40 Minutes In The Old Testament - Episode 98 (Exodus 29:1-30:10)

Episode Date: September 27, 2017

Chad and Daniel talk about the ordination of the priests and how holiness is transferred and why it's important. Do just people need this or is there more to it than that? What is packed into the promise of God being "your God?" And what is going on with all the incense? All that and more in this episode. Have a listen!

welcome to another episode of 40 minutes in the old testament i'm daniel emery price joined by chad bird chad what's going on this is episode 98 dude we've been doing a lot of these episodes that makes me feel old you know 98 we've been doing this a long time it doesn't you know it doesn't it it doesn't feel like we've been doing this that let's that as you get older chad time just goes by real quick i mean it does not feel like we have sat here and done this 98 times oh it doesn't i was thinking that this morning the 100th episode coming up which of course we'll record it uh at the conference it doesn't seem maybe 50 yeah but 100 no it doesn't it didn't seem like that yeah it's pretty hard it's pretty bizarre man the uh speaking of the conference by

the way we're doing something crazy for the conference when you hear this uh i know we've been saying you can get 10 off here's the thing guys if you're still thinking about coming uh maybe you live in california or something like that yeah it's even better than that you can get in on a sale that will run until the thing is sold out but you want to jump on it because after it's sold out it is sold out but uh there's a sale if you want to be a sellout like me and chad which of course we are uh you can go and you can enter the code sell out at checkout and get that ticket for 99 which is a hundred dollars off it's less than i mean that is a that's a steal it's ridiculous uh so you can you can do that so if you want to go and uh you want to just

save a hundred dollars and uh and come hang out uh go register enter the code sell out and check out box you can get that ticket for 99 bucks and uh that'll that's that's good as long as there's uh as long as there's tickets uh but uh i wouldn't uh mess around if you want to do it so that's my pitch love to see you come hang out listen to us record the 100th episode and uh spend two and a half days hanging out in southern california with me and chad and a whole bunch of other people. Chad, that being said, what's going on in Exodus today? We got Aaron and the sons halfway ordained. We did. Yeah, we kind of left them hanging there. It is a long ordination, so we just wanted to be accurate. It's a week long, and that's how long we're going to take.

That's true. Hey, yeah, we started this last week. We're going to finish it because it is a seven-day ordination. It's one of those really unusual episodes in the Old Testament. I mean, you have a lot of holy days. You have a lot of special occasions in the Old Testament, a lot of festivals. But this one's pretty unique in that you have this ordination that's lasting a whole week. But that's just the way it was set up. I'm going to just finish this pretty rapidly today because i know we talked about it last time the uh the basic ceremony was that aaron uh especially his sons too but aaron as the high as the high priest the top priest uh he was robed in all his special vestments and then his sons were were robed in their in their vestments and you

have all sorts of sacrifices that take place you uh you have the blood that's put on their their ear and their their thumb and their and their toe we talked about that a little bit last time you have uh some sacrifices that are completely consumed on the altar and some sacrifices that are partly consumed on the altar and then the rest is given back to Aaron and his son so that they can have a a sacred barbecue as I like to call it so you you receive back part of the sacrifice. You cook it, and then you eat it. So you are actually consuming the animal that was sacrificed for you. Anyway, this goes on for, as we said, seven days, at the end of which everything is wrapped up, and they are in the priesthood for the rest of

for the rest of their lives. So that's kind of a quick summary of it. I want to say one thing about something that is said right at the very end of this particular section. So most of Exodus 29 is about the ordination, but the last verse of this section, which is verse 37, says uh talks about how the uh the altar is also supposed to be atoned for which is kind of strange language i mean we're we're accustomed to hearing about how our sins are atoned for but we're not really accustomed to hearing about anything that is not a person being atoned for but actually that happened uh part of in the old testament you had the altar in particular that needed to be cleansed that needed to be atoned for the idea is that the altar and a lot

of the other parts of the old testament tabernacle because they were in the midst of a people who were sinful it's it's like the the sin of the people infected everything that was around them as well and so you had the altar that needed atonement as well this this is this is also repeated in leviticus 16 when we get to the day of atonement same thing happens there so you have atonement may not for not only for the people but also for these uh non-living things like altars so god was concerned not only with cleansing his people but cleansing even those articles of holy furniture by which the sacrifices were made for his people so i wanted to say that but then there's one other aspect at the very end that uh that i want to say just a couple of words about it says

so after the after the altar is consecrated after atonement is made for it it says then the altar shall be most holy and whatever touches the altar shall be holy now notice the difference here you got most holy and then you have holy now we've encountered this of course spatially because we've talked about the most holy place and a holy place the two parts of the tabernacle itself now this is different because this is talking about the altar shall be most holy and you have other sacrifices that are also called most holy and then you have other things that are simply called holy so what's the difference it's it's really quite simple uh it it's simply this that if something is most holy it communicates that holiness to other things

so that that's it plain and simple if something is most holy it is able to give its holiness to communicate its holiness to something that touches it and this gets to this fundamental really unusual idea to us that holiness is contagious in the old testament holiness is not it is not kind of an abstract concept i know i've emphasized this before but i'm gonna i'm gonna say it again because it is it is so contrary to the way that that we think holiness in the old testament is always incarnational and by that i mean holiness is visible it's tangible it's tasteable it's touchable it's smellable holiness is embedded in the stuff of creation so you have holy places you have holy things you have holy people so holiness is always something that is related to

the senses. And here it is as well. You have a holy altar that is most holy. That means that when you touch it, it communicates its holiness to you. That holiness is contagious, and it's passed on to others when they come into contact with it. Now, this might seem really strange to us, Uh, but it's actually not, uh, or at least it shouldn't be because this is with some differences, but this is basically the way that God still works. And he's still, holiness is still contagious. You still communicate. God still communicates his holiness to us through physical things.

I mean, what happens when you're baptized? You have actual wet stuff. You've got the stuff of creation, water, that touches you. This water has within it the word of God, and that sanctifies you. It makes you holy. So God is still giving you this holiness through the stuff of creation. It's no longer like animal blood or something like that, but now it's through water. Same thing with the Lord's Supper.

When we eat the bread of the supper, when we drink the wine of the supper, we are consuming also the body and the blood of the messiah and that sanctifies us that gives us the holiness of of christ through this tangible edible stuff of creation to which god has has joined his word so just like he worked back then so he continues to work holiness is still a contagious gift that god gives yeah uh two thoughts on that one when you're talking about sort of uh things uh requiring or becoming holy or even requiring forgiveness right uh this is not even this is not just an old testament concept uh we hear about the earth groaning and crying out for for you know redemption all of creation crying out for redemption um the word

that is used for uh that john uses the greek word uh where john says that christ uh became a propitiation for our sins not our sins only but the sins of the whole world uh it's actually the the word where we get our word cosmos i mean it's it's literally like everything it's not just yeah it's it's all that we think of oh the world like everybody in the world and that's certainly true but the word is actually speaking of the entire cosmos like all of creation not even just this world uh everything that exists that christ is a propitiation for all of it um so creation itself everything sort of has to be redeemed and it's not because rock sin uh but as those who are put sort of as the stewards of creation we have and this ties into what you're saying

all this stuff is is sort of is transferred or imputed and so we have sort of imputed our own sin to creation and and disrupted it and and broken it and made all of creation sinful like us and what christ does much like you're talking about here this transfer of holiness or imputation This is what he does, is that he takes what is not holy and makes it holy by transferring or imputing his holiness to it. This is the only way that us or creation is redeemed and sanctified and made good or holy again. So both of those things are up here in the New Testament and are super consistent throughout Scripture. Yeah, those are great points. And, you know, when you were talking, I was thinking that, you know, we hear, of course, all the time these days about how humanity has adversely affected the environment.

You know, we're hearing about that every time we turn the news on, you know, whether it's global warming or whatever it might be. When I hear of that, I think to myself, well, you know, that may be true, but it doesn't go far enough because we don't realize the extent to which humanity has adversely affected not just the environment, but all of creation. Yeah. The very reason that we have aggressive animals that sometimes attack people, the very reason that we have horrible things like hurricanes happen, the very reason that anything wrong in creation is traced back to the sin of humanity. So that was Pandora's box, if you will, that let loose evil into our world. And so you have this language in Romans 8 that you referred to about how creation is groaning in eager anticipation for the sons of God to be revealed because it's waiting for its own new creation to take place in the resurrection of the dead. So has humanity affected the environment?

Yeah, like beginning in Genesis 3. That's when everything went wrong. uh so uh humanity and creation are redeemed and all creation are redeemed by by christ and that that's a that's a done deal that's that's an accomplished reality that is hidden now in our world in the kingdom of god and we get little glimpses of the glory that awaits us now but that will be fully revealed at the end of time when you're going to have a new heavens and a new earth in which this fallen world and fallen humanity will be finally made new in christ in the resurrection amen so yeah uh that's a couple of a couple of good heavy theological points to

pull out of the end of that section about the ordination of the priest all right well let's wrap up this chapter uh we're this is this is following the section follows is connected with what precedes it, but it's also a distinct section. So the way the chapter ends, the way Exodus 29 ends, is a description of what is the kind of the basic everyday sacrifice that's offered, along with a few words that have to do with the purpose and the content of Old Testament worship. So verses 38 through 42 describe the sacrifices to be offered on a daily basis. It's sometimes called the Tameed offering. Tameed just means continually or regularly or perpetually. So every morning and every evening, this was the basic sacrifice that was to be offered.

so you have a you have a lamb you have flour you have oil and you have wine and each of these all of this is put together and it's offered in the morning and it's offered in offered in the evening on a daily basis so this becomes the foundational sacrifice that is offered every every single day of the year and every other offering then builds upon it but you can kind of think of the way i think of this anyway, is the ongoing perpetual way in which God continues to give an animal as a sacrifice for his people Israel. So just as there's not a day that goes by when they don't sin individually and nationally, so there's not a day that goes by when there's not a lamb on the altar shedding its blood for the people of god so you just as just as the the the need is

there so the remedy is there as well morning and evening every day this is the sacrifice that's offered it's called a continual burnt offering that's uh to be placed upon placed upon the altar. Then it goes on from there to heap up a whole bunch of verbs that describe what the Old Testament worship was all about, as well as why God brought them out of Egypt to begin with. Now, I just want to read these verses to you. So as I'm reading, listen to the verbs that are used, in particular the verbs that describe what God is doing for his people and what he's doing in in their worship of him so I'll start here with 42 it says that these sacrifices are supposed to be offered at the tent of meeting before the Lord where I will meet with you to speak to you there

and I will meet there with the sons of Israel then shall be consecrated by my glory and I will consecrate the tent of meeting in the altar. I will also consecrate Aaron and his sons to minister as priests to me, and I will dwell among the sons of Israel, and I will be their God. And they shall know that I am the Lord their God who brought them out of the land of Egypt, that I might dwell among them. I am the Lord their God. So you've got language like a lot of language of meeting. So God meets his people there you have the language of consecration or sanctification or making holy all means the same thing you also have the language of dwelling god's going to dwell among the sons of israel and he's going to be their god that's the the end of verse 45 says

that he will dwell among them and he will be their god now what i love about this section Anytime that I am leading a class, for example, on the connections between Old Testament and New Testament worship, this is always a go-to passage for me because I think it's a good summary of what God was all about in Old Testament worship as well as what he's all about in worship today. So why did God bring his people out of Egypt? Verse 46 says he brought them out so that he could dwell among them. Now, that verb for dwell in Hebrew is shakon. The noun form of that verb is mishkan, which is one of the words for the tabernacle. So we could translate that as I brought you out of Egypt that I might tabernacle among them. I am the Lord your God.

So this is why God brought them out of slavery, across the Red Sea, finally to the Holy Land, so that he could dwell among them. This touches on this ongoing theme that you see in the Old Testament, that God is not far from his people. Instead, he's the kind of God that likes to dwell in the very midst of them, which is what we see here in these passages as well. he wants to dwell right in the middle of the people of israel he's not some far away distant deity in the sky he's the kind of god that gets down into the nitty-gritty of his people's of his people's life and he comes there in order that he might be their god well to to be someone's god means to do good things for them that's what that basically means if someone if a god is being your God. That doesn't mean that he simply exists, but that he does good things for you. So he wants to

dwell among the people of Israel, to do good things for them, and to consecrate the place where he meets him and to consecrate his people. So he makes holy. So you pull all this together, and you see that god wants to bring them out of slavery dwell among them do good do good things for them and make them holy to sanctify them that's the purpose of old testament worship so god doesn't get anything out of old testament worship instead god gives in old testament worship that's the reason that he wants his people to gather around his tabernacle so that he might do good things for them, sanctify them, forgive them, bless them. And then this, when you relate it to the New Testament, is basically the same thing. Why do we gather together with our brothers and

sisters in Christ? Not because God needs something from us. Not because God just can't wait for us to get together and tell him how awesome he is. The reason he wants us to get together is in order that he might meet us there, dwell among us, be our God, and sanctify us, do good things for us, forgive us, serve us, cleanse us, do all the things that he does for us when we gather around his gifts. So sometimes we set up this, this is the Old Testament guy and me talking here on my soapbox. Sometimes we set up this huge chasm between the Old Testament and New Testament worship we talk about how the old testament was all just about the law and all about ritual and the new testament is all about freedom and all about this other non-old testament stuff and

that's just not the case of course there's there's differences uh all of this was was a pre pre-cross so of course there's gonna be differences but the essence is still the same the reason for old testament worship is the same reason that we have it today in order that god might gather his people around him to to serve them to sanctify them to forgive them to bless them to do good things for them because he is he is their god so that's the way the chapter wraps up that's the uh that's the end of 29 yeah yeah i i think that there's a lot of comfort and like some of the simple phrases in the bible when god says things you know over and over and again like i'm gonna do this and you will be my people and i will be your god that seems like kind of throwaway

statement like it's said a lot that's what i think cliche right yeah it's like yeah well so uh yeah well you know you made us and uh we'll be you know of course so we'll be your people and you'll be our god however like he's never saying this outside of the reality that he's speaking about rebels i mean he's he's speaking about people who like have rejected him and turned away from him gone astray uh are hostile to him and he's always saying it in in a way then is that i'm going to do this thing and the outcome of that thing of the outcome of my work is that they will be my people and i will be their god that's a that's a profoundly comforting statement for a sinner uh because what when when you're god's people that means that you are he's saying that that

you will be his treasure the thing that he'll be the thing that he takes care of that he looks after that he preserves and that you that he will be your god which is not to say that well that i'll be your god and i'm going to beat your head off but that i will be those things to you that Like that I will, my goodness and my loving kindness will be what you experience. And at the end of the day, this is all my work. That's huge stuff, man. For God to say like, no, I'm going to be your God. Not simply your judge, not simply your creator, but you're going to be like my people.

You're going to belong to me and I'm going to be your God. I'm going to be the one who, and for God, being God isn't just about ruling. it isn't just about even creating he certainly does those things but for god over and over and over again what you see him say about himself is when he's your god that means that you are a recipient of his gifts that as as his people you are going to be the people that he gives himself to and he gives his gifts to his gifts of grace and mercy and redemption and righteousness i love those phrases and they're all over the place where god and he doesn't just sort of like you know uh they're not these sort of like conditional things even like i mean he says like i'm gonna do this

and this will happen this is going to be the outcome of my work and uh that's good the the certainty of it and and what's packed into those kind of phrases yeah so often uh if you if you have if you ask the average person you know what's what's the characteristics of god they might say well he's you know he knows everything he's he's all-powerful or you know something like that more often than not even even among christians you'll hear an accent on the the sovereignty of god he's you know he's all-powerful well i mean and not not to deny that of course of course he is god gets right down to defining who he is in relation to his people he doesn't accent his his awesomeness or his power he's accenting here that he's the kind of god who's right there by

your side he's the kind of god who wants to be with you even though you are rebels and love you and forgive you and care for you so when god really wants to be god for you to you then he's the god of he's the god of love he's the god who cares for israel just like he continues to care of the church yeah this is why he says things like not just simply like and i will be their god like that's good enough like i said that's pretty great but he's like i will be their god who delivered them from egypt right this guy i'm i'm gonna be the they will know that i am the god who was good to them that saved them that's what he wants you to know about him right like i'm i'm the god responsible for the for the good things um that you receive yeah yeah because he's a he's

a giving god which is great for beggars like us yes it is good news it takes us through the end of chapter 29 uh i guess we will jump right into chapter 30 we're getting pretty close uh actually to the end of this whole tabernacle section and uh before you know it we're going to be in chapter 32 not a whole lot in chapter 30 uh chapter 31 kind of wraps everything up and talks about the sabbath for uh for a few verses and then in 32 moses comes down from the mountain and uh you know what he finds when he comes down from the mountain it's not it's not good news but we'll get there eventually uh maybe uh maybe next episode so uh chapter 30 begins by talking about uh by going back really this almost seems out of place uh because it begins by talking

about another altar talks about the altar of incense sometimes called the golden altar so it seemed like this should have been talked about earlier in the chapter earlier in this section rather you know because we we went over the stuff in the most holy place we went over the furniture in the holy place we went over the material that the tabernacle was made out of and then we got to the vestments of the priest the ordination of the priest we discovered so it's almost like we should be finished with all that when all of a sudden we have a section that deals with the uh the altar of incense the golden altar and i think one of the reasons, this is speculation on my part, but I think one of the reasons that this

was saved for now is because this particular altar is so connected with the priesthood that it's almost like God wanted to talk about the priesthood and the ordination of the priest, all of that, get that all covered. And then he wants to talk about a piece of sacred furniture where the priesthood does some of its most important work, and so that's the reason this particular section follows all of this talk of the priesthood. So what is the altar of incense, what is this golden altar? Well, we've heard about the altar that is the altar for burnt offering. It's also sometimes called the bronze altar or the outer altar. That's the one that's outside the the tabernacle that's the one where the sacrifices are offered on an ongoing basis

the altar of incense is inside the tabernacle itself it's a holy place it's the third article of sacred furniture in that holy place you've got the menorah the candle the the candles then you cross from that you have the table of showbread and the table of the bread of the presence and then you also have this third piece of furniture in the holy place and that's the altar of incense and it sits directly in front of the veil now this is where i wish we kind of had a video that people could watch or a picture we could put up but just kind of kind of picture this in your in your mind you've got a straight line from the altar of burnt offering outside the tabernacle to the altar of incense inside the tabernacle you can like draw a straight line

from one to the other one's outside and one's inside one's made of bronze and one's made of gold one's made of gold one's larger one's smaller one is mainly for the burning of sacrificial animals and one is mainly for the burning of incense and yet these two altars this is uh this is the way that i i want you to kind of connect these two together these altars are are like blood brothers and i mean that quite literally because what will happen is that some of the blood from some of the sacrifices that are offered on the altar outside will be taken inside and placed on the little horns of the golden altar of incense so the blood of sacrifice not the bodies there's never uh no part of the bodies of animals is brought to the

altar of incense but the blood of some of these sacrifices is taken inside and and placed upon smeared upon the the four little projections called horns they're on the the altar of of incense so these are blood brothers blood altars they're joined by the blood of the sacrifice now the reason this is significant i'll i'll get to it in just a minute but i want i want you to note that first off that the the the golden altar and the bronze altar the inner altar and the outer altar are bonded together by means of the blood of sacrifice that's the first thing i want you to to note the second thing is that really the the the purpose that this altar served was for the burning of incense that's what's called the the altar the altar of incense so

what would happen would be uh the high priest or in later years any priest they did this on a rotating vases any whatever the the priest assigned for that day he would go into the the tabernacle related the temple he would stand before this altar of incense and he would burn a very special incense no one else could use this you couldn't use this as home you couldn't use this in synagogues the special incense was only used only used in the inside the tabernacle and as this incense was burned on the altar of incense as the smoke of this incense rose before the throne of god the priest would stand there and pray he would intercede for for the nation now why incense what's the link between incense and prayer well it's it's it's really really quite amazing

so when the priest would pray of course god would hear his prayer but what happened with the incense is that the incense came to embody the prayers that the priest spoke so not only would god hear the prayers but you could say that god would smell the prayers and that god would see the prayers because the incense served a dual purpose the incense has its aroma but it also has the smoke that you can see so god would hear the prayers of the priest and the incense as the the physicality of the prayer itself god would see the prayer and god would smell the prayer as well so you have a triple way a trinitarian way if you will by which these prayers are reaching the throne of god the inner god's ears he hears them the inner god's eyes he sees them the inner

god's nose he smells the prayers as well now i'm not just making this stuff up i don't know some people may be thinking i am but in the psalms no you're making it come on language you're making it up yeah yeah come on you're just you're just spreading that exegetical butter across a whole loaf of bread right now yeah you're just pulling this out of nowhere all right i gotta i gotta justify myself so listen to listen to this good stuff psalm 141 verse 2 says may my prayers be counted as incense before you or actually quite literally there is no i looked in the hebrew there is no as there's no simile here literally it's may my prayer be reckoned or be counted to be incense before you. So make my prayer to be incense before you. So our prayers are incense

before the throne of God. And this isn't just an Old Testament kind of deal, because in Revelation, two places, Revelation 5.8 and Revelation 8.4, we have prayers described as incense. So in Revelation 5, it says that they are golden bowls of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And then it says in Revelation 8, 4, that the smoke of incense rises before the throne of God, and the smoke of incense are the prayers of the saints. So you have Revelation pulling upon this Old Testament imagery as well. So there's this great connection between God hearing our prayers and God smelling our prayers and God seeing our prayers as well. And all this is a way of accenting the fact that when we pray, when the priest stood before the altar of incense, and then when we, as those who are baptized into Christ, when we pray, our prayers reach the Father as incense.

He hears them. He smells them. He sees them. now this becomes even richer when you realize its fulfillment everything as we talked about everything in this is pointing to christ christ comes of course as our high priest we've talked about that uh many times but he doesn't come just to sacrifice he doesn't come just to offer himself on the cross just like there was a connection between the outer altar and the inner altar the blood from the outer altar was carried to the altar of incense so what christ does is he offers himself on the outer altar of the cross if you will and then he takes that blood inside and he stands before his father as the one who has shed his blood for us and there as our as

our sacrifice and as our priest he offers the incense of prayer before our father so he prays not just as a priest but as a sacrifice he's the one whose blood has been shed who then stands before the father's throne as the as really the the altar of incense incarnate he is our he's our new and better altar of incense who takes everything that he's done for us and he places before the Father, and he then intercedes for us. His prayers become incense before the Father's throne. We have multiple passages in the New Testament that talk about how Christ is interceding for us. He's seated at the right hand of the throne of God to make intercession for us. And in Romans 8 and Hebrews 5, it says that Christ offers up prayers and supplications for us.

And even in Ephesians 5, Paul says that Christ offered himself as a fragrant aroma. The two Greek words that are used there for fragrant aroma, osmen euodios, are the same two words that are used throughout the Greek translation of the Old Testament to describe those sacrifices back then. So Christ is our pleasing aroma before the Father. He's the one whose sacrifice is pleasing aroma, whose prayers are incense before the Father's throne. So it's a great comfort to think of how Christ prays for us, but he prays for us as those whose prayers will surely be answered, not only because he's the son of the Father, but because he is the sacrifice that's accepted by the Father on our behalf. It gives a whole, I think, whole new, deeper, richer understanding to the reason that they had incense in the Old Testament, pointing to the work of our high priest. Amen. There you go. And Chad did not make it up. I knew you didn't. I knew you didn't make it up.

That is good news. And other news that's not so good is we're out of time this week. that's it guys this is episode 98 episode 100 is going to be recorded live we mentioned it I'm just bookending it with it if you want to come for $99 though which is the number

episode that we'll be recording next week if you want to come for $99 which is insane you're going to eat well over $99 worth of food that is included in the ticket if you come if you want to come to the conference for that price you can just use

the code sellout and uh and that's good for until the thing sells out so get on it we'd love to see you there uh just go to here we still stand.org and all the information is there chad bud we'll see you next week for episode 99 all right man we'll see you then thanks © transcript Emily Beynon