Tcb (Taking Care Of Business) - Pt. 2 - Ash And Fire

TCB

Pt. 2

I remind you that last week I told you that Elvis has sold over 1 billion records worldwide. More than any other artist in history. But I also told you he didn’t accomplish this by himself. His band the TCB Band helped him accomplish this. TCB – Taking Care of Business was the driving motto in Elvis’ life.

But I also told you should also have significance for us as believers. Because Peter makes it very clear that we are priests. Remember I emphasized that this name or descriptive term for us carries great responsibility and duty. So we began a journey last week to discover what the duties a priest carried out each day and the implication of that for us.

The first was to diagnose and provide remedy for sickness. I told you we don’t TCB in this area because: 1. We aren’t healed ourselves – so we can’t heal anyone else. Healing is not a passive process. 2. We are too caught up in ourselves – so we don’t notice anyone else is sick. 3. We don’t want to get close to anyone – have to get involved in their lives. 4. We are afraid of contamination – don’t want their sickness to rub off. We must begin to operate in strength. 5. We are afraid they will ask us for a remedy and we won’t have an answer.

Second duty is to transport glory. Our answer is not a program or a class, but transporting the glory out of this place into our daily lives. The glory can bring remedy. However, I also told you that most of us can’t transport glory because we are not holy. We must be daily aware of our need to be holy so that we can transport glory. How many of you have a sore back this morning? You should because you should have been carrying the weight of glory all week!

So let’s move forward and look at more areas in which we should be TCB.

TEXT: Exodus 35:30-33, 38:1-7; Leviticus 6:8-10

30And Moses said unto the children of Israel, See, Jehovah hath called by name Bezalel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah. 31And he hath filled him with the Spirit of God, in wisdom, in understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship; 32and to devise skilful works, to work in gold, and in silver, and in brass, 33and in cutting of stones for setting, and in carving of wood, to work in all manner of skilful workmanship.

1He made the Altar of Whole-Burnt-Offering from acacia wood. He made it seven and a half feet square and four and a half feet high. 2He made horns at each of the four corners. The horns were made of one piece with the Altar and covered with a veneer of bronze. 3He made from bronze all the utensils for the Altar: the buckets for removing the ashes, shovels, basins, forks, and fire pans. 4He made a grate of bronze mesh under the ledge halfway up the Altar. 5He cast four rings at each of the four corners of the bronze grating to hold the poles. 6He made the poles of acacia wood and covered them with a veneer of bronze. 7He inserted the poles through the rings on the two sides of the Altar for carrying it. The Altar was made out of boards; it was hollow.

8GOD spoke to Moses, 9“Command Aaron and his sons. Tell them, These are the instructions for the Whole-Burnt-Offering. Leave the Whole-Burnt-Offering on the Altar hearth through the night until morning, with the fire kept burning on the Altar. 10Then dress in your linen clothes with linen underwear next to your body. Remove the ashes remaining from the Whole-Burnt-Offering and place them beside the Altar. 11Then change clothes and carry the ashes outside the camp to a clean place. 12Meanwhile keep the fire on the Altar burning; it must not go out. Replenish the wood for the fire every morning, arrange the Whole-Burnt-Offering on it, and burn the fat of the Peace-Offering on top of it all. 13Keep the fire burning on the Altar continuously. It must not go out.

I. Introduction

The priests had to daily (every morning and evening) approach the Brazen Altar. This altar blocked progress into the Holy of Holies until sin was dealt with. There could be no worship, fellowship, illumination or contact with God’s Shekinah glory until sin had been specifically dealt with at this gruesome altar which speaks again about holiness. Without holiness on a daily basis it is impossible to please God or even approach Him. At this altar the priests would make a sacrifice to deal with their sin.

We will talk more about this later, but today I want to draw your attention to the construction of this altar and the instruments that were used along with the altar. The altar was a hollow box shape made out of Acacia wood. It measured 7 ½ ft. square and was 4 ½ ft. tall. It was overlaid by brass. Suspended in this box was a brass grate. The Fire was down in the midst of the Altar, not on top. Teaching us that the sin that must be burned out of our life is not a surface issue, but goes to the heart of who we are. Just dealing with the emotions caused by sin isn’t enough. We need a deep cleansing by fire. The sacrifice was laid on the grate and this holy fire would burn it. The grate was designed so that the sacrifice would burn and the ash would fall through the grate.