The True Tabernacle (The Golden Altar) Series

The True Tabernacle: (The Golden Altar)

I. OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

I remember traveling to Hill Country Camp while on the youth committee and taking our children to Kid's Camp. There was a country store on the way that has a payphone outside. Our girls were young and had never seen a payphone. It was fascinating to them. They stood there pretending to talk on it.

Technology changes. There are some here today who remember a time when there was no email. We wrote letters. There were no text messages. We wrote notes and passed them to one another. There are a few of you who remember when your family got a house phone. Growing up our family had a rotary phone with a long twisted cord. Cell phones were the bulky things that fit into briefcases and carphones that businessmen and drug dealers had.

Wireless communication was a thing of science fiction. Today automatic wireless communication across the world is the norm. And even now, not all phones are created equal. There are satellite phones that can call anywhere from anywhere with no need for cell towers or hard lines.

Golden telephones have been a symbol of opulence, decadence, power, wealth, and elitism.

In 1930 when Vatican City was built it was connected to ITT the (International Telephone and Telegraph) lines. The Catholic Church in America presented Pope Pius XI with a golden telephone.

In 1957 the US presented a golden telephone to the Cuban dictator Batista

There is a story of iconic artist Andy Warhol giving away a golden telephone explaining that with it you can talk to God.

Ancient Israel was not given a golden telephone, but a golden altar.

II. SCRIPTURE TEXT:

In Exodus 30:1-10 (NIV) we read:

1 “Make an altar of acacia wood for burning incense. 2 It is to be square, a cubit long and a cubit wide, and two cubits high —its horns of one piece with it. 3 Overlay the top and all the sides and the horns with pure gold, and make a gold molding around it. 4 Make two gold rings for the altar below the molding—two on each of the opposite sides—to hold the poles used to carry it. 5 Make the poles of acacia wood and overlay them with gold. 6 Put the altar in front of the curtain that shields the ark of the covenant law—before the atonement cover that is over the tablets of the covenant law—where I will meet with you. 7 “Aaron must burn fragrant incense on the altar every morning when he tends the lamps. 8 He must burn incense again when he lights the lamps at twilight so incense will burn regularly before the Lord for the generations to come. 9 Do not offer on this altar any other incense or any burnt offering or grain offering, and do not pour a drink offering on it. 10 Once a year Aaron shall make atonement on its horns. This annual atonement must be made with the blood of the atoning sin offering for the generations to come. It is most holy to the Lord.”

Like a golden telephone on which the priests could talk to God, the golden altar was positioned in a central place in the first room of the tabernacle up against the veil that separated The Holy Place from the Most Holy Place.

It was the closest that any priest, other than the high priest once a year. could ever come to the Most Holy Place. Each morning when the priest went in to light the lamps, and each evening when he went in to close up for the night he burned incense on this altar.

It represents consistent prayer.

Friedrich Nietzche said, “The essential thing ‘in heaven and earth’ is that there should be a long obedience in the same direction; there thereby results, and has always resulted in the long run, something which has made life worth living."

This morning as we continue our series on the True Tabernacle, I want to point your attention to Israel's Golden Telephone -- the Golden Altar.

III. MOVEMENT 1:

The altar of incense and its connection with the evening sacrifice is connected with prayer throughout the Scriptures.

As Ezra prayed his heartfelt prayer of repentance for his nation it was at the time of the evening sacrifice (Ezra 9:5-15).

After the prophet Daniel had spent time praying and fasting seeking God, repenting for his sin and the sins of his nation, we read: "While I was speaking and praying, confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel and making my request to the Lord my God for his holy hill— 21 while I was still in prayer, Gabriel, the man I had seen in the earlier vision, came to me in swift flight about the time of the evening sacrifice. 22 He instructed me and said to me, “Daniel, I have now come to give you insight and understanding. 23 As soon as you began to pray, a word went out, which I have come to tell you, for you are highly esteemed." (Daniel 9:20-23 NIV).