Sermon Notes: Exodus 28:15-30 – The Breastpiece of Judgment
Last week we studied the “ephod” that was the long and sleeveless garment the priest would wear that had the two onyx stones worked into it on the shoulders.
Attached to the “ephod” is the “breastpiece of judgment”. By the name, we can begin to see that the Lord has in mind some manner of communicating his purposes to us. God makes judgments, and we need to know what they are. What is God’s heart on the matter? Right? Very important.
This garment is roughly 9 inches square, and it has woven into it with gold wire four rows of three precious or semi-precious stones.
Interestingly, just about all these gemstones are recounted in Ezekiel’s prophetic vision of the fall of the King of Tyre as Ezekiel likens the king’s fall from grace to one of the guardian cherubim who flank God’s throne and was present in Eden and walked among the fiery nature of these gemstones (Ezekiel 28:13). We see these gemstones again in John’s vision of the foundation of the capital city of the kingdom of Heaven in Revelation 21:19, 20. So, it’s not a stretch to say that the tabernacle and the clothing of the priest was God putting on display what was lost in Eden and what God was restoring with his presence among his people.
Take note that this piece of the priest’s clothing is called the “breastpiece of judgment”. God intends to do something very specific to bless his people with this item: He’s going to provide for them how to know his will, his direction, his heart for them.
Let’s read about it: Exodus 28:29-30
What should we observe?
1) God’s people are on his heart.
Repetition is important in the Bible. When God repeats something, he is making sure we get it.
We saw last week how the ephod was joined at the shoulders with two onyx stones with the names of the people of God engraved on them. We learned that God actively remembers his people and the covenant he made with them. Now, the next section repeats the same idea with a different piece of the clothing. With the breastpiece, the Lord has each name engraved on a different gemstone and over the heart of the priest.
Once again, the Lord lets his people know that he is actively keeping his covenant by bringing them near to him, revealing himself to them, and they are literally and metaphorically near his heart.
What God does to keep his people near to him is holy, glorious, and beautiful. God loves his people, and when his people rebel or walk away it’s not because God is not near or loves or cares for his people. It is because they have other dark loves that cause them to lust after other gods, some of their own making, and they leave.
Know, God loves his people, and he brings all who love him near to him.
Jesus has made this precious gift accessible through faith in him and his completed work on the cross and his ascended High Priestly role with and before the Father for all who will trust him.
2) God makes sure his people know his heart.
God desires that his people know his heart’s desire for them. That means God wants his people to know his will, his way.
This item the priest was to wear is called the “breastpiece of judgment”. That is that God would provide a means of his people to judge correctly what they should do with this part of the priest’s clothing.
In the breastpiece there is a place to keep two mysterious means of his people knowing God’s heart, his will, his direction, his judgment. He calls them the Urim and Thummim. These items are not translated just transliterated from Hebrew straight into English.
Urim – One of the “stones kept in a pouch on the high-priest’s breastplate, used in determining God’s decision in certain questions and issues. Urim = ‘lights’”.[1] So, light to determine God’s decisions on various issues.
Thummim – One of the “stones provided for the means of achieving a sacred lot. 1a used with the Urim, the will of God was revealed. Thummim = ‘perfections’”.[2] So, a perfection to understand a particular lot, or the larger scope of God’s will. Thus, we might say things like “that’s my ‘lot’ in life. In other words, God’s will had determined the larger scope of what is going on.
Urim helped answer questions and issues that arose among the people of God. Thummim, used along with the Urim helped reveal the larger scope of God’s will, the lot he had for them. These items would be referred to in other places in the Bible as the “lot”.
In other words, the Lord provided a way for his people to know exactly what his heart was in a matter. He wants them to know his will because he knows how to navigate the complex world of fallen and broken systems and the forces that run those systems. He wants them to know exactly where to step and where to go and what to avoid. So, they would ideally come and inquire of the Lord and the Lord would answer them.
In Johsua 9:1-14 we learn about the Gibeonite deception where Israel needed to consult the Lord and didn’t and got themselves into a pickle. Listen to Joshua 9:14 (ESV) 14 So the men took some of their provisions, but did not ask counsel from the LORD.
The fact that God calls them “lights” and “perfections” indicates that he will shed light on what is unknown, and his directions or instructions would be absolutely perfect for them.
Additionally, the prescribed use of these “lots” to determine what to do indicates the Lord is in charge of how these lots would fall. Think about it, God is so in charge of his creation that he makes dice land in a particular way.
If you break that down, it means that from the priest’s hold on the dice, to the friction applied passively as they are tossed, to the friction of the molecules in the air as those dice pass through the air, to the physics of every action having an equal and opposite reaction as they hit the surface, and how the molecules of the dice respond to the molecules of the surface they are landing on that make it harder or softer, and finally how they land, and likely a thousand other microscopic factors of physics, the Lord is running all of them to make the Urim and Thummim do his bidding.
It is about these stones in the breastpiece that the writer of the Proverbs writes this: Proverbs 16:33 (ESV) 33 The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD.
Can we just revel in that for a moment.
There is nothing that mentions folks who are not priests using these items to determine decisions. The priests would use them, for instance, to determine which goat was to be sacrificed to the Lord and which one sent to Azazel (Lev. 16:8). There are a few other occasions where they are mentioned in decision making, but we don’t need to go over each one.
To show that it was primarily a priestly function, Ezra and Nehemiah want to consult the Urim and Thummim about consuming the food from of offerings but would not do so until there was a priest who was from the correct line of descent to employ the means of determining the Lord’s will (Neh. 7:65, Ezra 2:63). This decision to not consult the Urim and Thummim without a legit priest is wise because evil people with evil intent can take the Lord’s holy means of his people learning his way and turn it into a dark means of consulting dark forces or a justification for doing their own thing.
However, it becomes clear that the lot was used by non-priestly folks with a holy intent to determine what they should do, because they used that means to determine who would succeed Judas in Acts 1:12-26.
In fact, this is the last time recorded in the Bible the people of God used this method to determine God’s illumined and perfect way was in Acts when the apostles needed to determine who would replace Judas. Listen to Acts 1:12-26 (ESV) 12 Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath day’s journey away. 13 And when they had entered, they went up to the upper room, where they were staying, Peter and John and James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot and Judas the son of James. 14 All these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.
15 In those days Peter stood up among the brothers (the company of persons was in all about 120) and said, 16 “Brothers, the Scripture had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spoke beforehand by the mouth of David concerning Judas, who became a guide to those who arrested Jesus. 17 For he was numbered among us and was allotted his share in this ministry.” 18 (Now this man acquired a field with the reward of his wickedness, and falling headlong he burst open in the middle and all his bowels gushed out. 19 And it became known to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the field was called in their own language Akeldama, that is, Field of Blood.) 20 “For it is written in the Book of Psalms, “‘May his camp become desolate, and let there be no one to dwell in it’; and “‘Let another take his office.’ 21 So one of the men who have accompanied us during all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, 22 beginning from the baptism of John until the day when he was taken up from us—one of these men must become with us a witness to his resurrection.” 23 And they put forward two, Joseph called Barsabbas, who was also called Justus, and Matthias. 24 And they prayed and said, “You, Lord, who know the hearts of all, show which one of these two you have chosen 25 to take the place in this ministry and apostleship from which Judas turned aside to go to his own place.” 26 And they cast lots for them, and the lot fell on Matthias, and he was numbered with the eleven apostles.
After this last use of lots recorded in the Bible, the use of Urim and Thummim, the text of Scripture will say things like this and will never again consult the “breastpiece of judgement”:
Acts 13:2-3 (ESV) 2 While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.” 3 Then after fasting and praying they laid their hands on them and sent them off.
Acts 15:28 (ESV) 28 For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay on you no greater burden than these requirements:…
We will come back to this in a bit. Hang on.
Now, we can’t say for certain how the practice of consulting the lots came to be used apart from the priests, but it did, and it seems that when righteous people needed to know God’s heart on a matter and used this means, he honored it.
We also don’t know how these items were made and exactly the method of casting them, just that they were made and used. This is God’s good grace to us because we would likely hijack this good and temporary grace that is to lead to something better and turn it into witchcraft like the dark forces have done over the ages.
What we can say for certain is that God wants us to know his heart, his way, his will, his judgment on all matters, so he gave his people a way of making his heart known to them.
Now, you are probably thinking like me that a couple of dice would be a nice option for clear decisions. Should we go here or there or do this or that?
Yet the Lord chose to not leave us with Urim and Thummim as the means of knowing his mind, his heart, his will. He gives us a more sure and more relational way of knowing God’s heart: The Holy Spirit, God with each one of us.
Now, hang with me.
Jesus is the fulfillment of all the tabernacle and the priests were a shadow of. Jesus takes us before the Father on an ongoing basis. He saves to the uttermost those who place their trust in him, and he faithfully pleads for us before the Father. And don’t get it wrong. It’s not like Jesus loves us and covers us in front of a begrudging Father and keeps the grumpy Father off us.
No, Jesus is the heart of God for his people in action. Jesus’ as our High Priest is the Father’s active love for us on display. And the Father’s active love for us did not leave us alone when the Lord Jesus rose and ascended to the Father’s right hand in his High Priestly work for us.
God the Father and Jesus the Son sent us the Counselor, the Holy Spirit to be with us, as the Triune God of Creation takes up residence with us and inside of us as his people to guide us according to God’s good heart, good will for us.
Listen to Jesus:
John 14:15-18 (ESV) 15 “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper (“allos parakletos” not “heteros parakletos” …another one of the same kind.)[3], to be with you forever, 17 even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. 18 “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. (Note the personal pronoun shift from “he” to “I”. Holy Spirit is Jesus with us.)[4]
John 14:26 (ESV) 26 But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name (Holy Spirit represents Jesus not himself.)[5], he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.
John 15:26 (ESV) 26 “But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me. (The Holy Spirit will witness to Jesus’ heart and will.)[6]
John 16:4-15 (ESV) “I did not say these things to you from the beginning, because I was with you. 5 But now I am going to him who sent me, and none of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ 6 But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. 7 Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. 8 And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment: 9 concerning sin, because they do not believe in me; 10 concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no longer; 11 concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.12 “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. 13 When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. 14 He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. 15 All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what Is mine and declare It to you.
Because of Jesus’ fulfilled work for us, we have the heart of God, God’s will and good judgment in all things as the relational and present Counselor with us in the Person of the Holy Spirit.
No dice to throw. We get to have the ever-present companion and help in the very person of the Holy Spirit, the Triune God with us.
Wow!
Application
What if what we just learned is not good news to you? What if you believe that a good set of holy dice would be clearer than the Holy Spirit?
For all our advancement and available resources, humans in our part of creation are not emotionally and mentally in a place to receive the news that Holy Spirit is better and clearer than dice on a table, and that is sad.
I’m not saying this to shame us, I’m saying this because it’s reality.
We are so full of unnecessary things that our spiritual antennas just pick up static.
What are we supposed to do?
- To know the counsel of the Holy Spirit, you will need to get to know yourself better and how the Lord Jesus created you.
Somehow, we have adopted a theology that demeans humans as image-bearers and the knowledge of how that works as inferior to theology proper, and that automatically is bad theology.
If we are created in the Triune God’s image, we are not losing ground to study the nature of mankind.
We are not merely a biome of physical existence. The brain is not the soul or spirit. The soul is not the spirit. The spirit of man is not the soul.
The Hebrew understanding of mankind is that he is a “living being” “nephesh” (Genesis 2:7). The Hebrew understanding of Adam is that he is a mash up of physical and non-physical parts.
The Greek understanding articulated by Paul (under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit) in 1 Thessalonians is that our nature has three distinct parts: 1 Thessalonians 5:23 (ESV) 23 Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
We can’t get too deep in the weeds here. You are going to have to go do some Proverbs 25:2 work on your own and together in fellowship.
Suffice it to say that we are fearfully and wonderfully made, and we are the image of God in his Triune nature.
A follower of Jesus who is reading their Bible is continually being confronted with who God is, who they are, and what sin has done to us. That Christian is then growing in understanding themselves in relationship to God, and they come face to face with how our nature is broken and being put back together by God in sanctification. He’s not just sweeping up sin. He’s repairing our relationship with him, with ourselves, with each other, and with creation. Lots of sanctifying going on.
We learn how our individual parts interact, and we learn that in that interaction we are always receiving information in the form of thoughts and ideas that affect our system of integrated ideas that then affects our body’s responses. Mind to soul to body.
When we become aware of this process, we start to practice discernment on the source of thoughts and ideas as either from myself, God, or some other source that may or may not have my best interest in mind. So, we learn to filter. What is our filter? It should be God’s word.
As the filter of God’s word gets better integrated, we begin to be able to discern the source and quality of the information, and thus we become aware of guidance and who is guiding us. Dark forces? Me? Sanctified me? Fleshly me? Holy Spirit?
However, if all we do is respond to our body’s cravings or warnings without discernment, we get caught in a swirl of rumination in the body and soul that is hard to escape, and it leads to mental and emotional breaking points.
So, we need to get to know ourselves and how the Wise Creator Jesus put us together to interact with him.
Get yourself into “Anatomy of the Soul” by Curt Thompson. Get into “Cleaning Up My Mental Mess” by Caroline Leaf. Get into “Emotionally Healthy Spirituality” by Pete Scazzero.
You are going to have to come to terms with the reality that truth is God’s, and it comes in the Bible, in creation, and in the hard work to search out reality after you filter away all the spin of competing agendas.
Pursue truth with God’s word as your filter, and you will learn about yourself and how God put you together to relate to him.
Test me in that and see if I’m telling you the truth. Do not take my word for it. Go get after it yourself, and let the results speak for themselves.
2) We must understand that confusion about the counsel of the Lord is not because the Lord is unclear. It is in our lack of understanding, attunement, and prayer.
Lack of clarity about the Lord’s heart for us is often rooted in the fact that we know more about “The Office”, Jim and Pam’s relationship, Dwight’s farm, or if Toby is the Scranton Strangler than we know about God and ourselves in his image from his word.
We simply have no excuse for not knowing God’s word. If we don’t understand, it’s not God’s fault.
Understanding leads to the action of attunement. You might say “mindfulness”. When you get to know God through his word, you begin to dial in your spirit’s antenna and can know what is going on in your person and how you are interacting with yourself and can discern how the Spirit is working all that process as well.
Prayer is faith in action, and prayer puts us in the place to hear and be shaped by the Spirit. And prayer takes time and discipline.
If we don’t invest in these parts of our being and disciplines of the faith, we are going to be longing for some dice to throw.
3) We can’t grieve the Spirit with unconfessed sin and hard hearts to his word and each other and expect communication from God.
1 Peter 3:7 (ESV) 7 Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.
If my prayers can be hindered because I’m being a goober to my wife, then how much more my ability to hear the Spirit if I’m grieving him and hardened to personal and corporate repentance?
Ephesians 4:30-32 (ESV) 30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. 32 Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.
We can grieve the Spirit by our behavior, our language, and our hardness or tenderness toward each other.
1 John 1:9-10 (ESV) 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.
John is not talking about a reapplication of justification here. The justifying work of the cross is once for all. Jesus keeps that up in his High Priestly work on our behalf with no effort of our own.
What John is addressing is the relational aspect of our salvation that results from justification. Forgiveness is not justification.
Forgiveness is relational. When we sin against our spouse, we don’t go get remarried. We ask for forgiveness and grow our relationship.
When we live in sin, we grieve the Spirit. In confession, we acknowledge our wrong and plead for restored fellowship not to be justified again.
If we are struggling to hear the Spirit, is there sin we need to confess? Tell the Lord. Tell a faithful fellow church member.
Are we hard-hearted toward someone in the fellowship? Repent.
Don’t go tell them when you repent and hurt them and make them suspicious of themselves because they will have no clue what they did, and you wound them in such childish behavior. Our hard-heartedness is our own fault, don’t sooth our consciences at the expense of another. Repent, and move forward. If someone hurt us legitimately, then that’s another issue. But if we are just hard-hearted because we are a jerk, then that’s on us.
4) We must learn how to still our mind.
Stilling our minds is a discipline that involves interaction between mind, soul, and body. If you are unaware of these, go back to the first application.
Stilling our minds is a discipline of putting away what causes our minds to get unstill. Only you know what those things are, and only you can manage those. You are going to have to exercise the Spirit fruit of self-control and put away things that created havoc in your mind.
5) Pray: Honor/Contrition/Prayer/Increase TRC/Seek Kingdom and Righteousness/Send
[1] James Strong, Enhanced Strong’s Lexicon (Woodside Bible Fellowship, 1995).
[2] James Strong, Enhanced Strong’s Lexicon (Woodside Bible Fellowship, 1995).
[3] Parenthesis mine.
[4] Parenthesis mine.
[5] Parenthesis mine.
[6] Parenthesis mine.