Sermon Notes: Exodus 24:1-18
Exodus 24:9-11. Let’s read it.
When it comes to living life, we live mostly within our physical experience influenced by our physical world and our physical senses.
What if creation is more than physical? What if God’s cosmos is visible and physical as well as unseen, spiritual, and supernatural? What if that unseen part of the cosmos is just as real and just as influential as the seen physical cosmos?
What if prayer is how we enter that part of creation and find strength, help, fellowship, and the primary way we make war on darkness with God? What if we don’t pray? We are bound to and only get what physical effort can get us. That would be a shame.
Paul assumes his audience understood the composition of God’s creation because he drops things on us like this and just walks away: 2 Corinthians 12:1-7 (ESV) 1 I must go on boasting. Though there is nothing to be gained by it, I will go on to visions and revelations of the Lord. 2 I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows. 3 And I know that this man was caught up into paradise—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows— 4 and he heard things that cannot be told, which man may not utter. 5 On behalf of this man I will boast, but on my own behalf I will not boast, except of my weaknesses— 6 though if I should wish to boast, I would not be a fool, for I would be speaking the truth; but I refrain from it, so that no one may think more of me than he sees in me or hears from me. 7 So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited.
Paul is speaking about himself in defense of his ministry and outs himself as the one he’s talking about being caught up into the “third heaven” and “paradise” to see things he must not speak about. So, to keep him from becoming conceited, God gave him a “thorn” in his flesh.
Third heaven? Paradise? Wait. Explain that please!
Paul’s cosmology is a Hebrew cosmology. Just to be clear, cosmology is the study of the nature of creation.
Yes, the Israelites understood the cosmos, and their understanding brought truth and order to bear on the bent and dark cosmology of the ancient near east they lived among. Moses is preparing Israel in their exit of an Egyptian cosmology to enter the cosmological worldview of Canaan.
Israel needed to have God’s blueprint of all things to adequately hear and obey him.
The reason a full cosmology is not fully unpacked in the Bible in one chapter of the Bible is because its divinely inspired authors assumed their audience understood how the cosmos was constructed. So, we must assume the Holy Spirit wanted it that way. That doesn’t mean the cosmos is unimportant. The make-up of God’s creation is in pieces throughout the whole Bible. There are some things the Lord wants us to search out.
The cosmology presented in Bible explains creation in three parts: The Heavens, The Earth, and Sheol.
The Heavens have three parts: First heaven is the air where we live, animals exist, and where birds fly.
The second heaven is where the planets and the constellations are, space.
The third heaven is God’s primary dwelling place where he takes counsel with a hierarchy of creatures, and this realm is mostly unseen unless God makes it visible. This is what Paul references.
NOTE: Living in all three parts of the “heavens” seemed to be the effortless reality of pre-fall humanity. Before the fall our parents enjoyed access constantly to the third heaven as the Lord Jesus came in the stormy winds of the evening to walk with and fellowship with his image-bearers. Jesus did this on and in the garden mountain of Eden (See Ezekiel 28:13-14). The fact that Eden was a mountain will begin to influence what we see in Exodus 24 and the construction of the tabernacle. After Eden and Genesis 6, mountains will be the place worshipers of the fallen “gods” interact with them. Thus, we get Babel, the step pyramids of Egypt as well as the step pyramids of South America: man’s attempt to worship the rebellious sons of God on man-made mountains.
The Earth: The Earth is our primary reference point. We are created from the earth, of the earth, and yet constructed in the image of God in every way he chose to make us reflect him and that means we are made up of seen and unsee parts. We tend to give more weight to the seen and earthy parts of ourselves.
Sheol: This is the shadowy place where the dead go, and it’s not until later Judaism, Jesus’ instruction on this place he will call “Gehenna” and later “hell”, and Peter’s use of “Tartarus” in 2 Peter 2:4 to describe the place fallen angels are imprisoned, that we get a clearer picture of the place of the dead who don’t follow Jesus.
So, according to how the Bible unpacks the cosmos 2/3 of it is unseen. And 2/3 of the cosmos has influence on the physical and seen parts of creation.
God calls us to live in the physical world in full knowledge of the unseen and its impact on the seen world.
In fact, experiencing the unseen’s impact on the seen world is part of the function of the Tabernacle and later, the Temple. These will serve to make the unseen visible again, and lead Israel to experience and worship Jesus again like our parents did back in Eden before they sinned.
There is your primer on the cosmology of the Bible. Woefully inadequate, but a start to hopefully get you curious enough to go read some things: Michael Heiser, Douglas Van Dorn, Kyle Greenwood. Here is a good documentary worth your time that does a nice job of introducing you to Heiser: https://youtu.be/HV2CUWcKMa8?si=1al7C7kJVq93heji
So, what is God doing here in Exodus 24 that warrants me introducing you to Hebrew and thus Christian cosmology?
God is preparing us for the good news of Jesus by restoring personal and tangible fellowship with his image-bearers that was broken and lost in judgment at Eden. Exodus 24:1-18
Part of what we lost from the rebellion is the personal and tangible fellowship of God. Faith was sight, and now Adam and Eve can no longer access the garden mountain and experience ongoing, personal, and tangible fellowship with God. They are cut off from the meeting place of the seen and unseen. In the garden with the Father-Son-Spirit the seen and unseen are open and available as we live and steward the earth and enjoy the cosmos God created for glory.
God begins the restoration of fellowship by breaking into the seen world for Israel to be able to see, hear, and taste that he might provide salvation and constant access to life in his presence so that we can get back personal and tangible fellowship with God.
It’s not that God is not already always present, but in his work of redemption, he is putting his presence on display to show them what relational closeness and connection in redemption is like.
How does God begin restoring fellowship with image-bearers with relational closeness and connection?
God restores fellowship by giving us his word, having his word read for his people to hear, and for his people to respond to. 24:1-4a; 7
The Lord invited the crew up the mountain, but he brought Moses near to have him hear and record the words of his law that we have been studying.
So, Moses wrote it down and he read it to the people.
The people heard God’s word and committed to obey it.
God speaks to us and comes near to us in his word.
We have here some of the beginnings of our understanding of Scripture, it’s source, God’s process for recording his word, the reality that God had captured for us what he actually said, and that he has seen fit to make sure his people accurately preserved what he said.
In Scripture, we have the nearness, fellowship, and tangible presence of God with us. So, when we read it, I ask you to stand to honor God because we are reading his words.
Words, language are powerful because they carry meaning from the author of word, so when God speaks and has it recorded for us, his word is more than just vocabulary captured in letters on a page. It is God’s very words, so much so that to disbelieve his word is to disbelieve him.
God comes near to us in his word.
God restores fellowship through the death of the innocent in the place of the guilty. 24:4b-6; 8
Immediately after writing down God’s words, Moses builds an altar at the foot of the mountain.
On this altar they provide sacrifice then splash the blood against the altar and on the people.
The pattern was set in Eden, and it is continued here to lead us to Jesus. That pattern is that without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins, and it is the blood of the innocent that pays for the sins of the guilty.
Here is the writer of Hebrews’ commentary on our passage and subsequent passages about the tabernacle and temple: Hebrews 9:18-28 (ESV) 18 Therefore not even the first covenant was inaugurated without blood. 19 For when every commandment of the law had been declared by Moses to all the people, he took the blood of calves and goats, with water and scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people, 20 saying, “This is the blood of the covenant that God commanded for you.” 21 And in the same way he sprinkled with the blood both the tent and all the vessels used in worship. 22 Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.
23 Thus it was necessary for the copies of the heavenly things to be purified with these rites, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. 24 For Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf. 25 Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own, 26 for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. 27 And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment, 28 so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.
Because of God’s plan, Jesus the eternal and innocent and perfect Creator Son, was sacrificed in our place for our sin. He was buried. He rose on the third day. He ascended at Pentecost. He entered the third heaven and put his own blood before the Father so that we could come to him by faith and have his sacrifice count for us and restore us to personal and tangible relationship with Father-Son-Spirit.
God restores fellowship by inviting us into his presence to see him and know him. 24:9-10
God doesn’t just give us his word and atone for us.
God restores actual fellowship that involves us experiencing him.
The representatives chosen went up the mountain and they got to see God in his Triune glory.
What is described is similar to what Ezekiel will see in his vision of the Lord he records in Ezekiel 1.
God didn’t just talk to them in some disembodied voice. He showed them himself and the glory surrounding him.
Jesus is the Word (See John 1). Jesus is the glory of God the Father put on display for us to see. God the Father and God the Spirit saw that scribes record Jesus’ coming and his words and his fulfillment of all that is written about him.
Jesus’ death for us, his burial, his resurrection, and his ascension leads to his people receiving the Holy Spirit, thus making us the mountain of God, individual temples, and thus priests of God.
So, when we come together in obedience as the local church, we are the place where God meets and displays his glory, where the seen and unseen are bridged. The church, made up of priests to God through Jesus Christ, is the place where God meets with and operates from and through to complete the restoration of the whole of creation to its Edenic state of being the Revelation 21 place where we enjoy his constant presence with no interruption forever.
God restores fellowship by accepting us and feasting with us. 24:11
Exodus 33:18-23 (ESV) 18 Moses said, “Please show me your glory.” 19 And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The LORD.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. 20 But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.” 21 And the LORD said, “Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, 22 and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by. 23 Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.”
The representatives get to see the Lord, and they lived. God let Moses see the backside of his glory one more time, and here we learn why Moses wanted to see him again. It was awesome!
Verse 11 translates “lay” what can be better translated as “send”. God did not send his hand on the representatives for seeing him.
They saw him, and the result should be death, but he graciously did not send his hand after the flesh that unjustly sees him. He pardoned them.
He’s so holy that flesh in its sinful state is not allowed to see the Lord and survive. He will summarily execute them. But in his grace and mercy and working with his gospel intent to count the sacrifices to them until Jesus would pay the price fully, he pardons them.
Not only does he pardon them, but they also eat and drink with him in his presence.
Whether they took the food and drink up with them or God set a table for them, I can’t be sure.
But the first thing I thought of when I was writing this was Jesus having breakfast for his disciples already on the shore after his resurrection while they were fishing. He invited them to come and eat and share some of what he helped them catch that moment. See John 21:9. Jesus just provided for them, and no wonder, he provides what is needed for his people.
Eating is a holy activity and is to be treated as such. Eating is necessary, and as a necessity, Jesus provides it for his people.
We are accepted in, by, and through Jesus’ cross for us, and not just rescued, but made sons and daughters and invited to his feast to be taken care of.
God restores fellowship by inviting us to walk with him by faith until his appointed day. 24:12-18
After the feast, the representatives go back to the daily work of leading the people, and the Lord invites Moses up for 40 days of receiving instruction for the people, and he takes Joshua to a point with him.
40 days is significant for the Christian.
40 days of rain in the deluge for Noah. Moses on the mountain 40 days receiving instruction. Israel’s 40 years in the desert for purging and testing. Elijah’s 40 days of journey to Mount Horeb to receive guidance and some correction. Jesus’ fasting 40 days and nights in preparation for his earthly ministry. Jesus’ post resurrection appearances over 40 days full of final instructions.
40 days for the Christian is loaded with significance. Preparation, testing, instruction, growth, and transitions to new beginnings. 40 days on the mountain is not all ease and win after win. 40 days is the invitation to enjoy God’s personal and tangible presence while we hear and obey his word for all the challenges that come with being on mission with him.
Because of the good news of the kingdom, we have personal and tangible fellowship with God restored. Through faith and by faith alone in Jesus, we are justified, given a new heart with new desires, given the Holy Spirit, and we have ongoing access to Father-Son-Spirit to lead us and fellowship with us as we join him on mission to see his kingdom come as all things are restored back to its Edenic state.
This missional life is life in the cloud of God’s presence, and it’s not all the time easy. On this side of the eternal kingdom, we get God’s present fellowship to help us prepare, be tested to grow, receive instruction on how to live by faith, and we learn to transition to new seasons of life until all things are restored. Mission complete, and fully prepared for glory in creation restored.
This is why Jesus reminds us that reward awaits those who stick it out. We are being prepared in our “40 days” on the mountain for Eden regained, and it’s worth it.
Application
Do you feel like you are on mission navigating the supernatural cosmos with God’s present fellowship, or do you feel like you are self-powered, out of gas, and God is distant and doesn’t care?
Maybe we live completely in the flesh and not tapping into the power of God for mission.
What can we do to tap into life in the cloud of God’s presence on mission? How do we live in the cosmological reality that we are not merely battling flesh and blood and are in fact in a conflict for the glory of Jesus?
I have three vital pursuits that I believe sit at the top of the chart for us to practice in order to tap into life in the cloud of God’s presence on mission.
Pursue God’s glory and each other’s honor.
These go together, and I’ll show you why.
Psalm 29:1-2 (ESV) 1 Ascribe to the LORD, O heavenly beings, ascribe to the LORD glory and strength. 2 Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his name; worship the LORD in the splendor of holiness.
Exodus 20:12 (ESV) 12 “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.
The root word for “glory” and “honor” is the same word. So, glory is honor and honor is glory.
Sometimes we translate them differently based on who is receiving the attention. When it’s the Lord, we usually translate it “glory”. When humans receive the attention, we usually translate it as “honor”. But there are examples in the Bible where we translate the attention given to God as “honor”.
Why?
Isaiah 43:7 says we were created to give God glory, honor. So, we are commanded to honor God, glorify him.
God’s law demands we honor parents. God uses the same word in relation to how we approach him on how we are to treat parents and other people, particularly of the family of faith.
Glory and honor matter to God. Glory/honor means to ascribe weight to, to consider, to defer to.
To set a culture and atmosphere that honors God and honors fellow church members seems significant to God.
Do we live every moment under the glory, the weighty reality of God’s presence and living to and for him in that moment to the point we can hear the Spirit’s directions in the very moment? The lack of honor and glory to God is prerequisite to unbelief, and if we don’t live with the weightiness of God as primary, we are really on the line of self-worship.
Do we consider each other so much that we would put our wants behind each other’s wants? Do we live in such a way that we honor one another so much that we would do nothing to prevent the other from their awareness of God’s presence?
Learn and practice contrition.
Isaiah 57:15 (ESV) 15 For thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: “I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.
“Contrite” – destroyed, dust
Isaiah 66:2 (ESV) 2 All these things my hand has made, and so all these things came to be, declares the LORD. But this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.
“Contrite” – lame; stricken
Psalm 51:17 (ESV) 17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.
“Contrite” – broken.
Contrition is what people mean in Christian circles when they say “broken”. A contrite person has accurately evaluated themselves before God and sees themselves as needing to get as low as they can, in the dust, destroyed, undone, stricken in comparison, completely broken.
Think of Isaiah’s response in Isaiah 6 when he saw Jesus. Woe is me!!!
Contrition is not self-centered self-deprecation. Contrition is person’s response to the holiness of God, and it’s not a denial of the gospel. Contrition is not condemnation. Contrition is humility in response to God’s saving and nearness.
The contrite is who God dwells with, revives, those to whom he looks, and those he will never despise.
Do you want to live in the cloud of God’s presence and receive his reviving power? Be contrite.
How? He said to Isaiah in 66:2, they tremble at his word. If you are not trembling at his word, you are not doing much with it. Get in it, tremble before it, and that’s a good start.
Don’t presume upon the Lord anything. Let his word speak, and wrestle with it. Let his word shape your opinions of yourself and your ideas and your values and actions.
Get as low as you can in honor of his presence. Do you need to be lifted? Get as low as you can.
James 4:6 (ESV) 6 But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.”
One very practical way to learn contrition is learning Sabbath. I’ve given you enough over the last few weeks to begin to practice Sabbath in everything all the time.
Nothing will get you lower to the ground than letting go of what you are trying to control and can’t and surrendering it to God for his outcomes while receiving from him peace and release as you trust him. Contrition might begin there for you.
Pray.
I think I’m beginning to believe that ease and lack of hardship makes us neglect prayer and thus being on mission and encountering hardship fuels prayer, and only then do we learn prayer if we learn it at all.
Learn from Jesus’ instructions on prayer in Matthew 6:5-14.
I don’t mean prayer requests. I mean praying.
What if we replaced prayer requests with people praying? Like, if someone has a request, they just bring it to the Lord as we dedicate time to prayer the way Jesus taught us to pray.
All great moves of God history are the outworkings of people praying.
2 Chronicles 7:13-15 (ESV) 13 When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locust to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people, 14 if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land. 15 Now my eyes will be open and my ears attentive to the prayer that is made in this place.
I’m not convinced we need another gathering to pray.
When you get together in RL groups, rather than voicing requests, pray. Whoever has something to ask the Father for, ask him in prayer. Since we are all priests of the Lord, just ask him.
Don’t spend time informing God. He knows what we need before we ask, so keep the prayer short. Jesus was clear about this. We are not to pray like unbelievers believing we are heard for many words. That’s Baal not Jesus.
Direct your words to the Father not the people in the room with you. Be careful with your words. Words carry life and death, and where they are directed matter.
When we enter corporate prayer on Sundays, those who lead, be clear in what we are asking the Father for and be clear when you want people to begin praying. When you are led to pray, pray.
Set time aside daily to pray. Try setting an alarm on your phone 4 times in the day, and when it goes off just being praying exactly what Jesus taught us to pray. Branch out from there.
Learn the prayers of the Bible. Pray them.
Pray the Psalms.
Sow prayer in tears as they come.
Before we worship, let’s close in corporate prayer:
- Pray we would see, enjoy, and pursue God’s glory among the nations.
- Pray we would learn to be contrite.
- Pray that we would learn prayer as is pleasing to God and for our joy in him.