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A brief bit of encouragement for your day from God’s Word
Well, a good Thursday to you. I hope you've gotten over the hump okay and heading toward the weekend. Looking forward to what the Lord has for us, not only today, but this coming Lord's Day as we gather together to worship and to serve him.
Well, today in our reading in Exodus, we're reading about the garments of the priests. Again, I mentioned this the other day. Do you find this tedious? Do you find yourself getting kind of bogged down with all these details about how the priest was supposed to dress and what his different components of his attire were to be like and what they were to be made of and all the rest of that?
Does that get a little tedious to you? Well, consider this. The Lord gives, God gives, some very specific directions to Moses on how Aaron, the high priest, if you will, is to be attired as he carries out his high priestly responsibilities.
And a couple of things to point out about the person who's the high priest and the priests as a whole is that in the first place, they were chosen. They were chosen by God. So there were these 12 tribes and out of all the tribes, God chose the tribe of Levi to be the tribe that would involve the priests and among the sons of Levi, God specified that Aaron and his sons would serve as the priestly, the priestly element of that particular tribe and therefore represent all of Israel as priests.
So they were chosen. God specifically, sovereignly picked them out to function as priests. But then they were also clothed. And verse 1 tells us about that, chapter 28 tells us about that. The Lord says take Aaron your brother and his sons with him from among the children of Israel that he may minister to me as priest.
Aaron and Aaron's sons. So he chose them. But then he also clothed them in proper attire. So it goes on in verses 2 through 5 and he says you shall make holy garments for Aaron your brother for glory and for beauty.
Notice the purpose of those garments, for glory and for beauty. And you shall make these garments for them and you speak to gifted artisans who will have the spirit of wisdom and know how to do these things that that I'm giving you to do and make these garments according to the details that I give you.
They'll have that skill. So they were to be chosen and then they were to be clothed in proper attire and the attire is for beauty and for glory. Now the various components of this priestly attire are really rich in symbolic imagery.
Just take for example the the stones that to go on the shoulder. The Lord said take two onyx stones and on these onyx stones engrave the names of all of the tribes, the twelve tribes of Israel. And then those stones, those onyx stones, were to be placed on Aaron's shoulder as the high priest.
Well, what what's the significance of that? I think it's pretty obvious, isn't it? That the high priest is bearing on his shoulders the weight of hmm responsibility for interceding in behalf of the entire nation, for all of God's people.
And then there's the ephod. And this ephod had a breastplate and on this breastplate are twelve precious stones. And on each stone there is one of the names of the tribe, tribes of the twelve tribes of Israel.
This is called the breastplate of judgment. And we see that in verse 15. It says, you shall make the breastplate of judgment, artistically woven according the workmanship of the ephod you shall make it.
Of gold, blue, purple, and scarlet thread, and fine woven linen shall you make it. And then he goes on to talk about the different stones. And each there's four different rows, three rows of each stone, and and each one, each stone is different, different precious stone, and then the name of the tribes given for in on those different stones.
So verse 21 says, the stone shall have the names of the sons of Israel, twelve according to their names, like the engravings of a signet, each one with its own names. They shall be according to the twelve tribes.
Well, what's this all about? Well, why? What's the point? Well, you drop down to verses 29 and 30 and you get the point. It says, so Aaron shall bear the names of the sons of Israel on the breastplate of judgment over his heart.
So he's not only carrying the names or the tribes on his shoulders, but he's got them over his heart when he goes into the holy place as a memorial before the Lord continually. Now, as you go on to read verse 30, you get a sense then of what that breastplate of judgment is.
It's not judgment in the sense of like a sentence for a crime committed. You know, not that kind of a judgment. It's more a judgment of discernment. You see this in verse 30, because he says, the Lord goes on to say, you shall put in the breastplate of judgment the Urim and the Thummim, and they shall be over Aaron's heart when he goes in before the Lord.
So Aaron shall bear the judgment of the children of Israel over his heart before the Lord continually. And that judgment, the Urim and the Thummim, were these two instruments. The best way I know to describe them is like a pair of dice.
They weren't dice, but they were, I mean, this is kind of the idea. And in order to discern the will of God for the people, when that will wasn't spoken, it wasn't a spoken revelation, and they're wondering, okay, do we go this way?
Do we go that way? Do we do this? Do we do that? The way the high priest would discern that or judge that for the people is he would cast these Urim and Thummim, and however they came up would give the answer, the sense of understanding and discernment of how to proceed, of what to do.
Now, here's the point of all this. This is all a wonderfully symbolic representation of the Lord Jesus Christ. The book of Hebrews makes it very clear that Christ is our high priest, and as our high priest, he bears us on his shoulders, and he has us next to his heart, and he, through his Spirit, uses the Word to guide us in the discernment, the judgment, of the ways of the Lord.
Our high priest is symbolized and represented in the role and function and even the garments of Aaron, the high priest. Well, as this passage continues, you get down to verses 40 and 41 and so forth, it talks about not only the garments of Aaron, but the garments of the regular priests, the everyday priests.
So Aaron was a high priest, and there was always one man who served as high priest throughout the centuries, and he was the one who would go into the Holy of Holies and offer the Day of Atonement sacrifice.
The high priest would do that. But the other sons of Aaron served as, shall we say, everyday priests or regular priests. But these two had to have specially designed garments, again, for glory and beauty.
We read this in verses 40 and 41. It says, for Aaron's sons shall you make tunics, and you shall make sashes for them, and you shall make hats for them for glory and for beauty. And so shall you put them on Aaron, your brother, and on his sons with him.
You shall anoint them, consecrate them, and sanctify them, that they may minister to me as priests. Well, again, I want to remind you that the New Testament Scripture speaks of the Church as a kingdom of priests.
So, for example, in the book of Revelation, we read about this in Revelation chapter 5, where this new song is sung to the Lamb, to the Lord Jesus, and says, You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and you have redeemed us to God by your blood out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation, and have made us kings and priests to our God.
Kings and priests to our God, and we shall reign on earth. And as priests of God, thereby chosen by God, we also need to be rightly clothed. And in our redemption, we are indeed rightly clothed. We're clothed in the righteousness of Christ.
And at the culmination, the end of the age, at what's called the marriage supper of the Lamb, there is this wonderful statement that says, Let us be glad and rejoice and give him glory for the marriage of the Lamb has come and his wife has made herself ready.
And to her it was granted to be arrayed, to be clothed in fine linen, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. It's the it's the lifelong process of sanctification, reaching its culmination at the marriage supper of the Lamb, when God's people, the Church, are brightly arrayed in righteous garments.
Just as the Old Testament priests needed to be, so do New Testament priests. So as we wrap this up today, let's, number one, give appreciation to our great high priest who bears us on his shoulders and over his heart.
And then let's also be aware of the fact that as a kingdom of priests, those of us who know Christ, we we're to be clothed in righteous garments, not literally, but figuratively. We're to be clothed in righteous garments, having the righteousness of Christ work its way out in our everyday life.
So our Father and our God, we do thank you for Jesus, our high priest, and for all that he represents to us and what he does in our behalf. And Father, also we pray today that we would be we would be a kingdom of priests that rightly represent our righteous King.
And this we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. All right. Well, have a good rest of your day, and I trust God will bless you in it.
