Moses on the Mountain with the Lord - Part 10
Exodus 31:1-17
Sermon by Rick Crandall
McClendon Baptist Church - August 25, 2010
BACKGROUND & INTRODUCTION:
*Tonight we are near the end of Moses’ fifth meeting on Mount Sinai with the pre-incarnate Lord Jesus Christ. (1)
*This fifth meeting lasted for 40 days, and most of that time the Lord was giving Moses very detailed instructions for the Tabernacle and the Priests who would serve there.
-But at the same time, the Lord was giving us 8 physical pictures of spiritual truth:
[1] The Ark teaches us about God’s law and love, because it contained the Law, and its mercy seat was sprinkled with the blood of the sacrifice.
[2] The showbread teaches us about God’s life, because Jesus Christ is the true Bread of Life.
[3] The lamp stand teaches us about God’s light, because Jesus is the Light of the world
[4] The Tabernacle teaches us about God living with and in His New Testament saints, because in Exodus 25:8, the Lord had told Moses: “Let them make Me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them.”
[5] The Altar of Sacrifice teaches us about the price paid for our sins.
[6] The priests teach us about our Great High Priest Jesus Christ, who goes to God the Father on our behalf, and bridges the impassable gap caused by our sin.
[7] The Altar of incense teaches us that our prayers are like sweet-smelling smoke rising up to our God.
[8] And the bronze basin of water, where the priests washed before their service to the Lord teaches us the importance of purity. Those Old Testament priests were washed in water, but Christians, we are washed in the Blood of the Lamb.
*Now the Lord is about to finish giving instructions to Moses, but God had some more important things to say. Let’s look at it tonight in Exodus 31, and we can start by reading vs. 1-6.
1. Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying:
2. "See, I have called by name Bezalel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah.
3. And I have filled him with the Spirit of God, in wisdom, in understanding, in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship,
4. to design artistic works, to work in gold, in silver, in bronze,
5. in cutting jewels for setting, in carving wood, and to work in all manner of workmanship.
6. "And I, indeed I, have appointed with him Aholiab the son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan; and I have put wisdom in the hearts of all the gifted artisans, that they may make all that I have commanded you:
I. In these verses the Lord speaks to us about our service. And we can notice three things about our service to God.
1. First: He gives us appointments.
*The Lord God gives appointments to His people. We see this in vs. 1&2:
1. Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying:
2. "See, I have called by name Bezaleel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah.”
*Also take a look at vs. 6, where the Lord said: “And I, indeed I, have appointed with him Aholiab the son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan; and I have put wisdom in the hearts of all who are gifted artisans, that they may make all that I have commanded you.”
*God had a job for Bezaleel, God had a job for Aholiab, and God has a job for you. God has a Kingdom purpose for every one of our lives!
-He gives us appointments.
2. And He gives us abilities.
*Speaking of Bezaleel in vs. 3-5, the Lord said:
3. “And I have filled him with the Spirit of God, in wisdom, in understanding, in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship,
4. to design artistic works, to work in gold, in silver, in bronze,
5. in cutting jewels for setting, in carving wood, and to work in all manner of workmanship.
*God gave abilities to Bezaleel. And the Lord did the same thing for Aholiab.
-We can see this in vs. 6-11:
6. “And I, indeed I, have appointed with him Aholiab the son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan; and I have put wisdom in the hearts of all who are gifted artisans, that they may make all that I have commanded you:
*I like the way the KJV puts vs. 6. -- Here the Lord says, “And I, behold, I have given with him Aholiab, the son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan: and in the hearts of all that are wise hearted I have put wisdom, that they may make all that I have commanded thee.”
7. the tabernacle of meeting, the ark of the Testimony and the mercy seat that is on it, and all the furniture of the tabernacle
8. the table and its utensils, the pure gold lampstand with all its utensils, the altar of incense,
9. the altar of burnt offering with all its utensils, and the laver and its base
10. the garments of ministry, the holy garments for Aaron the priest and the garments of his sons, to minister as priests,
11. and the anointing oil and sweet incense for the holy place. According to all that I have commanded you they shall do.’’
*God gave those workers all of the wisdom, skill and understanding they ever needed. -- This tells us is that we can trust the Lord to equip us for every single task He wants us to perform.
*Many of you know that our church was born out of tragedy. In the 1920’s, Shannon and Elzada Rogers adopted a little boy named Donald, and he grew to love the Lord at a very early age. Many times Donald tried to get his parents to go to First Baptist Church with him. One Sunday, he said, “Momma, please go to church with me.” Mrs. Rogers answered, “I will -- next Sunday.”
*But before the next Sunday came, their little boy was hit by a truck and killed.
-Mrs. Rogers never got that other chance to go to church with Donald.
-That’s what moved her to start a Sunday School for the children who lived on Downing Pines Road.
*When the class began, they didn’t have a building at all. They met under some trees about a half mile up the road. Louise Brown and Wilma Cobb were two of those children. In the beginning, the children stood; then they sat on boards laid across syrup buckets. And just like He did on the cross, God turned a tragic loss into a great blessing for many people. Two of those little children are still a part of our church family: Wilma Cobb and Louise Brown.
*Thinking back to those days so long ago, Louise Brown said, “The thing I mostly remember is, Mrs. Rogers saying, ‘I don’t know how to do this. The only thing I know to do is to read some Scripture, and pray.’ Then Mrs. Rogers said, ‘I’ve never prayed out loud before.’”
*But God gave her all the skill she needed for His work.
-And He will surely give it to us!
-As David Guinn says, “God does not call the equipped. He equips the called.”
*The Lord gives us abilities.
3. And He anticipates our accomplishments.
*As God said in vs. 11: “According to all that I have commanded you they shall do.” -- May the Lord be able to say the same thing about us!
*If He gives us the appointment, He will surely give us the ability.
-We just have to have the willing heart to do what the Lord asks us to do.
*Some of you will remember Bobby Richardson. He played 2nd base for the New York Yankees from 1955-1966. Bobby is a devoted Christian and national leader in the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. He has spoken many, many times for the Lord, even here at North Monroe Baptist back in 2007.
*One time at a meeting of the FCA, Bobby Richardson lifted up this powerful prayer: "Dear God, Your will, nothing more, nothing less, nothing else. Amen." (2)
*That’s the spirit we need in serving Jesus Christ!
-The Lord speaks to us about our service.
II. And He speaks to us about His Sabbaths.
*The basic meaning of “Sabbath” is “intermission.” It comes from the root word that means “rest, cease, put an end to.”
1. And notice that God was serious about His Sabbath.
*Back in Exodus 20:8-11, God had verbally given His Fourth Commandment to the people:
8. "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.
9. Six days you shall labor and do all your work,
10. but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates.
11. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.
*God was very serious about His Sabbaths. It is one of the Ten Commandments.
*Now in Exodus 31, we are near the end of Moses’ fifth trip up the mountain to speak with the Lord. The 40 days are almost over, and it is interesting to see that the last thing the Lord chose to discuss was the Sabbath.
*The Lord started in vs. 12:
12. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying,
13. "Speak also to the children of Israel, saying: ‘Surely My Sabbaths you shall keep, for it is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the Lord who sanctifies you.”
*This alone shows us that God was serious about His Sabbath.
-But we see more in vs. 14-16:
14. ‘You shall keep the Sabbath, therefore, for it is holy to you. Everyone who profanes it shall surely be put to death; for whoever does any work on it, that person shall be cut off from among his people.
15. Work shall be done for six days, but the seventh is the Sabbath of rest, holy to the Lord. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death.
16. Therefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant.’”
*Why was the Lord so serious about the Sabbath?
-Partly because God wanted to continuously remind them and us that the wages of sin is death.
-But another reason was because there was great significance in the Sabbath.
2. You see, God gave the Sabbath for a sign.
[1] Down in vs. 17, the Sabbath was a sign that God is our Creator. The Lord said: “It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.”
*It is a good thing for us to remember that God is God and we are not. As David said in Psalm 100:3, “Know that the Lord, He is God; It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves.”
*God is our Creator! And He gives signs to remind us. Psalm 19:1 tells us that “the heavens declare the glory of God.” The vastness of space shouts to the whole world that there must be a Creator God.
*Richard Wimer points out that if you hold your thumb at arms length toward the sky, your thumb nail is covering up more than 250,000 galaxies in space!
-And every one of those galaxies holds 100 to 200 billion stars! (3)
*But Isaiah 40:26 in the New Living Translation says: “Look up into the heavens. Who created all the stars? He brings them out one after another, calling each by its name. And he counts them to see that none are lost or have strayed away.”
*The universe itself is a sign of our Creator, and Exodus 31:17 tells us that the Sabbath is another sign that God is our Creator God.
[2] But the Sabbath is also a sign that God is our Savior.
*Look back at vs. 12&13:
12. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying,
13. "Speak also to the children of Israel, saying: `Surely My Sabbaths you shall keep, for it is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the Lord who sanctifies you.’”
*The Sabbath is a sign “that you may know that I am the Lord who sanctifies you.” In other words: “I am the God who purifies you and makes you holy. I am the God who makes you fit to be in my presence.”
*They could not know what we know: That God would sanctify us through His own death on the cross for our sins. So Hebrews 10:10 tells Christians that by God’s “will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.”
*And in 1 Corinthians 1:2, Paul wrote: “To the church of God which is at Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all who in every place call on the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours.”
*God sanctifies every believer through the cross of Jesus Christ. But the Sabbath was a very important Old Testament reminder that God is both our Creator and our Savior.
*So, do we still have to worship on the Sabbath? -- No. We worship the Lord on the first day of the week, because that is the day Jesus rose from the dead.
*One of the frequent battles in the New Testament church was whether or not New Testament believers have to keep the Old Testament ceremonial laws. While he was at Jerusalem, Paul brought the matter before the original church leaders at Jerusalem. Both Peter and James affirmed that we do not have to be circumcised or keep the Old Testament ceremonial laws.
*They sent a letter to the churches outlining the real requirements. Here it is from Acts 15:23-29:
23. . . . “The apostles, the elders, and the brethren, To the brethren who are of the Gentiles in Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia: Greetings.
24. Since we have heard that some who went out from us have troubled you with words, unsettling your souls, saying, `You must be circumcised and keep the law’ to whom we gave no such commandment
25. it seemed good to us, being assembled with one accord, to send chosen men to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul,
26. men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
27. We have therefore sent Judas and Silas, who will also report the same things by word of mouth.
28. For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things:
29. that you abstain from things offered to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell.
*They said nothing whatsoever about us keeping the Sabbath. In fact, Acts 20:7 tell us, “Now on the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul, ready to depart the next day, spoke to them and continued his message until midnight.”
*And when Paul was speaking to the Corinthian church about a special offering, he said:
1. Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I have given orders to the churches of Galatia, so you must do also:
2. On the first day of the week let each one of you lay something aside, storing up as he may prosper, that there be no collections when I come. (1 Cor 16:1-2)
*We don’t have to keep the Sabbath today.
-But God gave the Sabbath for a very important sign.
3. And God gave the Sabbath for our strength.
*Look again at vs. 16&17:
16. `Therefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant.
17. It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.’”
*God rested. -- Of course, He didn’t really need to, because Isaiah 40:28 says: “Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary. There is no searching of His understanding.”
*God didn’t need rest, but He knew we would need rest.
-So He rested as an example to us.
-And He created the Sabbath to make people get the rest they needed.
*Of course the Scribes and the Pharisees of Jesus’ day took this Commandment way too far. And we will talk about that when we cover the Ten Commandments. But Jesus told them that the Sabbath was made for man.
*God wants us to rest. Most of us are far too busy. We need rest, and the best place to get it is from Jesus Himself. In Matthew 11, Jesus said:
28. "Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
29. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.”
*The Savior wants to give you rest: Physical, emotional, spiritual and eternal rest.
*Let’s go to the Lord for the rest we need.
-We can speak to the same Lord who spoke to Moses on the mountain.
-Let’s do that right now.
-Would you please bow for prayer.
1. Good explanation of Moses’ time on the mountain: “Seven Ascents” by Richard Gamble - www.heraldmag.org/2006/06mj_3.htm
2. Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Richardson
Sermonillustrations.com - Commitment
3. Source: Popular Science TV Program (Found in the KERUX ILLUSTRATION COLLECTION - ID Number: 34700 - SOURCE: Wit And Wisdom at http://www.witandwisdom.org by Richard G. Wimer - TITLE: Billions And Billions - DATE: 5/31/07)
