The Nazarite`s Blessing

A few weeks ago we went through the sermons that Donny Bell preached and I spoke about all of them except the one that he spoke to Owen which we watched in church a couple of weeks ago. where Donny Bill spoke to Owen those wonderful words, a glorious message, but also is an opportunity for Owen to give a testimony of his faith and whom he believed at the end of his life. Donny read from these verses, and we've quoted them many, many times, and they're famous verses, and I've given them out to people, sent them to people on hundreds and hundreds of occasions. So if you turn in your Bibles with me to Numbers chapter six, and we can read these verses together. Numbers chapter six.

In verse 22, and the Lord spake unto Moses saying, speak unto Aaron and his son saying, on this wise, in this way you shall bless the children of Israel. Saying unto them, the Lord bless thee and keep thee. The Lord make his face to shine upon thee and be gracious unto thee. The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee and give thee peace. And they shall put my name upon the children of Israel and I will bless them.

Isn't that wonderful? That's so wonderful. What a blessing. They used to sing it when they so-called christened people or whatever they said down at the Presbyterian Church. So they sang that when I was christened there all those many, many years ago. They haven't got a foggiest notion about it, but it was one of the sweetest things they did there in amongst a whole bunch of things which were far from sweet and far from honouring the Lord.

But what really struck me as I was looking at it a few weeks ago was that that passage of scripture begins with the word and. And the Lord spoke, and and is a conjunction, and and takes us back to the rest of that chapter, and we don't have time to look at that chapter, but if you look, the chapter is a chapter regarding the laws of the Nazarite. The laws of the Nazarite. And one of the things that's remarkable about the Lord Jesus Christ is that according to the scriptures, after the Lord was born in Bethlehem, he was taken to Egypt and then he was taken back out of Egypt to Nazareth. And he came and dwelt in the city, Matthew 2, 23, came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, he shall be called a Nazarene. Now, this is one of the many passages in the Old Testament that speaks of the Nazarene and the Nazarite vow. And so these verses here and the similar verses that regard Samson as a Nazarite and John the Baptist was a Nazarite, speaks of this.

This is, what the Nazarite does. The word Nazarite just means someone who is separated. He separated himself. He separated himself unto God and he separated himself from many things. You can read about them at your leisure in Numbers chapter 6 if you don't have time. But the Lord Jesus Christ ultimately is the separated one, and he's the Nazarite. He's the one that was separated.

Listen to what Hebrews 7.26 speaks of this high priest. Such a high priest became us who was wholly harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, made higher than the heavens. The Lord Jesus Christ is the ultimate separated one. He separated himself.

And listen with me to an amazing verse in Psalm 18, which can only ever refer to the Lord Jesus Christ. He says in Psalm 18, verse 23, I was also upright before him. Well, who can say that they're upright before God? This is speaking of the Lord Jesus. All the psalms speak of the Lord Jesus Christ. People talk about it in religion. They talk about messianic psalms. They're all messianic psalms.

They all speak of him. But listen to what he says. I was also upright before him. And listen to this remarkable phrase. And I kept myself from mine iniquity. That's remarkable, isn't it? What a remarkable declaration of the Lord Jesus Christ. Not only did he keep himself and separated himself from iniquity, but he called the iniquity of all of his people, mine iniquity.

So with those two thoughts in mind, I want us to go back to a verse in Numbers chapter six, a couple of verses in Numbers chapter six that I was really, really struck by in my studies and they've been with me ever since. And in some ways in preaching, you unburden yourself. And I want what God has rejoiced my heart with to be the rejoicing of your heart. And I want you to think about this blessing because all the blessings of God are blood-bought blessings, and all of the blessings of God are in the Lord Jesus Christ, and all of the blessings of God are spiritual blessings. It may be very well that the Lord, in mercy to you, takes away the physical so-called blessings we have of this world.

Whatever, whatever takes you away from what is hindering your fellowship and your worship of the Lord Jesus Christ, if he takes that away, in all sorts of ways he takes it away, he separates his people to himself and he separates them from their sins and he separates them to and separates them from this world. He separates them from the things that steal his love from their hearts and their comfort in being one with him.

But this, the Nazirite, someone vowed to be a Nazirite, and I love the fact that it's either a man or a woman, it wasn't necessarily a man, and you can read about all the separations that went on in the days prior to it and how they had to be so fastidiously careful about not touching anything that was defiled or dead in any way at all, and that death speaks of sin. But listen to verse 13, and this is the law of the Nazarite. This is the law that the Lord Jesus Christ perfectly fulfilled and obeyed. This is the law of the Nazarite, when the days of his separation are fulfilled. He said it's finished.

"'And he shall be brought unto the door "'of the tabernacle of the congregation, "'and he shall offer his offering unto the Lord.'" That's exactly what Hebrews 9 says, isn't it? The Lord Jesus Christ offered himself without spot to God. The great transaction of the cross and the great transaction of our salvation is a transaction, for want of a better word, but it's a transaction between God and God. He offered himself to God.

And then this is what he offers. He offers one he lamb of the first year without blemish for a burnt offering. And one you lamb of the first year without blemish for a sin offering. And one ram without blemish for peace offerings. There's a burnt offering, there's a sin offering, and then there is a peace offering. And so often in the scriptures we have in our translations the word offering, but in fact often the word is just sin. He made his soul an offering for sin. He made his soul, his soul was made sin on the cross of Calvary. So this speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And when I looked up those particular words, In my concordance with you, you all can have on your phone. There's nothing particularly special about studying Greek and Hebrew these days. You can just pick up a phone and look these things up. But it really fascinated me.

The burnt offering. He offered one lamb the first year without blemish for a burnt offering. And in the Hebrew, that means that which goes up to heaven. That which ascends to heaven. And you think of the incense in the temple, and you think of the fire on the altar, and you think of what goes up to heaven. It's about offering. It's an offering unto God that goes to heaven. It reaches all the way into heaven, brothers and sisters.

And one new lamb for a sin offering. And sometimes that word means habitual sinfulness. If you're a sinner, if you're a Roman seven sinner, sin is what you are, and sin is what you do, and sin is what causes you to cry out, you're a wretched man. If God has made you a sinner, then that is what is the story of all of them. So one new lamb for a sin offering, one new lamb for sin, one burnt offering goes up to heaven, One offering is for sin.

And then, with all of that, then there is this ram, one ram without blemish for a peace offering. And that word peace offering means friendship. God can now be friends with sinners because of this. And he brings other things. But it's glorious. This is the law of the Nazarite. This is the law of the Lord Jesus Christ, who hath vowed, and of his offering unto the Lord for his separation, beside that which his hand shall get, according to the vow which he vowed. So must he do after the law of separation.

What was the vow that he vowed? It's the eternal covenant of grace, isn't it? He vowed a vow before his father, before the foundation of the world. You'll give me a people and I'll take them to myself to be one with me forever. And I'll be a husband to them and they shall be my people. And I vow to bear full responsibility to bring them back to you wholly and undefiled and separate from sinners, unblemished, unblameable, unapprovable in his sight. And I vow all of their righteousness before you. I bow, I vow these vows.

And that's the covenant of grace, it's the covenant of promise, it's the eternal covenant into the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And all of these Old Testament pictures are pictures of the wonder of that vow. And it's on the basis of this, this offering, this sin offering, This burnt offering that reaches up into heaven and this peace offering, we have peace with God.

He's made peace by his blood of the cross. He is our peace. There is no peace, says the Lord for the wicked, but the Lord Jesus Christ is our peace. He's all of our peace. He's one peace for us. Graham read those amazing verses out of Revelation and the one picture you get about all of that is peace, isn't it? I want to be there. Don't miss Christ. Don't leave here without the Lord Jesus Christ. Don't miss Christ. He vows that he's joined to them flesh and bone. He's joined to them as one.

And that's why that Psalm 18 is remarkable. And there are so many other Psalms that say exactly the same thing. Let me turn you to Psalm 40. Turn with me to Psalm 40. This Psalm is so glorious and it needs to be... I pray the Lord would write these Psalms on our hearts in ways that cause us to... have in view the wonder of our Lord Jesus Christ. We'll begin in verse seven.

But it's just such a glorious psalm, I'd love for you to read all of it. He says in verse six, sacrifice and offerings thou didst not desire mine, ears hast thou opened. What was the ear opening? In Exodus chapter 20, the servant said, I love my wife. I love my children, I love my master.

I'll not go free. You think of the promises that are vowed, that are pictured in this vow that the Nazirite made. I'll be separate, I'll be separate. But I'll vow to be one with them. My ears, burnt offering and sin offering thou hast not required. Then I said, then said I, lo, I come in the volume of the book it is written of me. We have a promised book from God in our laps, brothers and sisters.

This is preaching to the great congregation. What makes the congregation great? The presence of who's here is the one that makes the congregation great, wasn't it? You think of the most powerful person in all this world. If you were having a cup of tea with the Queen in the old days, the congregation would have been great because the Queen was there. She's nothing compared to this God who's with us.

I have preached. I have not hid thy righteousness in the hut. I have declared thy faithfulness and thy salvation. I have not concealed thy loving kindness, that's his grace, and thy truth from the great congregation. It's a great congregation because great truths are revealed to it. It's a great congregation because the great congregation holds to these great truths that are all of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And then he says, withhold thou, not thou, thy tender mercies from me, O Lord, and let thy loving kindness and thy truth continually preserve me. And listen to this, and this is the reason, having prayed all of that and having declared all of that, he asked God to be preserved in the truth and the loving kindness and the tender mercies. He was faithful, brothers and sisters, he was faithful to his God all the way to the death, the death of the cross.

For innumerable evils have compassed me about. They've separated me. They've surrounded me, sorry. They've surrounded me. And then he says, mine. Iniquities have taken hold upon me so that I am not able to look up. They are more than the hairs of mine head. Therefore, my heart faileth me. At the end of the Nazirite vow, what did the Nazirite do?

He shaved his head completely. so many glorious pictures of our Lord Jesus Christ in there. But listen to what he says, he says, mine iniquities, such is the union and such is the bond between the husband and his wife that he owns her iniquities on the cross of Calvary. God made him who knew no sin He had never sinned in himself. We read that in Psalm 18.

I've kept myself from mine iniquities. They were mine because of that covenant, because of that promise. They were mine because he was the lamb slain from the foundation of the world. They are mine because of the glory of this eternal union that he's causing his people to be blessed with. They're mine, he says they're mine. God says they're mine.

Sin can't be in two places at the same time and God be holy and just. God cannot possibly punish sin in the Lord Jesus Christ and then punish any of his people for it. That's the glory, that's the glory of this separated one. Be pleased, O Lord, to deliver me, O Lord, make haste to help thee. Let them be ashamed and confounded together that seek after my soul to destroy it. Let them be driven backwards and put to shame that wish me evil. What did he have to do to have them all driven backwards in the garden? Whom seek ye? Whom seek you? Six hundred men with spears and all sorts of swords and other things turned up there. Whom seek ye?

I am.' And people think they sort of tumbled backwards. They fell. They fell in an instant backwards. They didn't fall on top of each other. They just fell. On one mass fell. He just spoke. They're driven backwards. Let them be desolate for a reward of their shame that say unto me, aha, aha. To say aha is to rejoice over someone else's misfortune. That's exactly what they were saying at the cross of Calvary, a thousand years after David wrote these words.

But listen to what he goes on to say, The Lord be magnified. I love that word magnified. It means to take something which looks very indistinct and very far away and make it very big and very close and very clear in our sight. What a great prayer isn't it? Lord magnify yourself, magnify your son, magnify your name. But I am poor and needy, yet the Lord thinketh upon me. That's such a sweet, sweet word, isn't it, from God. He thinks upon his people. Make no tarrying, O my God.

So let's turn back to Numbers chapter six, and in light of that, these glorious words seemed to resonate with me in ways that have just been such a wonderful, wonderful blessing to my heart this last little while. I was so thankful that Donny chose them, the Lord chose them as the last words that Owen was to have preached to him by a man here. Isn't that wonderful? And the Lord caused Owen to rejoice in them. And then we join in the rejoicing. Isn't God good? Isn't he good?

And the Lord spake unto Moses saying, Numbers 6.22, speak unto Aaron and unto his son saying, on this wise shall you bless the children of Israel.

On this wise, as a result of the Nazarite vow being fulfilled, and the offering of the Nazirite vow going into heaven. Because the Nazirite went into heaven. He's gone into heaven, heaven. Heaven was the glory of all of these pictures we see in the Old Testament.

You are to make everything according to the pictures that Moses saw. As a result of the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ, the great Nazirite who separated himself This is what you say to the children of Israel, just the children of Israel, the elect of God, those that are joined as one with the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Lord bless thee, Jehovah bless thee, and keep thee. The Lord guard thee. I love that fact that the Lord is to guard. He's praying, the Lord bless thee and guard thee and watch over thee and preserve thee. The Lord watch over thee and bless thee and preserve thee.

If you live in this world as a sinner, how precious it is to have God guarding you, God guarding your steps, God saying to you, you can go this far. and no more, and I've hedged your way in, like he said to Gomer in Hosea chapter two, I've hedged your way with thorns. I'm going to guard your way. I'm not going to let any one of my sheep slip through my hands. They can wander and they can stray, and they can keep wandering and straying, and I'm the great shepherd, and there's an absolute limit.

God preserves and God guards, and God blesses them. He has great care over them. He's the shepherd, he's the great shepherd, he's the good shepherd. But he blesses us and he keeps us on the basis of a fulfilled Nazirite vow. That's the Father's blessing, isn't it? The Lord bless thee and keep thee and watch over thee and preserve thee. The Lord make his face to shine upon thee and be gracious unto thee. Where does the face of God shine?

You know the verses in 2 Corinthians 4. They're so wonderful, aren't they? For we preach not ourselves, but Jesus Christ the Lord, and ourselves your servants for Jesus' sake. Because God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, the very first words of God are light be and light was. This God has shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. He's the light. He's the light of the world. I just love that story in John chapter eight. It's a glorious story, isn't it?

There before the Lord Jesus Christ, these people that spoke so ill of him in Psalm 40 brought that woman caught in adultery. There she was, she's a sinner. She's nothing but a sinner. And she's caught red-handed, and they think they've trapped the Lord Jesus Christ.

And these men, when the Lord spoke to them, he said, he that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. And he stooped down, he wrote on the ground, And then they which heard it being convicted by their own conscience. Please take note of what God says about that. They were convicted by their own conscience.

People do horrible things and they suffer the horrible consequences of that conviction of sin. And the result of it in these people was that they left. She was convicted in her conscience that day and she was accused and accused rightfully. Who left? The ones convicted in their own conscience left.

The one who was convicted by God Almighty was forced by God to stay. See the difference, brothers and sisters? The sins of God's people caused them to cling to him, to run to him, to come back to him. He who fulfilled all of those vows, he who owned their sin as his own, he who took their sins away, He brings them back to himself. He guards them and he keeps them. And that's why his face shines upon them. And he says to her, woman, where are thine accusers? Has no man condemned thee? No man, Lord. And Jesus said to her, neither do I. That's what it is to be the light of the world.

You see the wonderful circumstances where God, this lady was his from before the foundation of the world. The Lord bless thee and keep thee. He watched over her and he guarded her. And even in the midst of her dreadful, dreadful sin, he made his face to shine upon her. And he was gracious unto her. The Lord make his face to shine upon thee. This is the beaming face of a great and glorious God.

And this God, when he came into this world, and he was declared to be who he was, I love what it says. If the word was made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld his glory, the glory of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth, John chapter one, verse 14. And of His fullness have we all received grace for grace, grace for grace for grace. For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.

He'll be gracious. He must be gracious. He must be gracious. The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee. The Lord lift up. The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee and give thee peace. What a remarkable thing. Our departed friends got to see his face. And it wasn't a downcast face, the fallen face of anger. It wasn't the hidden face withholding favour. It was a lifted up face saying, you're welcome.

You're welcome. You're perfectly fit to live in heaven. And you're perfectly fit to be with me and my people forever and ever and ever. Your sins are gone. The offering is accepted into heaven. And in this heaven that Graham's read about earlier, it can't get in or everything, everything that defiles, Satan and lies and everything that defiles is shut out forever and ever.

"'The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee "'and give thee peace.'" He is peace itself, isn't he? As he was going to the cross, as he was going to fulfil that Nazarite vow, he said to his disciples, he said, "'Peace I leave with you,' John 14, 27. "'Peace I leave with you. "'My peace I give unto you. Not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.

Their hearts are going to be completely troubled that night and they're going to be troubled for the next couple of days and they're going to be so afraid that night they'd run away and Peter would curse and swear. And God promises to give peace. He will give peace. There was darkness for a season, and then peace came flooding in on that resurrection morning, and darkness came flooding in again, and then he comes, the son of righteousness comes with healing in his wings, and he arises on his people, and he reveals to them the glory of his countenance to see the face of the Lord Jesus Christ. Imagine what it is to hear his voice. and to see him.

I hate every single picture I have ever seen of the Lord Jesus Christ. I hate seeing them anywhere, in any form, anyhow, no matter what, because every single one of them is a lie and every single one of them necessarily reduces him down to something worldly. Brothers and sisters, burn them. Turn away from them. They're just, they're a lie, aren't they?

They lie to us about the most glorious being, the most glorious God. And listen to what he goes on to say. And they shall put my name upon the children of Israel and I will bless them. What a glorious blessing it is to have his name upon us. Isaiah speaks so much of the name of God. It speaks of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, but in Isaiah 43, verse 7, it speaks of him. He says, He says in terms of gathering all of his people, he says, fear not, verse five, I am with thee.

I will bring thy seed from the east and gather thee from the west. I will say to the north, give up, and to the south, keep not back. Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth. even everyone that is called by my name. I have formed him, yea, I have made him.

54 speaks of the, I love how Isaiah 54 begins, isn't it? After Isaiah 53, which speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ and the glory of Him, that He was numbered with the transgressors and He bore the sin of many and made intercessions for the transgressors and then sing. sing he'll see the travail of his soul and be satisfied our great God my righteous servant is going to justify many but listen to what he goes on to say that's why we sing we sing because he is our husband verse 5 for thy maker is thine husband the lord of hosts is his name thy redeemer the holy one of israel the god of the whole earth shall he be called "'For the Lord has called thee as a woman forsaken, "'greed in spirit and a wife of youth, "'when thou wast refused, saith thy God.

"'For a small moment I have forsaken thee, "'with great mercies will I gather thee. "'In a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment, "'but with everlasting kindness, "'I will have mercy on thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer. "'For as the waters of Noah, For this is as the waters of Noah unto me, for as I have sworn that the waters of Noah should no more go over the earth, so I have sworn that I would not be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee. For the mountains shall depart, and the hills shall be removed, but my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord that has mercy on thee. Thy maker is thy husband.

The Nazarite was separate. He was separate from sinners. And he came into this world. And I love the fact that in the proclamation of the gospel, in Acts chapter two, it's Jesus of Nazareth. When Peter and John are questioned about who healed this man at the beautiful gate in the temple, they could have said the Lord God of Israel healed this man in his name. But they declare it was Jesus of Nazareth. They earned the fact that he was a Nazirite.

One who was separated, one at the end of his separation was offered and that offering went up to heaven. The burnt offering went up to heaven. The sin offering was accepted and the peace offering, friendship with God. Let me finish with these verses that you know very well, but I think in light of what we have read, I pray that they just become more and more powerful. Romans 8, we know, this is something that God's children know as a result of the Nazarite having fulfilled this vow and the result of these promises being sealed and signed in his blood. We know that all things work together for the good of them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

"'For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate "'to be conformed to the image of his son.'" That's what predestination is, to be conformed to the image of his son. "'That he might be the firstborn among many brethren. "'Moreover, whom he did predestinate, them he also called, "'and whom he called, them he also justified, "'and whom he justified, them he also glorified.'" Past tense finished.

Every single one of them. All the promises of God are yay and amen. All the blessings. The Lord bless thee. The Lord make his face. The Lord lift up his countenance. They shall put my name upon them. What then shall we say to these things if God before us, who can be against us, he that spared not his own son but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? Freely. That word means without cause. The cause of God's blessing is in himself. The cause of his love is in himself. Isn't it wonderful that the cause of what God does for his people is in himself? He doesn't have to look to us for a cause.

Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died rather than is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also, right now, at this very moment, maketh intercession for us. What a glorious intercession it is. Here are my words. Here am I, and here are all the children with me. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As is written, for thy sake we are killed all the day long. We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.

Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. For I am persuaded, I hope and I pray that I'm persuaded, I want you to be persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor power, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us. from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. I pray next time we read that blessing out of numbers, we'll see that it's the blessing of the Nazirite, having completed his separation, never to be separated ever, ever, ever again, just once, just once. And it was all done, finished. Amen. May the Lord bless his words to our hearts. Let's have a coffee.

The Nazarite`s Blessing

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The Nazarite`s Blessing

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