WEBVTT 00:00:06.320 --> 00:00:13.134 That is quite a barren but a beautiful place, and I want to thank all of you for being in this beautiful place. 00:00:13.134 --> 00:00:20.993 I also want to greet all of our online viewers, and especially men by the name of Donald Baldwin. 00:00:20.993 --> 00:00:29.984 Donald lives in all the way in Michigan and through connections here he watches us, I'm told most weeks of Donald. 00:00:29.984 --> 00:00:32.871 Thank you and everyone else there for viewing. 00:00:32.871 --> 00:00:39.753 I hope you'll engage with the monitor if we can help you in any way and send you any information that might be helpful. 00:00:39.753 --> 00:00:55.590 If you're in this area and you do not have a place to call your church family, we'd love to have you come be in person, because it's great being able to tune in, but it's quite another thing and another level of development and blessing to be in the room too. 00:00:55.590 --> 00:01:14.850 Take a second in light of our theme for today and just go to the Lord in prayer right where you are, and then take a second and pray for the person to your left and to your right and just ask for the Holy Spirit to do what he intends to do in your life. 00:01:14.850 --> 00:01:15.792 First. 00:01:15.792 --> 00:01:28.199 I know the world is broken, but unless the people of God are in revival and renewal, it doesn't reallywe're not going to be available to help change this world. 00:01:28.199 --> 00:01:33.119 And so then, pray for your brother and your sister to your right, for the same purposes. 00:01:33.119 --> 00:01:56.727 Okay, let's do that, and all God's people said amen. 00:01:56.727 --> 00:01:59.527 Apologize for my scratchy, deeper voice. 00:01:59.527 --> 00:02:03.239 As usual, I am fine, fit as a fiddle, not contagious. 00:02:03.239 --> 00:02:05.239 This is called college football. 00:02:05.239 --> 00:02:14.932 So turn to Exodus, chapter 19, please, continuing part three today of our series called Mountain Men. 00:02:14.932 --> 00:02:20.212 And today we're going to go to what is now northern Egypt for our setting. 00:02:21.544 --> 00:02:32.979 Years and years ago I think it was in the late 1950s that HG Wells wrote a novel, had written a novel that turned into a blockbuster movie called, you know, war of the Worlds. 00:02:32.979 --> 00:02:35.891 Right, it was redone a few years ago. 00:02:35.891 --> 00:02:38.219 I think Tom Cruise was in the starring role there. 00:02:38.219 --> 00:02:49.992 But the interesting phenomena is, as aliens come and join us here on earth, the people are deeply fearful, but they're also curious. 00:02:49.992 --> 00:03:01.728 In the opening scenes, especially when they see this huge form of a creature they've never seen before, they run in fear. 00:03:01.728 --> 00:03:07.180 But then they come back and they get closer and closer because they're curious. 00:03:07.180 --> 00:03:17.240 But then, when, of course, the heat ray comes on and starts incinerating everybody, then they run for fear again, the point being, we're still that way too. 00:03:17.240 --> 00:03:24.219 Some of the scariest, most mysterious things in our world together. 00:03:24.219 --> 00:03:28.200 There's something in us that is drawn by curiosity. 00:03:28.200 --> 00:03:43.567 Now, if in War of the Worlds they somehow could have communicated with these foreign things, then there may have been a better understanding and at least they would have known to never go there Out of curiosity in the first place. 00:03:44.389 --> 00:03:46.133 Many times it's like that with God. 00:03:46.133 --> 00:04:15.102 Many of you, maybe myself, have feared the very person who loves us the most and we shrink back from what should be the opposite of that, because we fear the future he has planned for us, or we fear the difficulty or the discomfort that will come, and, quite frankly, we spend a lot of our lives not knowing how to communicate with this great one. 00:04:15.102 --> 00:04:25.781 And so today, the connection is simply this what I want to try to say through the Scripture, three or four different ways, is if there is no consecration, there is no communication. 00:04:25.781 --> 00:04:31.521 And verse 10, where he's speaking to Moses and says go and consecrate them. 00:04:31.521 --> 00:04:42.037 Today, we'll explain that in a minute and we'll also explain, if you're not real super aware of it, what consecration really means, because it is a true statement. 00:04:42.037 --> 00:05:02.624 If we're not controlling that first word, which we can control the consecration, then our communication will be vague and distant, many times non-existent, and we will have the wrong kind of fear toward God rather than the healthy, reverential fear of God. 00:05:02.624 --> 00:05:04.134 So that's where we're going. 00:05:04.134 --> 00:05:08.680 It's a great idea, I think, to read all of chapter 19. 00:05:08.680 --> 00:05:21.855 We won't do that today because of time, but maybe this afternoon or this week, as part of your devotion, I always give you a little bit of Scripture that might help as good follow-ups to our talk today, and that would be a good one. 00:05:22.810 --> 00:05:33.898 This takes place in what is now northern Egypt and if you'llSelene, if you'll put that picture back up there you saw a little bit of it in the video just ahead. 00:05:33.898 --> 00:05:35.355 That is what is believed. 00:05:35.355 --> 00:05:54.771 This is Jadu Boodle, which is believed to be probably the peak where Moses ascended to meet with God, and you see how stark and how majestic and how steep that mountain is and everything this takes place. 00:05:54.771 --> 00:05:59.641 Chapter 19 takes place only three months after they crossed the Red Sea. 00:05:59.641 --> 00:06:05.814 It's still really early in their adventure, but it's not read that much. 00:06:05.814 --> 00:06:08.322 But here's the importance of Exodus 19. 00:06:08.322 --> 00:06:19.941 If Exodus 19 is not executed right and obedience by the people, I don't believe there's ever an Exodus 20 and you say, well, what's the deal about Exodus 20? 00:06:19.941 --> 00:06:31.180 If you read it, that's where we get the Ten Commandments and some other laws that are still in vote today, and so this is tremendously important as a preparation time for that. 00:06:31.650 --> 00:06:42.953 You're going to see the number three pop up several times and we'll walk through that as we go to deeply symbolic number in the Old Testament and the New Testament. 00:06:42.953 --> 00:06:57.278 So let's, just as we normally do, let's read through a few verses, we'll comment on it, and then we'll use the Scripture to devise how we are supposed to be better Christ followers today, and then at the end we'll have an invitation time, like we always do. 00:06:57.278 --> 00:07:06.465 This is your invitation to come forward and express a desire, a prayer request or a celebration that you may have. 00:07:06.465 --> 00:07:09.718 We've just been able to celebrate a couple of times already. 00:07:09.718 --> 00:07:10.040 Today. 00:07:10.040 --> 00:07:11.314 We will at 10.30. 00:07:11.314 --> 00:07:17.602 Praise the Lord, we'll be at baptism at Pinewood also today also, so we get to do that. 00:07:17.602 --> 00:07:18.312 So you're there. 00:07:18.312 --> 00:07:19.656 You're there at Exodus 19. 00:07:19.656 --> 00:07:21.696 Thanks for bringing your Bible. 00:07:21.696 --> 00:07:24.177 So I've kind of set the stage for you. 00:07:24.370 --> 00:07:29.312 Let's kick in with verses four through six, because this consecration, that's good, but what in the world? 00:07:29.312 --> 00:07:31.057 How in the world can I do this. 00:07:31.057 --> 00:07:41.735 The first point I would like to make is we need to review our past in order to receive our future calling, and God helps us do that. 00:07:41.735 --> 00:07:44.215 We all have that past. 00:07:44.215 --> 00:07:45.876 So how about starting at verse four? 00:07:45.876 --> 00:07:57.139 You yourselves, as God's speaking, have seen what I did to Egypt and how I carried you on eagle's wings and brought you to myself. 00:07:57.139 --> 00:08:03.942 You've seen what I did to Egypt, oh man, if you know the story, you know the plagues, you know the death angel, you know all of that. 00:08:03.942 --> 00:08:27.401 You know the release of all the Hebrews out of Egypt who were enslaved for 400 years, you can imagine how that would have decimated the entire economy of the most powerful nation in the world at that time and humbled the most powerful king and brought him to his knees, as it personally affected his life forever. 00:08:27.401 --> 00:08:32.159 And he says I carried you as if on eagle's wings up to this point and I brought you to myself. 00:08:32.159 --> 00:08:33.021 That's very important. 00:08:33.021 --> 00:08:35.129 I brought you to myself. 00:08:35.210 --> 00:08:37.437 Abraham was introduced to a covenant. 00:08:37.437 --> 00:08:39.696 He's referring back to that too. 00:08:39.696 --> 00:08:40.975 He's going to the past. 00:08:40.975 --> 00:08:54.183 Remember your past, but also let me remind you of my past with you, through your father, abraham is I brought you out of all the countries, the ethnic groups who exist. 00:08:54.183 --> 00:08:59.522 I chose you to be my lighthouse, and that's called a covenant. 00:09:00.210 --> 00:09:04.019 Later on in the Old Testament, we see it in a book called Kensman Redeemer. 00:09:04.019 --> 00:09:05.993 It was a law in their day. 00:09:05.993 --> 00:09:22.033 It's based on, though, the covenant of God, where, if there was someone who was a relative of like a widow, or someone who had lost their spouse, he was obligated to marry this lady. 00:09:22.033 --> 00:09:27.344 Also, if he could, and if he could not to pass that opportunity on why? 00:09:27.344 --> 00:09:35.615 To take care of her and to keep her in a healthy place in the family, and that's the analogy here. 00:09:35.615 --> 00:09:36.613 I brought you in. 00:09:36.613 --> 00:09:41.818 My job, god says, is to keep you in a healthy place in my family. 00:09:41.818 --> 00:09:47.221 If that happens, that's more up to us than that is to God. 00:09:47.221 --> 00:09:49.610 So let's look at five and six Now. 00:09:49.629 --> 00:09:55.355 If you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all the nations, you will be my treasured possession. 00:09:55.355 --> 00:10:03.393 Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. 00:10:03.393 --> 00:10:06.296 There are thethese are the words you speak. 00:10:06.296 --> 00:10:08.951 You are to speak to the Israelites, talking to Moses. 00:10:08.951 --> 00:10:15.676 Moses come up to them out and he's telling them to go back and give them this message, so treasured possession. 00:10:15.676 --> 00:10:22.668 They were slaves, a race of slaves, for 400 years, and he's reminding them. 00:10:22.668 --> 00:10:25.014 But I see you as my treasure. 00:10:25.014 --> 00:10:28.394 And he says this is really important too, y'all, in verse 5. 00:10:28.394 --> 00:10:30.188 The whole earth is mine. 00:10:31.764 --> 00:10:37.031 The Hebrews are surrounded by a bunch of ethnic groups who were polytheistic. 00:10:37.031 --> 00:10:38.892 They believed in many, many gods. 00:10:38.892 --> 00:10:43.378 They had been 400 years in Egypt, which was tremendously polytheistic. 00:10:43.378 --> 00:10:44.568 It had a God or goddess. 00:10:44.568 --> 00:11:02.733 For everything God announces for the first time through His words in the Bible, there's only one, and that one is me, and I'll prove it by telling you I made all this, I made all of you and I made all of this. 00:11:02.733 --> 00:11:05.714 So you are to worship me and me only. 00:11:05.825 --> 00:11:07.610 Next chapter, of course. 00:11:07.610 --> 00:11:12.573 First commandment is you can't have any other gods. 00:11:12.573 --> 00:11:22.096 So verse 6, he says you're going to be a kingdom priest A bunch of slaves are called now priests and a holy nation. 00:11:22.096 --> 00:11:42.258 Later, peter in 1 Peter, chapter 2, verse 9, I think he's paraphrasing this verse when he says almost the same thing hey, you are a royal, you're a holy priest, you're a royal nation, a people called to God for His usage there. 00:11:42.258 --> 00:11:45.754 It is an amazing statement that he makes. 00:11:45.754 --> 00:11:55.135 What is a priest, a priest in those days was someone who stood between heaven and earth and mediated. 00:11:55.135 --> 00:12:01.152 He was a mediator of God's words to the people and the people's desires to God. 00:12:01.152 --> 00:12:04.813 Atonement came through that mediator in those days. 00:12:04.813 --> 00:12:12.454 The forgiveness of sins, the revelation of God came through, and that's what Moses is being put into the role of here. 00:12:12.454 --> 00:12:18.674 Later Aaron does and others in his line, but it was a very important position. 00:12:18.674 --> 00:12:23.596 And then the next chapter we'll see it developed through a specific family. 00:12:23.725 --> 00:12:25.090 We all have a past. 00:12:25.090 --> 00:12:28.870 Some of our pasts are worse than others. 00:12:28.870 --> 00:12:37.469 The reason that wethe only reason that there's any value in looking back is to go forward. 00:12:37.469 --> 00:12:45.616 The danger is to review our past without the power and the presence and the calling of God. 00:12:45.616 --> 00:12:51.668 Because you've all heard the voice that I hear occasionally, and that's not God's voice. 00:12:51.668 --> 00:12:55.510 It's another voice that tells you men, you're not good enough. 00:12:55.510 --> 00:13:04.215 Ladies, you're not capable, you're too evil, you're too sinful, you're too broken. 00:13:04.215 --> 00:13:11.009 You might as well stay like you are or go back into what you used to be and what you used to do. 00:13:11.009 --> 00:13:29.250 The bottom line is the voice, without the calling to the future, will tell you there's no usefulness for you on this earth, and that has defeated many a good people who do not take the next step and review just long enough to see their future. 00:13:30.544 --> 00:13:32.230 God has a future for everybody. 00:13:32.230 --> 00:13:35.291 God knows the past better than we do. 00:13:35.291 --> 00:13:40.275 But God is the overcomer, the redeemer, the renewal from the past. 00:13:40.275 --> 00:13:41.669 Y'all agree with that. 00:13:41.669 --> 00:13:43.047 There's a quote. 00:13:43.047 --> 00:13:44.513 Many of you've heard it, I'm sure. 00:13:44.513 --> 00:13:47.332 Satan's always out to remind us of our past. 00:13:47.332 --> 00:13:49.690 Our job is to remind him of his. 00:13:49.690 --> 00:13:50.874 What Future? 00:13:50.874 --> 00:13:52.206 I love that. 00:13:52.206 --> 00:13:55.510 He's got a future too, and it ain't good. 00:13:55.510 --> 00:14:00.393 We have a future if you're a Christ follower, and it is really good. 00:14:01.985 --> 00:14:09.610 But what we do in the gap is what I'm interested in as a pastor right now, for myself and my family and for you. 00:14:09.610 --> 00:14:20.813 How we make the best use of the gap between the past and the future is so important, and there's a lot of other people hanging in the balance. 00:14:20.813 --> 00:14:53.438 Not that we have any power, but the presence of God really does, because this I can say with certainty I don't know the specifics of what he's getting most of y'all in prepared for, but I do know this One purpose he has for all of us is to stand up as this shining testimony to the rest of the world around us, testimony not to ourselves, but to Jesus Christ, because Jesus himself said do these good works be you know, shine your light into the darkness. 00:14:53.438 --> 00:14:53.926 Why? 00:14:53.926 --> 00:14:56.714 So that people will see your good works? 00:14:56.714 --> 00:15:00.486 Why so that they will praise my Father in heaven. 00:15:00.486 --> 00:15:04.874 That's why we exist and that's what we have to do. 00:15:05.065 --> 00:15:17.928 So, to wrap up this first point, which is tremendously important, I think, as a starting point, how do you do what I'll call and there's an old hymn that basically, I think was called this how do you press on? 00:15:17.928 --> 00:15:20.755 How do you keep going? 00:15:20.755 --> 00:15:22.009 How do you persevere? 00:15:22.009 --> 00:15:23.770 How do you overcome setbacks? 00:15:23.770 --> 00:15:26.932 How do you overcome and walk away from your past? 00:15:26.932 --> 00:15:31.233 We can't really do that alone, can we? 00:15:31.233 --> 00:15:35.455 We've got to be informed and influenced by one greater than us. 00:15:36.185 --> 00:15:38.613 This is where I'll ask you to write down another piece of Scripture. 00:15:38.613 --> 00:15:41.032 How about John 14, 13 and 14? 00:15:41.032 --> 00:15:53.394 In John 14, 13 and 14, jesus is speaking and he says I will do whatever you ask in my name so the Son may bring glory to the Father. 00:15:53.394 --> 00:15:57.176 You may ask the Lord for anything in my name and I will do it. 00:15:57.176 --> 00:15:58.587 Do you all? 00:15:58.587 --> 00:15:59.490 I'm not sure I do. 00:15:59.490 --> 00:16:02.235 Do you understand the magnitude of that statement? 00:16:02.235 --> 00:16:13.454 The Son of God, the Holy One of Israel, the Lord and Savior, is saying to you and me if you'll ask by my authority, I'll do it. 00:16:13.454 --> 00:16:17.390 Whatever you ask, in my authority, I'll do it. 00:16:17.390 --> 00:16:19.648 So what's got to go? 00:16:19.648 --> 00:16:21.394 That just sounds too good to be true. 00:16:21.394 --> 00:16:22.889 What's got to go along with that? 00:16:22.889 --> 00:16:27.875 A consecrated relationship does what's consecrated? 00:16:27.875 --> 00:16:29.991 Going to explain it a little bit more in the next point. 00:16:29.991 --> 00:16:34.135 It's being set aside from a holy God for a holy God. 00:16:34.135 --> 00:16:35.610 You got it. 00:16:35.610 --> 00:16:38.573 It means there's something got to be different about us. 00:16:38.573 --> 00:16:51.115 There's a place that we occupy that other people, the rest of the world, does not occupy, not out of our arrogance, but out of our calling from God to know Him through Jesus Christ. 00:16:51.115 --> 00:16:56.214 That's when he starts saying whatever you ask, I'll give it to you. 00:16:56.214 --> 00:16:56.435 Why? 00:16:56.435 --> 00:17:06.194 Because we're going to ask for what His Spirit's already told us to ask for, and that's just an agreement thing. 00:17:06.194 --> 00:17:07.037 So let's transition. 00:17:07.264 --> 00:17:08.289 I'm not going to read 7 through 9. 00:17:08.289 --> 00:17:09.749 So Moses does that. 00:17:09.749 --> 00:17:11.107 He's got a message. 00:17:11.107 --> 00:17:12.393 He goes down. 00:17:12.393 --> 00:17:16.839 Poor old Moses, before this chapter is over, he has gone up and down that mountain. 00:17:16.839 --> 00:17:22.711 You just saw three times, and it's not over, because then it the close of this chapter. 00:17:22.711 --> 00:17:28.313 He says now here's what I want you to do Go back down and bring Aaron, your brother, up here. 00:17:28.313 --> 00:17:32.753 So Moses finds out oh man, that'll be number four. 00:17:32.753 --> 00:17:35.990 He is quite a hiker by the time. 00:17:35.990 --> 00:17:40.006 This is all over, and that's just the trips that we do know, anyway. 00:17:40.006 --> 00:17:54.257 So Moses goes down, he gives them the message and what do the people say In verse 8, they say oh, of course we will do everything that God tells us to do. 00:17:55.884 --> 00:17:57.893 And I just picture this, not in Scripture. 00:17:57.893 --> 00:18:00.631 I picture when they say that Moses rolls his eyes. 00:18:00.631 --> 00:18:07.491 He's like oh yeah, because he knows these people, he knows how obstinate and stiff-neck they are. 00:18:07.491 --> 00:18:14.036 And I picture this when he goes back up the mountain and God says well, what did they say? 00:18:14.036 --> 00:18:17.518 Moses says hey, lord, check this out. 00:18:17.518 --> 00:18:22.059 They said we'll do everything, just like we always do. 00:18:22.059 --> 00:18:22.811 And God goes. 00:18:22.811 --> 00:18:25.558 I think God laughs out loud. 00:18:25.558 --> 00:18:36.479 Only when he laughs out loud, it sounds like the worst thunderstorm in the world is boom, boom, like that, because we know how ridiculous that statement is. 00:18:36.479 --> 00:18:42.039 I guess their heart was good, though they still didn't understand yet what we're saying. 00:18:42.470 --> 00:18:46.260 If there's no consecration, there's no communication. 00:18:46.260 --> 00:18:54.262 So let'sthe second thing we need to check out is reverence will prepare us for revelation. 00:18:54.262 --> 00:19:00.001 Reverence will prepare us for a deeper revelation, or maybe even a basic. 00:19:00.001 --> 00:19:02.837 So now we're ready to read verse 10 through 12. 00:19:02.837 --> 00:19:08.341 Verse 10, and the Lord said to Moses go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow. 00:19:08.849 --> 00:19:10.563 Have them wash their clothes. 00:19:10.563 --> 00:19:12.736 Why wash their clothes? 00:19:12.736 --> 00:19:14.375 I thought this was an internal thing. 00:19:14.375 --> 00:19:14.717 It is. 00:19:14.717 --> 00:19:21.202 They're physicallyspiritually I'm sorry supposed to separate themselves out to God. 00:19:21.202 --> 00:19:25.921 The evidence of that, or the symbol of that, is the washing of their clothes. 00:19:25.921 --> 00:19:28.394 How did theythey're in the desert? 00:19:28.394 --> 00:19:33.599 How does a whole race of people come up with enough water to wash their clothes? 00:19:33.599 --> 00:19:36.537 Well, go back to chapter 17. 00:19:36.537 --> 00:19:37.601 I won't take time to read it. 00:19:37.601 --> 00:19:43.997 But in chapter 17, they're allthey're already starting to whine and complain and all you know, we're thirsty, we don't have any water. 00:19:43.997 --> 00:19:47.800 And God said strike that rock and out of it water will come. 00:19:47.800 --> 00:19:51.599 And it was enough to slay the thirst of all of them. 00:19:51.599 --> 00:19:59.817 We believe it poured into, probably too big, like basins, geographic basins, or pool like things, and they're still close enough to access that. 00:19:59.817 --> 00:20:04.141 So that's where they got thethat's where they got the water from. 00:20:04.450 --> 00:20:07.740 But verse 11, be ready by the third day. 00:20:07.740 --> 00:20:14.490 There's the number again, because on that day the Lord will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people. 00:20:14.490 --> 00:20:16.637 He says I'm showing up on the third day. 00:20:16.637 --> 00:20:18.115 Why wait three days? 00:20:18.115 --> 00:20:27.336 Because it probably is going to take that many people three days to wash that many pieces of clothing in two locations. 00:20:27.416 --> 00:20:31.498 Right Verse 10, put limits on the people. 00:20:31.498 --> 00:20:41.420 That means set a barrier, a system of barriers up or something, or signs around the mountain, and tell them be careful that you do not come up to the mountain. 00:20:41.420 --> 00:20:43.056 He's going to say that three times too. 00:20:43.056 --> 00:20:50.534 God is adamant and urgent and aggressively saying don't let anybody get near enough to touch the mountain. 00:20:50.534 --> 00:20:55.698 It will not go well for them if they do and they'll blow up what we plan to do here. 00:20:55.698 --> 00:21:01.074 Do notthree times he says that, and once he's talking about reverence in God. 00:21:01.074 --> 00:21:21.115 God is to be reverenced even to this day Now, not the fear that shrinks back from Him, but the fear that reverences Him and says oh, you are holy, you are pure, you are the Almighty. 00:21:22.890 --> 00:21:29.040 This is not aboutat this point, this is not about good and evil. 00:21:29.040 --> 00:21:46.651 This is about operating in the world or in the spirit, and that's still our process today, if we are absorbed too much into the world and the philosophies and the ideologies of the world. 00:21:46.651 --> 00:21:49.498 We cannot be set apart for God. 00:21:49.498 --> 00:21:56.883 So we have to operate, of course, in this, but we are to be separate people. 00:21:56.883 --> 00:22:13.536 It's about the spirit, because only when I am detached mentally and emotionally, and at times for a little while, physically enough, from the rest of the world can I be spirit-filled, because that's an ongoing battle. 00:22:13.536 --> 00:22:19.671 Because you are a Christ follower does not mean that you are spirit-filled every single day. 00:22:19.671 --> 00:22:26.221 That is our task to work on and to yield to on a daily basis. 00:22:26.221 --> 00:22:30.901 So it's not so much about just keeping the law, it's about the internal. 00:22:30.901 --> 00:22:34.958 It's about what's going on in my gut and your spirit. 00:22:35.538 --> 00:22:42.481 Also, at this point, the people are going to realize what Moses has been told on the mountain. 00:22:42.481 --> 00:22:48.938 We need a mediator here, and God places Moses, for now, in that role. 00:22:48.938 --> 00:22:56.532 Now, later, we know there is another mediator that will arrive on the scene, and you know who that is. 00:22:56.532 --> 00:23:00.859 That mediator is talked about in Hebrews, chapter 11. 00:23:00.859 --> 00:23:03.598 That's another good passage to read later this week. 00:23:03.598 --> 00:23:13.876 Hebrews chapter 11 actually goes back and talks about this incident and then compared it to his culture in that day. 00:23:15.190 --> 00:23:20.082 Let me just read a sample of it in chapter 12 of Hebrews, verse 22. 00:23:20.082 --> 00:23:27.495 It says Now but you have come to Mount Zion, symbolically, to the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God. 00:23:27.495 --> 00:23:35.495 You have come to thousands upon thousands of angels in joyful assembly Now listen to verse 23,. 00:23:35.495 --> 00:23:40.276 To the church of the firstborn, that means the church of Christ. 00:23:40.276 --> 00:23:45.095 That's us, that's us today Whose names are written in heaven. 00:23:45.095 --> 00:24:06.601 You have come to God, the judge of all men, to the spirits of righteous men made perfect, to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, to the sprinkled blood that speaks to a better world than to the blood of a better world in the Old Testament. 00:24:06.601 --> 00:24:11.540 The new covenant fulfilled the old covenant and a lot of you know this. 00:24:12.009 --> 00:24:28.041 So can I tell you where a dividing part is for a lot of folks, good people, otherwise, we get to a point where we start to realize this and we realize there's something more to this relationship with Jesus than our thought there was. 00:24:28.041 --> 00:24:34.942 And then we were back to the fear issue and we vote not to go fully. 00:24:34.942 --> 00:24:43.578 We like to kind of like can I just mix in some of Jesus with what I'm doing and what I enjoy doing, and we'll be okay here? 00:24:43.578 --> 00:24:48.781 No, you can't, because that is called in today's culture leveling down. 00:24:48.781 --> 00:24:49.653 You've heard that, henry. 00:24:50.289 --> 00:25:03.820 When we level down, we accept a life and a value and a purpose of our life that is less than what we were created for and there's nothing but dissatisfaction in that. 00:25:03.820 --> 00:25:11.539 There is no feeling of fulfillment or accomplishment in that. 00:25:11.539 --> 00:25:23.676 So when we choose to do it as God says we are to do it, we level up and the value and the purpose and the meaning of our life goes up. 00:25:23.676 --> 00:25:39.973 Now it comes with a price that we have to pay, but in my experience and I think the Scripture teaches this If you're going to follow the promises of God, that will always be greater than whatever pain comes out of it. 00:25:39.973 --> 00:25:49.612 There's just no comparison, because without consecration there's no real good communication with God. 00:25:51.650 --> 00:25:58.232 So what specifics, I guess, before I move on, what specifics in your life and my life need to be addressed. 00:25:58.232 --> 00:26:03.318 What license do I take? 00:26:03.318 --> 00:26:05.496 What liberties do I take? 00:26:05.496 --> 00:26:09.317 What maybe, as Paul said, legal but not helpful? 00:26:09.317 --> 00:26:13.414 What's in me that is in that category? 00:26:13.414 --> 00:26:30.013 What's not truthful, what's not loving, what's not compassionate, what's not kind, what is destructive and not instructive, that I need to deal with? 00:26:30.013 --> 00:26:38.838 We all have two or three of those things, and that's part of the confrontation he has with these people for three whole days. 00:26:38.838 --> 00:26:43.775 I know what some of you are thinking. 00:26:43.775 --> 00:26:45.700 I'm not real comfortable with all this. 00:26:45.700 --> 00:26:47.511 You shouldn't be. 00:26:47.511 --> 00:26:52.035 I spend half my life not comfortable. 00:26:52.035 --> 00:26:55.993 He's not a comfortable God. 00:26:56.034 --> 00:27:09.877 Y'all In that movie, the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe remember the famous line, the beaver he's talking to beaver, you know, and the little girl says is he safe? 00:27:09.877 --> 00:27:11.372 Talking about Asylum? 00:27:11.372 --> 00:27:13.156 The lion, who represents Jesus? 00:27:13.156 --> 00:27:16.269 He's fearful, is he safe? 00:27:16.269 --> 00:27:18.596 And the beaver says is he safe? 00:27:18.596 --> 00:27:21.237 Who said anything about being safe? 00:27:21.237 --> 00:27:26.333 No, he's not safe, but he's good and he's the king. 00:27:26.333 --> 00:27:32.751 I tell you, he is the king and there's a part of him. 00:27:32.751 --> 00:27:33.875 Y'all, that's just faith. 00:27:33.875 --> 00:27:43.352 That's fearful, but if you belong to him and you're separated out for his purposes, you don't have to be afraid. 00:27:43.352 --> 00:27:54.162 You just have to be obedient and you just have to be willing to be consecrated for him, because with that comes the communication. 00:27:54.162 --> 00:27:59.559 So now, real quick, let's look at verse 16 through 20. 00:27:59.559 --> 00:28:05.339 So, moses, again, you know he's the messenger of the mediator. 00:28:05.339 --> 00:28:18.732 He goes now and tells them wash ups, third day we're going to seehe's basically saying better, get ready, because in three days you're going to see and hear something you have never seen before. 00:28:18.732 --> 00:28:21.153 So verse 16,. 00:28:21.213 --> 00:28:30.842 On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, with a thick cloud over the mountain and a verynot a loud trumpet, a very loud trumpet blast. 00:28:30.842 --> 00:28:34.237 Everyone in the camp trembled. 00:28:34.237 --> 00:28:39.040 Now Hebrews 12 that I did not read said even Moses is trembling. 00:28:39.040 --> 00:28:42.115 Have you ever seen somebody so scared? 00:28:42.115 --> 00:28:43.859 In their trembling they look like they're dancing. 00:28:43.859 --> 00:28:56.980 I think I picture all these people standing down in that valley and it is so overwhelming that that's exactly what they are doing here. 00:28:56.980 --> 00:29:00.114 And here's my other question. 00:29:00.114 --> 00:29:03.477 All of a sudden, a trumpet starts blowing. 00:29:03.477 --> 00:29:06.714 Now let me remind you, moses is down on the valley. 00:29:06.714 --> 00:29:08.459 All the people are down in the valley. 00:29:08.459 --> 00:29:11.496 Nobody's on the mountain except God. 00:29:11.496 --> 00:29:12.914 Who's blowing the trumpet? 00:29:12.914 --> 00:29:15.875 It's coming from the mountain. 00:29:15.875 --> 00:29:19.257 This is not a human occurrence. 00:29:20.371 --> 00:29:25.422 17, then Moses led the people out of the camp to meet with God and they stood at the foot of the mountain. 00:29:25.422 --> 00:29:31.761 Mount Sinai was covered with smoke because the Lord descended on it with fire. 00:29:31.761 --> 00:29:36.416 The smoke billowed up fromlike smoke from a furnace. 00:29:36.416 --> 00:29:39.222 The whole mountain trembled violently. 00:29:39.222 --> 00:29:49.282 Can you imagine A force so great that that mountain we just saw is shaking like Jello? 00:29:49.282 --> 00:29:57.793 A lot of commentators have said because there was fire and smoke and all this was a volcanic mountain? 00:29:57.793 --> 00:30:03.320 I don't believe so, and they've not been able to find any extinct volcanoes in that area. 00:30:03.320 --> 00:30:08.221 I don't think God needed a volcano to help him out. 00:30:08.990 --> 00:30:27.718 I think God is God and I think if he decided to put on a show, he's going to put on a show, and if he decided to prove to them once and for all who he was and what he was capable of, he did it, and so it looked like a furnace. 00:30:27.718 --> 00:30:36.833 Verse 20, the Lord descended to the top of Mount Sinai and he called Moses to the top of the mountain. 00:30:36.833 --> 00:30:39.076 So Moses goes up. 00:30:39.076 --> 00:30:40.375 Here we go again. 00:30:40.375 --> 00:30:49.002 It's a beautiful picture God descends to earth and Moses usins to meet God on a high place. 00:30:49.002 --> 00:30:56.261 Hence he is now a mountain man and he is in the presence of the living holy God. 00:30:56.261 --> 00:31:02.179 And this is a moment like unlike any other. 00:31:02.179 --> 00:31:34.787 Until maybe you get to the Mount of Transfiguration in the New Testament, until maybe you read Matthew 28, 2, where it says On another hill called Golgotha, a man hangs on a cross and there's a violent earthquake that shakes the whole city so bad that the curtains are torn down in the temple and there's damage to Herod's temple like never before. 00:31:34.787 --> 00:31:38.422 Yeah, that type of effect. 00:31:40.515 --> 00:31:44.644 If you're walking with God, you're going to be that testimony that you're called to be. 00:31:44.644 --> 00:31:48.545 You're going to hear some revelations from God. 00:31:48.545 --> 00:31:50.141 A lot of them are what we call general. 00:31:50.141 --> 00:31:51.881 They apply to all of us. 00:31:51.881 --> 00:31:54.021 We pray and read the Scripture. 00:31:54.021 --> 00:31:55.519 Some of them are specific. 00:31:55.519 --> 00:31:57.318 This is just for you. 00:31:57.318 --> 00:32:04.385 And if you're not, if you're not hearing those, there is a barrier. 00:32:04.385 --> 00:32:10.826 That barrier will be torn down by love, allowing Him to love you. 00:32:11.634 --> 00:32:15.603 And again, an honest assessment do I love Him enough? 00:32:15.603 --> 00:32:20.721 Can I be very frank with you? 00:32:20.721 --> 00:32:40.421 If you're still using the reason for not following Jesus fully I'm too busy, I'm too tired at night, I don't know enough, yet I'm so distracted I've got so many other people to think about. 00:32:40.421 --> 00:32:44.938 Those are not reasons, those are excuses. 00:32:44.938 --> 00:32:51.738 And the bottom line of all of that is you're basically saying to the Lord I just don't love you enough. 00:32:51.738 --> 00:33:01.265 I like you and I like your benefits, but I don't love you enough. 00:33:05.595 --> 00:33:06.257 Here's some good news. 00:33:06.257 --> 00:33:11.460 God always works through broken people. 00:33:11.460 --> 00:33:18.223 Everybody you're going to find in the Scripture are broken people. 00:33:18.223 --> 00:33:25.605 Everybody in the modern day that he uses for His work are broken people. 00:33:25.605 --> 00:33:29.982 He prepares us even through a broken past. 00:33:30.315 --> 00:33:34.444 Moses ends up out in the wilderness because he murdered somebody. 00:33:34.444 --> 00:33:46.265 But when he stops walking he is put into the family of a priest, a Midianite priest, who somehow knows what he will know later. 00:33:46.265 --> 00:33:51.987 There's one God, his name is Jehovah Yahweh God, and I'm going to introduce you to Him. 00:33:51.987 --> 00:33:53.546 That's no coincidence. 00:33:53.546 --> 00:34:01.780 There's no coincidence that he has a daughter who Moses ends up marrying and they spend 40 years together. 00:34:01.780 --> 00:34:10.266 His father-in-law is a priest and when the time comes, that revelation, he's able to do it. 00:34:10.266 --> 00:34:14.121 He doesn't think he can do it, but he's been prepared to do it. 00:34:14.121 --> 00:34:22.025 So why can't I just add Him to my list of stuff that is not of God? 00:34:22.025 --> 00:34:26.582 I'm not killing anybody, I'm not hurting other people necessarily. 00:34:26.582 --> 00:34:37.744 I'm just adding Him to some vices and stuff I love to do, because 1 Peter 1.16 is the reminder be holy, because I am holy. 00:34:37.784 --> 00:34:38.745 That doesn't mean perfect. 00:34:38.745 --> 00:34:39.527 We can't get there. 00:34:39.527 --> 00:34:40.228 We're all broken. 00:34:40.228 --> 00:34:48.001 What it means is set apart, be different, be a little bit off-center there. 00:34:48.001 --> 00:34:50.038 That's what we're called to do. 00:34:50.038 --> 00:34:58.581 Give me real quickly, give you some advantages to yourself If you decide, I'm in for this, being set apart today. 00:34:58.581 --> 00:35:02.247 If I'm not today, I'm going to reorder my life. 00:35:02.247 --> 00:35:03.819 I'm going to confess, repent. 00:35:03.819 --> 00:35:06.643 I want to be set apart for God's glory. 00:35:06.643 --> 00:35:09.162 I'm going to do the uncomfortable things. 00:35:09.162 --> 00:35:11.842 There's some advantages just to you to do it. 00:35:11.842 --> 00:35:14.562 We're doing it for God, but man he always blesses. 00:35:15.234 --> 00:35:15.978 One is obedience. 00:35:15.978 --> 00:35:18.241 It means your obedience will be a lot easier. 00:35:18.241 --> 00:35:21.242 You can do the hard things that you didn't think you could do. 00:35:21.242 --> 00:35:22.979 There is fellowship with God. 00:35:22.979 --> 00:35:26.843 You'll never be closer to God than you are after that never. 00:35:26.843 --> 00:35:30.844 Also, you'll know yourself better. 00:35:30.844 --> 00:35:33.383 The best way to know yourself is to know God. 00:35:33.383 --> 00:35:55.605 The best way to know your wife or your husband is to know God, because God created him or her, and so there's a lot of reasons that do it, and that's why I say if you are willing to do that, the promises of God are always going to be greater than the pain that comes with that. 00:35:55.605 --> 00:35:56.798 And there will be some. 00:35:56.798 --> 00:35:59.419 I'm going to shoot straight with you. 00:35:59.419 --> 00:36:00.997 There too, there will be some. 00:36:03.514 --> 00:36:08.082 So if you turn a page in your Bible, there is chapter 20 staring at us. 00:36:08.082 --> 00:36:17.905 Chapter 20 will not happen unless chapter 19 is honored and obeyed and respected. 00:36:17.905 --> 00:36:27.387 This takes three trips up and down that mountain, three days of purification and consecration. 00:36:27.387 --> 00:36:29.236 Three times. 00:36:29.236 --> 00:36:38.401 God says don't let them touch this mountain, you get the idea that there's something significant to three. 00:36:38.401 --> 00:36:42.761 There is A couple of thousand years. 00:36:42.761 --> 00:36:51.799 After this, a man is killed and he's buried, and on the third day he is resurrected oh my goodness. 00:36:51.799 --> 00:36:59.046 And let me close with one more little bit of Hebrews 12. 00:36:59.046 --> 00:37:04.645 I'm telling you you need to read Hebrews 12, especially here in 2023. 00:37:04.645 --> 00:37:06.375 Check this out. 00:37:06.375 --> 00:37:09.925 Verses 26 through 29. 00:37:10.154 --> 00:37:12.861 At that time, his voice shook. 00:37:12.861 --> 00:37:14.264 That's God's voice, remember. 00:37:14.264 --> 00:37:14.866 He's going back. 00:37:14.866 --> 00:37:17.382 He's describing and explaining Exodus 19. 00:37:17.382 --> 00:37:26.635 At that time, his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised once more I will shake not only the earth, but also the heavens For them. 00:37:26.635 --> 00:37:29.062 That was definitely futuristic for us. 00:37:29.062 --> 00:37:30.205 We may be living it. 00:37:30.205 --> 00:37:37.384 It may some of it's futuristic also, I'm sure, but I'm going to shake the earth and also everything around the earth. 00:37:38.074 --> 00:37:38.555 27,. 00:37:38.555 --> 00:37:43.306 The words once more indicate the removing of what can be shaken. 00:37:43.306 --> 00:37:49.023 It is all the created things, so that what cannot be shaken may remain. 00:37:49.023 --> 00:37:52.488 What does that mean? 00:37:52.488 --> 00:38:04.567 Verse 28, therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful and worship God acceptably, with reverence and awe. 00:38:04.567 --> 00:38:05.417 Here we are back. 00:38:05.417 --> 00:38:06.758 We've completed the loop. 00:38:06.758 --> 00:38:19.164 We're reverencing God by worshiping Him as set-apart people, because we're after the one thing that this world will not see shaken, which is the kingdom of God. 00:38:19.164 --> 00:38:20.006 Guess who that is? 00:38:20.006 --> 00:38:20.877 That's me and you. 00:38:20.877 --> 00:38:30.469 And then he closes it out with a simple statement that you've heard, for our God is a consuming fire. 00:38:30.469 --> 00:38:32.914 Oh yeah, oh yeah. 00:38:32.914 --> 00:38:46.861 He's to be loved and he's to be adored, but he's also to be reverenced, because when Jesus comes the second time, there'll be a lot of fire going on. 00:38:46.861 --> 00:38:59.384 And so thank you, thank you for being serious about your faith, and thank you, many of you, for being able to relate to my statement. 00:38:59.384 --> 00:39:12.601 I've already said a couple of times is I'm willing to follow the promises of God because that's so much greater than whatever pain I'm going to endure. 00:39:12.601 --> 00:39:15.179 That's always the greatest plan. 00:39:15.594 --> 00:39:19.323 Watchman Neil, a long time ago, says with consecration there is perfect peace. 00:39:19.323 --> 00:39:22.478 You don't have that perfect peace today. 00:39:22.478 --> 00:39:30.879 As Eddie comes forward to lead us, you can know that perfect peace and we can help you down front. 00:39:30.879 --> 00:39:33.462 Love to pray for whatever you're, whoever you have on your mind. 00:39:33.462 --> 00:39:41.422 Love to celebrate If you need a church home, you need to be baptized, something like that, and this is where God has led you to the Spirit. 00:39:41.422 --> 00:39:42.920 Love to talk about that also. 00:39:42.920 --> 00:39:44.519 So why don't you stand and let me pray for you? 00:39:44.519 --> 00:39:53.943