And thou shalt make an altar
of shittum wood, five cubits long and five cubits broad. The
altar shall be four square, and the height thereof shall be three
cubits. And thou shalt make the horns of it upon the four corners
thereof. His horns shall be of the same,
and thou shalt overlay it with brass. And thou shalt make his
pans to receive his ashes, and his shovels, and his basins,
and his flesh hooks, and his firepans, all the vessels thereof
shalt thou make of brass. And thou shalt make for it a
grate of net-work of brass, and upon the net shalt thou make
four brazen rings in the four corners thereof. And thou shalt
put it under the compass of the altar beneath, that the net may
be even in the midst of the altar. And thou shalt make staves for
the altar, staves of shit and wood, and overlay them with brass.
And the staves shall be put into the rings, and the staves shall
be upon the two sides of the altar to bear it. Hollow with
boards shalt thou make it, as it was shewed thee in the mount,
So, so they make it. Now, this brazen altar, I can get it off here. It's stuck
on there good. This brazen altar was the largest
piece of furniture in this tabernacle. It was square. Its sides are
seven and a half feet long. It's four and a half feet deep.
And it was made, like we read, of the incorruptible wood covered
with brass. And that's what we see over and
over and over again, the incorruptible wood covered with brass. And
beginning next week, we'll see incorruptible wood covered with
gold. The reoccurring theme throughout this tabernacle is the God-man.
That incorruptible wood is a picture of the sinless humanity of Christ. Our Lord had no sin, no sin whatsoever
of His own. So if He's going to die, He's
got to lay down his life. He's not going to die because
of his own sin. So if he's going to die, he's
got to lay down his life. And that shows us how he voluntarily
became sin for his people. He volunteered to have the sin
of his people imputed to him. And even in death, his body was
incorruptible. It didn't decay in death because
the sin that was charged to him was gone because of his sacrifice.
So that incorruptible wood is the sinless humanity of Christ. But this is all covered with
brass. And just like we've seen in the
post of the fence, this brass is a picture of the deity of
Christ. And this brass is known for its strength. Look in Psalm
89. Psalm 89. This is a picture of
the strength of Christ. When God sent a Savior into this
world, He did not send a boy to do a man's job. He sent one
who is mighty to save. Look in Psalm 89 verse 19. Then thou spakest in vision to
thy Holy One and saidest, I have laid help upon one that is mighty. I have exalted one chosen out
of the people. Where did He lay help? On one
who is mighty. And that's what the brass of
this altar pictures, one who is mighty. This brass has got
such strength, it will withstand fire. And that was so necessary
for this altar to be able to withstand fire because they constantly
kept a fire burning in this thing. They had so many sacrifices to
offer. They never let the fire go out.
It was just constant, one after another, after another, after
another, so many sacrifices. And that fire that was constantly
burning consumed those sacrifices, but never changed the brass.
This brass was never affected, even though, I mean, you can
imagine how hot that fire was in a space seven and a half feet
by seven and a half feet, four and a half feet deep. You can
imagine how hot this thing got, but the brass was never changed. And that's such a clear picture
of Christ bearing the fire of God's wrath for the sins that
were laid on him. Look in Revelation chapter 1. When the apostle John got a vision
of our Lord on the Isle of Patmos, this is what he saw in Revelation
1 verse 13. And in the midst of the seven
candlesticks, one likened to the Son of Man, clothed with
a garment down to the foot, and girded about the paths with a
golden girdle. His head and his hairs were white like wool, as
white as snow, and his eyes were as a flame of fire, and his feet
likened to fine brass, as if they had been burned in a furnace,
and his voice as the sound of many waters." Why do you reckon
his feet, this vision that John saw, looked like fine brass as
if they had been burned in a furnace? Because they had been. He bore
the fire of God's wrath against the sins of his people. He trod
that fire, that horrible judgment alone and was able to withstand
it because he is actually God. And that's what this brass represents.
Only God, only this perfect holy God could bear that judgment. And that's what this brass represents.
Now, if you look over in Hebrews 13, I want to show you so clearly, without mistake, that this altar
is given to us as a picture of Christ. You know, we don't have an altar
like this today. We don't have an altar of brass
or something out here, you know, we're offering animals and stuff
on. But we do have an altar. Look
in Hebrews 13, verse 10. We have an altar. Whereof they
have no right to eat which serve the tabernacle. Now we have an
altar and that altar is the Lord Jesus Christ. And what the apostle
means here when he talks about that they have no right to eat
which serve the tabernacle, the priests ate the meat that was
roasted with fire on this altar. That's where they got their food.
They didn't own animals and livestock and crops and so forth. So this
is where they got their food. Well, believers are made kings
and priests, scripture says, unto our God. And someone who
serves this altar, who serves the law, has no right to eat
of our altar of the Lord Jesus Christ. They have no right to
eat of the freedom and salvation and forgiveness of sins that's
found in the Lord Jesus Christ, our altar. He's the fulfillment
of this. This is just a picture. This
is the law. Christ is the fulfillment of it. He's full of grace and
truth. And Christ is the altar. He's
the sacrifice that's offered on the altar and He's the high
priest who's offering the sacrifice on the altar. Christ is all. I hope we see that. He is all. He's everything. Now, the whole
Levitical system was based on this altar and the sacrifices
that were constantly offered on this altar. The whole Levitical
system hung on this, based upon this. But Christ is all. What we believe is not just based
upon Christ. Christ is everything we believe. Our hope of salvation is not
just based on Christ. It's not just based on things
that surround Christ. Our hope of salvation is Christ. Christ is all. So much better
than just the picture. Christ is all. And I'll tell
you where you found this altar. It was inside the gate. The altar
is not placed out here where everybody could see it. The altar
was in here, inside the gate. The altar was only for people
who came inside the tabernacle. That was the only people that
this altar was for. And that's a picture of Christ.
Christ isn't out here outside the tabernacle. He didn't die
for the sins of the whole wide world. He died for His people,
the people that were put in Him by the Father. That's where you
find this altar. It's in the tabernacle. It's
just meant for those people who come inside the gate. And if
you come inside the gate, the very first thing you see is this
altar. It was placed right at the gate.
That's the very first thing that you saw. And you had to have
a sacrifice before you went any further. You had to have a sacrifice. And it shows us so clearly, no
sinner. can come to God without a sacrifice. God must be worshipped with a
sacrifice. But now listen, it has to be
the sacrifice that God will accept. You can't just say, well, okay,
I'll sacrifice. I'll give up chocolate or I'll
give up smoking or drinking or cussing. That might be a sacrifice
to sinful flesh like us, but that's not a sacrifice that God
will accept. He's not going to be worshipped
with that kind of sacrifice. It's got to be the sacrifice
that God will accept. And the only sacrifice that the
Father will accept is the sacrifice of His Son. The people that brought
a sacrifice to this altar had to bring a sacrifice prescribed
by God. They brought the sheep. They
brought the ram. They brought the bullock. They
brought the animals. God had prescribed. He must be
worshipped with the sacrifice that God will accept. And when
you saw, when you came in the gate, you saw this altar, you
knew very, very quickly, this is a place of sacrifice. This was a place of slaughter. It was a bloody Smelly place
you can just imagine after all the animals just constantly one
after another the priest was slaying beside this altar and
the blood and the Gore and then the burning of the flesh. This
was a place of sacrifice of slaughter The word altar is Taken from
the word that means slaughter the altar is meant as a place
of slaughter It was not a pretty place There in Exodus 27, we
are first reading about the altar. There's a word in there that
gives a very clear indication of what went on at this altar.
God told Moses, you make the flesh hooks of brass. These animals were slaughtered.
They were cut up and placed on the altar and you needed flesh
hooks to move those things around because of the heat of the fire.
You had to have flesh hooks. This is a place of slaughter. And the main activity that went
on inside this in the tabernacle is the sacrifices. That's the
main thing. They were continually offering
sacrifices at this place of slaughter. You imagine how bloodstained
this place became around the altar after all those animal
sacrifices were offered continually. And you know, people might get
caught up in all the gold. and the silver and the precious
stones and things that were used to construct the tabernacle.
But the most abundant substance that's found in the tabernacle
is the blood of the sacrifice. Rivers of animal blood were shed
by the priests over the course of years at this altar. Rivers
of blood. And all those animal sacrifices
kept telling the children of Israel their sin was not purged. Because they offered a sacrifice
in the morning, but their sins not purged. Why? They had to
offer another one this evening. They had to offer another one
tomorrow. They had to offer one at noontime. They had to just
constantly be bringing sacrifices because the last sacrifice they
brought did not purge their sins. And this should have told them
so clearly. Salvation is not in the ceremony that goes on
in this altar. Salvation is found in Christ
our altar. They should have known we're
looking for one to come whose blood will atone for sin. This
animal's sacrifices are not taking away our sin. We're looking for
one to come who will put away our sin. We need a substitute
who can put away our sin. And in the fullness of time,
the Father sent His Son in righteousness into this world and His blood
did atone for the sin of His people. Hebrews 10.14, for by
one offering He hath perfected forever them that are sanctified. One offering, because His blood
did atone for sin. This was the sacrifice that the
Father will accept. And because of that sacrifice,
the Father says, their sins and iniquities will I remember no
more. Because of the sacrifice of His
Son. The very reason that Christ came incarnate into this world
was to die. He came to shed His blood on
the altar before the Father as payment for the sins of His people.
That's why He came. And just like people who get
caught up in the gold and the silver and the precious stones
of the tabernacle, people get caught up in the miracles of
our Lord. They get caught up in His healing
and the good deeds and the good words that He spoke. But I'm
telling you, what is most precious about our Lord is His precious
blood, His blood that put away the sin of His people. And when
our Lord shed His blood, it was not a pretty sight. He was slaughtered. When He sacrificed Himself, He
was slaughtered. His visage was marred more than
any man. That at Calvary was slaughter. I mean, look at it with the eyes
of faith. Look at it in your mind's eye.
I'm telling you, it's slaughter. It's horrible. And it had to
be horrible because that's the result of our sin. What happened
to him there was the result of my sin. It's horrible slaughter,
this judgment that's required for him to suffer for the sins
of his people. And at this altar is where you
got the most clear picture of the holiness of God, how much
God hates sin. God is Just and holy. Can't even look on sin. You didn't
have to look far. Just come in the gate and look
and you see the blood. You can imagine what the smell
of that place was. Just the smell of death. Calvary
was a place of slaughter. At Calvary is where you get the
most clear picture of man's sinfulness. Man's hatred of God. God put
His precious sons in the hands of man one time, and look what
we did to Him. Just beat Him, tortured Him,
made Him die the most painful, humiliating, horrible death that
we can come up with. That shows man's hatred of God. If someone ever tells you everybody
loves God, take them to Calvary. That's all you have to do. Take
them to Calvary. There's what man thinks about God. And at
Calvary, is where you see God's holy hatred of sin. When sin
was found on his son, God turned his back. And it wasn't just
man that killed him. It was the father that pierced
his soul. It was the father that made Christ
offer his soul as a sacrifice for sin. That's where we see
God's holiness and his hatred of sin. Now, look over in Exodus
chapter 40. This altar is a holy place. It's called Most Holy in Exodus
chapter 40. Exodus 40 verse 10. And thou shalt anoint the altar
of the burnt offering and all his vessels and sanctify the
altar and it shall be an altar most holy. The only pieces of
furniture in this tabernacle, they're all holy, but the only
ones who are called most holy is the brazen altar of sacrifice,
of the burnt offering. And we'll look at this, I don't
know, I never know how far I'm going to get each week. One week
we're going to look at the golden altar, the altar of incense.
Those two altars are the only pieces of furniture in the tabernacle
that are called most holy. This is a holy place. This sacrifice,
what's going on here is holy. Now God is just. God must punish
sin. And that's what the death that
went on in this altar showed us, that God will punish sin.
But do you know that anything that touched this altar was made
holy? It's most holy. And anything
that touched it was made holy. Now anyone who's in Christ, I
don't care the total depravity of our nature, anyone that God
by His grace puts in Christ, anyone who's been touched, by
Christ, the Son of God, is made holy. And we're made holy because
of the sacrifice of Christ that was offered on the altar before
the Father. And the sacrifices here show how God can be just
and justifier. It has to be through the death
of a substitute, through a sacrifice. And this is the place that God
will meet with men. Look back at Exodus 29. Right
here is where God will meet with men in Exodus 29, verse 42. And this shall be a continual
burnt offering throughout your generations at the door of the
tabernacle of the congregation before the Lord, where I will
meet with you to speak there unto thee. Here's where God will
meet with men because of the sacrifice. See, God must be worshipped,
he must be approached with a blood sacrifice. Now, this altar is
hollow, and the grate of it is actually probably down inside
the altar itself, and fire burned down inside the walls of this
altar. And that's a picture of the inward
soul suffering of Christ. That fire of God's wrath burned
in His soul, inside Him. And I'll tell you why that had
to be. Sin is not what we do. Sin is who we are. Our sinful
actions flow from inside us, from a sinful, depraved heart
and soul. And because sin is what's in
us, Christ had to suffer the sin that we are. He had to suffer
the punishment that we deserve. That's why Scripture said He
made His soul an offering for sin, that the fire of God's wrath
burned in His soul, inside of Him, because that's where sin
comes from us, from inside the heart. And that's why this fire
burned inside this altar. But the altar has four horns. And what they used these horns
for is to tie the sacrifice down to the altar. Now, horns in Scripture
are almost always a picture of power. And some of us were talking
about this Wednesday night after service. Christ was held to the
cross by His power to save. You know, the crowd mocked Him
and they said, well, He saved others. Himself He cannot save. Come down from the cross and
we'll believe you. And He didn't come down from the cross. And
He hung there until He gave up the ghost and died. And they
thought that meant He had no power. When in fact, just the
opposite was true. The fact that He hung there in
that bloody agony until He died was proof of His power. What
held Him there is power to save. His power to save the people
that He loved. There's no other way for them
to be redeemed. It was His power to save. that
held him there. It wasn't human weakness or Roman
nails, it's his power. And that's what these four horns
represent. Now the altar square has four sides. And remember
when we read the great was put in the compass of it. These four
sides faced all four points of the compass, showing us that
the Messiah, when he comes, is going to come as the Savior of
the whole world. Not just for the Jews, but for
the whole world, for spiritual Israel. Now listen, never be
afraid to come to Christ begging mercy. Never be afraid to do
that. He came to save all sorts of
people from all around this globe. He came to save sinners. Don't
let your sinfulness keep you from coming to Christ. That's
who he came to save, is sinners from all over the world. So never
be afraid to come to God, pleading the blood and the sacrifice of
Christ. That's the sacrifice he'll accept.
That's the only way he'll accept us. So never be afraid to come
to the Father, pleading the sacrifice of Christ. Now, this altar we've seen is
given to show us the sacrifice of Christ. But it's also given
to us to show the kingship of Christ. God never intended to
save a people through the sacrifice of an animal. That's foolish.
How can an animal put away the sins of a man? It can't be done.
In Hebrews 10 we read that in burnt offerings and sacrifices
for sin, thou hast had no pleasure. In all those thousands, untold
thousands of sacrifices that were offered on this altar, God
was never pleased. It never put away a single sin. This is not how God ever intended
to put away the sin of His people. When God puts away the sin of
His people, He's not sending an animal. He's sending the King. Look in Numbers chapter 4. In Numbers 4 verse 13, now this
is when the pillar, the cloudy pillar would begin to move. The
children of Israel know we've got to move camp. They had to
pack everything up and move when that cloudy pillar started to
move. Well, when that thing started to move, they had to pack up
not just their tents, they had to pack up this whole tabernacle
because it was just a temporary, it was only meant to be temporary. And God gave them specific instructions
how to pack this thing up and move it when the clouds started
to move. And here's his instructions about moving this brazen altar.
Numbers 4 verse 13. And they shall take away the
ashes from the altar and spread a purple cloth thereon. Now remember when we looked at
the colors that were in the gate here. Purple was given as a representation
of royalty. That's what the purple represents.
There's a king coming. to be the sacrifice, to be the
altar, to put away the sins of his people. When God sends a
sacrifice, he's sending the very king of kings. But look at verse
14. Over top of this purple, the
royal robes, they shall put upon it all the vessels thereof, wherewith
they minister about it, even the censers, the flesh hooks,
and the shovels, and the basins, all the vessels of the altar,
and they shall spread upon it a covering of badger skins. and put to the staves of it. They carried it with the badger
skins, but everything else was covered with badger skins. Now
remember when we looked at the coverings of the tabernacle of
the congregation, those badger skins are a picture of the humanity
of Christ. That royalty was covered up with
a picture of the humanity of Christ. And what this is telling
us is a man is coming. who is King, who will put away
the sins of His people. It's the God-man again. As much
God as if He were not man, and as much man as if He were not
God. Great is the mystery of godliness.
God manifests in the flesh. And that's when they moved this
altar what that was a picture of. And just like the coverings
of the tabernacle of the congregation, you had to be given eyes to see
past the badger skin To see the purple royalty. To see the picture
of the royalty. I'll tell you who saw it. I know
one person who was given eyes to see that. You see it. I'll
tell you someone else who was given eyes to see it. Thief on
the cross. What did he say? Lord, remember me when you come
into your kingdom. Only kings come into their kingdom. That man, that sinful man, was
given eyes to see past the badger skin, to see past the bloody
sacrifice, to see past the slaughter, to see the King, the King of
Glory. Even way back here, 2,000 years
before Christ ever came incarnate, God's showing us amazing grace. Amazing, astounding grace. This ceremony, this law was never
given to save anyone. Salvation was always going to
come through amazing grace. Get a hold of this. The king,
the king of kings is coming to humiliate himself, to be the
sacrifice for his people. That's what we have in this prison
altar. I told you, I never know how far I'm going to get. I've
got lots of other notes. But we're going to quit here, and
Lord willing, we'll pick up next week with this labor, okay?