Now when you look at a brother or sister that you
know and you see sin and maybe you see them in a season of awful
sin and you start thinking in your heart about how sinful they
are I want you to remember this as a believer, as a sanctified
child of God, the sins of that brother or that sister's heart,
the sins of their thoughts, of their sinful flesh is far worse
than what you see. And the same is true of you. And worse than even the sins
of your thoughts is the sin you are in your flesh. Now, if you think it turns you
and makes you abhor the sin you see, just imagine how God would
look at you and all your sinful very best righteousnesses. And think how he would regard
you if you didn't have a high priest. Do you know this about yourself? I remember, I think it went something
like this, but somebody told Brother Greg Amquist that, they
said, you just don't know how bad my sin is. And he said, his
reply was, well it's a whole lot worse than what you think
it is. That's true, brethren. Now the
garments we're looking at today picture Christ. They picture
Christ. In this ceremony that we're going
to talk about, pictured Christ. You know, whenever Christ cried
out and said, it's finished, the veil in the temple rent from
top to bottom, saying that all the old covenant law was fulfilled,
all the types and shadows were fulfilled. But you know something
else that happened too, is on one occasion, the high priest
got so angry at Christ, he rent his garments. And in both of
those, God is saying the old covenant law is finished. There's
been a change now of the law. We're under the law of faith
and love, the law of grace and liberty. And there's been a change
of the priesthood. It's no longer Aaron. It's this
high priest who came of the tribe of Judah. But no priest came
from the tribe of Judah. They came from the tribe of Levi. But Christ is from the tribe
of Judah. The priesthood's been changed.
We only have one high priest. That's Christ. And the whole
law's been changed. We're not worshiping under that
old letter anymore. We worship God in spirit now
through faith and love. Now, why is it important that
I have a high priest? Because I have to have somebody
represent me to God even now that I'm a believer, that even
now that He sanctified me, I need somebody to represent me to God
to intercede for me because I'm just that sinful. And so is all
His believing people. I need Him to represent me. If you read on down the page,
we'll see this another time, but Aaron's job as a high priest
was he was bearing the iniquity of their holy things. That meant
all the things that the children of Israel did in offering sacrifice
just the way God said to offer them. In doing everything God
told them to do, Aaron was bearing the iniquity, their iniquity
in those things. He was bearing their iniquity
as they worshipped and served God. You see, even as believers,
we're so sinful, we have to have Christ our high priest to intercede
for us so that our iniquity doesn't separate us from God. He makes
our service and our worship perfect before God. That's what I'm getting
at. He makes everything His children do in worshiping Him and serving
Him to be perfect before God. we have to have this high priest. And what we see here now, we're
going to look at the ephod and the breastplate. And what we
see here is the ephod and the breastplate together teach us
that Christ intercedes for his people in the perfection of beauty
and glory. In three ways. In the perfection
of strength, in the perfection of faithfulness and wisdom, and
in the Perfection of love. Perfection of strength. Perfection
of wisdom and faithfulness. I put those together, you'll
see why. And the perfection of love. This is how He's our High
Priest. This is our security as believers. This is how come you can pray
And we pray in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ because it's
Christ who presents that prayer to God in the perfection of beauty
and glory. That's what I've titled this.
The perfection of, I can't remember what I've titled it. The perfection
of beauty and glory, I think, of our high priest. Something,
I can't remember. All right, first of all, let's
look at these three things. wisdom, and love. First, Christ
intercedes for us in His perfect strength. Now look at verse 11. He says, With the work of an
engraver in stone, like the engravings of a signet, shalt thou engrave
the two stones with the names of the children of Israel. They
took these two onyx stones and engraved the names of the children
of Israel on them. Thou shalt make them to be set
in these settings of gold. And thou shalt put the two stones
upon the shoulders of the ephod. And they were for stones of memorial
unto the children of Israel. And Aaron shall bear their names
before the Lord. So here's Aaron between the Lord
and between the children of Israel and both the children of Israel
and the Lord are reminded of those children of Israel by those
stones on his shoulders. He'll bear their names before
the Lord upon his two shoulders for a memorial. So you got two
memorials here. Children of Israel are remembering
and the Lord's remembering. And they're both looking at the
high priest and those names on his shoulder. Christ bears the
names of each elect child of God on his shoulder. Just like Aaron the high priest
bore the names of each of the children of Israel, each of the
children of Jacob. They represented the twelve tribes. Those names of those 12 children
represented every single person in those tribes. And by looking
at that we can say too that those 12 names represent every single
elect child of God. every elect child of God. There
was nobody else written on his shoulder. There was lots of nations
that existed at this time, but only the names of those 12 sons,
the 12 tribes of Israel were represented on his shoulder. They were for a memorial before
the Lord and before his people. Now, if you want to turn there,
Isaiah chapter 9 and verse 6, you are familiar with this and
I can just read it to you. Isaiah 9 and verse 6 tells us,
unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, now here is
what I want you to see, and the government shall be upon his
shoulder. The government shall be upon
his shoulder. His name shall be called Wonderful
Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince
of Peace. And of the increase of His government
and peace, there shall be no end. Upon the throne of David
and upon his kingdom to order it and to establish it with judgment
and with justice from henceforth even forever, the zeal of the
Lord of hosts will perform this. The government shall be upon
his shoulder. Now brethren, the government
of three things is on his shoulder. The government of fulfilling
the righteousness of the law. The government of fulfilling
the righteousness of the law is on his shoulder. The government
of the world for his people is on his shoulder. and the government
of converting and delivering his people to the Father. This
is the government on his shoulder. One, the government of fulfilling
the righteousness of the law is on Christ's shoulder. The sinless substitute. Our Lord
Jesus proved himself to be the sinless one. The only man that
had no sin besides Adam before the fall. But the Lord Jesus
Christ is the sinless one and this sinless substitute willingly
gave himself to the Father and he bore, he bore the enormous
load of sin of all God's elect upon his shoulder. That's what
you see taking place on the cross. He bore that enormous load of
sin of all His elect upon His shoulder. And having been made
sin for us, and you think about the weight of that sin. He said
He abhorred it. He abhorred the sin. He despised
the shame of it. And there he is bearing this
massive load. It's on his shoulder. The whole
responsibility of taking care of those sins and answering to
God's holy law for those sins are on his shoulder. He's representing every elect
child of God. Their names are engraven in stone
on his shoulder and that's who he's representing. All their
sin is put on him. And having been made sin for
us, Christ bore on his shoulders the full weight of God's wrath,
which was our cursed death. The cursed death we would have
died is the wrath of God for our sins. Christ took that load
of sin and so God justly poured out that enormous weight of wrath
and justice on Christ. He bore it. God-man submitted
so that death had dominion over him for a time. Death had dominion over him. Sin and death. He was buried
in a grave. The God-man was buried in a grave
and came out of that grave to show his people, we shall never
have to bear the weight of sin and death again. Not before God. Not before God. He put away the
sin of His people by the sacrifice of Himself. Now hear what I said. He didn't make it possible for
them to be put away. He put away our sin by the sacrifice
of Himself. Hebrews says that's why He came.
To put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. When He had by Himself
purged our sins, put them away. He sat down at God's right hand.
He had the specific names of those children on His shoulder.
He bore the specific sin of those children on His shoulder. He
bore the specific particular death of those children on His
shoulder. And so everything he did was
for that people. He honored God the Father to
the highest. He declared the righteousness
of God. He declared God is a just God
and a savior. He declared he's just and the
justifier. This is what Christ declared.
And therefore now, as our high priest, at God's right hand,
his intercession The government of interceding for his people
in God's presence, it all rests on his omnipotent shoulders.
Now you know the shoulder represents strength. Well this is perfect
strength we're talking about. He perfectly bore our sin, perfectly
bore our curse, perfectly put the sin and the curse away. Now
he's perfectly interceding for his people at God's right hand.
And the strength of that intercession is this. He justified each sinner for
whom he died. That's the strength of his intercession.
How come it is that we can know that God hears him and God always
grants his petition for his people? How can we guarantee that and
be assured of that? Because the strength of His shoulder
is this, He totally, perfectly honored God and justified His
people. That's strong. That's strong. God won't do anything contrary
to His justice. That's strong. He will not pour
out wrath a second time. The strength of that intercession,
brethren, is not our doing. That's what we saw this morning.
It's not our doing that's the strength of God hearing us. It's
the strength of Christ doing and dying. It's the strength
of what he accomplished by his doing and dying. God is honored
and the law is fulfilled by Christ our high priest. Do you think
God will hear him? You think God will hear him when
he intercedes for his people? Who is he that condemneth? It's
Christ that died, yea rather, that's risen again who's even
at the right hand of God who also makes intercession for us. He's there. He's at God's right
hand making intercession for us and nobody's going to condemn
because it's Christ that died. It's that perfect God-man who
died as our substitute and God's pleased with him. Wherefore He
is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by Him, seeing
He ever liveth to make intercession for them. Who does He make intercession
for? For them that come to Him. That's
the only ones He makes intercession for. Them that come to Him. Have
you come to this Redeemer I'm talking about? Have you come
to this High Priest? He only intercedes for those
that have come to Him. but he ever lives to intercede
for them. Believer, when any man sin, we
have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous,
and he is, he himself is the propitiation for our sin. He
himself is the strength of advocacy with the Father. So the first
thing about a government that was on his shoulder was interceding
for us or was putting away our sin so that he could intercede
for us in perfection at God's right hand. And then two, the
government of the world in general is on his shoulder and particularly
his church and kingdom. He's the king of nations and
he's the king of saints. What does that mean? It means
he rules in the hearts of everybody. He rules everything. God said,
I've set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. The father made
his son, scripture says, Lord over all his house, ruler over
all his substance. Our high priest is also a king. You couldn't even picture that
under the old covenant. There was King David who pictured
Christ, then there was Aaron the high priest that pictured
Christ. It's all in one for us. We have Christ Jesus who is our
all-powerful sovereign king and our high priest. The God-man
proclaims, all power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. And the scripture says, Psalm
77, 19, speaks to him and says, Thy way is in the sea, and thy
way is in the great waters, and thy footsteps are not known.
He's pictured in Revelation, it's got one foot in the sea
and one foot on the land, and he's ruling the whole world.
Not just the world, the whole universe. That's the power of
God. And he rules the world for the
good of his people. and for His glory. That's how
He rules the world. So, that's the government that's
on His shoulder. There's not a king that's lifted
up to a throne, but Christ, the King of Kings put Him there.
The King doesn't make a decision, He doesn't do anything, but that
the King of Kings turned His heart like you turn the rivers
of water. And so Christ is also ruling in His house, in His church,
in His kingdom with the same precise sovereign hand. Everything is under His control.
Everything. Whatever has come to pass in
your life, He is controlling it. and it was supposed to come
to pass, just like it did. Just like it did. You might be
able to see any good in it come to pass just like he would have
it. You may be guilty of sin for
the way it came to pass. You're not excused for that,
but it came to pass just the way he'd have it come to pass.
And then three, the government of our conversion is on his shoulder. He knows each child He redeemed
by name. Just like Aaron had the specific
names of his brethren on his shoulder. Christ knows the name
of every single child He redeemed. And there's the name on his shoulder. The name of each lost sheep. Go with me to Luke 15. He knows them. And because he's sovereign, and
because the government of the world is on his shoulder, he
can send this gospel to every single one of them. He can rule
everything to send this gospel to every single one of them.
Jeff, can't he? Can't he do that? And he can
put us under his gospel in ways that we would never imagine it
would happen. Look here. Luke 15, verse 4. It says, What man of you having
a hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety-nine
in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he
find it? And when he hath found it, he
layeth it on his shoulder rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls
together his friends and his neighbors, saying unto them,
Rejoice with me, for I found my sheep which was lost. And
he says there, I say unto you that likewise joy shall be in
heaven over one sinner that repenteth more than over ninety-nine who
think they're just and need no repentance. He's finding the
lost sheep. He's bringing each one of His
own to repentance. And He takes us up and puts us
on His shoulder and He carries us. And now when He's found us
and He's taken us up, He doesn't then depend on us for our shoulder
to have the strength to carry us home. No, He puts us on His
shoulder and He carries us home. He carries us all the way home
until we're with Him in glory, and that's why Scripture says
He does not lose one of His people. He has the key and the power
to open the heart of His child, and He has the key and the power
to shut the heart of the reprobate. Listen to this. Isaiah 22, 22. The key of the house of David
will I lay upon his shoulder. He's the key. He's the key. He's the one that opens it all
up to us. It's on his shoulder. The responsibility
is his to open up. Look. So he shall open and none
shall shut. And he shall shut and none shall
open. It's His power. It's on His shoulder.
Now, this idol God that men are talking about, this Jesus that
wants to save you if you'll just let Him, and this God that He
wants to do this and that, but if you just let Him do it. Listen,
let me tell you something about that God. Isaiah 46, 7 says,
they bear Him up on the shoulder and they carry Him. That's not
this God. That's not this God. He said,
even to your old age I am He, and even to your gray hairs will
I carry you. I have made and I'll bear you,
even I'll carry and I will deliver you. That's the true God. That's the true Savior, the true
Shepherd. You think on this, brethren.
The Spirit of God teaches us this. It says, at the name of
Jesus, at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow, of things
in heaven and things in earth and things under the earth. That's
what I've been telling you about right now. He's king of things
in the heavens and the earth and under the earth. He's king
over all. And at His name every knee is going to bow and every
tongue shall confess Jesus Christ is Lord and give all the glory
to God the Father. Christ rules everything in heaven.
He rules everything in earth. He rules the devil. He rules
wicked men. He rules His saints. He brings
the gospel to His children. And through this gospel, He causes
His name to be declared in the heart of His children. The new heart He's given. So
that in this life, before we ever get to glory, Every one
of His children would have already bowed the knee and confessed
Him to be Lord of Lords and King of Kings to the glory of God
the Father. We've already done it. And we'll do it in that day. But we're going to do it for
eternity. But we've already done it in this life because it's
all on His shoulder to bring us to do so. Thank God our Lord
has laid help on one that is mighty. That's what the scripture
said. Now secondly, That's the beauty of His strength,
perfect strength. Perfect government and strength
is on His shoulder. The government of His redemption
and His intercession, the government of ruling this world, and the
government of converting and bringing His children home. It's
all on His shoulder. If any of that was on mine and
your shoulder, we'd perish. We elect one man to president
and he's got the government of this country on his shoulder.
Not all men in the world, not all countries in the world, just
one man. And you'll see him go in the
office and his hair look one way and you'll see him come out
of the office and if he's got any it's white usually. This
king right here's got the government of everybody and everything on
his shoulder. and the world to come. He's got
more power than the... He's all powerful. Now secondly,
Christ intercedes for us by the beauty and glory of His perfect
faithfulness and perfect wisdom. Verse 8, The curious girdle of
the ephod. There's His perfect faithfulness. This ephod went down and it covered
the loins. It was a girdle that covered
the loins. It says, And the curious girdle
of the ephod, which his opponent shall be of the same, is gold,
blue, purple, scarlet, fine twine, linen. Then look down at verse
30, And thou shalt put in the breastplate of judgment the Urim
and the Thummim. The lights and perfections representing
Christ, the light and perfection of judgment. And they shall be
upon Aaron's heart when he goes in before the Lord, and Aaron
shall bear the judgment of the children of Israel upon his heart
before the Lord continually. We turn into Isaiah chapter 11. This girdle around the loins,
brethren, points us to Christ's faithfulness, His faithfulness,
His faithfulness to God and His faithfulness to His people, as
our great high priest. And the Urim and the Thummim,
meaning lights and perfections, points to Christ's wisdom in
bearing righteous judgment for His elect before the Lord continually. You see, whatever Christ prays
for, whatever He intercedes for, His Father gives Him. And whatever
He intercedes for is perfectly just and righteous. It's the
best thing for His people. Watch this, Isaiah 11 verse 1.
And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, out
of his family, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. This is
Christ. And the Spirit of the Lord shall
rest upon him. The Spirit of wisdom and understanding
the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of
the fear of the Lord. That's the Urim and the Thummim.
That's what the Urim and the Thummim represents right there.
The spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might,
the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord. And it
shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord. And
he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove
after the hearing of his ears. But with righteousness shall
he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the
earth. And he shall smite the earth,
the wicked men, with the rot of his mouth, and with the breath
of his lips shall he slay the wicked. And righteousness shall
be the girdle of his loins. There's the girdle. Righteousness
shall be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of
his reign. That's what the girdle and that
Urim and Thummim represent. When it says Christ, we see Christ
there in the Urim and the Thummim, the lights and perfections, it
means He's the perfection of wisdom, and understanding, and
counsel, and might, and knowledge, and the fear of the Lord. He
is. What does Scripture say? In Him
are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Everything
is in Him. Him. Every bit of it. And like
He did when He walked this earth, He was a servant. He was serving.
And He trusted the Father to rule everything. But let me tell
you something. From His throne in glory right
now, He's ruling all things in this earth for His people. for those He redeemed, for those
names that are on His shoulder that He has the responsibility
to bring to God. He's ruling everything for us
and look, He does not judge after the sight of His eyes, neither
reprove at the hearing of His ears. You know, we see our brother
or our sister do something and we think it's sinful and we don't
like it. You don't know what's going on in the heart. You have
no idea what's going on in his heart. None whatsoever. The Lord does. He's judging with righteousness. He's judging the poor with righteousness,
it says. And He's reproving with equity
for the meek of the earth. That's His people. Whatever's
happening in your life and mine, it's right and it's equitable. With righteousness, He's judging
what we need, when we need it, and how long. That's what he's
doing. He reproves us in our hearts
with equity. And as for our enemies, with
that same righteousness, he smites them with the rot of his mouth
and just with the ease that you blow out a candle. Just like that, he slays the
wicked. We see an enemy before us that
are huge and mighty and so much out of our control that we don't
know how we're going to get out of it or what we can do about
it. That's all he's got to do. They're gone. Like you'd blow
dust off of your desk. Does he do this for us continually?
Is he going to do this for us continually or is he going to
forget about us? Righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins
and faithfulness the girdle of his reins. When he's moved, that
means he's controlled, completely controlled by his righteousness
and by his faithfulness. That's what the loins, the girdle
being on the loins represents. You're moved by your loins, aren't
you? You'd be out here in the yard
doing something and your loins could tell you all of a sudden,
you better get in the house. You better get to the toilet. You're
controlled by your loin. Well, His loins, He is all-powerful
and His loins are righteousness and faithfulness. That's what
turns Him. That's what moves Him. That's
what makes Him do what He does. In this earth, in His intercession
with the Father on our behalf, He only does that which is right
for us. He only does what is perfectly
faithful for us. As our text says, He bears the
judgment of the children of Israel upon His heart before the Lord
continually. Continually. Now I want you to
think of this. Think of this infinite wisdom
that he has to possess. He comprehends and accomplishes
and uses all things for his own glory and for the salvation of
our souls. Think of that. He can comprehend
everything that's happening. He can accomplish everything
for his glory and the salvation of his soul. our soul. In Christer,
he had all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. That's why God
makes him wisdom unto us. You know, when a person's hearing
the gospel, Before God does this work in their heart, you'll tell
them something and it could be just as clear as a bell before
their eyes saying, you know, God chose His people in Christ
before the foundation of the world, not based on any good
or evil in us. You could show them in the scripture
and they're going to butt, butt, butt, butt, butt. When are they
going to stop butting? When God makes them see that
Christ is wisdom. When He does that, then you and
I become ignorant and we bow to be taught by Him. Perfect,
righteous, perfectly faithful in all of His judgments and everything
He does. Now, lastly, go back to Exodus
28. Christ intercedes for His people
by the beauty and glory of His perfect love. His perfect love. Verse 29, And Aaron shall bear
the names of the children of Israel in the breastplate of
judgment upon his heart, when he goes in unto the holy place
for a memorial before the Lord continually. On his heart. That's where love is. That's
where love is. And He's got the names of His
children on His heart who He everlastingly loves. That means
the love that Christ has for His people has no beginning and
no ending. He doesn't love today and cease
loving tomorrow. He doesn't love today by His
grace and tomorrow stop loving because of your works. No. Those
He loves, He everlastingly loves. As the high priest had those
precious jewels, those were precious jewels, and they had the names
of each son of Israel and they were on his heart. Christ has
the names of each precious elect child of God on his heart continually
as he goes into the holy place in the presence of God and intercedes
for us. You know, These jewels, His jewels,
is what He calls His people, and they're precious in His sight.
Scripture says, He says, They shall be mine, saith the Lord
of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels. He says, You shall
be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people, for all the
earth is mine. You see all these different kinds
of precious stones? There's a whole lot of different
kinds of believers. There's a whole lot of different kinds of believers,
but we're all under the same judgment and rule of the same
one, and He has the same love on His heart for each one of
us. For each one of us. When you spend a lot of money
on a jewel, that is a precious jewel to you. When you spend
a lot of money, the more you spend on that jewel, the more
precious it is to you. Each of His elect are precious
jewels to Him because He bought us with His precious blood. That
is as costly as it gets. That's as costly as it gets.
That means there's a perfection of love for each individual elect
child of God. A perfection of love for us.
This breastplate was bound to Aaron's heart. It was bound to
his heart. It was bound to that Ethan. So
all that faithfulness and judgment that's on his shoulder that we
saw, that intercession that's on his shoulder, that government
that's on his shoulder, these elect that are on his heart are
bound to that same faithfulness and righteousness. And these
elect are bound on his heart. They won't ever not be bound
on his heart. That was the whole purpose of
the rings and the twisted gold and the blue ribbon. Everything
was so that this breastplate would never be separated from
this ephod. It would always be on the priest's
heart. And that's where his people are
continually. Do you ever think sometimes,
the way things happen in life, do you ever think sometimes,
Christ has forgotten me. I thought that sometime. Thought
it some lately. Christ has forgotten me. We're enclosed next to his heart
in gold settings, just like those stones were each in a gold setting
that held it there. It wouldn't let it go. We're
enclosed near His heart in a gold setting, bound to His heart. Our names are written in stone,
just like these names were engraved on stone, right there on His
heart. He's a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. He shows us He won't ever leave
us and He won't ever forsake us. He won't do it. Can a woman
forget her sucking child that she should not have compassion
on the son of her womb? Yes, they may forget. Yet I will not forget thee, he
said, because I have engraven thee. Those names were engraven. I've engraven thee upon the palms
of my hands. Thy walls are continually before
me. I'm continually hedging you about.
I'm continually protecting you. The only way you can go this
way is I'll open up a wall and let you go that way. I'll close
that wall off and I'll open up one this way and you can go that
way. But you're always protected. You're always at the center of
His thought. Always. Scripture says, having loved
His own, He loved them to the end. On his heart. On his heart. In love, he says
this. This is what he told us. In love,
I will pray the Father for you. Remember that when he told his
disciples? I'll pray the Father for you,
and He'll send forth the Holy Spirit. And when He's come, He'll
convince you of sin, because I go to my Father. Of righteousness. What was it? Of sin, because
you see me no more? Of righteousness, because I go
to my Father? And of judgment, because the
Prince of this world is judged. And that's what He continues
to do. When we have the Spirit in abundance and we can see Christ
plainly and we're turned from our flesh, He prayed the Father
for us. He interceded for us as our high
priest. His love is particular for His
elect alone. He said in John 17, He's praying
to the Father and He says, I pray for them that you've given me
out of the world. I don't pray for the world. I
pray for them that you gave me out of the world, Father. Thine
they were and you gave them to me. And now they're mine. I don't
pray for this world of ungodly rebels. I pray for those you've
given me, that I redeem, that I'll call out, that I have called
out. And he said, and I pray for them
that shall be called out, that shall believe on me, and they'll
be called out through the word of these I've already called.
It's a particular love for his people. So that means, brethren,
He's going to add to us exactly who should be added to us at
the very time they should be added to us. He said, I'm going
to pray for them and intercede for them who shall believe on
me through their word. He's going to call out His people.
We're saved by the intercession of our great high priest. That's
how we're saved. It's a perfect perfection of
beauty and a perfection of glory. And that's this interceding high
priest we have. He's the perfection of beauty
and the perfection of glory. That's what these garments represented. They wear these garments for
beauty and for glory. And that's what Christ did. The
perfection of beauty and glory with the government on His shoulder,
with the strength on His shoulder for our perfect intercession,
our perfect governance, our perfect protection. It's all on His shoulder. That means He has the responsibility
to bring us to the Father. The perfection of glory and beauty
in His perfect wisdom and faithfulness. He's perfect wisdom and He's
perfectly faithful. You know, if you had one or the
other, it wouldn't be good. Think about it. He could have
perfect wisdom but not be faithful to us. Or he could have perfect
faithfulness, but not have wisdom to know how to execute that faithfulness. He's the perfection of both.
That ephod and that breastplate on that urim and thumim, along
with that ephod on the girdle, never separated. His wisdom and
his faithfulness never separated. And He's the perfection of beauty
and glory for those He's everlastingly loved. The names of those children
of Israel were always on the high priest's heart. And our
names are always on His heart. Now, He said all that was for
a memorial to the children of Israel. Just like God in heaven
is looking at him right now and he's being reminded of his children
and everything Christ is for his children, we sat here this
morning, hearing of him, so we look at him and are reminded.
Our names are on his shoulder, our names are on his heart, all
this perfection of glory and beauty, he is for us. So now then, let's come here
to his table and remember him. All right, Brother Scott, you
and Brother Greg, if y'all would.