All right, brethren, Exodus chapter
30. Read in verse one and thou shall make an altar to burn incense
upon. Everything a believer does is
sin. We recognize our sin when we
commit some outward offense. And sadly, it has to be a pretty
bad offense for us to recognize it. But we forget that even our best
thoughts and deeds are sin. All our righteousnesses are as
filthy rags. the very best deeds. Coming here
today and sitting and hearing the gospel preached is nothing
but sin apart from Christ. Offering, if you offered everything
you have in your bank account to God is nothing but sin. My preaching, standing here preaching
truth, preaching Christ and Him crucified in me without Christ
is nothing but sin. And you think about what could
be better than a sinner praying to God. Our prayers are sin. It would be good if we could
look down on our own sin and our own selves as quickly and
readily as we do others. Because all we do is sin. In
my flesh dwells no good thing. Without Christ even, our prayer
is sin. What we see in our text today
is the only way sinners, saved by grace, can enter God's presence
in prayer and with our thank offerings is through Christ,
our High Priest, who ever lives to make intercession for us. The only way sinners, saved by
grace, can enter God's presence in prayer and with thank offerings
is through Christ our high priest who ever lives to make intercession
for us. Apart from him, everything is
sin. An obnoxious to God, abomination
to God, apart from him. I want to look this morning at
Christ in the golden altar. Now this was a different altar
than we saw before. The altar we saw before was brass. This altar is gold. That altar
was for sacrifice. This altar is for burning incense. That altar was in the courtyard
before you entered the holy place. This altar is in the holy place
before you enter the holiest of holies. That brazen altar
typified Christ, our Redeemer, and the sacrifice of his blood
by which we're brought into the holy place. This altar of incense
typifies Christ, our risen high priest, by whose intercession
we enter God's presence in the holiest of holies. Now alliteration helps us to
remember, so I used alliteration for my outline. I don't usually
do this, but I have six points. So I want to give you some P's
to remember. First is the picture. Secondly,
the person. Thirdly, presence. Fourthly,
the place. Fifthly, the perpetuity. And
sixthly, the prohibition. Picture person, presence, place,
perpetuity, and prohibition. First, the picture. Exodus 30,
verse one. Thou shalt make an altar to burn
incense upon. Now this incense pictures Christ's
intercession together with the prayers of his saints rising
up into God's presence in the true holy of holies. It's a picture
of our prayer going up but Christ interceding and presenting that
prayer to God in the holiest of holies. Go over to Revelation
8. And I'll show you this, Revelation chapter 8, verse 2. John is beholding things
in heaven and he says, verse 2, I saw the seven angels which
stood before God, and to them were given seven trumpets. And
another angel came. Now this is the angel pictured
in this altar of incense. Another angel came and stood
at the altar having a golden censer and there was given unto
him much incense that he should offer it with the prayers of
all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne.
and the smoke of the incense which came with the prayers of
the saints ascended up before God out of the angel's hand. That's what we have pictured
in our text. We pray in the name of our Lord
Jesus Christ. In the name of the King of Kings.
In the name of Christ Jesus our Lord. Why do we do that? We see it pictured in the altar
of incense. The prayers of Christ's people are offered unto God in
the name of our Lord Jesus Christ so that Christ presents them
to God as He intercedes for His people. We can't come to God
outside of the name of Christ. There's no way. Our prayers rise
up to God accepted only by the merits of Christ's sin-atoning
blood. Speaking of this gospel age in which every true believer
prays in the name of Christ our King, Christ our High Priest,
he's speaking of this gospel age and God said, from the rising
of the sun even to the going down of the same, my name shall
be great among the Gentiles. And in every place, incense shall
be offered unto my name. and a pure offering, for my name
shall be great among the heathen, saith the Lord of Hosts. So that's
the picture. It's of our prayer going up together
with Christ. That incense is pictured this,
and Christ's intercession for us, making us accepted. Now,
secondly, we see the person. We see Christ in verse one. He says, Verse 1, he says, of
shit and wood shalt thou make it, a cubit shall be the length
thereof, a cubit the breadth thereof, four square shall it
be, and two cubits shall be the height thereof. The horns thereof
shall be of the same, and thou shalt overlay it with pure gold,
the top thereof, and the sides thereof round about, and the
horns thereof, and thou shalt make unto it a crown of gold
round about. Now this altar of incense was
made of shidom wood and of gold. We've seen this before. Shidom
wood represents Christ's humanity. It was an incorruptible wood.
It couldn't be corrupted. In his humanity, as a man, Christ
is holy and without sin. Incorruptible. Incorruptible. Gold represents Christ's divinity. Christ is God. He's holy. Righteous, eternal, all-powerful
God is who that man Christ Jesus is. He's the only person that
was God and man in one person. And as a man, our Lord Jesus
could be made under the law. He came to save sinners who were
flesh and blood, so He had to partake of flesh and blood. He
came to make us one with God who is spirit, so it had to be
God that did it. So he come down and he was made
under the law and as a man he could obey the law for his people
who he represented. As a man he could willingly,
a sinless man, he met the requirement to willingly take the sin of
all his people and bear that sin and willingly lay down his
life and suffer the justice of God and die and satisfy justice
by his blood. And also as a man, He was touched
with the feeling of our infirmities, yet without sin. That means everything
sin causes you to feel, every infirmity sin causes in you,
our Lord was touched with every one of those. It doesn't just
mean He sympathized with us, although He does, it means He
was actually touched with the feeling that our sins cause. Yet He never sinned. And for
that reason, He's able to comfort us in all our tribulation. In all our tribulation. Now as
God, our Lord Jesus is eternal and He's all powerful. And so
everything He accomplished is eternal. We read of eternal redemption,
eternal righteousness, eternal life. Everything's eternal. As
both God and man, our Lord Jesus, He can lay hold of God and He
can lay hold of His people who are men and He can bring us together
in reconciliation. That's why Paul said there is
one God and one mediator between God and men. He didn't say between
God and man because He's not the mediator of all mankind. But he's the mediator between
God and some elect man. And he's that one mediator who
can bring us together in harmony. Go with me to Hebrews 4. You'll
want to mark your place in Hebrews because we're going to come back
here quite a bit. Hebrews 4. It's Christ being God and man
that gives us boldness to come to God in the holiest of holies.
Christ being God and man gives us boldness, liberty, welcome
access to come to God in the holiest of holies. In His presence. Hebrews 4 verse 15. We have not
a high priest which cannot be touched. I'm sorry, let's begin
in verse 14. Seeing then that we have a great
high priest that is passed into the heavens. This altar, golden
altar of incense. It was taller than all those
other tables in the holy place. it was taller, about an inch
taller. We're talking about Christ risen,
Christ risen above all as our high priest. Look here, he's
passed into the heavens, Jesus the son of God, let us hold fast
our profession. For we have not a high priest
which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities,
but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore, See, this is
why we want to come. Therefore, come boldly unto the
throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to
help in time of need. For every high priest taken from
among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God,
had he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sin, and who can
have compassion on the ignorant and on them that are out of the
way, for that he himself also is compassed with infirmity.
That's the twofold reason. Who is he that condemneth? It's
Christ that died. So that now, before God, sacrifice
has been made for sins, so nobody can condemn his people. But also,
He's risen again, who's even at the right hand of God, who
also maketh intercession for us. That's what He's doing right
now. Rather than the horns on this
altar. Horns represent power. And there
was a crown round about on this golden altar. And that pictured
Christ's power and His kingship before God, by whom we have power
to come into God's presence. He arose as the God-man in glorified
human flesh, and as the king all-powerful, he sits there upon
the throne at God's right hand, in our very nature. You ever think about that? That's
amazing. There's a man with the same nature
as you and me, glorified without sin, and that man is God, and
he's seated in heaven. So that's the person that's represented
here. Now, thirdly, let's look at the
presence. The presence, verse four. And
two golden rings shalt thou make to it under the crown of it,
by the two corners thereof, upon the two sides of it shalt thou
make it. And they shall be for places for the staves to bear
it wherever it go. And thou shalt make the staves
of shimwood and overlay them with gold. So you had on the
four corners, you had these rings and the staves went through those
rings so they could pick this golden altar of incense up and
carry it wherever they went. It was always present with them. Wherever they were, it was present
with them. That's the case for every believer.
Christ is always present with us. always present to intercede
for us with God in the holiest of holies. Hebrews 7 verse 22. You probably want to look at
this. Hebrews 7 verse 22 says, By so
much was Jesus made a surety of a better testament, a better
covenant. And they truly were many priests
because they were not suffered to continue by reason of death.
But this man, because he continueth forever, hath an unchangeable
priesthood. There'll be no, his presence
will never leave us because of death, because he ever lives.
Wherefore he's able also to save them to the uttermost that come
unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for
them. Are you, you think you're too far in sin for him to intercede
for you? Do you think you've gone away
from grace too far for Him to intercede for you? He saves to
the uttermost. As the old timers used to say,
to the guttermost. he's able to make intercession.
He's always present with his people. For such a high priest
became us, whose holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners,
made higher than the heavens, who needeth not daily as those
high priests to offer up sacrifice first for his own sins, then
for the people's, for this he did once when he offered up himself. For the law maketh men high priest
which have infirmity, But the word of the oath, which was since
the law, maketh the son who is consecrated forevermore. So brethren,
Christ will never leave us and never forsake us. He said, I'm
with you always. He's always present. Nothing
is going to separate him from his people. And so the intercessions
of Christ are ours in every place, wherever we are, in every circumstance,
continually, continually. Now fourthly, let's look at the
purpose. Here's the purpose. Exodus 30 verse 6, we read, thou
shalt put it, you put this golden altar of incense before the veil
that is by the ark of the testimony, before the mercy seat that is
over the testimony where I will meet with thee. Now this is where
we see this picture really portray Christ our intercessor. The golden
altar of incense, if you walked in, okay, you came in, the fence
was around it, you came in to the courtyard first, that's where
the brazen altar was. And once you're past that brazen
altar, you go into the holy place, that was the first room. And
right against the veil, looking straight ahead, right against
the veil, that veil made the holiest of holies. The high priest
alone could go in there. That's where the ark of the testimony
was. That's where the mercy seat was.
That's where God said, I'll meet with you. Now, just before you
got to that, on this side of the veil, there was the golden
altar of incense. The holiest of holies pictures
the very presence of God. That pictures where Christ is
right now. Beyond that veil in that holiest
of holies was the ark of the testimony. That's, y'all remember,
some of you read that page that somebody took a picture of Brother
Don's Bible, but he hung his cane on one verse, and that verse
said, and then they shall see heaven open, and they'll see
the ark of the testimony in the temple. That's not a little box
he's talking about. That's Christ. That's Christ. That's where he hung his cane,
right there. This golden altar was there in
the holy place before the veil. So the priest had to come through
the altar of incense. The priest had to come through
the altar of incense to enter the holiest of holies where the
Ark of the Covenant was. And that holiest of holies pictures
God's presence where Christ is, Christ our mercy seed, our propitiation. And that last chapter, everything
took place out in the courtyard. Remember? We were out in the
courtyard where the brazen altar was. We saw how God sanctifies
and consecrates His child so that we have communion with God.
The sin offering, it typified Christ bearing the sin of His
people and putting away our sin. There was a burnt offering, it
typified Christ's obedience, coming up to God a sweet smelling
savor in whom we're accepted of God. And there was the realm
of consecration, which typified the Holy Spirit coming and applying
the blood of Christ and making us holy so we can hear and believe
and follow Christ. There was that peace offering
that typified Christ our peace in whom we have communion with
God. That offering was made on the brazen altar outside of the
holy place. But then now, once that's done,
now we're in the holy place. And when that's done to you,
brethren, when God's brought you to see what Christ has done
for His people, and you believe on Him, now you're in the holy
place. Now you're in Christ, our tabernacle. Now you're in Christ, our sanctuary.
And beyond that veil and that holiest of holies, it pictures
where we are right now. We're in the holy place. We're
in Christ right now. But God is in the holy of holies,
in heaven. And Christ is there, brethren.
So if we're gonna, you and I are gonna We've been made priests
by His blood already. We've been brought into the holy
place. We're now sanctified and made holy and we're without sin
in the holy place, in Christ. But God's pictured here beyond
the veil and it typifies how that if we're going to enter
God's presence in prayer and come before Him to His throne
of grace, we have to have Christ intercede for us. Christ has
to represent us there. Or even our prayer is too sinful
and God won't have anything to do with it. But now Christ being there, we
have welcome access. Go with me to Hebrews 10. Hebrews
10. He brings our prayers up to God
perfect. He brings our The calves of our lips, our sacrifices
of thanksgiving He brings to God perfect. Anything we do in
the name of Christ, He brings to God perfect for us. So that it's not sin, it's perfection
before God. Look at this, Hebrews 10 verse
17. He says, their sins and iniquities
will I remember no more. Now where remission of these
is, there's no more offering for sin. Having therefore, brethren,
boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new
way and a living way, which He hath consecrated for us through
the veil, that is to say His flesh. and having a high priest
over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart and
full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an
evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water." See
all that stuff it said there? You already have your heart sprinkled
from an evil conscience and your body washed with pure water.
That's what we saw pictured out there in the courtyard. Remember
they washed the priests, then the blood was shed for them,
and the burnt offering was burnt for them, and the blood was applied
to them. So having had all that done to us in conversion by God,
sanctifying us through the Spirit and blood of Christ, now we're
in Christ the holy place. That's where the altar of incense
was. Now through Christ, we can enter the holiest of holies and
have welcome access. Because it has to be perfect
to be accepted of God. And we are in Christ. So then,
let's go now and look at the perpetuity. Exodus 30 verse 7. Aaron shall burn their own sweet
incense every morning when he dresseth the lamps. He shall
burn incense upon it. And when Aaron lighteth the lamps
at evening, he shall burn incense upon it, a perpetual incense
before the Lord throughout your generation. The key here is to
see that Aaron, the high priest, every high priest after him,
keep this sweet incense burning every morning and every evening
perpetually before the Lord throughout their generations. This incense
was burning all the time. No matter where a sanctified
child of God is, Christ is always present with us. No matter our
condition or our circumstance, Christ ever lives to make intercession
on our behalf and He never stops. It's perpetual. He never ceases
to intercede for us. Now don't get in your mind that
Christ doesn't sit there and beg God for something. He doesn't. He just has to be present. He's
got the wounds in His hands and His side and His feet and it's
just His presence that intercedes for His people. That's how all
our prayer and all our doing, even our faith is full of sin. How does our faith come up to
God perfect? In Christ our intercessor. We
cannot send away grace. Don't you like that? Now you
can send away grace with your friends and your brethren, shamefully,
but you can't with God. You can't with God. God will
never say that's enough. No time will one chosen redeemed
child of God be turned away from the throne of grace. Christ ever
lives to make intercession for us. There will never be a time
that we will not have perpetual access and acceptance in God's
presence. Now that being said, There have
been times when in scripture we find God did not grant access
or acceptance. God killed Aaron's sons. Why? They offered strange fire. King Uzziah got lifted up in
pride and he decided he was going to bypass the priest and he was
going to come in and burn incense to God himself. and God smote
him with leprosy and he dwelt in a separate place away from
everybody until the day he died. So let's heed this prohibition.
There's a prohibition here. Look what it is, verse 9. You
shall offer no strange incense thereon, nor burnt sacrifice,
nor meat offering. Neither shall you pour drink
offering thereon. And Aaron shall make an atonement
upon the horns of it once in a year with the blood of the
sin offering of atonements. Once in the year shall he make
atonement upon it throughout your generations. It is most
holy unto the Lord. Brethren, the Lord Jesus Christ
is most holy unto God. He's above all. He's preeminent
above all. Now this is what God prohibited.
He said no strange fire could be used. The fire that they used
to burn this incense, it had to come off the burnt offering.
That's the only fire they could use. It had to come from the
burnt offering. We'll see that when we get to Leviticus 16.
But the fire had to come from off the burnt offering. And if
you didn't bring fire from that altar, you're bringing strange
fire. Now that's where Nadab and Abihu
departed from the plain word of Jehovah. By it they said that worship
may be offered to God on another foundation other than Christ
crucified. That's what they were saying.
I don't have to come in God's one way. I don't have to come
in Christ. I come another way. That's what they were saying.
I come in a way of my own imagination. And God killed them. And God
will kill anybody that tries to come to Him apart from Christ. Christ is most holy unto the
Lord. Most holy. No strange incense
could be used. Only the recipe God required
could be used. It declares Christ alone is our
high priest. He alone is our intercessor.
And his intercession alone is accepted of God. You can go back
down and read verses 34 through 38. I don't have time right now,
but what that's showing us, those ingredients represent the sweet
incense of Christ's merit and of His efficacy as our Redeemer. That one of those there, He said,
you take some of those ingredients and feed it small. Our Lord Jesus
Christ was beaten on the cross. He was bruised on the cross.
He's entered in now into the sanctuary, into the tabernacle
of the congregation, and He's there, He is the testimony, He's
the mercy seat, and God receives Him and Him alone. His righteousness,
His obedience, His blood, His atonement, and His advocacy,
His intercession. Any man's sin, we have an advocate
with the Father. We have an intercessor with the
Father. Jesus Christ the righteous. And He alone is our mercy seat. He alone is the propitiation
for our sin. We can't come any other way.
Now you picture Aaron the high priest offering that incense.
Picture the high priest, Aaron, offering that incense. He was
a figure, a picture type of our Lord Jesus Christ in heaven,
offering up prayer on behalf of those who are his. Aaron offered
incense only for the children of Israel. And that's what our
Lord Jesus Christ said, I pray not for the world, I pray for
them, Father, you have given me out of the world. The same ones who died ceremonially
in that sacrifice on the burnt offering, when they brought that
limb and they burn it on that brazen altar for a sin offering,
the one that was represented as dying in that sin offering,
that's the one for whom intercession was made in the holy place. And
everybody for whom Christ died, everybody represented in His
shed blood is who He intercedes for. That's who He intercedes
for. And also, we see here, no burnt
offering could be offered on this altar. No meat offering,
no drink offering could be offered on this altar. Remember, that
was done out there in the courtyard on the brazen altar. We saw that
last chapter. It couldn't be done on this altar those burnt sacrifices along
with the meat offering and the drink offering, that was a thank
offering. That was being thankful for what
Christ has done for you. Thankful for what God the Father
has done in giving His Son. It pictured the calves of our
lips which we offer up in thanks and gratitude. It pictured the
anything you do in the name of Christ and for the cause of Christ
is what it pictured. But God said, you can't offer
that on this altar. This altar, one time a year,
Aaron's to sprinkle the blood of the synatoma on this altar. So when you come to this altar,
you see blood already has been shed. But you can't offer your
thank offerings on this altar. Why? What's he teaching us? It's
not your thank offering that makes God receive you. It's not
our praise that makes God receive us. It's not anything we do in
gratitude to God that makes God receive us in the holiest of
holies. It's Christ only. It's Christ only. In order to show this, he had
that blood spread on it once a year. Once a year. And when
they were burning that incense on that blood-stained altar,
it reminded them continually there's one way that God receives
us into His presence. Just one way. There's only one
way our prayers are accepted, our thank offerings are accepted,
our spiritual sacrifices are accepted. One way. The Lord Jesus
Christ alone. Without Him, I'm telling you,
you could lay down your life for a brother. and shed your
own blood for another brother you loved him so much, give him
your kidneys or whatever, and die, and that would make you
accepted with God. That would be a sinful act in
itself that God considered an abomination. What makes it holy
and perfect? Christ. Christ. And only Christ. You're back there in Hebrews
10, go back there and look one more time. Look back there and
back up at verse 14 now. What gave us that access? He
said, By one offering he hath perfected forever them that are
sanctified, whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us. God makes it known in our hearts,
here's what he makes known, verse 17, their sins and iniquities
will I remember no more, so where remission of these is, there's
no more offering for sin. Don't ever think of your prayer
as a sin offering. Don't ever think of anything
you do in the cause of Christ as a sin offering. Don't ever
think anything you and I do is making us accepted with God.
It's not even our faith that makes us accepted with God. In
this sense, it's the object of our faith that makes us accepted
with God. We have boldness to enter in
the holiest, look there, by the blood of Jesus. He's the new
and living way. He consecrated that way for us
by laying down his flesh and dying under justice. And it's
because we have a high priest over the house of God. There's
no acceptance any other way. Now brethren, When Christ, or as Christ intercedes for us,
He takes our persons, He takes our prayers, He takes all our
performances, He takes our presence that we want to give to God,
and He goes to God with them, and the fragrance of His high
priestly character, of His person, of His work, that perfumes everything
that a believer does before God, so that we are perpetually, continually,
at all times, with no interruption, accepted of God. He is our acceptance. It's lively
stones are built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood to offer
up spiritual sacrifices. We should offer up spiritual
sacrifices. We should do everything we do
in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. We should offer up spiritual
sacrifices. But remember, they're acceptable
to God by Jesus Christ. But they all are. They all are. Whether you're acknowledging
it or not, whether you're thinking of it or not, Christ is there. and he's making all our thoughts,
words, and deeds accepted of God. And that's why we read in
Ecclesiastes, go thy way, eat thy bread with joy, drink thy
wine with a merry heart, for God now accepteth thy works. Isn't that a blessing? That's
joy, amen. Our Father, we thank you for
this word. Lord, don't let us ever look to our prayers or our
faith or anything we do. Don't let us
look to it and think that our repentance and our tears are
making us accepted. Lord, keep us ever remembering
that it's by your pure perfume, by the incense of your blood,
the incense of your person, that we're accepted. Keep us ever mindful. Everything
we do, let us think on Christ and remember it's in His name
that we're perfect. Let us pray in His name. Let
us sing in His name. Let us preach in His name. Let
us Drink water in his name. Whatever it is, cause us, Lord,
to do it to the praise and glory and honor of Christ, in whom
alone we're accepted. Thank you for this word. Thank
you for reminding us with these simple pictures. And don't let
us forget it, Lord. Make us judge ourselves. Make
us judge ourselves. Make us judge of just how of
an abomination our best deeds are apart from Christ. Keep us
low. Keep us at His feet. Keep us
looking to Him alone. We thank you for our brethren,
Lord. We pray that this is what you're working in them everywhere,
teaching them through your gospel and trials and your providence.
Don't ever let us forget it. It's in that precious, holy,
perfect name, the Lord Jesus Christ, that we ask these things. Amen.