Chickens and Offerings

In this series, we will look at some of the submissions from all of you and respond to 2 or 3 each week in either a mini-sermon or a dedicated lesson. Let’s see what we got in store this week...

Chicken Jokes

Submission: From a child. Why did the chicken cross the road? To eat every leaf in the whole world in 2 minutes.

Sidestep… bless the children

Kids doing night-night prayers —> Thank God for silly things (irritating to me sometimes)

Colossians 3:21 CSB

21 Fathers, do not exasperate your children, so that they won’t become discouraged.

Sometimes we entertain the silliness because to a rambunctious toddler, silliness is joy… and Christ brings us eternal joy.

AS TO THE CHICKEN…

Talk about… gluttony and self-indulgence?

Talk about… pursuit of something he wants (a la, the parable of the pearl in a field)?

Real Talk: It doesn’t make any sense.

NOTE: The joke made sense to the child… but the meaning is hidden from us (sounds like parables)

Mark 4:10–12 CSB

10 When he was alone, those around him with the Twelve asked him about the parables. 11 He answered them, “The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you, but to those outside, everything comes in parables 12 so that they may indeed look, and yet not perceive; they may indeed listen, and yet not understand; otherwise, they might turn back and be forgiven.”

Respond to the children with dumb jokes...

Do we ignore them? NO!

Do we criticize them? NO!

It’s a window into how they see the world! WHAT AN OPPORTUNITY!

Christ speaks to us in many forms… miracles, parables, testimonies of the saints and spiritual mentors, and life experiences.

These are opportunities to see creation as He sees creation.

Are you taking those opportunities with the open eyes and listening ears of a believers to see what He is revealing to you or are you living your life confused because the joke doesn’t make sense? Or maybe criticizing God because you can’t reason with it?

Sometimes what may seem confusing at first is God’s way of telling us we need to pause, get over ourselves, and listen to what God is communicating to us about HIS understanding.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS: Read Mark 4:10-12 and think about how some of the things in the Bible are worded in confusing and obscured ways. 1) Have you ever taken a class where the instructors actually made you think through problems instead of just giving you information to memorize? How does forcing you to “think through things” (rather than memorizing correct answers) impact your understanding? 2) Why do you think God might favor communicating through parables and teachings that require thought and meditation rather than just “giving us the answers” to life’s questions?

Numbers 7

Submission: Numbers Ch7

Three separate parts...

Verses 1-9: Preparation for consecration

Verses 10-88: Offerings of the tribes

Verse 89: The voice of God

Consecration...

Numbers 7:1–5 CSB

1 On the day Moses finished setting up the tabernacle, he anointed and consecrated it and all its furnishings, along with the altar and all its utensils. After he anointed and consecrated these things, 2 the leaders of Israel, the heads of their ancestral families, presented an offering. They were the tribal leaders who supervised the registration. 3 They brought as their offering before the Lord six covered carts and twelve oxen, a cart from every two leaders and an ox from each one, and presented them in front of the tabernacle. 4 The Lord said to Moses, 5 “Accept these from them to be used in the work of the tent of meeting, and give this offering to the Levites, to each division according to their service.”

Consecrate = Making sacred, setting apart… ALSO, making it profane for secular use

Question: WHAT IS REVERENCE?!

Recognizing that which is holy.

Acknowledging that which is consecrated (and therefore inappropriate for secular use).

Some consecrate the grounds, buildings, or furniture of the church.

If you have dedicated something to God, it is consecrated and should be respected.… whatever that is.

HOWEVER… the tabernacle was consecrated BY GOD (not men). God makes sacred, not us.

Million $ Question: Do you treat with reverence that which God has consecrated in you and in others? Or do we make ourselves and others as profane by not respecting the soul that Christ died for?

Offerings

All Tribes gave the same things...

silver dish and basin with gain and oil

gold bowl of incense

a bull, ram, lamb (burnt offering)

goat (sin offering)

two bulls, five rams, five male goats, five lambs (fellowship sacrifice)

Common giving shows...

Fellowship and belonging (the horizontal component)

Individual devotion (inward component)

Selflessness and deference to God (vertical component)

People get uncomfortable when we talk about Church giving because it feels like a deeply personal thing.

The reality is that giving, specifically in context of your church family, does actually matter. It’s not just a ploy for money and corporate greed.

These horizontal, inward, and vertical components are all essential parts to being a part of the consecration we NOW know through the Body of Christ…

WHICH BRINGS US TO THE END OF NUMBERS 7.

The voice of God

Numbers 7:89 CSB

89 When Moses entered the tent of meeting to speak with the Lord, he heard the voice speaking to him from above the mercy seat that was on the ark of the testimony, from between the two cherubim. He spoke to him that way.

God communicated to Moses through the mercy seat… the area between the angels on the ark of the covenant… but we now commune with God through the Holy Spirit.

FOLLOW ME HERE: If the consecration of the tabernacle was a precursor to God communicating in that place, what does that now mean of our souls that we have been sent the Holy Spirit as an advocate between us and Christ?

The body of the faithful are consecrated and made holy, but not because of what we have done… because of what God has done. The question is do we treat that body as holy, fully recognizing the horizontal, inward, and vertical components involved, or is this something less?

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS: Read Numbers 7:1-5, 12-17, 89. Think about how the tabernacle was set apart by God but then acknowledged by the 12 tribes through these acts of selflessness and sacrifice. 1) When many look for a church, they ask “does this church give me what I am looking for?” How does this influence the way people interact with their church? How can it work against building a sense of family and community? 2) The Hebrew people couldn’t “pick” their tabernacle; they were called to the one God ordained. How does feeling drawn or called to a church (rather than “window shopping” for churches) put you in a different frame of mind to experience church differently?

Tying It Together

Today we took two truths away from seemingly random submissions to a form: one about something silly and one asking about Old Testament procedures that can come across confusing.

BOTH INSTANCES… In both cases, we see there is a great truth.

BOTH INSTANCES… In both cases, we see the study could have gone many different directions.

Beyond the individual lessons, take this away… God is present in all things; nothing goes by without seeing His workings in our life.

If your thoughts on the divine are limited to only when you are forced to think on it, then you’re missing out.

God surrounds you in all moments, the serious and the silly. Are you listening to what God has to tell you?

After all… God has consecrated your heart and speaks into your life on a regular basis; sometimes clearly and sometimes subtly. Regardless of how He talks, it would be a shame to miss what He has in store for us.