SPEAKER_00: Let's uh let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, thank you for today.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for our food.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for the folks that made it for us.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for a chance to fellowship together.
SPEAKER_00: We pray you'll bless our time together today and encourage us today.
SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name we pray.
SPEAKER_00: And everybody said.
SPEAKER_00: Alright, as we are reading through the Bible chronologically here at First Baptist, and it's been fun.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you guys in other churches, you know we love you guys being here, jumping in with us is great.
SPEAKER_00: This week uh we have been reading all about the high priests and the tabernacle and the furniture that goes in the tabernacle and the gowns that they wear and you know all this kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes you read that, and if you're not familiar with it or spend a lot of time studying it, it just gets kind of tedious, right?
SPEAKER_00: But when you really understand and break down what's happening, uh there's a phrase that God uses in that um in that instruction to Moses where he says, do everything according to the pattern I've provided.
SPEAKER_00: And so if God has intentionally designed the pattern, then there's a reason for it.
SPEAKER_00: And remember what we're doing with the children of Israel is everything that God is doing, he is creating a people for himself to be uh the lighthouse for the world, to draw attention to who he is and his plan to bring a redeemer in the world.
SPEAKER_00: So all of these things are all about uh pictures of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And so the type of wood, the colors of the thread, the all this kind of stuff, all illustrates the person of Jesus and the promise of the Redeemer that would come.
SPEAKER_00: The shedding of blood, the sprinkling of blood on stuff, all that stuff is all about the Redeemer who would come and would shed his blood for us and create a plan of salvation.
SPEAKER_00: So I picked one of those that I just particularly like, and that's the altar of incense.
SPEAKER_00: Altar of incense.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I don't know about you, but I hate incense.
SPEAKER_00: It just stinks and it wears out my allergies and all kinds of stuff.
SPEAKER_00: So, like I, you know, so it's kind of a weird thing for me to like this and kind of wade into this, but it's one of those things that I think is fascinating.
SPEAKER_00: Genesis 30 is the part where he talks about the altar of incense.
SPEAKER_00: And so when we read it, it's kind of got that sort of tedious, you know, sort of thing to it.
SPEAKER_00: So here's what he says you are to make an altar for the burning of incense, make it of acasia wood, it must be square, 18 inches long and 18 inches wide, it must be 36 inches high, its horns must be of one piece.
SPEAKER_00: Overlay its top all around its side and its horns with pure gold.
SPEAKER_00: Make a gold molding all around it.
SPEAKER_00: Make two gold rings for it under the molding on two of its sides and put these on opposite sides of it to be holders for the poles to carry it with.
SPEAKER_00: So let's talk about that just for a second.
SPEAKER_00: So, what you're doing is you're building an altar.
SPEAKER_00: It's a box, it's in a square, right?
SPEAKER_00: You can picture it, it's not super large, um, and uh, it's only three feet high.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and it has kind of a square, it has a top that looks a little bit like a crown.
SPEAKER_00: So on each corner, there's what looks like a horn coming up and a ledge around that because you're gonna put a fire in that, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so they're gonna burn incense in that.
SPEAKER_00: So it's protected, kind of like a fireplace sort of looking thing.
SPEAKER_00: And then the holes on the sides would be like you would picture the Ark of the Covenant.
SPEAKER_00: You run poles through there and they carry it.
SPEAKER_00: So remember the tabernacle is a tent.
SPEAKER_00: God is leading the children of Israel through this journey to where he's gonna take them into Canaan.
SPEAKER_00: So they are mobile in what they're doing.
SPEAKER_00: And so, how do you carry this thing?
SPEAKER_00: If it's made of wood, it's heavy, it's overlaid in gold, it's heavy, that kind of a deal.
SPEAKER_00: So they run these poles on these rings and they pick it up, you know, carry it like pictures you may have seen of the Ark of the Covenant.
SPEAKER_00: He says in verse 5, make the poles of Akasha wood and overlay them with gold.
SPEAKER_00: You are to place the altar in front of the veil by the ark of the testimony, in front of the mercy seat that is over the testimony, where I will meet with you.
SPEAKER_00: Aaron must burn fragrant incense on it.
SPEAKER_00: He must burn it every morning when he tends the lamps.
SPEAKER_00: When Aaron sets up the lamps at twilight, he must burn incense.
SPEAKER_00: There is to be an incense offering before the Lord throughout your generations.
SPEAKER_00: Now keep in mind, he's not saying for the journey.
SPEAKER_00: He says, We're gonna do this forever.
SPEAKER_00: Like this is what we're doing.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to be burning this incense all the time.
SPEAKER_00: So this is an important deal.
SPEAKER_00: He says, you must not offer unauthorized incense on it or a burnt grain offering.
SPEAKER_00: You're not to pour a drink offering on it.
SPEAKER_00: Those are all different kinds of offerings.
SPEAKER_00: So he's making it clear this altar has one purpose, and it is the burning of incense.
SPEAKER_00: And don't confuse all these other offerings or think you're smart and you're going to bless the Lord by doing something else or whatever.
SPEAKER_00: You got to do it this way.
SPEAKER_00: Now, if you go on to a later part of chapter 30, I'll just read to you real quick.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord said to Moses, Take fragrant spices, and then he lists that the spices and pure frankincense are to be in equal measures.
SPEAKER_00: So he is giving him a recipe for the type of incense that he's making.
SPEAKER_00: And remember, he said, you must not offer unauthorized incense on it.
SPEAKER_00: So God is very clear, you got to, the only thing you're going to put on this altar is doing it the way I told you to do it, according to my recipe.
SPEAKER_00: Prepare expertly blended incense from these.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, it's not some kid's science project at school.
SPEAKER_00: Like you are going to do this very carefully.
SPEAKER_00: And then he says, um, it is to be seasoned with salt, pure and holy.
SPEAKER_00: Grind some of it into a fine powder and put some in front of the testimony in the tent of meeting, where I will meet with you.
SPEAKER_00: It must be especially holy to you.
SPEAKER_00: As for the incense you are making, you must not make any for yourselves using this formula.
SPEAKER_00: So you can't be Aaron and like go home with the wife and she says, like, what's the incense smell like?
SPEAKER_00: And he goes, Oh, it's really good.
SPEAKER_00: It smells great.
SPEAKER_00: It's really, you know, all this whatever.
SPEAKER_00: And she says, Well, I want to smell it.
SPEAKER_00: It's like, here, let me make you some.
SPEAKER_00: Like, we're not doing that.
SPEAKER_00: This is a holy exercise.
SPEAKER_00: It is only to be used there.
SPEAKER_00: As for the incense you are making, you must not make any for yourselves using this formula.
SPEAKER_00: It is to be regarded as holy by you as, it's be regarded by you as holy, belonging to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Anyone who makes something like it, to smell its fragrance, must be cut off from his people.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's a you're banished from the children of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's a serious crime and penalty when we're talking about this.
SPEAKER_00: So, what we know then from that is this is something that's holy.
SPEAKER_00: This is something that's significant.
SPEAKER_00: So, some of you guys have been around church a while, you've taught some of these lessons, you kind of know what this looks like.
SPEAKER_00: This is the floor plan of what happens with the tabernacle.
SPEAKER_00: This is a curtain that is built around it.
SPEAKER_00: And of course, the children of Israel, God even gave them the map of how the tribes were to be settled encamped around the tabernacle as the pattern of how it works.
SPEAKER_00: There's a wall that's made of a curtain that goes around it, forms a courtyard.
SPEAKER_00: When you walk into this area, this is where they would burn the offering.
SPEAKER_00: Sacrifice the bull, you know, or the lamb or whatever they were doing, that's where that sacrifice is made, right?
SPEAKER_00: The brazen altar.
SPEAKER_00: Then this is uh labor.
SPEAKER_00: It's a place where the priests would symbolically cleanse themselves, their hands and their feet, before they went into the tent.
SPEAKER_00: Uh that one phrase called the tent of meeting, it's the where God meets with the people.
SPEAKER_00: This is what we think of as the tabernacle.
SPEAKER_00: There are two rooms in it.
SPEAKER_00: This is the outer room, and this is the inner room.
SPEAKER_00: It's called the Holy of Holies.
SPEAKER_00: So that is the Ark of the Covenant, and there's a huge veil that's right here.
SPEAKER_00: So when we talk about the veil being torn and all that stuff, that's this veil.
SPEAKER_00: And it was made floor to ceiling, wall to wall.
SPEAKER_00: There was no space that came out of it whatsoever.
SPEAKER_00: It was made according to the design, specific colors.
SPEAKER_00: It illustrates the person of Jesus, which is how we get to the presence of God.
SPEAKER_00: Our sin separates us from the presence of God, and Jesus is the Redeemer.
SPEAKER_00: So everything about this is the picture of the Redeemer.
SPEAKER_00: And so the Ark of the Covenant was placed there, and after they had closed it up, then God's presence would come and sit and rest there symbolically on the Ark of the Covenant.
SPEAKER_00: And the outer part of this is where the priests did their work.
SPEAKER_00: You would walk in, and there were three pieces of furniture in here.
SPEAKER_00: And the one we're looking at, the altar of incense, is right here.
SPEAKER_00: And it was specifically placed according to God's pattern, right?
SPEAKER_00: You see that?
SPEAKER_00: And it is right, it's the door where you walk in, the openings in the curtains where you would walk in.
SPEAKER_00: It is what you see, and you see it in relief against the veil, and it's put right in the position against uh mirroring where the Ark of the Covenant is, right?
SPEAKER_00: So here's what we're gonna look at.
SPEAKER_00: First of all, the pattern, since this is according to a pattern, it matters.
SPEAKER_00: The altar itself represents the person of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: This whole business about made of Akasha wood and then covered in gold, those are symbolizing Jesus as our Redeemer.
SPEAKER_00: The wooden part of that is the humanity part of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: He hung on a wooden cross.
SPEAKER_00: That's the natural part of that, that represents him as our Savior.
SPEAKER_00: Then the gold part of that represents him as the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords.
SPEAKER_00: And so when we come into the presence of God, we come through Jesus, who is the one who died for us, but he is also the King of kings and the Lord of Lords, and the one who conquered death and sin.
SPEAKER_00: He is the name which is above every name.
SPEAKER_00: Every knee will bow and every tongue confess.
SPEAKER_00: So that's that's Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Now it's interesting when you go back to this, this is a minor.
SPEAKER_00: Give me the, eh, let's go back.
SPEAKER_00: This altar of incense with the four horns and the top and crown around it is a small version of this.
SPEAKER_00: So when you come in and you see the sacrifice, you can only enter into worshiping God and all that through the shed blood of the sacrifice that makes a way for us to come before the Lord because of our sin.
SPEAKER_00: And that's where the sacrifice is.
SPEAKER_00: This has that same appearance and feel as the place where our sins are sacrificed, and now the place that is where we come in before God, that also represents that sacrifice and person of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: The incense represents our prayers, the incense itself, and those are holy to the Lord, and there's a pattern in which that happens, there's a way that has to happen, but Scripture often uses that picture of incense being burned before the Lord to represent our prayers as people.
SPEAKER_00: You see in Revelation, when John has that picture before the throne, and it says there are four of these winged creatures and the 24 elders, and they are waving these golden bowls that have incense, and the scripture specifically says those incense is that's the prayers of the saints.
SPEAKER_00: In the Psalms, David talked about our prayers being an incense.
SPEAKER_00: In 2 Corinthians, the Bible describes us as when we're living as Christ, we are like incense to him, our lives and our lives of worship and surrender to him.
SPEAKER_00: And so incense represents the prayers of God's people.
SPEAKER_00: And so what happens in the tabernacle, the priests are there on behalf of the people, and they are worshiping the God, the Lord, serving the Lord, they are representing the people to the Lord, and prayers are an inherent part of our worship to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Prayer is so important to God that he builds a pattern and a model of prayer for us into the very structure of worship he created here as he's creating the children of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm clumsy as all, get out.
SPEAKER_00: The position, the position of it is important.
SPEAKER_00: The reason we look at the map is the only way to God is through Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And our prayers are made through Jesus and through him.
SPEAKER_00: And so what we understand is when I am praying, I am coming to the Lord through the shed blood of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: In Hebrews chapter 10, when it talks about the veil which was torn, we can enter into the presence of God through that.
SPEAKER_00: It was through the shed blood of Jesus that we're able to enter the presence of God.
SPEAKER_00: And so our prayers in coming to the Lord happen through the person of Jesus and the work of Jesus, and it is how we come into his presence.
SPEAKER_00: It's how we come into his presence.
SPEAKER_00: And so all of that is built according to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: The procedure of that, there is a it's very specific in here.
SPEAKER_00: You put it there, you put a certain kind of incense in there.
SPEAKER_00: That incense is holy to God.
SPEAKER_00: You can't use it anywhere else.
SPEAKER_00: It is a very consecrated, holy process of creating this incense that comes, uh, that comes into the presence of God as He is in the tabernacle.
SPEAKER_00: And it is to be made throughout the day.
SPEAKER_00: God is very specific about that.
SPEAKER_00: You start it in the morning, it goes through the day, in the evening before you end the day, you begin it and you start a whole new round, and then you come in the next morning and it's time to reload and you do it again.
SPEAKER_00: It goes on throughout the day.
SPEAKER_00: It is a constant process that happens.
SPEAKER_00: And so the role of the priests, part of their role in service in the tabernacle and later in the temple, is to continually make sure that this incense is being burned as this representative picture of our prayers before the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: If you'll remember in the New Testament when John the Baptist's father was a priest, the Bible said he was his turn or rotation in the temple, and he was lighting the incense as a part of what he was doing.
SPEAKER_00: So God has said this will go on and it will continue to go on.
SPEAKER_00: And then there is a permanence to it.
SPEAKER_00: So this burning of this incense that represents the prayers of God's people is an integral, permanent part of our worship before the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: So when you see that picture, you know what that looks like.
SPEAKER_00: Now, these Old Testament pictures are just that, a picture for us in our New Testament relationship with the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And so this is not just a Jewish thing, but it teaches us about how we're to worship the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: It teaches us how we're supposed to recognize our relationship with the Lord, how we come before the Lord, because in Hebrews, for example, he teaches us what this means, that the veil separated us, that Jesus Christ, as the ultimate high priest, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, tore the veil and separated the veil so that we can now boldly enter into the presence of God.
SPEAKER_00: But the pictures here still teach us how to do that.
SPEAKER_00: So, for example, several times in the Old Testament, when the children of Israel walked away from God, they were continuing to do this.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the priests would do this, it was their job, right?
SPEAKER_00: They would show up, they would put the showbread out, they would light the incense, they would light the candlesticks, and they'd go about their business.
SPEAKER_00: It was a job.
SPEAKER_00: And God's judgment on them, and one of the things he would tell them is, I don't care about you doing that.
SPEAKER_00: Because you don't mean it.
SPEAKER_00: Your heart is not in it.
SPEAKER_00: It's not an honest act of worship.
SPEAKER_00: So for us, it's more than just understanding you gotta do this, it is understanding the heart of it.
SPEAKER_00: That's why I think it's important to highlight things like don't make up the incense at home.
SPEAKER_00: It's holy before the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: When we come before the Lord, we should learn from this picture of how this works.
SPEAKER_00: It should give us a seriousness about how we approach our Christian life.
SPEAKER_00: We recognize that this altar of incense is the place that houses and equips our prayers before the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: When I come to Jesus, when I come to prayer and I come to pray to the Lord, I am coming through the shed blood of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: The only way that I have the freedom and the opportunity to come before God and to give Him my prayers is because Jesus died for my sins on the cross and conquered death and sin.
SPEAKER_00: It changes our prayer life when you can visually see I literally cannot get to the presence of God without walking through repeatedly the sacrifice of Jesus, cleansing myself before Jesus, and walking in to the incense, burning as prayers that is filling up that room, and it's the only way I can even see the path to how to get to the person of God.
SPEAKER_00: And think about how our prayer life would be changed if it wasn't God do this for me, God do this for me, and God bless this deal, and I got 47 people who got whatever illnesses or whatever thing over here, and this guy needs a job, and how many do other?
SPEAKER_00: Like, that's great to pray all that.
SPEAKER_00: But how would it change our lives, our prayer lives, if we visually put that in front of ourselves and we began and humbly entered in the presence of God?
SPEAKER_00: The only reason I'm here is because Jesus died for my sins.
SPEAKER_00: And the wood on that thing represents I'm only here because Jesus sacrificed himself for me.
SPEAKER_00: And when I'm coming here, I'm not just coming to the Jesus that hung on the cross, but I'm coming to the one in Revelation that John describes as gleaming white and eyes like fire and a voice like thunder and a tongue like a two-edged sword.
SPEAKER_00: And he tells John, I am the Alpha and the Omega.
SPEAKER_00: I'm the one who was once dead, and now I'm alive, and I hold the keys to death and hell.
SPEAKER_00: That's the gold wrapped around the wood.
SPEAKER_00: And when I come to God in my prayers with the Heavenly Father, man, I'm coming through the shed blood and the glory of Jesus Christ and the work as my Savior.
SPEAKER_00: And all of a sudden, I'm gonna come not with my stuff, but I'm gonna come and I'm gonna ask him.
SPEAKER_00: I'm here, what do you need me to do?
SPEAKER_00: What do you want me to pray about?
SPEAKER_00: What do I need to surrender?
SPEAKER_00: We come with a heart of repentance.
SPEAKER_00: I am entering the Holy of Holies.
SPEAKER_00: It's interesting in Hebrews.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible doesn't ever say, God's not here anymore, or any of that kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_00: He does not blow up this illustration.
SPEAKER_00: He gives us this illustration and he says, Jesus split the veil and gave us access to the person of God.
SPEAKER_00: But he never removes the illustration of the holiness of God and the significance of what it means to come into the presence of God.
SPEAKER_00: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_00: He tells us to boldly come into the Holy of Holies, or boldly come into the presence of God, boldly come to the throne of grace, but he never removes the significance of that illustration, trying to remind us man, we are coming to God Almighty when we come to him in our prayers.
SPEAKER_00: And we come through the shed blood in the person of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Christ.
SPEAKER_00: He says boldly come because Jesus paved the way for you, but understand what we're doing when we come into his presence to pray.
SPEAKER_00: He tells us to pray all the time.
SPEAKER_00: All the time.
SPEAKER_00: The incense never stopped burning.
SPEAKER_00: In the New Testament, it says, pray without Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: One of the greatest pictures I see in Scripture of that is the person of Nehemiah.
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 1.
SPEAKER_00: He's all brokenhearted, repenting before the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He's praying.
SPEAKER_00: He's asking what God's going to do because the walls are broken down and Jerusalem is in rubble and the people are distressed and all of that.
SPEAKER_00: And then you get to that point where he comes before the king, and you've got to remember, like that king was not a nice guy.
SPEAKER_00: This was an evil, murderous, wretched human being, thought he was God person, right?
SPEAKER_00: He is so affected by his brokenheartedness over Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible describes it to us.
SPEAKER_00: He's the cupbearer to the king, and his countenance is all fallen, and he looks all terrible.
SPEAKER_00: And you got to imagine what that's going to be like for a king, man.
SPEAKER_00: You're tasting my food to see if somebody's killing me, and you look all like somebody kicked your dog, and you know all that.
SPEAKER_00: What's wrong with you?
SPEAKER_00: Is there something wrong with my food?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, this is a significant deal.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, What is wrong with you, Nehemiah?
SPEAKER_00: And the Bible says that Nehemiah, in this setting, prayed to the Lord and then said to the king, now that wasn't a long prayer, because the king is about to cut his head off if he doesn't have a good answer.
SPEAKER_00: But he didn't even answer or speak in that moment without reaffirming his prayer and making sure that he was hearing from the Lord and was speaking what the Lord wants him to speak.
SPEAKER_00: Pray without ceasing all the time.
SPEAKER_00: The incense never stops.
SPEAKER_00: What do you want me to do here?
SPEAKER_00: How do you want me to do that?
SPEAKER_00: What is your direction in this moment?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I heard.
SPEAKER_00: Really?
SPEAKER_00: It's funny.
SPEAKER_00: He deserves it.
SPEAKER_00: Don't say that.
SPEAKER_00: Our walk with Jesus is to be a constant burning of the incense.
SPEAKER_00: Now you've got to imagine if God had given this kind of instruction with this kind of seriousness to keep that incense burning all the time.
SPEAKER_00: If I'm on duty in that building, I guarantee you I've got one eye on that incense all the time.
SPEAKER_00: It is not going to burn out on my watch.
SPEAKER_00: If there's got to be more, I'm going to make sure there's more.
SPEAKER_00: I'm probably not even going to trust one of those other Yahoos to make it correctly.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, might love you guys, but I'm going to make the batch for when I'm on duty because I want to make sure it's right.
SPEAKER_00: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_00: You see that picture?
SPEAKER_00: That's how we're to approach our prayer life.
SPEAKER_00: And we are to do that with freedom.
SPEAKER_00: We're to do that, as the Bible says, boldly.
SPEAKER_00: But he says, boldly come to the throne of grace through our high priest Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And so our prayer life is constant, but our prayer life is according to the procedure that God has given us.
SPEAKER_00: The effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.
SPEAKER_00: What makes it effective?
SPEAKER_00: Scripture is all kinds of instructions for how we pray.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus even gave us models of how to pray.
SPEAKER_00: And so when I am making that mixture of my prayers, I am praying according to the formula that Jesus instructed me to pray with.
SPEAKER_00: That kind of prayer life is a pleasing aroma to our Heavenly Father.
SPEAKER_00: I just think it's a beautiful picture.
SPEAKER_00: Hope it's encouraging to you guys.
SPEAKER_00: Let me pray.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, thank you for today.
SPEAKER_00: Every time we come to your word, we're amazed at the lessons and the detail and the power and the instructions, the challenges, the encouragement, and the incredible picture of who you are as our God and the salvation that you provide for us to allow us to come into the significant place of your presence.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, I pray as we think about this lesson, it'll encourage us about our prayer life to be serious and constant, to search out how Jesus has instructed us for the chemistry of our prayer lives in the same way that he explains the chemistry that's necessary for this incense.
SPEAKER_00: Help us to take it with that level of seriousness and that level of gratefulness that we know, man, we are entering into your presence because of what Jesus did for us.
SPEAKER_00: And Lord, I pray that as your people pray, as we seek revival in our community and salvation of people around us, and for people to grow to be like you and our churches and our Sunday school classes and our families, Lord, I pray that this will equip us and encourage us to pray prayers that are a sweet aroma to you, that you are free to answer and move in the midst of our prayers.
SPEAKER_00: We thank you for the privilege to come to the Holy of Holies with prayer because of what Jesus did for us and salvation in his name.
SPEAKER_00: And these things we pray, and everybody said, Amen.