We have about 354. 354. What a friend we have in
Jesus. What a friend we have in Jesus. Lord, our strength and grace
to bear. What a faithfulness to bear. ? Everything you've got is great
? ? Oh, what reached me off the hardest bit ? ? Oh, what fingers
made me bend ? ? Oh, we got together again ? ?
Everything you've got is great ? Can we try authentication? Is there trouble anywhere? We should never be discouraged. Take it to the Lord in prayer. Can we find a way to pray? ? Farewell our sorrows share ?
? Jesus, Lord God, bring me nearness
? ? Bring me to the Holy Grail ? ? Lord, we'll be anything you
have ? ? Comfort me, the Lord of care ? Take him to the Lord in prayer. We'll find a solace there. Guide
me, O Thou Ranger of the pilgrims, through these barren lands. I am he, but thou art I, only
with thy pow'rful hand. Rail thee home, rail thee home,
deep into thy wonderful home. Deep into thy wonderful home. Open now the crystal fountain
which the healing spring doth pour. Let the fire and cloudy
billow lead me on my journey through. Be thus with my strength and
cheer, Be thus with my strength and cheer, When I tread the verge
of Judah, Be my anxious fears subside, Bear me through, the swelling earth, let me stay
on his side. Songs of praises, songs of praises,
I will ever give to thee. I will ever give Exodus chapter 21. First six verses. Our Lord has
finished the Ten Commandments. and set forth the fact, and reiterated
that there could raise no gods of silver and gold, and set forth
the manner in which to be worshipped at an altar, where burn offerings
and peace offerings are offered, which both represent the work
of Christ and its effect on the believer. And now he begins to
set forth rules and regulations and judgments to the people of
Israel, Now these are the judgments which thou shalt set before them.
Thou mine Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve, and in
the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. If he came in by
himself, he shall go out by himself. If he were married, then his
wife shall be well. She hath borne him sons and daughters,
the wife and her children shall be the masters, and he shall
go out by himself. And if the servant shall plainly
say, I love my master, and my wife and my children, I will
not go unto him. And his master shall bring him
to the judges. She shall also bring him to the door, or to
the doorpost. And the master shall bore his
ear through with an eight ball, and he shall serve him forever. Blessed King of Kings and Lord
of Lords, you who dwell in your habitation in the heaven of the
earth at your feet, you who reign supremely over all that you have
created and are the sole proprietor of the universe and all of brotherhood.
We thank you, Father, for your great work to salvage that you
accomplished by coming down here to this world, living among your creatures,
sinners of all, came and lived without sin, born of a woman, born under the
law to redeem them from the law, went to the cross of Calvary,
died in the mouth instead of the people, is made to be their
righteousness, wisdom, sanctification, and redemption. Now you sit enthroned in glory
as the Lamb of God for sinners. We thank you that we can think
such things and say such things. For we know apart from a work
of grace in our hearts and minds we cannot be able to do because
you've given us faith to believe, to rest, to finish the work of
Jesus Christ. Father, we pray for those of
you who are sick, especially our brother Fred. The thing in
his jaw is not going down, and we pray that you will minister
to him in peace. Father, you know what our heart's
desire is for you. Thou knowest we bow to your will. Pray for those of our company
who are shut-ins, who are going through trials and tribulations,
and even those who don't know how to, that you would be a comfort
and a strength to them. Help us tonight as we gather
here, that you might be pleased to give us fortune as we consider
these things to be the force of your word. Bless your word,
your witness to your people. Help us now, we pray, to worship
you. This chapter addresses judgments
or laws that attend civil matters among the people of God and are
generally adjudicated by elders of the tribes. The Lord himself
gives the laws through Moses and sets the judgment We'll see that as we study further
in this chapter. The design was to make this nation
like no other nation, like no other nation, whose laws or civil
society are derived from nothing other than God Himself. That's
what he said in Deuteronomy chapter 4, verses 5 through 8. He says,
Behold, I have taught you statutes and judgments, even as the Lord
my God commanded me. that ye should do so at the land
within our coastal possession. Keep therefore a new thing, for
this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of
the nations. We shall hear all these statutes and say, surely
this great nation is wise and understanding to people. For
what nation is there so great, who hath God so nigh unto them,
as the Lord our God is in all these things that we call upon
Him for? And what nation is there so great,
that hath statutes of judgment so righteous, as all this law
which I set before you this day? Our Lord not only gave the Ten
Commandments, Illuminated the fact that all of Israel had already
transgressed because the law was ready to transgress because
of transgression. He now gives these civil laws
to make this a civil society of good citizens. And the laws
were given, or the people might be right, and do right, and were
punished if they didn't. And verses 2-6 deal with servitude
and freedom, immediately strikes a chord in the hearts of believers
who are sinners saved by grace, by the Spirit, through the preaching
of the gospel, the believer has learned of the servitude of sin
that he experienced, and the servitude to sin, and Satan himself. And he's also learned of the
glorious liberty for which Christ has made us free. The Lord said
in John chapter 8, he who commits sin is a servant, you see, a
slave, you see. Men think that they're free,
born free. They think that they have no
one ruling over them. But man is made to be employed
by a sovereign. And whether it be God or sin
or Satan or self, man does not rule his own self. His root is
made that way. He who commits sin is a servant
of sin, a slave to sin. And the Lord also said this,
If the Son shall make you free, you shall be free indeed. So
when we see terms like servitude and freedom, we automatically
think of these things. These verses address buying a
Hebrew servant. That's what it's talking about.
Or a Hebrew servant, or a Hebrew man being sold into servitude. And there were two reasons why
a person could be sold into servitude as a human citizen. Why a person
could suffer this kind of indignity where he was once a free person
and now he's in servitude. The only two reasons for his
first extreme poverty, if a person wasted his money or he made bad
investments or Something happened that destroyed his crops or his
herds and he suddenly found himself without any means whatsoever. He could offer himself to be
sold into servitude. If he was in great debt, he could
be going to servitude to pay that debt, to get that money
to pay that debt. The other reason is if he was a thief and was caught. He could be sold into servitude if he was called a thief. Now,
being guilty of theft, there must be restitution, and that
restitution was a six-year period of servitude. That was the penalty
assessed for that felony. And most Hebrew writers, in fact,
if you read just about any one of them, you'll find that all
of them say, this was what this man was guilty of. He was guilty
of thieving. He was a thief. He wasn't in
poverty. He was a thief, so he was sold
into servitude because he was guilty. In the seventh year,
he was to be set free, for it was the year of the Sabbath.
He was set free. And he was to be set completely,
completely free. No shadow hanging over him, no
cloud over his head. When he walked out after the
six years of servitude, it was as if he had never sinned. He
had never been a thief. He was a free man and free completely. Scripture says he shall go free
for nothing. Go free for nothing. Now his
debt was fully paid. After six years his debt was
fully paid. Now the fact that it was substantiated
in that the former servant was not to go out empty. So not only
did he serve this indenture for six years and go free in the
seventh year, his former master was to set him up in life. After
the six years of servitude, when he walked away as a free man,
the former master was to set him up in life, sending him off
as a citizen of substance, functioning in society as one who was okay. He was a good, upstanding citizen
at that point. Not only that, he had goods.
His former master, by law, was bound to do this. If you look
over at Deuteronomy chapter 15, Moses, in those 30 days prior
to the end of the promised land, gave that very instruction to
those who held the sermons. In Deuteronomy chapter 15 verse
13, it says this, And when thou sendest
him out free from thee, Thou shalt not let him go away empty.
Thou shalt furnish him liberally out of thy flock, and out of
thy floor, that's grain, and out of thy winepress, that's
with wine, that wherewith the Lord hath blessed thee. Thou
shalt give unto him, down in verse 16, and it shall be that
he shall say unto thee, I will go away from thee, because he
loveth thee, and that house that thou wilt deal with him will
be empty. But there's a reason for this
understanding. Look at verse 18. It says, It
shall not seem hard unto thee to do this, to give him all these
goods, when thou sendest him away free from thee. For he hath
been worth a double. I have served thee, and served
thee six years, and the Lord thy God shall bless thee in all
that thou doest. So when the man was set free,
Hadn't been a servant. He was set free, but he didn't
go out empty. He was set free and gained a
multitude, probably more than he had when he started. Now such
liberality is relative. There's a reason our Lord gives
to the person who's to set this man free and give him liberally
all these things. The Master's to show this kindness
because he needs to remember something. He needs to remember
that he was once a slave. And he was once a slave in Egypt
and was set free and came out of that servitude with great
abundance. Remember what the prophecy was
to Abraham in Genesis 15? That people would be held in
captivity for 430 years and they would come out by his power with
great abundance. They would come out with great
things, and that's exactly what happened. You remember in our
study, in Exodus 12, the people of Egypt wanted to get rid of
them Israelites because of all the plagues, and so they gave
them their jewels, they gave them their riches, they gave
them herds, and sent them out with more than they came in with.
They came in, you remember, dead broke and looking for some corn
to eat. Now they go out with abundance. That is the way of
the child of God who is set free. Our Lord said that in 1 Corinthians
chapter 3. When we were freed from our sin,
when we were brought out of that servitude to sin and the Son
set us free, He gave us all things. He gave us all things. That's
what it says in 1 Corinthians 3. You have all things. You are
Christ and Christ is God. You have all things. So when
we came out of servitude, we were very poor. We had nothing
of ourselves. There was nothing in us or about
us. And we had nothing that could ever recommend us to anyone.
We were poor, wretched, spiritually poor people. And what did we
get? God said, now if you'll just
work real hard, and try real hard and do some righteousness
for me, I'll reward you. He gave us everything. Freely
gave us all things. Ephesians chapter 1 verse 3.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
is blessed with all spiritual According as he's chosen, it's
in Christ before the foundation of the world. Colossians 2 and
verse 9, you are complete in him. You have everything. You lack nothing. You have need
of nothing. And so this is a picture here.
When this servant, when this man comes out of the servitude
and he's set free, he's not set free. He's given freely from
the master, all these things. And that's a picture of our salvation. We have all things in Jesus Christ.
All things are yours. All things. What does that mean? Well, everything's a thing. So,
all things are yours. This earth is yours. The world
is yours. We're told to use it and not
abuse it, but it's ours. Ours. Then in verses 3 and 4
back in our text, If he came in by himself, he
shall go out by himself. If he were married, then his
wife shall go out with him. If his master hath given him
a wife, and she hath borne him sons and daughters, the wife
and her children shall be the masters, and he shall go out
by himself. Now, this addresses the freedom,
or lack thereof, of the married servant, if the servant is married,
and his wife. Now, if he's single, when he
comes into servitude, he's to go out, and if he stays unmarried,
he goes out single, just like he came in. Now, if he's married,
when he went into servitude, his wife went with him, and when
he set free, she set free too. But, there's a caveat here. There's no suggestion here that
the wife is in servitude. That's a picture of Christ's
bride. She was never in servitude. She was not. She was simply staying
with her husband. Staying with her husband while
he was in detention. But the Master has never had any sort
of claims on her. Only on the husband. If, however,
the Master had given him a wife. During his servitude, the Master
gives him a wife. And during that six years, she's born him
children. When he's set free, the wife
and children don't belong to him. They belong to the Master.
In this case, he would have to go out free without his wife.
He had been given, or the children had been born in that relationship.
And I believe the reason that is set up the way it's set up
in the chronology of it is because it makes us have an easier and
a better understanding of what comes next in this passage of
Scripture in verses 5 and 6. It says, verse 5 and 6, If the
servant shall plainly say, I love my wife and my wife and my children,
I'm not ready. I will not go out free. I would
rather stay a servant and go out free. Then his master shall
bring him before the judges. He shall also bring him to the
door or unto the doorpost, and his master shall bore his ear
through with an awl, and he shall serve the master forever. Now these two verses introduce
the concept of the bond-servant. Paul often referred to himself
in this way when he said, I have served the Lord Jesus Christ.
He was talking about being a bond slave. He wasn't a slave who
was taken captive and couldn't change it. He was a free man,
the Lord had freed him. He stood fast in the liberty
of the Word of Christ and made it free. But he said, I'm a bond
slave. What does that mean? He loves
his master. He loves his master's house.
He doesn't want to leave. He's there because he wants to
be there. That's what a bond slave is.
This precept relates specifically to the Lord Jesus Christ throughout
Scripture as the servant of the Most High God. Mark's Gospel
is about Christ being the servant of God. Matthew's about him being
king. Mark's about him being servant. Luke is about to be
the son of man, and John is about to be the son of God. But Mark,
why was Mark? Because Mark was the servant,
and the learned one. When he was traveling with Paul,
he kind of got a little upset about it, and didn't want to
do the work. But that's what it says in Scripture.
Paul sent him off with somebody else, because he didn't want
to do the work. But the word there originally, she would take
right to it. means he didn't want to serve. Now at the end
of his life he was glad to serve in prison. He was a good and
faithful servant. So sometime between when he didn't
want to serve and he ended up serving he learned how to serve.
So what does he write about? Christ the servant of God. Christ
the servant of God. So this is how Christ is presented
in the book and he calls himself the one who serves God. Now,
Jesus Christ served the most high God, and if the man, speaking
of this here, who has served six years of indenture, and was
to be set free, was married, or if he came with a wife, or
was given one, if there were children or not, he would ask
the master to remain as a servant. And the reason is simple. He
loved his master. He loved his master, he loved
his children, and he loved his wife. Now, if the master agreed,
he took the servant before the judge. It says, this is an interesting
thing, the word judges here is Elohim. Elohim is the name of
God. It's one of the names attributed
to the most high God. But this name of God Almighty
is also applied to idols. It's also applied to men of stature. The word Elohim is applied throughout
Scripture. I'll give you a few examples. Over in Exodus chapter
32, when they raised up this calf, it's a golden calf, and
they made that golden calf out of it. It says, when the people saw
that Moses was too late to come down from the mount, the people
gathered themselves together, and Aaron said, let us make us
gods, which shall go up before us for this Moses, the man that
brought us out of the land of Egypt. We will not worry. Moses
is gone 40 days, and we ain't seen him. And Aaron said, break
off the golden earrings which are in your ears, and wives and
sons and your daughters, and bring them to me. And all the people
break off the golden earrings which were in their ears and
brought them there. And he received them in their hand and fashioned
them with a graving tool after he had made a molten calf. And
they said, these be thy gods. Where's Abel then? These be thy
gods, O Israel, which brought them. Can you imagine that? They just made this calf. since the Israelites were coming
to Egypt. They know that God parted the
Red Sea for them. They know that God buried Pharaoh's
army in the bottom of the sea. And they look at this thing that
they just made with their own hands, this golden calf. And
it's these Pharaohs that brought us out of Egypt. The word is
Elohim. That same word is used. And in Psalm 82, if you'll turn
there, Psalm 82, the word Elohim is
in 10. Verse 1 says, God standeth in
the congregation of the mighty. He judges among the gods. The
word gods there is plural, Elohim. And if you look down at verse
6, it says, I have said ye are gods. We are gods, and all of
you are children of the Most High. We are gods. The same word,
Elohim, is used there. But our Lord used this also in
the New Testament when He was talking to the religious leaders
of the day who just wanted to kill Him because they said, Thou
being a man, make Thyself to be God, over in John chapter
10. In verse 34, the Lord quotes
Psalm 82. Jesus answered them and said,
He is not written in your law. I said, You are God's, same word. So it can be used in several
different ways in the past few years. And the judges that were
brought forward, they were called God's. Because they were important
people. They weren't idols. They were
called God's because of their standing. as judges. Now the master then took the
willing servant to the doorpost, he says, and pierced his ear. Now this piercing was not in
the lobe. It was in the upper part of the right ear. And it's
still much used today in the East as a designation of a servant. But in that day it was designated
as a willing servant. A willing servant. Somebody saw
the right ear of a person holding his ear. They would know that
he was a bond-server. They would know that he was a
bond-server. And the bond-server then served
the master forever, according to this man's description. Well,
we know that when the river ended, they were going to die. The master
was going to die. The servants were going to die. It actually meant they
served to the year of jubilee. Because of the year of jubilee,
the 50th year, the last and final, the greatest slam dunk, everybody
was set free. People who owed money didn't
know it, nothing. people who had lost their homes
or had to pawn their land because they couldn't sell the land,
that was illegal under the Jewish law. They got their land back.
If somebody had moved into their home and taken over their land,
raised their cattle, they were living there and had their family
there on jubilee, that person who had formerly owned that home
could walk in that house and say, y'all gotta leave. So in the year of Jubilee, this
servant would no longer be a servant. Even if he was a bondservant,
he would no longer legally be a servant. Now as a servant of
God, our Lord took the place of a bondservant. His service
to the Father was entirely willing and entirely voluntary. He came
into this world to die. He didn't come to set up a kingdom.
He didn't come to make people's lives better. He didn't come
to be a martyr. He didn't come to be an influencer. He came to be a dead person,
to die in the room instead of his people. It said in Hebrews
chapter 10 verse 7, Lo, I come, and the volume of the book is
written to me, to do thy will, O God. And he designated himself
throughout scripture as a monster. When the Psalms and were written,
they were written about Christ. Genesis through Revelation was
written. It was all written about Christ. All Scripture spoke of
Him. And in Psalm 40, which was one of the great passages, which
about everybody, every commentator said, this is Christology right
here. In Psalm 40, verses 6 through 8, Hyrule quoted this in Hebrews
chapter 10. verse 6 is sacrifice and offering
thou didst not desire for nine years thou hast opened burnt
offering and sin offering thou wouldst not then said lo I come
with a Bible book it's written in me to do thy will oh God my
ears are open now what do I mean by ears are open? my ears are
open I'm willing to serve the fact that it was voluntary is
clearly stated throughout scripture look at Isaiah chapter 50 and I say in chapter 50 verse
5 and 6, since the Lord God hath opened my mouth, and I was not
rebellious, neither turned I away from it. Now that I know it was
voluntary, look at the next verse. I gave my back to the slaves,
and my cheeks to them that pluck off the earth, and I hid not
my face from shame and spit. Shame and spit. It's a voluntary
thing. Our Lord didn't die at the hands
of men. The men wanted to kill Him, but
they couldn't kill Him. Now what He did, suffering in
His body, suffered perhaps more than anybody else in their hands.
But that was to show how men feel about God. That treatment
of our Lord Jesus Christ was the only time that God actually
allowed man to touch Him. And what did He do? Tried to
beat him to death. So he suffered. He suffered greatly. Then he went to the cross of
Calvary. They hung him on a cross. Nailed his hands and feet. There
they waited for him to suffocate and die. Then our Lord shut down
the lights. Cut off the lights. and poured
out his wrath on Jesus Christ for all our sins. For Christ said in Psalms, I'm
consumed with the blow of thy hand. He suffered in those few hours
of darkness on the cross, the equivalent of the eternity of
hell that we should have suffered. Nobody killed him. He came out
on the other side of that and said, ain't alive, ain't alive.
A lot of us said, my God, my God, my God. My son was like
a beast, still alive. What killed him? He killed himself.
He died voluntarily. He stopped living. He gave up
a ghost. He died voluntarily. And he said
that's what the board had told him was going to do, that he
was commanded to do. In John chapter 10 verse 15 it
says, As the Father knoweth me, even so I know the Father, and
I lay down my life for the sheep. That's who he died for. He died
for his sheep. The other sheep have I which
are on this fold, that is the fold of the Jews. Them also,
Gentiles, I must bring, they shall, hear my voice, they shall
be one fold and one ship. Therefore doth my Father love
me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it up again.
Look at verse 18. No man taketh it from me, but
I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down,
and I have power to take it up again. This commandment have
I received of my Father. Our Lord loved his Father. He
loved his father's house. He loved his wife, his bride,
his church. He gave himself 40 cents for
a business plan. He loved his children and voluntarily
did the work that his father sent him to do. Voluntarily. Look over at Hebrews chapter
2. Hebrews chapter 2 verse 13 says,
Then again I will put my trust in him, and again, behold, I,
the children of God, have given thee for as much thee as the
children are for takers of flesh and blood. It seems like that
saved a table of children before he came. They were always his children.
They were eternally his children. For as much then as the children
are partakers of the flesh, but he also himself likewise took
part in the same, that through death he might destroy him that
hath the power of death, that is the devil. The power of death
is the fear of death. That's the power that Satan has,
the fear of death. And to live with him who through
the fear of death were in the lifetime subject to bondage.
Fear of death is bondage. For verily he took not himself
the nature of angels, but took upon him the seed of Abraham.
Who is the seed of Abraham? Is it the Jews? I don't know. Ishmael was the seed of Abraham. Isaac was the seed of Abraham.
Also, Ishmael is called Abraham's seed in Scripture. He is part
of Abraham. Who is Abraham's seed? According
to Galatians chapter 3, those who believe in Jesus Christ are
Abraham's seed and heirs according to promise. It says, Wherefore,
in all things, it behooved him that he might be like unto his
brethren, that he might be merciful and faithful and high priest
in all things, pertaining to God, and make reconciliation
for the sins of his people. When that he himself has suffered,
being tempted, he is able to suffer them that are tempted,
comfort them that are tempted. Why do we do that? Because we
love them. Behold, I am with you. We still
ask you to love us. He loved his father's house,
he loved his children, he loved his bride. to do. I wrote and say that Isaiah
chapter 42 verse 1, Behold, my servant, my servant, I am elect,
in whom my soul did lie. Father, bless us to understand
and pray for us. Amen. Amen. I'm glad you're here.