back to indexWed Bible Study (BCC 2 - Class 1) - 09-21-16
00:00:00.000 |
All right, good morning. Not good morning. Good evening. All right. Again, as you can 00:00:19.820 |
see, tonight we don't have any specific assignments for small group. You're going to be getting 00:00:25.200 |
assignments for small group next week. So I can have somebody take this and pass this 00:00:32.920 |
out. So for today, we're going to spend a good chunk of time on our orientation, and 00:00:49.600 |
then I'm going to have an introductory study of BCC2. And I want to explain to you guys 00:00:55.680 |
what we are doing and why we are doing what we're doing. So you guys kind of get an idea. 00:01:01.160 |
The format is going to be pretty similar. Those of you who've been to our Bible studies 00:01:04.380 |
on Wednesday, we're going to have how we started our Bible study, just like we did today. That's 00:01:10.660 |
how we're going to be starting Bible study. And then we'll have a brief time of teaching, 00:01:14.760 |
maybe about 30 or 40 minutes. And then we're going to break up into small groups for discussion 00:01:18.480 |
time in small groups. Okay. So in on the paper, as you are getting it, if you can put your 00:01:23.800 |
name and small group preference, okay, your name and small group preference, okay. Because 00:01:38.920 |
if you don't mind, if you can put your age on there as well, okay, so that we can, if 00:01:44.560 |
you have a preference, like an older group, younger group, we don't want to put your name 00:01:48.000 |
up there. Just say older group, younger group, no preference, married, not married. And then 00:01:53.320 |
those of you guys who are going to be alternating between husband and wife, say alternating 00:01:57.400 |
husband and wife. So put that there as well. Okay. If you have a group and you say, you 00:02:03.320 |
know what, this is a group that we must stay together. Okay. Make sure you put that, put 00:02:08.000 |
it all on one paper. If you say, I want to be in the group, okay. So you're going to 00:02:15.280 |
have to put the names of the people and make sure you turn it in together or else I'm not 00:02:21.240 |
going to know. And then there's some of you who are not able to come consistently and 00:02:26.680 |
maybe you don't have a preference or you don't want to be in a small group. You just kind 00:02:30.000 |
of want to be floating around. Put that on there as well. We'll may have one table where 00:02:34.960 |
we don't have a small group because of the inconsistency or for whatever the reason you 00:02:39.360 |
have to leave early and you prefer not to be in a small group. We'll have a table for 00:02:43.480 |
that as well. Okay. So in a, in a large group like this, we have all different needs. So 00:02:49.760 |
just make sure whatever your needs are or desire preference, put it on there and then 00:02:55.040 |
we're going to assign the small group. So next week when you come in, the small group 00:02:58.480 |
assignments will be in the back. So as you're coming in, you'll be able to see which table 00:03:03.160 |
are and we'll Mark each table by number. So when you come in, you'll know exactly where 00:03:08.520 |
to go next week. Okay. If you know you're going to be inconsistent, please Mark that 00:03:14.040 |
on there. So we don't put you guys all in one group. So we don't want one group with 00:03:19.760 |
like one week, six people in the next group. Next week we have one person in there. Okay. 00:03:27.040 |
If you have every intention of being consistent every single week for the next 12 weeks, you 00:03:31.920 |
don't have to put anything. But if, if you know you're not going to be consistent, please 00:03:35.120 |
Mark that on there as well. We do not have a coed group. Okay. So if that's your preference, 00:03:42.160 |
don't put it on there. Okay. So it'd be all, all men and women. Um, but again, we have 00:03:49.160 |
men and women who are alternating because of husband and wife situation with the children. 00:03:55.200 |
We are still trying to figure out the, the childcare. So we are planning to have it, 00:04:01.040 |
but again, we're still trying to figure that out. So just be patient with that. Did I miss 00:04:07.480 |
anything? Yes. Okay. If you have not registered, if you showed up today and you didn't register 00:04:15.920 |
for the class, please go on to Facebook. If you have Facebook, if you don't have Facebook, 00:04:22.360 |
get Facebook. If you're not planning to get Facebook, ask somebody who has Facebook and 00:04:28.000 |
register through Facebook or email us directly and we'll do it for you. Okay. That way we'll 00:04:36.960 |
have your names all in one master list and that'll help us to put the things together. 00:04:41.760 |
Okay. All right. So everybody put that on the paper. Did everybody get that? You guys 00:04:53.600 |
all done with that? Did everybody get the piece of paper to write your name and small 00:05:04.360 |
group preference? Yes. Okay. Those of you guys who are sitting in the back, can you 00:05:15.040 |
guys come up and fill this out? Unless you guys are planning to leave in the middle or 00:05:17.800 |
something, there are seats up in the front. Okay. And on the side here somewhere. Okay. 00:05:30.760 |
As you were coming in, you should have gotten a piece of paper with the orientation, the 00:05:35.040 |
class outline, and then we have the teaching outline for today. So class outline and teaching 00:05:39.800 |
outline. Okay. So if you didn't get one, you should go to the back and it's on the table. 00:05:47.520 |
So again, every day when you're coming in, you should pick up. So we're going to have 00:05:52.480 |
the handouts that we're going to be handing out where you were today. When you were coming 00:05:57.280 |
in, it'll be right at the entrance. So when you're coming in, just pick one up as you're 00:06:00.400 |
coming in. Okay. So every beginning of the class, that's where it's going to be. So anything 00:06:06.440 |
that we need to hand out is going to be in the back. So again, pick one up as you're 00:06:09.600 |
coming in. Okay. All right. The structure of the class, if you look at it from the beginning, 00:06:27.160 |
Breean's BCC2, September 21. Let me go over the structure real quick. Do your best to 00:06:33.840 |
try to come on time at seven o'clock. Okay. Usually we start out trying to get close to 00:06:39.200 |
seven o'clock and then as each week goes by, it kind of gets looser and 710, 715. And then 00:06:45.880 |
at the end, it's like 720. We don't want to do that because that's 20 minutes wasted for 00:06:50.520 |
somebody who came at seven o'clock. Okay. So please, please, please, if you're in a 00:06:55.320 |
habit of grabbing dinner at 650, you know what I mean? You're, you're goofing around 00:07:00.520 |
or whatever. And then 650, that we have 15 minutes and you're just kind of casual about 00:07:04.080 |
time. Please be as prompt as you can. I know some of you guys coming off of work late and 00:07:09.440 |
you can't help that, but if that's not the case and you just kind of are really bad with 00:07:14.040 |
time and I just want to give you some life encouragement. If that's a practice that you 00:07:18.520 |
have that'll ruin your life at some point in your life, right? At some point, somebody's 00:07:22.600 |
going to say, this guy's not reliable. So if that's a practice that you have, or if 00:07:26.360 |
that's a practice just at church, that's not, that's not good either. Right? If you're prompt 00:07:31.720 |
at work and prompt at appointments, but not prompt at church, that's a, that's just a 00:07:37.040 |
bad heart. Right? So do your best to try to come on time. And this also relates to church 00:07:43.260 |
on Sunday. Okay. Again, it's church on Sunday and we have to periodically remind you the 00:07:48.920 |
church starts at nine and 11. So if you're in a habit of missing 10 minutes of church 00:07:53.240 |
every single week, that adds up at the end of the year, you missed half the church according 00:07:59.040 |
to my math. All right. So I want to encourage you guys, you know, if you can be prompt as 00:08:05.040 |
much as you can. So we're going to try to do, try to start closest to seven o'clock 00:08:09.200 |
as possible. So if you look at the timeline, seven o'clock to seven 15 is going to be worship. 00:08:15.720 |
Again, about 15 minutes. And then after that, there's going to be a, we'll study, um, every 00:08:24.000 |
week there's going to be a memory verse. And we're going to ask you guys to just take some 00:08:27.200 |
time to meditate on that. Those memory verses are related to the teaching topic of that 00:08:32.160 |
day. Okay. So if you look at it, look at the bottom, look at the bottom and you know how 00:08:41.680 |
it says Leviticus one, Leviticus 10, one through 11, the week, 61 through 16, all of these 00:08:47.360 |
verses are related to the topic that pastor Mark is going to be teaching next week. Okay. 00:08:53.320 |
So what we were asking you to do is each week's quiet time, our passages that are going to 00:08:59.640 |
be, again, the topics are going to be covered for that week. So again, the quiet time, those 00:09:06.280 |
are quiet time passages that we're asking you to take the five days to do. And then 00:09:10.200 |
the one verse to memorize. So when you first come in here in your small groups, we're going 00:09:14.280 |
to ask you guys to take some time to keep each other accountable, right? And memorize 00:09:18.360 |
those verses. Okay. And do your best so that you'll kind of have a system in your head. 00:09:24.400 |
In the, in the next 12 weeks, you'll have about 11 verses that you have memorized and 00:09:28.640 |
it'll correlate with the topic that we are teaching that day. Okay. So that's for this 00:09:34.160 |
week again, if, if you come and ask me where the quiet time passages, it means you weren't 00:09:39.600 |
paying attention right now. All right. So it's in the bottom of the orientation sheet. 00:09:44.200 |
Okay. Leviticus it, um, those five verses plus the memory verse in the very bottom of 00:09:49.600 |
the page. Most of you guys, I'm going to be adding on electronic copy for whatever reason. 00:09:56.360 |
If your email is not accurate, um, it's not going to go to you or your emails outdated. 00:10:01.040 |
And if it doesn't come to you and you wanted one, you're going to have to email separately 00:10:04.960 |
directly to me or pastor Mark. And we'll try to add you to that. Otherwise, um, we're just 00:10:10.320 |
going to be adding everybody to the email list. We're going to also, we're going to 00:10:13.560 |
have a hard copy, but we're also going to be sending out emails as well. Okay. All right. 00:10:20.080 |
Any questions about that? So after that, we'll have time of worship after worship, there's 00:10:24.360 |
going to be teaching for about 30, 40 minutes. And then after that, there's going to be again, 00:10:28.720 |
reflection worship. So we're going to have either probably about one song in the beginning, 00:10:32.560 |
one or two songs, and then one or two songs at the end. And then that'll lead you to the 00:10:37.240 |
time of small group and small group will be about eight, 10 to about nine, 10. And then 00:10:41.400 |
we're going to have snacks afterwards. Okay. All right. So that's the format. So those 00:10:46.040 |
of you who are familiar with Wednesday Bible study, it's very, it's pretty much what we 00:10:50.200 |
did before. But for those of you who are new, that's the format that we're going to be following. 00:10:55.600 |
Okay. Okay. Elements of the class each week, we will have devotional passages again. So 00:11:01.560 |
we already went over that. And then there will be discussion questions at the end that 00:11:06.400 |
we're going to ask you guys to take some time to discuss. Okay. So next week, when you come 00:11:15.520 |
in again, we're going to be pushing you to small groups. So look for that when you come 00:11:19.920 |
in. So we'll try to minimize as much time as possible next week. Again, up to next week, 00:11:24.120 |
it's going to be a little bit more hectic in the small groups because we're trying to 00:11:26.600 |
get organized. But after that, we'll kind of be in a system. This is a 12 week class. 00:11:31.440 |
That'll take us to December, I think 14th. We have one week off during Thanksgiving. 00:11:37.200 |
Otherwise, it'll be straight 12 weeks. Okay. And then after that, we're going to be taking 00:11:43.120 |
Christmas and New Year's break, and then we'll come back for another class afterwards. Let 00:11:47.280 |
me give you a brief synopsis of why we're doing this for this particular class. BCC 00:11:54.560 |
2 is something that we've actually been discussing in leadership for many, many years. For the 00:11:59.760 |
last maybe about five, six years plus, we've been discussing this because as our church 00:12:04.720 |
started growing to a certain size, we started realizing that the core values of the church 00:12:10.960 |
weren't translating into the rest of the church as organically as it used to. Before, we would 00:12:17.720 |
have small groups, and during small groups, we would read certain books, certain fundamental 00:12:21.840 |
books about God's attributes, about the essence of what it means to be saved, gospel according 00:12:27.880 |
to Jesus, and then the teachings about the church. What is the book's name? Master's 00:12:38.680 |
Plan for the Church. Sorry. So those are three books that every single member of the church 00:12:42.520 |
read multiple times because those three things established a fundamental foundation upon 00:12:48.840 |
which we build everything else at church. So if you have a wrong view of God or skewed 00:12:52.720 |
view of God or incomplete view of God, then you're not going to really understand why 00:12:57.640 |
we are a church that does what we do and why we do that. Another book that we read is Gospel 00:13:03.440 |
According to Jesus. If your understanding of the gospel or your salvation is superficial, 00:13:08.160 |
again, is incomplete, then again, a lot of things that we do in the church is not going 00:13:12.800 |
to make a lot of sense to you. And then the third is what is God's intent for the church, 00:13:17.600 |
for the local church, and how did God establish it? What are the essence of the local church 00:13:22.120 |
and what we believe in it that the Bible teaches? And that kind of gives you the framework behind 00:13:27.400 |
everything that we do at church. How do we how we do discipleship? Why we do teaching 00:13:31.480 |
this way? Why is the church organized this way? Right? And then when our church was smaller, 00:13:36.520 |
when we were having small groups, basically, if you were at the church for more than five 00:13:40.840 |
months to six months, you would have already kind of understood, oh, this is what our church 00:13:45.120 |
is about. But as our church started growing, we realized that that wasn't happening organically. 00:13:49.840 |
And then these fundamental books were not being read. Okay. I'm assuming more than half 00:13:54.600 |
of you in this room probably have not read any of those three books. There was a time 00:13:58.760 |
in our church, I think up to about 200, where almost 100% of the church read that and probably 00:14:04.120 |
read that multiple times. Okay. The reason it's not that those three books are the only 00:14:09.920 |
books that deal with that subject, but the subjects that those three books deal with 00:14:14.000 |
are foundational to the church. So again, if you either don't understand it, or maybe 00:14:19.820 |
even you don't agree with it, right after you've read it and said, I don't know if I 00:14:23.320 |
agree with this, then you're going to have a hard time with a lot of things that we do 00:14:26.880 |
at church because our teaching and everything else we do is founded upon that. Right. So 00:14:31.720 |
for so many years, we've been wrestling with, well, how are we going to reintroduce the 00:14:37.160 |
church? And then we've been talking about having BCC too, but we just didn't have the 00:14:41.440 |
manpower, you know, again, I'm not going to get into that part of it, but we didn't want 00:14:47.360 |
to overload the pastors and the people who are already serving and then add another thing 00:14:51.440 |
that we had to do. So we thought that, you know what, why don't we take the time that 00:14:55.320 |
we have on Wednesday and just do it with the whole church. And then the class that we're 00:15:00.080 |
having now is going to be a class that we're going to continue to develop, you know, not 00:15:05.360 |
change, but develop. And it's going to be an ongoing class. So the future members that 00:15:09.600 |
come to our church, we're going to have BCC one. And then we're going to have at some 00:15:12.680 |
point after they become members, ask them to take this class. Right. So this is kind 00:15:18.240 |
of like a large picture discipleship. We want everybody at the church to come to the same 00:15:22.120 |
page. And so if you have a lot of questions, if there are discussions happening in your 00:15:26.360 |
small groups where you need help we want to do our best to kind of shepherd you in that 00:15:31.120 |
way to we'll come over to the table, answer some of the questions, because like I said, 00:15:37.200 |
everything that we're teaching at church, obviously we're doing it. It's important because 00:15:40.240 |
it's coming out of the scripture. But if fundamentally you don't get something or you don't agree 00:15:45.720 |
with something or you need explanation of why this is so important, we really want to 00:15:50.200 |
try to help you to do that. Because like I said, if these foundations are not there, 00:15:55.680 |
what you are learning on Sunday and weekday Bible study, you're not going to have the 00:15:58.760 |
container to hold these things. Right. You're going to have questions and it's never going 00:16:03.160 |
to be answered because you don't understand why we do what we do. Okay. So that's the 00:16:07.680 |
reason why we have BCC two. So those of you who've been at our church for a long time, 00:16:12.600 |
meaning if you've been here six, seven years or longer, a lot of the stuff that we're going 00:16:16.800 |
to be talking about is review. And I think it's beneficial for you too, because we want 00:16:22.680 |
to bring the church back to the backbone of our church. The first 10 years of our church, 00:16:28.040 |
this was our church, right? This is what we built on. This is what was taught. This is 00:16:32.240 |
what was repeated. And every member of the church knew exactly why we did what we did. 00:16:38.040 |
And so again, as our church is getting, getting larger, we want to make sure that we bring 00:16:41.400 |
our church back to that. Right. So again, even though it is review, I think it's worthwhile. 00:16:47.240 |
We want to try to get the church back. So our hope is that in the future, if somebody 00:16:52.840 |
new comes to church and they ask, why did the church do this? And why does the church 00:16:55.880 |
do that? How come evangelism is done this way? That every member in the church who's 00:16:59.640 |
been here for a while, we'll be able to explain to them, right? Because you, you yourself 00:17:04.720 |
understand what's going on. All right. So that's what's going on. That's the reasoning 00:17:09.260 |
behind our BCC two class. After this session, it will probably offered either on Thursday 00:17:15.120 |
or even on Sunday, we may have a Sunday afternoon, BCC two class, and we may have various people 00:17:20.120 |
teaching that. Okay. Um, if you happen to miss this, it is going to be recorded. So 00:17:27.080 |
there's, I think there's one group in particular that's meeting out in Hacienda and they have 00:17:33.520 |
a group of 10 or 12 that that's meeting. And, um, if you, if you are, if you happen to be 00:17:39.920 |
way out there and you cannot make it here, um, the recordings are going to be recorded 00:17:44.880 |
and uploaded sometime this week. So I think on Thursday or Friday, it's going to be uploaded. 00:17:51.200 |
So they're going to be a week behind us. So if you say, you know what, I'm coming from 00:17:55.280 |
LA and it's too far and we can't make it. And if you, if you create a small group over 00:17:59.760 |
there that can watch the video, uh, we encourage you to do the same thing and we'll get the 00:18:04.040 |
materials out to you and the recordings will be there so you can follow one week after 00:18:08.760 |
we're done. Okay. All right. Any questions about that so far? Okay, good. All right. 00:18:16.860 |
So if you look at the description of the course, I'm not going to go through all of it. The 00:18:20.520 |
outline of the course is very similar to BCC class. Those of you who've taken BCC, I believe 00:18:26.400 |
probably about 70, 80% of this, this room has probably taken the class. When we first 00:18:32.440 |
developed BCC, um, our pre-membership class is 10 week course. First week is an introduction. 00:18:38.400 |
Last week is review. And then the eight courses that eight classes that we have are divided 00:18:42.860 |
into two visions. The first vision is God-centered worship, not man-centered. So the two days 00:18:48.500 |
of class, we go over God's attributes, God, Christ, Holy Spirit. Right? And then as we 00:18:54.120 |
do that, we go, we introduce, um, our church philosophy, why we do this, and we introduce 00:18:59.320 |
our church as we're talking about that. The second two weeks is, is the vision of, you 00:19:03.920 |
know, to equip every Saint with God's inerrant word and why inerrancy and the word of God 00:19:08.680 |
is so important and how that affects what we do in our church, right? Ministry philosophy. 00:19:14.040 |
Third is the building a local church based on love and accountability and how that affects 00:19:18.300 |
the church, right? And then fourth is reaching the lost locally and globally. So each of 00:19:24.360 |
the eight weeks that we have, two weeks dedicated to each vision and each of those two weeks, 00:19:29.760 |
we talk about the vision of the church. Now, so the topic that we have is similar, but 00:19:35.520 |
we're going to go a bit further than what we're able to do on those eight weeks. Okay? 00:19:40.780 |
So if you notice here, the outline is similar, but we spend a little bit more time on some 00:19:45.120 |
subjects than we do the other. So the first three is going to be, again, God-centered 00:19:50.440 |
worship, high view of God. And we're going to get into that today and I'm going to start 00:19:54.800 |
it and pastor. So pastor Mark and I are going to be alternating teaching. So I'm going to 00:19:58.760 |
do one and the next week he's going to do his part and I'm going to do, I'm going to 00:20:02.480 |
do the week after that. When he leads, I'm going to be, I'm going to be leading worship. 00:20:07.040 |
And then when I'm teaching, he's going to be leading worship. We're going to, we're 00:20:09.840 |
going to help each other that way. And then, um, so the four or five and six and seven, 00:20:15.960 |
we dedicated four weeks to a high view of scripture, high view of scripture and what 00:20:22.040 |
that means. And we're going to be talking about the essential principles of hermeneutics. 00:20:26.560 |
Like I said, it's going to be reviewed for a lot of you, but I hope that you will have 00:20:30.920 |
a lot of discussion and opportunity to practice fundamental hermeneutical principles. Again, 00:20:37.560 |
not just how to do it, but to, to encourage you to do it and to establish daily disciplines 00:20:43.760 |
of coming to the word of God yourself. And so that's the point of what we're doing there. 00:20:47.360 |
And then high view of church three weeks and then the philosophy of evangelism and why 00:20:51.240 |
we do evangelism the way we do at church. Okay. All right. So that's, that's how it's 00:20:56.960 |
broken down. Um, one more thing, one more housekeeping thing before we get started. 00:21:04.440 |
Um, we are going to have snacks and because of the large group and there's 12, I don't 00:21:10.320 |
know how many groups we're going to end up having. So we have, so most likely we're going 00:21:17.320 |
to have maybe at least two groups bring snacks together. Possibly three are going to, are 00:21:23.040 |
going to be teamed up together because of the large group. The number in here I think 00:21:27.080 |
is somewhere between one 60, uh, one 50 to one 60, maybe one 70. So those of you guys 00:21:32.920 |
who are doing snacks, just keep that in mind that you're not doing it for 30 people. You're 00:21:37.280 |
doing for a hundred. That's why we're gonna have two people, two groups together. So starting 00:21:41.640 |
next week, we don't have a sign small group. So if you know that your group, um, is going 00:21:47.520 |
to stay together, your group probably may be the best group to start next week. So please 00:21:53.960 |
let us know ahead of time. And then I think today we're not going to have you sign up 00:21:57.660 |
because you're not in your small groups today. Right. But if you do know, if you have two 00:22:02.560 |
groups that know that, you know, these are the groups that we want to stick with, please 00:22:06.360 |
come and let us know so that we can assign you for next week. And then after that we'll 00:22:10.000 |
have other groups do this, do the snacks. Okay. All right. Any questions about any of 00:22:15.680 |
that? Okay. All right. Good. Now we can get going. Okay. Oh, you're going to, I guess 00:22:29.560 |
I could do it. Yeah. Can you guys see with me standing right in the middle right here? 00:22:54.120 |
You guys can't see. Okay. So I was debating whether to put slides up or not today because 00:23:03.480 |
of this. Um, all right, let me pray for us and we'll jump in. Heavenly father, we ask 00:23:19.760 |
for your grace. We ask for the Holy spirit to lead and guide us. We pray father God that 00:23:27.360 |
the subject matter that we're covering would sanctify the church, unite us together, Lord 00:23:33.200 |
God, to understand the fundamental things, Lord, that are essential in your heart and 00:23:39.400 |
in your word. I pray that you would open up our ears, that the things that we're learning 00:23:46.600 |
would cause us to grow and understand who you are in a deeper way. So we pray for your 00:23:51.120 |
blessing over this time in Jesus name we pray. Amen. So you'll see on the back that there's 00:23:58.840 |
an outline here. Okay. Okay. Look at the back of the orientation. Look at the back, back 00:24:03.960 |
side of it. Okay. So you guys are, I have no idea what I'm talking. Yeah. Look at the 00:24:08.600 |
backside here and there's, it's an outline where you can take notes. Okay. So just follow 00:24:15.280 |
along with that. And when you see it up here, you can just fill it in as we're going. Um, 00:24:19.600 |
but I don't want you guys to spend so much time taking notes that you're not really paying 00:24:22.920 |
attention because I'd rather have you pay attention to what's, what's being taught today 00:24:28.200 |
than for you to take good notes because I really want us to be united together. Okay. 00:24:39.560 |
First vision of the churches. We said God centered worship and not man centered. Why 00:24:44.480 |
is this vision so important in the church, especially today in our generation where, 00:24:50.760 |
you know, every once in a while somebody would ask me, you know, um, if we do this, more 00:24:55.920 |
people will come. I had a friend who visited our church and they felt uncomfortable. Could 00:24:59.780 |
we do this over that? The reason why we have man, God centered worship, not man centered 00:25:06.760 |
is that we believe that primary need of man is God, right? That first and foremost, the 00:25:12.880 |
church does not exist for me or you. First and foremost, church is a place where we come 00:25:17.880 |
to honor God. The scripture says in Colossians 1 16 that all things were made by him and 00:25:23.800 |
for him. Therefore, all truth and action must, must have God as the center, right? Let me 00:25:29.520 |
make that absolutely crystal clear because there is a confusing message in our generation, 00:25:35.880 |
right? How does, how do we make the church work? How do we make the church feel more 00:25:41.560 |
connected? How do we make newcomers feel better? Like all of these things are not unnecessary 00:25:47.640 |
questions. They're good questions, but the most fundamental question of every church 00:25:52.160 |
ought to be, what does God desire, right? What should the church be? What does, what 00:25:59.680 |
is God made the church for? Right? So first and foremost, the greatest question that we 00:26:05.600 |
need to ask is how do we worship God better if all things were made by him and for him? 00:26:10.980 |
So he doesn't exist for us. We exist for him. So the fundamental question of what can 00:26:16.360 |
God do for me is a wrong question. There is no answer for that. Okay. Or the answer is 00:26:23.000 |
already done because Christ has already done, right? Has given us eternal life. So the rest 00:26:28.480 |
of our life is to be lived for his glory. So first and foremost, God centered worship 00:26:33.520 |
refocuses our attention on him and not us. God's very nature demands it. The fact that 00:26:43.120 |
we call him God and that we are creation in and of itself teaches us fundamentally that 00:26:49.980 |
we exist for him and not him for us. If, if that orientation is not changed correctly, 00:27:01.620 |
you can miss the church or you can miss Christ. You can miss scripture, right? You can be 00:27:06.060 |
a church and be discontent because God or the church is just not doing, it's just not 00:27:10.500 |
doing it for me. Right? Fundamentally, the fact that we call him God requires us to be 00:27:17.900 |
the worshiper of him. And we have to be careful that we don't turn around and make him a worshiper 00:27:22.900 |
of us. Like these are my needs and what is the church and what is God going to do to 00:27:26.780 |
meet my needs, right? A right and proper view of God changes everything that we do. It changes 00:27:35.100 |
everything because if everything is made by him and for him, all things, then he's the 00:27:39.780 |
head of the church, meaning right understanding of who he is, is going to be the starting 00:27:44.720 |
point of the philosophy behind everything that we do at church. How we handle the Bible, 00:27:50.980 |
how we look at fellowship, how we do evangelism. And we're going to be talking about that on 00:27:56.060 |
our third session, right? So today we're going to be talking about his, his core nature. 00:28:02.100 |
Next week we're going to be, Pastor Mark is going to be talking about how that core nature 00:28:05.660 |
was revealed to sinful men and how we ought to approach him through the Levitical system. 00:28:11.220 |
And then on the third week, we're going to be talking about how does that, a right view 00:28:14.860 |
of God affect church, fellowship, evangelism, prayer, even the gospel, how we view sin, 00:28:22.620 |
right? How we view discipleship, how that reorients everything that we see, right? So 00:28:28.500 |
right view of God affects everything. This is not just the way you think, but it affects 00:28:33.820 |
everything that you value. What you consider to be good, how you evaluate what's bad, all 00:28:38.460 |
stems from a right view of God. So wrong view of God will cause you to even evaluate what 00:28:44.500 |
is good and what is bad. What, how you consider a church to be good, a church to be bad, right? 00:28:51.020 |
Can be skewed based upon how you view who God is. So again, that's why this is the first 00:28:57.780 |
and the most important part of our worship. Our church ministry philosophy is a right 00:29:03.020 |
view of God, God-centered worship, not man-centered. The sins of Israel can be, can be divided 00:29:11.700 |
into three parts. One is idol worship, and that is a straight breaking of the first commandment. 00:29:17.540 |
"Thou shalt have no other gods before me." And so there are periods in Israel's history 00:29:21.820 |
where they strayed so far away from God, they were guilty of Asherah worship, or Baal worship, 00:29:27.300 |
or worship of Molech. And at one point was so corrupt in their sins that they were offering 00:29:33.180 |
up their children for sacrifices to God of Molech, right? That's idol worship. And that's 00:29:39.100 |
clearly, you know, there's a clear line between right and wrong with that. Idol worship, I 00:29:44.260 |
mean, there's no way to defend that. But the sin that tripped Israel up more than anything 00:29:49.700 |
else were the next two. The second was that they made graven images of Yahweh and worshipped 00:29:56.420 |
it. And that's the breaking of the second commandment, where God said, "Thou shalt have 00:30:00.780 |
no graven images before me." There are two examples. I've only given one, but two examples 00:30:06.180 |
of this where the first one, I don't have it here, but the first one is Aaron. When 00:30:14.420 |
Moses is up in the mountain, he doesn't come down for a while. Remember what Aaron does, 00:30:18.020 |
he makes a golden calf, and then he presents it to the nation of Israel. And when he presents 00:30:23.760 |
this golden calf to worship, he presents it to them and says, "This is the God who delivered 00:30:28.980 |
us from Egypt." So in his mind, he's not introducing a new God to Israel. He's introducing these 00:30:36.620 |
calves in replacement of Yahweh. They were waiting for God to come. And because he can't 00:30:41.620 |
be seen, Aaron has a bright idea. Moses goes up and he's not here, and people are getting 00:30:46.740 |
restless. What do we do? Who do we follow? And so Aaron has this bright idea, and I'm 00:30:51.180 |
going to make an image of this God and present it to them. Right? So in his mind, this is 00:30:56.940 |
not idol worship. This is just a graven image. Right? We see the second, oh, I do have it 00:31:03.460 |
here. Sorry. The second is Jeroboam. Okay? When the kingdom of Israel split into two, 00:31:11.100 |
Jeroboam, who rebels against Israel's kingdom, takes the ten tribes and he goes up to the 00:31:16.860 |
south. And that's when the Israel splits. And he's afraid that because he's taken ten 00:31:23.020 |
tribes and gone up to the south, and Jerusalem is in the north, sorry, north, and Jerusalem 00:31:28.580 |
is on the southern part, he decides that he's going to create another way for people to 00:31:34.060 |
go. If they go down to Jerusalem to worship Yahweh, he's going to lose their loyalty. 00:31:38.980 |
So he decides to set up worship in Dan and Bethel, two separate places. And he also makes 00:31:44.380 |
golden calves and presents it to Israel. And he says the same thing in 1 Kings 12, 28. 00:31:50.060 |
Here is God who led you out of Egypt. And he says the exact same thing that Aaron says 00:31:55.540 |
in Exodus 32, 4. And this is a breaking of the second commandment. Right? Now, the reason 00:32:02.620 |
why this commandment, this was so dangerous, all throughout the northern kingdoms' sin, 00:32:10.860 |
there are, one of the primary sins that continues to penetrate into the northern kingdom is 00:32:15.420 |
this particular sin. They will continue to worship God with the golden calves, saying 00:32:21.460 |
that this is Yahweh. This is the God who delivered us out of Egypt. How this sin is manifested 00:32:29.380 |
today is where we're worshiping God, but the God that we worship is a God that we've created 00:32:35.700 |
in our own head. We can call Him Jesus. We can call Him God, Yahweh. We can call Him 00:32:40.860 |
all that we want. But if that's not the biblical God of the Bible, that's no different than 00:32:45.980 |
the golden calf. Right? The God of the, the God of the, the, get rich, huh? Prosperity 00:33:00.260 |
Gospel, okay, Prosperity Gospel, sorry. Get rich quick, seminar God. Okay. The prosperity, 00:33:07.860 |
the God of the prosperity gospel is like the golden calf. They call Him Jesus, and they 00:33:14.460 |
can call the word gospel, and they can sound similar, but that is not the God of the Bible. 00:33:19.300 |
Right? So they made a God in His image and worshiping it, thinking that they're worshiping 00:33:24.660 |
Jesus, but they're not worshiping Jesus. The Jesus that they worship is a Jesus that they've 00:33:29.500 |
created out of their own mind to get what they want. And that's what golden calf was. 00:33:34.100 |
Right? In the name of God, they were worshiping it, but it had nothing to do with God. So, 00:33:39.540 |
if we don't have a biblical understanding of who God is, the way He presented Himself, 00:33:44.700 |
we can easily be in danger of creating a God in our own head, just because we call Him 00:33:48.740 |
God or Yahweh or Jehovah or Jesus, doesn't make that the right God. Right? So, this is 00:33:58.300 |
the danger that we have in our culture, when you have people who don't know what the Bible 00:34:02.060 |
says. I think one of the most dangerous places to be is to be committed, at least in theory, 00:34:08.620 |
be committed to the Bible without knowing the Bible. Right? It's kind of like being 00:34:14.140 |
committed to the idea of marriage while hating your husband and hating your wife. Right? 00:34:22.780 |
You can be committed to the Bible without knowing the Bible, and you could be worshiping 00:34:25.860 |
the false God and not even knowing it. Right? That was the second sin of Israel. The third 00:34:30.820 |
sin of Israel is the sin of the Southern Kingdom, and where they were better than the 00:34:36.740 |
Northern Kingdom, but the Southern Kingdom kept on tripping over that they were worshiping 00:34:41.980 |
in high places. Right? And the reason why this was a sin that kept on being repeated 00:34:47.920 |
over and over again, that even when they would have revivals, He said, "You know, this 00:34:52.100 |
was a good king, except they didn't put away the high places." The reason why God 00:34:57.140 |
told them, again, I'm not going to go through these passages for the sake of time. In Numbers 00:35:01.580 |
33, verse 52, it talks about how God detests worship in high places because this is typically 00:35:08.420 |
where the pagans gave worship to idols. So God gave very specific prescription of how 00:35:15.420 |
and where that they ought to worship God. And again, next week when Pastor Mark speaks 00:35:21.740 |
on the subject of Leviticus and how we ought to approach God, he's going to give us a 00:35:25.900 |
little bit more clarity as to why this is so important. The sin on the third of the 00:35:33.020 |
Southern Kingdom is that they were worshiping Yahweh, but they were worshiping Him in the 00:35:38.820 |
manner that the pagans did. Right? And that's again, that's just something that we need 00:35:45.140 |
to be careful about. That we may have the right God in mind, but even in the manner 00:35:49.380 |
in which we worship that we have to be careful that we don't do it like the world does. 00:35:54.980 |
Right? Even if we have, even if we are preaching the right gospel, even the way we worship 00:36:01.140 |
and how the church is organized and what we do, what activities we engage in, that this 00:36:05.660 |
is not for us to just pick and choose. You know, this makes a bunch of people at our 00:36:09.500 |
church happy. It brings more people and the church grows when we do this. That that's 00:36:14.220 |
not how we approach worship. That's not how we approach church. First and foremost, if 00:36:18.860 |
it's God-centered, if everything is made by Him and for Him, the most important question 00:36:23.580 |
is who is He? And what does He desire? And how does He want us to worship Him? Right? 00:36:31.420 |
So that's the fundamental question that we're trying to establish in this class. Okay? First 00:36:37.540 |
and foremost. So this is this important. The next question is how did God then present 00:36:43.220 |
Himself to Israel? God demanded to be regarded as holy to the nation of Israel. And you're 00:36:53.300 |
going to see that there are many attributes of God, but the holiness, His character of 00:36:58.540 |
holiness stands out above every other nature. And we're going to be talking about that. 00:37:03.980 |
Okay? First and foremost, the death of Nadab and Nebihu gives us a glimpse. Again, again, 00:37:11.100 |
Pastor Mark is going to be speaking about that. This is part of your, I think, quiet 00:37:13.620 |
time passage. I think maybe your first day, I think. Right? The death of, I'm not going 00:37:20.420 |
to go into it, but I want you to take a close look at the death of Nadab and Nebihu. And 00:37:25.540 |
if you are reading that for the first time, it'll probably be a bit shocking to you. Right? 00:37:32.780 |
Because their only sin is they didn't do exactly what God told them to do. Nadab and Nebihu 00:37:39.060 |
were the first two priests who gave the sacrifice to God, but they didn't follow directions. 00:37:44.580 |
And because they didn't follow directions, fire from heaven come down and consume them, 00:37:48.340 |
and they are punished. Right? They die. So, in our natural human paradigm, we're going 00:37:54.740 |
to look at that and say, "Wow, God is very vengeful. Was that really worthy of death?" 00:37:59.900 |
Okay? And again, when you have a worldly paradigm and you look at the stories of the Old Testament, 00:38:04.700 |
it's not going to make much sense to you. But this is the reason why knowing who God 00:38:09.340 |
is is extremely, extremely important. Okay? And at the end of that, he says, "The reason 00:38:17.060 |
for their punishment," he says, and again, it's going to be in your quiet time this week, 00:38:21.900 |
that he said, "They did not consider me as holy." Right? If you have an ESV, it says 00:38:28.220 |
the word that is used there is sanctified, but it is the same word in Hebrew for the 00:38:31.700 |
word holy. So, if you have an ESV or NIV, or NASV or NIV, it'll say, "It's because they 00:38:39.140 |
did not consider me holy." Right? So, that was their sin. That they didn't see him as 00:38:45.340 |
holy. Right? Moses, if you know this story, at the end of the 40 years of Israel's journey, 00:38:53.340 |
again, they're complaining to Moses. "Why did you bring us out here?" And they're whining 00:38:57.840 |
and complaining. And so, God says, "Give them the water that they're demanding." And he 00:39:02.260 |
goes there and he strikes the rock and he says, "Here's your water." Remember what happens 00:39:06.980 |
to him? He doesn't die, but he gets punished, and as a result of him doing that, he's not 00:39:16.300 |
allowed to go into the Promised Land. Moses waited 40—he endured with these stiff-necked 00:39:21.900 |
people for 40 years, thinking that, "If I just endure, I can get into this Promised 00:39:25.780 |
Land." But because of this one sin, and this sin of Moses was that he struck the rock. 00:39:32.260 |
We're not exactly sure what he did wrong. But the way God describes his sin was that 00:39:37.700 |
you didn't consider—you didn't show me as holy to the nation of Israel. Now, we don't 00:39:42.660 |
know if it was because he struck the rock or whether he was angry, but God says, whatever 00:39:47.060 |
he did do, that he didn't present himself—present Yahweh as holy. Right? That was the sin. And 00:39:54.140 |
that sin was so hideous before God that he was not allowed to enter into the Promised 00:39:59.060 |
Land. If you look at the Lord's Prayer, again, you don't need to turn there, Matthew 6, 9 00:40:05.660 |
through 13, when Jesus says, "Pray this way," and He begins, right? "Our Father, which art 00:40:11.060 |
in heaven," and how does the next part go? "Hallowed be thy name." The word "hallowed," 00:40:16.060 |
again, either reverenced, or another way to put it is holy. Right? Holy is thy name. So 00:40:23.380 |
the way that Jesus tells His disciples to address the Father is as a holy God. Right? 00:40:29.660 |
Holy. Now, I can give you example after example after example, but there's one attribute that 00:40:36.380 |
absolutely stands out above every other attribute. In fact, we can say that the history of Israel 00:40:42.900 |
is to present to the nation of Israel and to the world the foundation of His nature 00:40:47.980 |
of holiness. Right? Two separate places in the Bible where His attribute is repeated 00:40:57.540 |
three separate times consecutively. "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty." It's 00:41:03.260 |
mentioned in Isaiah 6, 3 and Revelations 4, 8. Right? No other place in the Bible where 00:41:09.420 |
any other attribute of God is repeated in this way. Again, those of you guys who know, 00:41:15.740 |
who've been here for a while know that whenever you see a repetition in the Scripture, you're 00:41:20.060 |
supposed to stop and consider deeply what is being said. So when Jesus would stop and 00:41:27.300 |
say, "Peter, Peter," or "Truly, truly, I say something to you," and He would do it in repetition, 00:41:32.580 |
it is meant to be highlighted, to pay attention. Something that I'm going to be saying to you 00:41:37.540 |
is extremely, extremely important. Twice in the Scripture, in the book of Isaiah and book 00:41:43.500 |
of Revelation, where a prophet of God sees a glimpse of the throne of God and at that 00:41:52.140 |
throne the creatures surrounding Him are declaring, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty." 00:41:59.440 |
So that alone, even if I didn't mention anything else, but that alone should cause anybody 00:42:05.600 |
to take a step back and see that this is a nature of God that is singularly singled out 00:42:11.460 |
above all the others. And I know that again, in our generation, if there's any aspect of 00:42:16.900 |
God or attribute of God that is singled out, it's probably His grace, His mercy, and His 00:42:21.100 |
love. It is important. It's absolutely essential. It is talked about. But no other place in 00:42:28.500 |
the Bible where it talks about God is love, love, love, grace, grace, grace, mercy, mercy, 00:42:33.020 |
mercy. And we don't want to diminish any one of those things. But this aspect of His holiness 00:42:39.460 |
is at the foundation of understanding of every other attribute. If you don't understand His 00:42:45.980 |
holiness, you're not going to completely understand His love. If you don't understand His attribute 00:42:52.540 |
of holiness, you're not going to understand His attribute of mercy. Because all of these 00:42:57.700 |
things are connected. There's a reason why two-thirds of the Old Testament is dedicated 00:43:06.440 |
to make sin utterly sinful. Basically, if you were to summarize in a nutshell the essence 00:43:15.380 |
of what was happening in the Old Testament, which is two-thirds of the Bible, He says 00:43:19.860 |
that the law was given and we see a history of the nation of Israel who is constantly 00:43:24.460 |
sinning and coming before God, and God is being merciful. But it's curse, after curse, 00:43:29.460 |
after curse. And He says, as we've been talking about on Sunday, it's to make sin utterly 00:43:34.500 |
sinful. But the reason why sin is utterly sinful is because we have a progressive revelation 00:43:41.900 |
of His holy nature. Sin is never utterly sinful when we compare it, when we don't compare 00:43:49.260 |
it to Holy, Holy, Holy God. The more we understand who He is, the more utterly sinful sin becomes. 00:43:57.020 |
Sin is not sinful when you compare it with other sinners. We can always find sinners 00:44:02.100 |
who we think are worse than us, and it kind of makes our sin a little bit better. We don't 00:44:06.260 |
feel as bad about our sins. See, but two-thirds of the Old Testament is sin in the presence 00:44:12.500 |
of this Holy God. So, again, this aspect of His holiness is at the foundation of understanding 00:44:21.620 |
of everything that we do. So if God reveals Himself as Holy, if His nature is at the core 00:44:29.460 |
of everything that we do, if at the core of His nature God emphasizes and highlights His 00:44:36.420 |
holiness, then what does it mean to be holy? What does the Bible mean by holiness? There's 00:44:43.300 |
two definitions. One is to be morally perfect or pure. In Habakkuk, chapter 1, verse 13, 00:44:52.340 |
it says, "You who are purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong." But let me 00:45:01.580 |
emphasize here. This is typically, when we think of holiness, we think about this aspect. 00:45:05.900 |
It's pure, He's perfect, He's morally, there's nothing wrong with Him, right? Which is the 00:45:11.380 |
correct definition, but we have to understand when we think about morally perfect, it's 00:45:16.740 |
different the way that you and I understand perfection. Because you and I understand someone 00:45:22.580 |
who is morally perfect, the closer and closer that we are to His nature, to who He is, right? 00:45:29.300 |
God is not morally perfect because He keeps a standard of right and wrong that is independent 00:45:34.660 |
of Him. I hope you're following along. God is morally perfect because He Himself is holy. 00:45:45.940 |
What is right and wrong stem from who He is. If He says to kill, that's the right thing 00:45:50.620 |
to do. If He says eat, then that's the right thing to do. If He says not to eat, then that's 00:45:55.420 |
the right thing to do. So His nature of perfection and morally being upright is different than 00:46:01.300 |
us. We have a set of right and wrong, and the closer we keep that, we're morally perfect, 00:46:06.420 |
right? So typically, when we think of God being holy, that's the first definition that 00:46:11.580 |
we have. But the definition that really encompasses all the other things is related to the second 00:46:18.340 |
part, okay? It's to be set apart. To be set apart. R.C. Sproul, and I'm just going to 00:46:33.940 |
read that part to you, he says, "The primary meaning of holy is to be separate. It comes 00:46:39.900 |
from an ancient word that meant to cut or to separate. Perhaps even more accurate would 00:46:45.260 |
be the phrase, 'a cut above something.' When we find a garment or another piece of merchandise 00:46:49.380 |
that is outstanding, that has a superior excellence, we use the expression that it is cut above 00:46:54.460 |
the rest." Right? It is different. There's nothing like Him. Right? That's the word holy. 00:46:59.860 |
So you can take an object that was common, and you would dedicate it to the Lord, and 00:47:05.340 |
what would happen to that object? It became holy. Right? Because now, it was for His use. 00:47:12.340 |
The holy temple, before it was just a bunch of dirt, and they put it together, and it 00:47:17.060 |
was bricks, but if you made the house for you to live in, it would be common. But if 00:47:21.740 |
that temple was dedicated to the Lord, what did it become? It became holy. Right? So the 00:47:27.100 |
second definition of it is not simply to be morally upright, but anything that is separated 00:47:31.940 |
for Him. It's cut above. Right? It is different. Now why is this definition so important? Because 00:47:38.940 |
when something is related to God, it takes something that is common, and then it becomes 00:47:46.780 |
something weighty. Right? Sorry. This part, I don't think it's in your notes, but I'm 00:47:53.780 |
going to jot it down. I encourage you to do the third part. To be set apart. To say 00:48:00.780 |
He is holy means that He is not meant to be considered as common, or anything associated 00:48:12.780 |
with Him to be common. The word used to describe expression of holiness is glory. Right? So 00:48:19.980 |
when His holiness is declared and is expressed, we say that we are glorifying Him, or we see 00:48:26.980 |
His glory. Right? Basically, His glory is an expression of His attribute. Right? You 00:48:32.860 |
follow? The word glory itself means to be weighty. Heavy. Right? Or something serious. 00:48:39.860 |
Not to be taken lightly. So what that means is, the very essence of the definition of 00:48:47.660 |
holiness means that there's, again, that He is perfect, that He is cut above, there's 00:48:53.300 |
nothing like Him, and that there is a weightiness. Right? That we are not to take it lightly. 00:49:00.300 |
Everything that He says is holy. Everything He says is holy. It's not meant to be talked 00:49:09.420 |
about lightly. Everything that He says was to be treasured and taken seriously. When 00:49:15.860 |
God shows up and He's in His presence, what does He make Moses do? Take his feet off, 00:49:21.180 |
shoes off. Because what? What kind of ground is it? It is holy ground. So when it is holy 00:49:26.580 |
ground, what does He mean? That you are not to stand here like you're standing in the 00:49:30.980 |
presence of just any bush. This is where God is. Right? Whenever anything was related to 00:49:37.980 |
God, it was meant to be taken seriously, because there are serious consequences. Right? That's 00:49:44.620 |
the definition of holiness. There's a weightiness of what it is. So again, let me step back 00:49:50.980 |
and we're going to be talking about this more on the third session. The very essence of 00:49:56.020 |
who God is requires us to search His Word carefully to figure out who He is. Today, 00:50:03.020 |
the way we worship God has become more and more adjusted so that more and more can feel 00:50:09.660 |
comfortable exactly the way they are. That is not worship. Worship is common people coming 00:50:16.660 |
before a holy, holy, holy God and being changed in the presence of His glory. Right? That's 00:50:25.420 |
worship. So fundamentally, our idea of making, adjusting the church and adjusting everything 00:50:32.220 |
that we're doing so that more and more things can become more and more common to attract 00:50:38.500 |
more and more people. And then we have to diminish less and less of the definition of 00:50:44.420 |
holiness. We can say the word holy, but if we don't understand the meaning of holiness 00:50:48.740 |
in the way that Scripture describes it, then we're going to miss the whole point of why 00:50:52.860 |
we gather together. Right? We're not here to just listen to some words. We're not here 00:50:57.620 |
to make friends. Ultimately, we're here to approach a holy, holy, holy God. Right? So 00:51:04.220 |
even when we talk about approaching the throne of grace with confidence, it's a throne that 00:51:10.060 |
we're approaching. It is a throne of grace, but it is a throne. It is a king that we are 00:51:15.060 |
approaching. So oftentimes, even when we talk about grace, we don't have this concept of 00:51:19.820 |
His weightiness, of His glory, and we kind of have this image of like this grandpa that 00:51:24.740 |
we're kind of coming to embrace. Nowhere in the Scripture do we see that. That's an image 00:51:30.860 |
of God that we've created in our own heads. Search the Scriptures anywhere, New Testament 00:51:36.080 |
or the Old Testament, any illustration, anywhere in the Bible where you see where God shows 00:51:40.940 |
up and people run to embrace Him. Right? That is not the image that we see in the Scripture. 00:51:47.700 |
That is an image that we've created in our culture to accommodate the masses, but that 00:51:52.420 |
is not what we see in Scripture. Right? Everything associated with God is holy. Instances, again, 00:51:59.420 |
and I'm going to end with this for today. If everything stems from His nature, at the 00:52:08.580 |
core of His nature is His holiness. The definition of His holiness is to be set apart, to be 00:52:15.740 |
weighty and serious, and there's nothing like Him. So it relates to His love. The love that 00:52:24.260 |
He talks about is holy, is cut above. It's different than any other love that you know. 00:52:30.340 |
His judgment is holy. It's different than any other judgment that we know. So even though 00:52:35.320 |
we use illustrations like, "Well, His love is like the love of the mother," no, it's 00:52:38.980 |
not. There's nothing to compare with. That's what it means to be holy. Right? When we talk 00:52:44.780 |
about His power, "Oh, His power is like the nuclear bomb," no, it's not. There's nothing 00:52:49.180 |
that we can compare it with. That's what it means to be holy, that He is set apart. There's 00:52:54.100 |
a weightiness of everything that we're doing. So I'm going to give you some examples of 00:52:58.940 |
Scripture. And again, we can comb through all the way from Genesis to Revelation, and 00:53:03.500 |
I can give you countless numbers of examples of people encountering God. And it is not 00:53:08.620 |
this picture that, again, in our generation that we've drawn of who God is. 2 Samuel 6, 00:53:16.820 |
1 through 11. And I want to, I know it's a little bit lengthy, but I want to read to 00:53:21.580 |
you. Some of you guys know the background behind this. And this is one of the books 00:53:29.740 |
that we used to have the whole church read. And again, if you haven't read this, we highly, 00:53:33.500 |
highly encourage you to get this book and read it and read it carefully. If you're in 00:53:37.740 |
a small group that, you know, you don't know what to read, read this first. Okay? Again, 00:53:43.820 |
for the sake of time, I'm not going to go too deep into it, but the story behind this 00:53:46.500 |
is that the Ark of the Covenant was stolen by the Philistines. And this is a scene where 00:53:52.060 |
David conquers, again, wins the battle over the Philistines. And they're bringing the 00:53:56.540 |
Ark of the Covenant back to Israel. But in this scene, they put the Ark of the Covenant 00:54:02.540 |
on a cart being pulled by an ox. And Uzzah, who happens to be a priest, when the cart 00:54:12.500 |
stumbles and it's about to fall to the ground, he reaches out and he saves it from touching 00:54:17.300 |
the ground and he brings it back up. And at the end of that, you would say, "Wow, he did 00:54:22.180 |
a great thing. He prevented the Ark of the Covenant from crashing to the ground." But 00:54:26.660 |
in God's eyes, he sinned. His sin was so horrible that he ends up dying. Right? In that passage, 00:54:35.140 |
there's no explanation. When we read that passage, we can look at that and say, "Wow, 00:54:39.540 |
that was pretty random. Instead of being rewarded for saving the Ark of the Covenant, God actually 00:54:44.100 |
punishes him." And I think R.C. Sproul does such a great job describing this. So, I know 00:54:48.860 |
it's a little bit lengthy, but I want you guys to pay attention to what he says. Uzzah, 00:54:56.140 |
probably a Kohathite. Kohathite is one of the tribes of the priests. He knew exactly 00:55:00.980 |
what his duties were. He had been trained thoroughly in the discipline of his calling. 00:55:05.600 |
He understood that God had declared that the touching of the Ark of the Covenant was a 00:55:08.700 |
capital offense. No Kohathite under any circumstance was ever permitted to touch the Ark. No emergency 00:55:16.020 |
was grounds for breaking that inviolate command. The elaborate construction of the Ark, complete 00:55:22.340 |
with golden rings through which the long poles were inserted, was so fashioned as to make 00:55:26.820 |
it clear that the Ark itself was not to be touched. The men commissioned to transport 00:55:31.380 |
the Ark could touch only the poles and the rings. Then it was the task of the Kohathites 00:55:36.140 |
to carry the Ark by these long poles. No provision was made for hurrying the procedure by transporting 00:55:42.060 |
the Ark via an ox cart. We must ask the question, what was the Ark doing on an ox cart in the 00:55:47.500 |
first place? God was so strict about the holy things of the tabernacle that the Kohathites 00:55:52.060 |
were not allowed even to gaze upon the Ark. This too was a capital crime. God had decreed 00:55:58.060 |
that if a Kohathite merely glanced at the Ark and the Holy of Holies for an instant, 00:56:02.160 |
he would die. Not only was Uzzah forbidden to touch the Ark, he was forbidden even to 00:56:07.020 |
look at it. He touched it anyway. He stripped out his hand and placed it squarely on the 00:56:12.780 |
Ark, steadying it in place lest it fall to the ground. An act of holy heroism. No, it 00:56:20.580 |
was an act of arrogance, a sin of presumption. Uzzah assumed that his hand was less polluted 00:56:26.940 |
than the earth. But it wasn't the ground or the mud that would desecrate the Ark, it was 00:56:31.420 |
the touch of man. The earth is an obedient creature. It does what God tells it to do. 00:56:36.980 |
It brings forth its yield in its season. It obeys the laws of nature that God had established. 00:56:43.660 |
When the temperature falls to a certain point, the ground freezes. When the water is added 00:56:47.420 |
to the dust, it becomes mud, just as God designed it. The ground does not commit cosmic treason. 00:56:53.460 |
There is nothing polluted about the ground. He goes on and on to give us perspective. 00:56:59.980 |
Again, Pastor Mark is going to take some time to go over the book of some parts of Leviticus 00:57:06.020 |
to explain this further. But when we have a superficial understanding of His holiness, 00:57:12.580 |
it completely disorients how we understand worship, how we understand our personal relationship 00:57:19.380 |
with God, how we understand expectation from the Church, how we understand expectations 00:57:26.460 |
from the world, how we understand the Gospel, our salvation, our hope in Christ, all of 00:57:30.660 |
this, right? All of this diminishes everything that we have when we have a diminished understanding 00:57:36.860 |
of His holiness. And that's why God spends painstaking time to teach the nation of Israel 00:57:43.060 |
and us about His holiness. And why the nation of Israel, in this particular example, was 00:57:50.380 |
given to us. Why He couldn't even touch, He couldn't even gaze at it, because any man 00:57:55.620 |
who saw the face of God, what did He say? He would die. He would die. He doesn't gaze 00:58:03.740 |
upon a loving face, a God that's waiting to give us embrace. First and foremost, that 00:58:12.060 |
is not the picture we see in the Bible. Isaiah chapter 6, 1 through 7, again, for the sake 00:58:17.140 |
of time, we're not going to read that, but where Isaiah sees a vision of God, and what's 00:58:21.980 |
Isaiah's first response? "Lord, I missed You. I wanted to see You." That's not the first 00:58:26.100 |
response. He falls to his face and he says, "Woe is me. I am done. I'm a man of unclean 00:58:32.340 |
lips from a people of unclean lips. And I have seen God." So Isaiah was expecting to 00:58:38.860 |
die because he saw God, because the Israelites understood. Because of what God has done to 00:58:46.020 |
the nation of Israel, because of His teaching, they knew, inherently they knew, that a sinful 00:58:53.060 |
man could not even gaze upon God and live. In fact, the Israelites were so afraid of 00:58:59.580 |
using His name in vain that they wouldn't even pronounce His name. So whenever you see 00:59:05.900 |
in the Scripture the word "Lord," capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D, in the 00:59:13.700 |
Hebrew Bible, it has His name, Yahweh. But the Jews were so afraid of mispronouncing 00:59:20.540 |
or misusing His name that they never pronounced it. And the reason why today, we're not sure 00:59:27.140 |
if the Hebrew words are meant to be pronounced Yahweh or Jehovah, because they didn't pronounce 00:59:32.740 |
it for so long, by the time they translated it into Greek, they didn't know which vowels 00:59:38.100 |
belonged to where. So all we have in the Hebrew are the consonants, and we don't have the 00:59:43.580 |
vowels. So if you put the vowels in a different place, it's pronounced Jehovah. If you put 00:59:49.180 |
the vowels in a different place, it's pronounced Yahweh. That's how they were scared. That's 00:59:55.140 |
how much they were scared to even pronounce His name wrong. Think about, and again, they 01:00:02.940 |
didn't create that. That came as a result of their encountering God. God taught them 01:00:08.820 |
this, right? God taught them this. They were doing what God taught them to do. "Do not 01:00:15.540 |
approach me, or you will die." Ezekiel 1:28. Ezekiel sees a vision of God. What happens 01:00:24.100 |
to him? He falls to the ground in terror. When we talk about fear, fearing God, because 01:00:32.980 |
it's hard for us to understand, because we've been given this picture of a God who is so 01:00:37.820 |
tame and so loving, so gracious, that we can get away with almost anything that we want, 01:00:44.540 |
that it's hard for us to understand, why would we fear God? I thought we would go and run 01:00:50.780 |
and embrace Him and sit on His lap, because that's the typical picture that we have. So 01:00:54.940 |
even the way that we interpret the word fear, "Oh, He's not talking about terror. He's talking 01:01:00.620 |
about reverence, honoring." No. Take a look at the word fear in Hebrew and in Greek. It 01:01:07.740 |
means terror. To be terrified of God. That's exactly the word that is used. In fact, it's 01:01:14.220 |
not just the word itself. Look at the way people respond when they're in the presence 01:01:18.360 |
of God. There is terror. The disciples, right, at the transfiguration, when they hear the 01:01:27.820 |
voice of God, how do they respond? They fall to the ground in terror. In Revelation 1:17, 01:01:35.100 |
when John sees a vision of God, what happens? Terror. Even in Revelation 5, 14, even the 01:01:43.420 |
four beasts and 24 elders in the scene of heaven, when they're in His presence, what 01:01:49.060 |
happens to them? They fall to the ground in terror. Even the angels in Revelation 7, 11, 01:01:56.560 |
it describes them in the presence of this Holy God, and they are face down, covering 01:02:01.420 |
themselves. Remember the scene with Moses, when God is calling him to lead the nation 01:02:08.580 |
of Israel, and Moses says, "I only ask one thing, let me see you." And remember what 01:02:14.580 |
God says to Moses, "If you see me, you will die." So what he says is, "I'm going to bypass 01:02:22.820 |
you and I'm going to cover you, so that you don't see a full picture of who I am." And 01:02:28.580 |
he covers him, and he says, "As I am passing, you will see my backside, as I am passing." 01:02:34.980 |
So Moses simply gets a glimpse of God as he is passing, covered and protected by God Himself. 01:02:42.420 |
The glory that was remaining on his face as a reflection of Him just passing was so terrifying, 01:02:49.420 |
that when He came down from the mountain and He began to speak to the nation of Israel, 01:02:53.500 |
they were so afraid of that glory shining off of His face, they begged Him to cover 01:02:58.180 |
themselves. So He puts a veil on, and He actually enters and hides in the temple just to have 01:03:05.660 |
conversations with the nation of Israel. That was a glimpse of His glory as it was passing 01:03:11.860 |
by, protected by God Himself. That's why when we talk about the cross, when it says it goes 01:03:17.900 |
dark, when Dr. Harris talks about it going dark, it makes perfect sense to me that He 01:03:23.100 |
makes it dark because He was approaching the cross to lay our sins upon Him. Because sinful 01:03:28.980 |
man can't gaze upon His presence and live. Why is this so essential? If we don't understand 01:03:38.220 |
the nature of His holiness, it disorients everything that we do. The sin of man is to 01:03:45.860 |
place ourselves where God belongs. Where we want to be worshipped, we want to be loved, 01:03:52.580 |
we want to be, and we place ourselves where He's supposed to be. So when we don't recognize 01:03:57.900 |
who He is, at the core of our heart, and every single person in here, I don't care how humble 01:04:02.660 |
we are, how long we've been a Christian, every single one of us struggles with us putting 01:04:07.900 |
ourselves at the center. And this is why until God is established and recognized and worshipped 01:04:15.620 |
as the God of the Bible, everything that the church does will be wrong. Everything. Even 01:04:21.780 |
when we think we're right, we'll be wrong. And that's why, again, this is, from the very 01:04:27.180 |
beginning of the church, this was fundamental to the church because until we have a church 01:04:31.380 |
filled with people who recognizes that this is God, and that when we come to worship, 01:04:36.940 |
that we're coming to worship this Holy God, that the God who sent His only begotten Son 01:04:41.780 |
to be crucified for our sin was this terrifying God, that the God that we come to pray and 01:04:48.060 |
to have relationship with is this Holy, Holy, Holy God. And it is in the presence of this 01:04:54.020 |
glory that we are changed. And we make Him any less than what the Bible presents. We 01:05:01.500 |
will be guilty of either breaking the first commandment, the second commandment, or the 01:05:05.340 |
third commandment. So I'm going to leave it here, and then if this is all we knew, if 01:05:13.820 |
this is all we knew, we would be dead. If we were left at the state that who He is, 01:05:23.180 |
left the way we were at, we don't have to come before God and say, "Well, let's look 01:05:27.860 |
at your sin." And that's typically the illustration that we are given. "Let's look at all the 01:05:32.220 |
sins that you've committed and say, 'Oh, you're guilty of this, now you're going to go to 01:05:35.420 |
hell.'" I don't think that's how it's going to be. I think the minute that a sinner stands 01:05:40.600 |
before a Holy God to be judged, he will be destroyed. There is no need for a list. There's 01:05:46.620 |
no need to go down the list of what you did, because the minute a man stands before this 01:05:50.860 |
Holy God without the protection of the blood of Christ, we would be destroyed. So this 01:05:57.360 |
is the foundation in which everything that we understand about church, about the Gospel, 01:06:02.620 |
about the Bible, about discipleship, evangelism, like this is fundamental. So I'm going to 01:06:10.420 |
pray and end it, and then I have some discussion questions to discuss. Pastor Mark, next week, 01:06:15.100 |
is going to take—so if this is who God is, what did He tell the nation of Israel, how 01:06:19.900 |
to approach Him? Okay? And so he's going to go over that in the Book of Leviticus next 01:06:24.220 |
week. So let me pray for us, and then I'm going to ask you guys to take some time in 01:06:28.200 |
your small group. Again, next week, I'm going to give you a little bit more time, but today, 01:06:31.940 |
because we had orientation, we're going a little bit further. Okay, let me pray for 01:06:34.260 |
us. Oh, sorry, we have worship right after this. Sorry about that. Okay. Heavenly Father, 01:06:47.140 |
help us, Lord God, to have a biblical view of who You are. And I know each one of us, 01:06:54.820 |
in our own way, have strayed, Father, from keeping You as the Lord of our life. I pray, 01:07:04.220 |
Father God, that through this class and through the things that we discussed, that You would 01:07:07.940 |
help us to be properly oriented of who You are, that our hearts, our affections, all 01:07:14.540 |
of it, Lord God, may be surrendered to You. Help us to see a vision of Christ and what 01:07:20.740 |
He has done, and who You are, Lord God. And Your mercy, that we would have different perspective 01:07:28.160 |
of everything that we have. So we offer this time to You, Lord. In Jesus' name we pray.