Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Well, good morning. If you got a Bible, you can
[00:00:02] Speaker B: turn to Exodus, chapter 20. We're gonna be looking at 18 through 20, so we'll finish this chapter today. But as we've been walking through the book of Exodus, one of the goals
[00:00:11] Speaker A: as we're walking through this is I hope that as I preach through these, that you're learning how to read the Old Testament in the sense of, okay,
[00:00:19] Speaker B: how do I read this and understand it and make application to my life
[00:00:24] Speaker A: so that we, when you read the
[00:00:26] Speaker B: rest of the Bible on your own, that we would be regular Bible readers,
[00:00:31] Speaker A: that we know how to do this
[00:00:32] Speaker B: together, that corporately we understand how do we read the Bible, understand the Bible
[00:00:37] Speaker A: and apply the Bible to our own life.
[00:00:39] Speaker B: And so that's one of the goals as we look at this. And I'm gonna hopefully show us some
[00:00:43] Speaker A: examples of how we use the New
[00:00:45] Speaker B: Testament, that the Scripture can interpret the Scripture. And so the New Testament gives us some understanding of what's going on in
[00:00:53] Speaker A: the Old Testament here as we begin to see.
[00:00:57] Speaker B: But I think really, one of the
[00:00:59] Speaker A: biggest questions that we should have in the Scripture is how does a sinful people live, dwell, exist with a holy God?
[00:01:14] Speaker B: How does that happen? We see in the beginning of the
[00:01:17] Speaker A: story that God dwelled with his people,
[00:01:20] Speaker B: Adam and Eve, in the garden.
He was with them.
[00:01:23] Speaker A: And so he walked with them, it says, and he talks with them.
And then because of sin, what we see is that when sin enters, then they are cast out of his presence, they're cast out of the garden, that
[00:01:41] Speaker B: they don't get to walk in his
[00:01:43] Speaker A: presence with him because sin has separated them.
[00:01:48] Speaker B: And so then we've got this problem,
[00:01:51] Speaker A: this huge problem, that now, how does a sinful people live with a holy God?
How does that happen?
[00:01:59] Speaker B: And that's the story of redemption that
[00:02:01] Speaker A: we see throughout the rest of the Bible, is that this story is that God makes a way because God desires to dwell with his people.
We know that throughout the scripture that it tells us that, that God desires this, and we see it in his
[00:02:18] Speaker B: actions that then the story of redemption is that God makes a way. And so we're seeing this take place with the people of Israel, that God made a promise, I'm going to bless you. I'm going to make you into a nation, and then I'm going to bring you into a land, a land that
[00:02:33] Speaker A: God could dwell with them in.
And so he set them free.
He's taken them through the desert. And then, as we saw last week, he brings them to this mountain which was the whole goal of what he was telling Pharaoh.
[00:02:49] Speaker B: Let them go so that they can
[00:02:50] Speaker A: come worship me in the desert. The whole goal was that they would be with him, that they would worship him.
[00:02:56] Speaker B: And so God's finally brought them back to this mountain. It's the place where he told Moses, I'm gonna bring you back here. This is gonna be a sign for you. You're gonna worship me on this mountain. And so then God shows up on this mountain in such a way that the earthquakes, that there's smoke on this mountain, lightning comes, they hear this trumpet sound that God shows, shows up on this mountain.
[00:03:20] Speaker A: And let's just begin reading verse 18, and we'll see what happens. Here says this now, when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and trembled, and they stood far off, and they said to Moses, you speak to us, and we will listen, but do not let God speak to us, lest we die.
So Moses said to the people, do
[00:03:56] Speaker B: not fear, for God has come to test you, that the fear of him
[00:04:03] Speaker A: may be for you, that you may not sin.
And the people stood far off while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was. And the Lord said to Moses, thus you shall say to the people of Israel, you have seen for yourselves that I have talked with you from heaven.
[00:04:22] Speaker B: And you shall not make gods of
[00:04:25] Speaker A: silver to be with me, nor shall you make for yourselves gods of gold. An altar of earth you shall make for me and sacrifice on it your burnt offerings and your peace offerings, your sheep and your oxen in every place
[00:04:39] Speaker B: where I cause my name to be remembered. I will come to you and bless you.
[00:04:44] Speaker A: And if you make me an altar of stone, you shall not build it of hewn stones, for if you wield
[00:04:50] Speaker B: your tool on it, you profane it. And you shall not go up by
[00:04:54] Speaker A: the steps to my altar that your nakedness be not exposed. Let's pray, and then we'll jump into unpacking this together.
Lord, we come to you just needy for your spirit to move among us, Lord, to remind us of that which is true. That by your word, Lord, you are able to divide soul and spirit, joint and marrow. Lord, that you're able to surgically do the work which needs done in our own heart, of showing us, of revealing things to us, of carving out lies or the things which we would believe which aren't true about you or about us or about Lord. And yet we're reminded in this passage that you desire to dwell with us, that we would walk with you, would dwell with you. And so, Lord, I pray that this morning, by your spirit, we might gain confidence, as Hebrews says, that we can walk with a holy God because you have made a way for us. So, Lord, would you encourage us by your word this morning we ask it in Jesus name. Amen.
Well, let's begin by unpacking this. I think that it breaks down really kind of into three sections of things that we see here, which I think are helpful for us to remember.
[00:06:11] Speaker B: So these three truths that are essential for us to walk and live with a holy God. How do sinful people. We're answering this question. How can a sinful people dwell with a holy God?
[00:06:23] Speaker A: Let's first just look at the holiness
[00:06:25] Speaker B: of God, that the holiness of God produces fear. Look back at verse 18, that the people, they see this interaction, that a holy God has come down a transcendent God. And an other God has shown up to his people in such a way, with lightning flashes, with thunder, with the sound of a trumpet, this deafening sound with the mountain smoking the earth.
He has shown up in such a way that no one can doubt his presence.
And no one thinks like, oh yeah,
[00:07:05] Speaker A: I can do that, right?
[00:07:07] Speaker B: Like he's other.
Like he is all powerful, all knowing, all present. Like he is other. He's separate. That's what holy is, that separate.
[00:07:24] Speaker A: And that, that separateness, that holiness causes
[00:07:29] Speaker B: fear that we see in the people.
[00:07:32] Speaker A: That encountering God causes the people to be afraid. It causes them to tremble and it causes them to recoil.
We see this throughout the Scripture, that when this happens to Isaiah, woe is me, he's undone.
When people come into the presence of God, that there is an awe which undoes them.
And so we need to be reminded that we should not come into the holiness of God casually.
He is not to be treated casually.
[00:08:11] Speaker B: You don't encounter this and just saunter up to God however you want, that he is other and that his holiness
[00:08:21] Speaker A: strikes fear in the people.
[00:08:24] Speaker B: But it's interesting that this fear which they are caused. Moses then confronts them in this fear, that they recoil back in fear.
[00:08:33] Speaker A: But there's actually two types of fear that I believe are talked about here. We see it in Moses words as the people said, like, no, no, no, no, no. Like, you speak to us and we'll
[00:08:43] Speaker B: listen, but don't let God speak to
[00:08:45] Speaker A: us, cause we'll die.
But then look at what Moses says to them.
[00:08:50] Speaker B: He specifically tells them, do not fear.
Like he's calling them out of Fear. We see Jesus do this all the time in the New Testament, in the Gospels, he's constantly calling people out of fear into faith. But he says, don't fear. But then look at what he says. Verse 20. God has come to test you that the fear of him may be before you. But then he's saying, but you should fear.
[00:09:15] Speaker A: We also know in the Scripture that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge or wisdom.
That.
Wait a minute.
[00:09:22] Speaker B: He's saying, don't fear in this way, but do fear in this way.
[00:09:25] Speaker A: And so let's just talk a minute about these two types of fear. That there is a fear, a terror which drives us away from the presence of God.
[00:09:37] Speaker B: That's what the people, they stood far
[00:09:38] Speaker A: off because they were like.
The holiness of God is terrifying.
We're sinful people. We can't be in the presence of a holy God, lest we die.
And yet there's another fear that Moses is saying here. He says, but the fear of the Lord may be before you, and this
[00:09:59] Speaker B: is the test that will you obey him. And so there's a fear, a reverence
[00:10:04] Speaker A: which draws us into obedience. Obedience.
There's a fear that drives us away, and there is a fear which draws us in.
There's a fear that makes us flee, and there's a fear that makes us worship.
Maybe I could illustrate it like this. That the holiness of God was not created in order to destroy us, but to transform us.
It's not there to destroy you, but there to transform you.
I don't know if any of y' all have ever driven down I49. You're headed south. You get out of Shreveport, and you're like, kind of cruising along. And then in the median, there's a
[00:10:47] Speaker B: group of trees, kind of sets up on a hill.
And some of you guys know what
[00:10:52] Speaker A: sits in those trees on that hill.
[00:10:56] Speaker B: Some of y' all have firsthand experience.
[00:10:59] Speaker A: We have a few state police in here. They might be the ones sitting there.
[00:11:05] Speaker B: But you're bebopping along, and then all of a sudden, you catch a glimpse of something shiny. And what do you immediately do?
[00:11:14] Speaker A: You look at that speedometer and go, whoa.
[00:11:18] Speaker B: There is a fear of an authority,
[00:11:22] Speaker A: of a power that transforms your actions into obedience.
That it's not a fear to make you flee and run and hide. It's a fear that might transform you into that which is good for you.
Because God's ways are good for us.
They are the path to flourishing. He has given us his commands. He summarized it last week that we
[00:11:47] Speaker B: ought to love God with all our
[00:11:49] Speaker A: heart, soul, mind and strength and love our neighbor as ourself, because that's what we were created for in order that we would flourish.
[00:11:57] Speaker B: And so there's a fear which would make us recoil. And that's not what we're to do.
[00:12:04] Speaker A: And yet oftentimes we feel that, don't we?
Like when you know that you've been in sin, you don't want to go into the presence of God.
[00:12:17] Speaker B: When you're continuing in sin and continuing in that which you know is not from God, then then you don't walk into his presence with boldness or confidence.
[00:12:29] Speaker A: No, you oftentimes flee and run and hide.
And yet the fear of the Lord is something that's good for us because it transforms us.
A holy God produces fear. The second thing that we see in this text is, is that a holy God requires a mediator. A holy God requires a mediator. We see this in the text of what do the people ask for? They say to Moses, we need you
[00:12:59] Speaker B: to be our mediator, that we want
[00:13:01] Speaker A: you to be the go between, that
[00:13:03] Speaker B: you go talk to God and then you speak to us, but don't let
[00:13:06] Speaker A: God speak directly to us.
That a mediator throughout biblical principles, it's one of the things that we see over and over. And it's built up in order to get some fuller explanation. And we'll look at the New Testament and how it informs this.
[00:13:22] Speaker B: But a mediator, we've seen it in the news.
Why is a mediator necessary? Well, because the two sides either don't
[00:13:30] Speaker A: trust each other, that's not what's going
[00:13:32] Speaker B: on here, or because they need someone to be able to communicate for them on their behalf.
[00:13:42] Speaker A: And so that's what they're asking for, is we need Moses to communicate on our behalf.
Because how does a sinful people confidently go into the presence of God?
And so we get a little bit of insight. Look at this in first Timothy, it's going to be on the screen for us. But in 1 Timothy 2, we gain a little bit of insight that Moses
[00:14:06] Speaker B: is this shadow of a mediator which is to come. Moses was a mediator, but the problem with Moses as a mediator, that Moses was a sinful person who needed someone to mediate for him.
[00:14:20] Speaker A: And yet then we find out in First Timothy 2 it says this. For there is one God and there is one mediator between God and men.
The man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time
[00:14:37] Speaker B: that Jesus is the Mediator. But he's the perfect mediator because he gave himself as a ransom that. That there was a penalty. The reason that the people couldn't go into the presence of a holy God is because they have sin. And there's a penalty that needs paid
[00:14:53] Speaker A: in order to go into the presence of a holy God.
And Jesus is that mediator who paid the ransom for all in order that we might come into the presence of God.
[00:15:09] Speaker B: That we see in here that they asked Moses to speak the word of God to them.
And we see in Jesus Christ that the word of God became flesh and dwelt among us.
[00:15:23] Speaker A: We see that there's this picture. How does a holy God and a sinful people dwell together?
Will we see it meet at the
[00:15:32] Speaker B: cross where God's holiness is put on display? That he doesn't lower his holiness, he doesn't shrink his holiness,
[00:15:45] Speaker A: but that his grace and mercy is put on display at the cross because Jesus pays the penalty of that sin.
And so we see this perfect mediator
[00:15:59] Speaker B: of Jesus who mediates on behalf of us sinful people.
[00:16:07] Speaker A: But then we get to this third point that.
That we see that, okay, there's a holy God produces fear.
With a holy God, there's a need for a mediator, someone who would go on our behalf, who would go in between for us.
[00:16:21] Speaker B: And then this last piece, I think,
[00:16:23] Speaker A: really helps us bring all of this together. And it's this that a holy God invites his people to come.
[00:16:32] Speaker B: He invites them to come. Look at verse 21 to 26 says
[00:16:39] Speaker A: this, that the people stood far off while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was.
[00:16:45] Speaker B: So this mediator goes to the presence of God.
[00:16:49] Speaker A: He goes.
[00:16:50] Speaker B: He draws near in opposition to the people who stand far off.
[00:16:57] Speaker A: But look at what then God speaks to Moses. Look at this verse 22. It's incredible.
And the Lord said to Moses, thus you shall say to the people of Israel, you have seen for yourselves that I have talked to you from heaven.
Let's not miss this. He goes, but look what I've done.
[00:17:18] Speaker B: I've come to you.
I've come to be with you. I've come to meet with you. I've come to have a relationship with you.
I've come to you. You didn't have to climb. You didn't have to do anything to come to me. I came to you.
[00:17:33] Speaker A: So I've come to you from heaven.
[00:17:35] Speaker B: And then he's going to give three
[00:17:37] Speaker A: things that they're not supposed to do.
So you shall not make gods of silver to be with me. Nor shall you make for yourselves gods of gold.
[00:17:45] Speaker B: That you don't have to make something in order to dwell with me. You don't have to make something in order to have relationship with me. I came to you. You didn't have to make these false gods like the the other nations around, which could only dwell with them if they had crafted something that that God could embody.
[00:18:06] Speaker A: Now you don't have to do that. Don't do that. You shall have no other. You shall have no graven images.
He's already told them this, and he's reminding them like, this is not necessary for you to dwell with me, but what shall you do?
An altar of earth you shall make for me and sacrifice on it your burnt offerings, your peace offerings, your sheep and your oxen. God then says, but here's the path, here's the way that you can have relationship and fellowship with me.
[00:18:40] Speaker B: You can build this earthen altar. You can gather up some rocks and you can make a pile of rocks. And there you can offer worship to
[00:18:50] Speaker A: me which is pleasing.
[00:18:53] Speaker B: There you can enter into and have relationship with me just on these earthen rocks.
[00:19:03] Speaker A: That the key to an altar was
[00:19:05] Speaker B: that there was atonement, that there's a payment for sin. That's what's key here, is that God says, I know that you're a sinful people, but you can make offerings and atonement for that sin in order that you can dwell with a holy God.
[00:19:21] Speaker A: So he offers them a way.
[00:19:24] Speaker B: They can't make up their own way. They can't say, well, we want to
[00:19:27] Speaker A: do it this way. We want to build these gods out
[00:19:29] Speaker B: of gold and silver. He says, no, don't do that.
He gives them a little bit more instruction. He says, in every place where I cause my name to be remembered, I will come to you and bless you. That His Holiness is not there to destroy them. His Holiness is there to transform them. And in that they would be blessed.
Then he says, if you make me
[00:19:51] Speaker A: an altar of stone, you shall not build it of hewn stones.
For if you wield your tool on
[00:19:58] Speaker B: it, you profane it.
So no gold and silver. Cause it's not about man's craftsmanship.
Don't chisel these stones because it's not about your efforts to build something. It's not about showing off your skill sets when you come to worship me. It's about offering sacrifice to me because
[00:20:16] Speaker A: I'm a spirit, holy, holy God. And it's about drawing near.
That there is a way which you can draw near it's not about showing off. It's not about building something.
[00:20:24] Speaker B: You don't come into the presence of God because you've got a great skill set.
[00:20:30] Speaker A: No, he desires to meet with his people.
He also says, you shall not go up by his steps of the altar. Right. That in the Old Testament, we see
[00:20:41] Speaker B: a lot of times that these altars
[00:20:43] Speaker A: to these other gods were built on
[00:20:45] Speaker B: high pedestals, and so they would go up. God says, no, you're not climbing.
I came down to you. So you're not climbing up. Don't build something up where you gotta go up steps. But he also says, lest your nakedness
[00:20:56] Speaker A: be exposed, so they would have worn
[00:20:59] Speaker B: garments which would have gone down to the ground. And so when you took a step, then you get to show off your socks, right? He says, no, that's not about.
I think what's really at the heart of here is that there's not supposed to be any distractions.
Don't be a hindrance to someone else.
That there is a way in which
[00:21:20] Speaker A: we're to worship God, and he's invited us into that.
So it's not about your skills. It's not about impressing God.
[00:21:34] Speaker B: It's not about impressing others. It's not about distracting others. What is this about?
[00:21:39] Speaker A: It's about a Holy spirit God.
I think there's some applications we can make. When you come to church to worship, who do you come for?
Do you come bringing your skill sets to show them off to others?
Do you come to impress others?
Do you come to be a distraction to others?
Or do you come to worship a holy God? Because he's made a way that he invites his people to come near, but they're supposed to come near in the way that he has made for them.
But there's something else going on here that I think is really important that we see that they were to offer these burnt offerings. And so how does a people, a sinful people, come into the presence of a holy God? Well, God has made a way here. We're going to see later in Exodus, that then he provides them the blueprints for how to build this tabernacle, this
[00:22:46] Speaker B: physical building, that they would move around with them, this tent, that they would move around with them. He gives them incredible instruction, and he says, that's where I'm going to dwell among you. And so there's specific instructions on how to dwell with a holy God among a sinful people. And so there's specific instructions about that.
And one of the keys to that is that there was this like 6 inch thick curtain that was to be made which was to provide a separation from the sacrifices which would happen out here and the presence of God in
[00:23:19] Speaker A: the holy of holies.
[00:23:21] Speaker B: That there was a separation, there was a barrier. God said, I want to dwell with you and I've invited you in and here's the way that you can do that. But there's still this barrier.
[00:23:34] Speaker A: So we have this mediator, Jesus, that we've learned about, that's the singular mediator between God and man.
And we know that in Mark, when Jesus went to the cross as the mediator, when he hung on the cross, Mark tells us that when Jesus died that that barrier in the temple was
[00:24:00] Speaker B: ripped from top to bottom, 6 inch thick fabric. And Almighty God, all powerful, ripped that barrier and said, there's no more barrier because of what Christ has done.
He says, you now have full access to the holiness of God because you're covered in the blood of J. Just like that Passover lamb that we studied earlier, that if you put the blood on the doorpost because of his blood, then God would pass over in judgment. In the same way, because of the blood of Jesus applied to our life
[00:24:35] Speaker A: through faith, that curtain's ripped and we
[00:24:41] Speaker B: have full access
[00:24:43] Speaker A: with confidence we can enter into the presence of a holy God.
Because Jesus cried out, it's finished, it's paid for.
[00:24:56] Speaker B: There is nothing left to pay. There's nothing left for you to earn or do or achieve.
[00:25:02] Speaker A: It's done.
Listen to the way that the author of Hebrews puts this. It's incredible.
He says, therefore, brothers, since we have
[00:25:13] Speaker B: confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, not by your genealogy, not by your achieving, but by the blood of Jesus. We have confidence by a new and
[00:25:30] Speaker A: a living way that he opened for
[00:25:32] Speaker B: us through the curtain, that is through his flesh.
And since we have a great high priest over the house of God, let us draw near, not recoiling from the holiness of God in fear, but drawing near to the holiness of God.
Because we have confidence in the finished
[00:25:48] Speaker A: work of Jesus Christ.
Let us draw near with a full
[00:25:53] Speaker B: heart, in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed pure of
[00:26:01] Speaker A: water, let us hold fast our confession of our hope without wavering. For he who promised is faithful that because of what Jesus has done, a sinful people can dwell in the holiness of God with confidence and hope and assurance.
Not fear, not fear that makes you run away, but fear which brings you into obedience, fear which recognizes the holiness of God.
That God has not lowered his standard in order to make a way for us.
He has not lost holiness, but we have access because Jesus has dealt with our sin.
Listen, when God rescues the people of Israel out of Egypt, it wasn't just to make them free.
It was to invite them into fellowship.
He wanted them to come in order that they could worship him, that he could dwell with them.
[00:27:16] Speaker B: That redemption is not just about saving you from your sin. Redemption is about fellowship with Jesus.
[00:27:25] Speaker A: And so what do we do with this? How do we begin to apply this?
Well, I think there's a couple different things connected to the first point. I think we need to recover the holiness of God. We need to recover a right view of the holiness of God.
[00:27:40] Speaker B: Maybe some of you grew up in a church and it's really repulsive because you had a pastor who literally tried to scare you out of hell by
[00:27:50] Speaker A: preaching the holiness of God.
[00:27:53] Speaker B: And it makes you recoil.
Listen, we should never shrink God's holiness. We should never dumb down God's holiness to make it achievable for people to come. God doesn't do that.
There is a standard in which he sets, and he invites us up to that.
[00:28:13] Speaker A: He doesn't lower it.
We need to recover the holiness of God.
That there is a terrifying aspect of
[00:28:21] Speaker B: continuing to live in sin and in opposition to a holy God, which ought
[00:28:27] Speaker A: to cause us trouble.
But yet we need to recognize in that second point that Jesus has completed the work of redemption.
This is like when someone asks you, like, how do you know if you'll go to heaven?
Our answer ought to be with confidence. I know because of the finished work of Jesus, because of what Jesus did.
[00:29:01] Speaker B: Not because of anything I did, but because of what Jesus did. That he who promised is faithful. I have assurance and confidence and hope
[00:29:11] Speaker A: of eternity
[00:29:14] Speaker B: to live in the presence of a holy God.
We need to recognize the completed work of Christ. That it's not according to your craftsmanship, it's not according to your skill sets. It's not because you were.
It's because of the finished work of
[00:29:29] Speaker A: Jesus that we have confidence.
[00:29:31] Speaker B: It's not because you live really well or you read your Bible a lot. It's not because you show up to church a lot and you're perfect on attendance to community group and service team. That doesn't get you in.
[00:29:43] Speaker A: The finished work of Jesus gets you in.
And then in response to that, we recognize that God has created a path for our flourishing, for his glory and our good.
That his holiness brings us into obedience to his ways.
That maybe some of us are bebopping down I49 of our spiritual life.
And we need to be reminded of the holiness of God and check the speedometer and go, whoa.
Because what happens if everybody drives recklessly and at incredible speeds? It's dangerous for you and it's dangerous for them.
God's ways are good.
To live outside of them is dangerous for you and dangerous for others.
His holiness brings us into obedience for his glory and our good.
We need to remain in that fellowship with him.
Maybe we could just summarize it this way. God's plan for you is that you would love him with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself.
And when we do that, he demonstrates to the world everywhere where my name is named. I'll bless.
You want a blessed life?
Live for his glory according to his ways, and he'll continue to bless and advance his kingdom. Would you pray with me?
Lord, we thank you for a text like this that just reminds us of your holiness.
It reminds us of our need for a mediator and your grace. That you sent the perfect mediator.
You sent the word made flesh that dwelt among us, that perfectly obeyed on
[00:31:54] Speaker B: our behalf, that went to the cross to pay the penalty of our sin, that by faith all those who would
[00:32:04] Speaker A: believe could be saved.
[00:32:07] Speaker B: That you would cast our sin as far as the east is from the west, that we are washed white as snow, that we are sprinkled clean
[00:32:17] Speaker A: because of the finished work of Christ, Lord. That in response to that we might live obedient lives to your glory and our good Lord. Would you help us to do that, Lord? That you might transform our city, that
[00:32:36] Speaker B: you might transform us.
[00:32:37] Speaker A: That as we gaze deeper and deeper into your holiness, Lord, that we might be transformed by it, not destroyed by it.
We ask it in Jesus name. Amen.
