Exodus chapter 25, our lesson
is going to begin in verse 17. 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 ye 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 one
to 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 will I 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, and of all things
which I shall give thee in commandment unto the children of Israel."
Now, the mercy seat was one pure slab of gold. It's about four
feet long, about two and a half feet wide, and it had cherubims
on each end of it with their wings outstretched towards each
other covering the mercy seat. And it was all one piece of gold.
Now, no one knows how thick the mercy seat was, so no one can
really accurately estimate the monetary value of the mercy seat. But everyone I've read agrees,
just because of the size of it, this was monetarily the most
valuable piece of furniture in the whole tabernacle. And that's
a picture to us of the cost of redemption. to redeem our souls is more costly
than we can really estimate. We cannot count up how valuable
it is, how the cost that our Lord paid to redeem our souls,
and that's what this most valuable piece of furniture in the tabernacle
represents. It's the centerpiece of the whole
tabernacle. The rest of the tabernacle was
built to house the Ark and the Mercy Seat. It's the centerpiece.
And I want us to see this morning in a number of ways how this
mercy seat is a picture of Christ. Now, first, it was an exact fit
on top of the ark. It wasn't too short, it wasn't
too narrow, so it would fall in. It was an exact fit. And
that's what Christ is to us. He is an exact fit to save an
exact number of people that the Father gave to the Son in the
covenant of grace. And the sacrifice of Christ is
an exact fit to save an exact number of people. All the people
that God chose to salvation. Now Christ is not too broad.
Just like the mercy seat was not too broad so that it had
overhang over top of the ark. It wasn't too broad. Christ is
not too broad so that some is left over and wasted. And Christ
is not too narrow. so that his blood, his righteousness,
his sacrifice is not enough to save everyone that comes to him.
Christ is an exact fit to save everyone that is called to him.
Now he's an exact fit. Christ did not die to make salvation
possible for Adam's race. Christ died to make salvation
certain for everyone that God chose in Christ. He's an exact
fit. And this mercy seat covered the
ark and it covered everything in the ark. And you remember
one of the things that was put in the ark was the broken law.
The mercy seat covers the broken law. Now both my daughters have
cars that this summer needed some repairs to. And it came
time, you know, we knew their cars had to be repaired and they're
kind of worried about, you know, how we're going to pay for this.
And I told them, don't worry. I've got you covered. And what
that means when I tell them, I've got you covered, is you
have no worries. I tell her that all the time.
Something comes up, don't worry, I've got you covered. And that
means you have no worries. You don't have to worry about
spending a single dime. I will take care of everything
that's required. I'll take care of all the expenses.
I've got you covered. That's what Christ Our Mercy
Seek does for His people. He covers the broken law. He
completely covers the law for his people. Christ Jesus was
obedient to every point of the law. There was not one point
that he left uncovered. He kept every point perfectly. And he freely imputes that obedience
to his people. He covered everything that God
requires of us and freely imputed it, gave it to his people. But
he went further than that. Christ was obedient, Scripture
says, even unto death. Christ died for the sins of his
people and that blood that he shed completely covered our sin
debt. It fully paid the debt for every
sin that was laid on him for all of his people. The blood
of Christ completely covered the broken law so that God cannot
see it because the blood covers it. And that's pictured every
day of atonement, once a year, every day of atonement, the hot
priest would come in and he'd sprinkle blood on this mercy
seat between the wings of those charities, showing the blood
on the mercy seat. It's the blood, it's the blood,
it's the blood that covers the broken law. Now remember I told
you the mercy seat's the most valuable, monetarily, the most
valuable piece of furniture in the tabernacle. You think of
the value having your sins covered. It's so valuable it cannot be
paid for any other way but the blood of Christ. I don't care
how much money you gather together, it cannot be paid for any other
way than the blood of Christ. And you know, most people don't
see that as being very valuable. I mean, what most people come
to religion for is somebody to heal them, somebody to make them
rich, somebody to take care of all their problems in this world.
And that's what they see as valuable, because they do not see themselves
as sinners. But if God ever shows us who
and what we are, nothing will be more valuable to us than the
blood, than the mercy seat that covers our sin, that covers the
broken law. And someone might think, I'm
such a sinner, I'm so vile, I'm so wretched. And the message
of the mercy seat is, I got you covered. Christ, our mercy seat,
says, I've got you covered. Now rest in Him. Just rest. When I tell my daughter, Savannah,
I got you covered, my feelings would be hurt, quite honestly,
if she kept worrying about it. I got you covered. And she doesn't
worry about it. Christ, our Lord, says, I've
got you covered. Now rest in Him. Just rest in
Him. You know, all those Old Testament sacrifices kept reminding
people of their sins. And it reminded them of their
sins because they had to keep doing it again and again and
again. It's rinse and repeat, rinse
and repeat, rinse and repeat, because the stain's not gone.
But God gave us a picture of this mercy seat that someone's
coming who's going to put sin away so completely that God,
who is everywhere, God who is all seeing, cannot see it because
it's been covered with the blood of the Lamb. Now that's valuable,
and that's what the mercy seat's a picture of. Now next, the mercy
seat is called by Israel of old and all the Old Testament writers,
they called the mercy seat the throne of God in Israel. Now
the high priest could approach the throne of God in Israel on
the day of atonement with the blood of the sacrifice. And that's
the exact same way sinners come to the throne of God today, to
find mercy, to be accepted, bringing the blood, pleading the blood
of the Lord Jesus Christ. But now remember, you come to
Christ. That's the commandment of Scripture.
You come to Christ. But you remember you're coming
to a throne. Now we're coming to the Sovereign, begging for
mercy. But you're begging on good ground
when you plead. the blood of the Son of God.
You parents, how valuable is the blood of your children to
you? I mean, think about it. How valuable,
how precious are your children? And we're sinful men and women,
aren't we? Think how valuable the Son of God is to the Father. You come pleading His blood and
His righteousness, begging mercy for His sake, you'll be accepted
because of the value, how precious the Son of God is to the Father.
In the mercy seat, the throne of God in Israel, this is the
only seat in the whole tabernacle. There's not a seat found anywhere
else in this whole complex. And there's not a seat found
anywhere because the high priest's work was never done. No matter how much he did, he
had to do it over again. It was never done. But the throne
is where the king sits. Ruling and reigning. And he sits
because the work is finished. He cried, it is finished. And he gave up the ghost. There
was no need to stay here anymore because the work was finished.
And he sits down. He sits. There's no need to go
out and fight another battle. There's no threat to his kingdom.
He sits. And we rest in him. The only
place for a sinner to find rest for his weary soul is in Christ
our mercy seat. This is where he sits because
the work is finished. Now the Hebrew word that's here
in our text is mercy seat. is the exact same word as the
Greek word that's interpreted and translated in the New Testament,
propitiation. Now, I did a lot of reading this
week, and boy, people get deep, I mean deep, trying to give a
definition of this word propitiation. Now, the word actually means
to appease, or to expiate, or to satisfy, to make satisfaction. Look over in Hebrews chapter
2. In Hebrews 2 verse 17, Wherefore, in all things it behooved
him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a
merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God,
to make reconciliation for the sins of the people. And actually,
the proper translation of that word reconciliation is to make
propitiation. He came to make propitiation
for the sins of the people. Now, in order for God to save
a sinner, God must first do something for Himself. Before God can do
something for us, He must do something for Himself first.
You see, God cannot violate His holiness and His justice in saving
a sinner. God just can't say, well, you
know, I'll let you go and ignore the fact that you're guilty.
Man's justice wouldn't stand for that. I mean, you know, someone
murders someone. Imagine Charles Manson, the parole
board saying, you know, we're just going to let you go. You
know, you killed all those people. We're going to let you go. There'd
be an outrage in our society because you're letting a guilty
man go free. Man's justice doesn't stand for
that. Well, God's justice certainly won't. He's not going to violate
His holiness just by letting a sinner go free and ignore his
guilt. So God must provide a propitiation. And the propitiation enables
God to remain holy and still bless the sinner because the
sin has been removed. The propitiation is offered to
God. The propitiation is to satisfy
God. And once that propitiation has
been made, Once sin has been put away, now God is satisfied
and He can be merciful. He can show mercy to sinners
in justice and righteousness. Now that's the definition of
propitiation. And I looked and looked and looked
at these definitions. I mean, it got deep. And I thought,
well, you know, all those things are, that's true. But boy, there's
not a lot of blessing there. I mean, he just gets so deep.
Here's the blessing that I want us to give. The propitiation
is not a doctrinal idea. It's not like a plank on our
religious platform, you know. Christ didn't come. God didn't
send his son into this world just to provide a propitiation. God sent his son into this world
to be the propitiation. The propitiation that we have
is not a thing, it's not a doctrinal idea. Our propitiation is a person,
the Lord Jesus Christ. And I'll show you that. Look
first at 1 John chapter 2. Christ is our propitiation because
he is the one who removed the sin of his people through the
sacrifice of himself. In 1 John 2 verse 1, my little
children, These things write I unto you, that ye sin not.
And if, and you know that's when, any man sin, we have an advocate
with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And he is the
propitiation for our sins. Basically what he's saying there
is, when we sin, Christ has it covered. He is the propitiation
for our sins. And not for ours only, but also
for the sins of the whole world. Christ is the propitiation. Now
look over chapter 4 in verse 10. Herein is love. Not that we love
God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation
for our sins. And you notice he didn't say
he sent his son to provide the propitiation for our sins, does
he? He sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. Christ
is the one who removed our sin, and was the propitiation, so
that let God be merciful to us. Now, look back at Romans chapter
3. About all of you knew we were
going to end up here. In Romans 3 verse 24, being justified freely by his
grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom
God set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to
declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are
past through the forbearance of God. Now here's how God is
reconciled. Here's how God can forgive the
sins of the Old Testament believers, which are past, and at the same
time forgive the sins of future believers, which are all in the
future. He did that at the same time. It's through the sacrifice
of His Son. We're saved through faith in
His blood, by believing in His blood. That's a picture of the
blood that the high priest brought into the Holy of Holies and sprinkled
on this mercy seat every year. And the propitiation is done,
it's for God. It's to remove our sins, enable
Him to still be God, and have mercy on us. I was studying a little bit one
night this week and I came out and told Janet, you know, I always
try things out on her before I try them out on you. If it
makes sense to her, I figured I'm on the right track, you know,
if it makes sense to you. And I told her about this and she
said, that cannot be stressed enough. And this is what I told
her. The blood was not offered to
you and me. The blood was offered to God
to make propitiation for our sins. The blood was offered to
appease God's anger against sin. The people of Israel never, one
time, saw the blood sprinkled on this mercy seat. Not one time
ever did they see it. They were all out here. This
was taking place in the Holy of Holies. They couldn't see
it. But it didn't matter. It wasn't offered to them. The
blood was offered before the Lord. It was offered to God to
make propitiation for our sins. Now Christ did not die to make
an offer of salvation to Adam's race. He did not die. Just make
salvation an offer and see maybe if somebody will accept him as
their personal savior. That's not why he died. He didn't
offer the blood to you and me. The blood was offered to God,
to the Father. He offered his blood upon the
altar before the Father to make propitiation for our sins, to
remove the sins of God's people. The blood was offered to God.
And that was pictured in this mercy scene. This shows us that
thousands of times that the high priest came and sprinkled blood
on this mercy seat, thousands of times, at least 2,000 years,
shows us there can be no mercy, there can be no forgiveness of
sins, without the sin-atoning blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And once the blood was shed,
offered to God, propitiation's been made, God is satisfied God can do something for sinners.
And that's what happens in verse 26. To declare, I say, at this
time, his righteousness, that he might be just and the justifier
of him which believeth in Jesus. The way God can be just and still
justify a sinner is through the propitiation, through the blood
that was offered to the Father to pay the sin debt of his people. God told Moses, you build this
mercy seat. And he said, there will I meet
with thee. There will I commune with thee. Between the wings
of the cherubim, above the mercy seat. The Shekinah glory of God
shone and dwelt between these wings of the cherubim. David, in the Psalms, four times
uses this phrase, the shadow of thy wings. The shadow of thy
wings. And what he means is the mercy
seat, the shadow of the wings that is formed above the mercy
seat. And when David talks about the shadow of thy wings, what
he means is a place of mercy. He's looking for a place of mercy
when he talks about the shadow of thy wings. I'm going to read
you three of them and then we'll turn to the fourth one. In Psalm
17 verse 8, David says, keep me as the apple of the eye. Hide
me. under the shadow of thy wings.
Hide me in the place of mercy, under the shadow of thy wings
where the blood has been offered for my sin. That's where I want
to be hid, in the place of mercy, where the blood has bought mercy
for me. Psalm 36 verse 7. He says, How
excellent is thy lovingkindness, O God! Therefore the children
of men put their trust under the shadow of thy wings. Where's
our faith? It's in Christ. It's through
faith in His blood that's offered upon the mercy seat between the
wings of the cherubim. That's where our faith is. Hide
me there. Keep me there. Psalm 63, verse 7. Because thou
hast been my help, therefore in the shadow of thy wings will
I rejoice. Where can you find a place of
true rejoicing? Rejoicing that'll last. John
and I were talking about this before service. You know, in
this life, the Lord gives us a few moments sometimes, you
know, when there's something you're happy about. It's a blessing
the Lord gives you, but it never lasts. I mean, because things
of this earth don't. Where can you find a place of true rejoicing
that will last? Mercy. The place where the blood
of Christ had bought mercy for his people. Now look over at
Psalm 57. This is the fourth time. that
David uses this phrase, the shadow of thy wings. Psalm 57, verse 1. Here David comes pleading for
mercy. He says, Be merciful unto me, O God, be merciful unto me,
for my soul trusteth in thee. Yea, in the shadow of thy wings
will I make my refuge. until these calamities be overpassed.
This is where I'm going to put my trust and my rest and make
my refuge in the place where mercy has been bought by the
blood of Christ. And he goes on, verse 2, he says,
I will cry unto God most high, unto God that performeth all
things for me. This is God saying, I've got
you covered. I'll perform all things for you.
He shall send from heaven and say that he's going to send his
son from heaven to be the propitiation for my sins. He'll save me from
the reproach of him that would swallow me up. All of our sins
would completely swallow us up and send our souls to eternal
damnation if it wasn't for Christ, our mercy, who made propitiation
for us. And this was the place in the
shadow of the wings, of thy wings, this is the place, God said,
I'll meet with you and commune with you. Well, that's the place
that God will meet with men today in mercy. It's at the throne
of God in Christ, our propitiation. That's the place God will meet
with us. Now, these cherubins, they're on each end of the mercy
seat. They were part of the mercy seat. They didn't make them separately
and, you know, weld them to it or attach them to the mercy seat
some way. It was all one piece of gold that was beaten into
the correct shape. And that shows us mercy to sinners
requires a beating. God's justice must be satisfied. That beating must be taken out
on someone. And the beating for all God's
elect was taken out on Christ, our propitiation. He was beaten
by God. He was beaten by men, but the
punishment came when he was beaten by God for our sins. And that's
what these cherubim are looking at. They're looking down where
the high priest sprinkled that blood. That's what they're looking
at. Now we've seen this in other places in our study of the tabernacle,
how the cherubims are a picture of power. We read it before,
how they're mighty living creatures. And if you tried to separate
these mighty living creatures from the mercy seed, you'd destroy
it. Because it's all one piece. And
those cherubims represent power and authority. Well, when men
preach a so-called Jesus, with a little J, Jesus, without absolute
power, without absolute sovereignty, without absolute omnipotence,
they destroy the gospel so that they don't have any gospel whatsoever
to preach. If you truly preach the gospel,
you truly preach Christ, and you truly understand the message
of the gospel, you'd be like that leper that came to our Lord. If you will, you can make me
clean. The emphasis is on if you will. You have the power. There's no
question about that. It's if you will. I'm the mercy
beggar. You're the king. The question
is, will you? That's what's pictured by these
cherubim. And the importance of this mercy
seed was shown throughout the history of Israel. The Philistines
came one day and captured the Ark and took it away. And they
came and told Eli, the Ark of the Lord has been captured and
taken away. And Eli fell back in horror and
hit his head and died. And Eli's daughter-in-law said,
the glory of the Lord is departed from Israel. Not because Eli
died. but because the ark of God was
taken." That's what she said. The glory of God has departed
from Israel because the ark of God is taken. How should we respond when Christ
is no longer preached in a place? When Christ is no longer preached
here? Someday, that'll be the case. Christ is no longer preached. What's our response? The glory
of God is taken away. The glory of God has departed.
You know, the past couple days I've been humming to myself the
song, The Mercy Seek. And I looked at it this morning
when I got here, because there was a verse, I couldn't remember
the exact wording of it. And there's a sixth verse in
this song that illustrates this point very well. I don't care
how much skill I've got, how much oratory skill a person may
have, if Christ is not preached, the glory's departed. The songwriter
said, oh, let my hand forget her skill, and my tongue be silent,
cold and still. This bounding heart forget to
beat. I'd rather die if I forget the mercy secret. I'd rather
die than have to live in this world and not be able to worship,
to be able to come to worship. A friend of mine, years ago,
fell ill. and came to the point that they
would not be able, they'd be homebound until the Lord took
them. Couldn't come to worship service anymore. And this was
their statement. What's the point in living if
I can't go to the house of the Lord anymore? What's the point
of going to a place, dressing up on your Sunday best and going
to a place where Christ is not preached? Because the glory of
God has departed. And when they brought that ark
back to Israel, King David danced in that procession, the front
of that procession. There's the king dancing in joy
because God's being brought back. And people looked at him and
thought, you know, that's foolish. This kind of behavior is beneath
the king. But the king was rejoicing because the glory of God was
returning to Israel. How much more should we rejoice
when we have another opportunity to hear Christ preach? It may
have just been since Wednesday. But how much more should we rejoice?
This is the opportunity that God has given us to come into
the presence of His glory and hear His Son preached. And Israel,
everywhere they went, through the wilderness, as they moved
from place to place, as they, you know, got in that big parade,
here they go, following the cloudy pillar, wherever it would lead
them, the ark went first. They always follow the ark. When
it came time for them to cross Jordan and go into the promised
land, the ark went first and all people went behind it. Telling
us, when they went into battle, the soldiers didn't go first,
the ark went first and the soldiers went behind it. You follow the
ark. And that tells us that's the
believer's life, is to follow the Lord Jesus Christ wherever
he leads. You find out where he's preached
and be there. You find out what His will is
for you and you do it. Just do whatever it is He gives
you and you follow Him and all will be well. When they go into
battle without the ark, they try to go somewhere off without
the ark and they met with disaster every time. Follow Christ. Just keep following Him. But
now do not trifle with this matter of preaching Christ and hearing
Christ preached. Just like you don't trifle with
this ark. You know, in 1 Samuel 5, the Philistines captured the
ark. Well, to them, this is just another religious relic, you
know, another idol. And they go put it in the house
of their idol, Dagon. They come in the morning. They
found Dagon falling on his face before the ark. Well, they set
Dagon back up in his place. They come back in the next morning.
There's Dagon again, falling down before the ark. His hands
had broke off, and just a stump of him remained. Well, I guess
they set him back up, you know. And all these horrible things
kept happening to him. You can read about the horrible...
I mean, all the men were smitten with hemorrhoids and all kinds
of awful things. And they finally said, we're
going to send this thing back. They finally figured out God's
judging them because they're trifling with the ark of God. They said, we're going to send
this thing back. Get this thing away from us. You do not trifle with
the preaching of Christ. Every knee shall bow and every
tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. to the glory
of God the Father. You do not, you know, I thought
this morning how serious, you know, my hands are cold and the
weight of opening God's Word to God's people. But we ought not trifle with
hearing the Word of God either. How come my hands aren't cold
and my heart doesn't race and I'm not worried on Wednesday
night when I come to listen to John preach. Do not trifle with
hearing the word of God. This is a precious blessing. Don't trifle with it. Uzzrah
taught us that lesson. They were bringing the ark back
from the Philistines. They didn't do it the way God
told them to do it. They didn't carry the ark through
the staves on the shoulders of the priests. They gave it a place
of honor, didn't they? Put it on a new ark. Never carried
anything before. Put it on the new oxen to pull
it. Oh, they're beautiful. They're
strong. They're pretty. Oh, they're the best we got.
And here they go, bringing the ark back. And those oxen stumbled
just a little bit and the ark shook. All those of his reached
up and touched it. He didn't want the ark of God
falling to the ground. God smote him and killed him
in that instance. You do not trifle with the ark
of God. You do not trifle with the preaching
of Christ. You come to Christ, but you come
reverently before the throne, knowing he's God.