Purify The Church

Well, you guys may be seated. I I want I was uh this is this this month we're going to talk about the labor. I don't know if you've ever talked about something for a solid month, but oh my lord, you're like, "All right, I gotta be careful here because where am I going to go next week?" Right? uh the the labor. I I I want to if you guys have ever heard me teach before or maybe even in conversation, you're like maybe not in conversation. I'm a big context guy.

I like understanding the context, understanding the problem, understanding that way I know where I'm going. If I can if I see the problem and then I then the rest of it starts to make sense. So if if I may, we we have there was an interesting something in the Old Testament, if you'll note that at the beginning of the Old Testament, you you you hear the mentioning of God often. And and for example, God said it is good. It is very good. It's it's a God the the main character is God, right? It's his creation.

It's his relationship. As you go through the Old Testament, it morphs out out of just mentioning of God and his thoughts to how people receive them. It's it's not that he disappears from the text. It's that it it morphs to to show a bigger picture to show a to show how that as a god with his intentions and his dialogue, but then it becomes and it starts it puts it in story form almost and and allows almost whole lives for us to follow so that we can play that out in our minds.

We can we can think through those stories. We can think through those those scenarios and we can see and we can learn from others mistakes and failures and and conquest. We can learn from those things. One one man that did that was Abraham. Uh I don't know if you guys know it or not. I'm a fan. Ab Abraham's there on the front row. Uh he there was nothing special about him. He wasn't he wasn't like David. David was Mr. Right. He he was Mr. kill you and steal your wife.

Like he he was just like he was like the all-American just what you could imagine. Abraham's just a dude. I mean he's just this guy. And we find then in Genesis 11 that Terara his father took his sons and they left of the Chaldans and they they were going towards Canaan. But when they came to Iran, they settled there and Tara died. I wonder. And the next thing we find out is that Abram is then commissioned by God to go on. He said, "Leave everything.

Take just your household and go." To me, it's always curious that Terra started that trek, but he got to the edge of the known. He almost got out of where he was at. He got to the edge of the known and was like, "You know what? This is good. This is far enough for me." So God calls Abram or Abraham out of the known into the unknown. He says, "You're going to have to trust me. You're going to have to walk with me." And he and he very specifically develops a very intense relationship with Abraham.

That Abraham's the father of many nations. He is the He is the father of the of the three main religions in the world. All go back to him and all the fighting. It just all goes back to him. So good or bad, good, bad, and ugly. Just blame Abraham. It it it comes down and he's he he God says, you know, where you go, I'm going to give you this land. And so he goes and he walks. He leaves what he knows and he goes into the unknown, trusting God, making sacrifices and going.

God and he says, "I'm going to give you a son." He doesn't have a son. So, he trusts him. He doesn't have a son. He doesn't know. He says, "I'm going to give you this land into your seed." So, can you imagine and put yourselves in his shoes? uh if we put ourselves God says, "Hey, I'm going to give you this for your kids, but you have no kids and you're 75 years old. You ain't likely to have kids." And you're like, "God, I'm doing this, but there's no point. There's no reason for me to do this.

There's no fruit of my labor." He goes anyway. Eventually at 100, he has Isaac. uh he goes on and he establishes God establishes a covenant with him and I want to look at that covenant for just a minute of in and understanding that the covenant it wasn't the first covenant so we go back Noah I I love the noah's covenant Genesis 6-9 it is it contains a whole story six chapter 6 through chapter 9 contains a whole story of Noah then noah's covenant still in effect. It's sealed with a rainbow.

We still as mankind, we live under Noah's covenant. It's He said, "As long as there's a sun, there's long as there's a rainbow in the sky, my my covenant is with man." Something really cool, right? Is uh it he said, "I'm not going to destroy the earth with water. I'm going to destroy it with fire and brimstone." Well, what within the last hundred years, we just we just came to the realization and that at some point in time, the sun's going to explode and we're all going to be vaporized.

I mean, really and truly, like that's how that's how suns do they and and but thousands of years ago, God saying, "Look, some point in time, I can just send a a solar flare and you're wiped out, dude. like all of mankind. I don't even have to deal with water anymore. Just a just an interesting note as he sets up that covenant with uh Noah. Just uh just another FYI here.

He he said he says if he said the life of man or the at the at the hand of man I'm going to I'm trying to do King James version over here and getting all tongue tied with it. Essentially, if if someone kills someone, then I will require them because man is an I will require their life because man is an image bearer of me. He establishes the the supremacy of life, not because it's life itself, but because it's a representation of him. It's not it. You're not special because you're you. Sorry, Disney.

You're special because you're a representation of God. You're an image bearer. As an image bearer, our entire our entire point and our entire lives, we are spent searching for our identity. Our culture is searching hard for identity. We are we and and and and we're trying to get back to this image bearing of Christ or of God. So So we went we went to Abraham, went to Noah, we come back to Abraham and we see that God establishes a covenant with him. This covenant was different.

He said, "I'm going to establish this to you and your seed after you." He says, "You're going to have to be circumcised." So, I have a video all last month. I am just kidding. All last month. All right. I don't know if you guys have ever watched the the video of like how a of how a cow is actually sacrificed. Like how you kill one kosher. It's brutal. I was like all like so pastors like you know he's teaching on the the brutality of the sacrifice. I'm like, man, I just put that video up there.

Just somebody put that up. I mean, it'd make us sick. But, you know, like somebody just put that video up there. We'd have to not put it online because it it'd probably like this is terrible content. It It's rough. That's we ain't we ain't doing a circumcision. All right. But that was the sign. Now, Abraham's a grown man. Not only Abraham, but all the men in his camp. They be like, "Hey, time out, buddy. You say you heard from God. Maybe not, you know, everybody.

And then he says, "When a child when a manchild is born, on the eighth day, you will circumcise him." Just a fun little fact here. We now know that on the eighth day of a of a little boy's life, that's when the the white blood platelets are the highest to fight against infection. Wow. They had no way of knowing that. God knew that. We know that now. But there's something about trusting what God says. That's right. Amen. Even in those little things, we don't quite understand. We don't quite know it.

We may never know. But understanding it trusting without understanding. That's faith, right? Faith, isn't it? Isn't it? It faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. That's faith. God, I'm hearing you. I'm trusting you. I have faith in you. So, he does. He trusts him. He establishes a covenant with Abraham. And that was the sign of the covenant. He goes on and and he has kids.

He has generations and God God promises him that land and and we find that from the depending on how you count it, but about 430 years from the establishing of the covenant was till they left Egypt. All right? Now, that's you got to do some it's it's you got to do some finagling with you got to count your generations and all that. It's hard. People still argue about it, but it kind of seems about that range there. All right? It was when they left Egypt was from 430 years from the establishment of the covenant.

So, he didn't see it. Generations and generations and generations. And so, then we get to the children of Israel. God is faced with this problem. Then if I may, if God can be faced with a problem, how do I have a direct relationship with all of these people the way I had a direct direct relationship with Abraham? Because it's not easy. Not everyone's going to leave their home on blind faith. That's not practical. Somebody's got to be a farmer. Are we all going to starve? you uh kind of like Netflix passwords.

Does anyone share a Netflix password? Yeah. Like everyone's everyone's a liberal until they start paying for their own Netflix and like, "Hey, hang hang on, guys. Now, now I can't just give out that password to everybody. The whole system's going to fall." Then we get real conservative real quick. Same thing. We all can't just be farmers. We We all can't just leave. We can't all just venture off into the unknown. So God provides a way for us to do that. He He gave us the altar of sacrifice. The altar of sacrifice.

Then uh we I it it was an animal that we had to care for. It was an animal that that man had to I I would say almost treat it like a pet. There was a This is a terrible uh there's there's these guys on uh Instagram who like they they will read youth pastor stories. Y'all may not get that feed. I don't know.

I'm not really sure why I get that feed, but like there was one guy who was preaching a youth camp and all week he had like a baby lamb or something that all the kids played with and then at the end of the week he just brought that bad boy up on the stage and killed it. Like yeah, I know it was awful. Like kids went home sick. It was terrible. They had to shut the whole thing down. I don't know where this was at or who did it, but it was just a story on the internet. It was funny if you think about it.

That's what they did, though. Really and truly, that's what they did on a mass scale. If you have like dark humor, it's funny, right? That's what they did on a mass scale. It was kids, this is the cost, this is the sacrifice. Uh uh and and and as they took it, they walked from from if you'll notice here, the only two things with inside this that were not inside the whole inside the actual tabernacle itself was the altar and the labor. That was it.

You could not get to the doors of the temple without going by those two. And the labor was there to wash. That's what it was for. It's just a sink. It was just a sink. But on the labor, if if in Exodus 30 17 21, the bronze basin, the Lord said to Moses, "You shall also make a bra a basin of bronze with it stand a bronze for washing. You shall put it between the tent of meeting and the altar.

So here, right there, between those two, you shall put water in it with which Aaron and his son shall wash their hands and their feet. When they go into the tent of meeting, or when they come near to the altar to minister to burn a food offering to the Lord, they shall wash with water so they may not die. They shall wash their hands and their feet so that they may not die. It shall be a statute forever to them, even to him and to his offspring throughout their generations. Exodus 38:8 adds something to this.

It says, "He made the basin of bronze and it stand of bronze from the mirrors of the ministering women who ministered in the entrance of the tent of meeting. from the mirrors of the ministering women who ministered in the entrance of the tent of meeting. Can you say Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers from the mirrors of the ministering women who ministered in the entrance of the tent of meeting? That's Exodus 38 and8. in in all of my just surfing the web, so to speak. That's what you call research, right?

Looking at the pictures that people had built of the brazen altar, of just what people had imagined it. There wasn't dimensions given. There weren't it wasn't anything fancy. But this this this little point stuck out to me for a minute. The mirrors of the ministering women who ministered in the entrance of the tent. They took a mirror and they put it on this thing where they washed their hands so that they could see. So this is my vanity tonight in case you guys couldn't tell.

This is So if we sit down, y'all can still see me, right? That's what it's for. And what's what do you what do you ladies do in your vanities? Hair, your eyebrows, mustache, beards, brush your teeth. You You check your teeth. You sat in the you you you you sat here and you get all pretty and you do all your things and and that's exactly what you're supposed to do it. These women took their mirrors and they said, "Put this here." There's there is something that happens.

What What did your mothers tell you when you stared in the mirror too long? What what did they scold you about? I they may not have. But you ever seen somebody that couldn't walk by a mirror without checking out themselves like, "Oh, they stuck on something. It's themselves, right?" They walk by the Oh. Oh. Guys are real good about it. It's like, "Dude, you ugly." Like, "What are you looking at?" Like, nah. Like, guys are just endued with confidence, right?

They're like, "Yeah, I'm It's like, dude, no you ain't." Like, no. No one has more confidence than a 40-year-old man. Like he's like, "I still got it." It's like, "Maybe not. Maybe not." As as they took their mirrors, I I want us to think about this for a minute. Can Can we Can we think about vanity? I know. Vanity. Vanity. Americans apparently really like doing that with that. Excessive pride or admiration of one's own appearance or achievements. That's what vanity is. Or there's a second definition.

The quality of being worthless or feudal. It's it's often defined as excessive pride in one's appearance. qualities or achievements can be viewed as a form of self idolatry or egotism with religious and philosophical implications. It can be seen a driving force behind the pursuit of wealth and distinction as well as a potential source of judgment and self-deception. In many religions, vanity is considered a form of self idolatry, a deviation from humanity and a focus on self rather than the divine.

They took the instruments of their vanity and they put them in the labor. When when they when they did this, the they were doing the same thing. They were looking when you're washing the blood from the sacrifice off of you. You're still looking at yourself. But what's happening? You're reflecting. What did I just sacrifice? Being real gentle about it. This cost me something. This didn't this didn't just happen accidentally.

And now instead of looking at oneself for one's own self, we're looking at ourselves the way God would see us. These women gave their mirrors as they were ministering. They were what? They were ministering what? What? What? How do we say this? the mirrors of the ministering women who ministered in the entrance of the tent. They served. If we're stuck on vanity, stuck on pride, we're self on self idolatry, step on stuck on egotism, building our own kingdom, building our own what's what's the antidote? Serving.

Ministering. finding a need and filling it. There was uh I I can't help but like in this in this instance I don't wandering around in a wilderness is not something is not a place where you can just go to Walmart. This was a prized possession.

this was something and they said let's put it here because when the priests go and they before they go into the holies holy of holies I need to make sure that my sacrifice and that they can make atonement for my sins as the same the same would go for the priest as they were standing in the mirrors and they were washing if they done it cavalerely it would show if they just half-hearted ly cleansed themselves. It would show they ministered and it got past themselves. Interesting thing.

Ecclesiastes 1 uh and one the words of the preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem. Vanity of vanity, says the preacher. Vanity of vanities. All is vanity. Man, have y'all ever read this chapter, this book? Plum depressing. Vanity of vanities. All is vanity. What does a man gain by all the toil which he toils underneath the sun? A generation goes and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever. The sun rises, the sun goes down, and hastens to the place where it rises.

The wind blows to the south, goes around to the north. Around and around goes the wind. On its circuits, the wind returns. He was wise. Circuits of the wind. You guys ever looked at maps of how it circles the globe? Wow. All the streams run to the sea, but the sea is not full. To the place where the streams flow, they flow again. There they flow again. This is This is getting depressing.

In verse 12, I'm I'm I'm going to the pre I the preacher have been king over Jeru of over Israel in Jerusalem and I applied my heart to seek and search out by wisdom all that is done under the heaven is an unhappy business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. I've seen everything that is done under the sun and behold all is vanity and a striving after the win after win. What is crooked cannot be made straight, and what is lacking cannot be counted.

I said in my heart, I have acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who were over Jerusalem before me. And my heart has great experiences of wisdom and knowledge. And I applied my heart to know wisdom, to know madness and folly. I perceived that this is also but a striving after wind. For in much wisdom is much vexation, and who increases in knowledge increases sorrow. Does anybody need some prozad? Now, we know that stuff doesn't actually work, but you know, CR that's he needed it, didn't he? He He was just stuck.

He was like, man, I want to I think I forgot to give this to to you, Israel. Um First Kings chapter 7 verses 23 through 38. Uh, if you can if you can find those real quick and if you guys have your Bibles or your phones with you, I I want you to follow along with me because this is this is some reading here. But I want you to I want you to see something here. First Kings 7:23-38. First Kings 7 23 and 38. Is everybody Does everybody got this? and he made the sea of cast metal.

I'm I'm using the ESV version just FYI if it if it's a little different. It was round, 10 cubits from brim to brim, five cubits high and a line of 30 cubits measured its circumference. This is Solomon's temple. All right. This is this is the tabernacle that is now being built and in in eloquence and in I mean just majesty. This thing was all inspiring. This was not the tabernacle in the wilderness. This was not a tent. This was a substantial place. Verse 24. Under its brim were gourds for 10 cubits.

Now cubits so on so forth about 18 in. So 180 in o that's over like over 15 16 feet. That's a lot. Maybe 17 brim to brim. Five cubits high and a line of 30 cubits measured its circumference. Now is anyone a math nerd? Any anyone? Y'all y'all need to look this up. It's called the golden ratio. All right, the Fibonacci sequence. All right, this follows that. Super cool. It's a 1.6 the ratio. Ian, you got me, buddy. Okay. All right. One per We got one. Woo. One nerd. All right. Super cool.

All the major uh monoliths in the world follow this this ratio in in building. Wild wild dynamics here. But this is this is how it was built. Uh there the it it stood on 12 oxen. This is verse 25. Three facing north, three facing west, three facing south, three facing east. The sea was set on them and all their rear parts were inward. Now, just to FYI, um the word sea in Hebrew, like it's like the same for like just any body of water. Like they just they did not clarify.

They're like, "Yeah, we crossed the sea." It's like, "Dude, that was a creek. They just did not clarify." Okay, I don't know why, but they just could not get a little more specific. So, this was a C. Now, this was big. So 30 cubits in circumference is that's a lot. Uh I mean a whole lot. It's over 30 feet. 40 feet or a little more wide. That's that's longer than my arms. Its thickness was a hand breadth. And its brim was made like the brim of a cup, like the flower of a lily. It held 2,000 baths. Good lord.

I hope they didn't actually use bath water. He also made the 10 stands of bronze. Each stand with four cubits long, four cubits wide, three cubits high. This was the construction of the stands. They had panels and the panels were set in the frames. And on the panels were set in the frames were lines, oxins, cherubams. On the frames, both above and below the lines and the oxen, there were wreaths of beveled work. This is detailed.

The one in the wilderness was like, "Yeah, we just had this late brazen this brass basin." That was that was about it. Moreover, each stand had four bronze wheels and axles of bronze. At the four corners were supports for a basin. The supports were cast with Reese at the side of each. You guys with me? Verse 31. We there? 31. Its opening was within a crown that projected upward one cubit. Its opening was round, as a pedestal was made, a cubit and a half deep.

At its opening, there were carvings and its panels were square, not round. Just make sure you note that, right? That's important. I I mean, it might be. I'm not really sure, but the four wheels were underneath the panels, and the axles of the wheels were of one piece with the stands. And the height of a wheel was a cubit and a half, and the wheels were made like a chariot wheel. Their axles, their rims, their spokes, their hubs were all cast. Verse 34. There were four supports at the four corners of each stand.

The supports were of one piece with the stand. 35. And the top of the stand there was a round band half a cubit high. And the top of the stand it says it stays and the panels were one piece with it. And on the surface of of its stays and on its panels he carved cherubam, lions and palm trees according to the space of each with reefs all around. After this manner he made the 10 stands and all of them were cast alike in the same measure in the same form. And he made 10 basins of bron. Each held 40 baths.

Each bas measured four cubits and there was a basin for each of the 10 stands. Is that enough detail for you guys? felt like I was talking to brother Sloan about building something how he does he can see it and I'm like all right well I trust you that's what was happening they built massive ornament have you ever been in one of those older houses the ornate just or you you go to the parthonon in in Nashville or in Greece if you're lucky enough the ornate the the the majesty of it.

But in all that detail, there was not one mention. At least it was the Bible. I think there was not one mention of a mirror and all the ornate detail, all the gold, all the brass, all the carving, they left out a mirror. When I think of a sacrifice, when I think of what God's done, and when I think of where God's brought me from, I can't just wash it off. There's a reason why we are set free by the word or made overcomers by the word of our testimony.

There's a reason why the why when we start thinking on the things that God has done. It just stirs it up. Solomon was depressed. All his vanity, vanity of vanities, all is vanity. He didn't reflect. He said, "I've done this. I've done this." But he didn't think about what God where God and all the sacrifices that had been made that had got him to where he was. He did not think about the sacrifices that man that that his father had made, that Saul had made, that the children of Israel had made.

He did not think about all the people that had died to get him to be the king of Israel, the most high, the man that could sit there and learn all the all the wisdom of all of all things. He did not sit there. He did not reflect. He killed when when when they dedicated that temple, the Solomon's temple, they killed like thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of bulls and animals. But he did not reflect and allow God to look past the ornate and the beauty and the and even just a sacrifice.

And he did not reflect and say not what I look like but what do I compare to God? How do I compare to a holy God? How do I sit here and brush my hair? How do I sit here and brush my pick out my teeth? How do I sit here and make sure that everything's right? But I can't see just me. I see what God's seeing. We might be a gerx society and a dawn dish soap world. You ever had something real nasty on your hands? German eggs just won't cut it. It was dawn dish. Ain't nothing that won't cut.

But how many times do we just pass by the labor? All right, I'm good. How many times we just Yeah, 99.9% we're good. I don't know if anything can withstand dawn over there. It takes your hide off with it. Ain't nothing left. But also, it takes a little longer. How long's it been since we passed by the altar after a sacrifice and said, "God, if I may, Abraham made a sacrifice." And and not to get too get too graphic with this. But he had to be real careful with it. You gonna like wink when I get too too graphic.

You going like you going to give me a Yeah. You had to be real careful with it and be real gentle. We a lot of us I think we we we make a sacrifice and we say, "God, look what I made. God, look what I did. God, look what I sacrificed for you. God, look at this. God, look at me. God, look. Oh, God. God, I I I I gave it all up for you. Like, dude, you're missing the point. That's not it. Because when you're looking in the mirror, you're still seeing yourself.

When it's a ministering mirror, it's no longer about yourself. You'll see the sacrifice I made and the path I made for you. You'll see what you'll see. You'll see past all the other things that are that are in the way. You'll see past all the vanity of self and ego and all the the failings of self and all the the the things that we would build and we would do and we would accomplish. You'll see past all of that and you'll see how little it is compared to a god.

See, there's something important uh for us to sit and to look to dwell. How little are we? He compares us to ants. Have you ever looked at an ant? Have you ever Have you ever looked at an ant colony? Those dudes can pick up like 50 times their their weight. I can't. We We can't do that. Ants are stronger than we are. And yet we'll look at them be like, "Oh, they're just an ant." We'll look at ourselves and I'm just a giant. Like, hang on there. Hang on. Looking at the wrong part of the mirror.

You you you haven't ministered. You haven't served. you haven't given. I I I I really I really wished I had the words tonight and I don't for Exodus 38:8 from the mirrors of the ministering women who ministered in the entrance of the tent of the meeting. If you'd stand with me right now, I'm going to let the spirit move on us for just a moment. I'm going to get out of the way. And I wonder if we can find ourselves with the mindset of God. When I look at their sacrifice, I shouldn't be seeing myself.

I should be seeing you. And the only way to do that is to minister. So, if you would, would you would you bow your heads with me for just a moment? God, I pray that upon each and every one of us here tonight, God, I pray, Lord, that you would allow the spirit of ministering to get a hold of us, God, the spirit of serving to get a hold of us, God. Lord, as we repent, as we wash, as we purify, but God, allow the spirit of ministering to get a hold of us, or else it's all done in vanity, God.

It's all done for our own glory, our own vain deceits. But God, I pray, Lord, help us to not do that. Help us to see past ourselves. Help us to see past our own needs. Help us to see past our own issues, God. Help us to see past and and purify ourselves for your glory, for your use, God, so that we will be holy and acceptable sacrifices to your purpose, God. God, I pray Lord that a spirit of servitude would grab a hold of our hearts.

A spirit of ministering would seep into our souls, into our way of life, into our walk, into our being. God, I pray, Lord, that you would let the Holy Ghost to move us and to shake us and to mold us. But God, that it would be intentional and it would be thoughtful, God, that our actions and our ways and our being, our whole world would change, God, and that it would move and it would shake and we would not even see us or the sacrifice we've made, but we would just see you, God.

God, I pray Lord that you would let us lay down our vanity and our vain desires, all of us, God, and that we would just pick up and minister and serve. God, we'll be careful to give you all the praise, all the glory, all the honor. Jesus.