The Holiness of God (03/10/2002)

Park Meadows Church

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Bible of the different major doctrines of the Bible not so much from a doctrinal point of view but from a practical point of view and if you remember we studied we started with the

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Word of God and we had proceeded to the place where we were talking about God himself we might call it the character of God and we just got started into that and then we went in a different direction for a while I'm going to return to that study this morning we had talked about the personality of God or the fact that God is a personal

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God and if you remember there are three things that theologians look at to define what a person is now theologians are interesting creatures they have to define everything so most of you know what a person is but they have to define what a person is and so usually the consensus of everything

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I've read comes up with three points to that definition and first is that to be a person you have to have intellect and that may leave some of us in the room out

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I guess I don't doesn't have to be a lot of intellect but you have to have some intellect when you're studying theology where you're talking about excuse me about the

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Lord himself usually you substitute the term omniscience for intellect but it falls in the same category it's just that God's intellect is omni which means it's all -encompassing there's not anything that he doesn't know and he never had to think it up to know it so let's just call it the omniscience of God but the fact that God has intellect is part of the proving of the fact that God is a person he is not just some impersonal energy force out there who started everything in motion he certainly not like what

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I guess it was what magazine was it life which one was it that was the oversized magazine back in the 60s life magazine came out on the front cover back in the 60s

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God is dead and the whole theory of the intellectuals in the 60s one of the reasons we have found ourselves in the place we are today is society worldwide is because of what was started in the 60s the popularity of these movements but their theory was that God was some impersonal energy force who started everything in motion and then he just simply kind of went like this and he just looks at what's going on but he takes no personal interest in it anymore he's just flung it out there and he's just watching to see what will happen now unfortunately a lot of our modern theology has gone in that direction and it is seeped into even a lot of the

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Baptist churches a lot of all types of churches all over the world I call it

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Arminianism but it is the concept of philosophy that man is in control and that God simply if he does anything he responds to what man does and that has never been taught in the churches if you go back as recently as 75 years ago you wouldn't find that theory in any of the churches of God but now we find it in almost every pulpit across the nation and around the world today and maybe it found its roots in that life magazine article who knows but God is not an impersonal energy force

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God is a person now when we think of persons our definition of a person we look at ourselves excuse me and our friends and so it does give us the wrong impression of the personhood of God because he is not bound by any of the things that we as people are bound by but that's why on this intellect part we don't use the word intellect with God we use the word omniscience it simply means all -knowing the second category of proof that something is a person we call it sensibility sensibility is simply the word for higher forms of feelings and emotions such as love or even hate or such as the concept of goodness so when we say

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God is good we're speaking of the fact that he is he has sensibility he has feeling he has emotion that's part of personhood and the third category will just call that will in order to be a person you have to have a will you have to have the ability to determine to do something and then to carry it out and so God certainly has this in fact

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God's will is that which puts into effect all that God has designed and God is in fact a sovereign

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God that is the opposite philosophy to Arminianism the philosophy that God is sovereign which we stand strongly on that in our local church here all of us believe very strongly in the fact that it is

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God who is in control not man thank his goodness for that we began our study earlier several months ago and we covered the omniscience of God so that's point one under intellect we talked about that God is omniscient he is all -knowing and even in some of the recent sermons that really weren't along these topical lines we have studied in the holy place in the wilderness tabernacle as well as later on in the temple you had the candlestick that was over on the left -hand side as you walk into the holy place that the children of Israel had and they were exhorted or commanded actually by God to keep the lights on the candlestick lit all the time never to let them go out because the lights on that candlestick literally pictured the fact that God is always with us it also pictures he is all -knowing and he is eternal all of that was pictured in the little lampstand so we've kind of hit on that a little bit even in recent days so we're going to move beyond the study of the omniscience of God and we're going to move into the second category this morning the sensibility of God remember there are three omniscience sensibility which mean feelings emotions and number three will we'll get to the will part later the will of God later today will start on sensibility now there are several subdivisions under the sensibility of God let me just tell you what they are we're only going to cover one this morning but under this category we would talk about the holiness of God then we would talk about the justice of God then we would talk about the love of God then we would discuss the goodness of God and then fifthly we would discuss that God is truth and there are probably other categories we could study under sensibility but those are the ones will study in this time that we have so this morning now you can have a little roadmap of where we've been and where we're headed so let me get into the message this morning we're going to talk about the holiness of God it is a subject that is not popular today in the church in fact it's not really popular to talk about God that much in the church other than as his role as a genie in a bottle that we can rub and get what we want when we need it that is the modern philosophy in a bottle right there is that prayer is all about getting from God what you want and that Bible study is all about finding out how

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God can make us have successful marriages be successful at child rearing be successful in business and that God's written all this for our success and so forth that's predominantly the modern preaching go back 75 years and walk into a church and what you'll hear is you'll hear a pastor preaching on God himself you'll hear him discussing who

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God is from the scriptures you'll hear him discussing what is God like from the scriptures you'll have him discussing what is

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God's will from the scriptures what are the desires of God's heart from the scriptures

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God it's what it's all about and I believe I found several years ago in my ministry that if we would focus on the

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Lord himself in our services together and preach sermons that predominantly have to do with God my children laugh at me sometimes

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I said where you gonna preach on this Sunday I'll say Jesus that's pretty good answer for most sermons but if we would focus on the

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Lord the other things happen as wonderful byproducts it is true that God will hear your prayers and answer prayers it is true that there are specific passages in the

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Bible that will tell you how to be successful in your life it's there I mean I like to say this is one things about this

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Bible is it's like an owner's manual for a human so it is all here but I believe that we get the emphasis in the wrong place when we emphasize man we should emphasize our

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Lord so as we come to the Lord and we think of him probably it's appropriate that the first thing we should discuss is his holiness it's not easy for us to think about the holiness of God because God has made our brains in such a way that most of the things we learn we learn by comparison and contrast fortunate thing is

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I suppose we can use contrast quite a bit to try to understand God's holiness because we can think of what we're like and he is the opposite we can think about our frailties and our weaknesses and his holiness is absolutely opposite of that but it's a little bit difficult to get a grip on the holiness of God because we tend to personify

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God and bring him to our level and think of him as we are we use the fact in Genesis where it says

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God created us in in his image we turn that around and we try to figure

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God out by looking at us we say well if we're in his image if I can figure myself out I've got God figured out doesn't work that way it's bad logic it doesn't work that way we tend to do that so we try to think of God we say holiness well that's kind of like me when

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I'm having a good day and I'm not doing anything wrong well you can't get a grip on God's holiness by thinking of yourself on your best day because the

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Lord says even our righteousnesses are as filthy rags in comparison to God so all

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I know to do as your pastor today is to get into scriptures with you and to see what the word itself says about the holiness of God and just hope that God will teach us as we read through the scriptures together there's nothing absolutely nothing that I can add as a man to anything the scripture says in dealing with God's holiness

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I can only understand God's holiness to the extent that he's revealed it to you and to me in this book because it's totally incomprehensible unless you're like John and have been there and had a look or like I believe the

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Apostle Paul got that opportunity as well we just have very little clue isn't it wonderful though that those men took a look and wrote some things for us so we do have that and we have

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God's Holy Spirit within our hearts to teach us this morning let's pray father we ask that you would reveal yourself today to us in ways we haven't seen you before reveal to us today a glimpse of your holiness

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I know father that if you do that you will also place within our hearts a certain fear that we might not have had when we came in the building this morning a healthy fear of an awesome

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God the father still we ask for a glimpse of your holiness and we ask it for Jesus sake and in his precious name amen turn to Exodus chapter three in verse one

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I'm going to show you the absolute first place that this concept is discussed in the

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Bible the best I could find and I want you to see the context that God introduces the idea of his holiness in so Exodus chapter three verse one follow along with me

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I'm going to read through about verse 14 now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father -in -law the priest of Midian and he led the flock to the backside of the desert and came to the mountain of God even to Horeb now do you think that Moses knew this was the mountain of God yet or is this just information for us historical information

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I don't believe Moses necessarily knew this yet but he's going to find out about it today in this passage one thing that would help a lot of the gentlemen in the room today is this when

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Moses was a young man he felt that God had called him to lead the people of Israel out of bondage and as a young man he attempted to do this once and he failed miserably because it wasn't

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God's timing God knew in his omniscience that Moses was not prepared yet for the task

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Moses had the zeal of a young man but he didn't have the knowledge that he needed from God and so I suppose for the next 50 years of this man's life this brilliant man who had been schooled at the hands of the best universities in Egypt of that day mathematics science philosophy languages he goes out into the desert having failed and I'm sure somewhat distraught like those of us men who have attempted things in our lives didn't quite work out like we thought we went through a time perhaps a depression time where we were down well he goes out for some 50 years into the wilderness and tends sheep how many of you like to do that some of us probably like to do that but you think that he felt fulfilled out there you think that as a man he felt this is what

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God had called him to do and I see Sarah back there laughing because that's what her husband's doing tending sheep you're not quite as old as Moses yet so you never know what can happen when you're out here tending the sheep my point for us gentlemen is this sometimes especially in our society we think that God's time for us is when we're in our 20s and that if we pass that and we haven't done that great thing for God in our mind that we are we failed and God's not going to use us if Moses had taken that view we wouldn't have any scriptures right now we would have certainly no nation of Israel right now of course all that's impossible because it was

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God's plan but Moses simply couldn't take that view he was out there 50 years with sheep until this day now

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God had done some equipping that we don't know about I'm sure but as we come up to this place we see the final end of the equipping time and the begin of the journey the beginning of the journey of Moses great thing in life that God called him to do and yet he's already a much older man so gentlemen don't ever think that God is finished with you he is merely in the midst of preparing you and equipping you for a great work for the whole purpose of your being the reason he brought you into existence and called you from your mother's womb to be a servant someday you didn't know that at the time but God did it's all about equipping even the things we think are bad that happen in our lives all about equipping now let's go on and see this man that's been out here in the desert all this time since the time that he perhaps felt he had failed in verse 2 and the angel of the

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Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush and he looked and behold the bush burned with fire and the bush was not consumed and Moses said

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I will now turn aside to see this great sight he's thinking to himself what is going on here

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I'm gonna pay attention to this for a few moments why the bush is not burnt now

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I love verse 4 because it says and when the Lord saw that that he turned aside to see now is

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God omniscient does God have to see Moses turn aside before God knows it's time for God to speak well when we think of the father certainly he does not he knows all things but I want to put before you an idea that I've put out many times certainly in my thinking and in some of my sermons it tends to come out and I believe that this is true

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God chooses to come down into time he made this place he made you and me he made his entire creation for himself it is not illogical to think that he would come down into it and enjoy it and I think that he does that in the person of Jesus Christ the

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Lord also in the person of the Holy Spirit but sometimes he enters into time and acts as if he's bound by it he certainly did that during 33 years of his walk on this earth when

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Jesus Christ was walking he was bound by time but in this place when he comes down to meet with Moses he is now in time the eternal

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God who is outside of time and not bound by time has placed himself in time now you can debate on whether this is an appearance of the

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Lord Jesus Christ in the Old Testament my opinion is that perhaps this is when you see the word

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Lord in all caps in your English Bible it means Jehovah and yet no one really knows how to pronounce that word today because it has been such a holy name to the

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Jewish people through the years the ages that they stopped pronouncing it out loud so no one really knows how to pronounce it today but we call it

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Jehovah and it yet it says an angel of Jehovah many times there are places where the angel of Jehovah appears to be the

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Lord Jesus Christ in the Old Testament I believe this is probably such an incident so this is

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God in time and the Lord looks and beholds that Moses has turned aside to take a look at this burning bush and at that moment it's as if the

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Lord is ready to address him verse 3 says Moses said I will now turn aside and see this great sight why the bush is not burnt and when the

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Lord saw that he had turned aside to see God called into him out of the midst of the bush and said

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Moses Moses now what would you have said you're out here tending the sheep you've been doing it every day for 50 years you're used to it it's not new it's not fun anymore it's not exciting anymore it's the same thing you've been doing every other day the only difference is there's a bush that has just caught on fire and it's not burning up and you turn to it and a voice comes out of it and calls your name twice what do you do what do you say well here's what you're supposed to say if this happened to you here

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I am what better answer Moses Moses I'm over here as if God didn't know where he was but I think

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Moses is trying to convince himself where he is I'm here I think

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I don't think that I've been elevated to the heavenlies and yet God has appeared and is speaking and the first thing that happened to Moses was fear gripped his heart because he wasn't sure that any man had ever looked upon God and lived and so he doesn't want to look anymore once the voice comes and calls his name out but he does answer and he says here

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I am and he said draw not nigh hither put off thy shoes from off thy feet for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground that is the first reference to the holiness of God that I can find in the

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Bible and it's an interesting reference because what it teaches us is that the presence of God creates holy ground when

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God as they say shows up all the sudden the place where you are if you're there becomes holy ground now

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God is omnipresent he's everywhere at once but there is a sense in which God chooses to come down even uses it

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I will come down he uses that expression I will come down into the earthly realm into time and when

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God chooses to do that the place where he chooses to be becomes a holy place now

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I would say this we know one place that he chooses to be is in our hearts is it not he dwells within the heart of a believer and so this is such a place it is a place where you should take your shoes off is a place where the ground is actually holy verse 6 is moreover he said

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I am the God of thy father the God of Abraham the God of Isaac and the

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God of Jacob and Moses hid his face for he was afraid to look upon God now we don't have a great way to understand the holiness of God other than try to be here and picture what's going on as this happens to Moses there's not just a whole lot of information given to us but we know this we know that when

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God spoke and Moses said here I am and God identified himself as the

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God that Moses apparently bowed down to the earth with his face in the dirt and would not look at the burning bush because of the holiness of God that is how this holiness affected this man and the

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Lord said I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters for I know their sorrows now look at this phrase

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I am come down to deliver them he has come from a different dimension into time and space where we are and he calls that coming down we view heaven as being up we don't know that that's a fact although some believe it's in the direction of the

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Northern Star the third heaven but whatever God expressed it this way he said

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I've come down I have come into time to deliver my people out of the hand of the

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Egyptians which picture the world and Satan and even the flesh so I've come down to deliver the purpose is for deliverance and so a holy

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God comes from a holy heaven to this earth where his people are and comes into time and space and he tells

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Moses to take his shoes off for this is now a holy place and Moses bows down to the earth when he finds out this is the

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God and now God continues he says I've come down to deliver them out of the hand of the

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Egyptians and to bring them up out of the land out of bondage into a good land and a large unto a land flowing with milk and honey unto the place of the

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Canaanites and the Hittites and the Amorites and the parasites sorry I started to say parasites the parasites and the

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Hivites and the Jebusites now therefore behold the cry of the children of Israel is coming to me and I have also seen the oppression wherewith the

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Egyptians oppressed them this is all a picture of the world system and Satan himself and even your own flesh that you dwell in how that it can begin to oppress you but God came down to deliver them come now therefore and I will send you unto the devil he says

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Pharaoh Pharaoh's a picture of the devil himself now here you are you've got to be here to get anything this morning you got to be in this place you got to try to become

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Moses you got to be out there with the humdrum day in day out everything same way happening

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Archie saying it ain't never the same way when you deal with animals and I know that's a fact but yet same old same old every day for 50 years and all the sudden

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Moses life has a turn of direction God speaks to him

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God comes down into time speaks to him he takes his shoes off he bows his face to the ground and he gets information and the information that God gives him is that my people are captive they are slaves to the world the flesh and the devil and now

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I'm going to send you Moses to talk to the devil face to face to Pharaoh himself now we know the story of Moses Moses began to give reason why he couldn't be the one you see the experience for 50 years with the sheep was humiliating was a humbling experience to Moses because Moses needed that as a young man he was brash he was powerful he was intellectual he was strong physically he whipped a man he killed a man

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I don't know that he intended to but he hit him so hard he killed him as a young man and was going to lead

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Israel at that time and God said no it's not the time for you you got to go through some humility you've got to live some years in this world where I'm going to place you with the thorns and the thistles and all the things that won't go right in your life and as a young man you young guys that are out here today this is going to happen to you you're going to have your wilderness you're going to have your sheep to tend for many years before God will use you because you have a pride that you don't even understand as young men and women you haven't lived long enough and gone through enough hardship to be wise in these areas and so you're very susceptible to falling to pride so God will take you through time and hardship and suffering and he'll take you all the way to the bottom sometimes so don't give up when he does this he had done this to Moses and all of a sudden you'll have your burning bush and God will tell you what your life is all about and you'll find the strength in that humility to allow

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Jesus to work in you to accomplish this great thing you will be out of the way enough that he can do this well

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Moses comes to this day God looks at him through that bush and Moses is not looking back but he is listening and he says

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I will send you to Pharaoh that thou mayest bring forth my people the children of Israel out of bondage out of Egypt and Moses said unto

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God who am I that I should go into Pharaoh it's exactly what you and I would say at least if you've been through the humbling that's what we would say who am

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I that I should go am I equipped Lord am I ready for this who am

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I and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt and he said certainly I will be with thee

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God told him was this a great comfort to Moses heart at this point in his walk no because his faith is not extremely strong at this point and he's saying

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I'm not sure that's enough well if you're in a place where you're not sure that's enough you've really been humbled you've got the place where you're so low in your own estimation of what you can accomplish that you don't even think you can do it with God and this is where Moses was and he said certainly

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I will be with thee and this shall be a token unto thee that I have sent thee when thou hast brought forth the people out of Egypt ye shall serve

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God upon this very mountain and Moses said unto God behold when

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I come into the children of Israel and shall say unto them the God of your fathers have sent me into you and they shall say to me what is his name what shall

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I say into them he said God if I go tell them I'm gonna lead you out because your

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God has sent me to lead you they're gonna say what's your who is your God they're gonna challenge my authority

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Moses said and God told him you tell him this and God said unto

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Moses I am that I am and he said thus thou say into the children of Israel I am has sent you the word

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Jehovah that we use today is comprised of the same

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Hebrew word that would create the English phrase

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I am that I am it simply means that I am the one who is self -existent and I am also the one who reveals myself to my children so I am the self -existent one who reveals myself to my children the burning bush was proof of this here he is a personal

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God speaking in the language of his child Moses in a personal way but he says my name is

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I am I am in the eternal present tense everything is now to me he says you go tell him that's who sent you that the one who is from eternity and to eternity the

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Alpha and the Omega has sent you and so here we see our first encounter on this planet at least as it's recorded in the scriptures with the holiness of God now turn with me to one other place

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Joshua chapter 5 verse 13 now a lot of history has passed at this point and you know the story of how

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God did work in Moses led the people out of captivity into the promise or to the edge

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I should say of the promised land Moses made a tremendous error later in his life when he messed up a type or a symbol that God told him to use to teach people of truth

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Moses in his anger didn't do what God said and he gave the wrong picture if you remember one time they were out of water and God told

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Moses to smite the rock and water would flow forth enough for the children of Israel drink and got in Moses did strike the rock with his rod and God brought forth the water and then there was a second time in Moses life when they ran out of water again

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God very carefully said to Moses this time go and speak to the rock and it will give water and Moses was angry with the children of Israel and he went in anger and he smoked that rock with his rod when he was not supposed to he was merely supposed to speak to it and it did give forth water but God said guess what

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Moses you don't get to go into the promised land now and Moses didn't he was not allowed to go in because of that you know what you can't smite

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Jesus Christ twice and that's the picture that Moses gave a lot of people in churches today believe that they believe you can lose your salvation and get it back again if that were true you would have to crucify

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Jesus anew Hebrews chapter 6 says in the first few verses you would have to recrucify the

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Son of God and put him to open shame that's impossible to do therefore if his death and his blood is not sufficient to save you forever then you're in trouble because he's not going to be smitten twice now if you are saved and you're covered by his blood and you've been washed by his blood and then you find yourself committing a sin and you come to the

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Lord the second time for water you don't have to recrucify Jesus all you have to do is go to him with first John 1 9 and and agree with him how sinful your sin was and confess your sin and he's faithful to forgive you and to cleanse you from all unrighteousness you simply speak to him you don't recrucify well

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Moses kind of messed that picture up didn't he so God didn't let him go into the promised land so guess who the leader was going to be the great

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Joshua do you remember the story of Joshua was he a young man when he got to lead them into the promised land think about it was

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Joshua a young man or had he and Caleb already gone in once and seen that yes we can take this but no one listened to him so they wandered in the wilderness until Joshua became an old man perhaps about the age

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Moses was when his day of leadership came why is that because as wonderful a young man as Joshua was do you remember the time when they had business before the wilderness tabernacle but they built another tent outside the camp where they're going to go meet with God and best

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I can tell from the scriptures pretty much Moses and Joshua were the only two that went out there the rest of the men came to the to the opening of their tents inside the camp and looked out and tried to worship but they were supposed to go out there but they wouldn't go but Joshua did as a young man and he followed

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Moses out to this place and the Shekinah glory of God which is a beautiful earthly picture of God's holiness the best we can see if we can picture resplendent light coming out from inside this tent and the presence of God is in this place and his holiness is there and I'm sure that Moses and Joshua took their shoes off on this occasion as well and they walked into this place where God was and when

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Moses had received his instruction he immediately got up off his knees or his face and he walked out the tent went back to prepare to do the job guess what job

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Joshua did as a young man he just stayed in there I don't know how many minutes or hours he stayed by himself because he didn't want to leave the holy presence and the awesome wonder of God's presence as a young man and yet he wasn't ready even after that experience to lead the people until many years of trouble and trial and sorrow and suffering in his own life and you come to this place now he's ready so look at Joshua 5 13 and look how this is introduced so very similar to the way

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Moses is ministry really began and here we have with Joshua 5 13 and it came to pass when

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Joshua was by Jericho they had gone into the promised land and the soon as they got in they began to face the enemy didn't they do you know why it is that God didn't just let him go in and take all the cities at once because they couldn't have handled it they couldn't have handled it they had to take it little by little just like our growth is from the moment we're saved we begin to grow little by little line by line we begin to understand the scriptures

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God reveals himself each to us at a different time in a different place in a different way and we all grow to maturity down a different path but it's all within his word and by the leading of his

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Holy Spirit but it's very personal just as personal as this encounter of Moses and this encounter of Joshua they were similar but they were different they were similar in the sense that they faced a holy

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God and understood the holiness of God but they were different in the sense they were personal and so Joshua comes and it comes to pass when

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Joshua was by Jericho they come into the promised land first thing they find is a fenced city a walled city and they can't go beyond without conquering this city and here they've been out in the desert and I don't know what kind of weapons they may have had but I don't sense that they felt prepared for battle necessarily and yet Joshua was to lead them to battle and they come to this place and Joshua was by Jericho and that he lifted up his eyes and looked and here he is he's not tending sheep but I view him as being out alone walked out away from the camp a bit to spend some time alone and perhaps to pray and he goes out to this place this lonely place he lifted up his eyes and looked and behold there stood a man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand and Joshua went unto the man

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I don't know if there's a man in this room that would have reacted that way yet maybe

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God will bring us to a place in our life where we would but if we had seen this man this particular man with a drawn sword the reaction would be to go the other direction very quickly yes

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I would take my shoes off so I could run but look at Joshua at this place and time in his life he moves towards this man

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Joshua went unto him and said unto him and I'm gonna tell you something about Joshua that if you hadn't seen it yet you see it now this man was not just a man of God but he's a warrior he was a man who was going to fight

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God's battles and he goes to this man and he says are you for us or against us he says are you for us or for our adversaries and he said nay isn't it interesting he didn't answer that question directly he didn't say well

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I'm for you or I'm for your adversaries he just said nay but as a captain of the host of the

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Lord am I now come and Joshua fell to his face have you seen this response once already this morning he fell to his face on the earth and did worship and said unto him what saith my

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Lord unto his servant very similar to what Paul said when Jesus appeared to him on the Damascus Road first thing

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Paul says Lord what would you have me to do and Joshua now recognizes that this is the

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God this is most definitely an appearance of the Lord Jesus Christ in the

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Old Testament before the manger scene theologians call it a theophany it is an appearance of Yeshua Jehovah the everlasting

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Son of God who calls himself the captain is he not the captain of our salvation and he appears and Joshua begins to discern who this is and as soon as he discerns this he falls with his face on the earth and begins to worship now worship in the eastern part of the world in the

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Middle East especially in that part of the world worship there is a predominant posture of worship now in the

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Bible there are several postures but the predominant posture is to be on your knees with your head and face buried in the dirt and your hands perhaps out in front not looking at the one you're worshiping that perhaps is the posture that Joshua takes and he begins to worship and he said to him what sayeth my

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Lord and to his servant and the captain of the Lord's host said unto Joshua loose thy shoe from off thy foot have you seen this before this morning take your shoes off for the place whereon thou standest is holy and Joshua did so so when the presence of God appears in time at least that's the scenario we're studying right now in time on this planet on the earth and you become aware of the presence of God then the place where you are is holy and they take off their shoes and they fall on their face and they began to worship the

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God the God of the universe loose thy shoe from off thy foot for the place whereon thou stand is holy and Joshua did so Joshua had already fallen on his face and begun to worship before he knew to take his shoes off he worshiped

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God right there as he was because it was a response to the presence of God you can't be taught how to worship by anyone except God don't try to look at the person next to you and whatever posture they take it may be like this it may be like this it may be down with their face on the ground it may be standing

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I don't do that real naturally do it and it may be standing like this don't try to copy

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God will speak to your heart and he'll tell you you'll say what would you have thy servant to do he may tell you take your shoes off but he just did all he knew to do he fell on his face and began to worship

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God gives him further instruction tells him loose your shoe because I am here and this is holy ground because I am here and so he obeyed and Joshua did so now

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Jericho was straightly shut up because the children of Israel none went out and none came in and the

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Lord said unto Joshua see I have given into thy hand Jericho and the king thereof and the mighty men of valor we don't have any time left this morning we've got much much much material about the holiness of God but I want you to take this home with you today that in both cases as these men came into the presence of God and became aware that God was there

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I'm talking about in time with you and God was there they both responded by falling on their face and worshiping

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God and saying what would you have your servant to do and God said take your shoes off this is holy ground they recognized the holiness of God before anything else happened in their life

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I would have to say that's probably the same scenario that has to happen with us you and I have got to come to place where we recognize the presence of God but beyond that in his presence we discern his holiness and his holiness becomes so awesome that the tendency is for us to be fearful at first to try to gaze in the direction of where he is but simply to fall before him and ask him what should

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I do now and only at that time when you've discerned

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God's presence in your life and his holy nature which he is by nature it is not like us where we strive to be good with God it's not that he becomes holy it's that he is holiness holiness means separation it means total separate totally separate from sin totally absent from any thought of sin and we understand the purity that comes from that in his presence and we ask him what would you have us to do and the next thing that can happen in our lives is what just happened to Joshua God said look the enemy is before you but I've already put him in your hand not only have

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I put him in your hand but I've put all of his mighty men that could picture the demons of hell the king is picturing

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Satan here the fenced city pictures the whole world system that Satan uses to try to lead us down the wrong pathway each day of our lives with influence in a satanic way the philosophies of the world whether it's in the universities whether it's in the schools whether it's in the post office whether it's in the government whether it's in the churches wherever these philosophies of man come into play they're pictured by this fenced city and God says now that you know

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I'm with you and now that you understand my holiness and you begin to understand what you have to do to be in my holiness in my presence in the presence of a holy

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God you are now beginning to be just ready to fight the spiritual battle but he said

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I've already given it into your hand I've given you the victory now that is the word that Joshua got before they went into their first battle he was not like Moses in the sense that he said well

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I'm not sure I can even do it with you with me thing about Joshua he didn't say that I think

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Joshua was ready to go but it took many years of the Lord working his life to get into that place so some of us today may be in that place some of you may go home and think about these passages and the

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Lord may use this in your life some of you may have been to this place already some of you haven't been here yet and God is still preparing you through suffering tribulation trials hardships perhaps death of a loved one but he's getting us to the place where we're going to comprehend more about his holiness than we ever had before and when we get to that place where it brings a literal feel into your person a feeling of fear into your person a feeling of awe into your heart and mind an urge literally to do nothing but fall down before him and say what would you have me to do then you're not far from entering the battle we do live in the end times folks we live in the end of the end times

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I believe and I believe there are going to be many more battles some will be subtle some won't be quite so subtle and we've got to be the place where we're equipped to go through them we won't get there until his holiness becomes real to us now once we see his holiness the natural thing that happens to God's children is we begin to reflect that when we're in his presence and it changes our life and we become more in his image because of being in his presence happened to Moses happened to Joshua and it's going to happen to you and to me let's stand and have prayer together father we have had time this morning to have a brief introduction to this vast topic but Lord it will be nothing much more than academic to us if we don't as individuals come before you and kneel before you in the quietness of our own personal relationship with you and if you reveal yourself to us in such a way that we see what it means what the holiness of God means

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Lord we live in such a vile world we live in such a country that's given over to assiduousness and all manner of ungodliness and yet this may be the greatest nation in the world so our world is in in terrible shape we know that you said at the end there would be great falling away or apostasy from the truth and from godly ways and we're seeing it all around us even in the churches and so father we ask that you would meet with us

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Lord anytime that you choose to meet with us when we're together like this it's wonderful but we ask that you would meet with us individually and that you would reveal more of yourself to us more of your holy nature and that it would affect us and have that equipping effect of causing us to be ready for battle or to help us to want to fight the fight and not to be on the bench help us to want to be in the front we live in wonderful and exciting times and days when the heavenlies are as a great audience many witnesses all excited about the end of this age and you've allowed us to be born into a time where we'll be players in this awesome thing that's about to happen so we pray father for your equipping both corporately when we come together but also as we're alone with you cause us to sense your holy nature and to fall before you and understand that where you are is holy ground

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Lord we pray for that change of our lives that Moses had and Joshua had.

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We pray for that equipping. Lord may that also affect our children and young people in our congregation that they might be equipped for the day in which they've been called to live as well.

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We ask that you bless our fellowship together and the food we're about to have and our afternoon services and we ask this in Jesus name.