He Will Dwell with Us

[0:00] the two kidneys with the fat that is on them, and the right thigh, for it is a ram of ordination, and one loaf of bread and one cake of bread made with oil, and one wafer out of the basket of unleavened bread that is before the Lord.

[0:15] You shall put all these on the palms of Aaron and on the palms of his sons and wave them for a wave offering before the Lord. Then you shall take them from their hands and burn them on the altar on top of the burnt offering as a pleasing aroma before the Lord.

[0:33] It is a food offering to the Lord. You shall take the breast of the ram of Aaron's ordination and wave it for a wave offering before the Lord, and it shall be your portion.

[0:44] And you shall consecrate the breast of the wave offering that is waved in the thigh of the priest's portion that is contributed from the ram of ordination from what was Aaron's and his sons.

[0:56] It shall be for Aaron and for his sons as a perpetual due from the people of Israel, for it is a contribution. It shall be a contribution from the people of Israel from their peace offerings, their contribution to the Lord.

[1:12] The holy garments of Aaron shall be for his sons after him. They shall be anointed in them and ordained in them. The son who succeeds him as priest, who comes into the tent of meeting to minister in the holy place, shall wear them seven days.

[1:30] You shall take the ram of ordination and boil its flesh in a holy place. And Aaron and his sons shall eat the flesh of the ram and the bread that is at the basket, sorry, in the basket in the entrance of the tent of meeting.

[1:47] They shall eat those things with which atonement was made at their ordination and consecration, but an outsider shall not eat of them because they are holy.

[1:58] And if any flesh of the ordination or of the bread remain until the morning, then you shall burn the remainder with fire.

[2:09] It shall not be eaten because it is holy. Thus you shall do to Aaron and to his sons, according to all that I have commanded you, through seven days shall you ordain them.

[2:23] And every day you shall offer a bull as a sin offering for atonement. Also, you shall purify the altar when you make atonement for it and shall anoint it to consecrate it.

[2:35] Seven days you shall make atonement for the altar and consecrate it. And the altar shall be most holy. Whatever touches the altar shall become holy. Now, this is what you shall offer on the altar.

[2:48] Two lambs a year old, day by day, regularly. One lamb you shall offer in the morning and the other lamb you shall offer at twilight. And with the first lamb, a tenth measure of fine flour mingled with a fourth of a hen of beaten oil and a fourth of a hen of wine for a drink offering.

[3:08] The other lamb you shall offer at twilight and shall offer with it a grain offering and its drink offering as in the morning for a pleasing aroma, a food offering to the Lord.

[3:18] It shall be a regular burnt offering throughout your generation at the entrance of the tent of meeting before the Lord, where I will meet with you to speak to you there. There I will meet with the people of Israel and it shall be sanctified by my glory.

[3:34] I will consecrate the tent of meeting and the altar. Aaron also and his sons I will consecrate to serve me as priest. I will dwell among the people of Israel and will be their God.

[3:46] And they shall know that I am the Lord, their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt, that I might dwell among them. I am the Lord, their God. Let's pray.

[4:01] Lord, again, we come to that which is far removed from from us. And yet, Lord, we know that your word is relevant and teaches us and instructs us.

[4:14] It points us to Christ. Lord, help us as your word is open to understand your word. But Lord, not for mere intellectual profit, but Lord, that we would worship you, that we would see Christ in your word, that he would be glorified.

[4:29] We pray this in his name. Amen. Now, as we come to the end of chapter 29, we are really at the end of five chapters that have described the tabernacle and the furnishings of the tabernacle and the priest and their clothing.

[4:48] Now, their ordination. You can even look a little bit ahead. In chapter 30, we're going to look at the altar of incense. So we're five chapters in at this point. And the details are very specific in each of these instances.

[5:03] Even here, we're seeing loads of details about the sacrifices that are to be made. And I think it's it's easy for us today to get lost in all the details. To kind of get overwhelmed with all this.

[5:15] And I'm going to try not to dive into every single aspect of that. But really point us to what we see in God's word. And in some ways, this has been true all throughout. But what is it that we're seeing here in the word of God?

[5:29] Well, the first thing I want us to see is that look at the sacrifices that were needed. The sacrifices that were needed. So we've seen that the priests have been consecrated.

[5:40] They've been ordained. And they've been anointed. Now we see more detail of an ongoing or continual ordination for a seven day period. Remember, they've already come to the entrance to the tent of meeting and been washed.

[5:55] A full bath. They've been robed. They've been anointed with oil. And they've even now been sprinkled with the blood of the sacrifice. All this has taken place and yet there's still more that's needed.

[6:12] We talked about in past weeks and we see this at the beginning of the passage. It talks about the fat from the ram in verse 22 and the fat tail and the fat that covers the entrails and the long lobe of the liver and the two kidneys with the fat that is on them and the right thigh.

[6:28] And we talked about this that fat may not literally mean fat but it really means the best portion, the good portion. And so here they're taking the best parts of it and they're dedicating it to God even as we've seen in the past.

[6:41] And it's a wave offering which we know very little about. The word can also mean that it's filling, it fills them. But they take it and they wave it before the Lord probably in some way to say clearly this is God's, this is not ours.

[6:55] And yet you see later they get to eat of a part of it. But it's an offering that's dedicated to God by waving it to Him. Almost as if we were getting God's attention. Hey God, over here, this is yours.

[7:07] And of course we know God's not like that. Our God doesn't fall asleep, He doesn't stop paying attention. He's all knowing. But it's to make clear probably more so even for the people, this is for God.

[7:18] I'm waving it to Him. But we also see that as the priest, Aaron and his sons, they had the right to receive a portion of the sacrifice for their food.

[7:31] We see that in verse 26. This is specifically, we see the ram's breast and the ram's thigh were at different times given to them. This is continued on in verses 27 and 28.

[7:44] We see that it's a continual thing that happens. That the priests are then allowed to eat from what is given by the people. And of course that's part of our offerings today and how we understand things today.

[8:00] A portion of what is given to the church goes to those who minister in God's name. 1 Timothy 5.18 says, For the scripture says, You shall not muzzle an aughts when it shreds out the grain and the laborer deserves his wages.

[8:14] And so this principle is really what leads to the New Testament understanding of supporting pastors for the work that they can serve. These priests were given full time and you can understand why they were given full time to the work, can't you?

[8:27] As we look at what happens, there's sacrifices day after day after day. And so someone has to be the person who knows how to do that and go about doing that.

[8:38] And so instead of working in the field or gathering, they spend their time serving in God's presence at the entrance of the tent of meeting in the courtyard but sacrifices for God's people and of that they're able to eat certain portions of that.

[8:55] I found it also interesting about the robes. I put a lot of thought in this and maybe we don't need to go very detailed into this either but Aaron's robes, the ephod of the high priest, he would wear for seven days during the ceremony and when he passes on it gets passed on to his sons.

[9:18] So we read of the first instance of this in Numbers chapter 20, 28 and 29. And Moses stripped Aaron of his garments and put them on Eliezer, his son.

[9:30] And Aaron died there on the top of the mountain. Then Moses and Eliezer came down from the mountain and when all the congregation saw that Aaron had perished all the house of Israel wept for Aaron thirty days.

[9:42] But we see there the example of his garments get passed down. So these really nice garments would eventually become hand-me-downs over and over again.

[9:53] They would receive them, they would wear them for seven days, they'd do it again year after year until they got passed on to the next person. And God somehow preserved them. And I thought of the washing and the anointing with fragrant oil, they have perfume or cologne, they put these garments on, they get splattered with blood, they wear it for seven days, it gets done all over again.

[10:16] And so even all the details that have gone into this, there's nothing inherently special about the clothing, but it's God who makes this clothing holy. It's God who sets it apart as something different.

[10:29] And you'll also notice that in addition to everything we've already seen that happened at the tent of the meeting on one day, we now have seven days of ordination or consecration of the priest.

[10:45] And every day there is a bull that is sacrificed on the altar. And in addition on every day there's a lamb sacrificed in the morning and a lamb in the evening.

[10:55] So every day at the very least, and that's not in addition to other sacrifices that would happen later on, but any time this takes place that a priest would be ordained, there would be three animals a day for seven days in addition to what we've already seen, maybe we call it day zero at the very beginning of the ordination.

[11:15] So 21 plus animals sacrificed in the ordination of the priest. And so every day the priests that are doing the sacrifice are those who are also being ordained by the sacrifices.

[11:30] And so each day they're reminded repeatedly over and over again. They wake up in the morning and what are we doing? We're prepping a lamb to sacrifice it. We sacrifice it on the altar.

[11:42] We go through the ritual of what we do with the blood and the meat. And then just about the time we're finished it's time to sacrifice the bull. And then after that we begin preparing to do the evening lamb.

[11:55] I think of some of the mothers here can kind of relate to this, right? It's like you get up in the morning maybe you're making breakfast in the morning you're washing the dishes and by the time you get finished the kids are ready for lunch.

[12:08] And over and over again it seems like the cycle never ends. And it's like this with the priest but in this instance it's sacrifices. There are animals that are dying over and over again you see an animal die.

[12:20] And I think what's being communicated to them is there's a daily reminder of God's grace in taking away sin. That each day they see God is taking away my sin.

[12:34] There's this process that's necessary over the course of these seven days to make the priest ready to serve. And so as they see the death they go God's sanctifying me.

[12:46] God's making me holy. He's ordaining me for this work. Over and over again. And then when it's all done the priests still have to make sacrifices for the people's sin apart from the ordination.

[13:00] They still have to make sacrifices for their sin. It's not as though okay it takes seven days and we're clean and we never have to worry about that again. The sacrifices continued over and over again day after day.

[13:13] And you would think especially since God is prescribing this that these sacrifices daily given would be enough to sanctify God's people.

[13:24] Maybe I could take that even further and say not just to sanctify them but to justify them to make atonement for their sins. But we've seen over and over again as we've gone to the Hebrew book of Hebrews Hebrews really teaches us about how we understand what's happened here in the book of Exodus.

[13:41] In Hebrews 10 verse 11 this is what we read. And every priest stands daily at his service offering repeatedly the same sacrifices which can never take away sins.

[13:57] Let that sink in for a moment. I hope if you've been here for some time you understand the scope of what's going on here but let me just walk through it one more time. They're sacrificing animals and what's the purpose of sacrifice?

[14:14] To deal with sin. And Hebrews tells us every priest stands daily at his service offering repeatedly the same sacrifices day after day over and over again and maybe it's like that mom we were talking about earlier and the kids are never full.

[14:33] They keep eating and then they hit teenagers and you realize they've somehow multiplied or something. They're even more hungry than they were before. It's over and over again. So the priest stands there he offers the sacrifice and the goal is to deal with sin and yet we're told in Hebrews 10-11 they offer repeatedly the same sacrifices which can never take away sins.

[14:59] Never take away sins. It wasn't possible for them to take away sins. So why? Why all the sacrifices?

[15:11] Why all the details that we've been waiting through for months now? Well, God's word tells us in Romans that these sacrifices at least in part enabled God to overlook the sins previously committed until the appropriate time.

[15:34] The time of the true sacrifice. That these were only copies of that these pointed to the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. but it's also a reminder for God's people all the time that they're sinners before a holy God and that God requires holiness.

[15:52] In fact, as we've gone through these chapters in our passage today without going into all the details what do we see over and over again? That holiness is required. God will make the altar holy.

[16:03] Whatever touches the altar will become holy. God will make his priests holy. He will consecrate them. He's going to set them apart. Make them holy for the service to the Lord. And so all those who draw near to God are reminded that there's this need for holiness.

[16:22] Verse 44 of our passage. I will consecrate the tent of meeting and the altar. Aaron also and his sons I will consecrate to serve me as priest. One commentator Phil Riken he says before he descended in glory everything everything was made holy.

[16:43] That's before God comes to the tabernacle to stay there. Before he descended in glory everything was made holy. God made the tent holy consecrating it with holy sacrifices.

[16:54] He made the furniture holy. Each piece was carefully crafted to reveal something about his divine character. He made the priests holy. He washed them dressed them anointed them and sprinkled them with consecrating blood.

[17:08] He even put a label on their foreheads that said holy to the Lord. And so you get this idea that holiness matters. That our God is holy.

[17:19] And God cannot descend in all his glory to rest there over the ark of the covenant until all had been made right for him. Until his dwelling place, his house was ready and prepared for him.

[17:33] And so in many ways the sacrifices were so that God's people could understand what salvation is. Even though again it had not yet been realized it was only pointed to.

[17:47] What is salvation? Hebrews again kind of instructs us in this. Hebrews 12, 14 says strive for peace with everyone and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.

[18:06] Without holiness no one will see the Lord. God here is consecrating them. He's making them holy so that what will happen? That they will see the Lord.

[18:19] That's really what I want to look at next is how they saw the Lord. God dwelling with us or dwelling with our God. If you've been here for some time maybe you remember but what was the purpose of the Exodus?

[18:36] Why did God deliver the Israelites out of Egypt? Why? What was the purpose? Well the purpose statement was given back in chapter 6 verse 7.

[18:49] God says I will take you to be my people and I will be your God and you shall know that I am the Lord your God who has brought you out from under the burden of the Egyptians.

[18:59] again I will take you to be my people and I will be your God. So there's two sides of that. We're going to be his people and he will be our God.

[19:11] That's why he brought them out. And in particular as we've seen to dwell among them that that relationship could happen and his presence could be there.

[19:24] We talked about this before but this is to some extent what Adam and Eve experienced in the garden. They knew relationship with God. They were there with him in the garden.

[19:35] His presence was known there. They're probably not to the same degree even as we see here with the tabernacle. But that was lost in the fall. And so remember God promised Abraham in the Abrahamic covenant Genesis 17 7 and 8.

[19:54] God said to Abraham I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant. And what's the covenant?

[20:05] He says to be God to you and to your offspring after you and I will give to you and to your offspring after you the land of your sojournings all the land of Canaan for an everlasting possession and I will be their God.

[20:20] God. So the point then to be a God to you and to your offspring after you and I will be their God.

[20:37] So God's purpose in saving them His promise to Abraham is that there's going to be relationship. But there's a problem. I prayed about it a little earlier in our pastoral prayer.

[20:50] We've talked about it some already. Why is this why is there this great need for holiness? Why all the sacrifices? Because there's a holy God in whose presence evil cannot exist.

[21:04] Whose eyes are too pure to look on evil. And what does it take to be evil? Now I know kids when you watch movies it's always it's usually easy to tell who the evil character is.

[21:18] Sometimes the music is a little different. Maybe the scene darkens when He shows up. But the reality is this that sin is what stains all of us.

[21:34] That if we understand evil to be the opposite of holy imperfection not just the bad guy in the cartoon or in the movie but each and every one of us who have sinned before a holy God and fallen short of His glory.

[21:54] All of us have sinned and all of us sin therefore evil before God and so what does that mean if God's eyes are too pure to look upon evil and evil's not just the bad guy I'm the bad guy.

[22:09] I'm the one who's evil. How can God look upon me? How can there be relationship? How can we know God to be our God?

[22:21] To possess that, to own that as ours? He is our God. And along with that how can God dwell among us?

[22:37] He can't be in the presence of evil. I'm evil therefore this isn't difficult logic is it? Therefore He cannot dwell with us. And so we see in this process a reminder of that.

[22:49] God's presence is coming down to this tabernacle and these natural things have to be purified and made holy. These objects the linen the gold even the silver the brass all these things are tainted by our sin and they have to be purified and holy sanctified made holy that God can dwell there in the temple.

[23:15] And if that's true of them how much more so of us? So even the priests that serve daily have to be prepared sacrifices over and over again. And God's purpose in all these details why has He given us all this?

[23:31] It's to teach us that He is saving and sanctifying making a people holy for His own glory. He's making us fit to be in His presence so that we can be with Him and know Him as our God.

[23:49] That's God's goal not just in the Exodus. We've said already that the Exodus in many ways is a smaller version a type of the salvation that we find in Christ Jesus.

[24:05] We're brought out of bondage to sin. We pass through the waters of baptism. We journey through life much like the Israelites in the desert longing to reach the promised land where we will dwell with God forever.

[24:24] And so God is working to prepare us for the promised land. And it's not Canaan. we're not all trying to move back to Canaan or repossess the land or whatever you might say.

[24:39] But we understand God's speaking of our heavenly dwelling with Him. We see God's purpose in doing this reaffirmed in passages like Leviticus 26, 9-13.

[24:53] God says to the people, I will turn to you and make you fruitful and multiply you, which is a repetition of the Adamic covenant, be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth.

[25:05] He says, and I will confirm my covenant with you. You shall eat old store long kept and you shall clear out the old to make way for the new. I will make my dwelling among you and my soul shall not abhor you.

[25:18] And I will walk among you and will be your God and you shall be my people. I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that you should not be their slaves. And I have broken the bars of your yoke and made you walk erect.

[25:34] So as we hear that, God reaffirms that covenant promise. I will make my dwelling among you and my soul shall not abhor you.

[25:46] Now I don't know if any of you felt uncomfortable earlier when I said, talked about who's evil. We're all evil. But listen to what God says here. He's doing this work.

[25:59] He saved them from Egypt that he might purify them as a people for his own possession so that he may dwell among them and no longer abhor them. The state of all men apart from salvation in relation to God is one of abhorrence.

[26:20] We talk a lot about God being a God of love and he is. There's a sense in which there's love that God has for all of his creation including all his people. But we also have to understand the other side of that is that God is righteous and holy.

[26:35] That he is by his very nature opposed to that which is evil. And therefore of necessity of his being he abhors the unrighteous.

[26:48] That's a problem. How is it that God's going to dwell with us? Jeremiah 31 prophesies about the new covenant in Jesus Christ.

[27:02] And this is what it says in verses 31 through 33. Behold the days are coming declares the Lord when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah.

[27:15] Not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt. My covenant that they broke though I was their husband declares the Lord.

[27:28] For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days declares the Lord. I will put my law within them and I will write it on their hearts and I will be their God and they shall be my people.

[27:43] That's the new covenant promise. And so the new covenant is not like the old covenant because what did the old covenant do? Where was the law written? We've seen already.

[27:54] Written on tablets of stone. God's given the Ten Commandments. Obey these as my people. And how did they do? Hopefully you remember those sermons where we preached through the Ten Commandments.

[28:06] And I don't know if you're like me but realize that there's not one commandment that I've kept so far. They broke the commandments. We have all broken God's commandments.

[28:19] commandments. And so the consequence of breaking the commandments is breaking the covenant which is a breaking of relationship with God. How can God continue that relationship when it's been broken?

[28:34] But the new covenant is a little bit different because where is the law written? It is written on the hearts of all those who are in the covenant. God has saved them.

[28:46] They have the law written upon their hearts so that they have this internal desire working outward that they want to do what's pleasing to the Lord instead of an outward desire pressing in on them.

[29:04] This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days declares the Lord. I will put my law within them and I will write on their hearts and I will be their God and they shall be my people. Everything that we've been looking at in the book of Exodus is moving toward God dwelling with his people, him being in their presence, him being their God and them being his people, although it may be partially realized with the tabernacle and later when they enter the promised land and with the temple at some point, it doesn't last and it's not to the full.

[29:40] And so in the new covenant we see a fulfillment of that and we'll talk a little bit about that in a second but there's also a future reality that's a part of this. So as Christians we're experiencing the new covenant and we know in a greater degree that being made holy before God, that relationship with God, that dwelling with him than was ever known before Christ.

[30:06] But there's a greater reality, Revelation 21 3. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them and they will be his people and God himself will be with them as their God.

[30:22] Now if you've been tracking along so far, hopefully you see the proclamation that's made in heaven on that day is a repetition of the covenant. God's covenant promise would be that he would dwell with his people, he would be their God and they would be his people.

[30:40] Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them and they will be his people and God himself will be with them as their God. Some of the exact wording except now it's fully realized in the new earth and new heavens.

[30:57] And I've talked a lot about the dwelling, God dwelling with us. That's what we desire but it's not just that we're dwelling with God, there's also a relationship that's had in this.

[31:10] He will be our God and we will be his people. a relationship established. John Murray speaks of this, he says, the spirituality of relationship which is the center of the Abrahamic covenant is also at the center of the Mosaic which we're going through now.

[31:32] Namely, union and communion with God. maybe we don't put a lot of thought into what's going on here is union and communion.

[31:44] That they would be united to God and that they would have fellowship with God, be able to relate to God. He's going to be their presence and they're going to be there commuting with God. God. I think one of the things that's just struck me so powerfully in the last three years, much of that time I was working on the Union with Christ project that we've had here at our church.

[32:09] But also as we thought about Union with Christ as I looked at that, there's been books like Michael Reeves, Delighting in the Trinity, which I strongly recommend to you. But as I look to this, just the idea, the understanding that there's God, the Trinitarian God, Father, Son, and Spirit, who are perfectly happy, eternally dwelling with each other, lacking nothing, and yet they created the world.

[32:41] God doesn't make the world because He's lonely. He's not making the world and people so that He could, so that we could dwell with Him because He needed a friend. Like the, really, the kid who's alone who makes the imaginary friend and talks to Him.

[32:56] God's not sitting there, I need somebody to talk to. God had perfect communion within Himself in the Trinity, lacking nothing, and yet He created. Why? Because the nature of God is such that He delights Himself in sharing that joy and communion in the Trinity.

[33:16] And so what we see taking place here is God's going to come down among them that He might bring them into relationship with Him. Why? So they can enjoy what God has eternally enjoyed among Himself, that joy and communion with God.

[33:37] And so, does it happen at the tabernacle? Yeah, no. Remember, even we saw with the mountain, God's people stood far off.

[33:47] They saw His holiness and they're aware of their evil, their sin. And so, they don't want to go too close. They're begging, just let God talk to you up there on the mountain.

[33:59] Don't make me go up there. And yet, they're far closer in relationship to God than, say, the Egyptians. They're seeing a theophany of God on top of the mountain.

[34:12] God's presence is there. Later on, He'll be in the tabernacle. They'll go into the courtyard and participate in the sacrifices, knowing that right there, maybe 15 yards away, 10 yards away, is the Holy of Holies and God's presence there above the Ark of the Covenant.

[34:32] And they will speak to the priest, and the priest will speak to God through a mediator. They're close to God. They're having a relationship with God. But is that really what we long for?

[34:44] Is that enough? And so God gives a new covenant. And in the new covenant, we see a greater fulfillment of all these things. I want to talk a little bit more about this in a second, but for now, to say that we have the presence of Christ on earth.

[35:05] And what does it say? God tabernacled among them. He dwelt among them. Like the days when there was a tabernacle, here's God incarnate walking among them.

[35:21] And when He speaks of His death, the disciples try to stop Him. No, no, no, no. We don't want you to go away. And Jesus says something that I think is just mind-boggling to us.

[35:34] It's to your advantage that I go away. Because if I don't go away, I can't send the Comforter, the Holy Spirit. And I say it's mind-boggling for us because it seems like for the disciples, they're standing there in the presence of God incarnate.

[35:57] It's the closest, maybe even better than what Adam experienced. It's closer than anything we've ever had to dwelling with God. And God says, Jesus says, it's a disadvantage for you if I stay here.

[36:11] There's a greater dwelling that's coming. What is that dwelling? I'm going to send my Holy Spirit to indwell the believer. We become the tabernacle where the Spirit is inside of us.

[36:28] And yet we're reminded there's still better things to come. I'll touch on that in a minute, but let me just say that what God is doing is bringing all of us into union with Christ, that we might have a relationship with God, that he might be our God, that we might have that relationship, that communion, that communion of the Trinity, that joy that's had there with them.

[36:57] And so one of the things we saw in our union with Christ study is that all the spiritual blessings that we enjoy are ours because we are united to Jesus Christ. It's because of this relationship, this dwelling with God.

[37:11] Psalm 144, 15 says, blessed are the people whose God is the Lord. That relationship. He will be our God and we will be his people. It is a blessing for us.

[37:25] So I've already touched on some of this because I just get excited sometimes, but let's look at a few things in application. First is the idea of atonement.

[37:39] In light of what we've seen, I think, I hope, all of us are convinced that, number one, we've all sinned at some point in our life, realistically, at some point in the day, maybe at some point during this message, we've all sinned before God.

[37:55] And we need a sacrifice for sin. There can be no atonement for our sin. The sins cannot be taken away without the shedding of blood and the blood of beast is insufficient.

[38:09] It cannot do the job. So we need a sacrifice for sin. Listen to Leviticus 17, 11. For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it for you on the altar to make atonement for your souls.

[38:22] For it is the blood that makes atonement by the life. And so the only way to make atonement is by the shedding of blood. And Hebrews has told us that the blood of these animals can never take away sin.

[38:38] And so understand our plight. Here we are, sinners before God that need to be made right with God, that we can come into His presence. And so blood has to be shed, but it can't be in animals because it's insufficient.

[38:51] Hebrews 9, 22 says, Indeed, under the law, almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins.

[39:02] And so anything else that we might hope that could save us will not do the job. There's nothing else that gets that stain out. Right? There's no hope apart from the shedding of blood.

[39:15] I can't be a good enough person. I can't go to church enough. I can't pray enough. I can't read the Bible enough times. I can't give enough to the church.

[39:26] I can't be nice enough to people who are needy. There's nothing that I can do apart from the shedding of blood.

[39:39] And even that doesn't work for us. But God has provided the sacrifice. God has provided the blood that does take care of sin, that does wash us and make us clean.

[39:56] Ephesians 5 2 says, and walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. These offerings, that aroma that's coming up, the fragrant offerings that we see here are meant to point to Christ who is our offering.

[40:14] By whose blood we are washed and made clean that we might be in the presence of God. I mentioned earlier that what that looks like at least at this point right now is that God dwells in all those who have been washed by the blood of Jesus Christ.

[40:34] God indwells us. It is a greater reality than anything that has been experienced throughout all history. You have it better than the disciples, at least before perhaps the day of Pentecost.

[40:51] 1 Corinthians 3 16. Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's spirit dwells in you? 1 Corinthians 6 19. Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God, you are not your own?

[41:08] And again, 2 Corinthians 16. What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God said, I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them and I will be their God and they shall be my people.

[41:25] Where did God say that? Well, at least one place is our text today, right? Verse 45. I will dwell among the people of Israel and will be their God and they shall know that I am the Lord their God who brought them out of the land of Egypt that I might dwell among them.

[41:43] I am the Lord their God. And we've seen it in the Abrahamic covenant. We've seen a repetition of it in Leviticus. Over and over again, God has promised this and what is the fulfillment of it?

[41:56] 2 Corinthians 16 again. What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God said, I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them and I will be their God and they shall be my people.

[42:09] So 2 Corinthians is telling us the fulfillment of that promise, the covenantal promises, it's been fulfilled in our time by Christ's spirit, the spirit of Christ, the Holy Spirit indwelling believers.

[42:24] That's what he's promising here. but to do that, he first had to make us holy. By the blood of his son, he has washed us.

[42:38] He has robed us in his righteousness. He has anointed us, not with oil, but with his spirit. And he sprinkled us with the saving blood of the son. He's ordained us, he's purified us to be servants to the living God.

[42:55] 1 Peter 1, 18-19. Knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.

[43:13] We've been ransomed by the blood of the lamb. So what should our desire be in light of all these things? My prayer is that in hearing this, all of us would desire that we would dwell with God.

[43:29] In his presence is fullness of joy, and his right hand are pleasures forevermore. Now I've said already that the covenant promise is fulfilled in the Holy Spirit.

[43:40] Listen to John 14, 23. Jesus answered him, if anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.

[43:54] Brothers and sisters, if you trust in Jesus Christ, you have the Holy Spirit indwelling you. He's made his home with us, and yet there still remains something even greater that could be imagined. There's coming a day when Christ will return, and this world, this creation will be consumed in fire, and there will be a new earth in which God will dwell with his people.

[44:17] There's coming a day where we will be in the presence of God in a way that exceeds that of the Holy Spirit. We will be in his presence, and we will be holy.

[44:30] We will be glorified. We will not be able to sin. It will be impossible for us. And we will know communion with God like we've never known before.

[44:42] How's that going to happen? Well, the only way we can be made right to dwell in the presence of God is by the blood of the sacrifice, and we've seen already it's not that of animals.

[44:57] It's of Jesus Christ. If you put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ, if anyone loves me, keeps my word, my Father will love him and will come to him and make our home with him.

[45:09] That's not just about the Holy Spirit. He's coming to us that he might make his home among us that we might know that fullness of joy everlasting.

[45:20] Let's pray together. Dear Heavenly Father, we pray that you would help us to conceive of how great it will be to dwell in your presence.

[45:40] Lord, in this life, Ephesians 5 has told us you've given us marriage as an example of that. And Lord, in the fallen world, even those marriages are tainted with sin. But Lord, we pray that we would know some of this, how great it is to live with our spouse, with our family, the blessings that we've known to be close to friends, to have relationships with them, fellowship with them.

[46:07] And yet, Lord, all these are but shadows of a greater reality that we long and desire to have with you. Lord, may we set our hearts upon that.

[46:19] May we desire that. And Lord, in doing so, we pray that we would look to Jesus Christ and that you would wash us in that blood. That that sacrifice would sanctify us and ultimately would glorify us, that we one day could dwell with you forever.

[46:37] We pray this all in Christ's name. Amen.