Alright brethren, let's go back
now to Exodus 31. In the previous six chapters,
Moses has been in the mount with God. He's been there almost 40
days and 40 nights. We've been looking at those six
chapters and all the things God told Moses. He's been in the
mount that whole time. God's been giving him the pattern
and telling him how to build the tabernacle and the furnishings
and who to be called and how they're to be dressed and all
of these things. And God told Moses to build all
these things. And then God provided a man to
do it all for Moses. Bezalel of the tribe of Judah,
as head and chief over the building of the tabernacle. Our subject
is Christ in Bezalel. Next time, Lord willing, we'll
try to look at some of these other, this other man who was
in charge of the garments. But this man was in charge of
the tabernacle. He was in charge of building
the tabernacle. And that's a picture of Christ
who is the builder of his church. That's what we have here. Bezalel
was given the charge to build the tabernacle. And Christ is
the builder of his church, which is his true tabernacle. Go to
Hebrews 8. Hebrews chapter 8. And look at verse 1. He's been
talking about Christ and he says now, of the things which we've
spoken, this is the sum. We have such a high priest who
is set on the right hand of the throne of the majesty in the
heavens, a minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle, which
the Lord pitched and not man. The Lord built his church. He
built the tabernacle and he'll bear the glory. He'll get all
the glory. We see Christ in the relationship
between Moses and Bezalel. Moses pictures the law, Bezalel
pictures Christ. The law can't build this church,
but Christ through the law will build this church. Scripture
says what the law could not do, and 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, Moses couldn't build this tabernacle. The law, you can't
go to the law and build his church with the law. God provided a
man who through Moses, Christ through the law, built his church
by fulfilling it. We're commanded by God to keep
the whole law. Everything God told Moses in
that mount was, you do everything I've told you to do here. Then
God said, and I've provided a man that's gonna do it all for you.
Isn't that a good picture? Good picture of Christ. Because
that's what he said to you and me, keep my whole law. And since
we broke it in the garden, we got to die to keep it. We got
to die to keep it. How are we going to do this?
God provided the man to do it on our behalf, his son, the Lord
Jesus Christ. Now, first of all, God called
Bezalel by name. He says here in verse one, the
Lord spake unto Moses saying, see, I have called by name Bezalel,
the son of Uriah, the son of Hur of the tribe of Judah. When
we read in scripture when God calls by name, it's only those
he's appointed to a high office. It's only once he calls by name.
He called Moses by name. God called Cyrus by name. And here he's calling Bezalel
by name. God the Father called Christ
preeminently by name. Before this world was made, he
called his son by name. He took not this honor to himself,
scripture says, but was called of God, like Bezalel was. Now brethren, before the foundation
of the world, when God called Christ by name, when he made
him to be his servant and builder of his church, when I say builder
of his church, I mean to build you up as a living stone, a timber
in the tabernacle. to make you fitly framed into
this building. God called his son to be our
great Bezalel. He called him by name, and when
he called him by name, he called you and me who are his by name.
And he called us in Christ, and when he did that, our salvation
was accomplished. That's right. The works were
finished from before the foundation of the world. He saved us and
called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but
according to His own purpose and grace, which was given us
in Christ Jesus before the world began. That's when He called
us. That's when He called us. That's
when He saved us. That's when He made us holy.
When? When He called Christ by name and called us in Christ. It was done. When he says he
blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places
in Christ according as he chose us in him, that means there's
not one blessing left out. How real is salvation not by
our works? How real is salvation not by
our works? They were finished before God
made a world, before God made you, before you were born, before
you ever came forward to be able to lift your puny little finger
to do a work. The works were finished. That's how much salvation
is not by our works. Do you get that? Bezalel's name
means in the shadow and protection of God. That's what Bezalel means,
in the shadow and protection of God. Bezalel was under the
shadow and protection of God. Nobody could harm Bezalel while
he built that tabernacle. He was under God's protection.
Well brethren, when Christ walked this earth as a servant of God
his Father, he came under the shadow and protection of the
Almighty. You see, he didn't come here
and do the works as he walked this earth specifically as the
Son of God. Now don't get me wrong, he never
ceased being the Son of God, but he took the form of a servant
as a man. And as such, he depended entirely
upon the protection and shadow of God. Go with me to Isaiah
49. As you turn there, let me read
this to you. Scripture says, he that dwelleth
in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow
of the Almighty. Now look here what God says in
Isaiah 49, and he's talking here about Christ. He calls Christ
Israel, and that's Christ's name. You remember why the Lord changed
Jacob's name to Israel? It means as a prince thou has
power and has prevailed with God. That's Christ. That's who
Christ is. He's the prince and he had power
and he prevailed with God. He's Israel. He's Israel. When God called his name, you
remember when God made Adam and Eve and he called them by name? Do you remember what he called
Adam and Eve in the garden? He called them Adam. They were just one. And the head,
she was represented in the head. And she didn't fall till the
head fell, till Adam fell. But when he called us in Christ,
he didn't call Kristen and Rob and Adam and Cheryl and Art,
he called Christ. And you were that bride in him,
and as he is, so are you. And so he's Israel, and as his
elect Israel, what he is, we are. Now look what he says here
about him concerning this shadow of protection. Isaiah 49.1. Listen,
O Isles, unto me, and hearken, ye people, from far. The Lord
hath called me from the womb. This is Christ speaking. From
the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. He'd
been calling Christ's name from the beginning. Watch, he made
my mouth like a sharp sword, and in the shadow of his hand
hath he hid me. He's made me a polished shaft,
in his quiver hath he hid me, and said unto me, thou art my
servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified. If you read on
down the page, you'll know this is speaking of Christ because
it says, that he gave him for a covenant of the people and
gave him the power to open the prison and let the prisoners
go free. That's Christ. He's the one spoken. But you see there, in the shadow
of his hand hath he hid me. That mean when Christ walked
this earth, he could not be harmed, he could not be touched by any
man until the hour was come in which he laid down his life,
in which he gave them permission. That's why you find out that
so often the Pharisees would pick up stones and they were
ready to kill him. They were ready to lay hands
on him and kill him because he took it out of their hands. It never has ceased that when
people get angry about the gospel, I don't care what excuse they
give, they're mad because it's taken out of their hands. And Christ is getting all the
glory. That's the issue. It always is the issue. But they
couldn't touch him. They tried to lay hands on him.
They couldn't touch him. They couldn't do anything to
him till the hour came. And he told them, when they came
to arrest him, he told them, this is your hour. He said, I
was with you. I went in and out among you. You never laid hands
on me. but this is your hour, I'm giving you permission. And
just to make sure they knew that they had no permission without
him, and that he was laying down his life, when he said, I am,
they said, where's Jesus? He said, I am. They fell back
on their backside. Showing him, you couldn't touch
me if I didn't let you touch me. He's in the shadow of the
Almighty. Well brethren, by calling you
and me into him, by calling us by name, when he couldn't be
touched, we couldn't be touched. When he was touched, it was under
justice. It was to pay our sin debt, and
we were touched right there. And now that he's called you
into him by faith in him, guess what? You can't be touched so
as to separate you from the love of God in Christ. It can't happen.
You're under his shadow and his protection. Now secondly, we
see here God filled Bezalel with the Spirit of God. Verse 3 says,
and I have filled him with the Spirit of God in wisdom and in
understanding and in knowledge and in all manner of workmanship.
Now, the Spirit of God filled Christ, our great builder, without
measure. You remember when he was baptized,
that was Christ entering his public ministry. And when he
was baptized and he came up out of the water, they saw the heavens
open and the Spirit of God descended upon him like a dove and lit
upon him. And a voice from heaven said
this, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. You
know what God was saying? In Isaiah 42.1, God said, Behold
my servant, whom I uphold, mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth,
I have put my spirit upon him, he's going to bring forth judgment
to my people. That's what God, when God spoke,
when Christ was come up out of that water, and the Spirit of
God descended on him, and God said, behold, my son. God was
saying, behold, my servant, right here, the one I've put my spirit
upon, he's the one that's gonna satisfy my law and save my people
from their sin. It's the fulfillment of God's
word that he spoke in Isaiah 11. He prophesied through Isaiah,
and he said, there's coming a rod out of the stem of Jesse, there's
coming a branch that's gonna grow out of his roots, and the
Spirit of the Lord shall rest on him. and the spirit of wisdom,
and the spirit of understanding, and the spirit of counsel, and
the spirit of might, and the spirit of knowledge, and the
spirit of the fear of the Lord, and he shall make him of quick
understanding in the fear of the Lord. How quick. As soon as that spirit came upon
our Lord Jesus Christ, he entered his ministry. He went straight
into the wilderness right then and defeated the devil who tempted
him. Christ is full of the Spirit
in wisdom. That means, it says there, he
says, I'm going to fill him full of the Spirit of wisdom. That
means Christ is the power of God. He's our creator. That's what that word wisdom. He says, I'm going to fill him
in understanding. The Spirit of God made our Savior
of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord. Christ heard
the word of his Father. He understood the word of his
father. He fulfilled the whole will of God, doing always only
that which pleased the father. That's what he did as the representative
of his people. He only did what pleased the
father. He was quick in understanding. It says there, I'll make him,
I'll pour the spirit on him and he'll be, he'll have knowledge. This is what's amazing to me,
as a man, Scripture says of Christ, he increased in wisdom and stature
and in favor with God and man. That's an amazing thing when
you think, this is, on one hand, he's God, almighty, all-knowing
God. But he so took upon him the form
of a servant for worms like us. that he had to go through life
growing, just like us, and growing in wisdom, and growing in stature.
You see, he's perfecting faith for his people. He's fulfilling
the law of obedience to God for his people. So he had to, in
every way, be like his people without sin. And that's what
he was doing. It says there in verse 4, he
says, to devise cunning works. I'm going to give him the spirit
to devise cunning works. That means to purpose the works
that he's going to do and finish the works that no other man could
do. Bezalel, God poured out this spirit on Bezalel. Bezalel was
the architect. I mean, he took the plans that
God gave him of how that tabernacle should be laid out. He purposed
how he was going to do it. and he went to work and he built
that old tabernacle. He must have been some man. No,
he's just a man, but God put this spirit of knowledge in him,
this wisdom in him. Well, Christ Jesus our Lord came
forth to purpose and finish the works no other man could do. He came forth and he devised
the whole layout of his church, he purposed everything about
his church, and then he came forth and he worked it all out. He said, I wisdom dwell with
prudence, and I find out knowledge of witty inventions, of cunning
works. I do amazing works. I do works
that no man ever even thought about. And then verse four says
he worked, Bezalel was given this spirit to work in gold and
in silver and in brass. You know the Ark of the Covenant
with that mercy seat on it, we saw that, it was covered in gold.
Well where is this man Bezalel going to get the knowledge to
know how to work in gold? God gave him that knowledge.
And what does that ark typify? That ark typifies Christ. That
mercy seat typifies Christ. Christ is the one who came forth
in the goal of his perfection, the goal of his righteousness.
That law and that ark wasn't broken. We're going to see that
coming up when Moses is going to come down with the law and
he's going to see that they're going to be worshiping idols.
As soon as he comes down from this mount, they're already going
to be turned against God, broken his law before he ever gets it
to them. And Moses gets angry and throws the tablets down,
breaks it, breaks the law, because they had broken the whole law.
God calls him back up. He writes the law on the tabernacles
himself, on the stones himself. He gives it to Moses and said,
go now, you put that in the ark and don't give it to the people.
Well that law, that unbroken law was in Christ's heart and
He never broke it. He fulfilled it completely for
His people. God couldn't trust it to us.
He couldn't give the law to us. We broke it before we ever got
down out of the mount with it. But with that law being in Christ's
heart, isn't that what Christ said? He said, the law of God
is in my heart. And He came and fulfilled the whole law of God
for His people. And because He did, He is the
seat of propitiation. He's the seat of mercy. That
was the whole point of that ark. Over that ark was a mercy seat.
Between God and that law was a seat of mercy. And God said,
that's where I'll meet with you. Those cherubims overshadowed
the mercy seat. They were singing, holy, holy,
holy is this mercy seat right here. This is the place you can
find mercy with God right here. That's Christ, brethren. That
high priest came in there with the blood of that slain lamb
who'd been slain in place of the people, and he sprinkled
that blood on that mercy seat seven times, the number of perfection,
perfect atonement, perfect reconciliation, perfect righteousness, perfect
holiness. And God said, now, in that mercy
seat, in that blood, right there, is where I'll meet you. You want
to come to God? You want to be accepted of God?
There's one place God's going to meet with a sinner. That's
in Christ the mercy-seeker, our propitiation. being justified
freely by His grace through the redemption that's in Christ Jesus,
who God set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood. That
means if I'm going to come to God, I'm going to come believing
Christ is all my mercy with God. He's all my acceptance. Do you
realize, I said this Thursday, mercy means if you cry out for
mercy, that means you're guilty. That means you're nothing but
guilty. You have no defense. You have
no leg to stand on. You're guilty. Always guilty. Constantly guilty. Never not
guilty in yourself. You constantly need God's mercy. God said in Christ you'll find
it. You'll find it. That's all you'll find in Christ
from God is mercy. Let the wicked forsake his wickedness. I don't care how bad it is, God
said. I don't care how I disapprove of what this man did. God says,
you come to me in Christ in the mercy seat. You come to me confessing
all your wickedness. I'll have mercy on you. You can't
do that for me, and I can't do that for you. If you came to
me confessing all your sins that you can confess to God, I would
never treat you the same again. We're not supposed to build a
confessional booth and come in here and sit down and confess
our sins to one another. When he says confess your sins
to one another, he means you admit you're a sinner. Don't
try to put yourself above somebody else. But it don't mean go and
confess your actual, particular, vile, obnoxious sin. You wouldn't
do it anyway. You wouldn't reveal what's in
your heart. But you will to God. And this
is how different God is from us. In Christ the mercy seat,
God says, when you come and do that to me, all you're gonna
find is mercy and pardon. Isn't that good? Isn't it good? Don't you love that you can sit
and pour your heart out to God and be honest, that there's somebody
you can be honest with about who you are and what you are,
and they won't treat you like a Pharisee. He won't do that. He'll receive you, He'll have
mercy on you, He'll pardon you. And when somebody tries to lay
a charge to you, all you gotta do, trust Him. Just keep trusting
Him. He'll deal with that person.
He'll either break their heart and make them cry out for mercy,
or He will destroy them and let the earth open up and swallow
them up, one of the two. He will. I've seen it happen
repeatedly. Trust God and wait on God. He's
going to work his will. And he's going to protect his
people. You're under the shadow and protection of God Almighty. You're
coming to God in the mercy seat. He's going to provide. He's going
to save you. And then look here at the gold. Remember the gold
of the candlestick? Christ is our light. We're nothing
but darkness. We have no light. We don't know
the light of this gospel until Christ shines. In thy light shall
we see light, the psalmist said. It's the only way you're gonna
know the light of the gospel is Christ the candlestick. And
He shines in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge
of the glory of God in the face of Christ Jesus. And for the
first time we see we have light to see our sin. Everything that's
reproved is reproved with light. He gives you light and you see
your sin, you see your inability, you see your total nothingness,
and at the same time He shows you Christ's full sufficiency. Bezalel was given this spirit
to work in silver, and I thought of the silver foundation we saw.
Remember that silver foundation? Bezalel, he had this wisdom God
gave him to take that silver shekel of the sanctuary, melt
it down, and make these giant silver sockets that made up the
foundation of that tabernacle at which all the boards were
put into those silver sockets, and the whole tabernacle was
held up by that foundation. And when they came in there and
did any work, they did it on the foundation already laid.
They didn't add to that foundation. They didn't take from that foundation.
They did it because they wanted to do it on the foundation of
accomplished and laid. Christ is that foundation. He
paid it all. He paid all the redemption price.
Our redemption from the loss fulfilled. Try to understand
what that means. You, believer, are dead to God's
law. And that's a good thing. The
law says I'll never again charge you with sin. Not any. Not any. Who's gonna lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? God forbid if I'm that ignorant
that I'm gonna charge one of God's elect with something. Because
God don't. The law won't charge you again.
He charged Christ, and Christ paid the full wage, the death
that you owed, and God won't lay to your charge condemnation
at all. And that's so good news when
you know that you can't do anything to please God. And here's the
thing about sanctification. The only way Christ could have
fulfilled the righteousness of that law is if he did it from
a holy heart. And that's what he did. So he's
both our righteousness and our sanctification. That's right. We were talking about this, me
and Greg were talking about this yesterday. God doesn't do anything
halfway. He just don't. When men tell
you, well, you're not sanctified yet, the only sense in which
you're not fully sanctified is that God's going to give you
a new body one day and you're going to be totally righteous
and holy in and out, completely. But in that new man He's made,
you're holy. And in Christ, you're holy. You're
perfectly holy in Christ. And that's where it matters.
God doesn't do it halfway. And when He tells you, be ye
holy in all manner of conduct, for I am holy, He's not saying
you're going to make yourself holy by behaving in a holy way. He's not saying you're going
to make yourself more holy by behaving in a holy way. He says,
you're holy, it's done, now act like it. That's it. You were darkness, but now you
are children of light, so walk as children of light. You get
it? It's not a thing that you, if
you put your hand to that ark, You're gonna be slain. You can't
put your hand to this work. He getting all the glory for
building this building. The brass altar, we don't have but one
brass altar. That's Christ, our brazen altar. His sacrifice completed
us and he makes all our sacrifices to God complete. So he's our
Bezalel. He devised and did all this work
for his people. Then look at verse five. Now
here's where we come in, right here. in cutting of stones to
set them, and in carving of timber to work in all manner of workmanship. Christ, you picture Bezalel,
he goes out there, and he's got his workmen, and he goes out
there, and he's overseeing his crew, and they're out there at
the quarry, and they're digging around, and they're finding stones.
And they're bringing them stones out of the quarry, and they're
bringing them back, and they're gonna use them for the work of
the tabernacle. Well, Christ, He's ordering His
preachers. He's sending forth His servants
into this world. This is like the big quarry,
this whole world. And He's pulling you out like
a stone, a dead stone. He's bringing you out of this
world, out of the earth as a dead stone. And by His Spirit in you,
He's making you a living stone. a living stone, alive. And by His all-wise counsel and
power, He sets us right where He would have us set in the tabernacle,
in the tabernacle. He sets us, brethren. He puts
us where He'd have us put. Just like He did Paul and Priscilla
and Aquila and Eponidas and Timothy, He put them right where He'd
have them be. That's what He does. And when He finds us, we're
like tall timber. He says he gave him the ability
to carve timber. He finds us, and we're in ourselves,
thinks we're tall timber. We're like the timbers of Lebanon.
We're like those big, mighty cedars. That's what we think.
You know the first thing he's gotta do? If he gonna bring that
timber to the tabernacle and make it be useful in the tabernacle,
first thing he's gotta do is cut that tree down. First thing
he's gonna do when he comes to you in grace is cut you down,
because you gotta be cut down. And He's going to carve you into
His image. And He does this by the Spirit
of God. And then He performs all the workmanship needed to
make us excellent and successful. And He plants us in the tabernacle.
For we're His workmanship created in Christ Jesus under good works
which God has already foreordained that we shall walk in. Remember
they overlaid some of those boards with pure gold. Once they brought
those boards in there, they're going to set them in that foundation.
Christ is going to bring you in. He's going to set you on
Christ the foundation. Paul said, No other foundation
can a man lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.
He's our one foundation. We just sang it. He's going to
take this timber, He takes these boards, and remember He covered
them boards in gold. And then He set them in that
silver socket, in that tabernacle, and they wouldn't move. They
were right there. In all that wasteland wilderness,
they wouldn't move. They were set there, and they
stood there in that tabernacle. Our Lord calls you to Him, and
calls you to faith in Him, and He covers you in the gold of
His righteousness. So you're perfect before God.
And He sets you on His finished foundation of redemption accomplished,
and you can't be moved. This wilderness blows against
you and the devil, he permits to try to sift you and then lets
him blow against us with winds, but I'm telling you, every piece
of timber that God has fitly framed in this building will
never be moved. You believe that? It won't. God will have to be moved before
one of his people can be moved from the church that he's put
them in and planted them in and fitly framed them in. It can't
happen. That's security. It can't happen. These gifts were given. Now,
I want you to see lastly, some people, I read this and I'll
be brief on this, but I read that some of the commentary said,
well, see the Lord, he picked out people who were wise and
then he poured his spirit out on them and made them wise. That's
not what that means. God does no respect to persons.
He don't come and find out and say, well now who's wise and
now I'm gonna give him the spirit and I'm gonna make him a member
of my church. No. He pours out the spirit and makes
you wise. He makes you wise. He gives you
life. He gives you life. He does it
all. Nothing was done in the building of this tabernacle and
in the power and wisdom of the flesh. Nothing. Bezalel couldn't
lift a finger to work on it. You think about it. These children
of Israel have been slaves for 400 years in Egypt. You know
what they've been doing? Them and their ancestors before
them, you know what they had been taught and been learned
and been passed down from generation? How to be a good slave and build
bricks so they could build pyramids. That's all they had ever been
taught. They know nothing about working
in gold and silver and precious stones and carving timber and
making, they know nothing about any of that. And you and I don't
know anything about being a child of God. We don't know anything
about grace and love and kindness and mercy and long suffering
and forgiveness. We know nothing about this stuff
and none of this is done in the power of our wisdom and the power
of our flesh, none of it. God has to give you the spirit
to do it. So that when you've done what you ought to do, you
say, Lord, you did it. I didn't do it. Isn't that right?
He gets all the glory. And so everything was made after
the pattern. I'm going to give you a couple
of scriptures. I'll go to Hebrews 3. Hebrews 20. Except the Lord build
the house, they labor in vain that build it. That's talking
about God's house. In Amos 9.11, let me read this
to you. God said, In that day will I
raise up the tabernacle of David. Talking about his church that's
fallen. And I'll close up the breaches thereof, and I'll raise
up his ruins, and I'll build it as in the days of old, that
they may possess the remnant of Edom, and of all the heathen
which are called by my name, saith the Lord, that doeth this.
It's the Lord that's doing it. Now who's the Lord, God, that's
building this tabernacle? It's Christ his Son. Listen,
Hebrews 3.3. Talking about Christ, it says,
This man was counted worthy of more glory than Moses inasmuch
as he who hath built the house hath more honor than the house.
For every house is built by some man, but he that built all things
is God. And Moses verily was faithful
in all his house as a servant for a testimony of those things
which would be spoken after. but Christ as a son over his
own house, this is his house, whose house are we? How's it
gonna be proven that you're a member of this house? How's it gonna
be proven that you're a part of this building that he's fitly
framed together and made you a habitation of God? How's it
gonna be proven? If you continue trusting Christ
together with his people until the end. That's it. That's what
he says there. If you continue firm unto the
hope, unto the end, trust in Christ. If you leave, if you
depart, if you go out of the building, if you forsake it,
you forsake the gospel, the only thing a man has proven is God
didn't build him. God didn't build him. That's
all. That's all. Let God be true and every man
a liar. I pray God a blessing. All right,
Brother Art. Brother Greg, will you come and
close in prayer when he finishes leading us? Alright everyone, our final hymn
is going to be hymn number 118, When I Survey the Wondrous Cross,
number 118. And we'll all stand. When I surveyed the wondrous
cross On which the Prince of Glory
died My riches gained I count the lost and pour contempt on all my pride. Forbid it, Lord, that I should
boast Saving the death of Christ my God. All the vain things that shun
me goes.