Well, good evening, everyone.
If you would open your Bibles with me, begin our service. John
chapter one. John chapter one. As you're turning,
I'll tell you, if you recall Sunday, I told you that I was
scheduled to preach in Danville, Kentucky last night. And, um,
on my way there, I got a call that their air conditioning was
out. The building was 90 degrees. And so they canceled the service.
So I wish I could tell you where the best service ever was, but
it was canceled. And also we want to remember
our brother Rick Dillon in prayer. His father's funeral was today. And many of you know, that's
one of the toughest days in your whole life. We want to hold him
up in prayer. All right, John chapter one,
we'll read the first 14 verses. In the beginning was the word
and the word was with God. And the word was God. The same
was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him,
and without him was not anything made that was made. In him was
life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth
in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not. There was
a man sent from God whose name was John. The same came for a
witness, to bear witness of the light that all men through him
might believe. He was not that light, but he
was sent to bear witness of that light. That was the true light,
which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. He was
in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew
him not. He came into his own, and his
own received him not. But as many as received him,
to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them
that believe on his name, which were born. Not of blood, nor
of the will of the flesh, nor the will of man, but of God. And the word was made flesh and
dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory. The glory is of the
only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. All right, Sean, come lead us
in our singing, if you would. If you would, turn in your hymnal
to song number 17, Come Thou Fount. 17. Come thou fount of every blessing,
tune my heart to sing thy grace. Streams of mercy never ceasing,
call for songs of loudest praise. Teach me some melodious sonnet,
sung by flaming tongues above. Praise the mount, I'm fixed upon
it, mount of thy redeeming love. Here I raise mine Ebenezer, hither
by thy help I'm come, and I hope by thy good pleasure safely to
arrive at home. Jesus sought me when a stranger,
wandering from the fold of God, he to rescue me from danger interposed
his precious blood. Oh, to grace how great a debtor
daily I'm constrained to be. Let thy goodness, like a fetter,
bind my wandering heart to thee. I feel it, prone to leave the
God I love. Here's my heart, oh, take and
seal it, seal it for thy courts above. OK. If you would now turn to song
number 168, Even Me. 168. Lord, I hear of showers of blessing,
thou art scattering full and free. Showers the thirsty land
refreshing, let some drops now fall on me. Even me, even me,
let Thy blessing fall on me. Pass me not, O tender Savior,
let me love and cling to Thee. I am longing for thy favor whilst
thou art calling, O call me. Even me, even me, let thy blessing
fall on me. Pass me not, O mighty spirit,
thou canst make the blind to see. Witnesser of Jesus' merit,
speak the word of power to me. Even me, even me, let thy blessing
fall on me. Love of God, so pure and changeless,
blood of Christ, so rich and free. Grace of God, so strong
and boundless, magnify them all in me. Even me, even me, let Thy blessing fall
on me. Pass me not, Thy lost one bringing,
bind my heart, O Lord, to Thee. While the streams of life are
springing, Blessing others, O bless me. Even me, even me, Let Thy
blessing fall on me. All right, now let's open our
Bibles to Exodus chapter 25. Exodus chapter 25, we begin reading
in verse one. And the Lord spake unto Moses,
saying, speak unto the children of Israel, that they bring me
an offering of every man that giveth it willingly with his
heart, he shall take my offering. And this is the offering which
ye shall take of them, gold and silver and brass, and blue and
purple and scarlet, and fine linen and goat's hair, and ram
skins dyed red, and badger skins and chitim wood, oil for the
light, spices for anointing oil, and for sweet incense, onyx stones
and stones to be set in the ephod and in the breastplate. And let
them make me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them. According
to all that I show thee, after the pattern of the tabernacle,
and the pattern of all the instruments thereof, even so shall you make
it. And they shall make an ark of
shiddum wood. Two cubits and a half shall be
the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof,
and a cubit and a half the height thereof. And thou shalt overlay
it with pure gold. Within and without, thou shalt
thou overlay it, and shall make upon it a crown of gold round
about. And thou shalt cast four rings
of gold for it, and put them in the four corners thereof.
And two rings shall be in the one side of it, and two rings
in the other side of it. And thou shalt make staves of
shittum wood, and overlay them with gold. And thou shalt put
the staves into the rings by the sides of the ark, that the
ark may be borne with them. The staves shall be in the rings
of the ark. They shall not be taken from
it. And thou shalt put into the ark the testimony which I shall
give thee. And thou shalt make a mercy seat
of pure gold. Two cubits and a half shall be
the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof.
And thou shalt make two cherubims of gold. Of beaten work shalt
thou make them in the two ends of the mercy seat. And make one
cherub on the one end and the other cherub on the other end,
even of the mercy seat, shall you make the cherubims on the
two ends thereof. And the cherubims shall stretch
forth their wings on high, covering the mercy seat with their wings.
And their faces shall look to one another toward the mercy
seat, shall the faces of the cherubims be. And thou shalt
put the mercy seat above upon the ark, and in the ark Thou
shalt put the testimony that I shall give thee. And there
I will meet with thee and will commune with thee from above
the mercy seat, from between the two cherubims, which are
upon the ark of the testimony of all things, which I will give
thee in commandment under the children of Israel. We'll end
our reading there. Let's bow together in prayer. Our father, which art in heaven,
Holy and reverent is your matchless name. And Lord, we very carefully
and reverently come into your presence this evening and bow
before your throne of grace with our faces in the dust, daring
only come before you in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, pleading
his obedience as our only righteousness, pleading his blood as the only
cleansing for our sin. Lord, we come with fear and trembling. Yet how thankful we are that
you've told us in your word to come boldly through the Lord
Jesus Christ to your throne of grace. And father, we bow before
you this evening, begging a blessing from your storehouses of grace.
Father, I ask you that as we look into your word, that you
would be our teacher, that you would show us the glory of the
Lord Jesus Christ from this passage of scripture. Father, cause us
not just to know the facts and the figures and the history,
but Father, use this picture to reveal Christ to each heart
here. Cause us to believe him, to run
to him, to cling to him. If we've never believed him before,
to believe him now. And if we have believed him,
to believe him even more, more strongly. If we've never loved
him before, cause us to see him tonight and love him tonight.
And if we've loved him before, cause our love in him to grow
even deeper and stronger. Father, I thank you for a place
where we can meet together in peace and unity and to worship
you. And Father, I pray that you would
continue to be with us, that you would be with this congregation
in a mighty and special way. that you continue to bless your
word as it's preached here to your people wherever you would
send it to them. And Father, we do pray a blessing
for your people that you've brought into the time of trouble and
trial. We pray for them, we pray for your hand of healing and
deliverance upon them and comfort. We pray especially for our brother
Rick Dillon and his whole family at this difficult time of loss
that you'd comfort their hearts as only you can. And Father,
we ask you forgive us of our many sins and failures, and ask
that you would see us and hear us only in our Lord Jesus Christ.
For it's in his precious name, for his sake we pray, amen. I've titled the message this
evening, The Ark of the Covenant. When we began this study in the
book of Exodus, I wasn't sure how far that we would go through
it. We finished Genesis. I just felt like I don't want
to leave the children of Israel, you know, in Genesis. Let's see
him come out of, or in Egypt and see him come out, come out
of Egypt. I didn't know how far I'd go, but every chapter, every,
every part I read is just, it's such a blessing. Although I can't
quit now. So we're going to begin a study in the tabernacle, uh,
on Wednesday nights here tonight. And, In the coming weeks, verses
one through eight that list all the different things that the
people would give as a free offering toward the building of the tabernacle.
And we'll see how every detail, each one of those things, none
of them is accidental. They're all pictures of Christ. The Lord told Moses in verse
nine, according to all that I show you, after the pattern of the
tabernacle and the pattern of all the instruments thereof,
Even so shall you make it. Moses, you make it just like
according to the pattern that I'm giving you because this pattern
is gonna be a picture of my son, a picture of the Savior, the
Lord Jesus Christ. One of the writers I read on
this said, we meet Christ around every corner of the tabernacle.
And I like that statement because every stitch, every color, every
placement of everything in the tabernacle, in the courtyard,
It's all a picture of Christ. And there's no question that
God meant for it to be that way. The tabernacle's a picture of
Christ. In John 1, 14, we read to open the surface. It said
how Christ came and dwelt among us and we beheld his glory. That
word is tabernacled. Christ came and tabernacled among
us, fulfilling the picture of this tabernacle. In Revelation
7, 15, it says that he that sitteth on the throne shall dwell among
them. And that word dwell is tabernacle.
Christ is coming to dwell with his people. That's what he says
in verse eight, let them make me a sanctuary that I may dwell
among them. The tabernacle is a picture of
how the Lord Jesus Christ came and he dwells among his people.
And John tells us from what he says in revelation, he always
will. He'll always be tabernacling among his people. Now tonight
we're going to start with the Ark of the Covenant. And the
Ark of the Covenant is in the sanctuary here, where these coverings
kept in the Holy of Holies. And you all know all the different
stories and things about that. We'll get to all that during
our study. In the past, when I've taught
on the tabernacle, I've always started going from the outside
in. And I did that, number one, because
Sandy told me that's what she did. So I thought, well, I'm
going to follow her example. But number two, I felt like I'm
going to start on this outside, and I'm going to build up to
what I call the crown jewel of the tabernacle, the Ark of the
Covenant and the mercy seat. But as I got reading this and
studying this, last week and this week, it really struck me
when God gave Moses the instructions for the tabernacle, God began
with the ark of the covenant and the mercy seat. And I believe
he did that because this is the most important piece of all this. This is what it all culminates.
All the tabernacle culminates with this, the ark of the covenant
and the mercy seat where the blood is going to be sprinkled
on the mercy seat. This is the whole point of all
of the tabernacle in verse 22, and there, above this mercy seat,
there, I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee
from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubims, which
are upon the ark of the testimony. This ark is a picture of the
Lord Jesus Christ, how he came and dwelt among men. And the
only way you and I, sinners like us, can commune with God is through
the Lord Jesus Christ. So I want us to look at several
pictures. I probably will not get to the mercy seat tonight. We'll probably have to pick up
there next Wednesday. But to begin looking at the Ark
and see how this Ark of the Covenant, how it pictures the Lord Jesus
Christ. Number one, the Ark pictures
Christ, the God-man, the two natures of Christ. He's both
God and man in one body. In verse 10, the Lord says, and
they shall make an ark of Shiddim wood. Two cubits and a half should
be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof,
and a cubit and a half the height thereof. And thou shalt overlay
it with pure gold. With the in and without shalt
thou overlay it, and thou shalt make upon it a crown of gold
round about. Now the ark is four feet long,
two and a half feet high, two and a half feet wide, And it's
made of this incorruptible wood, wood that won't rot. And it's
completely covered with gold. So inside and out, so that you
can't see the wood, the wood's completely covered with gold.
And you're gonna see this over and over and over and over again.
I'm gonna say it so many times, I promise you, you're gonna remember
it. The gold and the wood together picture Christ the God-man. The
incorruptible wood pictures his sinless, incorruptible humanity. Even when Christ died, his body
didn't decay because he had no sin. There was no sin in him.
And the gold pictures his deity. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
God-man. He is actually, truly God. And he's actually, truly a man.
Now that's something that we can't, the human mind, we just
can't grasp that or wrap around it. But this is the glory of
Christ. His person is beyond our understanding. That's how glorious he is. And
the wood, the incorruptible wood that they use came from an acacia
tree. I guess that's how you pronounce
it, an acacia tree. It's the only tree that grew
to any size in the desert there. And it was incorruptible. Over
the course of time, you know, you cut it down, use it, it never
would rot. Which, like I said, is a picture
of the sinlessness of Christ. Now, remember where they're at.
They're in the desert. This acacia tree, not only can
it grow, it thrives in very dry ground, very, very harsh conditions. That's a picture of Christ our
Savior. He's the root out of dry ground. You think when he
came, that rod of Jesse, the stem of Jesse, the house of David,
I mean, it had deteriorated to nothing. I mean, if you would
consider it as a rod or a tree, I mean, it was just a dry twig
in the ground. You think it's dead? I mean,
and the Lord came to Israel? Mm-mm-mm. How their religion
had deteriorated into harsh, harsh conditions. And here our
Savior came, a root out of a dry ground, and he thrived, didn't
he? I mean, he thrived so that he
accomplished all of the salvation of all of his people. He thrived
in saving his people. He did it so well, not one of
them can be lost. And this acacia tree also has
long, sharp thorns on it, just like the thorns that they used
to make a crown to shove upon our Lord's head at Calvary. Even
this tree tells us, gives us a picture of Christ bearing the
curse of sin for his people. Thorns are the result of the
curse of sin. Before Adam's sin, there were
no thorns. But after Adam's sin, God cursed the ground, said it's
gonna bring forth thorns. These thorns are the curse of
sin, the effect of sin. And Christ bore the effect of
sin. away from his people forever,
so that they cannot die. They cannot be condemned. They
must be accepted in him. And then something else that's
very interesting about this acacia tree, at nightfall, you know
what people would do? They'd go out and pierce this
tree, and the sap that came out of it, they'd use it to make
medicines. I mean, can you see just what
an all-encompassing picture of Christ this is? How on Calvary's
tree, Christ was pierced and out flowed blood. Blood to redeem,
blood to atone, blood to pay for sin. And when that Roman
soldier pierced his side with his spear, out flowed blood and
water, the double cure. Blood to redeem, water to sanctify. out of the body of our Lord Jesus
Christ flowed the balm of Gilead that heals his people from every
sin sickness. That's what this tree, this was
just no ordinary tree, was it? God created this tree to be a
picture of his son. And that wood was completely
covered with gold. Gold, a picture of the deity
of Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ, now this
is awe-inspiring, and go back to what I said a minute ago,
but our human minds can't comprehend this, that the Lord Jesus, he's
both the Son of God and the Son of Man, both. Now that's a mystery,
isn't it? I mean, the Apostle Paul, who's
smarter than all of us put together, said, great is the mystery of
godliness, that God was manifest in the flesh, I hope we never
stop being amazed or we never get over the person of the Lord
Jesus Christ. He's both God and man. But I
don't want us to just know that fact. I want us to be awed at
why the Son of God became a man. The Son of God became a real
man so he could be the second Adam. So he could be the representative
of his sinful people, and he could undo for them what Adam
did to him. Adam, by his disobedience, made
all of his race sinners, didn't he? Made us unrighteous. Christ,
by his obedience, made everyone that he represented, all of God's
elect, he made them righteous. He came as a man to die. God can't die. God can't be made
sin, but a man can. And Christ came. The Son of God
came as a man so that he could die in the place of his people. We just sang that song, Even
Me. I love y'all. And I'm not just
saying this. Maybe it's wrong to say, but
I could see why Christ would die for you. Here's the thing
I can't get over, that he'd do it for me. He came and did that
for the likes of me. God help us to never get over
how thrilling that is, that the son of God became a man so he
could completely save the likes of us. I mean, that's just the
best story that's ever been told. And then the Lord said, after
you finish covering this with gold, If you looked at this closely,
you can't see it from that far away, but there's a crown of
gold all around the top of this ark, telling us that this son
of man, now he's gonna be the son of man and the son of God. He's gonna humiliate himself
to appear as a man, and he's gonna suffer like no one's ever
suffered. He's gonna suffer even before
he went to the cross. You think how he suffered all
his life long, how he suffered living. amongst sinners like
us. He came into his own, his own
received him not. Just what a, how he suffered
like that. But don't you ever forget this.
Don't you pity him and don't you feel sorry for him. He's
the king. He's the king of kings and he's
the Lord of lords. And if the Lord Jesus Christ,
the Savior is king, and this book says he is, I'm gonna tell
you what, he's not gonna fail to save his people. He will save
them. You just cannot preach the gospel
without preaching the kingship of Christ, the sovereignty of
Christ. You can't do it. You can't, you
can't preach who Christ is. You can't preach Christ and him
crucified without preaching that it's the King who died. And since
it's the King who died, this is what he accomplished in his
death. You have to preach the kingship of Christ. I don't know
why I do this. I get on Sermon Audio sometimes,
and I look around at different places, you know. I did this
last week, and there were so many places that I saw there. Their name was Sovereign Grace,
something or another. And I thought, I wonder if they're
preaching anything. This is a small sample size.
I looked at four or five, and let me tell you, they're not. The preaching of sovereign grace
means this. God's king, God is God, the Lord
Jesus Christ is his king, and he sovereignly chose, because
it's his right to do so as our creator, as our king, who he
would save. And the king came, and he saved
them. He saved those people from their
sins. He didn't die making an offering
to you and me to see, you know, it's up to us to, to accept it
or reject it, that's foolishness. The king died making an offering
to his father to pay for the sins of his people. And salvation,
the salvation of God's people is sure because it's the king
who died. It's the king who rose again
and it's the king who ascended back to glory. And you know what
he's doing right now? He's sitting on the throne as
king ruling over everything that happens in this creation. Everything. From something as insignificant
and maybe unnoticeable to you and me as a piece of dust flying
through the air, to the actions of kings and presidents that
changed the world. Our Savior is in control of every
one of them. They're all doing his bidding
to accomplish this purpose. to save his people from their
sins. Now them shouting words, isn't
that good news? This art pictures the God man,
king, who's gonna come and save his people from their sins. But
here's the second thing. Now Christ came to dwell amongst
his people. Oh, he's tender. He's tender
and compassionate with sinners. Oh, he came preaching grace and
mercy, but don't you forget this. He's God, and man cannot approach
God outside of Christ. That's what these staves and
rings are about, beginning in verse 12. And thou shalt cast
four rings of gold for it, and put them in the four corners
thereof. And two rings shall be in the one side of it, and
two rings in the other side of it. And thou shalt make staves
of shittum wood, and overlay them with gold. And thou shalt
put the staves into the rings by the sides of the ark, that
the ark may be born within. The staves shall be in the rings
of the ark. They shall not be taken from it. Now the Lord told
them, you make these rings and then you make these staves and
you put them through it. And once you put them through
those staves, don't you ever take them out. They're to stay
there always. Because when it came time to
fold up the tabernacle and to move to the next place where
the pillar would lead them, No mere man was to touch this ark.
Only the high priest, and even the high priest couldn't touch
it. The high priest would pick up the ark and they'd bear it
on their shoulders, they'd carry it on their shoulders by these
rods that go through it. And they could not touch it. And all of that kind of came
to roost one day. Remember when the Philistines
came, the story, they came, they stole the Ark from the children
of Israel. And they took the Ark down there
and they said it with their god, Dagon, and all kinds, you can
read about it, all kinds of bad stuff happened to the Philistines.
And the Philistines finally sent word to David, you come take
this out of here, you take it away from us, because it's causing
us all these problems. And David did. He sent, David's
gonna, oh, now he's gonna make show of this. He's gonna do this
good. He built a brand new ark, or a brand new cart. Never been
used to haul anything before. David said, you take that cart
and you haul it down there and haul the ark on this cart back
to Jerusalem. And as they were bringing it
back, can you imagine how happy, I mean, I don't know how it all
went to get the ark from the Philistines, but they got it
and they put it on that, cart, can you imagine how happy they
were to be bringing the ark back to Jerusalem? And as they were
going along, everybody's happy. The oxen are pulling the cart.
They stumbled and lurched and the ark shook on that cart. And a man named Uzzah just reached
up to steady it. I mean, who wouldn't? You don't
want the ark falling down in the mud and in dirt and potentially
breaking or something. He just said, who wants to bring
shame to the ark of God, seeing it fall on the ground? And he
reached up and touched it, and God killed him. God killed him. And David remembered, oh, the
priests are supposed to carry this. You can read the story. He sent the priest to carry it,
and every few steps he stopped and made a sacrifice. You don't mess around. We need
to remember this now. God help us from ever trifling
with the gospel of God, the gospel of his dear son. This is the
gospel of God. This is God's message to men. And important, although not nearly
as important as this is God's message, this is the message
that will save sinners if they believe it. Let's not trifle with it. Let's
not trifle with the worship of our God. Look to what happened
to Uzzah when he did. And David started the whole mess,
didn't he? Let's not mess with it. There
is only one way to God. Our Lord told us that it was
Him. No man cometh unto the Father, but by me. There's just one way. But thank God there's a way.
Thank God there is a way. Now we better not try to come
to God on our own, by our own merit. We better not be messing
around, the right word, and using the gospel of God to accomplish
some purpose that we want to accomplish. Don't try to come
to God on your own merit. It won't happen. We'll be destroyed.
But if you come to God in Christ, the message of this book is you'll
be accepted. You'll be accepted not on your
merit, but on the merit of the Lord Jesus Christ, who he is
and what he's accomplished for his people. Now come to God in
Christ. That's what this thing, that's
what the stage, they're screaming to us. Don't come to God on your
own. You need a mediator, you need
somebody between you and God. Come to God in Christ. Now here's
the third thing that the ark tells us. Absolutely everything
that a sinner needs is found in Christ. Christ is everything
that we need. Verse 16. The Lord says, and
thou shalt put into the ark the testimony, which I shall give
thee. Now there are three things that
were kept in this ark and these three things, you put them together
and they tell us about the person and work of Christ. The first
thing that was put in here, the Lord calls it here, the testimony.
It's the 10 commandments. It's the law of God. And he calls
it the testimony because you know the law of God, not just
the 10 commandments, but all of the law of God. It's a testimony,
isn't it? It's God's testimony of who He
is. God's law tells us that God's
holy, that God's just, that His punishment is always exact to
the crime, to the disobedience. It's never too much. It's never
too little. It's always exact. It tells us
about God's justice and who He is. But the law is also a testimony
about who we are, isn't it? The law is a testimony to the
sinfulness of our sin. I love what the Apostle Paul
said. I didn't even want to covet anything till the law told me
don't covet and then I did. The law is a testimony of our
sin and our need of Christ. And you know the story of the
Ten Commandments. Moses went up to the mountain and he received
a set of the Ten Commandments on two tables of stone written
by the finger of God. And Moses took those tablets,
and he's coming back down the mountain to the children of Israel,
and he finds them in idolatry. And Moses, so angry, he threw
those tables of stone down and broke them. That's a picture
of how we've broken the law of God. The law of God is not safe
in our hands. There's no salvation in it, because
we can't keep it. So God called Moses back up to
the mountain. He said, I'm going to write this
law again. You bring two more tables of
stone, just like the first. I'm going to write these 10 commandments
again. But Moses, they're not going
to stay in your hands, which is a good thing, isn't it? Because
the law was put into Moses' hands. He threw them down and broke
them. In the garden, the law was put. Not even the whole law,
just one rule was given to our father Adam, and he broke it.
So God said, you take these down. and you put them in the ark for
safekeeping. The law is not given into the
hands of men because men can't keep it. It's given into the
hands of Christ who kept it perfectly for his people. That's why Christ
came. Let me show you that in Psalm
40. Again, I don't want us to see
the facts of these things, that Christ came to obey the law for
his people. I want us to stand amazed at
it, that he would come and keep the law to make sinners like
you and me righteous. That's why he came. Psalm 40,
verse seven. Then said I, lo, I come. In the volume of the book, it's
written of me. And he's talking about the Old Testament scriptures.
The volume of this is written of Christ. What we're looking
at in the Old Testament scriptures concerning the tabernacle, it's
all written of Christ. In the volume of the book, it's
written of me. I delight to do thy will, O my God. Yea, thy
law is within my heart. God put it in his heart and he
kept it. He obeyed it perfectly. He magnified
it and he kept it safe, just exactly like the Ten Commandments. Those two tables of stone were
kept safe in that ark. Now again, I don't want us to
just know the fact, yes, Christ came and He's the second Adam
and he obeyed the law. I want us to find such joy in
our hearts, such peace in this. Sinners are made righteous by
the obedience of another. We were made unrighteous. We
were made sinners by the disobedience of another. That's why we're
in the whole mess that we're in. That's why we act the way
we act, the way we think the way we think. So sinful and so
rotten because we were made sinners by the disobedience of another.
And the wisdom, I mean the wisdom of God doing it this way is so
marvelous, His grace, His consideration for His people. He didn't tell
us, you gotta keep the law to make yourself righteous, because
it's too late. He sent His Son to keep it for His people. And
Christ doesn't just give His people a righteousness, like
here's a piece of paper that says you're righteous. Christ
is the righteousness of his people. Now look, I just love the simplicity
of that. It's all Christ. Now you look
to him. If you want righteousness, go
to him. It's all in him. Then second, look back at Exodus
chapter 16. They put a pot of manna in this
ark. Exodus 16. Verse 33. Moses said unto Aaron,
take a pot and put an omer full of manna therein and lay it up
before the Lord to be kept for your generations. As the Lord
commanded Moses, so Aaron laid it up before the testimony to
be kept. They took this golden pot and
they put an omer of manna in it and they kept it in this ark. Now again, here's two elements.
There's the gold, bowl, the deity of Christ. And there's this bread
that pictures his sinless humanity put in inside the gold pot. There's two natures, the God-man
and one person. That bread, you know what it's
a picture of. It's Christ, the bread of life. God's elect are born in this
world dead, dead in sin. And Christ gives life to his
people. Miraculously, mysteriously, spiritually,
powerfully, supernaturally, he gives life to his people so that
we have life and now we believe, now we see, now we hear. And
there's that child of God, been born again, a baby. Well, how's
that baby in Christ gonna grow to a young man in Christ and
to an old man in Christ? It's the preaching of Christ.
It's Christ who sustains the life of his people. He causes
that life to be sustained. He causes us to grow in grace
and in knowledge. Christ sustains the life of his
people. But again, this is something
so much more than giving life to his people and sustaining
the life of his people. Christ is the life of his people. Life is in him. It's all in him. If you're dead and you need life,
go to Christ. It's all in him. He's all you'll
need. He's all that you will need to
get from here to glory. I promise you that's so. And
the manna is a picture of that. The manna shows us Christ is
everything that we need spiritually. Every day for 40 years, you know
what the children of Israel ate? Manna, manna. It wasn't a very
variety of a diet, was it? They ate manna for 40 years.
And do you know that manna took them all the way to the promised
land? It was enough to sustain them
and bring them to the promised land. Now you come to Christ
and you feed on him. Christ, the bread of life, will
sustain you. I promise you he will. All the
way through this wilderness of sin, until we appear in glory. It's Christ alone. It won't be
Christ plus your strength, Christ plus your ability to walk, Christ
plus your ability to scavenge and find some other food. It's
Christ alone. It's Christ alone. Now you come
and you eat him. Look at John 6. This is what
the Lord said. We've covered this many times,
you know this, that when the Lord talks about eating, he means
believing. He means union with Christ. John 6, verse 50. This is the bread which cometh
down from heaven that a man may eat thereof and not die. Remember the Lord told him, your
fathers ate man in the wilderness, they're all dead. This is the
bread which cometh down from heaven that a man may eat thereof
and not die. I am the living bread, which
came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread,
he shall live forever. And the bread that I will give
is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. Christ
is the bread of life, and this is what the Savior says now.
You believe on him, and you'll have eternal life. Now I know
this from experience, and if anybody's out there struggling
with this, let me see if I can give you some help. I can't remember a day in my
life that I didn't know you'd have eternal life if you believe
on Christ. I can't remember a day in my life that I did not know
that. And I wish I could count up the wasted years trying to
make myself believe on Christ. You can't do it. I mean, it's
the most miserable place to be in when you're trying to make
yourself do something you can't do, to believe on Christ. But
can I give you a piece of advice? Call out to God in prayer and
beg him to give you the gift of faith. If he gives you the
gift of faith, you'll believe and you'll never not believe.
And what you'll believe is not a set of doctrines and a few
points that you gotta remember. You'll believe Christ. And if
you believe him, you'll have life and your doctrine will be
just fine. I promise you it will. But here's
the third thing that they kept here in the ark. It was Aaron's
rod that budded. Now you can read about this in
number 16, the rebellion of Korah. You're probably all familiar
with it. Korah and these men, they, you know, rebelled against
Moses and Aaron and said, we're just as good as you. We should,
we should be the leaders instead of you. And God said, show you
how I'm going to deal with this matter. And he told him, you
pick a prince from every tribe, and you have them put their stick,
their walking stick. You put it down before the ark,
and you leave it there overnight. In the morning, you'll know who
my high priest is. And they all laid their rods
out before the ark. And Aaron, they picked Aaron
as the one to represent the tribe of Levi, and in the morning,
Aaron's rod budded. And it didn't just have buds
on it, it had buds. It had blossoms and it had fruit. Full grown almond, I think it
was almonds what grew on it. That stick had every stage of
life in it. Look at, let me show you that
Numbers chapter 17. Numbers 17. verse eight. And it came to pass
that on the morrow, Moses went into the tabernacle of witness
and behold the rod of Aaron for the house of Levi was budded
and it brought forth buds and bloom blossom and yielded almonds.
And verse 10, the Lord said unto Moses, bring Aaron's rod again
before the testimony to be kept for a token against the rebels.
And thou shalt quite take away their murmurings for me that
they die not. They put that rod in the ark. as a reminder who God's high
priest is. And don't you murmur against
him. Don't you murmur against him. The Lord Jesus Christ is
our great high priest. He's God's anointed. He was anointed
of old to be the savior of his people. Now don't murmur against
him. Don't say, well, I don't like
that gospel. I want this and I want, don't
murmur against him. Do you know why Israel lived
after this rebellion of Korah and his buddies, they were swallowed
up in the earth, but you know why the rest of Israel lived
there and in several other places? Because Aaron, who they were
murmuring against, made an atonement for the rebels. The Lord Jesus
Christ was chosen by his father to be the high priest of his
people. Remember there in Isaiah 41, he said, behold, mine elect,
That's his son. Not only did the father elect
a people to save, he elected a savior to save them. But Christ
is not like a priesthood of Aaron. Aaron was the high priest for
however long he was the high priest, and then he died. Somebody
had to take his place, didn't they? Christ is a high priest
after the order of Melchizedek. Christ has an eternal, everlasting,
unchanging priesthood. And because he has an unchanging
priesthood, he ever liveth to make intercession for his people.
You know why his people aren't snuffed out? Because Christ,
our high priest, made atonement, and he makes intercession for
his people. So don't go looking for any other high priest, anybody
to bring you to God. You go to Christ. He'll bring
you to God. Second, Aaron's rod tells us believers have life
in Christ. I often wonder, How long ago
did Aaron cut that, his rod, cut it off of a tree or whatever
and start using it for a walking stick? How long ago did he do
that? This rod has been dead a long
time. And suddenly it blossoms and
blooms and bears almonds. That's Christ our Savior. He
did die. But he was raised again, wasn't
he? Raised again to never die again and he bears much fruit. Oh, much fruit. There's gonna
be heaven populated with a number that you and I can't count, made
just like him. I mean, that's some good fruit,
isn't it? Spiritual life is in Christ. Do you want life? Go to Christ. He is our life. We have eternal life by union
with Christ, by being joined to him. Christ is the vine and
we're the branches. We've been dead sticks a long,
long time. About 6,000 years, we've been
dead sticks. But believers in Christ, they
bear fruit because of this vital union with Christ. And the old
timers called it a vital union because there's no life without
it. If you want life, you come to Christ. You come to him. The
Lord said, he that believeth on me hath everlasting life. I am the resurrection and the
life. He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall
he live. I will give them life. And you
know why that life can't be lost? You don't ever have to worry
that God's Holy Spirit's gonna birth new life in you, but you're
gonna kill it and not end up in glory. You don't have to worry
about that. You know why? Because it's kept safe in Christ. just
like Aaron's rod was kept safe in this art. That's a whole lot of pictures
for a box that's four feet by two and a half feet, isn't it?
Only God could do such a thing, and I hope you'll enjoy this
study. I have so enjoyed studying this
this week, and I look forward to the coming weeks. I hope you
will too, and it'll be a blessing to you. Let's bow together. Our Father, how we thank you
for this glorious picture of Christ our Savior that we find
in the tabernacle and in the Ark of the Covenant. Father,
we're so thankful. How can we begin to give you
thanks for revealing these things to your people so that we actually
see Christ in these pictures, that they cause our hearts to
believe Him, that it draws our hearts to Him, that in these
pictures you showed us something of the glory of Christ our Savior.
And Father, I pray that you would reveal that glory to each heart
here this evening. And Father, let us leave here
tonight believing in Christ our Savior. It's for his sake, for
his glory we pray, amen. All right, Sean. Okay, if you would, turn in your
hymnal to song number 51 and stand as we sing Praise the Savior. Praise the Savior, ye who know
him, who can tell how much we owe him. Gladly let us render
to him all we are and have. Jesus is the name that charms
us, he for conflict, fits and arms us. Nothing moves and nothing
harms us while we trust in Him. Trust in him, ye saints, forever. He is faithful, changing never. Neither force nor guile can sever
those he loves from him. Keep us, Lord, oh, keep us cleaving. to thyself and still believing
till the hour receiving promise joys with thee then we shall
be where we would be then we shall be what we should be things
that are not now nor could be soon shall be