Dyer, Inez Wolfe, Josh Chamber,
and Kathy Robinson, who has her shingles, bless her heart. She
says she's never had pain like that in her life. She's been
through a lot, so that's amazing. So remember these folks in your
prayers, and also the others who requested prayer. you got
an email from or not an email but a facebook thing from tracy
right she's doing okay she's got a long recovery after this
because they cut through so much muscle to get those things out
of her but uh... she's she's doing okay so continue
to remember her in your prayers and seek the lord's help for
them as well as Dee Parks haven't heard anything about Dee so i
guess the situation's about the same let's begin our worship
service with hymn number three hundred and fifty four what a
friend we have in jesus What a friend we have in Jesus
All our sins and griefs to bear What a privilege to carry Everything
to God in prayer ? What peace we often forfeit ?
Oh, what needless pain we bear ? Oh, because we do not carry
? Everything to God in prayer ? Have we trials and temptations their trouble anywhere. We should never be discouraged. Take it to the Lord in prayer. Can we find a friend so faithful? Who will all our sorrows ? Jesus knows our every weakness
? Taken to the Lord in prayer ? Are we weak and heavy laden
? Cumbered with a load of care ? Precious saviors till our rest
? Do thy friends despise forsake
thee ? Take it to the Lord in prayer ? In his arms he'll take
and shield thee ? Thou will find a solace there M number 118,
when I survey the Wonders Cross, When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the Prince of Glory died My richest gain I count
but loss Forbid it, Lord, that I should
boast, save in the death of Christ. most. I sacrifice him to his
blood. See from his head, his hands,
his feet. Sorrow and love flow mingled
down. Did e'er such love and sorrow
meet, Or thorns compose so rich a crown? Were the whole realm of nature
mine, That were a present Love so amazing, so divine Demands
my soul, my life, my all If you have your Bibles, refer
me to Exodus chapter 19. You want to read the entire chapter
again. I'm taking my text tonight from
verses 7 through 9. In the third month when the children
of Israel were gone forth out of the land of Egypt, the same
day they came to the wilderness of Sinai. For they were departed
from Rephidim, and were come to the desert of Sinai, had pitched
in the wilderness, and there Israel camped before the mount. And Moses went up unto God, and
God called unto him out of the mountain, saying, Thus shalt
thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel,
Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I buried
you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself. Now therefore, if you will obey
my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a
peculiar treasure unto me above all people, for all the earth
is mine. And ye shall be unto me a kingdom
of priests and a holy nation. And these are the words which
thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel. And Moses came and
called for the elders of the people and laid before their
faces all the words which the Lord commanded him. And all the
people answered together and said, All that the Lord has spoken
we will do. And Moses returned to the words
of the people and to the Lord. And the Lord said unto Moses,
Lo, I come unto thee in a thick cloud, that the people may hear
when I speak with thee and believe thee forever. And Moses told
the words of the people and to the Lord. The Lord said unto
Moses, Go unto thy people, and sanctify them today and tomorrow,
and let them wash their clothes. And be ready against the third
day, for the third day the Lord will come down in the sight of
all the people upon the Mount Sinai. Now shall set bounds unto
the people round about, saying, Take heed to yourselves, that
ye go not up to the mount, or touch the border of it. Whosoever
toucheth the mount shall be surely put to death. There shall not
a hand touch it, but he shall surely be stoned or shot through.
Whether it be beast or man, it shall not live. When the trumpet
soundeth long, they shall come to the mount. Moses went down
of the mount unto the people and sanctified the people, and
they washed their clothes. And he said to the people, Be
ready against the third day. Come not as your wives. It came
to pass on the third day in the morning that there were thunders
and lightnings and thick cloud upon the mount. and the voice
of the trumpet exceeding loud, so that all the people that was
in the camp trembled. Moses brought forth the people
out of the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the nether
part of the mount, and Mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke,
because the Lord descended upon it in fire, and smoke thereof
ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly.
When the voice of the trumpet sounded long and waxed louder
and louder, Moses spake, and God answered him by a voice.
The Lord came down upon Mount Sinai on the top of the mountain.
The Lord called Moses up to the top of the mountain, and Moses
went up. And the Lord said to Moses, Go down, and charge the
people, lest they break through unto the Lord, to gaze, and many
of them perish. And let the priests also, which
come near to the Lord, sanctify themselves, lest the Lord break
forth upon them. Moses said unto the Lord, The
people cannot come up to the Mount Sinai, for thou chargest
us, saying, Set bounds about the Mount, and sanctify it. And
the Lord said to him, Away, get thee down, and thou shalt come
up thou, and Aaron with thee. But let not the priests and the
people break through, and come unto the Lord, lest he break
forth upon them. So Moses went down unto the people
and spake unto them. Let us pray. Our Father in heaven,
we come in the blessed name and perfect righteousness of him
who's altogether lovely, the chiefest among 10,000. He who sits enthroned at thy
right hand because he has purged the sins of his people. He who
is the bright and morning star, who is the effulgent glory of
God, who is the outshining of God. We know that that name is
the only name you respect upon the earth, so we come in that
name. We beseech you on behalf of those
who are sick and those who are troubled, those who are mentioned
on our prayer list. We ask, Lord, you'd be with them,
watch over them. I pray especially for Kathy Robinson.
She's got these shingles. We pray to ease her pain. Thank
you for the good result. Sylvester, he's had this procedure
on his heart. We're thankful that the doctors
did well. We pray he'll recover quickly. Pray for the others who requested
prayer for Tracy Wright and Dee Parks. Help us, Lord, to remember
them in our prayers and call their names out to thee. Thou
knowest every case and it's you alone who can heal and comfort
and strengthen. So we pray you do so according
to your good will and your good pleasure. Pray for ourselves
tonight as we gather here. We ask Lord that you would be
in our midst by your spirit to take the things of Christ and
reveal them unto us. Make our headquarters in the
dust where we belong. We lift our eyes to see him who's
altogether worthy of praise and honor and glory, for he has redeemed
us by his blood out of every kindred, nation, tongue, and
people and made us kings and priests unto our God. It is he
who loved us and washed us in his blood. It is he who loved
us and gave himself for us. Gave himself the just for the
unjust to bring us to God. We thank you, Father, for the
truth of the gospel, the blessedness of it. It gives us knowledge
of our inability and our weakness and our frailty, and gives us
equal knowledge of his excellence and his ability and his supremacy,
knowing full well that what he puts his hand to, none can turn
back. And he will do all his pleasure.
We thank you in that blessed name. Amen. I want us to read verses 7 through
9, for that's what I'm going to look at tonight in the third
and last volume of Law and Grace. We'll be looking more at the
Law in the next few weeks. Verse 7 said, And Moses came
for the elders, or called for the elders of the people, and
laid before their faces all the words which the Lord commanded
him. And all the people answered together, and said, All that
the Lord hath spoken we will do, And Moses returned the words of the people unto the Lord.
And the Lord said unto Moses, Lo, I come unto thee in a thick
cloud, that the people may hear when I speak with thee and believe
thee forever. And Moses told the words of the
people to the Lord. In this short passage, we see
a difference in the manner of approach that God makes toward
His people. This chapter is a preamble to
the giving of the Law of Moses to be relayed to the people on
Mount Sinai some three days hence. Throughout the New Testament
these laws and ordinance will often be referred to as the Law
of Moses. That is what they are called
throughout the New Testament. This use is generally spoken,
however, in opposition to grace, to the grace or the law of the
Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus. And that law had not yet been
given. It had been promised in what the Lord had previously
spoken in verse 8. When He said this, He said, And
the people answered together and said, All that we will do.
Our Lord had said, If they obey My commandments, I will make
them kings and priests unto our God. And the promise of blessing
was conditional and contingent upon the people keeping the covenant
and obeying the commands that God gave and would give. And we know that these words
point to a greater covenant and promise conditioned on the obedience
of one man, even the Lord Jesus Christ. His obedience, even unto
death, freed us from the law of sin and death, which is what
the law is going to be called, not on Sinai, but in the days
of the New Testament it is going to be called the law of sin and
death that's what Paul said to the children of God in Romans
chapter 8 he said there is therefore now no condemnation to them that
are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh but after
the spirit for the law of the spirit of life in Jesus Christ
has made us free from the law of sin and death for what the
law could not do that is we could not do it in that it was weak
through the flesh God Sending his own son in the likeness of
sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteousness
of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the
flesh but after the spirit. It's called the law of sin and
death. And that this law, soon to be given in the next chapter
here in Exodus, should be called the law of sin and death, gives
us some sense of the reason for the way our Lord speaks in our
text, the change from the fact that He speaks of His excellent
work in salvation. But then when the people respond
to that, to what He requires, He says, He'll come and smoke
and fire, and that's the language used throughout the rest of the
chapter. The New Testament is replete
with such dark references to the law. Those who seek to live
by it in Galatians chapter 3 are said to be cursed. They are under
the curse of the law. The third chapter of 2 Corinthians
describes this law that is going to be given three days hence
in Exodus as the letter that killeth, as the ministration
of death, and administration of condemnation in 2 Corinthians
chapter 3. In Colossians, the law is declared
to be ordinances against us. that Christ nailed to the cross. And these are just a few of the
negative references to the law in the scriptures. These are
primarily employed in reference to those who believe they can
keep the law and opt to live by its precepts for justification,
for sanctification, or for rule of life. If you're seeking the
law for justification, sanctification, or for rule of life, you're applying
to that which is dead to the believer. You're going to the
graveyard and digging up an old dead thing and saying, Advise
me on how to live. Now here we can see why the Lord
previously spoke of the excellency of salvation and then He began
to speak in terms that were dark and terrifying. It says in verse
16, It came to pass on the third day in the morning that there
were thunders and lightnings and thick cloud upon the mountain,
the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud, so that all the people
that was in the camp trembled. What brought about was the response
of the people. What that brought about was the
response of the people. The Lord said, if you will obey
my commands, you will keep my covenant, then I will make you
kings and priests. And when Moses told the people
that, their response says, in verse 8, and all the people answered
together, all that the Lord has spoken, we will do. All that
the Lord has spoken. We will do. This reveals the
audacity and the hubris of the natural mind. There is no indication
of any plea for help in doing so, no suing for mercy, no asking
for grace, and no words such as, if the Lord wills, we will
do it. No, they said, all that the Lord
has commanded, we will do it. This is simply the self-righteous
declaration that they would do all that the Lord commanded.
Those who have tasted the grace of God, want nothing to do with
the law and the commandments of the Lord, are always considered
in the light of Christ's fulfillment of the law, and in their own
ability to do anything spiritual whatsoever, save by the grace
of God. They know that without Christ
they can do nothing. But this is not the language
of the Old Testament. This is not the language of these
people. Oh, you told us what we'll do? No problem. We can
handle it. We can handle it. And immediately
upon hearing this ludicrous response of the people, the Lord says
He will come in a dark cloud And throughout the rest of this
chapter we heard threatening words followed in the remainder. In verses 12 and 13 he says,
And thou shalt set bounds unto the people round about. Take
heed to yourselves that ye go not up to the mount, or touch
the border of it. Whosoever toucheth the mount
shall be surely put to death. There shall not be a ham touching
it. But he shall surely be stoned and shot through. Whether it
be beast or man, it shall not live. When the trumpet soundeth,
they shall come to the mountain. In verse 21 and 22 it says, And
the Lord said, Go down and charge the people, lest they break through
unto the Lord to gaze. and many of them perish, and
let the priests also which came near to the Lord sanctify themselves,
lest the Lord break upon them." And then he threatens them again
in verse 24. Now the people, the believer
does not approach Sinai. We don't do that. When the believer
sees the commands of the Lord, he has a response to them. He
says, Lord, if you'll help me, Please be my help. Lord, give
me grace. Lord, give me mercy that I might
do what you told me to do. But this is not the language
here. But the believer does not approach Sinai. Look over at
Hebrews chapter 12. Paul in dealing with law and
grace in the Old Covenant and the New Covenant says this about
the children of God. In Hebrews chapter 12. In verse 18 it says, For ye are
not come to the mount that might be touched, it can be touched,
but it'll kill you if you do, and that burned with fire, nor
into blackness, and darkness, and tempest. You've not come
to that. You have not come to the sound
of the trumpet, and the voice of words, which voice that they
heard, entreated that the word should not be spoken to them
any more. I do not want to hear any more
about this. This is terrible. For they could not endure that
which was commanded. And it is so much as a beast
touched the mountain, it shall be stoned and thrust through
with a dart. And so terrible was the sight that Moses said,
I exceedingly fear and quake. But ye are come to Mount Zion. That is, the Church, unto the
City of the Living God, the Heavenly Jerusalem, as it says in Galatians
chapter 4, and to an innumerable company of angels. This is where
you come. You don't come to Mount Sinai. You come to the General
Assembly of the Saints, the Church of the Firstborn, which are written
in Heaven. and to God the judge of all,
and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus the
mediator of the new covenant, the blood of sprinkling, that
speaketh better things than that of Abel." That's where you've
come. You don't come to Mount Sinai. And that's why the Mount
Sinai was forbidden in the Old Testament. Don't you dare touch
this mountain. Don't you dare. For the children of God don't
go to that mountain. They go to Zion. The believer does not approach
Sinai. The people spoke in like manner in Exodus chapter 24,
if you will turn back, when the law was actually read and is
called the Book of the Covenant. And they spoke in the same way.
In Exodus chapter 24, verse 7, they said, And he took the Book
of the Covenant, and he read it in the audience of the people.
And they said, All that the Lord hath said we will do, and be
obedient. Now what follows that is he kills
a lamb. And sprinkles everything. Sprinkles
everything. Because what they're talking
about can only be cured by the blood of God. When the words
of the book of the covenant was read, that book was the law handed
down from Sinai. And that people desired to do
what they said was good. Our Lord said it was good. But
the fact that they believed they could do it. was ridiculous and
audacious. And the Lord lamented over that
in Deuteronomy chapter 5 when He is talking about giving that
law in Sinai. Verse 28 and 29, And the Lord
heard the voice of your words when you spake unto Me, And the
Lord said unto me, I have heard the voice of the words of the
people, where they have spoken unto me, and they have well said
all that they have spoken. He said, It is a good thing to
want to do what God says, what God has commanded. Oh, that there
was such a heart in them, my soul. Oh, that there was such
a heart in them, that they would fear me, and keep all my commandments,
always, that it might be well with them, and with their children
forever. And if you read the preceding
words, he sets forth that whole scenario that we just read about
here in Exodus chapter 19. That whole scenario is set up
to this point. And the Lord said they spoke well, they want to
do what's right, but they can't. And oh, if they had the heart
to do it. The problem wasn't in so-called physical ability. The problem was in their heart.
Oh, that they had a heart to do these things. You mean they
can be done by the heart? That's the only way they can
be done. But it can only be done with a new heart. These words
in Deuteronomy reveal the problem of the people and of all people.
We have, by nature, a heart problem. A heart problem. Scripture says
the heart is deceitful and desperately wicked. Who can know it? That's the condition. Scripture
says out of the heart are the issues of life. And what it naturally issues
is against God on every level. That's what our Lord said when
he was teaching by parable to the disciples in Mark chapter
7. He said this, now he was addressing
the fact that people, that the Pharisees always washed their
hands, washed their hands before they ate so they wouldn't defile
their body and it wouldn't take anything because they said if
you, certain things you eat under the old dietary laws that would
defile the body. Now we know the Lord settled
that in Acts with Simon Peter on that roof when he's handing
down that sheet with all manner of beasts. and said, take and
eat, and Peter said, not so, Lord, for this stuff you've prohibited. He said, don't you call unclean
what I've made clean. Now what he was addressing was
the fact that the Jews called the Gentiles unclean, and Peter
was about to be sent to a Gentile's house for the gospel. And that's
what he was addressing, don't call unclean what I've called
clean. But in Mark chapter 7, they were
saying, we always wash our hands. And the Lord said, you fellas,
that don't do you no good. It ain't what goes in your body
that defiles you. And the disciples were amazed.
They said, well, tell us what you mean by that prayer. We don't
understand that. We've always been taught you had to wash your
hands and all that before you eat, because you're allowed to
do something that would defile your body. And he says this in
verse 18, our Lord said, He said, Are you so without understanding?
Mark chapter 7. You do not perceive that whatsoever
thing from without entereth into a man, it cannot defile him. It cannot defile him. Because
it entereth not into his heart and into his belly, and goeth
out the drought, entereth into the heart and his belly, and
it goeth out the draft, purging all means. It goes right through
the system. I was raised in religion that
taught me what went in my body defiled my body. Were you? Don't drink. Don't use Terbecki. Don't do those things. That's
a sin. That defiles the body. What you
take into your body cannot defile your body. Now you can abuse
and you will abuse all that God has given you. But God is the
one that created alcohol. God doesn't want to give men
wine to drink to soothe their stomach and to ease their mind,
according to the Word of God. God invented those things. There's
nothing wrong with those things. You can abuse them, though, and
that's what we do. But those things don't defile you. Even
if you abuse them, they don't defile you. Your problem is not
what you take into your body. That's what our Lord is teaching.
Because it entered not into his heart, but into the belly and
goes out. And He said, That which cometh
out of man, the issues of life. That which cometh out of man,
that's what defiles him. That's what defiles him. For
from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts,
adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness,
deceit, lasciviousness, and evil eye, blasphemy, and pride, foolishness,
all these evil things come from within. That's what defiles a
man. He said, oh, that they had the
heart to do these things. Well, they don't have the heart.
They don't have the heart to do these things. It's always
our problem. This problem was addressed as
it always was in the Old Testament. The people were to cleanse themselves.
That's how it's addressed in the Old Testament. They were
to cleanse themselves and also address removing or to cleanse
or sanctify themselves and cleanse their clothing. This was repeated
in the manner in which the priest would go into the temple and
so forth. They would have to wash themselves and cleanse themselves.
Now, cleaning the outside of the body doesn't do anything
for you. But it represented something in the Old Testament. It represented
something else. In Genesis chapter 35 and verse
2, it represented leaving idolatry. Our Lord said, forsake those
idols and wash yourselves. and wash yourselves. Since the
priesthood was yet to be established, though it talks about the priesthood
here, the word priest here refers to the patriarchs or the firstborn
of the males of the tribes. Now the fact that this law cannot
reach the heart, that's the fact, the law cannot reach the heart. It cannot reach the heart. It
can only deal with behavior. And if you look at the Old Testament,
that's exactly what it dealt with. The rub is that the law
requires the heart. to be the catalyst for the behavior
and it cannot be produced our lord told the pharisees that
they heard that the law said thou shalt not commit adultery
and every one of those pharisees could say well I've kept the
law I've not cheated on my wife I've not committed adultery the
lord says but I say unto you this is what you heard I say
unto you if a man looks on a woman to lust after her He's already
committed adultery in his heart. Wait a minute. That goes beyond
behavior. Where did the adultery occur?
In his heart. In the innermost man. He said
the same thing. You've heard thou shall not kill.
They said, well, we didn't get to there. We kept the law there.
We didn't kill nobody. He said, but if you hate your
brother, you murdered him in your heart.
you're a murderer, if you hate your brother, or if you say your
brother's a raca or a rascal, you put him down, you murdered
him in your heart. So our Lord said the law dealt
with matters of the heart, but for the people, they could only
see that it had to do with behavior, because the law cannot touch
the heart. It cannot touch the heart to
change it, to move it in a certain direction. He then told him that
all these things, what they heard and what they believed about
the law, meant something more than what it was. Over in Deuteronomy,
he talks about the heart a lot. Over in Deuteronomy chapter 10,
he says, you circumcise, but not with the circumcision of
the heart. How do you do that? He says, you're a stiff-necked
people. in Deuteronomy chapter 10, verse 16. Then in Romans
chapter 2, verse 28, he said, He is not a Jew who is born inwardly,
whose circumcision is outward of the flesh, but one who is
a Jew who is born inwardly, whose circumcision is of the heart,
whose praise is of God and not of men. The problem was the heart,
and Paul said we are the circumcision in Philippians chapter 3, verse
3. who worship God in the spirit and have no confidence in what?
The flesh! And he goes on to talk about
the flesh cutters, or the concision that requires men to be circumcised.
Our Lord said, Oh, that there was such a heart in them, such
a heart in them, that they would fear me, worship me, love me,
and keep all my commandments always. It would be well for
them if they did, and with their children forever. Now, how can
that ever happen? Only if you are in Christ. For
in Christ you keep the law. You honor the law with your heart. With your heart you do because
He kept it for you. Finally there are two profound
statements concerning why the law was given to begin with.
We look at these wondrous things. They're getting to the base of
Sinai. In three days, the Lord's going to call Moses up and he's
going to, with his finger, write the Ten Commandments on the tables
of stone. He's going to give Moses all
the directions for what's to come, the ceremonies, the different
sacrifices, the tabernacle, the priest's robes, the crown, the
royal crown or the that's hooked to the miter of the priest that
says holiness unto the Lord. All these things are going to
be given in the law. But why was the law given? Why
was the law given? Two profound statements in the
scriptures why the law was given and thus reveals the estate of
those who make this statement. We'll do it. No problem. We'll do it. They make that audacious
claim. In Romans Chapter 5, the Word
of God says, The law entered. What does that mean? It wasn't
there before. It entered that the offense might
abound. The law entered that sin would
be more obviously sin. more open, more defined sin. Then in Galatians 3 the word
says the law was added BECAUSE of transgressions. It was added BECAUSE of transgressions. What does that mean? The transgressions
preceded the law. This declares that those who
made this statement, Lord, we will do all that you have commanded,
were already transgressors and offenders. the law was not given for you
to do, but rather to legally indict you for what you've already
done. You're a transgressor. How do
I know? God created a law to indict you
of it. That's what it's talking about.
Romans 5.14 says, For until the law, sin was in the world, but
sin was not imputed or charged to man, when there was no law. Sin was in the law, for death
reigned from Adam to Moses even over the similitude that did
not sin after Adam's transgression. The law. Sin was here since Eden,
but there was no law to define it. There was no law, so it could
not be charged to men. That's true today in our society. Though our legal system has fallen
apart, it seems to me You can't charge a man for something
unless there's the law that defines what he's done. I've used this as an example
to explain that for years men stalked women and often ended
up killing them. But they could never charge a
man with stalking a woman because there was no law against stalking. There was simply no law. So they
couldn't bring charges. So they went to the Congresses
and the Senates of these states, and they came up with a law that
says a man can't stalk a woman. Now, because there is a law,
the transgression that's already been committed can be adjudicated. Why? Because there's a law. These
people were transgressors. We are all transgressors. And the law was not given for
us to do something. The law was given to tell us
the transgressions that we made, to show us what sinners we are.
The law was added that these transgressors and offenders would
be charged with sin. That's why the law came. That's
what the Scriptures say. It takes no stretch of the imagination
to grasp it after the people said what they said Lord, everything
you ask, we'll do. It doesn't take a stretch of
the imagination to wonder why the world, smoke and thick clouds
and fire and quaking started. Because the law is dark, and
it tells us what we are. Paul said to the Roman church,
what the law saith, is saith to them that are under the law.
every mouth might be stomped and the whole world become guilty
before God so by the law by the flesh shall no flesh be justified
in his sight by the law we'll keep it one way you'll keep it
you'll die under its penalty That is how you are going to
keep the law as everybody keeps it. Now keep these facts in mind
as we delve deeper into the Word from Sinai and realize that every
law that has been given addresses a transgression in some way,
some form. This knowledge will inform our
hearts to both the transgression and also the remedy for the transgression
as is stated in the law as it is given throughout this book.
Father, bless us to understand and pray in Christ's name.