Keep sharing good news without ads.
Pastor David Mitchell
I'm going to, Paul is going to help set the, because I'm
going to show you a picture before we start.
Because what I'm going to show you is a picture of you.
And you won't think it looks like you,
but there you are.
An old tabernacle.
An old tent.
Now really you live inside that thing that you look at in the mirror every morning.
That's your tent.
And we're going to talk about that some this morning.
We've been talking about it for several weeks, so I wanted you to get a picture of it the way God pictured it.
And certain parts of that place you need to know a little bit about before you can understand anything about the message
this morning.
Many of you know a lot about this.
Some of you have only begun to study it.
Some of you haven't studied it before, but you will.
And this is the wilderness tabernacle.
God gave exact instructions for how to build it, exact dimensions.
And then he did the same for the temple a little bit later on when they got into the promised land.
The permanent, well you can't say permanent, but certainly more permanent than this.
The temple of Solomon.
And someday in our near future another one will be built in the same place.
And this was the first one.
And this is called the outer court.
It looks like a fence or pictures a wall.
But all of it pictures you.
If you think about it, this was built in such a way that people who were on the outside can't see what's going on in there.
And these
create a wall, hide from those on the outside whatever's
going on on the inside.
If you picture that as you, this would be the body that people see when you walk by.
That's what the world sees.
And we grow up thinking that's us because we start seeing that at a very young age in the mirror.
Mom starts combing our hair.
Bathing and powdering us.
And I won't tell you that story some other day.
I have a family story about being bathed and powdered.
But we focus on that
where
it's all just me.
And only the word of God can cut asunder or make a difference between
the soul and the spirit.
Let alone the body and the soul and the spirit.
So many of us live our whole lives focused on that.
If you get saved and you begin to study the word of God.
God begins to move you through these gates and closer and closer to this area.
Let me show you another one.
Notice it's on the top.
It's in the shape of a cross.
The cross is
laid
here.
Nobody has to go inside to go past this church or this area.
Other than the high priest of Israel.
And he could only do that once a year.
And he could only do it with the blood.
Which pictured the body of Jesus but also fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ.
This is on the altar of incense, I believe.
The church right here.
They're not in this place yet.
Zacharias, before John the Baptist was born.
He was actually in this place in his youth.
He was one of the priests.
So y 'all were rooting for me back there, I know.
You have to know that, don't you?
You might have a problem listening to the rest of this if you don't know that.
But the designated priest would be in here during his youth.
And Zacharias was in there when the angel told him about John the Baptist.
Not only did he be born and came out to speak like I can say here.
But once a year,
the altar of incense pictures our prayers going up before God.
Don't read pictures of the body of Christ and fellowship.
Candlesticks picture that God himself is eternal.
That Jesus is the light of the world.
But they were instructed never to let that light go out.
Ever.
So it pictured the eternal nature of God.
And it also pictured his omnipresence.
That he is always with us.
His light is with us.
All these things are pictured here.
And you need to remember some of this as we get into the scriptures.
This is a mercy seat.
It's really not a mercy seat until it's sprinkled with blood.
It's a judgment seat.
It can picture the great white throne judgment, I think.
But when you sprinkle it with blood, it becomes the mercy seat.
And that's what it is to God's children.
To get into this place.
This place is called the Holy of Holies.
To get into this place, you've got to go past this labyrinth.
But you have to first come to the altar that is out here.
This is where the animals are sacrificed.
You come in through the gate.
The sacrifice is well in place.
So here is the cleansing water.
You go into the holy place where you see fellowship with Jesus.
You see the eternal life.
You see the life of Jesus Christ.
You see the altar of incense.
Our prayers going up before God.
And then on one man, the high priest works here.
Where the mercy seat is.
Which is actually the presence of God with the nation of Israel.
Now all of this was given to us, the Bible says, in two different places in the New Testament.
As examples for those of us who live in the last days.
To learn spiritual truths.
The New Testament says that our body is the temple of the living God.
So as you look at this, you can picture yourself.
You can see a lot about how things work with your relationship with God.
And many, many, many thousands upon multiplied thousands of truths can be learned from studying this.
So I want you to turn to 2 Chronicles chapter 29.
And we've been in this passage of scripture the last two times I've preached.
And so today we'll follow up with the conclusion of this message.
We had started talking about some duties of the priests.
And we pointed out that all of us as believers are priests unto God.
And so we have duties that are pictured in the Old Testament by the Old Testament priests.
The things that they did can picture or be in samples of things that we ought to be doing in our
lives.
The first thing that we studied was the fact, the obvious fact, that a priest's duty is to offer sacrifices.
And we mentioned that one such sacrifice is giving praise unto the Lord.
We find that in Hebrews chapter 1 verse 15 in the New Testament.
Secondly, we should offer a sacrifice of giving substance to others.
To other brothers and sisters who are in need, in their time of need.
Hebrews 13, 16 says that that is in fact an
offering.
And then in Romans chapter 12 in verse 1, giving our bodies as a
living sacrifice.
And I believe my reference is wrong on the first one, praise to God.
I don't believe that's Hebrews 1, 15.
It's probably Hebrews 13, 15.
We'll check that out later.
Is that right?
Hebrews 13, 15.
So we see these things that the sacrifices that the priests would give in
the Old Testament pictured many things, but one of the things it pictured for us is that we have the duty of offering
sacrifices as priests.
The sacrifice of praise from our lips, the sacrifice of giving from our substance, and
the sacrifice of giving our own bodies as a living sacrifice unto the Lord, Romans 12, 1.
And then we talked about, we began to talk about what we're going to conclude today is the second duty
of the believer priest is keeping the charge
of the tavern, 18 in
verse 1.
And ye shall keep the charge of the sanctuary, and the charge of the altar, that there
be no wrath any more of it.
Now that implies the
study of,
in other
words,
study of
it,
instructions.
It says that the Levites are given as a gift from the Lord to the priests to be as
servants, to help them take care of this place.
And it goes on in verse 7, and it shows specifically that the priest's duty
is to take, let me turn this back on, the priest's duty
is to take care of the
Levites,
or the stakes, the tents, and all
the way to the next place
of the necessary physical things with this physical building or tent.
But it says very clearly, therefore, thou and thy sons shall keep your
priest's office for everything of the altar and within the veil.
If you, usually if the word veil is used alone like that, it means the tent that
comes right before that little last room we looked at, where the mercy seat is.
So it was their job to take care of everything that was in there, especially when they had to move it and so forth.
And the Levites took care of the outer part.
Now, turn to 2 Chronicles 28, verse 27.
We'll review just a little bit, and then we'll bring our conclusion to this passage.
Because not all of you were here for the first two messages.
And those who were, it's been quite a few weeks since we talked about it.
So we'll do a little bit of review.
But we see in 2 Chronicles 28, verse 27 that Hezekiah became king, and he was a good
king.
He follows the bad king.
But the good king, now we have to remember that Jesus fulfills three offices.
Who can tell me one of them?
King and priest.
Give me the prophet.
All right, now, I believe Hezekiah can picture Jesus in his
kingly role in this passage.
And you watch and see if you agree that Hezekiah here can be a type or a symbol
of Jesus in his kingly role.
Now, Hezekiah in verse 29, now going into chapter 29, verse 1, began to
reign when he was 25 years old, and he reigned 29 years
in Israel.
He did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, verse 2 says.
There were several things that the king commanded that they be done almost immediately when he
took the throne.
He didn't wait.
He didn't get a committee together and vote on it.
He didn't get the wise men together and say, do you really think we ought to do this?
Would this be politically expedient?
He said, start right now and let's do this.
And the very first thing he did in verse 3 was he opened the doors of the house of the Lord and repaired them.
And if you were here for that message, you remember that we went into Revelation chapter 3.
In the famous passage in verse 20 where Jesus said, behold, I stand at the door and knock.
If any man hear my voice, I will open the door and sup with him.
And the door was not written to a lost person telling him how to be saved, although I wouldn't get angry with you if you used it
as a soul winning verse.
It wouldn't bother me at all.
But that's not the context.
The context is that verse is written to a saved person whose door is
in disrepair and is closed to the Lord.
And the first thing a person can do if you picture yourself as this tabernacle is make sure that
if that door is closed to the Lord, you're in big trouble, especially
if you claim to be a believer.
But this came in
this
room outside that
door where he's not supposed to be outside that door.
He's supposed to be inside that place.
And he's knocking on the door saying, let me come in and I will sup with you.
That's fellowship.
It's like we learned in Sunday school this morning.
You can't lose your salvation if you're saved.
But you can certainly lose your fellowship.
And for those who have or who do in the future, just remember the order of things is to repair the
door first.
Open the door.
Open the door to this place.
This is the first thing that the king commanded to be done.
Now the second thing that happened is they went
into the innermost parts first.
They didn't start trying to repair the outside of that tabernacle, the little thing that looked like a
fence around it.
They didn't work on that part first.
They didn't work on the part that the world could see first.
Notice that in many churches that's exactly what is done.
However, they work on the outside part first.
They want you to get a haircut or they want you to wear a skirt down to a certain length or they want you to make sure
you go to this place or that or that you use this version or that version of the Bible.
And yet,
let's go down to about verse 4.
Immediately after this door was fixed, which had to be fixed first to get into the inside part, they
immediately walked into this place, went all the way into the innermost part of it first.
And that's where they began to clean out first.
Verse 4 says, And he brought in the priest and the Levites and gathered them together into the east street.
Now, this is the king speaking.
And this is what the king Jesus would exhort us to do and demand that we do with our
temple.
And he said to them, And hear me, ye Levites, sanctify now yourselves and sanctify the house of the
Lord God of your fathers and carry forth the filthiness out of the holy place.
Go into the holy place, which was pictured by the smaller tent that was inside the big fenced -in
area.
It includes the outer part with the candlesticks and the altar of incense and the showbread.
And it also goes beyond into the veil the mercy
seat is.
The very first thing they were exhorted to do was to clean out the filth from this place and to bring it out of
there.
And you're going to find a little bit later in this study that it was the priest's duty to go into that place and get the filth out.
And then the Levites took that and did other things with it, as we'll see in this passage.
So you have within you that which plays the role of the Levite that's supposed to keep your outer
body clean.
Some people don't think that how we look on the outside has anything to do with our Christianity, and that's not true either.
It's like you've got pendulum swings back and forth from one end of the spectrum to the other.
Over here on this side, you've got the people that believe that we all need to dress just like the preacher and
just like the preacher's wife or whatever, and you've got to just march to these standards.
And you swing all the way over this side, and you have people that say it doesn't matter how I look, I believe in Jesus.
Well, that's wrong too.
The truth is somewhere in the middle.
Because what is on the inside will affect the outside.
If the inside is corrupt and dirty, the outside certainly will be.
But don't ever start working on the outside first.
Go to the inside, just like God exhorted these, just like the King Jesus exhorted them to do.
So, they, in verse 5,
Next, they went into
the very inner places and began
to isolate where the filth was and to take it out.
Now, notice that they start on the inside and move outwardly.
Now, we see this same pattern in the New Testament when the Bible speaks of us.
Let's leave your hand there in 2 Chronicles.
We're going to come back to it, but I want you to turn to Romans 12, verse 2.
Now, while you're turning to Romans 12, too, I'm going to give you an Old Testament verse that uses the same terminology
as we see so many times in the New Testament.
2 Chronicles 15 .8 There was another time in the history of Israel where
the temple needed to be cleansed again, just like this time.
And notice the language that's used here.
They said,
They renewed it.
Now, I want you to think about that word renewed as you look at these New Testament verses.
First of all, Romans 12, 2.
Now, remember, as soon as the door is fixed, we're going to go into
the deepest parts of ourselves and we're going to begin cleaning.
One of the first things God says to do is to be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you prove
what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
Turn over to Colossians 3, 9.
And then Ephesians 4, 22.
Colossians 3, 9 and Ephesians 4, 22.
When we get to the passage in Ephesians, we're going to see very clearly how this thing moves
from the inside out to the outside that if we clean the inside first, the outer things become cleansed.
Colossians 3, 9 says,
which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him.
When we go to the innermost parts of ourselves, we need to begin to renew our minds, renew our knowledge,
take care of the filth that is in there that can come in through television, through radio, through
wrong people we hang around with, through bad philosophies in the world, through
carnality, through the world system itself, through Satan himself.
All of these bad things and thoughts that can come into the innermost part of us, we need to be aware
of them and get them out immediately.
Ephesians 4, 22 says that he put off concerning the former conversation, the old
man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts.
There is no fixing the old man.
So we just put him off.
But we are then told in verse 23 to be renewed in the spirit of our mind.
And that you put on the new man which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.
You go into that innermost part of yourself and you renew it, you cleanse it.
Now notice what happens when that innermost part is renewed in spirit.
When you move into verse 25 and following, you start to move out towards the outer
part of the tabernacle, which is where most people start.
It's futile to start there.
But once you do start on the inside, all of a sudden the Levites, you know the priest comes into the inside
and does his work of cleansing, and he hauls the filth out, places it out here in the outer court,
and the Levites begin to work.
Then they take that filth and the other filth that's in the outer court and the part that the world sees and they do something with it
which we'll see at the close of the message.
It's awesome.
I can't wait to get to it.
But I've got to let you wait a little while just so you have to do your beautiful sitting here this morning.
So we're going to get to it the long way.
We're going to meander through and take the scenic route.
The new man, the inner man is renewed.
Now look at verse 25 and watch how this begins to move towards the outer.
While putting away lying, speaking every man truth.
Now you know lying, you could say that's an outer thing, but it's kind of in there deeper than some of these things that we think are
the really biggies.
We move on out to the very outside part of the flesh and we begin to focus.
Oh, there's the biggies.
There's the big sins we've got to watch out for.
Lying is something that starts way in here.
So you see how they've moved out from the very deepest part out, but they're still kind of on an inner part
here on the inside.
And it says put away lying.
Speak every man the truth to his neighbor.
For we are members one of another.
It's like lying to yourself when you lie to a brother or sister.
It hurts you worse than it does them.
Be angry and sin not.
You see how we're still kind of on the deep part.
We're in that part that really bothers us sometimes with anger or bitterness as it brings in.
Somebody does something to us that's not just right and we dwell on it.
Doesn't hurt them.
They don't even know what you're thinking.
It just hurts us.
The odd thing about bitterness is the New Testament tells us, however, that if you let it stay, it will then affect
others.
It begins deep in the heart.
So we're bringing out these deep things of filthiness and we take anger and we
bring that out.
Now this is the wrong kind of anger.
There is a type of anger you're supposed to have when you're angry with holy, righteous anger.
And it's not talking about that.
It's why it said be angry and sin not.
It moves on and says let not the sun go down upon your wrath.
What a wonderful exhortation from the Lord.
If you could practice going to bed and not being bitter, you'll be a wonderful Christian.
Just deal with it before you go to sleep every night.
And don't carry it with you into the next day.
You know why?
Because if you do, verse 27 says you'll give place to the devil.
Now how can you do that if you're saved?
There are some who believe the devil and his demons can affect you, but the Bible is full of exhortations
for the saved not to give place to the devil.
What place do you think he's talking about?
What are we talking about?
We're still dealing with the sins of the inner part, such as lying and anger.
And he says, now I'm going to tell you this.
If you let the sun go down on yourself, that's you, this whole place, and
you are still angry at some brother or sister, because I've found I don't get that
angry at people out in the world.
I mean, I feel for them.
I wish they could get saved.
I wish you could just go, you know, convince them and they'd get saved.
But sometimes you guys can irritate the fool out of you.
And I know I never do that to you, but
you can't let it come into the next day.
You have one day to be wrathful and bitter.
And at sunset, when does the next day begin, Brother Russ?
Sunset.
Not sun up.
That's the Gentile way.
God set it where the next day begins at sunset.
That's where it stops.
That's right.
Now, why?
Because if you disobey that verse, you give place to the devil.
What place do you give him?
I know this doesn't meet the theology of some Baptist preachers who preach that Christians can't be affected by demons,
but they're just wrong.
I can't help it.
And they've never done any counseling.
I guarantee you they've never done any counseling with people that are hurting.
I have.
I've seen them be delivered.
Christian people.
In my office right back there, and there's people sitting in this room that I've dealt with that I'll never tell any of you who it
is, but they came to me.
Well, I don't know that they're sitting here.
They may or may not.
Some are.
Some aren't.
Because there's more than one or two.
Now, if you think your brothers and sisters in here aren't saved, go tell them that.
But I believe they are, but they had demon problems.
Why?
They gave place to the devil.
They didn't mean to.
Do you think that a Christian ever means to?
I guess there are some who do.
I don't know that they outwardly mean to, but there's something about that sin they like.
And so they give place, and they're the most difficult ones to help because they really still like it for
some reason.
I happen to believe that.
Brother Otis was talking to me about this one day at coffee, and we were talking about it.
And now this is pure philosophy, so just my theory, and I know y 'all don't even care about that.
But I just like talking about what I think sometimes.
I think if it happened to where he got into this place, that Christian would cease to exist on this earth
and would be taken home.
From a human viewpoint, we would call that being taken home early.
He would die before what we consider his time.
Now, from God's viewpoint, is that early or is that on time?
It's right on time.
But in 1 John, it talks about a sin that's unto death.
Many interpretations of that passage.
One of the most prevalent interpretations in the world in all the theological works is, though, that that means that you can
die before what we would consider your time.
If there is such a thing as that happening, then that's if you let the enemy get to a place where
God is in you.
So don't do that.
Now, that's just philosophy.
I don't know that the Bible teaches that part of what I'm saying.
Now, I'm going to stop that, and I'm going to go right into what I do know the Bible teaches.
I do know that the Bible teaches that the enemy...
I was just theorizing what might happen if he got into this part.
My theory is you would be taken home at that point, because God the Father will not dwell in the presence of sin, period.
He won't dwell in the presence of Satan.
He won't dwell in the presence of the world system and all that.
And all of the holy angels, the cherubs, they protect the holiness of God.
Two of them are pictured there looking down on that mercy seat.
I just don't believe that's going to happen.
I mean, just boom, and it's over is what I think.
Well, even if you just consider the fact that that might be true, it certainly puts a healthy fear of the Lord in
our hearts, is that we are to guard this place.
Listen, one of the most important things you can do as a believer priest is to keep charge of your
heart.
You can't allow Satan to get anywhere close to there.
You cannot afford to allow the demons of hell to get anywhere close to there.
As they begin to come into this place, and you feel one
throwing a fiery dart at you, at your outer body perhaps, that's the
time to resist.
That's the time to resist Satan, for he will flee from you, the Bible says.
But what does it mean when it says, neither give place to the devil?
Does that imply that one could?
If you give place to him,
let's read on here in 2 Chronicles 29.
Here we are with some of these deeper sins.
I'm not in the right verse, am I?
Oh, I'm sorry.
I'm in Ephesians chapter 4.
I'm going, wow, this is not here.
Ephesians chapter 4.
I'm sorry, I got on a rabbit trail.
Back on the trail now.
Ephesians chapter 4, verse 27.
Neither give place to the devil.
Now, we're going to start moving out into some more outward areas.
As we see the Levites now take some of that filth that was in the innermost parts, and they also are going to
clean up some of the outermost parts of our tabernacle.
Let not corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth.
Like these little kids writing cuss words on our church on the door over here and all over here.
Now, we look at those and we say, boy, that's a hellish little children.
Well, you know, that's just kind of like an outward thing.
That's cussing.
We look at that as the biggie, don't we?
But God mentions some things such as lying and anger that are deeper.
Cussing is something that comes out.
It comes right out of your tongue, and it's just like part of the outside sins that show to the world
very much.
You know, it wouldn't take two seconds.
Born -again experience, and those little kids wouldn't be doing that anymore.
I can remember when Charlotte and I were first married, I used to say, well, you know, when we have children, I'll have to quit
cussing.
I don't know how I'm going to do it.
She said, I don't know either, but you'd better figure out a way.
Well, fortunately, I probably never would have figured out a way, but God saved my soul in my car driving to work one day
when I was 24 years old.
And I've only cussed about 100 times since that time.
No, no, it just went away.
Not all sins do immediately like that, but that one did.
That's an easy one.
That's my point.
You know, that's one of the easier ones.
Now we're in these outer ones.
Communication, corrupt communication coming out of your mouth.
Well, you know, do that which is good to the edifying.
Speak what's good to edify your brothers and sisters.
Let that which you speak minister grace to the hearers.
Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby you are sealed unto the day of redemption.
He is in this place,
because the high priest party is going there to be with him.
He is sealed within you.
That's why I believe my theory is that the demon, if you allow place in that place, I don't see how
that can be.
I don't see how that can be, and you still be here physically.
How do we grieve him?
We grieve him by letting corrupt communication come out of our mouths.
We grieve him by giving place to the devil.
We grieve him by being angry at one another, having bitterness.
We grieve him by lying to one another.
Now look at verse 31.
Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and evil speaking be put away from you with all
malice, and be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted.
This is what happens after the Levites and the priests get finished.
We've got a pure temple.
We have a purified temple.
Kind one to another.
One of the greatest, most outstanding attributes of a saved person is that no matter what your
personality was before you got saved, when you got regened, when you got
regenerated, you got a kind spirit.
That's hard for some of us who don't necessarily have one, but still it happens.
When you get saved, you have a kindness there.
Tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, has forgiven you.
Be ye therefore followers of God as dear.
I love that word, dear children.
There's children, and then there's dear children.
The dear children are the ones that
keep working and cleaning this place out.
They start on the inside.
They make sure the door is working.
They go all the way to the inside.
They start carrying this corrupt stuff out, and they work at this continually.
So we notice how the inner sanctuary got filthy in the first place.
We talked about that the last time I preached.
In 2 Chronicles, now we're going to go back there.
I told you to keep your hand there, and it probably fell asleep.
So flip back over to 2 Chronicles 29, verse 4 and following.
We see how this temple got corrupted in the first place, and I'm just going to hit the points.
We're not going to look at the Scriptures because we already did it.
Number one, they turned away their faces from God.
Number two, they shut the doors.
They shut this door right here.
They didn't bother with it, acting like they were going to let the Lord in.
They shut the doors.
They put out the lamps.
They came right into here.
The Lord said to keep burning continually, picturing my ever -presence in my eternal
nature.
They just let the oil go away.
What is the oil picture?
The Holy Spirit.
They just let the oil go dry, and they let the fire go out.
This is what the people did before this place was defiled.
All of these things happened before it was defiled, and then when these things were done, it was defiled.
In fact, we know from history that a Gentile came in and offered a pig,
and then he came into this inner place, took all this precious gold and all the things in there, and took it out of there and hauled
it off.
A long time before that happened, they shut the doors to Jesus.
They let the fire go out.
They didn't burn incense anymore.
What is that picture?
Prayer.
They didn't have a prayer life anymore.
It pictures true, genuine prayer.
They stopped having burnt offerings, which to us pictures praising God, giving substance to God, and giving our
bodies as a living sacrifice.
And what was the result that we see down in verses 8 and 9 in these places?
Well, trouble, astonishment, hissing, the sword,
captivity of the wives and daughters, which has happened in our nation.
We've got a place now where the women, we've got a place where the little girls call the guys on the phone
trying to get dates.
That's no big deal.
Well, I'm not trying to say that's a big deal.
I'm just trying to say it's a flip -flop.
It's not the way it was meant to be.
The woman is supposed to be the responder.
And we've got a place where our women, our wives, and our daughters have been brought into captivity of Satan,
the world system, the ads of this world, and the flesh.
Why did this happen?
Because as a people, the Christian people in this country have been turning their faces away from the true God
for a long many years.
I don't know, a couple of decades or more.
They've been shutting the door of their hearts.
They've been putting out the lamp and playing like God doesn't even exist.
They put the lamp out as if God's presence is not there.
They don't burn incense because they're not a people of prayer and they don't worship and praise properly anymore.
So there's trouble, astonishment.
September 11th happens.
Different things more greater than that will happen, I'm sure.
The good king came and told them to repair the doors.
He told them to go into the innermost part and to take the filth from
in here.
And they did that.
And now let's look at the end of this message.
Look at 2 Chronicles chapter 29 and verse 10.
Now before we do this, I've got to read a little bit of history to you.
I want to read from Unger's Bible Dictionary, which really should be called Unger's
Encyclopedia of the Bible.
He quotes Smith, a scholar, a Bible scholar.
And he is defining a place that's called the Brook of Kidron.
And I want to read this to you.
The Brook of Kidron, because it's going to come into play here in a moment.
To the north of Jerusalem begins the torrent bed of the Kidron.
It sweeps past the temple mount.
And historians and archaeologists tell us that a couple thousand years ago, the Kidron actually was, the
bed of it was actually closer by several hundred feet to the temple than it is now.
It sweeps past the temple mount, past what were afterward Calvary.
It sweeps past Calvary where the cross was.
It sweeps past Gethsemane where the garden was, where Jesus' sweat,
blood.
It leaves the Mount of Olives and Bethany to the left, Bethlehem far to
the right.
It plunges down among the bare terraces, precipices, and
crags of the wilderness of Judea.
The wilderness of the scapegoat, that is.
Now pay attention to where this river runs.
This river runs past the temple.
It runs past Calvary where the cross was and Gethsemane where Jesus prayed the prayer, Lord, it
be Thy will, let this cup pass from me, but nevertheless Thy will be done.
And then it went to the place and went through the very wilderness, this little river, not
really a river, but just a little creek almost, except during
sometimes the year when it floods.
It went through this wilderness where they let the scapegoat go.
It had all the sins of the people on its head.
So barren and blistered, so furnace -like does it become as it drops below the
level of the sea that it takes the name of Wadi An -Nar or
the Fire Wadi.
At last its dreary course brings it to the precipices of the Dead Sea,
the lowest place on the earth which probably covers Sodom and Gomorrah, into which
it shoots its scanty water in the winter, but all
summer it is dry.
The valley is only 20 miles long but with a descent of 3
,912 feet.
It is the brook crossed by David while he was fleeing Absalom in 2 Samuel.
This valley in the time of Josiah became the common cemetery of Jerusalem.
Now you've got some history behind you.
Let me go into chapter 29 of 2 Chronicles and let's see what happened to this filth that
they took from the innermost parts of the temple.
The priest's job was to go into the very inner parts and get the filth and bring it out into the outer court.
The Levite's job was to get the filth from the outer court and the filth that they had brought from the inner court and take
this and do what God says and here's what God said to do with it.
We see in verse 10,.
Now it is in mine heart to make a covenant with the Lord God of Israel that his fierce wrath may
turn away from us, the king says.
Isn't it interesting that the king's job in many ways is to turn God's wrath from his people?
My sons, be not negligent.
What an exhortation for us this morning.
For the Lord hath chosen you to stand before him.
He's talking to you as a priest this morning.
If you neglect the job of the believer priest, that means you let your body control everything.
You just let the urges of your flesh tell you what to do every day.
You predominantly walk and you're interested in that part you see in the mirror.
That's just the outer little fence around the thing.
You saw it a minute ago.
It's like a little fence.
It's a tabernacle.
It's just the outer parts of it.
And we focus on that because we're negligent.
But he says, my sons, be not negligent.
For the Lord hath chosen you to stand before him and to serve him.
That's why you're here on this planet.
He has chosen you and the real you, the new man, is supposed to be in control of this outer
flesh anyway.
And the outer flesh just serves.
It's just a servant to the new man because the new man's job is to stand before God
and serve God and that you should minister unto him and burn incense.
What's that?
Prayers.
Then the Levites arose.
Now you see the Levites listened.
And they gathered their brethren and sanctified themselves and came according to the commandment of the king by the
words of the Lord to cleanse the house of the Lord.
And the priest went into the inner parts so they listened too and they went into those deeper parts of
yourselves.
Now remember the priest is you.
And the tabernacle is you.
And the innermost part is where God dwells in you.
And the priest went into this innermost part of the house of the Lord to cleanse it and brought out
all the uncleanness that they found in the temple of the Lord unto the court of the house of the Lord and then the
Levites took over.
And the Levites took it to carry it out abroad into the
brook, the key drawn where it was dumped.
Now this is amazing.
Turn with me to John chapter 17 verse 24 but leave a hand there.
2 Chronicles.
Brother Russell, I'm coming into the third ending we were talking about this morning.
John 17, 24.
Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where
I am that they may behold my glory which thou
hast given me.
Think that prayer will be answered?
That was Jesus praying.
Which thou hast given me for thou lovest me before the foundation of the world.
O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee but I have known thee and these have known that thou
hast sent me.
And I have declared unto them thy name and will declare it.
That goes right up to our day today.
Do you know that the king is in the midst of us right now teaching and singing praises as we
sing, he sings from within us.
As we teach and learn, he teaches from within us and to us
because that prayer was answered.
He says, I have declared unto them thy name and will declare it that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may
be in them and I in them.
Do you know that the same love that the father loves his son with that he loves you with?
Can you even believe that?
You couldn't if the word didn't tell you that because you couldn't feel that way because you know we've sinned before and we haven't treated God
right and we've let this tabernacle get filthy before.
How can he love us as much as the one who never sinned but was tempted in all points as we?
Well, the only reason he can is because Jesus made it to be so by being our
substitute and died for us on that cross.
So we go into chapter 18 there in John in verse 1 and it says when Jesus had spoken these words
he went forth with his disciples over the brook and look what brook this is.
A key drop.
Where was a garden?
And you know the rest of that story.
That is an important place, that river.
Very important place.
Now when you go into the last verses in this chapter 29 of 2 Chronicles where they have
repaired the door of the tabernacle they have gone into the innermost places and brought the filth out of it
filthiness of the mind and of the spirit and brought it out into the outermost part and then the Levites
took that and carried it completely out through that front gate and dumped it in this river Kedron
which is the place where the cemeteries are now it's the place where all these things in history happened it's the
river that Jesus crossed the night he went into the garden and prayed about the cross
itself and all of these, this filthiness was dumped there and after all of this was taken care
of this was the result in verse 20 of 2 Chronicles 29.
Then Hezekiah the king rose early and gathered the rulers of the city
and he went up to the house of the Lord can you see Jesus Christ as the high priest gathering
you as a believer priest and me and gathering us all
up together and bringing us to worship God and they go up to the house of the
Lord which really we are but when we meet collectively in this place God meets with us as a
group as well and we as a group become the house of God.
The Bible teaches in certain places and they brought seven bullocks and seven rams and seven
lambs and seven goats for a sin offering for the kingdom.
You've got to notice the different offerings.
This first one was a sin offering and notice that it says it's for the kingdom.
Wow, have you ever seen that before?
I've always seen it, you know, for the sanctuaries for the people.
I never saw the phrase for the kingdom until this week when I was studying this again the
kingdom, that's who the sacrifice of the sin offering is for and he gives it
and he offers it up for the kingdom and for the sanctuary.
Now notice the kingdom is us.
So when Jesus died on the cross that was for us.
But you know what else it says?
It says and for the sanctuary guess who that's for?
That's called propitiation that is for God, the Father.
We think of Jesus dying for us all the time.
We ought to think about Jesus dying for the Father to make sure that his holy and just wrath
could be fulfilled at the same time that he can show mercy to sinful people.
It was more for him than us really because unless he was satisfied
first we could not be saved.
So he offers up sin offerings for the kingdom, that's us and for the sanctuary, that's God
and the commandment of the priest the sons of Aaron to offer them on the altar of the Lord.
Then they go for the goats, the sin offering and the scapegoat takes place and they laid their
hands on the goat down in verse 23 and they offered the goat.
So there we have the sin offering today.
That is a remembrance for us of the one time death of Jesus Christ on that cross.
He died for us and he died for the Father that the Father might be satisfied and that we might
be saved.
And you go into verse 27 we see a second type of offering.
It's called a burn offering and Hezekiah commanded to offer the burn offering.
This is a free will offering.
This is given from the hearts of the people.
There's no way these people could have done this with a corrupt, filthy tabernacle.
If you want to get past the stage of just being saved which brother Otis talked so beautifully about Sunday school this morning it
was eloquent.
The ending of that lesson was as eloquent as anything I've heard since I got saved.
Sorry brother Otis some good things from him too.
But if you just want some few Christians ever even get past their salvation
but if you ever want to go past and beyond into the deeper things of God you've got to make sure that
the temple is cleansed from the inside to the out and it would
come out.
And this free will offerings are given from the people then and then we see in
verse 25 He set the Levites in the house of the Lord with cymbals and psalteries and
harps according to the commandment of David and the instruments of David.
They began to sing and dance and praise God.
But you know what too many people try to do that today without taking care of this whole 45 minutes of sermon
today.
And the whole 45 minutes Sunday last time I preached and the whole 45 maybe 60 minutes before
that they don't go to these places.
They want to do this the easy way and sometimes loud music can do that for you.
But those of you who have seen the real thing know that it takes more than that.
We've got to have a clean tabernacle first from the inside out and all of this
spill has to be dumped into the Kidron to go away into the wilderness.
And then we can come in together with the cymbals and the psalteries and the harps and the instruments of David we
can shout and praise God and praise Him for who He
is praise Him for what He's done.
And then you know it's interesting.
But in verse 31 it ends up with thanksgiving.
We try to thank God often.
But you know a person that's got kind of a dirty tabernacle is not a real thankful person
because he's in the self.
But in verse 31 then Hezekiah answered and said now ye have consecrated yourselves unto the Lord.
Now that you've consecrated yourselves come near and bring sacrifices.
And thank often you know
what they did?
You realize that these people brought ten bullocks a hundred rams two hundred
lambs six hundred oxen three thousand
sheeps sheep, sheepies and they kept
bringing animals bringing these free will offerings to show God their thanks and
to praise God and to thank Him for all He had done in the whole time.
They were picturing the Lord Jesus Christ our Savior.
We can look back at it with hindsight and see everything that was pictured.
They couldn't see it all just vaguely could they see it but they did it with such joy and noise
and music and laughter.
And crying
little
doubt little doubt.
Little doubt in my mind that many of the remaining years
of our lives God is going to bring us to a cleansing
poor old America.
Our religious services our abomination
our prayers become an abomination when we're in
idolatry.
We owe it to these little children we in the tabernacle.
We're going to open up the altar this morning before the fried chicken.
The Lord leads you to spend some time in confession
to cleanse the temple or if you've already done that
in praise or worship then you can stay where you
are and do that.
Or you can come down to this altar whatever the Lord leads you to do this morning.