Blueprints to Reality
The Going Forth - From Slavery To Freedom • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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6 By steadfast love and faithfulness iniquity is atoned for, and by the fear of the Lord one turns away from evil.
7 When a man’s ways please the Lord, he makes even his enemies to be at peace with him.
8 Better is a little with righteousness than great revenues with injustice.
9 The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps.
Introduction:
Main Overall Point: (Walking in your relationship with Christ)
Each and every person who has received the forgiveness of Sins by faith in Jesus has a unique story.
It is an individually tailored testimony for each person.
Every saved person starts at the same point: Beginning their new relationship with learning how to live it out each day.
A new believer is a “newborn”, meaning that there is no knowledge as to the beginning is and how to go about growing in their faith.
Thankfully we have a letter from our Savior written to each and every one of us, and it can be applied individually, and collectively.
He leaves in His word outlines for our growth.
In Exodus 38 God left practical principles for how we can build our relationship with Him, at the same time instructing Israel to build His dwelling place.
Transition:
In 37 Bezalel finished the crafting of the furniture for the inside of the tabernacle.
They were either overlaid with Gold, or were of pure Gold.
Moving from the inside of the tent to the outer court we find a material change; from Gold to Bronze.
Gold highlights value and lifts up divinity and purity, which typifies God’s divine presence and His holiness.
The Bronze is a metal that, because of the Altar of Atonement, symbolizes judgment.
Which is the “focal point” in the outer court.
Altar/Bronze Laver (1-8)
Altar/Bronze Laver (1-8)
1 He made the altar of burnt offering of acacia wood. Five cubits was its length, and five cubits its breadth. It was square, and three cubits was its height.
2 He made horns for it on its four corners. Its horns were of one piece with it, and he overlaid it with bronze.
The altar was a box with a bronze grate to hold up the sacrifice and let all the ashes fall to the ground, fitting into the original altar made from Earth.
It was 7 1/2’ square and 4 1/2’ tall, with horns at each corner.
Poles to carry it since it was mobile.
Illustration:
If you ever go to a museum there is something that you notice as you make your way through.
It is divided into rooms; but when you enter each different area you notice a theme or the main point for that area.
In the area where trains are the prominent features you aren’t highlighting the paint on the engines as if the artwork was the showcased part.
Trains are the main point and all the plaques explain how each engine added to the overall theme of a museum: History is important enough to know and remember.
We find a similarity to the first and most prominent thing you would see walking around the entrance into the outer court.
The altar adds to the overall theme for the Tabernacle.
That theme is that God is present and is available; but the Altar explains how He can be approached!
There is only one way to approach Him.
You can have access to Him only through a blood sacrifice!
There needs to be atonement made!
Atonement is: the covering of sin.
Access to God requires your sin to be covered in order to enter.
Illustration:
Let’s say we plan a visit to Yountville, California, which is in the Napa valley.
Your looking up restaurants and realize...the prices are ridiculous, and all a bit too fancy.
You find one called the French Laundry.
You arrive and come to the hostess and she says you can’t come in...But you’ve already made reservations..
She goes into a back room and brings out a suit coat close to your size and says you have to wear this.
If you want food you have to wear a jacket, that’s the rules.
If we want to be near the Lord our Sin has to be covered.
Not visible; even though He knows it’s there under the garment.
Why doesn’t He just call out our hypocrisy?
We are approaching Him by faith.
Our faith is being shown by obeying His requirement.
The altar reminds and sets a precedent that no one can come near God unless they have a covering for their sin!
Were taught the importance of a sacrifice and the necessity of atonement.
A substitution has to be made!
Atonement provides access to God; but cleansing is needed to maintain fellowship.
Which leads us to the laver, which we may not see because it is probably smaller than the bronze altar.
The Laver is where the priests needed to wash.
8 He made the basin of bronze and its stand of bronze, from the mirrors of the ministering women who ministered in the entrance of the tent of meeting.
Notice there are no dimensions provided for this basin; Bezalel could make it as big or small as he wanted or had material enough for.
A great point that verse 8 teaches is where Bezalel got the bronze.
It was the bronze mirrors given by the ladies who would stand and minister at the entrance.
You could say that the self-reflection of the outward was exchanged for the inward purity.
Their giving up of vanity made it possible for the priests to enter the presence of the Lord, as long as their defilement was washed away.
The laver provided a second principal for entering the presence of God.
It wasn’t enough to covered; there had to be washing or cleansing.
Connection:
This part of our outline brings the newborn in the faith to unchanging principals:
There must be a sacrifice to cover your sins.
You must be washed clean from your sin.
(Call to Salvation!)
It would be easy for us to all wallow in our sinful dirt and find that we have no hope; but thankfully “In Christ” we have a covering and we have been cleansed.
This statement “In Christ” I heard someone illustrate the Greek wording.
It literally means that we become part of Him.
It’s like an organ in the body, an liver, kidney, pancreas, stomach, etc...
Since we are part of Him we find hope, like in 1 John 2:2
2 He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.
He is the substitute for our penalty, He took it in our place and we are asked to clothe ourselves in His righteousness.
27 For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.
24 and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.
Because of Christ we have hope, and because of the robe He covers us with, we can enter boldly into His presence.
We have a covering. Step one completed!
What about step 2, How are we cleansed and worthy?
In Christ you have been cleansed and 1 John 1:7-9 are good to write on your heart.
7 But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.
8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
We find the promise that is sufficient the first time we mess up and the 99,000th time!
Our continual cleansing mimics the Laver before the tent.
But praise God that John reveals what happened to this cleansing after Christ:
6 and before the throne there was as it were a sea of glass, like crystal. And around the throne, on each side of the throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind:
The cleansing of Christ is permanent!
Point:
God instructs Israel and us that there are only 2 ways that you can come into His presence:
Have a blood sacrifice to cover your sins.
Wash in the Laver to cleanse your sins.
All the other ways people attempt to approach Him, He doesn’t accept and they are still unworthy!
Transition:
Bezalel continues and moves to:
The Outer Court (9-20)
The Outer Court (9-20)
9 And he made the court. For the south side the hangings of the court were of fine twined linen, a hundred cubits;
10 their twenty pillars and their twenty bases were of bronze, but the hooks of the pillars and their fillets were of silver.
Bezalel and his craftsman are said to have constructed the poles, hooks attached to the poles, bases of Bronze, and the fine twined linen hung.
The court spanned 75’ wide and was 150’ long.
A fairly good size structure to make a separation with fine twined linen.
This separation taught a principal to everyone, not just the Israelites.
There is a separation between God and the World.
This separation provided only a glimpse of what was happening inside the linen wall!
They could see the smoke, they could hear the animals, possibly the fire too.
They would only see the results of God’s work, the way of righteousness was hid from them.
It was happening on the other side of the fine twined linen.
This would create a curiosity, for what was being done?
Illustration:
This reminds me about a couple that was going camping and invited their neighbors to go along with them.
The first couple set up their tent, staked it down, put the rain cover on over it; like they had done a few other times before.
The second couple attempted to set up their tent.
Both placed their sleeping bags, and such in the tent.
It rained that night....
Guess which couple didn’t place their rain cover on, and also didn’t really have the right sleeping bags for colder weather than they anticipated?
The first time campers.
I say all of that to say this:
The materials make a difference between a good tenting experience and a....Never going again one.
The Israelites had tents; but they weren’t like the tent that God stayed in.
I don’t think the Israelites tents had an division from the outside world, I don’t think they were as beautifully adorned, with Bronze bases, Silver fillets to hang the material from.
I don’t think they had many layers to their outer covering.
I don’t think they had walls covered in Gold, or a pure golden lamp to light the night.
There isn’t a person who would see the tabernacle and not know where royalty lived..
Every nation they traveled into would know which tent is for the Leader and King.
Just in appearances alone everyone would know that it was for royalty, not just another Israelite.
Connection:
Our lives should reveal something similar:
Our lives should point out who our King and Leader is.
There should be no doubt who you reverence more than you King.
These would be revealed by:
The “works” we reveal because of our faith.
The things we say because of what our hearts are filled with.
The things we think about because we are consistently renewing our minds through scripture.
Our overall character can reveal our King and leader.
The one who is Royalty...It would create a curiosity in their hearts as to how we are confident, hopeful, and have a joy that isn’t dictated by circumstances...
Providing us the opportunity to tell them: “Come and see”...
Allowing us to introduce them to the proper worship God accepts and how to properly approach Him.
Thankfully Jesus’ sales pitch isn’t difficult, Believe and have eternal life… Jesus already took care of everything.
It is awesome how Jesus provided everything for us to be in His presence, and In Exodus 38 there were all the materials provided for His presence.
Thinking about the materials we find next they:
Evaluate the Materials (21-31)
Evaluate the Materials (21-31)
21 These are the records of the tabernacle, the tabernacle of the testimony, as they were recorded at the commandment of Moses, the responsibility of the Levites under the direction of Ithamar the son of Aaron the priest.
They recorded everything that was offered in this one offering.
24 All the gold that was used for the work, in all the construction of the sanctuary, the gold from the offering, was twenty-nine talents and 730 shekels, by the shekel of the sanctuary.
25 The silver from those of the congregation who were recorded was a hundred talents and 1,775 shekels, by the shekel of the sanctuary:
There was Gold, Silver, and Bronze.
It measures the Gold and Silver in shekels, only this measure isn’t a coin as many would think.
It is supposed that coins weren’t invented until the 8th century B.C. by the people group the Lidians who lived in Anatoli or Modern Turkey.
Since these weren’t coins how can we connect the value of what they state here?
A Shekel was the measurement by weight which is .4oz or 11grams.
So armed with this knowledge we can find the value of what was offered to the building of the tabernacle.
It was approximately 1 ton of Gold worth today at $107.5 million
It was approximately 8600lb’s in Silver which is worth about $2.6 Million
It was approximately 2 1/4 tons of Bronze which is worth about $72K
For an approximate total of $110,172,000.
Ok, Let’s outdo them today and take an offering and see if we can beat it. (haha)
They only built a tent...Imagine what we could build here with $110 million, it would be crazy.
This offering revealed their desire.
They desired the Lord come into their presence at any cost.
It showed their obedience to supply what God was asking for.
I want to insert here a little nugget of wisdom that the bible teaches:
28 For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it?
Can we read in Exodus that God evaluated the cost of the request He had for the building of the tabernacle, Nope...
Do you think God knew what it would cost?
God always knows the cost!
I bet He knew how much the Israelites would plunder from the Egyptians on the way out and what they could give over.
More than He was going to ask for.
Connection:
God always knows what it is going to cost us from the things He asks out of obedience.
Much better than that.....He always provides for that request over and above!
Our worship is really just giving back what He placed in our stewardship.
Illustration:
I learned from youth ministry that there are many generous people among the body of Christ who know the importance of summer camp in a teens life, so they donate money to cover the cost of camp.
I noticed early on that when some kids get camp for free, they don’t appreciate it as much as those who saved and worked for it.
When people give towards things, those things become valuable to them, important.
When they pay a great price...It’s precious.
Point:
Jesus paid it all for you and for me, we are precious and invaluable to Him.
When we offer from the things we are given stewardship over they become important to us.
What has God entrusted you with, and how are you using it to build His kingdom?
How about yourself, how can you offer yourself over to His will?
Be a living sacrifices which is your reasonable worship..
When that happens - our worship becomes important to us.
Conclusion:
A newborn baby believer often doesn’t have a direction for where to start as they begin a new way of living by faith.
Thankfully we were left a road map to follow; the Bible.
In Exodus 38 we are getting the transition from blueprints to reality for the building of where God will be present and available to His people.
In this outline we can gain an understanding for a few good starting points in our faith.
In the outer court we get the hint that there is specific ways to approach God.
There must be a blood sacrifice to make atonement for our sins.
There must be a cleansing before we enter.
The outer court shows there is a division between the world and God.
This creates an opportunity for the onlookers to see the results of Godly worship; but the way of righteousness is hid from their view.
It’s our duty as we worship the Lord to bring them to the entrance and show them what kind of worship God accepts.
The evaluation of materials reveals a stewardship of wealth they were entrusted with.
This can come as a challenge to us:
We have each been given great wealth to be stewards over.
Do you know what you have been given and are you offering it to the Lord for His use fulfilling His call on your life?
We are confronted with truth: worship is through Obedience.
God gave us the blueprints for correct worship it’s up to us how we bring it into reality!
-Pray!
