in the religious world, in the religious world around
us where God is unknown, where God is ignored, where God is despised. There's great emphasis on all
things that men consider to be acts of religion. People are
taught to say their prayers and spend time, certain time in prayer. And it's fine, I encourage you
to set a time to call on God in prayer. But Christianity is
not saying your prayers. Don't ever teach children to
say their prayers by teaching them to practice being religious.
Teach them to pray. There's a difference. Christianity
is not saying your prayers. Christianity is living before
God in prayer. You who know the difference,
know the difference. And you who don't, don't. Christianity
is not exercising faith when you get in a jam. is a life of faith. Christianity
is not so many acts of worship, either public or private. Christianity
is worship in God. It is a life of worship. This
is paramount. We cannot serve our families. I cannot be a faithful husband
and a faithful father. I cannot be. I cannot serve the
souls of men. We cannot and we will not be
useful, truly useful to society as a whole or to anyone individually. We cannot, we will not be or
do anything. of significance, of benefit to
anybody if we are not first and foremost and always the servants
of our God. That's paramount. That's paramount. As they journeyed through their
wilderness for 40 years, whenever the children of Israel set up
camp, whenever they pitched the tent, the tabernacle of God,
and set up a place of divine worship. Their camp was set in
three circles. There were three distinct circles. At the very center of everything,
the core of life, the heart of their existence, the heart of
the nation, the heart of everything was the worship of God. That's
it. the tabernacle, right in the
middle of the camp. On the outer circle, on the outside
fringes of the camp of Israel, were the places where those men
who were numbered for war set their tents. You read it in Numbers
chapters 1 and 2, that was the portion allotted there. Inside,
between those men of war and that holy place, that sanctuary
of divine service, surrounding the tabernacle, but inside those
men of war was a circle of Levites, men whose responsibility it was
to maintain the worship of God in all things outward. They maintained
the tabernacle and all the sacrifices and all those things. They kept
these things maintained all their days. The men of war were responsible
by the appointment of God. They were responsible to defend
and protect the nation. But in the center, at the very
heart of the camp, at the core of the nation's life, was the
sanctuary. And those divinely appointed
priests of God who lived and died ministering in the sanctuary. They lived and died in the service
of holy things. And the scripture tells us they
did so, the men of war, the priests and the Levites. They did so. Everyone according to his service
and according to his birth, his responsibility. Thus were they
numbered as the Lord commanded Moses. Now there have been lots
of things deduced from that by men. This
order in the camp of Israel certainly was not intended by God to be
an order of church government dividing clergy from laity. That's
good enough for Rome, but not in the kingdom of God. There
are no such things as clergy and laity in God's church. Baptist
churches these days, they have laity. That means we're going
to have you peons do something important, while us clerics stand
by and watch. proud, haughty, stupid, irreverent,
unbiblical division among God's people. We're one. We're one. The Church and Kingdom of God,
one body, one family. I have the burden, the responsibility
of being the pastor-teacher in this place. That's my responsibility,
my burden. That doesn't mean the work of
the Assembly is my work. It's our work. Anything that
God allows me to do by your assistance is what we do, not what I do. Our ministry is not my ministry,
it's our ministry. This is not my church, not even
our church, it's his church. But there's no such thing as
clergy and laity. We must never forget that believers,
as those who are born of God, are ordained with the garments
of salvation in Christ. And we are first and foremost
the servants of God. That's what this picture is all
about. We are first and foremost God's priest. Jesus Christ has
made us unto God kings and priests. Kings. Right now, Bobby Estes
made a king. Made to be one with Christ who
is the king and made a king to rule over something. made a king
to rule over your passions, and to rule over this world, and
to rule over the influences of this world. And priest, that
man right there's a priest. Well, he doesn't have a funny
looking costume on like most priests you see. That's because
he's not that kind of priest. He's not an idolatrous man who
sets himself up in the place of God so that you come worship
him as God. That's what it is for a man to
call himself a priest. Man calls himself a priest to God. He said,
I'm Christ. I'm your savior. I'm your mediator.
That's not the kind of priest he is. A priest, though, is one
who constantly does business in the holy place serving God. That's what we are. God's priest. If we're not, we know nothing
about God's grace. We know nothing about faith in
Christ. We know nothing about salvation. Believers are made
a a holy nation and a royal priesthood. We are God's priests, and yet
we move in all the circles of the camp. You see, the believer
is also, he is, he must be, like it or not, a man of war, constantly engaged in conflict. If there's none without God,
there's plenty within. constantly engaged in conflict.
We must take the helmet of salvation. We must take the shield of faith.
We must have our feet shod with the preparation of the gospel
of peace. We must carry in our hearts the sword of the spirit.
We must walk before God, understanding that we are numbered and placed
here as men of war. We're soldiers of Christ engaged
in a warfare that will not end until we've ended life in this
world. And yet we're like the Levites who minister to God's
people. Each believer walks about in
the midst of God's kingdom and people serving his brethren. Not seeking his brethren to serve
him. There's a huge difference. About
everybody wants that. We are Levites walking about
among God's people seeking to serve our brethren. seeking to
serve one another according to the ability God has given us
and in the sphere in which God has put us. Remember the parable,
our Lord speaks of the kingdom of heaven. He says it's like
a man who's gone on a journey and before he leaves, he brings
all his goods and commits them to his service. He said, you
watch over this, you watch over that, you watch over that. That's
what our master's done. He's committed to our hands.
the care of his kingdom, his people, his house, his children. Oh, what a privilege. Oh, what
a responsibility. And every child of God is a worshiping,
sacrificing priest all the time, ministering unto God in the holy
place by faith in Christ. Not part time, but all the time.
Not just on Sunday, every day. We're not Sabbath keepers in
a legal sense. We're Sabbath keepers in the
right sense. We bow to Christ and rest in Christ and worship
Christ all the time, every day. That's what the life of faith
is. I've said all that to say this. We cannot function properly. We cannot walk aright. in any
sphere of life. None. We cannot function properly. We cannot walk aright in any
sphere of life if we are not first and foremost serving God
in all things. I just call skits, eh? Next time
you go to Lexmark, doesn't matter what it is you've got to do,
doesn't matter who you're influencing, It doesn't matter why you're
there. You can't function right unless you're worshiping God
doing it. It can't be done. First and foremost,
I'm God's servant. It doesn't matter whether I'm
plumbing a house, digging a ditch, or whether I'm ruling the nation.
First and foremost, I'm God's servant. If we are not first
and foremost engaged in the business of worshiping and honoring our
God, We're useless. And we're a detriment rather
than a help. You see, Christianity is not
isolationism. Folks had the idea somehow that,
you know, if we could just, boy, if we could just separate ourselves
from those bad folks. If we could just, if we could
just not hear the things they say, and not see the things they
do and not get too close to them. We wouldn't smell like them anymore.
We'd start being good. That's the teaching of Romanism.
It bleeds over into Protestant churches and bleeds over into
Baptist churches, but that's nothing but Romanism. That's
nothing but will worship. That's the idea that somehow
evil is outside us. So let's live in convience. Let's
live as cloisters and we'll really be devoted to God. Let's live
in communes. Let's go live as hermits. Let's
not be exposed to all the evil that's out there. Oh no, that's
not Christianity. Christianity is living right
here, right now, in this real world among fallen, depraved,
sinful men and women for the glory of God. That's where the rubber hits
the road. That's what Christianity is. I want to talk to you today
from Leviticus chapter 10 about some things that God taught Aaron
the day he killed his boys. Some things necessary in the
worship of God. And I'm not talking now about
just worshiping here Sunday morning, Sunday night, Tuesday night.
I'm talking about things necessary in the life of faith. Things
necessary if we would walk with God. Things necessary if we would
believe God. Hold your hands here in Leviticus
10 and let's look at these first 11 verses together. Here's the
first thing. Sacrifice. If we would come to God, if we
would worship God, If we withdraw nigh unto the Holy God, we must
come to him with a sacrifice. You can't worship God without
a sacrifice. And everybody knows that. Everybody
does. That's been established in the
hearts of men by creation, stamped on their conscience by the finger
of God, written in their hearts by the hand of God, so that every
man knows there are no exceptions. Every man knows somehow or another,
by one means or another, God Almighty, whoever, whatever he
is, that God that I know I must face is holy, and I've got to
come to him with a sacrifice by which his wrath can be appeased
for my sin, because I know that's what I am. I know that's what
I am. Every man knows that. There is
no space in history, no place in the universe where you find
human beings where men and women have not attempted somehow or
another to appease God's wrath by some sort of sacrifice. Sometimes
it may be the sacrifice of a goat, it may be the sacrifice of a
hog, it may be the sacrifice of a dog, or it may be the sacrifice
of their own children. But they're going to appease
God if they can. God's got to have a sacrifice. But God doesn't
require just a sacrifice. God demands His sacrifice. Look at verse 1. They dab in
a bayou. The sons of Aaron took either
of them his censer, and put fire therein, and put incense thereon,
and offered strange sacrifice to God. Offered strange fire
before the Lord. But she commanded them not, but
she said, don't you dare break. And there went out fire from
the Lord and devoured them, and they died before the Lord. These
two boys, Nadab and Abihu, and they weren't little boys. When
I say these two boys, I mean they were boys like Lindsay's
boys are boys, grown men. These two boys of Arun, these
two boys, like their father Cain, Heard the record that God gave
of his worship? Heard, like God told Adam and
Eve and showed Cain by his example, that they must come to him with
a sacrifice of blood, which God himself provides, robed in the
righteousness of another. But like Cain, they said, oh,
no. God doesn't have any right to
require that. We're not that bad. We're not
that bad. We can come to God as long as
we're sincere. We'll bring his sacrifice, but
now don't tell us we can't bring something of our own. Don't tell
us we can't bring something of our own doing, something of our
own making, something of our own providing, something that
makes us feel good. And so they came, and they brought
a burnt offering. You read it in the latter part
of the chapter. They came with a burnt offering, exactly the
kind of burnt offering God required. They came and brought the Lord
Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Only thing was they put something
of their own with it called strange fire. And God killed them dead
as a hammer on the spot. How come? They endeavored to
mix grace and works. They endeavored to mix law and
gospel. They did what the law prohibited. They tried to come
to God wearing a garment of linen and of wool. A garment they had
spun and a garment that the Lord had spun. They tried to come
to God and serve him plowing with the unclean and with the
clean, with an ox and with an ass. They came to God bringing
their own will and their own works to mingle with God's free
grace and God's work in a substitute. And for that, God killed them.
And I tell you here and now, God helped you to hear me. Would
to God the world would hear what I'm saying. You must come to
God. thy faith in Jesus Christ alone
are you going to hell. But preacher, I know that God requires that
we come by faith in Christ and God requires that we trust his
blood and his righteousness, but surely you don't mean that
we must come to God as nothing but naked empty-handed, repugnant,
vile, defiled, hell-bent, hell-deserving, doomed, damned, helpless sinners,
trusting Christ alone. Oh, now you heard me. You won't
come any other way. Oh, may God, as we read in Psalm
39, rebuke your iniquity in you, and your goodliness will wither
before Him. then you'll gladly come to him.
Nothing in my hands I bring, simply to thy cross I cling.
Naked come to thee for dress, helpless look to thee for grace.
That's the only way to come. All right, here's the second
thing, submission. The worship of God, faith in
Christ at its heart, at its core, involves surrender, submission,
humiliation, the humbling of ourselves under the hand of God,
submitting everything to the will and glory of God. This is
what the Lord taught Aaron and teaches us in verses three through
six. We won't try to read all these passages, but there is
a striking, striking statement. at the end of verse three and Aaron stood before God with
his mouth shut Aaron held his peace what an astounding statement
here are Aaron's two sons a week before just a weekly boy. Oh, what a proud daddy he must
have been. I would have been. Here's Aaron and my boys. Look at them. Look at them. God has made them priests. God
has put on them the garments of the priesthood. The Lord God
has touched Their ear with blood and their feet with blood and
their hands with blood. The Lord God has anointed them
for the priesthood. And with his boys, he goes into
the holy place and worships and serves God. These boys had been
with Aaron just the day before as they worshipped God and brought
the sacrifice God required. And the Lord God showed his glory
and blazing light came down from heaven and consumed the sacrifice. They were with him when the camp
of Israel rose up with one mighty shout of triumph, giving God
the glory for God's salvage. They joined in the shout. And
now Next day, they come to the house of God. And they bring
their free will. They bring their works. They
bring their good deeds. They bring their emotion. They
bring their feeling. They bring their with Christ. And God gives it. And here Aaron
stands. Here's Eliezer and Isabel. slaughtered in an open public
display of divine judgment and anger and wrath because they
despise God's Son. What does Aaron say? Not a word. What does he do? Nothing. Aaron held his peace. As the
psalmist said, I was dumb and opened not my mouth because thou
didst it. In silent, reverent awe, he bowed
his head in the house of God and worshipped. The pillars of his house were
destroyed. But the pillars of God's house
were still firm. His heart was crushed within him, but he worshipped
God. His sons were dead. And Aaron
knew that there was something more important than his sons
and their death. He knew as God's servant, as
God's priest, there's something more important than me and mine. Would to God be a burden? I'm
here. God's here. His people are here. And His glory is more important
than Nadab and Abiyah. His will is more important than
Nadab and Abiyah. His church is more important
than Nadab and Abiyah. His worship is more important.
His honor is more important than these two boys. Aaron stands
before us as a deeply impressive commentary. upon the words of
David, God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of the saints,
and to be had in reverence of all them that are about him.
His two sons despised God's sacrifice, and God killed them, and his
ailing stands there in awe before God, in reverence before God. He sees his sons and their charred
bodies. And they said, boys, you despised
my God. You despised his son. You despised my Savior. You trampled underfoot the blood
of God's dear son. And God's killed What he said by his silence is
this. God does right. God does right. Now you listen
to me. I weep for your souls. I cry out to God for you. I seek
a message from God for you. I pray for you. But if you go
to hell, If God Almighty sends you to hell, God Almighty does
right. And that's true of me, of you,
of mine, and of yours. God does right. So how do you know that's what
Aaron said? Because he told Moses in verses 16 through 20, Moses
came and said, why didn't you eat the burnt offering? He said
in verse 19, he said, Moses, If I had eaten the sacrifice
those two boys brought into God's house, I'd be right there with
them. If I had made myself a partaker
of their worship, of their ways, of the way of Cain, of the way
of Baal, God Almighty wouldn't have accepted me either. Oh no,
I can't eat the sacrifice Moses did. You're right, buddy. You're
right. Faith comes to God only by the
merits of Christ. And faith bows to God. You see, my family is not my
family. It's His. My life is not my life. It's His. My wife is not my wife. She's His. I just had these things
on temporary load for just a little while. For just a little while.
Thirdly, steadfastness. Verse six, Moses said to Aaron
and Eliezer and Ithamar, and the sons, uncover not your heads,
neither in your clothes, don't you act like you're going crazy
now, lest you die. Lest wrath come upon all the
people. Let your brethren, those folks
outside there, those folks who don't know anything about this
business, let your brethren, the whole house of Israel, bewail
the burning which the Lord has kindled. And you shall not go
out from the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, lest you
die for the anointing of the Lord's upon you. And they did
according to the word of Moses. Now this is God's word to us.
As God's priest, as the servants of the Most High God, we must
not bewail the burning which God has kindled. I've looked at this and looked
at this. What on earth is he talking about? Something similar
to what Paul said when he said, we are of God, a sweet savior
of Christ. To those that are saved, a sweet
savor. To those that perish, we're still
nonetheless a savor of death unto death. Something like what
he said in Romans chapter three. What if some did not believe?
Shall their unbelief make void the purpose of God? Oh, no. Let God be true in every man
alive. You see, if we are God's servants, God's people, God's
priests, We are indeed to live above this world. I think maybe
for the first time in my life, I've begun in the last couple
of days to understand something about what Paul meant when he
said, set your affections on things above. It's exactly what Aaron did.
It's exactly what he did. By the blood of Christ, by the
anointing of the spirit, We've been brought into another world,
another kingdom, another sphere of life. That doesn't mean that
we're stoics. That doesn't mean we don't feel
things. Feel them we do. We feel them like other men and
feel them more keenly than other men. Aaron knew, Aaron knew what
nobody else knew until they were told. Aaron knew that his boys
died under the wrath of God. And he stood there in dead silence. Don't even imagine he didn't
feel it. Oh my God, he felt, he felt the pain. But like Aaron, we must, if we're gods, live
above the world, above the range of the world's influence, above
the reach of the world's touch. above the claims and passions
of our own hearts, above the influence of nature. I'm in God's
house. I'm God's servant. Let me sit
down here to study for you. Years ago, doctors anticipated
I'd soon die when I was undergoing the Cobalt treatments. The fellow
who was head of the outfit there at Duke, Sharp, sharp fella. He said, he said, now Reverend
Fortner, what he called me, I didn't fuss with him. He said, Reverend
Fortner, you're going to have to take a leave of absence for
so long. I said, Dr. Noel, now whatever it is you
want me to do, best of my ability, I'll do it. But I ain't about
to quit preaching for a few weeks or a few months. That's just
not going to happen. If it means don't take the treatments,
don't take the treatments. But I'm not going to quit. No, no.
How come? Because there's something more
important. Somebody more important. God's
people. God's kingdom. God's glory. God's will. God's purpose. Several
years ago when Shelby went to hospital, she had a large cyst. The doctor didn't know whether
it was cancerous or not. Another time went back, had that
tumor, didn't know whether it was cancerous or not. went into
surgery, and I had to leave her. You can't do that. Well, I had
to. I didn't have any choice. I had
to. How come? Because I'm God's servant. And I've got his church, and
his kingdom, and his people, and the souls of men to care
for. I said, but Pastor, you're a preacher. You too, Lindsey
Campbell. God's grace. There's something
more important than me and mine. And no matter what the pain in
me, I stand in this world as God's servant, and I will live
above the pain. And by God's grace, I will abide
in the door of the tabernacle. He didn't just say to Aaron,
he said, you've got to abide here. He said, you shall abide here. Because you're my priest and
the anointing's on you. You're not going out. Now, you're
responsible to stay here. You're responsible to not let
this bed drive you from me and from my worship and from my sacrifice.
But I'll see to it you do. And then, there's something else
required. Sobriety. You can read it for
yourself in verses 8 through 11. God told Aaron and his son,
said, now, boys, when you go into the tabernacle, when you
go into the house of God, don't you fellows drink any wine and
don't drink any Jack Daniels. Well, what a statement. Who would ever think about, before
you get up in the morning and have breakfast? I mean, these
fellows were out doing business in the tabernacle before daylight.
Who would imagine those fellows were just absolutely smashed? I've known in my life a lot of
folks who liked their alcohol pretty good. I've known folks
who just stayed drunk most of their waking hours. I've never
seen one in my life get up and have it for breakfast. I just
haven't. I'm not saying nobody does, but
that's a rare bird. Well, what's he talking about
here? There is certainly a literal prohibition to the sons of Aaron
against the use of alcoholic beverages engaging in their priesthood. But does that mean that God is
here giving a prohibition to the use of wine or beverages
of that kind? No, no. No, our Lord served up
real good wine at the marriage of Canaan. Now the scriptures
give a strict prohibition to drunkenness. The scriptures teach
moderation and temperance. Nowhere in this book is anybody
taught total abstinence with regard to such things. Moderation
is right. But to teach abstinence is to
teach wrong. That's not what our Lord's talking
about here. Well, what's he talking about? Turn to Titus chapter
2, I'll show you. Verse 11. The grace of God that brings
salvation has appeared to all men. The gospel of God's free grace,
this message we preach to you, has appeared to all men. Everybody's
heard it, but some of us have heard it teaching us, teaching
us. You see, when God, when God teaches,
you get the lesson. He doesn't just put it out here
as a proposal and say that here's something for you to consider.
Other folks are thinking about it. We learned, teaching us,
and this is what the grace of God's taught us, that denying
ungodliness and worldly lust, we should live soberly, righteously,
and godly in this present world. looking for, standing on the
tiptoe of faith, anticipating that blessed hope and the glorious
appearing of the great God and our Savior, who gave himself
for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify
unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. Now, here's
the prohibition. Wine and strong drink, they tend
to exhilarate our passion. They tend to aggravate our basest
nature. When men and women are under
the influence of wine and strong drink, when men and women are
intoxicated, their most base nature comes out real easy. Inhibitions are gone. Judgment
is gone. And they act like they really
are. Somebody says, well, he was drunk.
That wasn't really him. Oh, no. When he's drunk, that's
really him. That's really him. The bars are gone. The cage doors
opened up. Nothing to stop it. That's what
it really is. You too. You too. But we're not to live
like that. We don't worship and serve our
God according to our base passions. We don't worship and serve our
God according to our nature, but rather with deliberate, thoughtful,
calm reason. That's what it is walking spirit
with sobriety. Otherwise, we can't discern between
the unclean and the clean. We can't discern between that
which is holy and that which is unholy. The whole world thinks
they can because the whole world says nothing to me that means.
The whole world says, this is what I think that means. The
whole world says, let me tell you how I feel about that. And
the whole world, preachers included, build their religion and their
doctrine, their theology and their practices on what they
feel. Intoxicated with their passions
and they're going to hell with it. We judge things according
to this book. by the teaching of God's spirit
with sobriety. And we distinguish between clean
and unclean doctrine. Holy and unholy doctrine. Clean
and unclean sacrifices. The sacrifice of Christ or strange
fires. We discern between that which
is good and that which is evil according to the judgment of
Holy Scripture. There's something else here. In the house of God, We must
studiously avoid those things that rouse passions, excite carnal
natures, and stimulate base emotions. If you took that out of the Hollywood
churches, if you took that out of the programs, I'm talking
about just take out of the church everything that excites the carnal
nature. Everything that stimulates your
base emotions. Everything that rouses your passions. You take that out of churches,
they'll close up tomorrow. Close up tomorrow. Our master,
when he's going through the money changes tables, he said, my house
will be called a house of prayer. Not a house of politics. Not
a house of economics. Not a house of entertainment.
Not a house of sensuality. A house of prayer. Preaching,
worship, praise. This is what it is to call upon
the name of the Lord. This is what it is to believe
God. This is what it is to worship Him. It's to come to God through
His sacrifice, submitting to His dominion, steadfastly clinging
to Christ with utter sobriety, because God This is what I have
chosen to do, and this is what I must do for the glory of God. Amen.