OPEN: Years ago I went to the a seminar for preachers put on by a local hospital. In part, the seminar was an attempt on their part to show appreciation for our ministry to their patients. But they also went over various items that would make our ministry more effective. Amongst the topics they covered that day was basic hygiene. They explained that the simple practice of washing hands was often overlooked by visitors. Even Doctors and nurses sometimes would forget to simply wash their hands. But, they explained, hand washing was essential for protecting the health of patients from infection. They taught us that the best way to wash your hands at a hospital is to use soap and then scrub your hands for 10 seconds (mentally counting to 10) before washing away the suds and drying our hands. Essentially, they were telling preachers - cleanliness is next to Godliness.
The seminar ended and it was time for our meal at the hospital. Several of us went into the bathroom, and as I was at the sink washing my hands I heard a voice nearby:
“1… 2… 3… 4…”
Cleanliness IS next to Godliness.
But hospitals haven’t always practiced that principle.
ILLUS: Back in the 1840’s, one of the world famous medical centers was in Vienna Austria. If you had a medical problem – this was the Mayo clinic of the day.
But they had a problem. In their maternity wards, women were dying at the frightening rate of 1 in 6 pregnant women (about 20%). Doctors of the day felt the death rate was due to delayed lactation, excessive fear, or poisonous air.
But then a young doctor named Ignaz Semmelweis arrived and was placed in charge of the maternity ward. He was troubled by the death rate and decided to observe that the women who were examined by the doctors and medical staff became sick and died much more often than the women who were not examined.
He traced the behavior of their doctors back to the autopsy room. Apparently, before going to the maternity ward, these doctors often went to the morgue and examined bodies of people who’d died in the previous 24 hours. Immediately afterward – without washing their hands – the medical staff visited pregnant mothers and would do pelvic exams.
Sensing a connection, Dr. Semmelweis instituted a strict policy: any medical student or doctor who’d visited the morgue was required to carefully wash their hands before visiting the maternity ward. Mortality rates immediately went down only 1 out of every 42 mothers died. (a little over 2% death rate compared to the nearly 20% previously).
When this policy was applied hospital wide… other death rates came down as well.
And what the response of the medical staff? They howled in protest – they scorned him, belittled him, and eventually fired him.
When he was hired at another hospital in Budapest, he obtained the same results for patients… and encountered the same rejection by the medical staff. Eventually he ended up in an insane asylum because the obvious remedy for these mothers was rejected and the death rate rose again to their previous levels.
None of These Diseases by S.I. McMillen, M.D. pp 24-26
It took decades before the medical community embraced the simple idea: Washing hands was the best way to control infections.
Yet, 3000 years before Semmelweis was born God taught His people the importance of being clean. In Numbers 19 God told His people that anyone who touched a dead person would be unclean for 7 days, and part of the process of becoming clean again was:
“The person being cleansed must wash his clothes and bathe with water, and that evening he will be clean.” Numbers 19:19
In other words: Cleanliness WAS next to Godliness.
In Exodus 30 we’re introduced to another kind of Biblical cleansing. This cleansing took place at something called the brazen laver or bronze basin. (Show picture of “Brazen Laver”).
For those of you who weren’t here for the previous sermons, the Tabernacle was a tent –like structure inside of an enclosed courtyard. The first thing you’d see when entering the courtyard was the altar of sacrifice. Then – between the altar and the door of the tabernacle.
Exodus 30:20-21 tells us that
“Whenever they enter the Tent of Meeting, they shall wash with water so that they will not die. Also, when they approach the altar to minister by presenting an offering made to the LORD by fire, they shall wash their hands and feet so that they will not die. This is to be a lasting ordinance for Aaron and his descendants for the generations to come."
In other words – before the priests were allowed to do any service for God they were required to stop at the brazen laver and wash their hands and feet.
They couldn’t make a sacrifice…
They couldn’t enter the tabernacle…
They couldn’t offer incense…
Or light the candles in the Holy Place…
UNTIL they had FIRST stopped at this basin and washed their hands and feet.
(Pause)
I found it intriguing – this is the only piece of furniture at the tabernacle that isn’t described in detail. There are no dimensions. No real physical description to speak of.
We know it had to be small enough to be transported (By comparison when Temple was built, its bronze laver was huge - capable of holding about 20,000 gallons of water).
Now remember, the tabernacle was built according to strict specifications because in Hebrews we’re told it was copy of the tabernacle that exits in Heaven and thus it God wanted to use the earthly tabernacle to teach heavenly truths.
But in Scripture, God deliberately left out any dimensions or specific descriptions about the bronze laver. All we know is that it was a basin meant to hold water for washing the hands and feet of the priests.
So apparently, that’s what God wanted us to focus on.
If that’s true, what can we learn from the limited information God gives me this bronze basin?
1st – we find in Exodus 38:8 that “They made the bronze basin and its bronze stand from the mirrors of the women who served at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting.”
Mirrors of that day were made of polished brass (no one had yet learned how to make glass) and Scripture tells us God had the people melt down the common brass mirrors people used to look at themselves and they made this bronze laver the priests used to wash their hands and feet.
Why would God have them use mirrors to make this washstand?
Well… James 1 teaches us “… get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you. Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.
Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who LOOKS AT HIS FACE IN A MIRROR and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. James 1:21-24
Now, why would I look in a mirror?
Well, I might do it to admire myself. (I spent a couple of minutes “preening”)
But more often, I will look in a mirror to see if my hair is combed
Or if I missed a little when I’ve shaved
Or to check my tie – is it straight.
In other words, there are things about myself I can’t SEE TO FIX without a mirror.
When I come into the presence of God there are things about myself that will need fixed, things about myself that need to be cleaned up - washed away. But I can’t see the problem in myself without some kind of mirror to help me.
There are many folks think they’re OK with God. They believe they’re going to get into heaven because they aren’t “that bad”. They believe that they are clean enough for God. But they suffer from the fact that they don’t bother to look at themselves using the mirror of God’s Word. They don’t believe there’s anything wrong with themselves because they’ve never looked closely enough in God’s Mirror.
God’s mirror says to all of us. You need to clean yourself up because
“All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God” Romans 3:23
Or as Ecclesiastes 7:20 declares:
“ There is not a righteous man on earth who does what is right and never sins.”
What we NEED to do is look into the perfect Word of God and see the sin that’s reflected in our life. The closer we look at ourselves in that mirror, the more we’ll see we need to work on. But once we look honestly at ourselves using God’s standards, then we’ll know we need wash ourselves before coming into His presence.
(pause)
Now some scholars look at this passage in Exodus (about the bronze Laver) and think the laver stands for baptism. After all - Ananias told Paul before he baptized him that baptism was involved in washing away his sins.
In Acts 22:16 we read that Ananias said to Paul
“Get up, be baptized and wash your sins away...”
So baptism IS USED by God to portray our sins being washed away, but there are some problems with believing that the laver (here at the tabernacle) stands for Christian baptism.
The 1st problem is this:
Only the priests were to use this basin for washing.
No other Israelite washed their hands at the bronze laver.
In fact, EVEN if you were a Levite - but not a priest – you couldn’t wash your hands here.
Only the priests could wash in this basin.
In an earlier sermon we noted that once we became a Christian we became priests of God. As 1 Peter 2:5 tells Christians: “you also… are… a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”
And we learned that BEFORE Old Testament priests became priests they had to go through a ceremony where they were washed with water.
In Exodus 29:4 God tells Moses: "bring Aaron and his sons to the entrance to the Tent of Meeting and wash them with water.”
In the same way, when we became Christians, we were washed in the waters of baptism and at that point we become priests of God.
But this brings up the next problem with the laver being a symbol of baptism. Notice the priests in the tabernacle had to wash their hands and feet EVERY time they approached God at the altar or the tabernacle.
If the laver represents baptism… that would mean we’d need to be rebaptized every time we sinned. Do we have to be rebaptized every time we sin? (Of course not).
ILLUS: In the first church I served I was approached by a very gentle woman. Her husband had recently died (I did the funeral) and she began to re-attend church after years of having lived apart from God. But now she wanted to make herself right with God again. She sensed she had sinned too much to simply walk right back into God’s presence and be accepted and she wanted to be re-baptized.
They hadn’t covered this topic in Bible College and I wasn’t sure how to answer her. So, I asked for some time to pray about her request. A few days later I believe God gave me the answer I’d been looking for.
When I saw this woman again I opened the Bible to John 13 and we read the story of the Last Supper together. But in John we’re told Jesus left the room for a short time and returned with a towel wrapped around His waist and carrying a basin of water. Then He began to wash His disciples’ feet. Peter was appalled. Rabbis didn’t do that sort of thing – it was beneath them – and he refused to let Jesus wash his feet.
"No," said Peter, "you shall never wash my feet."
And Jesus answered, "Unless I wash you, you have no part with me." John 13:8
Overreacting (as he often did) Peter replied "Then, Lord, not just my feet but my hands and my head as well!" John 13:9
Then Jesus responded: “A person who has had a bath needs only to wash his feet….” John 13:10
He who has had a bath doesn’t need to bathe again… just that his feet be cleansed.
I explained to the woman that she didn’t need to be re-baptized, she only needed to wash her hands and feet at the basin Jesus held.
Thus - the Bronze Laver (basin) stands for our constant need as Christians to be cleansed.
In 2 Corinthians 7:1 Paul tells the Christians at Corinth “… let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God.”
Even as Christians we need to constantly examine ourselves in the mirror of God’s Word and purify ourselves. But how can we do that? John told the Christians of his day: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” 1 John 1:9
In order to cleanse ourselves of our sins we need to admit we’ve sinned.
We need to come to God and own up to our sin.
We need to confess what we’ve done wrong.
But too often people take the mirror that should be used to examine our own lives – and turn it just enough so that it reflects the people around them.
It’s not their fault – it’s someone else’s.
The student who fails in class will tell you "It was my teacher’s fault because he expected too much."
A married man who has an affair with a co-worker tells his wife, "If you had been a decent wife to me, it never would have happened."
And criminals regularly defend themselves in court by blaming every-body from God to their parents for what has happened in their lives.
But God says: Don’t blame somebody else… wash you OWN hands when you come to Me.
ILLUS: Researchers at the University of Toronto reported in 2006 that people who are suffering from a guilty conscience experience “a powerful urge to wash themselves.”
To study this effect, the researchers asked volunteers to recall past sins. They were then given an opportunity to wash their hands as a symbol of cleansing their conscience. Those who had recalled their sins washed their hands at “twice the rate of study subjects who had not imagined past transgressions.” Our Daily Bread 2/4/08
The only way to remove our guilt as Christians- and get close to God - is to wash our hands. To confess our sins to God and then trust Him to forgive us and purify us.
This kind of Cleanliness IS next to Godliness.
Paul tells us that Communion is a great place to examine ourselves: “A man ought to examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of the cup” (1 Cor. 11:28). Thus – every week as we gather at the Lord’s Table – we should be confessing our sins from the past week and then partake of communion.
What I want to do this morning is take time right now to have you examine yourselves. Think back over the past week and– ask yourself have you experienced
Lust?
Greed?
Pride?
Anger?
Unforgiveness toward someone else?
(Have them bow their heads and after an appropriate amount of time, close with prayer)
CLOSE: We can’t offer sacrifices on the altar till we’ve confessed our iniquity.
We can’t come into the tabernacle of God’s presence until we’ve acknowledged our sins
We can’t experience any true closeness to our Father till we own up to our own shortcomings.
Poem by Kathleen Wheeler
He came to my desk with quivering lip; the lesson was done…
"Have you a new leaf for me, dear Teacher? I have spoiled this one!
I took his leaf, all soiled and blotted and gave him a new one, all unspotted
Then into his tired heart I smiled: "Do better now, my child!"
I went to the Throne with trembling heart; The day was done.
"Have you a new day for me, dear Master? I have spoiled this one!"
He took my day, all soiled and blotted, and gave me a new one, all unspotted;
Then into my tired heart He smiled: "Do better now, my child!"
