Turn back to the book of John,
chapter 1. I've got some things I want to
talk to you about this morning concerning the true tabernacle
of God. We've gathered here this morning,
I hope we have, to worship God. To worship God. And I just want
you to sit there for a minute and think about what I just said. We've gathered here this morning
to worship God. God. Those who worship God, the Scripture
said, must worship Him in spirit and in truth. He's not worshipped
with men's hands, Paul said, as though he needed anything.
He said, if I was hungry, I wouldn't tell you. I'm God. I created the sheep and the mountains
on which the sheep feed. I created the grass that they
feed on, the air that they breathe, and the water they drink. If
I was hungry, I wouldn't tell you. I'm God. I'm God. He's not to be worshipped with
men's hands as though he needed anything. He doesn't need the
drums and the guitar. He doesn't need the clapping
of the hands and the running of the aisles. He doesn't need
our wisdom. We need His. You see what I'm
saying? We've gathered here this morning
to worship God. The things that I have to speak
to you this morning are concerning men like myself and like you,
men and women, who come before God. Before God. It's not a matter of what I think,
or what you think, or what I feel, or what you feel, or something
we experience someplace in time, or events and circumstances of
our lives. We're talking about the eternal
God and peanut man, gathering together in one place. And I
tell you this, if you know anything at all about God, you know this,
all you can do is worship Him. Not in ceremony. Not in the dead
letter of duty and law. Not in pretense. We're big pretenders, aren't
we? We are. We don't like to admit it, but
we are. We pretend before men and we pretend before our parents,
even as child. We learn to do that as children.
And we pretend. And it carries over into our
adulthood. And it carries over into our
spiritual things. And we come in this place and
we have to keep up appearances. And we have to pretend. God can't
be worshipped with pretense. He has to be worshipped in truth. In truth. You can't pretend before
God. His eyes, see, they divide the
marrow of the bones. They're a discerner of the thoughts
and intents of your heart. You can't come before God and
worship Him and pretend. You just have to come as you
are. And God knows what we are. We're sinners. We're sinners. We're ignorant. Don't come in
here pretending to be wise. You're ignorant. I'm ignorant. What do we know about God? Where
was you, He said, when I laid the foundations of the earth?
when I hung the stars in the sky. Explain to me the mystery
of the frost and the snow, of migration. Explain it. If you know so much, tell me,
he said. He's God. Don't bring your wisdom
in here before God. Just come, not in pretense, but
come in sincerity of heart before God as a sinner, empty, ignorant. It's what we are. We come together with the heart,
coming together as we've been instructed, and we come together
in truth. Truth, I believe, is in a true
heart with true motives, true needs, true desires, and even
more than that, the truth as it's declared in the gospel of
God's mercy and grace in Christ. Where there is no gospel, there
is no worship. There is no worship. Where there
is no gospel, there is no assembling in His name. The only way you
can know the name of God and worship God in His name is through
the preaching of the gospel. If you assemble where there is
no gospel, you've not assembled in His name. Now where His name
is, whether they be two or three gathered together, He said, there
will I be in their midst. He didn't say, I might be. He
didn't say, I'm going to be there sometimes. He didn't say, I'm
going to be there if. He said, there will I be. Not for their sake, but for the
sake of My name. And My presence is going to be
among them. Boy, that's what we need. Now, I'm telling you,
that's what we need. There is no assembling in His
name apart from the gospel. And where there is no gospel,
there's no prayer, no fellowship, no communion with God. But what
is this gospel? Hold your place there in John
chapter 1 and turn with me over to Romans chapter 1. read this
verse by verse to you. You can look in it as I talk
and see that what I'm saying is from the Word of God. But
by way of introduction, I want to give you three things that
Paul states in his letter to the church at Rome concerning
this Gospel. And first of all, he declares
in verse 1 that it is the Gospel of God. You see that? He said,
I've been separated unto the gospel of God. It's God's gospel. Now gospel means good news. That's
what it means, good news. But this is good news from God. The more you know about God,
the more you'll look at that with wonder and awe. Good news. Good news from God. It's God's
gospel. It's His gospel. He's the author
of it. He's the author of it. Wise men... I was listening to a thing on
the History Channel just briefly yesterday. I was doing some painting
and I flipped something on that I could listen to and not have
to watch as I was painting. And they were talking about the
Bible. And they were discussing who
was the author of it. Did God write this thing? Did
one man write it? Or did several men write it?
Or how did this thing come into being? And they were speculating
on this thing, and they were all over. It's His gospel. He's the author of it. All Scripture
is by inspiration of God. It's His gospel. He's the Creator. The Governor,
the Judge, He alone can give the good news. And this gospel
reveals God. That's what it does. Now, I don't know. I listened
to them preach today and I honestly don't know what it is they're
trying to say. I just don't know. I listened to it and tried to
make some sense out of it just so I could deal with the error
of it. I can't even understand what it is they're trying to
say about God. This gospel reveals God. You can't just come down the
aisle and shake somebody's hand and come into fellowship with
God. You've got to know who God is in order to know what it takes
for you to be redeemed, in order to know what it takes to be approved of God. And we'll get into that here
in a minute in the study of the tabernacle, but Israel was just
going through the motions, going through the ceremony, going to
the priesthood, taking sacrifices and doing all these things. And
in Isaiah chapter 1, he said, Whoa! He said, Who hath told
you? Who required your presence in
my courts? What are you doing? What are
you doing in my presence? Who told you to bring these things
in here? Who told you to go through these
motions? Who told you to stand and wave your hands and not hear?
These are my courts. You come in here to worship me.
And the only way you can worship me is with the understanding.
Do you understand what that lamb represents? Do you understand
what that water represents? Do you understand what this priesthood
represents? Until you do, don't you come
rushing up into my presence waving your hands and pretending to
worship. Read it for yourself. God's revealed in this Gospel,
and this Gospel is revealed by God. I can stand up here all
day long and read you Scriptures and tell you things and just
walk out of here shaking my head. I just don't understand why they
don't get it. I know why you don't get it. It has to be revealed. Not the words of it, the glory
of it, the mystery of it, the affections of it. And it's God's
gospel in that when this gospel is preached, it shuts men up
to God. As God is and as man is, it shuts
you two up together. It doesn't bring you to me. It
doesn't bring you to a decision. It brings you before the living
God. And now, standing in His presence,
in your condition as a sinner, in His person, perfectly holy
and just, He'll show mercy, He'll show grace, but He said, I will
by no means clear the guilty. Now how is this guilty sinner
going to be justified with this holy God? The gospel shuts you
up to God. I can't do that. Only God can
do that. It's called his gospel because
it glorifies God. The preaching of it, the hearing
of it, the objects of it, the results of it, all glorifies
God. A fellow told me one time, and
a fellow who ought to know better, he said, I just think if a guy
goes to church, he ought to go home feeling better about himself
than when he went in. Not necessarily. Not necessarily. The very life
this gospel proclaims is summed up as knowing God. Did you know that? This is eternal
life. To know God. This is eternal
life. That's what it is. Well, I thought
it was just a continuation of what I have. No, that's darkness. That's outer darkness. That's
what that is. Eternal life is to know God.
and to know Christ. I know this, the peace and assurance
of this gospel rests in the faithfulness and power of God. It's His gospel. And this gospel, look here in
verse 2 of Romans 1, is the gospel, and this is what I want you to
see. I want you to pay particular attention to this. This is the
gospel promised afore by the prophets in the Holy Scriptures.
What separates the gospel of God from all the other gospels? Paul said they'll come preaching
another gospel. He said, if any man, even myself,
if I come back to you and preach another gospel, which I had not
already preached to you, he said, I don't care if he's an angel
from heaven, let him be accursed. They're going to come proclaiming
other gospels. There's other gospels being proclaimed
throughout the world. But what separates the gospel
of God from all these other gospels is that God foretold His gospel
from the beginning. At the dawn of civilization,
when man fell in the garden, God came to him in the cool of
the day and revealed to him his sin and how he couldn't hide
behind the trees and the bushes and the fig leaf apron. He was
naked before God. And God came to him as he was,
where he was. And he slayed a lamb and he took
the skin and he covered him. That's a picture of that righteousness
of Christ whereby we're clothed. And he shed his blood, which
is a picture of the blood of Christ. And then he gave him
that promised seed, that coming Redeemer that's going to come.
And he said, this blood of this sacrificed lamb you view in the
picture of this coming Redeemer. And he established that gospel.
And from that day all through history, it's always been a lamb
on the altar. When John the Baptist proclaimed
his coming and he saw him coming down that path, he said, Behold
the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world. Here he
comes. Here's the Lamb. Here's the Lamb. And what separates
this gospel? God said, Remember this. He said
this through Isaiah, his prophet. He said, you remember this and
show it to men. Bring it up to them. Tell them
about it. Bring it again into their minds. He said, remember
the former things of old, for I am God and there is none else.
I am God and there is none like me, declaring the end from the
beginning. That's his gospel. That's what separates it. It's
eternal. This gospel is as old as God. We don't even know how to tell
you about it. I use words and phrases that
I've read that other men say, like the Council Halls of Eternity
and what Brother Don likes to talk about, Old Eternity. It's
eternal. There is no beginning. It's as
old as God. And he said, I declare the end
from the beginning and from ancient times the things that are not
yet done, saying my counsel shall stand and I'll do all my pleasure.
And I call a ravenous bird from the east, or the man that executeth
my counsel from a far country, I've spoken it, I'll also bring
it to pass, I've purposed it, I'll do it. That's what separates
this gospel from all these other gospels. I tell you, do us all good to
read a little church history. You'll find out that about 85%
of the churches today started 150 years ago, 200 years ago. What this world calls a foreign
gospel, what they call a sham and a farce, was all that
was preached before then. And I tell you this, you cannot
validate the Gospel of Christ apart from the Old Testament.
If you carry around with you a little New Testament in your
hand, you're carrying around a half a Bible. That's what you
got. The very watchword by which the
four Gospels were written and sanctioned is the fulfillment
of all that was written of Him. And it came to pass that the
Scriptures might be fulfilled. It just says it over and over
and over. This is what validated him as
the Christ of God, the gospel which God had aforepromised through
His holy prophets. Are you with me so far? This
is God's gospel. And it's the gospel promised
afore by His holy prophets. It's not about man. It's not
about man. It's about God. It's about His
glory, His purpose, His will. It's God's gospel. It's declared
throughout the Old Testament. Let me read you one more passage
of Scripture over in Romans chapter 16. This is so important to what
I have to say to you this morning. The reason why religion is so
deceived and men so ignorant that they believe these lies
and fall into their superstition is for the same reason he gave
to Israel. He said, you do err not knowing
the Scripture. If you knew the Scriptures, you
wouldn't believe such foolishness. You do err not knowing the Scriptures. If I read a Scripture and it
tells me that God is immutable, unchangeable, every good gift,
every perfect gift cometh down from the Father of lights, with
whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turn. If you have an
understanding of the Scriptures, and when men start talking about
coming down an aisle and God changing his mind, God doesn't
change. The change has to be in you,
not in God. God is not going to change. He
is not going to change. I am the Lord, He said, I change
not, therefore you are not consumed. Now listen to this, Romans chapter
16 verse 25. Now to Him that is of power and
authority to establish you. Now watch it. according to my
gospel." Ain't that what that says? And the preaching of Jesus
Christ according to the revelation of the mystery which was kept
secret since the world began, but now is made manifest by the
Scriptures of the prophets. You see that? That's Old Testament
Scripture. according to the commandment
of the everlasting God made known to all nations before, for the
obedience of faith. When this gospel is preached,
and it's validated as God's gospel, promised from the beginning,
established in the Old Testament Scriptures, you better believe it. And you
better bow and submit yourself to this gospel. That's what he
said. And then thirdly, back over here in Romans chapter 1,
and this is where I want to camp for a while, this gospel is concerning
his son. It's concerning his son. Jesus Christ, our Lord, which
was made of the seed of David according to the flesh, I remember
very well, a month or so ago, William and Nathan coming over
to my house. And we sat around, I guess, for
an hour or so and shot the breeze and had casual conversation. And I could tell they had something
on their mind. And pretty soon William sat down
and he said, What is the gospel? Do you remember what I told you?
The gospel is not a what, it's a who. It's a who? It's a person. It's the Lord
Jesus Christ. He's the gospel. There's no good
news apart from Him. There's no knowing God apart
from Him. There's no approaching God apart
from Him. He's everything. There's one
mediator between God and men, the man, Christ Jesus. Just one. Just one. It concerns His Son. And it concerned his son in the
beginning and the revelation of Jesus Christ to his servant
John on the Isle of Patmos. The very first words he spoke
to him, do you remember what they were? I am Alpha and Omega,
the first and the last, and everything in between. Now what I tell you,
you write it down. There are two things revealed
in Christ that are necessary to faith. You must see Him as
the Son of God. This is what John tells us here
in John chapter 1. In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He is the Son
of God. Now, the Son of God was not made. Huh? He wasn't made. The Son
of God has no beginning. He's the second person of the
Godhead. He's co-equal with the Father and the Spirit. He always
was. In the beginning, He was with
God and He was God. And He still is. He's God over
all. Paul said, blessed forever. But
I must see Him also as the Son of Man. The Son of Man was made
according to the seed of David. He came down. took up a bowl,
took to Himself human flesh. See it down there in verse 14
of John chapter 1? The Word was made flesh and dwelt
among us. He was made of the seed of David,
declared, the Scripture said, to be the Son of God with power
according to the Spirit of holiness when God resurrected Him from
the dead. When we talk about the Son of
God, we're talking about the second person of the Godhead.
But when we talk about the Son of Man, we're talking about Him
who appeared in Bethlehem's manger as a babe. And the angels folded
their wings and looked out from the heavens and looked down in
mystery and marvel and awe and worshiped God and began to sing,
this is God coming. This is Immanuel, God with us. God with us. He's ever with God. His name shall be called Wonderful,
Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince
of Peace, Creator, Ruler, Sustainer. But He was made flesh and dwelt
among us. And what I want you to look at
here in John chapter 1 verse 14 is that little word dwelt.
Now, I challenge you, if you have a Strong's Concordance or
a Young's Analytical Concordance or anything that's going to take
you back to the original, show you how these words were translated,
I challenge you to look that word up. That word is tabernacle. The Word was made flesh and tabernacled
among us. When the Lord was made flesh
and appeared in this world in the human body, It was for the
purpose of tabernacle. The tabernacle was given to Israel
by God's design to be a pattern of the divine revelation to Israel. Everything that Israel knew about
God, they learned in that tabernacle. They learned something about
things being sanctified and set apart for the glory of God. Oh,
Uzzah just reached up. He was just going to steady the
Ark of the Covenant. God killed him dead in a hammer
right there on the spot. The grandson of King Nebuchadnezzar
took one of the vessels out of that tabernacle and he had a
party and he filled them full of wine and in celebration of
his conquering of the Jews, he took that wine in mockery of
God and drank that wine and he saw a hand come out and start
writing on the wall. You know that phrase, we hear
it so often, he saw the handwriting on the wall, that's what it means.
Exactly what it means. Your time is over. Your time
is up. That tabernacle was given by
God's design to be a pattern of the divine revelation to Israel. And everything about this tabernacle
in some way pictures the person and work of Christ in this world.
In the Old Testament when God delivered them from the bondage
of Egypt and led them out through the wilderness of sin, He took
Moses up on a mountain and He gave him His law. And He gave
him not just the Ten Commandments, but the ceremonial law. And He
gave him all those things. But He also gave him a pattern
of this tabernacle. And then He sent him back down
and He said, You take care. When you build this tabernacle,
don't you forget the pattern that I showed you in the mountain.
Don't you change a thing. Don't you add to it. Don't you
take away from it. You build it exactly as I revealed
it to you in the mountain. In this tabernacle, God put His
testimony, Exodus 25-21. Within the Holy of Holies, there
was an ark called the Ark of the Testament, the Ark of the
Testimony. Within this ark was the Tables
of the Law, Aaron's rod that budded, typifying God's favor,
and a golden pot full of manna, picturing Christ, the Bread of
Life. And over the ark was a mercy seat which had two cherubim looking
down. Two of these angelic beings witnessing
this glory. You remember in Isaiah chapter
6, when Isaiah saw His glory, he saw those cherubim covering
their eyes and covering their feet before the Lord, testifying
of His holiness and His justice, testifying of His righteousness.
Holy, holy, holy. They cried day and night, day
and night. That's what they cried over that mercy seat. Holy, holy,
holy. God's purpose in the ark was
to reveal the way God saves sinners. His law must be honored. His
promised favor must be made known. And His holy bread must be consumed.
Every detail of the ark in some way typifies the person and work
of Christ. It was a type of His body and
a picture of what would be accomplished in time. Listen to this over
in Hebrews chapter 8 and verse 1. Paul is telling them, you
really need to study the book of Hebrews because that's what
it does. It takes these Old Testament things in picture and shows you
the fulfillment of them in Christ. But listen to what he says here
in chapter 8, verse 1. Now of the things which we have
spoken, this is the sum. We have such a high priest who
is set on the right hand of the throne of the majesty in the
heavens, a minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle which
the Lord pitched and not man. That's the tabernacle. And it's
through Him, through His flesh, through what is revealed in Him
and accomplished by Him and in Him that we can approach the
living God. And we can find favor and acceptance
in our spiritual service and sacrifices, pitiful as they are,
can be accepted of God. You know, I don't want you to
get the wrong idea. I appreciate your gifts. I appreciate
you coming, listening. And I appreciate the help that
I get around these meetings and around the church. I appreciate
these things. But I'm telling you in the sight of God and compared
with God, what pitiful gifts they are. I thought about the preparation
of this message. What pitiful efforts this is
before God. It's through Him that these things
are made acceptable. Oh, listen to this, Hebrews 10,
9. Having therefore, brethren, boldness
to enter into the holiest, that's that inner chamber, that tabernacle,
by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He hath
consecrated for us through the veil. What veil? His flesh. See it? And having a high priest
over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in
full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an
evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. In that
old ceremonial law of Israel, there was a feast. It was called
the Feast of the Tabernacle. And each one was commanded under
that law to build a little booth. You remember reading about that?
They built a little booth, like a little shack. And they got
inside of it. And during this feast, they sat
in there and they meditated. And by faith, they remembered
and saw themselves. This is why the feast was given,
to see themselves. As Christ tabernacled in this
earth, they saw themselves in Him, in their representative.
And they thought on those things. All of these different feasts,
all representing different things that was done. Typical of Christ. Solomon's
temple was dedicated at the Feast of the Tabernacles. The Lord
suffered during the Passover. He poured out His Spirit on Pentecost. But do you know when He was born? Feast of the Tabernacles. He was made flesh and tabernacled
among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten
of the Father." Now turn with me to Hebrews 9, and I'll hurry
and wind this up. Paul tells us here that under
the old covenant, Israel had ordinances of divine service,
things necessary to do in order to worship and walk in favor
with God. And it had a sanctuary. It had
a place where they were to gather and do this. It had a sanctuary. And they had ordinances to be
done when they got to this place. Hebrews 9.2. For there was a
tabernacle made, consisted of two parts, an outer place and
inner place. And the first, the outer part, It was the place that had the
candlestick. If you've ever studied that tabernacle,
inside there was a golden table. The first thing, when you came
through the door of the tabernacle, there was a golden table. Upon
this table was a six-branched candlestick that represents the
church, represents man. Six always represents man. It
had six arms or six branches coming out of this thing. It
didn't burn as a candle, although it was called a candlestick.
It was like an oil lamp. It burnt from fine beaten oil
that the priest would put in there. That oil represents the
Holy Spirit of God. And it provides that light that
the church shines. You are the light of the world,
but you didn't have any light. You got His light. And this oil
provides that light and sits on this table. And right beside
it was the show bread, twelve loaves, freshly baked every Saturday. And they brought it in and they
laid it on that golden table, that bread of Christ. One loaf
for every tribe. He is the bread for the whole
house of God's history. And this light and this bread
stand before that heavy veil, stand before that place that
separates God from the common priest. Only the high priest
could go in there. But this light shined on that
veil. You read it. That light casteth
its light upon that veil, upon that direction. All the light
that the church, the light that I'm laboring so hard this morning
to shine to you is that light that shines on Him. That veil,
that is to say His flesh, that body that God gave Him by which
we are redeemed. When these things were ordained,
verse 6, look down here in verse 6, when these things were thus ordained,
the priest went always into the first tabernacle accomplishing
the service of God. But into the second went the
high priest alone once every year, not without blood, which
he offered for himself and for the heirs of the people. Now
watch it. The Holy Ghost, this signifying
that the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest
while the first tabernacle was still round, which was a figure for the time
then present, in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices that
could not make Him that did the service perfect as pertaining
to the conscience. Verse 11, But Christ, becoming
a high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more
perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not
of this building, neither by the blood of goats and calves,
but by His own blood He entered in once into the holy place,
having obtained," now watch it, What does that say? Eternal redemption
for us. What God purposed to do in eternity,
Christ purchased with His own blood. Purchased. Bought it. Owns it. Claims it. There's one mediator between
God and me and the man, Christ Jesus. And like the old tabernacle,
He's rough and common looking on the outside. saw no beauty
in Him when He appeared. But inside He is full of the
Shekinah glory of God. And inside all the purpose of
God is revealed and accomplished in Him. It was given to Israel
by God's design. They were to build this thing
in every detail exactly as God showed them in the map. And there
is a divine purpose in the tabernacle. It's to show God's eternal glory
in the salvation of chosen sinners. Everything that God has for sinners
is in Christ. It's in Christ. The love of God
is in Him. The mercy of God is in Him. The
kindness of God is in Him. Righteousness. Paul said, but
now the righteousness of God is revealed, even the righteousness
of God which is by the faithfulness of Jesus Christ unto all and
upon all them that believe. Grace being justified freely
by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Love,
herein is love, not that we love God, but that He loved us and
sent His Son to be the propitiation for everything we learn about
God. How to approach Him? Who He is? What's His character like? What
hope do we have? You see, everything we need to
learn about God, we learn in the tabernacle. And you learn
it in the wilderness of sin. You see what He said? The Word
was made flesh and dwelt among us, and because of this birth,
we received Him. And He gave us power to become
the sons of God. And He leads us and teaches us
through this tabernacle to understand all the mysteries. Do I believe
in good works? You better believe it. You better
believe it. But not apart from Christ. My motivations have to be right.
My end has to be right. Everything that I've come to
believe about God, I've learned in this tabernacle. And that's
why it was given. He tabernacled among us. What
I'm trying to preach to men today, I'm not trying to defend some
old doctrine that somebody come up with and somebody else disputed. I'm trying to point you to Christ.
Because that's the only way to God. It's the only way to revelation.
It's the only way to repentance. I tell you, when you repent,
when you see the goodness of God in Him, because the goodness
of God is what leadeth thee to repentance, you're going to learn
it in that tabernacle. So let's proclaim Him. Let's
exalt Him. Let's point men to Him.