We often urge sinners to come
to Christ as empty-handed beggars, bringing nothing with them. And
certainly there is a sense in which that admonition must be
pressed. But the law of God specifically
requires that none appear before the Holy Lord God empty. This is what he says. They shall
not appear before the Lord empty. That none come empty. That's my subject tonight. Our
text is found in Exodus chapter 23. Exodus chapter 23. If we come to God, we must bring
something with us. What does God require us to bring
to Him? Let's open the book and see.
Exodus 23, verse 10. And six years thou shalt sow
thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof. But the seventh
year thou shalt let it rest and lie still, that the poor of thy
people may eat. And what they leave, the beast
of the field shall eat. In like manner thou shalt deal
with thy vineyard and with thy olive yard. Six days thou shalt
do thy work, and on the seventh day thou shalt rest. Thine ox
and thine ass may rest, and the son of thy handmaid and the stranger
may be refreshed. And in all things that I have
said unto you, be circumspect. and make no mention of the name
of other gods, neither let it be heard out of thy mouth. Three
times thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year. Thou shalt
keep the feast of unleavened bread. Thou shalt eat unleavened
bread seven days, as I commanded thee in the time appointed of
the month Abib. For in it thou camest out from
Egypt, and none shall appear before me empty. And the feast
of harvest, the firstfruits of thy labors, which thou hast sown
in the field, and the feast of ingathering, which is in the
end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labors out of
the field, three times in the year all thy mails shall appear
before the Lord God. Thou shalt not offer the blood
of my sacrifice with leavened bread, neither shall the fat
of my sacrifice remain until the morning. The first of the
fruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the Lord
thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in
its mother's Now, reading those various commandments of God,
they seem to be, in many ways, unconnected. I want to show you
the connections. First, we see something here
about Sabbath-keeping. There are multitudes in our day
who talk about keeping the Sabbath. And when men talk to me about
keeping the Sabbath, I generally laugh at them. I laugh at them
because nobody keeps the Sabbath. not a physical, literal Sabbath.
Some folks just pretend to. And they insist that we keep
a Sabbath day, and they do so with morbid strictures that none
can live up to. We don't keep a carnal, ceremonial
Sabbath any longer because Christ is our Sabbath. We've come to
God, and we come to God by faith in Christ, resting in Him. He
is our Sabbath. The Sabbath observance is spoken
of here as a time of rest and refreshment in verses 10 through
12, and as a time of special provision for the poor. And so
it's given here as a very clear picture of something unique and
special. It's a time of rest, a time of
refreshment, and a time of provision specifically for the poor. Sabbath
keeping was central to the worship of God in the Old Testament.
Throughout the days of the Mosaic law, throughout the days of the
Mosaic economy, Sabbath-keeping was essential to the worship
of God. God required the children of
Israel to keep a Sabbath every week. He required them to keep
a Sabbath every month. He required them to keep a Sabbath
every year. He required them to keep a Sabbath
every seven years. He required that the Sabbath
be observed. It was as essential to the worship
of God as the blood atonement of the Paschal Lamb on the day
of atonement. In fact, there is no other command
given of God in the Old Testament Scriptures that has such strictures
against the breaking of it as the Sabbath, except defiling
the atonement with the blood of a sacrifice God had not ordained. In verses 10 and 11, We see that
God required Israel to observe a yearly Sabbath as well as the
weekly Sabbath. This is an expansion of what
God gave in the fourth commandment. Remember the Sabbath day to keep
it holy. Every seventh year, He required
the children of Israel to let their land rest. He required
them to let the land rest and do nothing to it. Not to work
it at all. not to work it at all. They were
not even allowed to go out and gather out of their gardens,
or out of the fields, or out of the vineyards, or out of the
orchards. They were not allowed to even
gather out those things that grew of their own accord. They
were to let the land rest altogether. In verse 12, the Lord God again
commands the observance of the weekly Sabbath, a Saturday Sabbath,
and these Sabbath laws served to remind the children of Israel
and to teach us some things that we shouldn't forget. We have
our bread by the hand of God, not by the labor of our hands. Some of you probably have a good
bit at stake in the, matter of fact, probably all of you have
a good bit at stake in the current economic crises that we're hearing
about on the news. And it ought to remind you, it
doesn't matter how hard you work, how much you skimp and save and
get by on, how well you prepare, we live by the bounty of God's
hand, not by ours. Not by ours. Let the land rest. You mean don't work it? How do
you expect us to live? Believe me. Trust me. But look at all that going to
waste out there in the garden. And nobody bother with it. Let
the animals have it. You trust me. You trust me. He said don't even gather it.
Leave it for the poor and let that which the poor don't gather,
let the animals eat it or let it rot. You trust me. Well, how do we know God will
provide? He said he would. That's it. He said he would.
We're to live by dependence upon our God. not depending on ourselves
or the arm of the flesh in any way. Depending on Him. Give us this day our daily bread. Learn this too. The earth is
the Lord's. We're just very temporary tenants
on the land. It belongs to God. We own nothing. Sometimes I get to thinking,
well, Maybe I ought to do things a little different. And I think,
well, maybe it'd be good to do this, do that, to make preparations
and get things for myself. I live in the house over here
and don't own anything. But I really own that just as
well as you own the one out there on the road. I'm going to live
in it till God takes my breath, and when that's done, the house
won't do me any good. And the same is true of you.
We live as tenants on God's earth. That's all. But notice the reasons
God gives us for these commands in verses 11 and 12. Number one,
that the poor of thy people may eat. And second, thou shalt rest. And third, he says, that the
stranger may be refreshed. The Sabbath was to be kept every
week and every year as a constant reminder to Israel of that sweet
rest that could and would be recovered only in and by Christ
Jesus. The rest that Adam lost in the
garden when he walked with God in the cool of the day and there
was nothing to trouble him. No thorns and thistles, no briars,
No storms, no heartaches, no trials, no sickness, no death. Just sweet rest and communion
with God Almighty walking in the garden. And He lost it all. But there is another Adam in
whom and by whom all that Adam lost shall be restored. And this Sabbath rest points
to Him. The Sabbath was entirely intended
and only intended to typify our salvation in Christ Jesus. That's
the whole purpose of it. Why don't you teach folks to
observe the Sabbath day? The Sabbath day, number one,
is Saturday. It ain't Sunday. It's not the first day of the
week, it's the last day of the week. Always has been and always
would be until the law ceased to have any power over us. The
Sabbath day was never intended for any purpose except to show
us the necessity of a Redeemer and the blessedness of salvation
in and by Him. I hope you see the significance
of this. The rest of faith is the same
rest that is set forth in all the other portions of the ceremonial
law. It is the rest of complete atonement. and complete reconciliation to
God through the blood sacrifice and perfect righteousness of
the Lord Jesus Christ. We rest in Him. What does that mean? That means
you quit working. That's what you do when you rest.
And the difficulty with man is that we always want to work.
We want something to do. Give men something to do and
they'll buy into it every time. Just give them something to do,
they'll buy into it. That's how papacy gets by wherever
it goes. With all the various strictures
and ceremonies and sacrifices that papacy requires, it gives
men something to do. And that's what all works religion
does. It gives men something to do.
The gospel proclaims, done! Rest now. Rest. Cease from your works. as God
did from his on the seventh day, and rested. Come unto me, all
you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Turn to Hebrews chapter 4. The
Holy Spirit speaks specifically of this. Hebrews chapter 4, verse
3. Paul says, we who have believed
do enter into rest. Look at it, Hebrews 4, 3. As
he said, as I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into
my rest, although the works were finished from the foundation
of the world. I won't stop and preach on that,
but that's good. The works were finished from
the foundation of the world, we just enter into it. We don't
perform the works, we enter into that which our Redeemer has done.
Verse 7, Again he limiteth a certain day, saying in David, Today,
after so long a time, as it is said, Today, if ye will hear
his voice, harden not your hearts. Here is a feast of fat things,
a feast of wine on leaves, of fat things full of marrow, of
wines on the leaves well refined. It is a rest of faith. Look at
verse 9, There remaineth therefore a rest. A rest. If you could read that in the
original language, just the word, or if you were to write out the
word in English, using the letters used in the Greek text, have
any idea what it is? There remaineth therefore a Sabbath. There remaineth therefore a Sabbath
to the people of God. A rest. a blessed keeping, a
blessed observance of the Sabbath. Then, back here in verse 13 in
our text, Exodus 23, And in all things that I have
said unto you, be circumspect. Be circumspect. I've got a newspaper
I get every month, and It's getting worse and worse month by month.
But there was an article in it, this time on holiness. And so
I thought, well, I'll pull that one out and read it. I wish I'd read something else.
Kept me up half the night thinking about how disgusting it was.
This all works. And talk about your circumspect
life, your moral uprightness, having something to do with holiness.
That's not what God means when it says, be circumspect. When
David was angered against God because the Lord God killed his
servant for putting his hand on the ark. When David was brought
to bow before the Lord, he said, here's the reason, we sought
him not after the due order. We attempted to worship God the
way we wanted to worship Him. We attempted to worship God after
the plans and devisings of our own hearts. We sought Him not
after the due order. This is what He's talking about.
You're going to worship me. You're going to worship me the
way I say. That's the only way you're going
to worship me. People have the idea that The
way we worship doesn't matter. The way we worship tells a whole
lot about who we are and who we worship. God says, see that
you do this circumspectly and make no mention of the name of
other gods. Does that mean not to even call
their names? Allah or Buddha or any other
god? No, no, no. You see their names
mentioned in other portions of scripture. Clearly that's not
what it means. What's it saying? Don't call on their names. Don't
speak of them with delight. Don't bring their names to your
lips except with contempt so as to denounce them and show
the folly of the worship of such. Don't bring the words free will
to your mouth except to denounce the name of such false gods.
Then in verses 14 through 17, the Lord commands the children
of Israel to observe three annual feasts. Actually there were more,
I think there were seven annual feasts, named over in Leviticus
23. But the children of Israel here are commanded to observe
these three feasts, these three annual feasts, in which every
male of the children of Israel is required to come up to God's
altar. When it was at the tabernacle,
wherever the tabernacle was, there they were required to come.
When later the temple was built in Jerusalem, they were required
to come up to Jerusalem, no matter where they lived, to come up
to Jerusalem these three times a year. These three annual feasts
of worship were great feasts of faith. Now this is what I
mean by that. It required considerable faith
to go worship. And worshiping as they did, and
carrying out these ceremonies connected with these feasts,
they displayed faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. That is to say
the ceremonies themselves were pictures of Him whom we trust. Well, how do you require faith
to go up there? You walk up there on your own feet. But you walk
up there leaving your family behind. You walk up there leaving
your possessions behind. You walk up there leaving your
business behind. Well, we can't do that. You can't expect a man to just
leave everything behind and go worship God for a week! No. I don't expect anybody to. Except
somebody who believes God. That's all. God said, I'll fix
it so that your neighbors don't want your land while you're gone
and they don't want your wife while you're gone. I'll fix it
so that nobody comes and takes anything of yours with no guard
at the house and no locks on the doors. And he did. And he did. Tell you what I've
never observed. I've never seen the righteous
forsaken, nor his seed baking bread. I have never observed
any man or woman lose anything by devotion to Christ. Tell me
what you lost. What is it you've lost? by devoting
yourself, your time, your money, your labors, your toil to the
cause of Christ. Anybody? Never known anybody
to. Exodus 23, 14. Three times thou shalt keep a
feast unto me in the year. Thou shalt keep the feast of
unleavened bread. Thou shalt eat unleavened bread
for seven days as I commanded thee in the time appointed and
the month of Abib. For in it thou camest out of
Egypt, and none shall appear before me empty. And the feast
of harvest, the firstfruits of thy labors which thou hast sown
in the field, and the feast of ingathering, which is in the
end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labors out of
the field, three times in the year all thy males shall appear
before the Lord God. Women and children were allowed
to come, and often did. But why did God just require
the men to come? Because men are the heads of
their houses. Well, I'm not the head of my
house, you better be, God's going to hold you responsible for it.
Men represent their houses. Men are to be under God, prophet,
priest, and king in their homes. They're the representatives of
the family. First he speaks of the Feast of Unleavened Bread.
Now this is a distinct feast from the Passover and yet the
two can hardly be separated. It follows immediately the Passover
feast and the Passover ceremony. On the Passover night the children
of Israel ate the lamb sacrificed with their coats on their backs
and their shoes on their feet and their staffs in their hands
ready to go out of Egypt. The Passover that was sacrificed,
that Passover that they were eating as they stood while the
death angel passed through the land, that Passover sacrifice
was the cause of their deliverance. The Feast of Unleavened Bread
represents the effects of that deliverance, the effects, the
result of that redemption. The sacrifice of Christ, the
Paschal Lamb, His shed blood, that's the effectual cause of
our pardon. The sweet fellowship of faith
represented in the bread, the unleavened bread, is the effect,
the sure, certain result of Christ's death as our substitute. This
feast was a constant reminder to Israel of that which God had
promised and that which God had done in the ceremonial aspect,
delivering them out of Egypt by the blood of the Lamb and
by the power of His grace. Purge out therefore the old leaven,
Paul says, that you may be a new lump as ye were unleavened, for
even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us. The Passover, you know,
speaks of our Redeemer, His blood, His atonement, His satisfaction
of justice. The Feast of Unleavened Bread
speaks of eating Him. It speaks of faith in Him. Now
understand this, understand the picture. Redemption is accomplished
by Christ alone and outside ourselves. Righteousness is accomplished
for us by Christ alone, outside ourselves. He is our righteousness. The only way we ever, however,
come to participate in that redemption and that righteousness is by
personal faith in Him, by taking Him, by laying hold on Him, by
believing Him. He compares it to eating His
flesh and drinking His blood. I take this glass and drink it, and it's mine. And you can't
get it. It's mine. Whatever's in that
glass that's of any value and worth is mine. It becomes a part
of me. And believing on the Son of God,
all that He is, is yours. He is part of you, and you part
of Him. One with Him, and He one with
you. Now don't miss the connection.
The connection between the Feast of Unleavened Bread and the Passover.
The Feast of Unleavened Bread began the next day as soon as
the Passover was ended. And so too the gift of faith
and life in Christ follows the accomplishments of Christ at
Calvary. That is to say, all who were redeemed by His blood
shall be made to live by Him and shall feed upon Him by God's
grace. And then as one great family
came out of Egypt, so we together as one family live on this earth
with the saints of God in heaven, one in Jesus Christ the Lord.
God's church, God's people, God's Israel is one. Every true believer,
every heaven-born soul, every true child of God is one in Jesus
Christ. We are one with our brethren
and our brethren one with us. Oh, God, teach us that. God give
us that blessed peace, and God teach us to walk on this earth
as one in this world with one another. One with all who believe. The children of Israel were one
family, and God's Israel is still just one family. One family in
heaven and in earth, all named after Christ. It's called the
family of God. As often as we eat the bread
and drink the wine at the Lord's table, Like Israel of old in
the feast of the unleavened bread, we show forth the Lord's death
until he come, remembering him. We eat the bread and drink the
wine of the Lord's table every Sunday evening in remembrance
of him and his sacrifice. And we eat the bread and drink
the wine in anticipation of that blessed day when he shall come
and bring this deliverance to its culmination in resurrection
glory. Now do you remember the question
I gave you at the beginning of the message? What does God require
us to bring to Him? Remember, whatever God requires
is what He gives. And the only thing God will ever
accept is that which He Himself provides. His name is Jehovah
Jireh. The word means the Lord shall
see. And seeing He shall provide.
And providing He shall be seen. Jehovah-Jireh provides for us,
and He accepts only that which He provides. And that provision
is Jesus Christ Himself set forth in all these ceremonies of the
Law. In the Feast of Unleavened Bread, we eat this with this
assurance, given in the last line of verse 15, And none shall
appear before Me empty. What does that mean? Turn over
to Deuteronomy chapter 16. Hold your hands here. Turn to
Deuteronomy 16 for just a second. This is the same law given in
the second giving of the law. Verse 16. Three times in a year
shall all thy males appear before the Lord thy God in the place
which he shall choose, in the feast of unleavened bread, and
in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of tabernacles, and
they shall not appear before the Lord empty. Every man shall
give as he is able according to the blessing of the Lord thy
God which he hath given thee." What a strange way to put things. You come before God, don't you
come with an empty hand. You come as you are able with
your own ability. You come with what you can bring. With what you can bring according
to the blessing of the Lord thy God which he hath given thee. What does God require of us?
He requires that we bring in our hands Jesus Christ His blood,
His righteousness, His person, everything connected with Him,
that we bring Christ Himself with the ability of faith according
to the blessing which God's given you. Not the blessings as if
it were many, the blessing. Now some came and they brought
sheaves of grain, and some came and brought little bits of grain. And some came bringing great,
great sacrifices, and others came bringing turtle doves. Each bringing the first fruit,
which is Jesus Christ Himself. The first fruit from the dead. The firstborn of every creature. We bring Him the blessing of
God. We bring Him, according to the
ability God has given us, faith in Christ. Say, Brother Don,
I just can't do that. I understand. I really do. I really do. I know you can't. My God, I know you can't. Unless
He gives you His Son. And you come here for it. I plead the merits of your own
son, his blood, his righteousness. I have no other hope. And God
smiles with approval and accepts the sacrifice. Then the Feast
of Harvest is described. This Feast of Harvest is the
same as the Feast of Weeks or the Feast of Pentecost. It's
spoken of in that way in the Scriptures as well. It was held
50 days. Seven days plus a day. Seven days and one Sabbath day
after the Feast of Firstfruits. It's commonly called Pentecost
because Pentecost means 50th. It's held on the 50th day. This
is the harvest, the ingathering feast. This is the harvest feast,
the speaks of Christ gathering in His elect. It's beautifully
typified on the day of Pentecost. When the day of Pentecost was
fully come, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Ascended, Exalted King of
Glory, demonstrating Himself clearly to be the Messiah, poured
out His Spirit, and with one mighty sweep of saving grace,
He called to Himself three thousand souls. Demonstrating that He,
the Ascended Savior, gathers his elect from the four corners
of the earth. God has given him power over
all flesh to give eternal life to as many as the Father has
given him. Take a quick peek at Leviticus
23. Here, Moses is giving a much
larger, more comprehensive declaration of God's law regarding these
feasts. In verse 22, he says, When you reap the harvest of
your land, Thou shalt not make clean bittets of the corners
of thy field. When thou reapest, neither shalt
thou gather any gleaning of thy harvest. Thou shalt leave them
unto the poor and to the stranger. I am the Lord your God. So that even in requiring Israel
never to gather everything out of their fields, he is giving
a foretaste of his mercy. He's declaring that they are
to be merciful to the poor and to the strangers. To those dwelling
among them called the poor and the strangers. Because the poor
and the stranger represent, throughout the Scripture, God's elect. His
elect remnant whom He has scattered throughout all the earth. In
that day, it was to say to Israel, remember, God has a people scattered
among the Gentiles whom He will call. And today he still has
his elect remnant scattered among all the nations of the earth,
Jew and Gentile, whom he will call by his grace. And as Israel
was to labor and leave the crops in the field as very as the handfuls
of honey for Ruth, so you and I must give ourselves to the
labor of the gospel, to the preaching of the gospel, for the poor and
the strangers, the outcasts, whom the Lord our God shall call
by his grace." And then, back here in our text, Moses speaks
of the feast of ingathering, which is in the end of the year,
in verse 16. This feast of the ingathering,
which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy
labors out of thy field. Isn't that interesting? I've
never thought about gathering my labor in, have you? I've never
thought about gathering in labor. If Shelby's sending me out to
get something out of the garden, and she doesn't often, but when she
trusts me to go get something, she'll send me out to get it,
and I'm told to get some potatoes, or get tomatoes, or get green
beans, or get some corn. She's never sent me out and said,
go get your labor. Strange way of putting things.
Until you understand that this is not talking about you, and
this is not talking about the children of Israel, this is talking
about the Redeemer. Go and gather in your labors
out of the field. This is the feast of tabernacles.
In this feast, Israel is reminded of that time when they dwelt
in booths in the wilderness. But it's far more important than
that. In this feast, Israel was reminded that there's one coming
whose name is the Son of God, who is the Messiah, the Prince
and the King of Israel. And He, the Word, shall be made
flesh to tabernacle among us. To dwell in this booth of humanity
just as we do. And in this booth of humanity
to accomplish redemption. And by the tearing down of this
booth and raising it up again, He will gather in His labor. And that's what he's doing. And
when he comes at last, he will gather in his labor all of them
in resurrection glory. He shall see of the travail of
his soul and shall be satisfied. And thus, the Lord God gives
his law to his people. And then he gives some strict
prohibitions. Verses 18 and 19. He said in verse 18, Thou shalt
not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leavened bread. What do you reckon that means?
You don't have to guess about that. You don't offer Christ's
sacrifice to God mixed with the leaven of your works. The leaven,
what do you think of when you think about it? You who read
the New Testament, what do you think of when you think about
it? The leaven of the Pharisees. The leaven of the self-righteous
religious workmonger who attempts to bring himself to God by his
own works of righteousness. If you do, you can't eat this
sacrifice. You can't do it, or you don't.
Neither shall the fat of my sacrifice remain until the morning. What do you mean? Eat it all,
or you can't have any. You must take the whole Christ,
or you can have none of Christ. You must eat the sacrifice alone
and all the sacrifice. Verse 19, the first fruits of
thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the Lord thy God. Christ, I repeat, is the first
fruit, the firstborn. the beginning of the creation
of God. The firstborn among many brethren. The first begotten
from the dead. He's the firstborn who opens
the womb. And it says, Thou shalt not seethe
a kid in his mother's milk. We must not mix the worship of
our God with that which we learn from the heathen and the pagan
idolaters around us. Israel dwelt amongst idolaters
all their days. Pagan, heathen folks. Some of
them, when they would have their harvest feast, kind of like we
have Thanksgiving. Isn't it amazing that Thanksgiving
has turned into a day of drunken revelry and partying? rather
than Thanksgiving. That's what you can expect when
men practice things without Christ. But they all had days of Thanksgiving
when they brought their harvest in. And many of them would take
a kid of the goats or the lambs and boil it in his mother's milk. Cruel. useless. But they did it because
they would then take the broth, if you can call it, and sprinkle
it on their fields, and sprinkle it on their orchards, and sprinkle
it on their vineyards for as they, now listen, as they gave
thanks to God for good luck for next year. They'd sprinkle it
out just in case they hadn't done things exactly right for
a little luck on their side. Don't come to me with all the
vile practices of the heathen. We dare not come before the Lord
God empty, yet we dare not bring Him any idolatrous mixture of
our own making, of our own works, or of our own wills. We come
to God with the sacrifice He has provided. Jesus Christ our
Redeemer and with no other confidence. This is how Paul describes those
who worship God. We are the circumcision which
worship God in the spirit and rejoice in Christ Jesus and have
no confidence in the flesh. Amen.