Old Testament Archives - Page 71 of 149

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Worship Like You’re Told

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Christ Church on June 14, 2020

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Introduction

People, being at root self-idolaters, think they can worship God on their terms, rather than worshipping Him as He has instructed us to. The difference between right worship and wrong worship is the difference between smoked brisket and burnt hair. If you don’t believe me just ask Cain, or Nadab and Abihu, or Ananias and Saphira.

The Text

Give unto the LORD the glory due unto his name: bring an offering, and come before him: worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness (1 Chronicles 16:29).

Worship Faux Pas

Worship in modern evangelical parlance has come to mean, almost exclusively, music. To be more exact, the sort of music that consists of three chords and the truth, give or take a chord, and give or take the truth. While we ought not to disparage the musicality which has come to pervade much of Protestant worship, we shouldn’t think of worship as confined to the musical aspects of our service. I just used the word service and it would be good for us if we began to think of worship and service as synonyms (Rom. 12:1). In other words, our worship service contains music, but music is too small a thing to contain our worship.

King David, in our text, is consecrating the restoration of the Ark of Covenant to the Tabernacle. He does so by way of “burnt sacrifices and peace offerings (1 Chr. 16:1).” But of great import is the offering of another type: a psalm (16:. In this song of thanks, we are summoned to give glory to the Lord, bring an offering, and come before Him. We are not only told what to do (i.e. bring glory), but how to do it: worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. We must worship not in common garments tailored to current fashion, but in garments of holy beauty.

The way we worship shapes what we believe. Ugly worship results in ugly faith. As an example, a deep bond of love and loyalty is formed in a family as they share meals together, go on walks together, laughing and talking. They might not realize how those routine elements of their family liturgy are shaping and fortifying their view of family. If a family becomes a bubble or two out of level, oftentimes a deliberate return to those basic “rituals” help to dispel some of the relational funk.

An important adjective for our weekly Lord’s Day worship should be familiar. In one way, we shouldn’t notice our liturgy. When you first learn the guitar every placement of every finger is a painful labor. But once you are well-practiced, those fundamentals fade. Not because they’re unimportant, but their purpose is to provide the framework for glorious strums, progressions, and scales. If we don’t deliberately look at what we’re doing, and why we’re doing it, we can grow flabby in our execution of what we’ve been told to bring: glory.

Call

Leviticus 1:1

And the LORD called unto Moses, and spake unto him out of the tabernacle of the congregation.

The book of Leviticus begins with God calling unto Moses with instructions as to how the Israelites were to bring their worship to Him. Worship begins and ends with God and at His initiation. We aren’t Aborigines with rain sticks hoping to make a loud enough clamor to get the gods’ attention. God calls, we answer. God initiates, we respond.

In the OT, God is continually coming to and calling to those whom He has set apart for His redemptive purpose. When He initiates His covenant there is a distinct pattern. But Man doesn’t summon God, rather it is He who calls to us, and invites us into His covenant life. He invites us to a meal.

Confession

Psalm 51:16-17

For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.

Before you can enjoy communion with Him, something must be done about the black tar of sin that is caked on you three inches thick. Though David invites us to worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness, outside of Christ, the most beautiful thing we can offer is the rasping of dead bones, ornately decked out in soiled grave-cloths. God summons us, and the first thing we realize is that we’re wretched, blind, and filthy. Unless our sins are covered, we cannot come. So we confess not only the vile truth about ourselves, but also the new creation which God has begun in Christ.

Consecration

John 15:3

Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.

But in being cleansed by the blood we are set apart for service. When the priests were consecrated, they were adorned in such a way as to tell the world that they were busy with sacred work (Cf. 1 Pt. 1:15). Their uniform declared their occupation. So we are consecrated to go about the work which God has called us to which is to hear the Word of Christ, in hearing we are renewed by that Word, to keep that Word (Deu. 6:17). Now our prayers and offerings of praise ascend to Him and are accepted by Him, because they are offered in the person of His Son (Heb. 13:15-16).

Communion

Psalm 63:5

My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness; and my mouth shall praise thee with joyful lips.

God calls us, cleanses us, and consecrates us in order to commune with us. The Peace Offering followed the Sin Offering and Ascension Offering (Cf. Lev. 9). This sacrifice was a shared meal: the LORD has his portion (Lev. 3:9-11), the priest/mediator received a portion (Lev. 7:31-32), and finally the worshipper partook of this offering (Lev. 7:15).

It’s no small wonder that Christ took the Passover seder (the pinnacle of the entire sacrificial system), and renovated it into a simple meal of bread and wine. Jesus didn’t disconnect it from what came before. The final sacrifice would be Himself. Thus the Peace Offering He offered on our behalf, ensured that we might partake with the Father and the Great High Priest of that covenant meal.

Commission

Mark 16:15

And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.

We’re commissioned because we have been equipped and filled for the task for which we’ve been set apart. Arrangement is always made for the successful completion of the covenant. In the instance of the New Covenant, we are assured that Christ will give us His very Spirit to guide and comfort us. He will be with us. Our practice of weekly Covenant Renewal service isn’t because we’re worried the Covenant will fail week to week.

Glory Upon Glory

The long and short is this: order and ardor are not at loggerheads. We worship with joy unspeakable and full of glory, but we do so with reverent fear. Your worship and service will only be accepted if it is offered in Jesus.

If we think we’re confined by an orderly liturgy, we are likely in danger of indulging ourselves in worshipping the way we want to, rather than the way in which God has commanded us to worship Him. The OT order didn’t become irrelevant because of the fulfilling work of Christ, any less than an acorn becomes irrelevant because it turns into an oak.

The Politics of Sin Forgiven

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Christ Church on June 7, 2020

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Introduction

What do Christians do when the world around them seems to be coming apart? We wait on God, our salvation, and we think and live in light of His promises. And in particular, we think and live in light of His promises to forgive our sins and the sins of the world.

The prophet Micah ministered in the southern kingdom of Judah towards the end of the 8^th Century B.C. He ministered during the reigns of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah (Mic. 1:1) when the northern kingdom of Israel/Samaria fell to the Assyrians in 722 BC (2 Kings 17). In other words, Micah was watching the disintegration of his nation. Despite the deep darkness in his day, his prophecy is full of light and hope for us.

The Text

“Woe is me! for I am as when they have gathered the summer fruits, as the grapegleanings of the vintage: there is no cluster to eat: my soul desired the firstripe fruit. The good man is perished out of the earth: and there is none upright among men: they all lie in wait for blood; they hunt every man his brother with a net… He will turn again, he will have compassion upon us; he will subdue our iniquities; and thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea…” (Mic. 1-9, 18-20)

Summary of the Text

Our passage opens with Micah’s cry of woe. The previous chapter has just finished God’s declaration of severe judgment (6:10-16), and here Micah cries out for the sin of his people (7:1). All the good men are gone, and everyone hunts one another with nets and takes bribes (7:2-3). The best men are briars and thorn hedges, and no one can trust anyone, not even friends, spouses, or family (7:4-6). But Micah’s response is a striking confidence: “Therefore, I will look unto the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation: my God will hear me” (7:7). Micah warns his enemy not to rejoice when he falls because he will surely rise, and even in the darkness God will be his light (7:8). Micah acknowledges that there will be consequences for his personal sin, but God will plead for him and deliver him and bring him back out into the light (7:9). Micah goes on to describe how God will judge the nations and care for his people through all the turmoil (7:10-17). The prophet closes asking who is like our God, and it’s striking that he is particularly astonished by His mercy, the way He pardons sin and passes by the transgression of His people (7:18). Despite all the turmoil, Micah is sure that God will turn again and have compassion on His people; He will defeat our sin and cast it into the depths of the sea (7:19). This is certain because God promised this mercy to Abraham (7:20).

Is There A God?

Is Micah’s response to the evil of his day reasonable? Is it reasonable and rational to respond to such pervasive corruption by saying you will wait on God (Mic. 7:7)? The answer to these questions illustrates why the existence of God really is a watershed issue. If there is no God, then eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we die. If there is no God, then morality is just a construct, and might makes right. Everything is survival of the fittest, grab what you can get. And morals are just temporary, utilitarian tactics for the cowardly. If there is such a thing as justice, then there must of necessity be a standard of justice. And for it to be real justice, that standard must be fixed from day to day, from generation to generation, and apply to everyone the same. Whenever anyone says something is “wrong,” they are making a claim to morality. This is why we must be constantly asking a most crucial question: By what standard? Why? You cannot claim that something is good, right, wrong, evil, or unjust if you have banished all absolute standards. If there is a God, there is a fixed standard. If not, to Hell with morality.

The Real Problem

The reason we don’t want a standard, an eternal, fixed law is because every man knows that the same law that will condemn evil out there in the world will also ultimately point its sharp end back at us. “Now we know that what things soever the law saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God” (Rom. 3:19). This is what Micah acknowledges having rehearsed the wickedness of his nation: “I will bear the indignation of the Lord, because I have sinned against him, until he plead my cause, and execute judgment for me” (7:9). So what will it be? Do we want justice or not?

The Politics of the Accuser

The city of man functions on the power of accusation. The best peace and community man can muster on his own is the “fellowship” of the standoff. We take hostages in the form of dirt on one another, and have guns pointed at one another with silent agreements (or not so silent) not to fire, if the others won’t. This happens in families, marriages, businesses, and nations. But this isn’t peace, this isn’t fellowship, this is a cold war, with every move scrutinized and studied. But the power of accusation is guilt and fear. People know they are guilty, they know they have dirt, and they are paralyzed by the fear of exposure, blame, and shame, so they play along. Satan is the Accuser, and this is the power he uses over the guilty (Heb. 2:14-15).

Conclusion

This is why when Jesus began His healing ministry He identified the deeper, more fundamental problem as sin. When the men let down their paralyzed friend through the roof, the first thing Jesus said was, “Son, your sins are forgiven” (Mk. 2:5, Lk. 5:20), which may have seemed a bit anticlimactic at first. And when Jesus finally did heal the man, it was to prove that He had the authority to forgive sins (Mk. 2:10-11, Lk. 5:24). To the extent that individuals, families, and nations are paralyzed with fear, violence, hatred, the answer is the same. They need their sins forgiven. If our sins are forgiven then the Satanic hostage game of accusation is over.

And what is the one thing our God is known for? Despite all the cries of misogyny and injustice and cruelty, everyone knows that our God is known for His mercy. From the beginning, He has covered the sins of people with grace. He pardons iniquity; He passes by our transgressions. He delights in mercy. So this is the message that we need to hear, the message proclaimed to our families and neighbors and nation: Jesus Christ the Righteous is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world (1 Jn. 2:1-2). He has defeated our sins, trampling them underfoot, by the blood of His cross, and they have been cast to the bottom of the sea (Mic. 7:19). This is the only path to peace in our lives or in our land. This is our light even when we sit in darkness, and it is our sure hope that the Lord will bring us out into the light.

A Gospel for Hypocrites (Malachi)

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Christ Church on June 7, 2020

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3:13-16 Your Words Have Been Harsh Against Me

Throughout the book of Malachi, the prophet has uncovered the pretense of religiosity amongst the Jews that covered their hard hearts. The Jews did not realize that their disbelief was speaking louder than their surface obedience.

3:16-18 They Shall Be Mine

This confrontation of the sin of the Jews was effective. Many of these people truly feared the Lord, despite their sinful behavior, and repented. And the Lord listened carefully to this and recorded it in his book of remembrance. They returned their focus to the Lord (meditating on his name), worshipping him. And he took them as his treasure and put his blessing on them.

4:1-3 A Day Is Coming

The Day of the Lord is foretold throughout Scripture. There have been many mini-days of the Lord throughout world history. But the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD was the culmination of all of them. Here Malachi describes both the judgment and the vindication that this day will bring.

4:4-6 Elijah Is Coming

The book of Malachi is the New Testament in miniature. God sends his prophet to confront the sin of the people and to preach the forgiveness of sins. Some hear the prophet and repent. Others harden their hearts as the day of judgment comes.

But then again, this is actually our lives in miniature. We live in the church and it is very easy for our hearts to grow hard, all while we walk through the motions of worship. Malachi preaches a warning for hypocrites. But Malachi also preaches a Gospel for hypocrites.

And one of the great blessings of this kind of repentance is the way it restores fathers to sons and sons to fathers. Gods blessings are best on display in successive generations.

Bring All the Tithes Into the Storehouse (Malachi)

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Christ Church on May 31, 2020

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The Text

Malachi 3:6–12

3:6 Great Is Thy Faithfulness

God identifies himself here with his covenant name – the Lord. In Leviticus 19, God taught the Israelites that the obedience that he required of them resonated with who he was, with his holy name. But now we learn that on top of being holy, God is constant – he does not change. And this constancy of God is, surprisingly, the foundation of his mercy. It is because he is always the same that you are not consumed.

3:7 Return

It is deeply ironic that God now tells the Jews that what they really need to do is “return.” Had they not already done just that? These were the people who had given up everything to return to Israel. And yet God says that their heart, which is what he really wanted, was far from him. But if they would return to him, he would return to them. And he had been saying this to them for some time (Zech. 1:3).

3:8-10 Test Me

The return to Jerusalem also meant a return to funding the temple system (Neh. 10:35-39). When we think of giving to God the way we would filing our taxes, we find that we are actually robbing ourselves.

God says, “test me.” There is a kind of testing God that we are not supposed to do (Deut. 6:16). But here we find that there is a kind of testing God that we are supposed to do. These actually correspond to two different ways that we can be tested. But God wants his steadfast lovingkindness to be proven, to be displayed. That is what this kind of testing does.

Tithing is meant to be an act of faith, as obedience before God and not man (Luke 21:1-4, Mat. 6:1-4). Your approach to tithes and offerings reveals something fundamental about where your heart is (Mat. 6:19-24). When your eye is on God, you will be generous and you will live under God’s blessing. But if your eye is on the blessing, you will be neither generous nor blessed.

In this passage, we see that God is zealous for his house. Does that make him a great “me monster”? God’s zeal for his own holiness and glory is his supreme gift to you.

3:11-12 The Fruit of the Land

The motivation to hold back the tithe is to hold on to your wealth for yourself. But ironically, we see that this holding back is exactly why they are struggling. Remember that God has been saying that his name will be great amongst all the nations (1:11). But now we see that that when we magnify God’s name, he magnifies us.

The Clouds of Heaven (Ascension 2020)

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Christ Church on May 24, 2020

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Introduction

One of the great difficulties that modern Christians have is that we do not let the two testaments inform one another. Because of this neglect on our part, we miss many visions of coming glory that the Old Testament prophets set before us. And as a people starved for glory, we ought not to miss any of it when God offers it.

The Text

I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed (Daniel 7:13-14).

Summary of the Text

In the night visions, Daniel sees someone like the Son of man coming on the clouds of heaven (v. 13). This one like the Son of man approaches the Ancient of days (God the Father), and is brought before Him (v. 13). When this mysterious figure approaches the Ancient of days, the end result is that universal dominion is bestowed on him—dominion, glory, and a kingdom. The nature of this kingdom was that all people, nations, and languages would serve Him (v. 14). His dominion was to be everlasting, and the kingdom he was receiving would never be destroyed (v. 14). And therefore preaching the kingdom of God, among other things, means preaching this.

The Son of Man

The first thing to note is how Jesus identifies with this phrase—“the Son of man.” Although the phrase is common in the Old Testament, this passage in Daniel is the only place in the entire Old Testament where it is used in a messianic sense. Thus, it is a messianic term here, but not a common messianic term. The Lord Jesus uses it of Himself, and it simultaneously conceals and reveals His identity. Some common examples would include Mark 2:10, 8:38, and 10:33.

The Lord Jesus did not want His disciples proclaiming His identity until the time was right. After His resurrection and ascension (Rom. 1:4), the time was more than right, and so two thousand years into it, this reality now must be declared until the end of the world. This is what we are charged to declare—the universal lordship over (and consequent salvation of) the entire world.

The Clouds of Heaven

We must let the Bible tell us what a phrase means. When we think of “the Son of man coming on the clouds of heaven,” what do we tend to think? We almost always think of the Second Coming, with Jesus descending to earth on the clouds of heaven. But this is not what it means at all.

The fact that Jesus ascended into heaven on the clouds (the event we are commemorating today) is not meant (with regard to this prophecy) to point to another event many thousands of years later. Although Jesus will come again the same way He left, His manner of going was the beginning of the fulfillment itself.

“And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven” (Acts 1:9-11).

Where This is Quoted

The first place to consider is in the Olivet Discourse. “And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other” (Mt. 24:30-31). This is not a sign in heaven, but rather a sign concerning the Son of man, who is in heaven. The tribes of the earth see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven. Now, in Daniel, where does He come? Into the presence of the Ancient of Days. His authority is apparent on earth (the tribes see it), but the coming is apparent in heaven. Put simply, He is crowned in Heaven; we see the ramifications of that coronation on earth.

The Jews who put Jesus on trial understood the ramifications of this phrase better than many modern Christians do. This is why, tearing his clothes, the high priest considered the statement blasphemous. “Jesus saith unto him, Thou hast said: nevertheless I say unto you, Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest rent his clothes, saying, He hath spoken blasphemy; what further need have we of witnesses? behold, now ye have heard his blasphemy.” (Mt. 26: 64-65; cf. Mk. 14:62-64). We should pay close attention to it—for this was the passage that brought about the conviction of Jesus. These were the words that condemned Him.

Lord of All

Returning to Daniel, what did the Lord Jesus receive after He departed from the disciples’ sight in a cloud? What did He receive when He approached the Ancient of days? The Scriptures are exceedingly clear on the point. He received everlasting dominion, glory, and an indestructible and universal kingdom (Dan. 7:13-14). He received the heathen for His inheritance, and the uttermost ends of the earth as His possession (Ps. 2: 8). He received the worship of all the families on earth, and the remembrance of all the ends of the world (Ps. 22:27). He will receive all men as they stream to Him, the ensign of Jesse (Is. 11:10), and His rest shall be glorious. The earth will be as full of the knowledge of the Lord Jesus as the Pacific Ocean is wet (Is. 11:9). He will receive all His adversaries, fashioned by the power of God into His footstool (Ps. 110:1). He will receive the human race, unveiled (Is. 25:7), and will set a feast of fat things, full of marrow, full of fat, and wine on the lees, well-refined (Is. 25:8).

This world, the one we live in now, will be put to rights, before the Second Coming, before the end of all things. The only enemy not destroyed through the advance of the gospel will be death itself (1 Cor. 15:26)—and even that enemy will be in confused retreat (Is. 65:20). The ramifications of this are many, but one of the things it means is that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. So return to your labors encouraged. You know your weakness, that is true, but hear the words of your God. It is an invincible weakness because one like a son of man has entered into the throne room of the heavens. His name is the Lord Jesus Christ.