the one that we can go to for wisdom. He's the one that has us as.
On his heart because He loves us and He's the one that has us on his shoulders of security. And umm, how wonderful that we find that here in these verses.
But, you know, sometimes we don't fully understand the Lord's ways with us. I was just thinking of a good example is, uh, the story of Joseph. You remember how faithful Joseph was with his brothers? He went down and, umm, to give them food. And what did they do? They took them and they threw them into a pit he was sold into.
Slavery and there he worked for Potiphar and he did such a wonderful job and yet his wife.
Accuse them of adultery and he was thrown into prison for two years.
You know, Joseph wouldn't have understood any of that. Why would the Lord allow all these things to happen when he wanted to please the Lord and he wanted to do what was right? But you know, the day came when he was made ruler of all Egypt, and it began to dawn on him, no doubt, why the Lord had allowed these things in preparing him for the time when he would be.
Ruler over all Egypt. So sometimes we don't get the answers as to why the Lord allows things.
Down here. But the day is coming when it will all be made manifest. We just need to trust Him. Well, if we go down, I see our time is running away. But if we go down now to verse 31.
He had mentioned Thou shalt make the robe of the ephod all of blue, so now we go from the ephod to that blue robe underneath.
And it says There shall be a hole in the top of it. In the midst of it shall be a binding of woven work round about the whole of it, as it were the whole of the harbogen that had been on rent, and beneath upon the hem of it.
Thou shalt make pomegranates of blue, and of purple, and of scarlet round about the hem thereof, and bells of gold between them round about a golden bell and a pomegranate, a golden bell and a pomegranate upon the hem of the robe roundabout. And it shall be upon Aaron to minister, and his sound shall be heard when he goeth in unto the holy place before the Lord, and when?
Cometh out that he die. Not so now we find on the hem of this. Well, first of all, the garment was made of blue. It's the heavenly color. But down along the hem there was a pomegranate, a bell pomegranate, and a bell all the way around. And it was made of those various colors that we know bring before us the glories of the Lord Jesus. And you know, the number of bells was exactly equal to the number of pomegranates.
And no doubt the pomegranates would speak of fruitfulness and the bells would speak of testimony, because everywhere the priest went it made a noise, the tinkling of the bells.
And there was an equal number of both. And you know, I think the thought in that is that in the life of the Lord Jesus there was absolute perfection.
The fruit in his life, his walk, was equal to his testimony. You know, the people asked him there in John Eight, they said, who are you and what was his answer altogether? That which I say unto you. In other words, his talk was equal to his walk. You know, with us that's often not the case.
You know, we can do a lot of talking, but our walk doesn't match up to what we talk about.
But with the Lord Jesus, there was absolute perfection. The number of pomegranates were equal to the number of bells. And so, uh, house, you know, I think it's so important for each one of us that our walk should equal our talk. I know it never does. Umm, we, we fail most of the time. But you know, there should be a desire.
00:45:17
That our walk would equal our talk. And I think we see that with the Lord Jesus. A good a good example would be, uh, Acts chapter one.
I'm sure you've seen this, but in the very first verse of Acts one it says this.
Umm, the former treatise have I made all theophilus of all that Jesus began to both do and teach. What came first the doing and what followed the teaching. And so, so often it's easy to do the teaching 1St and then failing in the walk. But with the Lord Jesus, the walk perfectly balanced the talk.
Well, we have that, but I think there's another thought here too, because in the 35th verse.
It says it shall be upon Aaron's minister, and his sound shall be heard when he goes into the holy place before the Lord, and when he cometh out that he die not. Now you will notice in the 33rd verse the pomegranates come first and the bells come second. But in the 34th verse the bells come first, and then the pomegranates.
And.
Perhaps the thought is that when the Lord Jesus went into the presence of God.
There was a testimony that that work on the cross had been done.
And that his work had been perfectly accepted before God. And what was the result?
The Lord sent the Holy Spirit to indwell the church, and there became blessing and fruitfulness as a result. So when the Lord went into the presence of God, it was the bell first as it were, but then the blessing went out in the giving of the Holy Spirit. So I just mentioned that in passing. And then just one other thing that we come to the last part, verse 36. And thou shalt make a plate of pure gold.
And grave upon it, like the engravings of a signet. Holiness to the Lord.
And thou shalt put it on the blue lace, that it may be upon the miter. Upon the forefront of the miter it shall be, and it shall be upon Aaron's forehead. And Aaron. I'm sorry that Aaron may bear the iniquity of the holy things which the children of Israel shall howl in all their holy gifts. And it shall be always upon the forehead that they may be accepted before the.
Now I trust I can make clear what I'm trying to say here, but.
You'll notice that on the, uh, front here, on Aaron's forehead, it said holiness to the Lord. And when the high priest went into the holy place there it said holiness to the Lord. In other words, God can only accept that which is perfectly holy. But you know, sometimes.
I think this actually refers to two things in our lives and that is worship and service. You know, in connection with our worship, you know, we might get up on Lord's Day morning and give out to him, or at least we have maybe, umm, we, we might get out of him and.
Uh, maybe a little bit of self is involved with it. Maybe I think, Oh well, I gotta do something. I'll, I'll give out to him. Umm, and in other words, there's that which isn't really for the Lord. Umm, it's iniquity, but it's mixed with our worship. Or maybe I decide to do something for the Lord and in it there is something that isn't really pleasing to the Lord.
Well, this says here that the errand was to bear the iniquity of the holy things.
In other words, the Lord would separate that which is not for his glory and put it aside, and only that which is for his glory would be presented as holiness before the Lord. And you know, I just say this, that there are young brothers here and perhaps on the Lord's Day morning you think, oh, I can't give out to him. It might not be the right thing, and there's a bit of self mixed up with it, but.
What would the Lord say? The Lord would say, go ahead, give out to Him, and that which is for me will be accepted, and that what isn't accepted will be put aside. Someone has used the illustration and I have enjoyed this for years and Leviticus chapter one. We won't turn to it, but when they offered birds, they were to take the crop and they were to put it in the place of the ashes.
00:50:23
And the feathers they were to take, and they were to put those in the place of the acids, and that which was acceptable was offered to God.
Now why would the crop be taken and put in the place of the ashes? Well, you know, the crop is the place where the bird keeps undigested food. And you know, sometimes we might get up and umm, we might say something that we really haven't made our own. And it really is like that crop, that which we have never made our own, it needs to be put aside. Now Lord puts that aside and what is acceptable?
To him is presented before God. The same with the feathers. The feathers would speak of outward show. And you know, I might get up and give a wonderful prayer to show people and I can really pray well, uh, or I can use beautiful expressions and so on. But that's just self that has to be put in the place of the ashes. But it says here that Aaron may bear the iniquity of the holy things. So the Lord.
He takes what is for him and is presented to God. That which is just for self is put aside in the place of the ashes. So I know I haven't gone into this very well this afternoon, but I think it's a wonderful chapter to think of what the Lord Jesus is doing for us, uh, at the present time, He's there in the glory as our high priest. He's maintaining us in the presence of God.
In security and in love.
And in and in wisdom. And He is living for us and He's our and He's serving us too. How wonderful. Well, I just mentioned these things. I've enjoyed it for many years and umm, just thought maybe we could profit from it. But, uh, how much we need to have His glorious person brought before us.
And umm, may we just take the time to umm, to umm, meditate on some of these things that the Spirit of God has given us in the Old Testament.
Maybe we could just sing 1 hymn in closing, how about 281?
281.
With joy we meditate the grace of God's High Priest above. His heart is filled with tenderness. His very name is love.
Uh, 281.
I can get anything.
00:55:03
From vitamin D time, I can hear you.
We didn't get you.
Refreshed and.
We're going to be.
Our God and.
Father, we come before Thee at the end of this little meeting, and we thank Thee for Thy beloved Son, that One who would perfectly did Thy will, went to the cross and accomplished that mighty redemption. And we thank Thee that now He is in Thy presence, maintaining us before Thee in all his loveliness and grace and goodness. And Lord Jesus, we thank Thee that we are on Thy shoulders of strength.
And that thou are carrying us home. And Lord Jesus, we thank thee too, that we are on thy heart.
Thou knowest each one of us individually and the difficulties we face and our natural dispositions, and yet thou just love us and thou art undertaking for us all the way home. And Lord, we thank thee too, that, uh, that thou knowest best what is best for us, and we can come to thee for wisdom. And we thank thee for that verse that says.
In him are are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
And we thank thee, Lord Jesus, that we can come to thee in every difficulty, and that thou art willing to not only hear, but to answer prayer. And so, Lord, we would just pray that that would bless the few words, though weakly, spoken here this afternoon, and it might be a blessing to each one of us. We ask in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
Philippians 2:12-18
A Brand Plucked from the Fire
Gospel—Henry Sikora
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Shine. It's like one diagram.
Let him touch the anger for me.
Now I can say I am father and I began justify my life and everything.
The hints it's like staying there before I'm finished.
And never left standing in 30 minutes. And then it's a girl standing very slightly berries like me.
At 513.
Is anything from judgement to clean?
Now there is no contemplation.
They can sustain their 4 minutes.
They are upset. Everybody, everyone stands around the five minutes.
Should I review this one corner by around the sun the next night before I'm getting?
I've got some Jing Jing the lights when it's hot like pink. So pretty.
I don't like that laughing out loud, it's crazy.
Let's get some things there for me.
Save me a tender.
Standing out there and every 5 minutes.
******** his blood toward my grandson. Let's get some things therefore, I mean.
Let's look to the Lord and pray and ask Him for His help.
Our God and our loving Father, we thank you for this time that is set aside for the gospel message.
The story of thy love.
The grace and the mercy that has been shown to us.
And we confess that.
We are so weak in telling forth.
That which is so strong with thee, and which is so vital with thee, and yet thou hast committed.
The preaching of the gospel to men. And so we look to thee for strength.
We look today for guidance. We pray for any in this room that do not yet know the Lord Jesus Christ as their precious Savior.
That they may come to salvation, That they may come to know Him whom to know is life eternal, like so many of us have done.
We just ask thy help, Father.
In that precious name of our Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
You know I have.
On my heart, a real, I don't know how to describe it, a burden. A burden, Something that weighs on my heart when I look at the audience.
Maybe you can describe it as it melts my heart to look out over an audience and wonder, just wonder, is everyone out here saved? I want to ask you. The song that we sang was very personal.
Christ is the Savior of sinners. Christ is the Savior.
For me Savior of sinners like.
00:05:02
Me, this is the savior for me.
Do you know him?
Do you know him? Can you point to yourself and say he's my savior?
You know, I sat in many gospel meetings.
From the time I was very young.
Many gospel meetings. Hundreds of gospel meetings.
Maybe not all know hear know me and I'd like to introduce myself.
By reading a scripture.
You know my name isn't in the Bible, but I can introduce myself by reading a scripture, and the scripture I'm going to read is found in the book of Zechariah.
Chapter 3.
Call.
And I'm just going to read the last phrase of the second verse.
It says this.
Is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?
Is not this a brand plucked out of the fire? And it is the Lord that's speaking in this verse, and he's pointing to a man and he says, is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?
I'm going to tell you a little bit about myself.
I came to gospel meetings, hundreds of gospel meetings.
From the time I was about five or six years old.
Year after year I went to gospel meetings.
And I didn't get saved.
I heard the message.
It was preached clearly, it was preached ably and I didn't get saved.
There came a time when I was 10 years old and I talked to some of the children and I know there's children here that are 9, there's some that are 10, there's some that are 11.
At 10 years old, I had an accident.
And you children probably don't know what a manure spreader looks like. But I'll tell you what it does.
It's the machine that takes.
Manure, which is droppings from, in this case, chickens and.
They take it out in the field and it has.
A rig in the back that chops this manure up into little pieces.
As fingers that come down and chop it up and spread it out.
In the field.
When I was 10 years old, I had an accident with the manure spreader. It was empty.
And I went into a nurse, I went into one of those mechanisms that was going around and around to chop things up.
And I went right in.
Or started to go in.
What do you think would happen to me if I went all the way in?
Yeah, I would have got chopped up.
And he stopped.
It stopped. It cut into my leg, uh, tremendous gash in my leg and it cut into my head.
It cut into my head. I probably came that close to being killed.
And God had mercy on me.
I wasn't saved and that's why I read this verse.
Is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?
00:10:00
God had mercy on me. He saved my life.
But you know, I had a hard heart.
I don't remember that bothering me and it wasn't for four years later it was four years later I was finally safe.
I was finally saved. I came to know the Lord Jesus Christ as my Savior.
And he's my Savior, and He saved me, and I thank him, and I praise him, and I bless his name, and I'm happy in the Lord Jesus Christ that He had mercy on me. And I look out.
Over this room at each one here and I want the same thing for you.
I want you to know your sins are forgiven. I want you to know that you're on your way to heaven. I want you to know that you have peace with God. I want you to know that you know the living God, the living God.
We recently we've been reading through the book of Acts in Dorothy and we came up with this in the in the 14th chapter.
Paul is preaching. He's preaching about.
The living God to these people who worshipped idols.
And you know by searching it says in the book of Job.
Canst thou by searching find out God?
How do we know God? Do you children understand the heart of man is so wayward and naturally just goes away from God? There were two times in the history of this world when everybody knew God.
You've heard the story of Adam and Eve. They were in the garden. They God talked to them. They talked with God. They knew God.
And it wasn't very long before this world was filled. I am certain that there were millions of people on this world, on this earth, at the time of the flood.
And almost none of them knew God.
They forgot God.
And we tend to do just that very thing. Forget God.
The fool has said in his heart, no God. People say, I don't want God. All we like sheep you may have read in the book of Isaiah and memorize the verse. All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way and we tend to do that to forget God.
But he hasn't left himself without witness.
No, there's the witness of God in creation. Turn to Psalm 19.
The witness of God in creation, just to look briefly at that.
The heavens declare the glory of God.
And the firmament show with his handiwork. Day on today utter a speech night unto night Uttereth showeth knowledge, there is no speech.
Nor language where their voice is not heard or that third verse could read. There is no speech.
There are no words, but their voice is heard.
You know when you look up at the stars and you look up at the moon and you look up at the sun?
How did they get there?
There's a God, it's a voice that speaks to men and women. And, you know, people have come along and tried to undermine the truth of the word of God and say there's a thing called evolution where things just came about by themselves. That's not true, is it? You know, I deal with birds. I, I work, I enjoy birds and I work with birds quite a bit.
And.
People come into my shop.
And one of the verses I have up is in the beginning God created.
00:15:04
And then another verse. Every house is built by some man, now that he now he that built all things is God.
And point out to people how much more wonderful a bird is than, let's say, an airplane. They both fly.
But you know, a bird is much more wonderful than an airplane.
An airplane doesn't fuel itself.
Right, you have to put gasoline fuel in. A bird feeds itself, it fuels itself.
An airplane doesn't navigate itself, it has to have a pilot drive in. A bird navigates itself.
And goes long distances. Some go thousands of miles. An airplane doesn't reproduce itself. You have to build another one. A bird reproduces itself. An airplane doesn't clean itself. You have to have machinery that cleans an airplane. A bird cleans itself. And yet if I went to an airport and showed a person in an airplane and said, look at this wonderful thing that just happened.
They say Henry, that's ridiculous.
How much more ridiculous it is that people say things just happen.
You know, there was a hunter.
Down in Africa and.
And he wasn't a believer. He believed in evolution. And he made fun of the young man who was his gun bearer, who carried his gun and.
They were out hunting one day.
And they were looking for lions.
And this man was making fun of the young man, the hunter was making fun of the young man who carried his guns.
He said. How could you believe?
In God. And so the young man said, well, look.
Here.
Is a track.
How do you know a lion has been here? He said to the hunter. The hunter said there's his track. He's left his mark.
You know what the young man said? The sun was coming up, he said. God has left his mark in the sky.
When you look at the sun, you look at the moon, it's a voice. There is no speech, there's no words, but it's the voice of God. It's the word of God speaking to men. He has not left himself without a witness. God has not done that. He's left adequate witness to everyone that he exists, that he is the living.
God, their voice is heard, wisdom to his power and wisdom.
That's what it's witnessed to when we sing that in one of our hymns. All worlds His glorious power confess, His wisdom, all his works express.
Is there further witness to God? Turn to Acts 14.
We've already alluded to that verse.
Acts Chapter 14.
And verse 17.
Paul was talking to people who worshipped idols. He said this.
Nevertheless, he God left not himself without witness, in that he did good.
And gave us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness. God gives witness to who He is by the way He cares for His creatures that He's placed here on the earth.
He cares for us. It tells us clearly that in Peter's epistle he cares for you.
The word of God makes it very individual, giving food. All the things that we enjoy, family life, we have homes, we have food, we have clothing. God gives us these things richly to enjoy. We enjoy them. It's the care of God for us. It's a witness.
00:20:06
The living God gives witness.
Regarding himself. And so we have the witness to his power and wisdom.
We have the witness to his care.
But there's something that is more wonderful than that.
And I began quoting.
A hymn, all worlds, His glorious power confessed, his wisdom all his works.
Express but oh his love.
His love what tongue can tell First John chapter 4 Let's read a little bit about.
His love.
How do I know that God is love? I don't learn that by looking at the sun and the moon and the stars. I don't know that God is love. I see his care and caring for me and giving.
That which is necessary for life. But there's one way that we learn about His love.
First John 49. In this was manifested the love of God toward us.
Because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him.
Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us.
And sent his son.
To be the propitiation for our sins.
You all know that verse so very well, for God so loved the world.
That he gave his only begotten Son. But you know, it's very important you can learn that verse.
God so loved the world. We can read this verse. God sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him and not make that personal. You know, when I was a child growing up, I heard this.
Maybe you've heard it.
The Lord Jesus needs to be your personal savior. You know what that means? He has to be your Savior.
It's not enough that mom and dad are saved. It's not enough that brother and sister are saved.
Or that grandmother and grandfather are saved. Or our best friend is saved. He needs to be your savior. I heard a story once I thought was so good There was a Sunday school teacher.
And he asked his Sunday school a question.
Yes. Umm.
What is the best thing you have ever heard?
And he got different answers.
One, one of the children in the class said the best thing I ever heard is that we were gonna move from the country into the city.
And that was the best news I ever heard.
And another one of the children said, that's funny. He said, the best news I ever heard. We were moving from the country and we were going to the city. Going from from the city to the country, Excuse me, just the opposite. You see, it was just a change. That was good news. They were moving somewhere else.
But there was one little boy. I love his answer.
He said the best news I ever heard.
Is that the Lord Jesus came into this world to save?
Me.
To save me.
To make it personal to understand that.
We have the question of sins.
Brought in here.
You children know what sins are.
You know what sins are There are things like.
Lies.
Disobedience.
We call them the bad things. There's much, there's much worse sins and there's many sins and.
00:25:08
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, but you know.
Sin is even, it is such an awful thing, and I believe we are sinners beyond anything that we imagine. Because you know what else sin is doing? My own will.
Instead of God's will.
Just doing what I want to do.
Uh, it's a awful thing. I remember a little girl.
Wanted something that her sister had.
And she grabbed it from her sister. She was just a little girl. And she ran away, saying me, me, me, me, me.
That's the whole principle of sin NI.
What I want? What I want?
We're sinners. You're a Sinner. I'm a Sinner. And I like to use the expression. It's like we're pickled in it. It's just like.
You ever you take a cucumber and you put it in this vinegar sauce and it goes, that vinegar goes all the way through it from one end to the other. And that's the way sin has got a hold of us. It gets into us. It's just.
Through us through and through sinners.
But the Lord Jesus Christ came into this world and it says God, he, God loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. And that's where the story of the cross of Calvary comes in. The Lord Jesus Christ came into this world and he went to the cross of Calvary.
And he suffered for sins whose sins he had no sins.
It was my sins that put him on the cross.
It was your sins.
That he was concerned about.
Christ.
Suffered for sins, the justice for the unjust, that he might bring us.
To God what a love God has for.
Us that we have here.
That God sent.
We have the love of God shown out because He sent His Son. But you know the love didn't begin then.
It says in the book of Jeremiah.
I have loved you with an everlasting love.
Do you know what that means?
God says I have loved you with an everlasting love. I used to think why that means that since I'm a believer that the Lord Jesus will love me from now till forever.
It means that, but it means much, much more than that.
You know he loved me before I was ever born.
Did you know that?
That God loved you before you were born, before your parents ever thought about you, before you ever existed, God thought about you.
That he loved you.
That's what it means. An everlasting love means there was never a beginning. There will never ever be an end to the love that God has. I have loved you with an everlasting love. And we read in the book of Proverbs, the Lord Jesus says my delights were with the sons of men before there was even an earth.
Here, that's the love of God. This is something that's immense.
This is something that's wonderful. This is something I cannot wrap my mind around. But God loves you and he loves me, and it's an everlasting love, and he loved you and me so much that he gave his only begotten Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
To be your savior, to be.
00:30:03
My Savior to suffer for those sins, sins that I can't even tell you, all the sins I've ever done, but in his own body.
He bore them on the tree. That is the love of our Lord Jesus Christ. That's the love that he wants you to enjoy. That's the love of God. Well.
You know what happens?
When that love is rejected, is he your savior?
Can you sing as we sang?
Christ is a savior of sinners. Christ is the Savior for me.
For me, let's look at another scripture, the book of Amos, Joel, Amos, Obadiah.
Amos.
Chapter 4.
And verse 11.
I I told you that I was.
A brand plucked from the burning. The Lord saved me. I would I I could be in a lost eternity today, but the Lord saved me. Let's read something else here.
Chapter Amos 411 I have overthrown some of you as God overthrew Sodom gomorrah, he's talking to Israel and ye were as.
Ye were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning.
Yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord, Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel, and because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God.
You hear what's being said.
The Lord is speaking to those who are in a special.
Privileged place. Israel at that time was privileged among all nations, and the Lord said to them, You only have I chosen of all the nations of the earth.
And you were like a brand. Like a brand plucked.
Out of the burning yet ye have not returned unto me. I'd like that to apply that to those who are in the room.
Everyone in this room is in a special, a very special, privileged place.
You have heard the word of God.
It's been made clear to you. You've had the gospel. There are people.
In this world, there are many people in this country that we live in who have never heard a clear gospel. But you have.
You have.
And it's like the Lord has taken you.
From.
A an awful place.
You're like a firebrand plucked out of the burning.
But then there's this comment made.
Yet have ye not returned unto me? Have you come to the Lord? I want to ask that question to everyone in this room.
Have you come to the Lord? Have you received the gospel message? Have you believed it? Can you say Christ is the Savior of sinners? Christ is the Savior for me. Can you say, like that young Sunday school student, the best news that I ever heard is that Jesus came into this world to save.
Me and I'm saved. Are you saved?
Because here's what's going to happen.
Prepare to meet thy God, everyone of us in this room.
Someday is gonna stand before God.
You're going to see him.
He is the living God.
Every one of us is gonna see God.
00:35:03
Are you ready?
Are you ready? There was a time in my life.
When that worries me.
You know, I would lay awake in my bed and turn from side to side.
And I thank the Lord that I grew up in a poor household.
Where I live in South Jersey, it gets hot in the summer.
Doesn't it, Daniel?
But you know what? We didn't have a fan.
We didn't have air conditioning.
And we didn't have insulation in the house and it got hot.
And I couldn't sleep.
Because I was worried about my soul.
I wasn't safe. Don't let that happen to you. Come to the Lord today.
It was a hot night that by the grace of God, I got out of my bed and kneeled down and accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as my personal Savior.
I'm looking forward to this.
Meeting God in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ.
The Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of God. He's God himself, and we've been reading about him. He humbled himself. He came into this world to be the sin bearer, to go to the cross of Calvary to wash my sins away, and he's washed the sins away of.
Everyone in this room that has put their trust in him and in the words of there was a poor lady who at the end of her life accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as her Savior. She was worried, worried, worried before she got saved.
And she heard the message of the gospel, and she got saved right at the end of her life.
You know what she said.
And oh, for the welcome, I soon shall know.
No heart can tell how I long to go.
That's proper Christianity to depart to be with Christ.
To look forward to that day when we will see him.
The one who loved us.
Loves you.
And gave himself for you.
What a wonderful message. What a wonderful savior. Is he your savior?
In closing, I'd like to sing a hymn. It's not on the hymn sheet. We're going to sing it from memory, but I'll it's just a single verse of a hymn that we sing often in Sunday school.
And I'll just go over the words. A message came from heaven to cheer my heart one day.
It set the joy bells ringing and taste my chaste, my gloom away. It was in the Holy Bible. John's Gospel, chapter 3, verse 16, I discovered was written there for me. That means me.
Whosoever will believe in that means.
Me John 316 is talking about For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him.
Should not perish, but have everlasting life.
It comes out and could tear my heart one day. It's nice. But Joy's upstream and came in chase by flew away but it's not Holy Bible comes back from chapter 3.
36960 very much great things. Therefore being that means being that means being true. So I have very well-being of the events that means.
I am so very glad because it's a big difference because so as a very well would be, to make that black means being.
Whosoever that means me, that means you, it means everybody. That's the heart of God. Let's thank him, Father.
00:40:00
Find love.
Is wonderful.
It has reached down into this world and saved so many of us in this room and it is our desire that each and everyone that is here.
Would know thee, the living and true God and Jesus Christ.
Whom thou hast sent, And enjoy the forgiveness of sins.
And go on their way in peace to heaven.
And wear a crown with Jesus there in that happy land. Father, we thank Thee for Thy precious word that reveals these things that we would never know.
Apart from it being written in thy word for revealing thyself to us.
Bless whatever was of thyself this evening, Father.
We pray in the precious name of our Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
Burdens
Children—Wally Dear
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I want to get started on the singing because.
I like to sing, and I know you boys and girls like to sing, right? OK, so we have this little hymn sheet in our hands and we're going to sing some songs off this hymn sheet. But you know what? If you have a song that's not on this hymn sheet.
And you want us to sing it, We might be able to sing it without the hymn sheet without looking. We just might be able to do that. So OK, what number would you like or which song would you like to sing?
#8 All right, let's start with #8.
And I'm gonna suggest that we sing the 1St and the last verse of the song or the hymn and that way we'll be able to sing more songs and more boys and girls will be able to give out songs. Sound like a good plan? OK, now if.
You really wanna sing another verse? You just let me know and we'll make arrangements for that, OK? But otherwise we're gonna sing first and last, OK #8?
See, I have a swell sky on. The drive is gone, and then it's glory of his, glory out. Come in, yell at the rest the same Saturday night.
Seven Y 797805.
Big over Sainsburys substantial.
Why you had so?
Yes, but I don't catch the eyes coming.
In for a reaction, His glory of Come on my name.
You're out of your way to stay.
Coming and watching them, staying in the Lord's love.
Caleb #11.
#11.
First and last verse.
Who will your eyes be? The whole spirit of the Lord named by.
Steady out of cold, that's not hard to murder your grind Where?
I should say I don't have a knee so hard. Wet light side stars, Fast forward.
We have cancer that it starts falling and cracked and shrugged while the bill was thrown like the children abroad which can not do gratis burning.
This singing sounds so wonderful. It's great. Now you hit your hand up. Which number?
Can you tell me?
47 So we're going to turn to the last song on the hymn sheet when he cometh.
00:05:03
When is he coming? Oh, by the way, who are we talking about here? When he cometh, who's the he? Do you know?
God. Can you tell me his name? Jesus. Yes, Jesus is God.
God the Son and He's coming back, but we just don't know when.
It could be today.
And he's coming to make up his jewels, so #47.
In the morning it is bright crowned on my thorny it ain't so shine again. And here it's beautiful to see right jumps forward against crown.
OK, down there, Burly.
Gypsy boy OK #44.
Again, the outpatient story is all right, so.
I can say of the children of men, nobody ever had something so.
If anything, we thought the last words of his friends, just as he answered the family of God is sent inside him, so ever said he.
Ensure that he sent him for me again. Salvation story received horizontal.
No one can set up the children of them. Nobody ever has told me before, Lord.
Yes.
Teammate would like #14 #14.
Our dear God, our men on this, darling, they provide you guys. No. Why do you watch in the blood of mine?
When the microwave drummers will your own speaking like you're right, flying in the flat out of the land where your soul be ready for a long time right and be washed in the blood of the land.
I want to drink the light in the soul. I think, what are the land and the land? I hear time and swastikas. Why? I mean that it's not snowing in that it's snowing. Are you lodged in the blood of the land?
Very good. Yes, Sam.
25 All right #25.
00:10:25
To become and the fatal light behind.
The time sitting in time.
Singing time while the voice of Jesus called to be in time.
If I can send you a long term way, you'll make fine so often. Get it and your pride is not too late the entire time.
And her key is still warranty coordinates like so far it's your heart you can show him it's that I don't know how to reach all otherwise it's big and time I need some darkness seems to be lightly frozen away that seems and pride come on I'm going to start from heaven to night vision.
Time.
And your pride becomes to play in time.
Yes.
Which one is it?
Oh, that's a good song. Yeah. I'm so glad that our Father in Heaven. Is that on the same sheet? I don't think it is, is it?
I think we can see that one though without looking right.
All right.
I am so glad that our Father in heaven comes after his father and my wife. He has given wonderful things that he found by teeth negative son care and sight. She is not loved me. I am so proud that he is unplugged me give us my speech. He is not spice me.
I am so glad that Jesus of me. Jesus loves me.
Jesus bless me. I am so glad that Jesus loves me. Jesus loves me.
You know, there's another song about the love of Jesus, the Savior's love, and it goes wide. Wide is the ocean. How many know this song? Oh.
Almost everybody knows it. Well, why don't we stand up and we'll stretch and you might want to turn sideways just a little bit so as not to harm your neighbor.
Why? Why does the old shine high as that happened to fall in different sights, even my favorite song.
I don't know where it is telling my child up his head.
On our hands, for our kids to believe that it is not great to see God breathe.
Very good. Nice to see you boys and girls stretch out on that song because there's nothing greater than the love of Jesus. It's so great and it just goes everywhere in the whole wide world.
It's so wonderful. Well, we have time for maybe one more song.
Uh, yes.
00:15:01
46.
I think that's going to be our last song off the hymn sheet for now #46 now we have a line here.
That says and he calls and he calls all the GIRLS.
How many of those do we have here, girls? How many?
OK, here's one another one. All right, Now listen, I'm going to ask you girls to sing that line all by yourself, all right?
You know what, maybe I'll just ask the girls that are sitting on the front rows that sing at all by yourself, OK?
Not right away, but when we get to that part, OK.
And then we're going to ask the boys to sing the next line where it says, and he wants all the Bo IS2. So I see boys and I see girls, and I'm not sure if one outnumbers the other, but that doesn't really matter. We're going to ask the boys to sing that line all by themselves, the ones on the front row. OK. And together we'll sing the rest of the song 46.
And he has died beyond King.
That day he has killed the last night to lands and beginning.
Boy, I almost need a hearing aid for that one. Maybe we should try it one more time. Girls, can you kind of raise the volume a little? And boys too. I think we can do better one more time.
Uh, TDP, I already got it. All right, it's me. Take your letter on my hands and she's lagging. He has two hands. Let's come to who has saved me dizzy.
Very good. That was much better.
So let's set these hymn sheets aside.
And we're going to take time to pray and ask the Lord for his help.
For the Sunday school.
Dear Father, in loving God, we thank Thee this morning.
For this wonderful opportunity to present to the boys and girls the love of Jesus.
And we thank thee, dear Father, that thou hast love.
The girls Douglas loved the boys and we are so glad that that was Tell us about thy love in the book that thou is given the Bible.
We thank you that my desire is that each one should be saved and know it and enjoy it. We thank Thee for that precious Savior, the Lord Jesus, who on the cross shed his blood to save us, to wash us from our sins. And we do earnestly pray that each and everyone here today might.
Go to Jesus for that cleansing power, that they might be washed whiter than the snow that we see outside this building, the beautiful snow. We ask this now as we commit this time to DC. Can I help not only here, but wherever Thy word is going forth. We pray for the salvation of souls. We ask all and give thanks.
My precious name, Lord Jesus, Amen.
Now, is there anybody here that wants to say a verse? We're not going to twist anybody's arm, but if you'd like to say a verse.
We'll ask you to say the first.
Be not rash with thy mouth, let not thine heart be hasty. Tutter anything before God, for God is in heaven, and thou upon earth. Therefore let thy words be few. Ecclesiastes five and two, Thank you.
Very nice.
00:20:18
And.
It's Tom the Shake.
In the save that which was lost. John. John 1411. Very good, thank you.
Anybody else?
I hope this little device isn't too scary.
I I I noticed the boys and girls, they seem to be quite taken with these microphones.
Ecclesiastes 5 and two, Be not rash with thine mouth.
Let not anything other before God.
And.
Let not thine heart be hasty for God not to utter anything before God. Wait.
Uh, for God is in the on the in heaven and on the earth that.
Upon the earth.
Therefore let thy words be few. Ecclesiastes five and two, thank you very good. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 316.
Oh.
OK, I'll tell you what, I'll be back.
Anybody else down here?
I can't know that one. Now you wanna see one good taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man you trust in him. Somebody for eight. Oh, that's good.
All right.
He kinda not a tender heart, forgiving and another Eden as God for God's sake for getting you.
John 316 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 316.
So 316 for God, so love the world that you gave is always forgotten. Should not pears have everlasting life? John 316 Good all right.
Yeah.
Dennis is one. There's one In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
Very good. Thanks.
Philippians 210 That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow things in heaven, of things in earth, and of things under the earth. I think that's it.
Very good, alright.
Anybody else?
No.
I'm just wondering, uh.
The apostle Paul said I'm not ashamed of the God.
Gospel of Christ. And you said that, didn't you? Yeah, that was really good. Now is that found in Romans chapter one, verse 12 or is it 16?
I think I said 12, but I wanna make sure I had that right.
16 I got thinking after maybe it was 16.
Well now, boys and girls, today.
I'm so happy to see you here.
Sitting on your seats.
And I wonder.
If anybody has a problem.
You know, last night Mr. Sikora was talking to us and he said he had a burden.
And you know, that's what I like to talk about today. Burdens.
Uh, a burden could be a problem.
And.
00:25:02
I'm gonna disappear.
For a little bit and then I'm gonna show up again.
So your boys and girls just wait, OK? Because I will be back.
Uh, uh.
Oh.
Is this a burden?
Yeah.
Is a burden.
It's big.
And if this was full of bricks?
This would be very heavy.
But boys and girls?
This that is on my back represents.
Avold a burden?
And it is the burden of sin, the load of sin.
And somebody asked one time, how much does that load weigh? They wanted to know how much.
Does the burden of sin way and they said well.
I don't really feel any burden of sin.
And.
Man, that.
Was listening. You know what he said? He said the Bible tells us.
About those that are dead in their sins.
They're dead in trespasses and in sins. And if there was a dead man laying on the floor here and we put.
£500 on him, would he feel it?
Would he know that he has a burden?
Do you think you would feel it? No. Well what do we put 1000 lbs on it?
Would you feel the burden? The load? How about a ton?
No. Why?
Can somebody tell me why he wouldn't feel it? Yeah, you tell me he's dead. Exactly. A dead man will not feel a weight.
And so this man said to this fellow that indicated he.
Didn't feel the weight of sin, he said.
The Bible says you're dead in your sins. Is that a good way to be?
I hope that there's nobody here today that is dead.
In their sins before God, you don't have any life. Oh, it's true. You come to Sunday school.
And you can play ball and you can skate and play hockey and you might say, well, I'm full of life, but if you're in your sins, God sees you as dead.
Did and you know if we had a dead man here?
We wouldn't feel too comfortable probably.
And I know some boys and girls, they don't like to go to a place where there's dead people, you know, like to a Funeral Home.
So to be dead.
Is how we are before God in our sins, but you know.
God works and He gives us to feel the weight of sin.
And today I brought this.
Burden because I thought it would be good to feel what the weight of sin really is.
And.
How can I get rid of this burden of sin? Does anybody have any idea how I could do this?
What do you think?
That's very good. What were you going to say, Sam?
Very good. Now he said, ask Jesus to take it away, take away the burden. And Sam said, ask the Lord Jesus to wash away your sins.
What were you going to say?
00:30:02
Do you know how I can get rid of the burden of sin?
No, no, what do you think Burley? Get saved. OK, so we have 3 answers.
Which one is right?
Which one is right, Caleb? All three are right. That's very good.
So I I brought a.
You see this, uh.
What I brought with me today.
Just across. See.
And did you know that on the cross the Lord Jesus took my birth of sin, and yours too? If you trust Him, He was willing to take the vote.
And he bore the punishment for my sins on the cross of Calvary. And it's so wonderful to think about the love of Jesus that he'd be willing to do that. You say, well, how heavy was the load? Well, now I brought something else here.
And.
You're wondering about all these books, right?
OK.
I would like everybody to come and take a book.
And then you can take it back to your seat, OK?
We got all different sizes here.
Some are thick and some are thin.
And some are big and some are little.
So as soon as you get a book, I'd like you to take it back to your seat.
OK, so we got the three books left here.
I thought we might run out of books, but we didn't.
Now these books.
Boys and girls.
You have lots of pages.
And we're gonna pretend like these books are a record of your life.
Every thought.
Thought every word.
Every deed, every action.
Is recorded in these books.
And so these are books that.
Are shall we say?
Books of sin and it's not a nice subject to talk about, but the fact is we have to face this matter of sin because sin is what separates us from God.
We don't want to be separated from God. We don't want to be separated from the one who made the world, the universe, made the animals, made you and me. We want to be close to our Creator. We want to have peace with him. But you know what? God is holy. He cannot look upon sin. It tells us that very clearly.
Holy, holy, holy. And to be holy means to love the good, hate the evil.
So sin is a big problem and thank God He has provided a remedy and we spoke about it already. We learned that the Lord Jesus shed his blood at the cross to wash away our sins and so we can come to God and enjoy his companionship. But we want to think about what the Lord Jesus did at the cross to make it all possible.
So some of you have books that are.
Quite thick. Some are thin, you know. I don't know what your life is like, but I want to tell you something if you are still in your sins.
I think you've got a lot more sins in that book than you perhaps realize. God is keeping a record. It tells us in Revelation 20 that the dead, small and great stand before God and the books are open at that time. In those books, nothing but sin because those people, and I'm afraid that they're going to be boys and girls there too, They had opportunity to come to Jesus, but they said no.
00:35:00
No.
I won't come.
And they die in their sins, and they're going to stand before the great White Throne. We read about it in Revelation.
Chapter 20.
But the books are opened OK.
Now you say, well this book doesn't seem that heavy, but I would like you to take your book.
And you hold that book, you see like this.
You just hold it right straight out like that.
And and don't rest it on your knee.
Just hold it there. You find that the book is kind of heavy.
Yeah, I see some books are going down like this.
You know, the longer that we hold that book out there, the heavier it becomes.
And the truth is, OK, you can put your book back.
The truth is, poison girls, the longer that we go on.
Without coming to Jesus, the more sins are recorded in the book and it becomes heavier and heavier and heavier.
It's a very serious thing to disobey the Lord.
And you know what the Lord says to you, and to me He says, Come unto me.
Come unto me, all ye that are.
Uh, heavy late labor and our heavy lace. I will give you rest.
And as I look at the boys and girls here today, I know some have come to Jesus.
In fact, yesterday one of the boys told me.
That he had accepted the Lord Jesus not very long ago, about a month ago, and that was some of the best news I heard.
In a while, it was good news. Yes, he came.
Because the Lord Jesus said, Come unto me, he came.
But the Lord Jesus speaks about some.
And he says they're so stubborn.
They will not come unto me that they might have life. They will not come.
And the book, the record of their sin. It grows and grows. It gets heavier and heavier.
And unless they come to Jesus, they're going to end up in a lost eternity.
In the Lake of Fire.
But the Lord Jesus, he wants to save you, boys and girls. I can't hardly begin to tell you how much He loves you and he wants you to be saved. He wants to have you. We sang about it in this song. He calls the girls. He calls the boys. Why? Because he wants the boys. He wants the girls too.
Because he loves boys and girls.
So I hope there's nobody here that's saying no to Jesus.
Because if you're saying no to Jesus, your book is getting heavier and heavier and heavier, and your book is going to be with you for all eternity if you don't come to Jesus. And you need to come now. Now we're gonna do something. And I never have done this before, but we're gonna find out how it works today.
You know, on the cross, the Lord Jesus.
With arms extended like this, he died.
And it tells us that there.
There was a darkness and I I brought something here.
You see this shroud?
She's planning on that.
What does this represent?
From 12:00 noon until 3:00 in the afternoon, it became dark.
And the sins of all who would trust in the Lord Jesus were put upon him during those dark hours. And Jesus suffered for sins, the chest for the unjust to bring us to God. He was wounded for my transgressions and for yours too, if you trust Him. You know it's nice to put names in verses.
I wonder if somebody here that is saved?
Would be willing to put your name in this verse He was wounded for. Is there anybody whose name I could use? Caleb. OK.
00:40:09
He was wounded for Caleb's transgressions. He was bruised for Caleb's iniquities. The chastisement of Caleb's peace was upon him, and with his stripes, Caleb is healed.
Does that make you feel good, Caitlin?
Yeah, I'd like to put my name in there. How about a girl? Is there a girl that OK, Julia? All right, Julianne is going to let me do her name.
He was wounded for Julianna's transgressions. He was bruised for Julianna's iniquities. The chastisement of Juliana's peace was upon him, and with his stripes Juliana is healed.
Could I put your name in the first?
I'm sure I could if you're trusting in the Savior. But maybe there's somebody here that has never come to the Lord Jesus and you're saying no to Jesus.
And.
That's going on in sin, really in self will, because the Lord Jesus says come unto me and you won't come. Well, let's see what happens.
See, I'll put this right here.
Caleb said he'd be willing to try this. So Caleb, do you mind coming up here?
And you put your hands out like this.
Can you just stand right here, OK.
Now, I know Caleb, he's a big, strong boy. That's why I called on him. So we're going to see how strong he really is. Now, I'm going to ask you boys and girls, one at a time to come up and put your books on Caleb's hands. OK? So can you just extend your hands like that?
Wait, wait, wait, wait. OK, You want to start Sam? OK.
All right.
OK.
Oh, OK, you got it. Let's try to line them up. OK, so.
All right, who's OK?
Now, Caleb, when it gets to be too much, you just let us know.
All right, just hold your seat one at a time, boys and girls.
OK, OK. I think we're done.
OK, boys and girls, thank you very much.
I think Kayla did a good job too.
Uh, no, no, you have to put them back up here, OK.
So, boys and girls.
Kayla did a very good job.
But he was not able.
To bear the sins. Book of everybody was he.
And there is nobody in the whole wide world. I don't know. Some men are so strong they could probably press up about 500 lbs.
Or maybe even 1000. I don't know what the record is, but you know what? There's nobody in the whole wide world.
Who would be able to bear the load of sin, the sin load? Only the Lord Jesus could do that. And so during those dark hours, the Lord Jesus took upon himself our sins. It tells us that.
He dare our sins in his own body on the tree.
And we often sing to him about Oh Christ, what burdens bow thy head our load.
Was laid on.
And you know, the Lord Jesus exhausted the judgment of a holy God against sin, and then his precious blood was shed to wash our sins away. And it's so wonderful to be saved and to know it and to know that we don't have to walk around with a big sin load.
On our back, because Jesus died on the cross, he gave his life.
And shed his blood. And you know, the Lord Jesus rose again the third day. He didn't stay in the grave, but.
00:45:08
When he came out of the grave and went back into heaven, you think he still has those sins upon him?
No sins are gone.
And he sits there.
In holiness and love, reaching out to boys and girls like yourselves. He wants to save you.
He wants to make you happy. You can't be happy with sin mode. Give it to Jesus, trust him, He'll take it all away. You know we sing a song and maybe we should close with this. I see if time is up.
I'm so happy and here's the reason why Jesus took my burden all the way.
How many know this song?
Oh, credit number. No it. OK, let's try it together and see if we can sing it without looking at the words.
I'm so happy and here's the reason why. Jesus took Piper and all away. Now I sing as the days go by. Jesus took my bird and all away. Who wants My heart was heavy with a load of sin. Jesus took the load and gave me peace with it.
Now I'm singing.
Go by, Jesus took my burden all away.
You know, there's another song and we won't take time to sing it. Our time has run out. But it says here in #39 are we weak and heavy laden, cumbered with a load of care? A load of care. You know, sometimes as Christians, we know our sins are gone, but we carry around cares and we worry and it just becomes.
Such a burden, all of these cares. We worry about whether we're going to get sick or what's going to happen tomorrow or if we're going to lose our job or somebody's going to say something.
It's not nice at school, but you know what? We can take this load to the Lord Jesus too, and he says.
You know he'll take care of the problem, so let's go to him, not only about our sins, but about our cares, OK?
Cast your burden upon the Lord, and he shall sustain thee, casting all your care upon Him, for a care is for you. So we're going to pray. And even as we pray, if there's a boy or girl who has never yet asked the Lord Jesus to take away their sins.
And you realize that your sins are just mounting up and the record of your sin is growing, and you want to be happy and you want to enjoy fellowship, companionship with the Lord Jesus and with God. You can be saved here and now even as we pray. Just say, Lord Jesus, I know I'm a Sinner and I want to be safe. I want to go to heaven.
And.
I ask you to wash my sins away.
He'll do it. He'll do it now, and you can go out of this place happy.
And you'll be able to sing from the bottom of your heart. I'm so happy because Jesus took my burden all the way. So let's pray. Our Father and gracious God, we thank thee this morning for the wonderful message of the gospel, a message of love that has come down from above to cheer our hearts. We thank thee, Lord Jesus, that thou is willing to go to the cross.
And thou wouldst be willing to take.
Our sins upon thyself, and make them thine own, and suffer the wrath, the fierce anger of a holy God against those sins. We thank thee that thou hast exhausted the judgment. And now we go free and we can rejoice and sing. Oh Happy Day, when Jesus washed my sins away. But we pray especially for any in this hall today who might still be without Christ.
Without salvation in their sins, traveling the broad road to destruction, we earnestly pray that they might be arrested in their downward course, might feel the weight of their sins, and enter into Thy holiness in some measure to realize that Thou art of two pure eyes than to behold iniquity. And so we do pray that souls might turn in repentance to Thee.
00:50:04
Lord Jesus, entrust thee and be.
Assured that all is well for time and eternity. So we ask all now and thank you for each dear boy and girl here today. We ask and give thanks for all things in the precious name of the Lord Jesus, Amen.
Ten Temptations
Open—Robert Boulard
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
Right.
Our loving God.
Father, we ask for help for this time before us.
That we have just had the privilege of giving back to. These are.
Father and the Lord Jesus and remembrance of the Lord reminded of that love. If any waters could not quench that here shown, we'd be sad as we've considered the Lord Jesus.
Submission to be, to be our father. And in that halfway here.
Thought it not robbery equal to God, but made himself no reputation. So we thank you for the ministry for the food that we've had so far. We need it. But now before Jesus, we ask the US out of the church to provide that which is needed for the day that we live in that.
That word from the prophet that they would speak two or three that thy mind would be made clear to us As for for the wilderness pathway and then it's a day-to-day trial of it. It would be that portion for each one of our hearts caused that there would be liberty of the spirit caused the Spirit be much blessing as a result of this time this afternoon. We ask these things our Father and our God.
In the name of our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
I'd like to turn to the Little book of Exodus. Read a couple of verses there in chapter one.
I was just praying I had this uh.
Subject upon my heart, and I just asked the Lord that maybe the hymn might suggest the portion and that a brother might pray and suggest a portion as well. I feel encouraged, you know, just to take this little passage. These are the passages of Scripture up in the Book of Exodus and the Book of Numbers in connection with the 10 temptations.
That the children of Israel tempted the Lord with.
But I'd like to read just introductory, a couple of verses because I believe as we consider the wilderness path and the testings that the Lord gives us in the wilderness, that we have to have a sense of the grace of our God. We have to have a sense of the delivery, the deliverance from Egypt, and the mighty power of God, the intervention of God in every one of our lives individually.
To deliver us from the power of sin and Satan, the power of this world.
That it was a mighty deliverance, and if we have a sense of the grace of God in connection with each one of us.
Then will be preserved as we face the testings as we go through the wilderness scene. So chapter one of Exodus verse.
13 The Egyptians made the children of Israel to serve with rigor.
They made their lives bitter with hard ******* and mortar.
And then brick in all manner of service in the field, All their service wherein they made them serve was with rigor.
You know that word? We don't use it very often. Rigor. It means with severity and with cruelty.
This world knows what it is to make those that are slaves to sin to serve with severity and with cruelty. And it took the Lord's deliverance to deliver us from so great a a *******. And we find then later in verse 22 That Pharaoh charged all his people saying every son that is born.
You shall cast into the river every daughter. You shall save a life.
And so the enemy in this world wants to throw our young men.
Into the river, into the river of the pleasures of this world and the pleasure system of this world. That's what it wants to do. Maybe you know what it says in I think it's Second Corinthians that we are not ignorant of his stratagems, Mr. Kelly's translation. We're not ignorant of his devices. One of his devices is to take the young men and to throw them.
Into the river of Egypt, that is, to get them taken up with the pleasure system of this world, so that they are lost to the people of God and they lose their fruitfulness.
The fruit that could have been born Godward. And then in chapter 3 it speaks here.
00:05:01
Of the deliverance in verse 7, the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters.
For I know their sorrows, and I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up.
Out of that land into a good land and a large onto a land flowing with milk and honey. And then a little bit later on it says in verse 10, come now therefore, and I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people, the children of Israel out of Egypt. And so just with this little backdrop, we have a picture of the.
The illustration in the Old Testament it was God's picture book, and he gives us a very clear illustration of our.
Hopeless situation under ******* to Satan. A picture of Pharaoh is a picture of that.
And with serving, with cruelty and with severity.
And no doubt they serve seven days a week. I'm not.
For sure, historically, what the fact is that I believe that there wasn't rest.
And those that serve the enemy of our souls, Satan. There is no rest. There is no time.
Forrest And so the Lord has intervened. Well, if we turn.
A little further on into umm, let's just look at.
Numbers, I think it's numbers Chapter 11. We'll see there. Just, uh.
Little snapshot.
No, it's Chapter 14. I'm sorry, Chapter 14 of Numbers. We can hold our place in Exodus. We'll turn back there.
Numbers, Chapter 14.
And verse 22 because all those men which have seen my glory and my miracles.
Which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and have tempted me now these 10 times, and have not hearkened to my voice. Surely they shall not see the land which I swear unto their fathers, neither shall any of them that provoked me see it. So there you have the expression that the Spirit of God uses. The Lord tells us that the children of Israel, as they walk through the wilderness, they tempted the Lord.
10 times.
They provoked them to anger. And you know, these are lessons for us. We can read of the children of Israel. We're no different. We're made of the same stuff. And the Lord desires to have us learn these lessons so that as we read the wilderness journeys of the children of Israel that we wouldn't repeat the same mistakes. And so we've had in our meetings these.
This past day, and perhaps this afternoon, if Lord Tarries, we've had the.
Thought of the murmurings and the complainings of what Paul was speaking to the children of Israel about and umm, so they murmured and they complained. Let's turn to chapter 14 of Exodus and we'll begin and we'll just look very briefly at each one of these 10 temptations of time permit.
We'll leave a little time for another one or two, as the Spirit would lead the chapter 14 of Exodus. We'll look at the first temptation, verse 10, Exodus chapter 14, verse 10. When Pharaoh drew nigh, the children of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians marched after them, and they were sore afraid, and the children of Israel cried out unto the Lord.
And they said unto Moses, Because there were no graves in Egypt, thou hast taken us.
A way to die in the wilderness. Wherefore hast thou dealt with us?
To carry us forth out of Egypt. Is not this the word that we did tell thee in Egypt, saying, Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians? For it had been better for us to serve the Egyptians than that we should die in the wilderness. Moses said unto the people, Fear ye not, stand still and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will show you today. For the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you shall see them again no more. Forever the Lord shall fight.
For you, and you shall hold your peace.
Well, here they really didn't value.
This work of deliverance they had been they had not yet crossed the.
Jordan.
Or the umm, the Red Sea.
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They were about to cross it. And so it speaks of really a quickened soul. The doctrine of the New Testament gives us a little picture. Uh, this is a little picture of being quickened, but yet not delivered yet. And so they had the enemy behind them and they're awakened to their danger. And a quickened soul is awakened to their danger and they are awakened to the fact that they are Sinner and that they need to have deliverance.
And so they're taken up with themselves. And so perhaps verse 11 and 12, they refer to themselves.
Many times that now it's taken us away to die in the wilderness. Wherefore hast thou dealt with?
Thus with us to carry us forth out of Egypt. So the focus wasn't on the Lord, it was on themselves. And so the lesson is really here that we need deliverance and we need to have our consciences cleared and remember that we cannot deliver ourselves and not to have our thoughts upon ourselves, but on the Lord himself. And so Moses, you know they cried.
To the children of Israel they cried out unto the Lord. It was a good thing for them to cry to the Lord.
But it was a temptation. They tried the Lord. They tested the Lord in this connection. And here the Lord had an answer. He says in verse 15, The Lord said unto Moses, Wherefore Christ, thou unto me, speak unto the children of Israel, that they go forward.
You know, brethren, it's wonderful to be able to just take one step forward in the path of faith, one step at a time. And God just gives us light for one step at a time. Isn't that true? You can't see He doesn't give you more light than for just one step at a time in the path of faith. And you and I can shine as it were, the as we were speaking yesterday of the light, and we can see what the end of the path is, the path.
Faith, but we need the light of the Word of God. We need specific instruction for one step of faith at a time. And so the Lord spoke and He gave them this direction that they go forward. Well, we know that they were delivered. They crossed the Red Sea and a little further on in chapter 15 we have the 2nd temptation in verse 23. So Exodus chapter 15.
And verse 23 they came to Mara.
When they came tomorrow, they could not drink the waters of Mara, for they were bitter. Therefore the name of it was called Mara. And the people murmured against Moses, saying, What shall we drink? He cried unto the Lord. Moses showed him, and the Lord showed him a tree, which when he had cast into the waters, the waters were made sweet.
There he made them a statue for them, a statute and an ordinance, and there he proved them, and said, If thou wilt diligently hearken to the voice of the Lord thy God, and will do that which is right in his sight, and will give ear to his commandments, and keep all his statutes, I will put none of these diseases upon thee which I have brought upon the Egyptians, for I am the Lord that healeth thee. And they came to Elam.
Where were.
12 wells of water and three score and 10 palm trees, and they encamped there by the waters. Well, we noticed that there was murmuring. There was a little bit of muttering under the breath. There was people were thirsty. And you know, this world is not a place of refreshment. The believer can't find refreshment in the things of this world, in the entertainments of this world, in the careers that this world has. All those things don't have any.
Refreshment. And the world doesn't give that nourishment to the believer. And so they came into the wilderness, seen and they murmured. They came to this water, and the water was bitter and the bitter waters of this world. You don't have to live very long in this world. And you're going to find that there's bitterness in connection with this world and what nourishes this world, what the world tries to get as nourishment, what it tries to.
What it uses to try to forget.
The eternality of the soul, what it tries to.
Engage in with forgetting that God exists and that God himself created this world.
It's a world filled with bitterness and it doesn't refresh the heart, doesn't refresh the soul, the music of this world, the all the things that they have. It doesn't refresh this world at all. It doesn't refresh the believer. And so they came to this world. They came to this water. It was bitter and it required that the tree would be cast in. The Lord showed him a tree.
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And that wonderful to just have the word of God presented.
To present Christ and to show us by the cross that we were delivered from this world.
You know, it's we have New Testament doctrine all throughout that we could refer to in connection with each one of these temptations. I don't think that we're going to have a lot of time to do that. But in Galatians chapter 2, we have this little verse of Scripture that we often quote Galatians 2 verse 20, it says I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me and the life which I now live in the flesh.
I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.
You know, you know, wonderful just to be able to read the word of God and to read.
Of what took place at the cross, and that were delivered from this world, and that it's Christ himself what took place at the cross.
Allows us to be refreshed even in this world that's filled with bitterness for the unbeliever and can be filled with bitterness for the believer if he doesn't walk with the Lord in communion with the Lord.
Is filled with bitterness, but you and I can walk through this scene as we have Christ before us and the work, the finished work of Christ before us, and recognize that we can live a new life in the newness of life and because we have the very life of Christ and we're indwelled with the Spirit of God.
That we can walk through and that we can receive nourishment. And it's the.
Cross of Christ, that will bring sweetness to those waters. Well, we notice too, that there were.
They came to this encampment in verse 27 to Elim and there were 12 wells of water and three score and 10 palm trees. Now, you know, in the book of, uh, in the, uh, umm, word of God, there's seventy books. Now we know that we often say there's, uh, 66 books, but if you include the five books of the Psalms.
Another seventy books in the Bible, and so we have complete provision in the wilderness scene.
12 wells of water speaks of refreshment, and it speaks to these three score and 10 palm trees. We have every provision for us in connection with the word of God. And you'll notice here in this little passage in connection with the 2nd temptation that the statutes are mentioned in verse 25. The ordinances, the commandments, and.
There are 10 words used in the 119th Psalm in connection with the Word of God. Because it's vital.
For a believer to know the word of God and the statutes speak of the divine regulations for life.
God wants you and I to have a regulated life and habits that are good habits as we walk through this scene and God helps us in His Word to know what it is to have a regulated life, not just a free for all and just get up in the morning and say, well, I wonder what I'm going to do today and how I'm going to do it. No, we have a regulated life. The ordinances teach us as to what is acceptable in connection with worship.
Divine instruction as to what is acceptable to God.
In connection with our worship and we find we could turn to different passages of Scripture in the Old Testament that would speak of ordinances, but you can search it out yourself and you'll find that we have really only two ordinances in Christianity. One is baptism and the other is the remembrance of the Lord. Those two things, those are the only two ordinances that we have in Christendom in in Christianity.
But in the Jewish religion, why, they had something like 613 laws. They had all kinds of things that they had to remember.
But in Christianity, when connection with the person of Christ and his work, we have baptism and just simply to remember Him in his death. Oh, how simple it is to walk in fellowship with the Lord and to just recognize in the wilderness seen in a place that has bitter waters, that there those bitter waters have been made sweet because of the work of Christ.
While we have the third temptation.
In chapter 16, verse two, it says the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron.
In the wilderness, and the children of Israel said unto them, Why would God?
Would God we had died in the hand, by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots.
And when we did, eat bread to the full, For we ye have brought us forth into this wilderness to kill.
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This whole assembly with hunger.
Verse four. Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold, I will reign bread.
From heaven. And then a little bit further on we could read uh.
Just verse 14, when the dew that lei was gone up, behold, upon the face of the wilderness there was there lay a small round thing, as small as the hoar frost on the ground. And then just turn to verse 31 as well.
Umm, verse 31, chapter 16 of Exodus, verse 31, the House of Israel called the name of the man thereof manna, and it was like coriander seed white, and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey.
Well, you know, they lacked bread.
They murmured here you had the refreshment at the Elam and they had these bitter waters at Mara that were made sweet. And first thing you know, they they're hungry and they wanted bread and it speaks of.
Heavenly food and Christ as food for our souls in the wilderness, doesn't it, to have the manna? And so the whole congregation murmured they wanted bread. The Lord sent bread from heaven. You know, I often think in connection with these little expressions that the Lord gives in his word, just turn just.
Think of John's Gospel chapter 21. You know when the Lord baked the bread and he cooked the fish for the disciples?
They fished all night. They didn't get anything. And they had when they came to the shore, there was the Lord. He had a meal for them.
Do you think there was ever any bread that tasted any better than that? Do you think there was any better meal of fish that anyone has ever had than what those disciples had?
The one who created the fish, the one who designed how bread would be made and who baked it himself, was there any better meal? But here, you know, the Spirit of God records that even though the people of God tempted the Lord, and they murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness, it says in verse 2, the Lord sent them bread from heaven. I will reign bread from heaven. But it was a type of Christ. And so I'll just point out in verse.
It says a small round thing speaks of the eternality of this person roundness, you know, it's there's no beginning or end. And then it speaks as small as the hoar frost on the ground speaks of his humility. Wonderful Savior that we have humble he humbled himself.
Became a man, humbled himself, became obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross.
And then you know, if we just turned over to verse 4 here of this, it says, the Lord said unto Moses, I will reign bread from heaven. So the Lord Jesus came from heaven. We had the heavenly blue color before us in the garments of the priest last yesterday, and the bread was from heaven, those three things. And then in verse 31 it says that the House of Israel called it mana.
Really a type of that heavenly grace necessary for us to walk through the wilderness.
In fellowship with the Lord. And then it's white. Or the coriander seed, a seed.
The seed, the source of life itself. And then we have its white, the purity of Christ.
The wafers made it was just the taste of it was like wafers made with honey that speaks of the sweetness of Christ.
You know, we oftentimes complain. It seems to me that complaining and murmuring are just about as natural to the human heart as breathing. Isn't it true? We, we get up and sometimes the first thing we do is we look out the window and we, we see weather that's a little inclement. And we, we, maybe we don't say it audibly, but we kind of sigh and groan that it's raining again today, or snowing or whatever.
We readily complain.
But you know, I believe the Lord Jesus had a thankful spirit for everything that ever took place.
In his life. And he was he could thank the Lord, He could thank his father Even so.
Father, For so it seemed good unto thee in thy sight, and so he had a thankful spirit. And the Lord has provided us food for the wilderness. Seen. It's Christ himself. And so that's the third temptation. Then we have another temptation in verse 25, chapter 16 of Exodus, verse 25.
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Moses said eat that today, for today is a Sabbath.
Unto the Lord eat today, and you shall not find it in the field. 6 days shall you gather it, but on the 7th day, which is the Sabbath.
In it there shall be none.
It came to pass that there went out some of the people on the 7th day before the gather. They found none. The Lord said unto Moses, How long will you refuse to keep my commandments and my laws? You know the children of Israel. It was a new concept for them not to work seven days a week.
You know, apparently a man left to himself without any principles and he wants to just work and work and work.
He will work himself to death. And I think we look in the news and we see evidence of men that are very wealthy men and they work and they work and they work. And one day you read of their death in the newspaper. They died working. They worked. They they served their enemy Satan with cruelty and with harshness. He ruled over them and they.
Served with rigor all of their lives but the Lord in his mercy and His kindness.
A little type of eternal of the Millennium, he said He made an agreement with them. It was a law that they were to keep the Sabbath and that is the last day of the week. So they were to use the first six days for themselves and to make a living, and then they were to use the last day for him.
But you know, he told them, go out, gather for the six days the the manna they were to labor to gather it up.
Are you laboring? Am I laboring to search the scriptures daily?
And to gather up for myself, gather up, you know, as those that are husbands and fathers, you need to gather up.
Enough for the household to be able to feed the household the things of God and bring them into the.
Knowledge of the truth and the enjoyment of the truth and to help them to understand that it's necessary to buy the truth. All of those things are necessary for one that is the head of a home.
But on that 6th day, they were to rest. It was the mercy of God. It was a type of the Millennium, as I say. But in Christianity we don't have a Sabbath. We have the first day of the week. And it's referred to they came together upon the first day of the week to break bread. It says in Acts chapter 20, I think it's maybe verse 7 or so. They came together on the first day of the week.
But you know, God hasn't given us that as a law during the first during the.
Christian era. It's by grace that we recognize that the first day of the week.
Is his that we ought to give it to him?
It's remarkable to me, you know, that in the day that we live in, we not only have the last day of the week as a day off, so to speak, we also have really, by law, the first day of the week as a day off as well. And so often times we have two days to rest or to do a little work for the Lord, the last.
Two, the 1St the last day of the week and then the first day of the week.
In Christendom, in Christianity, in the Western Christian world, largely.
But oftentimes, you know, we use that first day of the week for ourselves. We don't use it for him. It's not that we're under law. I'd just like to turn to Isaiah chapter 58, just to refer to this as a principle.
Isaiah chapter 58 and verse 13.
You know, it says in the 37th Psalm that.
We should delight ourselves in the law, in the Lord.
That's I think I'm just going to read it before I read that in the 58th, 58th chapter of Isaiah verse 13, but it says in the 37th Psalm, it says delight thyself also in the Lord. He shall give thee the desires of thine heart, Commit thy way unto the Lord, Trust also in him. He shall bring it to pass.
00:30:02
Well, here he tells us what it is to delight ourselves. And Lord, he says, if thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord honorable, and shall to honor him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words, then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord, and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth and feed thee.
Heritage of Jacob thy father, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken it. While this refers to the Sabbath, but we could apply the principle to the first day of the week, could we not? Could we say that we could use the Lord's day not for ourselves, Turn away our foot from using the Lord's Day for ourselves, not doing our own pleasure on the first day of the week?
And you know this world dishonors the Son of God, and by grace.
The sovereign grace of God, we have the liberty to be able to use the first day of the week for the Lord and how the Lord must value in his affections for us the price that was paid to deliver us from this world. How we must value you and I using that first day of the week for Him for His glory and how he must value it that we set aside of all of our commercial ventures, all of our.
Umm, activities at school we just lay everything aside and we use the day for himself, perhaps read a little ministry use use the day to read a little booklet, perhaps in the afternoon if we don't have.
Anything going at the Sunday school and that sort of thing, we can use it to go and sing hymns at the nursing home, different activities like that, and we can use the day for himself, how he must value it.
Well, it was a temptation. It was they provoked the Lord this 4th temptation in Exodus 16, verse 25, because they used the day for themselves and they ignored the rights of the Lord. Now we turn a little bit further on to chapter 17 and I'll just read verse 2. That's the 5th temptation.
Wherefore the people did chide with Moses, and said, Give us water, that we may drink. Moses said unto them, Why chide you with me? Wherefore do you tempt the Lord? The people thirsted there for water. The people murmured against Moses, and said, Wherefore is this, that thou has brought us up out of Egypt to kill us, and our children with our, and our cattle with thirst? Moses cried unto the Lord, saying, What shall I do?
And then verse 6 Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in orb, and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water out of it.
That my people, that the people may drink. And Moses did so on the sight of the elders of Israel. He called the name of the place Masa.
And Maraba, because of the chiding of the children of Israel, and because they tempted the Lord, saying, Is the Lord among us or not?
Well, these five temptations, these first five, the throne of Israel really didn't have the word of God.
Before them, they didn't have.
The 10 words hadn't been given to them, the 10 commandments yet.
And umm, they were, perhaps you might say, just beginning in the wilderness scene. And so the Lord dealt with them, you might say, in grace, even they murmured. And so, you know, sometimes we get saved. We know the Lord Jesus is our Savior. We've taken Christ, and we're delivered from the power of sin and Satan and from our rigor of service to this world.
And there's murmuring we don't really understand as much as we should.
And the Lord deals with us graciously all. He loves his people. He loves each one of us. And if we look back and we were honest with ourselves and our lives.
Before we read the word of God, perhaps we had, uh, were saved and umm, he dealt with us graciously.
But uh, when we find from the six temptation on that they were more responsible because they had the word of God and so God dealt with them a little more harshly.
But I just point this out in connection with the thirst of the people, that it was Christ himself.
That rock that followed them through the wilderness scene, the rock was smitten and Christ was smitten, stricken, smitten and afflicted. He was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. We hid as we were our faces from Him. You know the Lord Jesus was smitten at the cross of Calvary. It means to smite. It's the same root of the word to smite someone. He was smitten of God.
00:35:12
That you might find refreshment, That you might be nourished.
While you walk through this scene, that you might be have the water of life and be refreshed, and that you might not just have life, but that you might have it abundantly, I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish. And he says, I am come, that they might have life, and that they might have it abundantly. And so we have flowing waters that speaks of the Spirit of God as well as the word of God. And the Lord gave life through this.
This water that flowed forth, but he records it.
As a temptation, he records it as an incident in the people's lives when they tried it.
Now, trading isn't like murmuring.
You might murmur and we might grumble a little bit because things aren't very good, but chiding was a full blown in your face.
Very, uh, confrontational occurrence between the throne of Israel and Moses.
Well, sometimes we're very confrontational with our brethren, and yet the Lord is gracious and here He provided this water, may we be.
Exercised about not being confrontational with one another in connection with these things and connection with what we have from the Lord and this confrontation, the Lord records one of the things that they said.
In verse seven, is the Lord among us or not?
Very strong language is the Lord among us or not?
Oh, dear brethren.
Do you have a sense of the presence of the Lord, the sense that by grace you've been delivered from the power of Satan and brought into his very presence? You know, the children of Israel could actually have the physical. They saw physically the evidence of the presence of God. They saw the pillar of cloud during the day and the pillar of fire during the night, and they saw a visible evidence of the presence of the Lord but in the day of grace.
During the Church period on this earth, we don't see a physical expression of the presence of the Lord, but we have by faith.
The recognition that we come into the presence of the Lord, and based upon the Word of God, where two or three are gathered together unto my name, there am I in the midst of them. So when you come to the assembly meeting, do you think to yourself that you're coming into the presence of the Lord?
Or do you think that you're just coming to the meeting, a meeting of the brethren?
So it might be a meeting with the brother and all right, It might be.
But that's really not the highest.
Thought that you might have? Isn't it nice for us to be able to recognize by faith that we're being brought by the Spirit of God into the presence of the Lord? You and I, You, me, who are we?
We were once sinners of the Gentiles. I'm not a Sinner of the Gentiles anymore. I'm a Saint of God.
He doesn't see me as a Sinner. I have a new standing before God because of the work of Christ. He sees me as a St.
And He wants me to be in His presence. But isn't it something they tempted the Lord?
And this is what they said. Is the Lord among us or not? Let's not doubt.
The Word of God and the presence of the Lord Jesus in the midst of his people. Well, if we look a little bit further on in the book, I think it's close to the end chapter.
32 The 6th temptation, verse seven. Six chapter 32 verse 7.
The Lord said unto Moses, Get thee down. For thy people which thou brought us out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. They have turned quick aside, quickly out of the way which I commanded them, and have made them a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto, and said, These be thy gods, O Israel, which have brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.
And then verse 15, Moses turned and went down from the mount.
And the two tables of the testimony were in his hand. The tables were written both on both their sides.
On the one side and on the other, were they written?
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And the tables were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, graven upon the tables.
When Joshua heard the noise of the people, they shouted. He said unto Moses, There's a noise of war in the camp.
He said it is not the voice of them that shout for mastery, neither is it the voice of them that cry for being overcome, but the noise of them that sing. Do I hear?
And then just.
Verse 22 Aaron said, Let not the anger of my Lord wax hawk.
Thou knowest the people that they are set on mischief. They said unto me, Make us gods.
Which shall go before us? As for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we want not what has become of him. And I said unto them, Whosoever hath any gold, let them break it off. So they gave it me. I cast it in the fire, and there came out this calf.
Then just the last verse of the chapter, Chapter 32, verse 35.
The Lord played the people of Israel.
The people because they made the calf.
Which Aaron made.
You know, I've wondered about this expression, Aaron. You know, he got, he was kind of caught, wasn't he?
He of any of those that were there should never have been involved in idolatry. He was the priest, the high priest among the children of Israel.
A type of Christ, but he failed in that type and he makes this excuse, he says.
You know, I just put all this gold together and poop, out came this calf. Just presto. I didn't have to do anything. It just kind of came out.
Well, it was a bold faced lie to his brother Moses.
But you know, sometimes it speaks idolatry, speaks to us of.
Covetousness. Covetousness is idolatry, and we live in a day, perhaps one of the most idolatrous days that have existed upon the face of the earth. We have enough money to buy just about anything that we'd like to have, and the world is doing everything it can, and it's advertising to make us unhappy with what we have and wanting something else.
That's what the advertising in this world is doing, is making you unhappy. Every single advertisement that you and I see.
It's making us unhappy with what we already have and putting the desire in our heart.
To have something else that God hasn't given us.
And so they fell into idolatry. They had the word of God and Moses, we know that broke those.
Broke those tables of stone. If we just turn to the New Testament to get some of this teaching. Let's look at First John. Just the last part of First John.
Because.
I feel we need to recognize that it provokes the Lord.
If we're covetous.
That provokes them.
As provocative.
To want to want to want to want and not to receive what we have from the Lord. You know that God has created you and I to be dependent creatures to depend upon him and to ask him for what we have need of and this world tries to make us independent of God. So chapter five of first John the last verse he says little children keep yourselves from idols. And then if we looked at first Corinthians chapter 10.
It just brings in before us this little instruction.
In verse 14, chapter 10, verse 14. Wherefore, my dearly beloved, flee from idolatry.
While we have that instruction given to us in in Christianity, the Lord gives us to us in the epistles, John's epistle, the epistle written by the apostle of the affections. The Lord used John to give us ministry that helps us to maintain our communion with the Lord.
And Mr. Darby said that he trusted that the brethren would not set aside John's ministry, that they would in the as the day grew darker, that we would continue to read John's ministry and not be taken up with idolatry. And so they tempted the Lord, and it was a price to pay.
In this aspect of things, because the Lord plagued the people and so that didn't bring happiness, it brought the judgment of God upon them. Now let's turn to.
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Uh, numbers Chapter 11.
Numbers Chapter 11 and verse one. This is the 7th temptation. When the people complained, it displeased the Lord, and Lord heard it, and his anger was kindled. The fire of the Lord burned among them, consumed them that were in the uttermost part of the camp. And the people cried unto Moses. And when Moses prayed unto the Lord, the fire was quenched, and they caught. He called the name of the place.
Tabara, because the fire of the Lord burnt among them.
Well, here we have the people complaining. It wasn't just perhaps muttering and murmuring, but there was a.
Complaining.
They were complaining. They were still in the wilderness. You and I are still in the wilderness, by the way. You know, we're seeing as as believers, we're seen as being in Egypt. We're in wilderness, and we're also in that heavenly land. We're seated in heavenly places in Christ. We're seen in all three places. But the children of Israel went through the wilderness historically.
Well, they complained, and there was judgment for it.
But you'll notice those that suffered them that were in the uttermost parts.
Of the camp.
Are you and I seeking to walk closely with the Lord? Are we?
Walking at the fringes, just kind of, uh, got one foot in the assembly, one foot in the world, so to speak.
Oh, the Lord desires to have his people close to Himself.
To walk with him in communion, to desire his company. And if I could just use it this way, do you, do you have the desire to be at all the meetings in the assembly where you come from or do you pick and choose which assembly meetings that you're going to go to?
You know the Lord desires you to be there to every meeting and to enjoy His presence and enjoy His Word.
And I believe there is a blessing for us at every meeting that we go to. The Lord will have something for us. And His delight is to feed, to nourish his people, to refresh His people, and to give them a fresh sense of the grace that has sought to release them from the rigors and the ******* of Egypt and the cruelty of Satan. And to have that sense of grace. And we need to be in the presence of the Lord, not just at the fringes.
But we need to be in the presence of the Lord and near to Him so that we have that sense of grace and the sense of His deliverance and the mighty work that was done, the value, the price that He paid to redeem us. Well, Moses prayed unto the Lord and the fire was quenched. And so, you know, there may be some in your assembly that are walking in the fringes. And that's one of the things that we can do is pray for them.
And ask the Lord to deliver them to warm their hearts.
And we could perhaps do a little bit of shepherding work. You know, the Lord Jesus, he saw those two that were going on the road to Emmaus.
And he drew near to them, and he walked with them.
They were going in the wrong direction, but He walked with them and it was the Shepherd in action. He was drawing their hearts and He was speaking to them. Of those things that had to do with himself. He brought Himself before them.
Well, we have the 8 temptation in verse 4.
It says the mixed multitude that was among them fell a lusting and the children of Israel also wept again.
Said, Who shall give us flesh to eat? We remember the fish which we did eat in Egypt freely.
The cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, the garlic. But now our soul is dried away.
There is nothing at all beside this manna before our eyes, and the manna was as coriander seed, the color thereof as the color of dallium. The people went about and gathered it, and grounded in mills and beat it and mortar, baked it in pans, made cakes of it, and the taste of it was as a taste of fresh oil. When the dew fell upon the camp in the night, the manna fell upon it.
Well.
Here there is another temptation. They kind of got tired of the manna.
You might come to the assembly meetings and feel like there's not a lot of food. Perhaps it's the same food that you had all your life. But isn't it wonderful to be able to come to the assembly meetings and read the Scriptures yourself in your own home and privately and receive the freshness of Christ, and to enjoy Christ and a portion of Christ on a daily basis?
00:50:06
In his presence, but here they were just trying to re manufacture things and trying to, as we know, ground. They grounded in mills, they beat it in a mortar and they baked it. They did all kinds of things to make it a little more palatable. Brethren, let's not never get tired of the simplicity that we have in Christ, the glory of this person, the heavenly aspect of Christianity and our heavenly calling and to enjoy the fact that we're blessed with.
All spiritual blessings in the heavenlies in Christ. Now we have the very best that God has given us, the very best heavenly food for the wilderness. Let's never get tired of hearing of Christ. You know, it's wonderful to be able to come to meetings like this and to hear and to get a portion of Christ for our souls. Oftentimes we hear the comment made well, just wish the ministry was a little more practical. We need more practical ministry and so on. There there is a place for that.
And there is a necessity for practical ministry.
But what really nourishes our souls and gives us a sense of the greatness of the deliverance from Egypt as a little portion of Christ, a little glimpse of the person of Christ, the love of the Savior for us and the price that He paid for us, and grace, The sense of the grace that were delivered from so cruel a master. Let's not get the idea that we have to remanufacture the truth and remanufacture things and try to get self help books out of the camp and so on. I'm not trying to condemn all.
The writings of those that are not gathered to the Lord's name. But I just say let's be careful to read those things that we know that aren't laced with a little bit of poison. And let's read ministry that we know that those that have written it walked in the truth of God and valued the truth of what it was to be gathered to the Lord's name and valued the simple teaching.
The valuable teaching of the apostle Paul Now if we just look at.
Chapter 12 We have there that incident. It's the 9th temptation Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman.
Whom he had married, for he had married an Ethiopian woman. And then you find.
A little later on, we don't have time to read much.
Umm.
Let's read verse 11, Aaron. And Aaron said unto Moses, Alas, my Lord, I beseech thee, lay not the sin upon us. Where? Wherein have we done foolishly, and wherein we have sinned? Let her not be as one dead or stillborn, of whom the flesh is half consumed, when he cometh out of his mother's womb. Moses cried unto the Lord, saying, Heal her now, O God, this I beseech thee and the Lord son of Moses.
Well, let you just read the rest yourself. 1St 15 Miriam was shut up, shut out from the camp. Seven days in the people journeyed, not till Miriam was brought in again.
You know, there was a grumbling in the camp and there was a grumbling here.
They speak against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married now.
Mr. Darby and his notes and jotting suggests, and maybe you've had the same question in your mind, is this a different woman from Zipporah? Did he have a second wife? He suggested It's probably a different woman than Zipporah.
And you know, Sapporo went back with his her two sons. She didn't appear that it appears that she didn't spend all of the wilderness journey in the in the wilderness with Moses. So he was lonely. He wanted a companion and perhaps this Ethiopian woman, a little picture of the Gentile and.
So Moses wanted the companion.
And he married this woman, and perhaps it was years before, but there was a grudge that these two.
Miriam and Aaron held a little bit of a grudge against Moses, and maybe it was hidden for a long time, but then there was a time when it came out and they had a grudge against him. It came out and they complained against him and, uh, he had married this woman.
And it came out, you know, brethren, we need to keep short accounts with the Lord and with our brethren and not to have a grudge against our brethren on any matter, because sooner or later it's going to come out and the Lord will allow it to come out, and He will judge what is brought in, in disobedience to him. So he dealt with this and he dealt in judgment. Miriam was a leper. She was healed. And then.
She was restored.
But we have this lesson in connection with grumbling and then The Last Temptation.
00:55:03
Is in verse chapter 14 verse one all the congregation lifted up their voice and cried and the people wept that night.
Let's read UH chapter 13, verse 30.
Caleb stilled the people before Moses said let us go up at once and possession for we are able.
Well able to overcome it.
And they said, verse, uh, four, they said one to another, let us make us a captain and let us return into Egypt. And Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the assembly of the congregation of children of Israel. Joshua the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Japuni, which were of them that searched the land, rent their clothes. Well, we don't have time to go further.
But this temptation, the last temptation, was the temptation of apostasy. They gave up.
They were really in essence giving up the knowledge of God, setting up a new order of things. They wanted to just leave the Lord, leave the wilderness journey and return into Egypt. Now, why didn't God want the people of Israel to return into Egypt?
Was a mighty deliverance. He loved his people. But Egypt is a picture of this world in its independence of God, and this world is trying to make you go back into Egypt.
It's like a big magnet and it's doing everything it can to draw you back to that world system that's independent of God.
And in opposition to enslave you.
And so the Lord didn't ever want them to return. And so instead of going up into the land of Israel.
In the cross, Canaan into that land across Jordan, they wanted to go back. Well, it speaks of to us as to whether or not our hearts have forsaken Egypt. Moses, it says he didn't leave Egypt, He forsook Egypt. So in his heart.
He said I don't ever want to go back there again. I don't want it. He could have had perhaps the very best, but he said the Spirit of God records it in Hebrews Chapter 11. He first took Egypt. I want to ask you a question. Have you forsaken Egypt or have you left in testimony, left Egypt and perhaps you're gathered to the Lord's name, you come to the assembly meetings, but you haven't forsaken Egypt in your heart.
Well, it's necessary to judge that desire to have what Egypt has and the food that Egypt has.
We need to judge those things.
I very much enjoyed Whatever Brother Robert.
Brought before us is searching how that.
Murmuring seems to come natural to us, but the Lord desires that we might be rejoicing in His presence, and I believe that this is brought before us in another incident in.
The, uh, the count of Israel in the Old Testament.
Deuteronomy chapter 26 number.
Deuteronomy chapter 26.
And, uh, perhaps we'll just.
Read a portion here, it says, And it shall be, when thou art come in unto the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an inheritance, and possesses it, and dwelleth therein, that thou shalt take of the first of all the fruit of the earth which thou shalt bring of thy land, that the Lord thy God giveth thee, and shall put it in a basket.
And shall go unto the place.
Which the Lord thy God shall choose to place his name there, And thou shalt go unto the priest that shall be in those days, and say unto him, I profess this day unto the Lord thy God, that I am come unto the country, which the Lord swear unto our fathers for to give us. And the priests shall take the basket out of thine hand, and set it down before the altar of the Lord thy God.
Now this land that God brought his people into, it was a good land. It was a land that flowed with milk and honey.
And the Lord has good things for us to enjoy.
And He has brought us into a place of unspeakable favor.
In Christ.
01:00:00
And we had opportunity today.
To be gathered in the presence of our Savior, the Lord Jesus.
And to enjoy.
Together, that which God has given to us.
In Christ and it involves worship.
It involves praise and Thanksgiving.
And this is what God delights in.
And here are the people were to bring of the fruit of the earth.
But notice it says, When thou art come in unto the land.
In verse three, they were to take this basket of fruit to the priest and say, I am come unto the country, which the Lord swear unto our fathers for to give us. You know this basket of first fruits, it wasn't brought to the priests in order that they might get into the land, but it was because they were already in the land.
And.
As believers, we know that we are in Christ. We are not seeking a position.
We have come, we have accepted the Savior, and God puts us now in Christ. This is our position. We're not striving to get there.
But the Lord has placed us there, and we are to be enjoying in our souls the wonderful.
Position that is ours now.
In Christ.
And he is made unto us, wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, redemption. We find in him one who not only saves our souls, but He satisfies. He's the bread of life and He's the water of life.
And how wonderful it is to contemplate the salvation that is ours. It's a full and free salvation, and we have it.
You know we have all the blessings that God has to bestow upon us. When we accept the Savior, when we believe in Him, the Lord Jesus Christ, we receive it all.
We're blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ.
And it's so wonderful, but we only enter in, it seems a little bit at a time to what we have been brought into.
But I do believe in order to.
Bring this offering.
In order to worship, in order to offer the sacrifice of praise to God, we have to.
Have a sense in our souls of security, of peace.
Because if we don't, if we question our salvation.
If we question.
The goodness of God and what He has provided for us, certainly we're not going to be.
Offering to him.
Because we're gonna be suspicious of him, we're gonna be questioning his goodness, and this is what Satan is up to.
He hasn't changed his tactics back in the Garden of Eden.
He sowed in the mind of Eve.
But out as to the goodness of God, he made Eve suspicious.
Of the Lord.
And try to give her to believe that the Lord was withholding something from her that was for her happiness. This is what Satan is up to. He's a master of deceit.
And may we?
Look to the Lord that we not be taken in by His.
Deception.
I want to tell you today the Lord is good.
And how could we question the goodness of God when we contemplate the sacrifice He's been willing to make on our behalf?
01:05:10
And we spoke of it this morning and we thought about it this morning.
We saw it in Abraham. He was willing to offer his son.
But he was spared the agony of offering his son.
Iran.
God provided instead of Isaac, but there was no substitute for the Son of God. God he spared, not his own son.
But delivered him up for us all.
This, beyond a question of a doubt, shows.
To us the infinite love and goodness of our God.
And He wants us to be reveling in the sunshine of His love and grace.
Because.
This is what's going to produce.
Worship and praise and Thanksgiving.
So this Israelite was to know that they.
Had come. He had come into the land.
And it was God that gave them the land.
God gave it to them.
Because the Lord is a giving God, and every good and perfect gift it comes down from above.
That's what we learn in James. It comes down from the father of lights, with whom there's no variableness, neither shadow of turning.
Now they were to bring this basket.
And put the first of all the fruit of the earth in the basket.
And bring it where?
They were bringing to the Lord.
They were to bring it, as it tells us here in verse 2, on to the place which the Lord thy God shall choose to place His name there.
They just couldn't bring it anywhere they pleased but.
They were too. Let the Lord make the choice as to where this offering was to be brought.
And so this is actually putting the Lord 1St and this is what we need. You know, there was a brother.
Ron Reeves Years ago, I recall he'd give me a little piece of wood.
Is about four inches piece of corner molding.
4 inches long. It had two words on it, God first.
And you know, this is what I'm seeing in this portion.
There's 5 words that seem to just jump out at me in verse 2.
It's the word.
1St.
And it's the words, the Lord thy God.
5 words. First, the Lord thy God.
We live in a world where the Lord is.
Not even given a place.
I imagine it appeared that he is. You know, we we have that which is called Christianity. But the fact is, man seems to rule.
And the Lord doesn't have his rightful place, but I believe.
We find in scripture that God wants to have the 1St place.
And if we don't give him the 1St place, he won't get the 2nd place. He's going to be way down the line somewhere.
So may the Lord help us to give him the 1St place. You see, God gives us so many things to enjoy.
He's a wonderful God.
But we find that.
Our natural tendency is to take what God.
Gives us.
And enjoy it selfishly.
01:10:01
Rather than recognizing that this is what comes down from above, this comes from the Lord.
Years ago we were distributing invitations.
In Fredericton and I talked to a man as he stood in his garden.
It was a beautiful garden.
A vibrant growth and there were large vegetables.
And you could see them hanging off the vines and the plants.
But he was sending the tomatoes, you know, and I thought to myself, these tomatoes are beautiful, big, red, juicy tomatoes.
And so.
I said to the man.
Isn't it wonderful that God gives to us tomatoes like these?
And it was just like I was talking to a wall.
You don't want to have anything more to do. I couldn't even give him an invitation.
To the Bible hour, He wasn't interested. He was interested in tomatoes.
But he wasn't interested in the one who gave the tomatoes. You know this is a serious problem.
When we become.
Interested in God's creation and leave the Creator out of the picture?
This is.
Not good.
And it's going to lead to destruction, man's destruction.
Placing more importance on the creation the.
Creature than the Creator, here they were to bring 1St through the Lord.
What God had given to them.
And to enjoy it in the Lord's presence.
In the place that the Lord.
Would choose to put his name there, you know. It's not up to you or to me to choose.
As to where the Lord, well, let me put it this way.
We need to look to the Lord to make the choice as to where He would have us.
To offer the sacrifice of praise.
I'm talking in a collective way.
But.
I talked to many.
And I have to be careful, even myself, that I don't get in the way of God with respect to making a choice.
There's many today that they're simply looking at what pleases them.
You know the dynamic preaching at this place or the beautiful building.
Or or. The people are so very nice.
And they seem to be.
Friendly people.
I think this is probably where I want to go. Well, I mean.
We need to be looking to the Lord, don't we, about the choice, and He can make that plain to us through His word as to where He would have us to go. So we find that the.
Israelite brings the basket of first fruits, presents it to the priest and acknowledges his past condition, he says.
I'm a Syrian ready to perish was my father. He went down into Egypt, verse 5 sojourned there with a few, and became there a nation great, mighty and populous. The Egyptians evil entreated us, inflicted us, laid upon us hard *******. And when we cried unto the Lord God of our fathers, the Lord heard our voice and looked on our affliction, and on our labor, and on our oppression. And the Lord brought us forth out of Egypt with a mighty hand, with an outstretched arm, and with.
Terribleness and with signs and with wonders, and yet brought us into this place and has given us this land, even a land that flows with milk and honey. There's no murmuring here. This Israelite is very thankful.
For what the Lord has done for him or for her?
01:15:01
And in verse 10 says, And now, behold, I have brought the first fruits of the land which thou, O Lord, has given me, and thou shalt set it before the Lord thy God, and worship before the Lord thy God.
And thou shalt rejoice in every good thing which the Lord thy God hath given unto thee, and unto thine house, thou and the Levite, and the stranger that is among you. Now you notice what this kind of activity results in when we put the Lord 1St and we follow his word.
And we find ourselves where he has placed his name.
And together we enjoy what the Lord has given to us.
Is rejoicing. It's a place where there's joy.
And.
We must acknowledge that there are problems in the assemblies, but you know, God is above all these problems. The Lord is above the problems, and sometimes we come up against situations that seem impossible.
We had our brother bring before us about the Red Sea. The people, they seem trapped. What are they gonna do? Impossible situation. Well, they look to the Lord and he works it out.
And I'm thinking, too, of how they came to Jericho and here are these huge walls.
And this place is blocking their entrance into the land. What are they going to do?
Well, God has that all figured out too, and so we know.
In a remarkable way.
The Walls of Jericho fell down and twice it says he fell down flat. I like that word flat.
Didn't fall down in heaps that make it rather difficult to get into the city, but they fell down level horizontal with the ground.
So we can see how God comes in and gives deliverance and he will in his time and way. And sometimes it's exciting, you know, to anticipate how the Lord is going to work things out.
But his deliverance, it doesn't come too soon that we miss out on the blessedness of trusting in the dark.
But neither does it come too late that we experience the misery of trusting in vain.
So.
Take heart. Look up. Don't give up, look up.
And the Lord is able and willing.
To come in and undertake for us.
And we can trust him.
For the future, you know, as we read on here, we see that they were.
Tithing.
And uh.
Verse 12 When thou hast made an end of tithing, all the ties have thine increased the third year, which is the year of tithing, and hath given it unto the Levite, the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, you know, you see here.
Uh, when we give the Lord the 1St place.
And there's worship and praise. We're not only going to be thinking about the Lord.
We're gonna be thinking about.
That are in need.
And I think we have the truth of it in Hebrews chapter 13.
You know, there we have.
Offering the sacrifice of praise to God continually. So this is.
Vertical.
But when you come to the next verse, it says, But to do good, and to communicate, forget not, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased. This is horizontal.
And so they were to.
Be looking out for those that were in need, The Levites, you know, he was involved in the service of the Lord. He didn't have a earthly possession. He was provided for the stranger, the fatherless, the widow, here's one that perhaps cannot support herself and so on.
Well, these ones, they were to eat within the gates and be filled.
01:20:06
Well, may the Lord bless His word.
These few thoughts and may we give the Lord his rightful place.
And remember.
That the Lord has said, they that honor me, I will honor.
Because my heart a fresh could burn 26 in 30.
Again, if you need to tell me. Oh yeah, I certitude with thy consenting.
Oh give me a little bit of earth and cause my oil and fresh sugar river.
Oh dear sweet friend, please do free service.
I don't know what's my apologize. I'm impressed too and we're doing.
All right.
Let me go away on the floor.
By 10 minutes towards our beginning grace.
Joy and one more time and wait for anything.
Process my day your sexy.
You're almost as long as you wait for longer to be.
Ye are not looking at all the chance Friday and better soon as you're spelled and sighed. Then come on and come on, come on.
My hopes to be taking everything.
Alright, thank you for your help. So you're working on days to $5 a hundred?
It's trash, that's it.
Still a little scary and wait for your baby.
Thank you for the faithfulness of our brethren to minister to.
And, uh, pray for those who are traveling from home.
Think about our brother mentioned in his word about or on the fringes.
Pray for them, Father.
01:25:04
Closer to the center.
He asked us to do the right thing, to see Jesus.
Putting the Lord First
Open—Wally Dear
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
I very much enjoyed Whatever Brother Robert.
Brought before us is searching how that.
Murmuring seems to come natural to us, but the Lord desires that we might be rejoicing in His presence, and I believe that this is brought before us in another incident in.
The, uh, the count of Israel in the Old Testament.
Deuteronomy chapter 26 number.
Deuteronomy chapter 26.
And, uh, perhaps we'll just.
Read a portion here, it says, And it shall be, when thou art come in unto the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an inheritance, and possesses it, and dwelleth therein, that thou shalt take up the first of all the fruit of the earth which thou shalt bring of thy land, that the Lord thy God giveth thee, and shall put it in a basket.
And shall go unto the place.
Which the Lord thy God shall choose to place his name there, And thou shalt go unto the priest that shall be in those days, and say unto him, I profess this day unto the Lord thy God, that I am come unto the country, which the Lord swear unto our fathers for to give us. And the priests shall take the basket out of thine hand, and set it down before the altar of the Lord thy God.
Now this land that God brought his people into, it was a good land. It was a land that flowed with milk and honey.
And the Lord has good things for us to enjoy.
And He has brought us into a place of unspeakable favor.
In Christ.
And we had opportunity today.
To be gathered in the presence of our Savior, the Lord Jesus.
And to enjoy.
Together, that which God has given to us.
In Christ and it involves worship.
It involves praise and Thanksgiving.
And this is what God delights in.
And here the people were to bring of the fruit of the earth.
But notice it says, When thou art come in unto the land.
In verse three, they were to take this basket of fruit to the priest and say, I am come unto the country, which the Lord swear unto our fathers for to give us. You know this basket of first fruits, it wasn't brought to the priests in order that they might get into the land, but it was because they were already in the land.
And.
As believers, we know that we are in Christ. We are not seeking a position.
We have come, we have accepted the Savior, and God puts us now in Christ. This is our position. We're not striving to get there.
But the Lord has placed us there, and we are to be enjoying in our souls the wonderful.
Position that is ours now.
In Christ.
And he has made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, redemption.
We find in him one who not only saves our souls, but He satisfies. He's the bread of life and He's the water of life.
And how wonderful it is to contemplate the salvation that is ours. It's a full and free salvation. And we have it. You know, we have all the blessings that God has to bestow upon us when we accept the Savior, when we believe in him, the Lord Jesus Christ.
00:05:03
We receive it all.
We're blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ.
And it's so wonderful, but we only enter in, it seems a little bit at a time to what we have been brought into.
But I do believe in order to.
Bring this offering.
In order to worship, in order to offer the sacrifice of praise to God, we have to.
Have a sense in our souls of security, of peace.
Because if we don't, if we question our salvation.
If we question.
The goodness of God and what He has provided for us, certainly we're not going to be offering to Him.
Because we're gonna be suspicious of him, we're gonna be questioning his goodness, and this is what Satan is up to.
He hasn't changed his tactics back in the Garden of Eden.
He sowed in the mind of Eve.
A doubt as to the goodness of God. He made Eve suspicious.
Of the Lord.
And try to give her to believe that the Lord was withholding something from her that was for her happiness. This is what Satan is up to. He's a master of deceit.
And may we?
Look to the Lord that we not be taken in.
By his.
Deception. I wanna tell you today, the Lord is good.
And how could we question the goodness of God when we contemplate the sacrifice He's been willing to make on our behalf?
And we spoke of it this morning and we thought about it this morning.
We saw it in Abraham. He was willing to offer his son.
But he was spared the agony of offering his son.
Iran.
God provided instead of Isaac, but there was no substitute for the Son of God. God he spared, not his own son.
But delivered him up for us all.
This, beyond a question of a doubt, shows.
To us the infinite love and goodness of our God.
And He wants us to be reveling in the sunshine of His love and grace.
Because this is what's gonna produce.
Worship and praise and Thanksgiving.
So this Israelite was to know that they had come. He had come into the land.
And it was God that gave them the land.
God gave it to them because the Lord is a giving God, and every good and perfect gift it comes down from above.
That's what we learn in James. It comes down from the father of lights, with whom there's no variableness, neither shadow of turning.
Now they were to bring this basket.
And put the first of all the fruit of the earth.
In the basket.
And bring it where?
They were bringing to the Lord.
They were to bring it, as it tells us here in verse 2, on to the place which the Lord thy God shall choose to place His name there.
They just couldn't bring it anywhere they pleased but.
They were too. Let the Lord make the choice as to where this offering was to be brought.
00:10:07
And so this is actually putting the Lord 1St and this is what we need. You know, there was a brother.
Uh, Ron Reeves. Years ago, I recall he'd give me a little piece of wood.
Is about four inches piece of corner molding.
4 inches long.
Had two words on it, God first.
And you know, this is what I'm seeing in this portion.
There's 5 words that seem to just jump out at me in verse 2.
It's the word.
1St.
And it's the words, the Lord thy God.
5 words. First, the Lord thy God.
We live in a world where the Lord is.
Not even given a place.
I imagine it appeared that he is, you know, we, we have that which is called Christianity. But the fact is, uh, man seems to rule.
And the Lord doesn't have his rightful place, but I believe.
We find in scripture that God wants to have the 1St place.
And if we don't give him the 1St place, he won't get the 2nd place. He's going to be way down the line somewhere.
So may the Lord help us to give him the 1St place. You see, God gives us so many things to enjoy.
He's a wonderful.
But we find that.
Our natural tendency is to take what God gives us.
And enjoy it selfishly.
Rather than recognizing that this is what comes down from above, this comes from the Lord.
Years ago we were distributing invitations.
In Fredericton and I talked to a man as he stood in his garden.
It was a beautiful garden.
A vibrant growth and there were large vegetables.
And you could see them hanging off the vines and the plants.
But he was tending to tomatoes, you know, And I thought to myself, these tomatoes are beautiful, big, red, juicy tomatoes.
And so.
I said to the man.
Isn't it wonderful that God gives to us tomatoes like these?
And it was just like I was talking to a wall.
He didn't want to have anything more to do. I couldn't even give him an invitation.
To the Eiselhower, he wasn't interested. He was interested in tomatoes.
But he wasn't interested in the one who gave the tomatoes. You know this is a serious problem when we become.
Interested in God's creation and leave the Creator out of the picture?
This is.
Not good.
And it's going to lead to destruction, man's destruction.
Placing more importance on the creation the creature.
Then the Creator here they were to bring first to the Lord what God had given to them.
And to enjoy it in the Lord's presence, in the place that the Lord.
Would choose to put his name there, you know. It's not up to you or to me to choose.
As to where the Lord, well, let me put it this way.
We need to look to the Lord to make the choice as to where He would have us.
To offer the sacrifice of praise.
00:15:04
I'm talking in a collective way.
But.
I talked to many.
And I have to be careful, even myself, that I don't get in the way of God with respect to making a choice.
There's many today that they're simply looking at what pleases them.
You know the dynamic preaching at this place or the beautiful building.
Or or. The people are so very nice.
And they seem to be.
Friendly people.
I think this is probably where I want to go. Well, I mean.
We need to be looking to the Lord, don't we, about the choice, and He can make that plain to us through His word as to where He would have us to go. So we find that the.
Israelite brings the basket of the first fruits, presents it to the priest and acknowledges his past condition, he says.
I'm a Syrian ready to perish was my father. He went down into Egypt, verse 5 sojourned there with a few and became there a nation great, mighty and populous. The Egyptians evil entreated us, inflicted us, laid upon his heart *******. And when we cried unto the Lord God of our fathers, the Lord heard our voice and looked on our affliction, and on our labor and on our oppression. And the Lord brought us forth out of Egypt with a mighty hand, with an outstretched arm, and with.
Terribleness, and with signs, and with wonders, and yet brought us into this place.
And has given us this land, even a land that flows with milk and honey. There's no murmuring here. This Israelite is very thankful.
For what the Lord has done for him or for her?
And in verse 10 says, And now, behold, I have brought the first fruits of the land which thou, O Lord, has given me, and thou shalt set it before the Lord thy God, and worship before the Lord thy God.
And thou shalt rejoice in every good thing which the Lord thy God hath given unto thee.
In Unadine House, thou and the Levite, and the stranger that is among you. Now you notice what this kind of activity results in when we put the Lord 1St and we follow His word, and we find ourselves where He has placed His name.
And together we enjoy what the Lord has given to us.
This rejoicing, it's a place where there's joy.
And.
We must acknowledge that there are problems in the assemblies, but you know, God is above all these problems. The Lord is above the problems, and sometimes we come up against situations that seem impossible.
We had our brother bring before us about the Red Sea. The people they've seen trapped, What are they gonna do? Impossible situation. Well, they look to the Lord and he works it out.
And I'm thinking, too, of how they came to Jericho and here are these huge walls.
And this place is blocking their entrance into the land. What are they going to do? Well, God has that all figured out too. And so we know.
In a remarkable way.
The Walls of Jericho fell down and twice it says he fell down flat. I like that word flat.
Didn't fall down in heaps that make it rather difficult to get into the city, but they fell down level horizontal with the ground.
So we can see how God comes in and gives deliverance and he will in his time and way. And sometimes it's exciting, you know, to anticipate how the Lord is going to work things out.
But His deliverance, it doesn't come too soon that we miss out on the blessedness of trusting in His heart.
But neither does it come too late that we experience the misery of trusting in vain.
00:20:08
So.
Take heart. Look up. Don't give up, look up.
And the Lord is able and willing.
To come in and undertake for us.
And we can trust him.
For the future, you know, as we read on here, we see that they were.
Tithing.
And uh.
Verse 12 When thou hast made an end of tithing, all the tithes have thine increased the third year, which is the year of tithing, and hath given it unto the Levite, the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, you know, you see here.
Uh, when we give the Lord the 1St place.
And there's worship and praise. We're not only going to be thinking about the Lord.
We're gonna be thinking about others.
That are in need.
And I think we have the truth of it in Hebrews chapter 13.
You know, there we have.
Offering the sacrifice of praise to God continually. So this is.
Vertical.
But when you come to the next verse, it says, But to do good, and to communicate, forget not, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased. This is horizontal.
And so they were to.
Be looking out for those that were in need, The Levites, you know, he was involved in the service of the Lord. He didn't have a earthly possession. He was provided for the stranger, the fatherless, the widow, here's one that perhaps cannot support herself and so on.
Well, these ones, they were to eat within the gates and be filled.
Well, may the Lord bless His word.
These few thoughts and may we give the Lord his rightful place.
And remember.
That the Lord has said, they that honor me, I will honor.
With thy thy extent in.
This place the rainbow and cross my heart.
Of gratitude.
Holy sweet claims, please do the crazy service.
Where do I behave?
My spirit.
Where I saw it came by getting to go away on the floor.
Against my chain and ignore. It's time to increase.
To the end of my life and wait for the place for anything.
00:25:07
Process my day your sexy.
You know what? Can't fall and wait for more energy?
All right, you got anything for you all over the prompts and these two 500.
And yes, I understand.
You're following. Stir right away for me.
Every day, and I love everything about every day. Let's try to take it, even if we're all a little scared and passed away while we're going to be.
Philippians 2:19-30
Elements of Revival Judges 5
Talk—Josh Stewart
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
Loving God and our Father, we give thanks this evening for the privilege of being together this weekend, for the hospitality of our brethren who have put on the conference, and for thy provision of spiritual food over these meetings. And two, for helping us all to get here safely. And we just pray for those who will be leaving for safety as well.
And we just pray about the little time that we have left in this last meeting. And we just pray that.
There might be something that would encourage us, that would stir us up and help us to walk a little bit more for the Lord Jesus Christ in this, in these last few days of the day of grace. So we just pray this and give thanks in the worthy name of our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
So I have for a number of months had something that's been kind of brewing around in my mind and my heart, and it is the subject of revival and.
I know that there's a lot of different definitions of revival out there. Umm, but I do think that we need.
A revival in a certain sense, we always need a revival. But you know, umm, what do we mean by revival? Do I mean that we need to have another outpouring of the Spirit? No, the Spirit of God has been sent. We're not asking for the Spirit to be sent again. But you know, I think that as we look around us and we just go through life.
Umm. At least to me. I think that I've gotten a little bit of a sense that there could be more.
Devotion to the Lord there could be more. Faithfulness to His Word, there could be more.
Umm, love and affection for Christ in my own heart and I think I can speak on behalf of many. Umm, we need to be restored to the Lord and, and a revival in that sense. And so I've been my mind has been going over a number of different passages in the word of God.
At times in the Old Testament when Israel was in a very low condition and what God used to revive them and umm, I've had chapters like First Kings 18 on my heart where the people were in such a low condition that they didn't even know who was God. Was it Baal or was it Jehovah?
And in a certain sense, in many cases, we can be in a condition like that today.
Where we don't even know who deserves our worship. Is it the entertainments of this world that deserve our attention or is it the Lord? Well, another chapter has come come before my mind and that's Judges chapter 5. And Judges chapter 5 comes right after Judges chapter 4. Umm And I'm not going to review the whole story of Judges chapter 4. I hope that you're mostly familiar with it, but just.
Briefly summarize, there was a very low condition in Israel, I mean low in a spiritual sense. And there were enemies of the people of God and a general named Cicera, and they had oppressed the people of God. And the Lord used a number of individuals, Deborah, who is a woman.
And barracks.
And another woman named Jail and a host of other individuals that aren't even named to have a revival and to get deliverance from this this bad condition that had come in and then in Judges Chapter 5.
Deborah and Barrick begin to sing a song and they kind of go over the whole story in a poetic way, and they bring out some really interesting things. And in a certain way, when I look at this song, I see you might say, some of the elements of revival.
And so I just wanted to go through it and bring out 10 things that I enjoyed from it. And I hope maybe you can be encouraged by some of these things. So we'll just start by reading the 1St 3 verses.
Then saying Deborah and Barack the son of a Binowam on that day, saying, Praise ye the Lord for the avenging of Israel, when the people are willingly offered themselves.
Hear, O ye kings, give ear, O ye Princess, I even I, will sing unto the Lord.
I will sing praise to the Lord God of Israel. So the first thing that I wanted to bring out was that if there's going to be a work of revival, it's the Lord's work. Praise ye the Lord for the avenging of Israel, but it's the Lord's work. But He uses those who willingly offer themselves. And if I want to see revival.
00:05:23
If I want to see a return back to the Lord, and if you do, we have to be willing to offer ourselves.
We can't just sit back and say, you know, things are going pretty bad right now, so I'll see you next year and come back next year and you know, things are going pretty bad. You know, there's a lot of things to be discouraged about. No. Are we willing to offer ourselves? That's the question. There were ones in this chapter who offered themselves and there were those who didn't. And I trust that we'll, we'll be able to offer ourselves to the Lord to use us in whatever way he can use us.
Well then, verses 4:00 to 5:00.
Lord, when thou wentest out of Seer, when thou markest out of the field of Edom, the earth trembled and the heavens dropped. The clouds also dropped water.
The mountains melted from before the Lord, even that Sinai from before the Lord God of Israel. You might say why? Why bring out something that happened a long, long time before Deborah?
Well, I believe Deborah and Barrick in this song are going back to the very beginning of Israel's history and bringing out what happened at the very beginning. That is, God brought them up out of Egypt with a strong hand and he brought he led them to the land of Canaan.
And what I take from this is that we have to go back to God's original purpose. They went back in their minds that God had a purpose when He brought Israel out of Egypt to bring them into the land flowing with milk and honey. And when he brought them, their enemies trembled. They were afraid of them. So they went back to the original purpose and to the original state.
And I believe that we need to do the same thing. You know, we can't base.
Our decisions on what we see around us, we can't base our decisions and our lifestyle on the status quo. We have to go back, as the apostle John said, to that which is from the beginning. And so we can turn to the book of Acts and to the apostles doctrine, and we can read about the church. We can read about how it began and we can read the principles as as was brought out this weekend.
Of the church, what the church is.
The calling of the church, the hopes of the church, the destiny of the church. And we can read about that.
And then we can see what God desires from us. So they they have that.
That was sort of the background in their mind. Now we see something different, Verses 67867 and eight. Let's read those verses in the days of Shamgar, the son of Anath. In the days of jail, the highways were unoccupied and the travelers walked through byways. The inhabitants of the villages ceased.
They ceased in Israel until that I, Deborah arose, that I arose.
A mother in Israel. They chose new gods. Then was war and the gates.
Was there a shield or spear seen among 40,000 in Israel?
And So what we have in these 3 verses is something else.
Now we have to be willing to acknowledge our failure.
And if there's gonna be a revival, we must first acknowledge the fact that we have failed.
Umm, the Lord Jesus said they that are whole need not the physician, but they that are sick.
Umm, you know, we speak about revival. I once had a lengthy conversation with a young man who was convinced that that there was going to be this huge worldwide revival of the church, and he thought it was happening like right now, and that the church was going to have this huge revival.
And everyone was going to get super holy and devoted to the Lord, and then he was going to come and take us home. And he said Ephesians 5 says that he might present to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing.
The church doesn't look like that today, so something's got to change. So he thought there was going to be this big revival. Well, I tried to explain to him that it is the unanimous prediction of the apostles that the state of the church is going to get lower and lower and lower.
00:10:00
Before the Lord comes and there's not going to be some worldwide revival. And there's a number of other reasons that we could show that, but that doesn't mean there can't be a revival in a partial way. There can be revival on a on a partial way. It can be in a local setting, in a local assembly.
And, umm, I don't think we should ever just throw up our hands and say there's no hope the ship is going down. You know, we're just arranging chairs on the deck of the Titanic. As one person said to me, that's not true.
Uh, exactly true.
But we have to be willing to acknowledge the failure. And there's a couple areas here brought out. The first one is that the highways were unoccupied. The travelers walked through byways. So that is that. It was so dangerous out that people couldn't go on the highway. They had to take twisty, windy back roads. And there's a number of thoughts that could be brought out, but one that comes to mind is hospitality.
It's it's a bit of a symptom in my mind that we don't.
We don't visit one another as often as.
Believers did in times past, Umm, my, my parents and my grandma, she told us about how in the old days, on Sunday afternoons after the meetings, there were ones who would go from house to house. This is just on a regular weekly, weekly basis and just visit and spend time together, maybe open the scriptures together and, and sometimes and that doesn't happen like it used to.
Umm, visiting one another.
To be together as as umm, as the household of God, not limiting our traveling to visiting family. You know our real family is the family of God.
Umm, but so that's that's a symptom. The next thing is the inhabitants of the villages ceased. They ceased in Israel. And it makes me think of the shrinking numbers in local assemblies. Now I know numbers aren't everything, but it is a sign that something is not right. The fact that.
We don't enjoy coming together in a local assembly, the fact that we shrink away.
From the assembly meetings, From being with one another.
That's something that is a symptom.
Now we get something that maybe might be one of the causes they chose new gods, and maybe this is one of the areas that we need to have addressed in our conscience. Have we chosen new gods?
You know what is an idol? And and our brother quoted from first John 5.
Little children keep yourselves from idols and I think in the context of first John and idol would be a false.
View of the person of Christ there are many false doctrines concerning the person of Christ and that were being taught gnostic doctrines and I think specifically there and idol would be a false.
An idea of the person of Christ, but we can apply that to anything that comes into our life that would rob the Lord Jesus of the worship that he deserves.
And when I was a young person, I guess I kind of still am, But when I was a single young person, I heard an explanation of what it means to glory.
In something, and I had never heard this before, it was uh, Rob House. He was explaining this. It was one of the Regal Ferry Sunday School classes and he was explaining.
What it means to glory in something. And he said it's like when you're at a hockey game or some sporting event and someone makes a really big play or scores a goal, that's like great. And everyone cheers and everyone's like, yeah, that is to glory in whatever that person just did that accomplishment and the whole stadium is just.
Enthralled, their adoration goes out to that person in that moment, and that's what it means to glory.
You know, the apostle Paul said, God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. And the things of this world do not deserve our adoration. There's only one person that deserves our adoration, that's the Lord Jesus Christ.
He deserves it. He paid the ultimate price, didn't he? He paid an infinite price. And uh, I think it saddens him deeply when he sees our affections, our praise, our worship go.
00:15:06
Somewhere it doesn't belong and umm, perhaps we have chosen new gods and we have forsaken the Lord.
And then the next one is, uh, was there a shield or spear scene among 40,000 of Israel?
We read in Second Corinthians that the weapons of our warfare are not carnal. Here it says there were no weapons. And there's a lot that could be brought out here. I realize I'm going over this stuff pretty quick, but I just think about familiarity with the Word of God. Do we know this book? Do we know it inside and out? Do we study it and do we let it study us?
You know, a brother that I have a lot of respect for said this.
We need to read the Bible in two different ways. One is we need to read it as a devotional. I think that's the 1St way we need to read it, and we need to let it study us. That is, we need to read it for the sake of meditation.
And letting getting ourselves in the presence of God. And the 2nd way is to study it, to learn. We need both of those things. Some people tend to gravitate towards one and some people towards the other. And I perhaps tend to gravitate towards studying the Word. And I can get to where I'm learning a lot of doctrine, but my heart is cold and empty. So I need to be feeding on Christ and to be getting into the presence of.
We need both of those things, but if we don't, if we become unfamiliar with this book, we've lost our our sword. We've lost our weapons. You know, there was another time in Israel's history when there were only two swords and all the land of Israel. Does anyone know when that was? Shout it out.
That's right, Saul and Jonathan were the only two who had swords, and each of them chose to do something different with that sword. Sat down under a pomegranate tree, Jonathan said to his armor bearer. Armor bearer, let's go over against the Garrison of the Philistines. And he went, and there was a tremendous victory. So we have a choice. What are we going to do with this book?
Are we going to read it? Are we going to let?
God use it through us.
Well, that was the state. It was a pretty sad state. Umm, but there's some good things coming up here. Verse nine, My heart is toward the governors of Israel that offered themselves willingly among the people. So I think that in spite of all the failure, this is the next thing is that we need to encourage what is of God. And there is always something to encourage and wherever there are believers.
There's the life of Christ.
And you can see it, and it's good to encourage that wherever you can.
Then in verse 10 speak ye that ride on white ***** that sit in judgment and walk by the way they that are delivered from the noise of The Archers in the places of drawing water. There shall they rehearse the righteous acts of the Lord, even the righteous acts towards the inhabitants of His villages in Israel. Then shall the people of the Lord go down to the gates.
Umm, So what I just want to bring out from this.
Is that there are those who are not going to get involved in the revival. There are these ones who ride on white ***** that would be their their royal Princess of Israel and they were kind of like this upper class.
They were delivered from the noise of The Archers. They they weren't in a place where they really felt it. They had plenty of money and the oppressors of Israel didn't really bother them too much.
So they really had no vested interest in this battle that was taking place in Israel.
You know you're not going to see everyone involved in turning to the Lord.
And that's OK.
And that's OK. And I think that's one of the lessons that we get here is that the work has to start with us. We can't say because this person or that person doesn't seem to have any interest, why should I? Now each one of us, we need to leave those ones with the Lord. And in fact, it says there's a verse 11. I think it's there's a more critical translation that says they are delivered. It says because of the voice of them that divide the spoil. So in other words, they weren't there for the battle.
They were there to divide the spoil. And you know what? We know what that's like. Someone wants to come when it's time to eat a meal, but they don't want to be there to prepare for it, you know, And we just need to leave those kind of things with the Lord and just serve Him and be faithful to Him ourselves.
00:20:16
Well then, verse 12 Awake, awake, Deborah, awake, awake, utter a song. Arise barrack, and lead thy captivity captive, thou son of a binowam.
And he made them that remaineth to have dominion over the nobles among the people.
So that's the next thing is that we need to wake up out of our spiritual slumber and we need to encourage others to wake up as well. You know, we can just kind of get into a rut where we're just.
We come to the meetings, maybe we hear people talking about the Lord, we hear people reading the Bible and discussing it with one another, and we just, we don't even feel any desire in our heart toward the Lord. We just kind of feel like a bump on a log.
We need to awake out of that slumber.
And there are scriptures that would tell us some of the things God uses to wake us up. But I think one of them in my own life has been the most influential is to think about the sufferings of Christ. You know, in the Song of Solomon, there was a woman there in chapter 5 who when her bridegroom knocked at the door, she was too lazy to get out of bed.
She, she said. I've taken off my my shoes and my coat and I I don't want to put them back on. I don't want to.
Get back out of bed. And so he continued knocking. She got out of bed and he was gone.
But he put his hand, it says, by the whole of the door. And I've heard this from others and I really enjoyed it, that we think of the Lord's hand.
We we think of that those nail prints that were in his hands.
And I think a view of the sufferings of Christ is something that the Lord can use to warm our hearts when we've gotten cold and sleepy towards Him. So for my own self, read Matthew 26 and 27, Think of the sufferings of Christ and it can wake us up out of the spiritual sleep that we're in.
And and two, to encourage others. If you see someone who's going along and they are sleeping, just to take it by the shoulders and give them a good shake and try to stir them up if you can.
Well, then we have.
Starting in verse 14 to verse 18, we have some of the records of this of this battle and who took a part in it.
So let's just read these verses. Verse 14 out of Ephraim there was a root of them against Amalek. After thee, Benjamin, among thy people, out of Maker came down governors, and out of Zebulun, they that handled the pen of the writer.
And the Princess of Issachar were with Deborah, even Issachar, and also Barrick. He was sent on foot into the valley for the divisions of Reuben. There were great thoughts of heart. Why a boatest thou among the sheepfolds?
To hear the bleedings of the flocks for the divisions of Reuben, there were great searchings of heart. Gilead abode beyond Jordan. Why did Dan remain in ships? Asher continued on the seashore and abode in his breeches.
Sabulin and Naphtali were a people that jeopardized their lives unto the death in the high places of the field.
And we'll stop there. So I'm not going to go through all of these, but you could. And I encourage you to just to take a look at some of these names that are mentioned. You know, God is recording everything that we do for Him. And there's going to be rewards at the judgment seat of Christ for faithfulness to him. That's not why we're laboring. I trust that we're laboring because we love Him and we want to see as we had before, we want to seek the things that.
Jesus Christ, we want to encourage his people and see them go on for him, but he's recording all these things and we get a record of this battle and who helped and who didn't help. There were some.
It says that they uh, let's see here out of E frame a root after the Benjamin among thy people came down governors statute givers out of Zebulun then that handled the pen of the writer. These were people that would not normally use weapons. These were not trained soldiers, but they came anyways. And it requires us to get out of our comfort zone. You might not think of yourself as.
00:25:03
A student of the word.
But you need to be a student of the word.
You may have barely cracked this book except in the assembly meetings. Go home, open it up and read it, and get down on your knees and pray and beseech the Lord to deliver his people.
We see here that the divisions of Reuben. For the divisions of Reuben there were great thoughts of heart.
You know, Reuben had some thoughts about helping out in this battle. But it says why a boat is thou among the sheepfolds to hear the bleedings of the flocks. You know, it's not enough to think about helping. It's not enough to think about doing something to care and to help and to serve God's people. We actually have to do it.
Umm, we find that there were some like Dan who even got into their ships and came down and they came right to near where the battle was, but they stayed on their ships. It was like they, they didn't just think about it, but they got onto their ships and they came, but they didn't quite get out of their ships and actually join the battle. And we need to.
The Lord would have us to join the battle.
Asher continued on the seashore and abode in his creeks. My margin says so. There were those who made it even a little further. They came into the inlets, into the into the land, but then they stopped, you know, and.
You know, it's not good enough just to think about it. We actually have to act.
Well, Debulin and NAFTA were people that jeopardy their lives unto the death and the high places of the field. We read about Epaphroditus today, didn't we? Who?
Was nearer to death for the Lord and for the Lord's people. And so that's the kind of devotion that we need to have.
That we need to have each one of us to be willing to lay down our lives in a day that a country that we live in, You know, we are not being asked to lay down our lives in a physical sense for the Lord, but in a moral and spiritual sense. We need to lay down our lives, that is to sacrifice our lives, our own ambitions.
You know some of these ones where from Gilead, it says Gilead beyond Jordan. That was a cattle land. You know, I think of the business pursuits and how sometimes we can value our business and our commercial interests more than the Lord and more than the Lord's people. Is it really more important that I secure that next project?
Is it more important that I land that next job?
Than helping out.
In the revival among God's people.
You know, I think that it's a, it's a matter of priorities and you know, it's all clear after the fact. Hindsight is 2020, but in the moment.
You know, I gotta take care of my sheep. If I take a couple weeks off to go fight some battle, who knows what's gonna happen to him? I gotta, I gotta take care of my business. Well, it's recorded in God's eternal word that they thought about it, but they never acted.
Well.
Verse 19.
Verse 19 down to 23. Let's read these verses.
The kings came and fought, then fought the kings of Canaan.
In Tanakh, by the waters of Megiddo, they took no gain of money. They fought from heaven. The stars in their courses fought against Cicero. The river of Keshan swept them away. That ancient river, the river Kishan.
O my soul, thou hast trodden down strength. Then where the horse hoods broken by means of the prancings, the prancings of their mighty ones. Cursive Miraz, said the Angel of the Lord, curse ye bitterly.
The inhabitants thereof, because they came not to the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord against the mighty. So now we actually get the battle itself. Before we had those who were called to the battle. Now we get the battle itself. And it says the kings of Canaan, which I take that to be the actual tribes of Israel. They came and they fought and they took no gain of money. That is, they weren't being paid. They weren't mercenaries, they weren't being paid for their services.
00:30:09
They came because they wanted to defend Israel.
And, uh, we need to, I believe labor without any thought of reward. We're not serving for reward. We're not getting kickbacks. We're not looking. We ought not to be looking for a place for some kind of recognition, some kind of status.
Umm, and those things are so subtle. We, we had brought out this weekend how we can be doing something and it really be for ourselves instead of for the Lord. But that's not the way it was. They took no gain of money. We find something here too, that this battle was really the Lord's. It says that the stars in their courses fought against Cicero, and that's poetic language, you know.
The river swept them away, the ancient river, the river Kishan showing that God.
And his sovereignty was behind this battle. The stars were fighting. I mean, not literally, right? I take it the stars didn't actually come down with swords and fight Cicero and his army. But it's springing out how the odds were stacked against Cicero because the Lord was behind it. And that's how it is that that that any work that is done is of the Lord.
And are we going to be with the Lord, or are we going to be against the Lord?
We find that there were these ones who are with the Lord, but there were those who weren't cursing Miraz. That was a little city right near Megiddo.
Right near the battle, they were right there where it was critical. The critical moment came and they did nothing.
You know, I've had a recent failure in my own life, and there was a time where something ought to have been done for the Lord's glory and for his honor, and I didn't do anything.
And.
I've I've had to repent of that because.
The moment comes.
When we need to take a stand for Christ.
And we need to do it. The opportunity is there and then it's gone and we don't get it again.
Mira's was cursed because they didn't act at the critical time, because they came not to the help of the Lord. You know, when there's a work of God, and I believe there's a work among the people of God, there is at all times. We need to sense that it's his work and we're coming to help him. It's for the Lord that we do these things.
Are we going to stand by and say others are going to do it, or are we going to do it ourselves?
Well, let's be willing to do it ourselves. Now we get a nice example.
And this is the ninth thing, and we're almost done here, but we have jail. Let's read about her. Blessed above women Shall jail the wife of Eber, the key knight, be blessed? Shall she be above women in the tent? He asked water, and she gave him milk.
She brought forth butter in a lordly dish. She put her hand to the nail, at her right hand to the workman's hammer.
And with the hammer she smoked, Cicero she smote off his head. When she had pierced and stricken through his temples at her feet. He bowed, he fell. He lay down at her feet, he bowed, he fell where he bowed.
There he fell down dead.
You know, umm, this chapter, whenever, a lot of times when we take it up, we bring out this aspect that there are two women that are very prominent in the, in the story. And I highly encourage you to take a look at it, especially those who are are, are sisters. But all of us take a look at it from that standpoint. It's not my purpose to go into that here, but one thing I take from the verses that we just read is our best work.
Is done when we stay in the sphere that God put us in.
This applies to brothers as well as sisters.
In the sphere that God has provided we do our best work. This woman stayed in the tent. She was a wife and women were told to be keepers at home. She stayed in that sphere and she won. She defeated the captain of the enemy's host. She single handedly killed this guy in her own tent. And you might think, I can't do anything for the Lord at home.
This one, maybe she woke up that day and had that thought. I I I doubt it based on her character, but maybe she did.
OK, a different story. The enemy of this of the enemies of Israel, the captain.
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Put him to sleep and drove a 10th stake through her head and it sounds like.
He smote off his head.
You know this, this woman was.
She was willing to act, it says she.
With her right, she put her hand to the nail and her right hand to the workman's hammer. It means she wasn't afraid to get dirty. We need to be willing in our sphere to get involved. You know when you read Romans chapter 12, I said our best work is done when we stay in the sphere. God put us in Romans chapter 12 where it talks about the gifts. I believe that is one of the central themes of that chapter.
Is that we are to stay with whatever the Lord has given. Read those verses, whether it be prophesying, wait on the proportion of faith that God has given to you. Whether it be ministry, wait on your ministry.
Know what God has given you to do and do that and that alone. If I could summarize those those verses there in Romans 12. And so in this work of the Lord, this revival, if there's going to be one we can't get out of our place.
And, uh, start doing a job that has been intended for someone else. The Lord has given each one of us something to do. We all have a gift, and we need to use that gift. Stick with it, and the Lord can use it for victory.
But there's a lot here. I, I, I say again, take a look at it with regard to the woman.
Umm, we see this with, with the man bowing down and it says it three times over. He bowed at her feet. You've got a man, the captain of the host of the enemy bowing down before a woman's feet. That's some, that's some serious language that's being used here in this poem to show the place, umm, that this man was brought by the Lord. Well, these last few verses, 28 to the end.
You might read them and wonder. This seems really strange for this portion to be included in the Canon of scripture.
But it's scripture and we'll read it. But I just want to say first what I the point I wanted to bring out of it is simply this. The Lord is able to completely turn the tables. He's able to completely turn the tables around when it looks like a hopeless situation, flip it around and make it look hopeless for the enemy.
It looks like it was gonna be a disaster for the Lord's people at the end of the story. It's disaster for the enemies of the Lord's people. Well, let's just read it for completion's sake. The mother of Cicero looked out at a window and cried through the lattice. So this is poetic language, bringing out the sorrow that was brought to the mother of Cicero and cried through the lattice. Why is this chariot so long and coming?
Why, Terry, the wheels of his chariot? Her wise, lazy ladies answered her. Yeah, she returned answer to herself.
Have they not spread? Have they not divided? The prey to every man, a damsel or two, to Cicero, a prey of divers colors, a prey of divers colors, of needlework, of divers colors, of needlework on both sides, meet for the next of them that take the spoil.
So she's saying to herself, why? You know, he seems like he's taking a long time to come home today. Maybe it's.
They've taken so much spoil that it's just taking them so long to divide it up, and she's coming up with all these reasons in her mind why.
He might be kind of late.
Umm, but it's bringing out the solemn irony of how wrong she was. She was totally wrong. Instead of dividing, uh, virgins between them to take home a spoil, he had died at the feet of a woman. Uh, shameful, shameful death. Well, the Lord is able to completely turn the tables, and so it closes. So let thine enemies perish, oh Lord, but let them that love him be as the son when he goeth forth.
In his might.
And the land had rest for 40 years. So the Lord is able to take the circumstances that we see around us and turn them completely around.
By by nature, I am not a super observant person, I would say of people, but the Lord has placed me in a marriage with a woman who is much more observant and I'm very thankful for that because it's important. It's important to know where.
Folks are at, in the assembly and we, we have the young people in our home, uh, on occasions and, uh.
It's nice to have a sense of where folks are at. And, you know, we might look around and we might see the condition, the low state, the idolatry that that has come in, perhaps among the people of God. We might see the lack of familiarity with the word of God, the lack of moral discernment for what is right and wrong. You might get discouraged about that. But.
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Keep in mind that God is able to completely turn it around.
As he did in this story, and he wants to use us if we're willing to offer ourselves in service to him. That's all I had to share. Do you guys want me to give thanks for the?
OK, let's pray the loving God and our Father, we give thanks for the privilege of being able to open up Thy word.
We think of the.
Of thy people, the Church.
For which, Lord Jesus, thou hast died and shed thy blood. And we just pray for our preservation, that we might be preserved from the from the world, from the flesh, from the devil. And we think of this chapter that we've just read. And we pray that it might be an encouragement to us to have a revival first in our own hearts, and then to be an encouragement to others.
For the glory and the honor of our Lord Jesus Christ.
We pray that we might not abide in our ships, that we would act for the honor and for the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. So we give thanks now for the food that has been provided, and we just pray for a blessing on it and on the fellowship that we enjoy together as well. We pray these things in the worthy name of our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
Philippians 2:1-11
Phillipians 2:12-18
Philippians 2:19-30