Exodus 23&24

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Exodus 23:1-33

“Thou shalt not raise a false report: put not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness. 2 Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil; neither shalt thou speak in a cause to decline after many to wrest judgment: 3 neither shalt thou countenance a poor man in his cause. 4 If thou meet thine enemy’s ox or his ass going astray, thou shalt surely bring it back to him again. 5 If thou see the ass of him that hateth thee lying under his burden, and wouldest forbear to help him, thou shalt surely help him. 6 Thou shalt not wrest the judgment of thy poor in his cause. 7 Keep thee far from a false matter; and the innocent and righteous slay thou not: for I will not justify the wicked. 8 And thou shalt take no gift: for the gift blindeth the wise, and perverteth the words of the righteous. 9 Also thou shalt not oppress a stranger: for ye know the heart of a stranger, seeing ye were strangers in the land of Egypt. 10 And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof: 11 but the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still; that the poor of thy people may eat: and what they leave the beasts of the field shall eat. In like manner thou shalt deal with thy vineyard, and with thy oliveyard. 12 Six days thou shalt do thy work, and on the seventh day thou shalt rest: that thine ox and thine ass may rest, and the son of thy handmaid, and the stranger, may be refreshed. 13 And in all things that I have said unto you be circumspect: and make no mention of the name of other gods, neither let it be heard out of thy mouth. 14 Three times [seasons] thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year. 15 Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread: (thou shalt eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time appointed of the month Abib; for in it thou camest out from Egypt: and none shall appear before me empty:) 16 and the feast of harvest, the firstfruits of thy labours, which thou hast sown in the field: and the feast of ingathering, which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field. 17 Three times in the year all thy males shall appear before the Lord GOD. 18 Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leavened bread; neither shall the fat of my sacrifice remain until the morning. 19 The first of the firstfruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother’s milk. 20 Behold, I send an Angel before thee, to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared. 21 Beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not; for he will not pardon your transgressions: for my name is in him. 22 But if thou shalt indeed obey his voice, and do all that I speak; then I will be an enemy unto thine enemies, and an adversary unto thine adversaries. 23 For mine Angel shall go before thee, and bring thee in unto the Amorites, and the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Canaanites, and Hivites, and the Jebusites: and I will cut them off. 24 Thou shalt not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do after their works: but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and quite break down their images. 25 And ye shall serve the LORD your God, and he shall bless thy bread, and thy water; and I will take sickness away from the midst of thee. 26 There shall nothing cast their young, nor be barren, in thy land: the number of thy days I will fulfill. 27 I will send my fear before thee, and will destroy all the people to whom thou shalt come, and I will make all thine enemies turn their backs unto thee. 28 And I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite, from before thee. 29 I will not drive them out from before thee in one year; lest the land become desolate, and the beast of the field multiply against thee. 30 By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land. 31 And I will set thy bounds from the Red sea even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert unto the river: for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand; and thou shalt drive them out before thee. 32 Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor with their gods. 33 They shall not dwell in thy land, lest they make thee sin against me: for if thou serve their gods, it will surely be a snare unto thee.”

Introduction

[Audio version: https://resources.ccphilly.org/detail.asp?TopicID=&Teaching=WED558]

“And in Exodus we are in a number of chapters after the Ten Commandments have been given, where there is more detail being given to certain aspects of the Law, we talked about some of these things last week. We have come as far the 23^rd chapter, one of the laws said “Thou shalt not bear false witness,” and some of these things are then, as we go through the Ten Commandments, they’re elaborated on.

Bearing False Witness--This Includes Gossip--Listening To It Also

Here is says “Thou shalt not raise a false report: put not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness.” (verse 1) The Hebrew word “raise” means “to receive,” it can mean “to carry,” that’s hard to do sometimes, isn’t it, ‘Don’t carry a false report.’ Just some of us, we’re very inclined to this. You know, ATT has got nothing on the church, the way things spread sometimes. [i.e. gossip has a lot to do with this commandment.] And ‘Don’t receive, don’t carry, don’t lift up a false report.’ “put not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness.” (verse 1b)

Don’t Go With The Crowd To Do Evil--Avoid Mob-Mentality--It’s Dangerous

“Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil; neither shalt thou speak in a cause to decline after many to wrest judgment:” (verse 2) Peer pressure. Isn’t it very interesting, look, as we look at these things, remember our context, God spoke from Sinai, the mountain trembled, there were sounds of trumpets, and the people said ‘Tell him not to speak to us again, you go speak to him, and whatever he says, we’ll do that, you come and relate it to us.’ So this is not like a Sunday-school lesson peer-pressure, you know, I don’t want you to do what the crowd does, like every parent tries to tell their kids. This sandwiched between this amazing scene that we’re going to see in the 24^th chapter, and the majesty of God being manifest from the mountain, and when Moses reiterates these things all the people are going to say ‘all the things you said, we’re going to do it.’ And they’re not just saying that naïvely, they mean it. There’s an awe attached to this. This is the Word of God, they understand the authority and the majesty behind this. You know, ‘Peer pressures, don’t go with the crowd to do what’s evil,’ what’s that about? Well God has separated us, he wants us to stand up, he wants us to be different, he’s always looking for an individual who will be willing to take a stand, and to realize you and God are always a multitude. You and the multitude are always a minority when it comes to a man of God, a woman of God whose standing with God and is not willing to knuckle under or buckle under the pressure. Ah, don’t go with the multitude. Just because there’s numbers doesn’t mean what they’re doing is right. Are you willing to stand? If your friends, people you go to school with, the people you’re around, if there’s a crowd of them, and they’re going to do something, what’s the price that’s going to be paid? Are you going to have to stand outside of that, alone? You’ll never stand alone if you stand with the Lord. [Comment: Also there is a real danger this commandment is warning about that Pastor Joe is just kind of skirting around. It is that of “mob mentality,” where if you’re in a mob of people, as I was once at night in Boston, where this movie theater had promised free tickets, and a mob of people showed up for them, and all of a sudden the crowd turned malovent, bent on wreaking havoc, and I could sense it. So I moved off to the side of a building, just as the Boston Mounted Police showed up, swinging billy clubs, charging into the crowd on horseback. They call that “mob-mentality,” and it’s real. I think it has something to do with the spirit-in-man, tapped into Satan’s wavelength, and it somehow translates into a force-multiplier where the mob starts to move as one entity, bent on evil. It’s a Biblical warning to stay out of mobs. The police are well aware of this phenomenon, even though they have no idea of its spirit-based origin.] Or do you weigh out the situation and think ‘It’s more important for me to be accepted by my peers, so I have some sense of belonging,’ well that’s because sometimes I think you and I, we can lack the sense of belonging on the vertical. And we can feel so alone that sometimes we can compromise on the horizontal to be part of something. But this is the LORD speaking in majesty, this is the LORD talking to his people and challenging them, do not be like the rest of the world, don’t go just because there’s a number of people, it doesn’t mean they’re right, be willing to take a stand. And you hope that you get that into the lives of your kids, you know, you get a little George Washington, you know, ‘I cannot tell a lie, I ate the cherry pie, or whatever he did, or I cut down the tree,’ that kind of a thing, ok, let’s start there, ‘I want to know you’re going to do that when your 12, when your 14 and when your 17, that you’re not going to compromise, you’re not going to go with the crowd, you’re going to take a stand, because God has his eye on you, his hand on your life.’ And his eyes go to and fro throughout the earth, he’s still looking for those whose hearts are perfect towards him, that he might show himself strong on your behalf, stronger than the crowd, stronger than the crowd. “Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil; neither shalt thou speak to decline after many to wrest judgment.” (verse 2) don’t pervert justice because of the crowd.

Don’t Take Pity On Someone Simply Because They’re Poor In Regards To Justic

“neither shalt thou countenance a poor man in his cause.” (verse 3) The other thing is, don’t take pity on someone simply because they’re poor in regards to justice. Yes we’re to pity the poor, but it says don’t take a poor man’s side of an issue, when he’s wrong, just because he’s poor and you feel bad for him. That’s a perversion of justice also, showing a favouritism that God would not show.

Help Your Enemy, Do Good To Him, Her

“If thou meet thine enemy’s ox or his ass going astray, thou shalt surely bring it back to him again. If thou see the ass of him that hateth thee lying under his burden, and wouldest forbear to help him, thou shalt surely help him.” (verses 4-5) Doesn’t God know us? Well, we’d stand and say ‘Hey, I know whose ox that is, I hope it falls off the cliff, this is great, God’s dealing with that guy.’ I’m afraid he knows just how we are. He says if you meet your enemy’s ox or his ass going astray, “thou shalt surely bring it back to him again.” And God knows, and your neighbour might look at you and say ‘What’s he up to? He’s not as bad as I thought he was,’ there actually could be reconciliation if you bring somebody’s ox back. Just a thought. “If thou see the ass of him that hateth thee lying under his burden, and wouldest forbear to help him, thou shalt surely help him.” (verse 5) if you think ‘I’m going to walk away and not do anything,’ he says don’t do that, help the beast.

Don’t Take Justice Away From The Poor Because He’s Poor

“Thou shalt not wrest the judgment of thy poor in his cause.” (verse 6) So in regards to the poor, in one place he says ‘Don’t show favouritism to the poor in regards to justice just because he is poor.’ On the other side of the coin, ‘Don’t take justice away from the poor because he’s poor,’ because rich people tend to influence us in a different way. We tend to be a little more lenient to somebody who pulls up in a Bentley or a Rolls than you might be to somebody who pulls up in a skateboard, just, God knows the way we are.

Stay Away From False Matters, Don’t Take Bribes

“Keep thee far from a false matter; and the innocent and righteous slay thou not: for I will not justify the wicked. And thou shalt take no gift: for the gift blindeth the wise, and perverteth the words of the righteous.” (verses 7-8) Man, that’s kid advice, “keep thee far from a false matter…’ Please take note of that, because sometimes there’s a false matter, you get caught in it, you’re innocent, the heat comes down on your head, and you think God has forsaken you. God said ‘No, I’m not going to justify the wicked,’ he stands on the side of and will vindicate righteousness, sometimes not as fast as we would like, but ultimately that’s the way it’s going to work out, because he’s the Lord of lords and the King of kings, he’s on the throne, he’s not going to let anything be unrighteous. But the wisdom in the first place is to stay as far away from a false matter as you can. You get caught up in it, you know, know that he doesn’t justify the wicked, and there’s a warning about slaying the innocent or the righteous, just certainly in our culture what a challenge that is, both the innocent sometimes victimized, sometimes the unborn, the righteous. Again, it’s remarkable our value system sometimes, to save the Spotted Owl but not the unborn. “And thou shalt take no gift: for the gift blindeth the wise, and perverteth the words of the righteous.” (verse 8) this is not talking about Christmas, so calm down. This is talking about bribes, ‘thou shalt not take a bribe, for the bribe blindeth the wise, and perverteth the words of the righteous.’ And some people know how to, you know, money talks, doesn’t it. You know my money says ‘Good-bye!’ Money talks, and you know, sometimes yes, we live in a nation where money talks, don’t we. [Comment: our republican form of democracy is highly corrupted by the ‘legal’ practice of lobbying, where lobbyists are paid large sums of money by rich constituents to lobby for legislation tilted in favour of the rich and their interests, so that the poor end up at the back of the line in legislative justice. Money really does talk, and since the rich have more of it, it talks in their favour. Lobbying is a legal form of bribery.] It talks louder in some places than it does in others. ‘Thou shalt take no bribe, for the bribe blindeth the wise, and perverteth the words of the righteous.’

Don’t Oppress The Foreigner (immigrants anyone?)

“Also thou shalt not oppress a stranger: for ye know the heart of a stranger, seeing ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.” (verse 9) This is a foreigner, it’s a prohibition of race prejudice. The Bible forbids it all the way through, and God gives a remarkable reason in this place, he shows different reasons, different angles in different places, “thou shalt not oppress a stranger:” a foreigner, “for ye know the heart of a stranger, seeing ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.” You should never oppress someone, seeing you were the oppressed in the land of Egypt, God’s exhortation to the children of Israel. And more than that, you know, God has said to Abraham ‘I will bless them that bless thee, curse them that curse thee,’ all of the nations of the world shall be blessed through you, part of the blessing of Abraham is to go to the nations of the world. If Israel was going to be prejudice and Israel was going to have an attitude towards foreigners, the blessing of Abraham could never continue and go wherever it was to go. So, here the challenge, that they were never to do that. By the way, we make application certainly to our own lives. We’re in the Kingdom, we got in, we were foreigners to the Covenants and Promises of God. [Comment: God promises foreigners that Israel’s borders will be open to them, both in Leviticus 19:33-34, “And if a stranger [foreigner] dwells with you in your land, you shall not mistreat him. The stranger who dwells among you shall be to you as one born among you, and you shall love him as yourself; for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God.” (NKJV) Now that’s Old Testament, now for a prophecy for the future, covering the start of the Millennial Kingdom of God, right after Yeshua’s 2^nd coming, in Ezekiel 47:21-23, which starts out describing the division of the Promised Land at the beginning of the Millennial Kingdom of God, and states, “Thus you shall divide this land among yourselves according to the tribes of Israel. It shall be that you will divide it by lot as an inheritance for yourselves, and for the strangers who dwell among you and who bear children among you. They shall be to you as native-born among the children of Israel; they shall have an inheritance with you among the tribes of Israel. And it shall be that in whatever tribe the stranger dwells, there you shall give him his inheritance,’ says the Lord GOD.” (NKJV) You can’t get much clearer than that. see also https://www.factsaboutisrael.uk/future-borders-of-israel-in-prophecy/ Palestinian Problem Solved, God’s Way!] I was wondering around in this world on the way to hell, and the Lord saved me, a stranger, a foreigner, and granted me citizenship. And we can never, we can never begrudge that to anyone else. I know you understand God’s grace, you understand the guy next to you needs it more than you do, which means you don’t understand it at all. You remember, he says, what it was like to be the foreigner. In verse 9 he’s giving some laws in regards to the land, as a foreigner came into the land, they were supposed to sense equity, they were supposed to sense certain things.

The Land-Sabbath, A Huge Blessing For the Poor, And The Farmers Who Would Do This

In regards to the land itself, “And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof: but the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still; that the poor of thy people may eat: and what they leave the beasts of the field shall eat. In like manner thou shalt deal with thy vineyard, and with thy oliveyard.” (verses 10-11) So they were to cultivate it for six years and in the seventh year let it go fallow. And because there was a rotation of pieces of ground, it wasn’t, everyone wasn’t on the same schedule depending on when you started to plant [i.e. depending on when you received your inheritance and started to farm in earnest, planting your fields]. But for the impoverished in the land there were always fields that were in the 7^th year, that were to go fallow, and the poor were welcome then to come into your field, whether it was grain, whether it was a vineyard, whether it was olives, and take as much as they would in that year, and even the beasts then to come in with the gleanings to finish off the field. And for them, if they would obey this, by the way, they would see a miracle, every 6^th year the land would produce twice as much as it normally would, which would carry them through this 7^th into the 8^th. Now Israel refused to do that. You know it’s interesting in Israel today, some of the Israeli farmers, they always look for loop-holes, so what they do, they plant their land for six years, and the 7^th year they’ll rent it to a Bedouin or an Arab or a Drews and let them plant the 7^th year for a percentage of what they get out of it, but in their mind they’re letting it rest, and then they’re back on it the 8^th again, and the land that way is never gathering nutrition back to itself again. [And the Israeli Jews are thus cheating the poor in their land from a blessing the God of Israel wants them to have! How greedy, selfish and evil is that?] And God, one of the reasons that he carried them to Babylon for 70 years is for 490 years they refused to do this, they didn’t let the land rest, and God said ‘You owe me 70 years, I’m going to collect.’ [And they owed the poor for those 70 years as well.] Certainly idolatry was part of it, he said the land’s going to rest now for 70 years, ‘because for 490 years you have not practiced the Sabbatical Year.’ So he gives the command.

The Sabbath & Holy Days

“Six days thou shalt do thy work, and on the seventh day thou shalt rest: that thine ox and thine ass may rest, and the son of thy handmaid, and the stranger, may be refreshed.” (verse 12) in regards to the Sabbath. So those that are working for you, the foreigner, the beasts of burden, your servants, resting on the 7^th day. “And in all things that I have said unto you be circumspect: and make no mention of the name of other gods, neither let it be heard out of thy mouth.” (verse 13) In all things that I’ve mentioned, God’s saying, be circumspect, circum, “circle,” spect, “to look,” God’s saying in all of these things I want you to look around, I don’t want it to go in one ear and out the other, the instructions that I’m giving to you in regards to life are so important, I want you to be circumspect. Not, I want you-all to be circumspect, the whole congregation, and he does, but the individual, it’s written to us. I want you, and whatever you do, I can’t escape it, he’s talking to me, I want you, and he wants you. Whatever your husband does, he wants you to do it, whatever your wife does, he wants you to do this, to be circumspect, to look around in regards to all of the things he’s told us, to be careful is the idea. “and make no mention of the name of other gods, neither let it be heard out of thy mouth.” Don’t even talk about them, it’s an infection, don’t let it be heard out of thy mouth. “Three times [seasons] thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year.” now there are lessons attached here, and he’s the Master Teacher, “Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread: (thou shalt eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time appointed of the month Abib; for in it thou camest out from Egypt: and none shall appear before me empty:)” i.e. without a sacrifice, “and the feast of harvest, the firstfruits of thy labours, which thou hast sown in the field: and the feast of ingathering, which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field.” (verses 14-16) the Feast of Passover began the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the shedding of blood (of the Passover lamb), the picture of course is that sin, leaven, is removed, there’s the shedding of blood, how that in our lives there should be a change. Certainly here it’s a Statute God is instituting, these three mandatory Feasts [Feast Seasons, as we’ll see], one was Passover and Unleavened Bread [which contained two Holy Days, one at the beginning of the Days of Unleavened Bread, one at the end of them], which were together. The Feast of Harvest of the firstfruits, which is Pentecost [Jewish Shavuot], “of they labour which thou hast sown in the field, and the feast of ingathering,” which becomes the Feast of Booths looking back to their wandering in the wilderness, which is the Feast of Tabernacles, “which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field.” “Three times in the year all thy males shall appear before the Lord GOD.” (verse 17) the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of Pentecost and the Feast of Tabernacles. [See the symbolic and prophetic meaning of God’s Holy Days https://www.unityinchrist.com/messianicmovement/Holydayshadows.htm which this article makes clear, both for these verses and Leviticus 23.] “Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leavened bread; neither shall the fat of my sacrifice remain until the morning.” (verse 18) it should be unleavened, he just said that. [Comment: “my sacrifice” is a direct reference to the Passover sacrifice, which was a requirement seen given in Exodus 12.] I don’t want meat to stay with flies and spots on it, be prudent in the way this is done.

Law of Firstfruits, Plus A Law Whose Misinterpretation Has Produced The Kosher World of Orthodox Judaism

“The first of the firstfruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother’s milk.” (verse 19) He asks for our best. [Also, the firstfruits were given to the Levitical priesthood, which was attached in a sense to the tithe system that nourished the Levitical priesthood and Levites, see https://www.unityinchrist.com/gifts4.htm] He wants the firstfruits from us, he wants the best. He asks us not to give him seconds, not to give him something leftover, not to give him something that he has not asked for or in a wrong way. That has never changed [see Malachi at: https://www.unityinchrist.com/prophets/Malachi.html]. He wants us to give him our best. And then this interesting part of this verse, “thou shalt not seethe” or boil “a kid” now that’s a baby goat, you shouldn’t boil a kid either, but this is a baby goat, “Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother’s milk.” This is not the dietary law here. Now this has produced the whole Kosher world of Orthodox Judaism. Of not having milk and meat together. What is being asked of them here had to do with a Canaanite practice where a young kid, a goat or a young calf was taken, cut up in pieces sometimes, and boiled either in its’ mother’s milk or in its own blood, and they considered that then to be extra fertile and it would be poured on the land as a sacrifice to make the land more fertile. God is saying ‘You keep these Feasts, you worship me, I’ll bless the land, you bring the firstfruits to me, you let the land rest in the 7^th year, you rest yourself on the 7^th day, you do these things, I’m the one who will bless and bring forth the crops and so forth, and I don’t want any of you boiling a kid in it’s mother’s milk,’ which was idolatry, it’s not the dietary law here. Now of course [in the Jewish world] it’s evolved into that whole thing in Israel [in Orthodox Judaism, that is] of being Kosher. A number of years ago when we were in Israel, Frank tried to change 4,000 years of “Tradition.” Of course, we didn’t know, we were new going to Israel, we were in a dining room, and we were having chicken, was being served. And someone at the table said ‘There’s no butter for the rolls,’ so he got up and started looking around, pushed away some barriers, went to the other side of the dining room, and brought butter back to the table. Of course on the other side they were serving fish, and you can have dairy with fish, in their minds, it was Kosher. So he brings back the butter to the table. Well in about 3 minutes we have ten guys around the table, saying this ‘babble, babble, babble, babble!!!’ Now I don’t know, I think they were speaking a different language, I didn’t know what any of them were saying. And then one of them came over, the head guy that spoke English, ‘That’s not Kosher!’ now they’ve got to break all the dishes, and Frank said ‘What are you talking about,’ they said ‘You’re having flesh and dairy,’ and Frank said ‘No, no, no, there’s meat, poultry and fish, there’s three categories,’ and the guy said ‘No, there’s two categories, there’s flesh and fish!’ and Frank said ‘You can’t boil a chicken in it’s mother’s milk, what are you talking about, chickens don’t give milk!’ and there’s this whole argument ensuing, and I’m kind of watching thinking ‘He’s not going to change them, they’ve been doing this for 4,000 years, it’s just not going to happen.’ But it was very interesting to watch the whole process, and we had a bad reputation after that. It was really interesting, I think when we left they were all waving good-bye. ‘Chickens don’t give milk! You don’t have to worry about this, you can’t boil a chicken in it’s mother’s milk.’ This is really not a dietary stipulation here, it has to do with idolatry in regards to the land being fertile and bringing forth. [Comment: Abraham settles the whole matter, where in Genesis 18 when Yahweh shows up at his tent, and he has Sarah run and prepare a meal for Yahweh and the two others, who were really angels, and Abraham served them “a fatted calf, butter and milk,” verse 8, which states, “And he took butter, and milk, and the calf which he had dressed, and set it before them; and he stood by them under the tree, and they [Yahweh and the two others] did eat.” I think God and Abraham settled the whole Kosher interpretation right there in Genesis 18:1-8 😊]

Behold, I Send My Angel Before Thee, Listen To Him, Don’t Provoke Him

“Behold, I send an Angel before thee, to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared. Beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not; for he will not pardon your transgressions: for my name is in him.” (verses 20-21) Now this is not an ordinary angel, there’s no other angels in the Old Testament where we find out the LORD’s name is in him or upon him, that have the power to pardon transgressions [what Pastor Joe is dancing around saying, is that this “Angel” is Yahweh, the pre-Incarnate Christ]. Remember Moses at the burning bush, it says “the Angel of the LORD” appeared, that’s the Messenger, that’s our word, “appeared to Moses there,” and then it says Moses didn’t look up because he was afraid to look upon God. When we come to Joshua chapter 5, we have there “the Captain of the LORD’s host,” the Messenger of the LORD appearing there in the plains of Gilgal outside of Jericho, and Joshua encountering this One and saying to him ‘Are you for us or against us?’ and the Captain of the LORD’s host said ‘No, I’m not for you are against you, I am come forth as the Captain of the LORD’s host, now you can take your sandals off your feet, because the ground you’re standing on is holy ground,’ the same thing the burning bush had said to Moses. Very interesting, being in Israel, a number of times talking to Orthodox Jews, and you ask them ‘Who is that?’ because it doesn’t say it’s Jehovah, it’s the Captain of the LORD’s host, which in their mind would make him someone less. But he’s saying to Joshua what the burning bush said to Moses, ‘Take off your sandals, your shoes from off your feet, the ground you’re standing on is holy ground,’ we ask them ‘Who is that?’ they don’t have an answer. They don’t know. It is this Angel, Messenger of the LORD’s presence, appearance of Christ. ‘Listen to him, do not provoke him,’ “for he will not pardon your transgressions: for my name is in him. But if thou shalt indeed obey his voice, and do all that I speak; then I will be an enemy unto thine enemies, and an adversary unto thine adversaries.” (verses 21b-22) Notice now, he switches to the first person. “and an adversary unto thine adversaries.” He said to Abram, ‘I’ll bless them that bless thee, and curse them that curse thee.’ I’m glad of that, aren’t you? That he can be an enemy to our enemies and adversary to our adversaries, I wish he’d lighten up on the first part of it though. “I will be an enemy to thine enemies and an adversary to thine adversaries,” you know, because what happens is sometimes Christians, not me or you, but in New Jersey, Christians sometimes they get off track and they’re doing something they shouldn’t be doing, then trouble comes, then they want him to be an enemy to their enemies and an adversary to their adversaries, they got the first part of it right, but God is allowing chastening or something in their lives, how wonderful it says here that if we walk with him, if we yield to him. And of course obeying his voice for you and I is vastly different than it was for those who were under the Law [he means the Torah Law]. You know, the disciples said ‘how do we work the works of God,’ and Jesus said ‘this is the work of God, that you believe on him whom he has sent.’ That will keep you busy every day of your life, believing on him whom he has sent, to believe on Christ every day of our lives will keep us busy. If you wake up in the morning and look at yourself in the mirror, and say ‘I have to believe God loves that?’ That will keep you busy for the rest of your life. If you’re not more convinced by the time you go to bed either. “For mine Angel shall go before thee, and bring thee in unto the Amorites, and the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Canaanites, and Hivites, and the Jebusites: and I will cut them off.” (verse 23) Jebus was the ancient city of Jerusalem, Jebusites. Now look, by the way, ‘This can’t be the God of the New Testament, he’s cutting people off,’ look, if you go back to Genesis chapter 15, God says, you know, ‘I’m going to take you down to Egypt, you’re going to be there 400 years, then I’m going to bring you into the land, because the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet come to a full.’ God measures time morally, not by the clock or the calendar. If you go down to the University of Pennsylvania Museum you can get a book on the Canaanites or the Hivites, how foul they were, how they were sacrificing their children, the immoral foul practices they were involved in, are unimaginable. And they had become irredeemable by that time, God waited. Yes, there would be those, Rahab, we’re going to talk about her a little bit, but there would be some in the land as individuals who turned and believed and were received of the LORD. But it was time for them to be judged. He says, I’m going to bring you in, I will cut them off, “Thou shalt not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do after their works: but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and quite break down their images.” quite immediately, don’t wait, break down their images, destroy their idols, “And ye shall serve the LORD your God, and he shall bless thy bread, and thy water; and I will take sickness away from the midst of thee.” What an incredible blessing, “There shall nothing cast their young, nor be barren, in thy land: the number of thy days I will fulfill. I will send my fear before thee, and will destroy all the people to whom thou shalt come, and I will make all thine enemies turn their backs unto thee.” (verses 24-27) Now look, in verse 28 he’s going to say “And I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite, from before thee.” Now there are those immediately who try to say ‘Well the hornets are not hornets, the hornets, it’s the fear that the LORD sends before them, they’re not really hornets,’ I don’t know why God would try to trick us with the hornet word, but they think, you know, because they studied, these are not really hornets, just something else, it must be the fear the LORD’s talking about. But when the two spies come into Jericho and they come to Rahab, “she said unto the men, I know that the LORD hath given you the land, and that your terror is fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land faint because of you.” This is before the hornets come, the terror of them had come on the land. Later in Joshua we’re going to hear about the hornets, God used the hornets too. So he’s going to bring this fear upon them, they hear what he did to the Egyptian army in the Red Sea, they’re going to hear about them destroying Sihon and Og, of the races of the giants who lived in Transjordan, that they could never deal with. And by the time they come to the land and the inhabitants of Jericho look over the walls of Jericho, and the Jordan River piles up and they walk across on dry land, they don’t need any other convincing. “I will send my fear before thee, and will destroy all the people to whom thou shalt come, and I will make all thine enemies turn their backs unto thee.” (verse 27) now we have the same God, working in 1948, 1967, 1973, 1982, still doing that with his people.

I Will Send Hornets Before Thee

“And I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite, from before thee.” (verse 28) Now it’s amazing to me to read the scholars, some of them great scholars too, but they, sometimes they’re afraid to just let something be supernatural, they have to say ‘these are the Egyptians, because they had bees or they had hornet emblems on their headpieces, therefore God’s talking about under certain dynasties the fact there were raiding parties from Egypt.’ And there were, but the Egyptians didn’t come up and drive them out, but they came up and killed them. Here is says these are hornets. Now I just like that. Maybe that’s why I’m being stubborn. Of course, he used flies, he used lice, he already used bugs to bring the whole nation of Egypt to its knees, who were a greater power than the Canaanites they came up and destroyed. He already used lice to do this to Egypt, and flies and bugs, some of you are itching when we start to talk about lice. You know, if we hear there’s lice in the school or whatever, you just see the secretaries walking around all day doing this, just, gets in your, you know. You can get in there. Deuteronomy chapter 7, says this, “Moreover the LORD thy God will send the hornet among them until they that are left hide themselves from thee, to be destroyed.” In Joshua, chapter 24, verse 12, he says this, “And I sent the hornet,” now this is after they’re afraid, with Rahab earlier in the book, “I sent the hornet before you, which drave them out from before you, even the two kings of the Amorites, but not with thy sword or with thy bow.” God used these hornets. Now archeologists have borne record to certain ancient cultures talking about problems with hornets. I don’t like hornets, that’s why I like them getting the bad guys, I like hornets doing something productive, because I don’t understand besides this what the purpose of hornets are, but I’m glad they did this. Ah, wasps, hornets, cicada-killers, you guys ever see those, they look like hornets only they’re about this big, and if you see them on your lawn get rid of them, because if you let them set up house they’ll come back every year. But the cicadas are 17-year locusts, and they feed on those, and they’ll come down, they’ll dig a hole in your dirt or on your walk, it looks like a mouse hole, it’s about this big, it’s got dirt outside of it, and you think that a mole’s gone in there, it’s a cicada-killer. If you mess with it and you hear a loud buzzing, start running, they sound like a plane. I sit on my back yard, I keep a badminton racket with me, I get them, and I don’t let them set up house, you hear this loud sound, you think ‘Is that a humming bird?’ it’s one of those things, and you can whack ‘em right out of the air. What they’ll do is they’ll get a cicada, a 17-year locust, come down on it right in the air, take it, and drag it down where their eggs are in the hole, and when the young cicada-killers hatch, the cicada, the locust is not dead, it’s in suspended animation from the sting, and then they have fresh locust to eat to get started in life. They don’t nurse, so they have that. But when they go in there, it’s interesting, Kathy brought me this can of spray stuff, sprays 18-feet you know, and you hit them in the hole. Now when you hit a normal hornet they fall over and they’re gone. These things, you hit ‘em and they come out mad and you see them flying away, and when they’re about 50-foot away they crash, it takes awhile, they’re tough. I’ll have to bring some in and show you sometime. We were in the castle in Austria one year in the pastor’s conference and they had them in the hillside there, one of them got on a guy and stung him about 8 times before they could get it off his cheek, swelled all up, he had go to the hospital, so you can imagine the Hivites and the Hornites and all the Ites here swollen with these things, I like that, I like that. “I will send hornets” it’s the word for hornets, “And I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite, from before thee. I will not drive them out from before thee in one year; lest the land become desolate, and the beast of the field multiply against thee. By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land.” (verses 28-30) Now look, the land of Canaan, going into the land of Canaan, is not a picture of heaven. There are some great Spirituals that talk about crossing over Jordan like you’re going to Heaven. But the type doesn’t hold up, because when they go into Canaan land, there’s 7 years of war, they’re fighting giants. I’m hoping when I get to Heaven I don’t have 7 years of war when I get there. I’m looking for the break, that elusive break that’s not gonna come till then. But it is a picture of us coming in to our spiritual inheritance, coming into the things of Christ, the promises he asks for us. And there is war there, there are real enemies there, there are giants. For you and I to step in to what God has for us, there is a struggle often in our hearts, the struggle against the flesh. We find there are strongholds, when God starts to sanctify us [see https://unityinchrist.com/corinthians/1st%20Corinthians.htm], we’re justified, because he takes us through the process of conforming us into the image of his Son, of sanctification, as he’s working it out in our lives in a practical way, we find there are struggles and there are battles. And this is a picture of that, and it’s very interesting to hear the LORD saying ‘I’m not going to drive them out all at once, that’s not how it’s going to happen. You’re going to take the land little by little.’ Imagine how unbearable it would be if God did it in a day. We talk to some poor Christian whose struggling with something, ‘pss, I don’t know what’s wrong with you, as for me, my house we started serving the Lord two minutes after I was saved, and we’ve never had a problem ever since,’ no, there’s something about the process. In fact it says in the Book of Judges, that God left some of the Canaanites in the land to teach the next generation how to do battle. The idea is, it wasn’t with the sword, it wasn’t with the spear, it was dependent upon the LORD, to pray and to trust in him, to be dependent upon him. And we learn some of those things in our struggles as we see the type here. Historically, it’s wonderful for me to look at this and think ‘He sent hornets and fear,’ and you know the historical reality of some of these things, just, you don’t have to keep listening to me, but I like him. “By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land.” (verse 30)

The Promised Land, What Does It Encompass?

“And I will set thy bounds from the Red sea even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert unto the river: for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand; and thou shalt drive them out before thee.” the Gulf of Aqaba over to the southern Mediterranean, “from the desert unto the river” it seems to be talking about the Euphrates. “Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor with their gods. They shall not dwell in thy land, lest they make thee sin against me: for if thou serve their gods, it will surely be a snare unto thee.” (verses 31-33) you can’t negotiate with the flesh, you and I, we’re to put the old nature, consider it dead, we’re not to negotiate. So, again, God is saying this with all authority to the children of Israel.

Exodus 24:1-18

“And he said unto Moses, Come up unto the LORD, thou, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel; and worship ye afar off. 2 And Moses alone shall come near the LORD: but they shall not come nigh; neither shall the people go up with him. 3 And Moses came and told the people all the words of the LORD, and all the judgments: and all the people answered with one voice, and said, All the words which the LORD hath said will we do. 4 And Moses wrote all the words of the LORD, and rose up early in the morning, and builded an altar under the hill, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel. 5 And he sent young men of the children of Israel, which offered burnt offerings, and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen unto the LORD. 6 And Moses took half of the blood, and put it in basins; and half the blood he sprinkled on the altar. 7 And he took the book of the covenant, and read in the audience of the people: and they said, All that the LORD hath said will we do, and be obedient. 8 And Moses took the blood, and sprinkled it on the people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant, which the LORD hath made with you concerning all these words. 9 Then went up Moses, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel. 10 And they saw the God of Israel: and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of heaven in his clearness. 11 And upon the nobles of the children of Israel he laid not his hand: also they saw God, and did eat and drink. 12 And the LORD said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount, and be there: and I will give thee tables of stone, and a law, and commandments which I have written; that thou mayest teach them. 13 And Moses rose up, and his minister Joshua: and Moses went up into the mount of God. 14 And he said unto the elders, Tarry ye here for us, until we come again unto you: and, behold, Aaron and Hur are with you: if any man have any matters to do, let him come unto them. 15 And Moses went up into the mount, and a cloud covered the mount. 16 And the glory of the LORD abode upon mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days: and the seventh day he called unto Moses out of the midst of the cloud. 17 And the sight of the glory of the LORD was like devouring fire on the top of the mount in the eyes of the children of Israel. 18 And Moses went into the midst of the cloud, and gat him up into the mount: and Moses was in the mount forty days and forty nights.”

The Blood Of The Covenant--Moses Ascends The Mount Of God

The Old Covenant Is Ratified In Blood

“And he said unto Moses, Come up unto the LORD, thou, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel; and worship ye afar off.” (verse 1) Now take note of Nadab and Abihu when we get to Leviticus, there are some very specific things about these two of Aaron’s sons. Now remember, they had set aside some of the elders to help Moses serve [that’s in Numbers chapter 11], so these are all, either representative of the tribes or those it seems who would specifically be set aside to help judge the nation according to God’s Word, seventy of the elders of Israel. “and worship ye afar off.” You come up to the mountain where God is, and worship ye afar off. I’m glad I’m in the New Testament, aren’t you, where we hear him say ‘Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, draw nigh with a heart filled with assurance.’ How different the Law is. Under the Law, God determined how close you could get, and you decided if you were going yield to that. Under the New Covenant, God removes the boundary, and you decide how close you’re going to get. The door is open. How much do we want of his presence, his fellowship? [Comment: the moment Jesus died on the cross, the giant veil that separated the holy place from the holy of holies was ripped asunder, from top to bottom, opening the way directly to the room where the ark of the covenant used to dwell, the very throne of Yahweh in the Old Testament. How symbolic of what Pastor Joe is talking about.] “worship me afar off.” “And Moses alone shall come near the LORD: but they shall not come nigh; neither shall the people go up with him. And Moses came and told the people all the words of the LORD, and all the judgments: and all the people answered with one voice, and said, All the words which the LORD hath said will we do.” (verses 2-3) Now from after the Ten Commandments, all these things we’ve been reading, “And Moses came and told the people all the words of the LORD, and all the judgments: and all the people answered with one voice, and said, All the words which the LORD hath said will we do.” And again, it’s not just that they’re naïve, no, I think they’re very serious, this is a very serious situation, ‘we’re going to yield, we’re going to do this.’ They didn’t know of course they didn’t have the strength to do it even of themselves, but their attitude I think was right, ‘we will do.’ “And Moses wrote all the words of the LORD, and rose up early in the morning, and builded an altar under the hill, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel.” (verse 4) Remember when the Caldwell’s were here and we saw some of the pictures from Saudi Arabia? “And he sent young men of the children of Israel, which offered burnt offerings, and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen unto the LORD.” (verse 5) Now the priesthood has not been established yet. “Burnt offerings,” it’s an offering of consecration. “Peace offerings,” which would be identified as offerings of fellowship. “And Moses took half of the blood, and put it in basins; and half the blood he sprinkled on the altar.” (verse 6) So he took these basins as they offered these oxen, he put half of the blood in the basin, he sprinkled half of the blood on the altar. “And he took the book of the covenant, and read in the audience of the people: and they said, All that the LORD hath said will we do, and be obedient.” (verse 7) What a great attitude. “And Moses took the blood, and sprinkled it on the people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant, which the LORD hath made with you concerning all these words.” (verse 8) I don’t know if that was an enjoyable part of the process, they’re drawing close, he hits the alter with blood, and they draw close and say ‘We’ll do everything God says,’ and he says ‘Great,’ swish, swish, swish,’ my wife would be going ‘Eeew.’ He sprinkled the people. And maybe the 70, maybe the representatives of the tribes, but it says he sprinkled the people. “Behold the blood of the covenant, which the LORD hath made with you concerning all these words.” (verse 8b) So blood, then fellowship again is the picture here. This is not repeated, so this is a picture then of the beginning of the relationship, a picture of Christ. [This was the official ratification ceremony of the Old Covenant in the blood of oxen.] “Then went up Moses, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel. And they saw the God of Israel: and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of heaven in his clearness.” (verses 9-10) Now I’m not sure what to do with that because there are places where it says no man can see God and live. [Obviously God turned down his radiance, or filtered it to protect those who saw him, obviously Moses had that protection many times.] Are they just seeing his feet? Are they just seeing a similitude but not really seeing him? It’s going to tell us in Numbers that Moses alone spoke to God face to face, unlike the rest of the people. So certainly they don’t have the familiarity with Jehovah that Moses has. But it says “they saw the God of Israel: and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of heaven in his clearness.” (verse 10) It was sky-blue in its clearness. We see this with Ezekiel, he sees this blue sapphire under the Majesty and Presence of God. Imagine now here comes Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, the seventy elders, they draw close to the mountain. And whatever, was God enshrouded in a cloud, did they just see his feet? They saw the God of Israel, on this crystal clear bright blue pavement as it were of sapphire. All I’d have to do is see his feet to be straightened out, it just, it says they saw the God of Israel. “And upon the nobles of the children of Israel he laid not his hand: also they saw God, and did eat and drink.” (verse 11) Just imagine that. I’d have been a little distracted, the eating and drinking would not have been my first point of interest here, and normally it is. But I mean you’re there in the presence of God, imagine this feast, what it meant to them. Now look, there are going to be those that the people will come to with their problems, these are to be those that will judge in equity, these are to be those that will take the Word of God without compromise, who will refuse to receive a bribe, will treat the rich man and the poor man equally [unlike our rules about allowing lobbyists to influence the votes of Congressmen, which amounts to allowing the rich to bribe Congress into favouring them in their lawmaking], these will be those who will take the Word of God and communicate it to the people of God, and without this, again, the things that they’re going to communicate are not going to be Sunday-school lessons as it were. These will be men that have sat in the presence of God, and when the people come for judgment, the people come for something to be settled, these will be men who remember these rules are not trite, this is not some little plaque material that looks good on a bumper, this is Almighty God, who said ‘It doesn’t matter what the majority is doing, what matters is what is right and who will take a stand.’ This is the God of Israel who they sat before and saw the presence of his Majesty, his feet as it were on this pavement of bright blue sapphire, who said ‘You shall not slay the innocent, I don’t want to hear about it, it’s not going to happen among you.’ The Word of God they communicate will not be an intellectual exercise, it will be alive, it will be powerful, it will be real to them.

The LORD Calls For Moses To Come Up Unto The Mount

“And the LORD said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount, and be there: and I will give thee tables of stone, and a law, and commandments which I have written; that thou mayest teach them. And Moses rose up, and his minister Joshua: and Moses went up into the mount of God.” The rest of them stayed behind, by this time they’re probably saying ‘We don’t have to go, do we?’ and he said ‘No, you guys stay here.’ “And he said unto the elders, Tarry ye here for us, until we come again unto you: and, behold, Aaron and Hur are with you: if any man have any matters to do, let him come unto them.” (verses 12-14) So Moses says ‘I’m leaving Aaron and Hur in charge, I’ll be back.’ Well it’s going to take over 40 days, and by the time he comes back Aaron did not do a very good job. We’ll see that when we come to the golden calf. But he’s leaving them in charge. And he goes up into the mount of God, “And Moses went up into the mount, and a cloud covered the mount.” (verse 15) Now they had been following the pillar fire at night, the pillar of cloud during the day, there’s the manifest presence of God on the mountain, and it says “And the glory of the LORD abode upon mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days: and the seventh day he called unto Moses out of the midst of the cloud.” (verse 16) Now for six days Moses goes up into the cloud, doesn’t hear anything. But when God says, ‘You come up here, I’m going to talk to you,’ you don’t ask any questions, he’s not saying ‘LORD, I’ve been here for two hours, what’s the deal? Been here for three days, what’s the deal?’ Six days, we live in a world with instant-on television, microwaves, instant cameras, we don’t like to wait six days to hear from the Lord. When I’m waiting six days to hear from the Lord, I think he’s mad at me, not talking to me. Which isn’t true. Six days, I just think, he’s up in this cloud, he’s up in, the glory of the LORD is there, I think, what a remarkable circumstance, six days. And finally on the 7^th day, “and the seventh day he called unto Moses out of the midst of the cloud.” (verse 16b) What was that like? ‘MOSES’ you know, like the movie, ‘MOSES,’ “And the sight of the glory of the LORD was like devouring fire on the top of the mount in the eyes of the children of Israel.” (verse 17) Imagine, Moses is right up in there, after 7 days God’s voice comes to Moses out of the devouring fire, and he says ‘Moses, come on up here,’ and Moses is thinking ‘Up there?’ And look, Moses is going to be up here at least 40 days and 40 nights, no water, no food. He’s going to come down, the golden calf is going to be there, the meekest man alive is going to throw down the tables of stone, the only guy to break all Ten Commandments at one time. Then he’s gotta go back up for 40 more days. He will go 80 days, no water, no food. Impossible, right? Impossible. Only thing is, that we were originally made to be sustained in the presence of God. When Moses comes down after 80 days he’s glowing, his batteries are so charged, his face is glowing. He’s gotta cover himself up so he doesn’t freak everybody out. It wouldn’t be food or water that sustained there, it was the very presence of God that sustained his strength. Because a human frame will die without water 40 days, let alone 80 days. Isn’t it amazing? What will eternity be like? Jesus when he was raised from the dead, he said ‘Touch me, does the spirit have flesh and bone,’ he didn’t have any blood, it was drained out. [Comment: this is one of those weird Calvary Chapel doctrines that says we will be composed of flesh and bone in the resurrection to immorality, where the Bible says God, and Jesus is God, is a flaming spirit. So God, and Jesus are spirit-beings, as are the angels. In 1^st John 3:1-2 John said we would be like Jesus in the resurrection to immortality. Jesus when he appeared was transitioning back and forth from spirit to human composition, which we see in Genesis 18, spirit-beings, in that case Yahweh and two angels, can transition from spirit to flesh when needed.] We have this carbon burning system right now, the life is in the blood. Evidently when our bodies are fashioned unto his glorious body the life is no longer in the blood, the life is in the spirit. Flesh and bone, not flesh and blood, but spirit-drive instead of carbon drive. [Doesn’t explain how even Jesus phased through walls, as a spirit-being can, but a flesh-and-bone human can’t. It’s just a weird doctrine they hold to, you can accept it or reject it, we’ll all find out later for sure.] A great system. And Moses, 80 days in the presence of the LORD, no hunger. How could we ever be in the presence of the Lord and hunger for anything, everything we have ever hungered for or thirsted for will be satisfied in his presence. What we were made for will be realized in his presence. And Moses, how amazing. “And the sight of the glory of the LORD was like devouring fire on the top of the mount in the eyes of the children of Israel. And Moses went into the midst of the cloud, and gat him up into the mount: and Moses was in the mount forty days and forty nights.” (verses 17-18) You know, it’s very interesting too, as we go on next week, Moses doesn’t give us, we don’t have a lot of details. We find out that he’s going be shown a pattern there, of the Tabernacle. We are told in the Book of Hebrews, chapter 8, it says, talking about the priests and the gifts and the sanctuary, “Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the tabernacle: for, See, saith he, that thou make all things according to the pattern shewed to thee in the mount.” (verse 5) Chapter 9 of Hebrews says, about Christ, “Moreover he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle, and all the vessels of the ministry. And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without the shedding of blood is no remission [of sin]. It is therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us;” (verses 21-24) that he’s there, where he ever lives he make intercession for us. So Moses is taken there, he gets to see the real heavenly Tabernacle. He gets to see the heavenly menorah, the heavenly ark of the Covenant, the heavenly table of showbread, the heavenly bronze altar, whatever that is [probably composed of spirit, which is undoubtedly more solid than physical matter], just imagine, and he’s told to come back and make things specifically according to the pattern. So all of that is a reflection, and as we begin our journey next week into the Tabernacle, I encourage you to read ahead, it is the most detailed description of any furniture or building anywhere in the Bible. But you have to realize, as we look at it, every bit of it reflects something of God’s glory. Moses gets the Law, the Law doesn’t take him 40 days and 40 nights to get, he gets the tables of stone. It seems that his 40 days and 40 nights were for him to write down all of the details of the heavenly pattern of things that he sees. He doesn’t give us a description of what that was like. You know, you and I would come down, if we were with God in glory, especially if our face was glowing, people would say ‘You were with him, weren’t you’ ‘Ya, you can tell, I know.’ What was it like? It’s heavy, man. He wouldn’t understand. There’s none of that with Moses, he comes, and he gives the pattern of things, he’s more consumed with communicating the very message that God gives him, and he doesn’t give us this big elaboration of the personal experience. In fact, when we get to chapter 34, he’s going to say ‘LORD, show me thy glory,’ evidently what he sees there, the patterns, there was more of God that he longed to see that he didn’t see. And he’s going to come to the point where he’s going to say ‘Alright, the Nile turns to blood, the rod turns into a serpent, ok, the frogs come up, you’re behind all of this, you’re not just into some freaky frog show in Egypt, I know there’s more cooking that you haven’t showed me, LORD, let me see your glory.’ You know, he’s got the biggest church that anybody ever had, it’s a Pentecostal church, biggest charismatic church in the world, two and a half million people, he’s got more miracles going on than anybody’s ever seen going on. None of that means anything to him, even this 40 days, he finally says ‘LORD, there’s something about you that you haven’t shown me. Heaven’s great, streets of gold, walls of jewels, that’s great, but you LORD, I want to know what’s behind all of this, I want to know what’s in your heart. I want to behold your glory.’ And God answers and says ‘Alright Moses, I’ll make all of my goodness pass before thee.’ that’s his glory, his goodness, merciful, longsuffering, ‘I’ll make all of my goodness pass before thee.’ Read ahead. Will you guys read ahead? You know, because if we come next week and there’s more people here, and I say ‘Who read ahead?’ and I’ll think, ok, I didn’t read ahead. Moses went up into the mount and got all this information, you have to read ahead, you have to be familiar with this, next week we’re going to go into this, and there’s beautiful types, shadows, remarkable things, remarkable pictures through all of this. But it’s remarkable as we enter into this Tabernacle, the things that God would say to us, that he would speak to us. But, here as we read through these things, again, they’re not trite, you know, how do we deal with somebody else’s ox? How do we deal with the less fortunate? Do we show favouritism to the wealthy over the poor? Or do we show favouritism to the poor just because they’re poor, and we want to be benevolent or magnanimous? Do we really stand and say ‘I don’t care, I love my friends, but I think they’re wrong, and there might be twenty of them going in the wrong direction, but Lord, that I can lay my head on the pillow at night and know I pleased you is more important to me than knowing I pleased them. I’m not going to go with the crowd.’ Do you think the Lord ever lets those things come across our path? It says he proves the children of Israel, not so that he can figure out who they are, so that they can figure out who they are. And how many times do you and I knuckle under and yield to something, the whole time the Holy Spirit’s telling us, we know the Word says we shouldn’t, we bend, we let the peer pressure steer us, it ends up to be a mess, and we’re standing there thinking, ‘I know I shouldn’t have done that! So dumb, I know I shouldn’t have done that!’ But we come out the other side so much smarter. And then the Lord says, Round Two, let’s try this again. And we’re saying Nope, not anymore, not anymore. I’m not gonna do it, Lord. Let God be true, let every man be a liar. It’s a snare to try to please the flesh, Lord, or to trust in the arm of flesh. And these are not trite things, these are not little rules, God doesn’t want us to live like we’re getting pecked to death by ducks or something. These are things that come from the majesty of his presence, these men see the presence of God on a pavement of sapphire, they see glory, they see majesty, and they realize that this God stoops down to care…[transcript of a connective expository sermon on Exodus 23:1-33 and Exodus 24:1-18, given by Pastor Joe Focht, Calvary Chapel of Philadelphia, 13500 Philmont Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19116]