i was sure your favorite bible character was going to be matthew matthew i missed that one i'm sorry well let me remind you of the three presuppositions for our bible study together i think you know them well by now but just in case you don't i'll go over it i think i better do this every day there may be a few people that have wandered in that haven't been with us all week and so we're we're studying characters in the bible but in a little bit different way because we're trying to say that that uh
the individuals are not the real hero the story the real hero of bible stories is god and what we learn about god is what we're really looking for i've been quoting jeremiah 31 verse 3 the lord appeared to us in the past if that's true about so many instances where he appeared we want to see what his face looked like we want to really try to get acquainted with the lord that's what we're looking for to try to find god as the hero of every story and then secondly i've been saying that the bible is
god's voice speaking to us the important thing for you and me today is not just seeing what happened to those people back there when god was talking to them but how does that translate to what god wants to say to you and me today it is in this way that we hear the voice of god in our own time and in our own place that's the important thing that we hear the voice of god speaking to us romans 15 4 everything that was written in the past was written to teach us that's what we're looking
for and then finally i'm i'm becoming more and more convinced every day i study the bible that the bible stories are really about salvation it's not so much about all the other things that could be but about salvation is this guy going to circle our tent to the whole day here come on down and listen why don't you we're trying to find out about salvation not just the great stories and as they happened but about salvation second timothy 3 15 the bible is able to make us wise unto salvation let's study it with that in
mind so with those three presuppositions and so far no one has jumped me afterwards and disagreed with any of those presuppositions so i'm going to assume that we're all reading off the same page i want to talk this morning about the the wanderings of the children of israel in the wilderness and the articles of furniture that inhabited the sanctuary that was right in the center of the israelite camp it's interesting the bible's word for journeying without direction is wandering and the children of israel are the greatest wanderers in the bible story aren't they journeying without
direction because they weren't following god's leading for what they really wanted it was pretty it's pretty clear in the bible that it was god's plan to take them out of egypt with a mighty hand through the red sea on dry ground with these amazing demonstrations of god's power over against the power of the egyptian gods which is a whole another study isn't it at a time i believe when egypt was at the height of its power there is debate exactly when the exodus took place the 18th dynasty in the 20th dynasty many people who who
are proponents of a 20th dynasty exodus say that because they find a place in the 20th dynasty where egypt was weak and didn't have much power and probably couldn't stop an uprising of slaves against their owners their masters who would just walk out of the country i don't think that's the way god works i think god would find no particular glory in humbling a nation that is already humble it seems to me that god brought the the slaves out the israelites out probably at the height of egyptian power it's one of the reasons i believe
in the 18th dynasty and and the pharaoh and the that is usually given the 18th dynasty time of the exodus probably the most powerful pharaoh of all of egyptian history but it was god's idea to bring the children of israel through the red sea establish them as his people around the holy mountain mount sinai give them his commandments give them the directions that he wanted to go and then take them directly into the promised land don't you believe that was god's plan but of course the people did not follow that and they ended up wandering
without direction for 40 years being scattered not knowing where you're going that's what wandering is all about being lost unable to find your way to where you really want to be and i think it's probably a good definition of people today who are wandering without spiritual direction in their lives wandering is a good word for us too i'm sure you have all experienced being lost i've been driving out with stephen from his home about 10 minutes away and not paying any attention to how to get to camp from his house until i found out that
this afternoon i'm going to drive from his house out to here and suddenly it became very important to me when to turn where right and one to turn left i've been lost a couple of times the very first time i went to europe i was driving in belgium with uh seven other people we had two cars and we were following my wife's brother and his car and we were driving trying to get out to the airport in brussels from where we were and we were driving around and around and trying to find the signs that
said to the airport and trying to to get there at a good time and and i began to notice that there was this one ancient round tower that we passed three times and i thought i'm sure the road from here to the airport didn't mean to take us to the air around the tower three times finally pulled him over and i said i think we're lost it was a wrong thing to say to my wife's brother he said well if you think you're so smart you lead so i led and we only passed the tower
two more times i'm happy to say finally we got to the airport it's terrible thing to be lost and not know where you're going isn't it to be wandering around without direction without knowing there's probably no better illustration of the israelite wandering than the episode we read in exodus chapter 32 the the episode about the golden calf if you'd like to turn there to exodus 32. can you hear me okay with the airplane or need to speak up a little bit you okay all right i have no idea what i'm saying can't hear myself but
if you can that's fine you remember this amazing story moses is up in the mountains where down below in the camp the israelites are beginning to complain again you remember they didn't take the israelites very long to begin grumbling they were grumbling before two months had passed from leaving egypt asking for more food and for more water and why are we coming out here to die and now they begin to grumble again and they go to the leader that's left in the camp moses's brother aaron and aaron is um a little non-plus [Music] is that
from the airplane or was it something else we had this yesterday didn't we [Music] how can you possibly concentrate how can i concentrate what were we talking good morning my name is stuart tyner no no we did that didn't we okay i'm going to try to forge ahead somebody will correct that can you sing too i think we're in the kindergarten tent [Music] what a sweet voice she has i if she comes on again let's sing with her we can do that okay we'll try it again in the golden calf episode the children of israel
come to aaron aaron doesn't know quite what to do but he gives in to the wishes of the wandering people who have been staying in the same place for a few days but they're wandering spiritually already and interestingly while he is down there making the golden calf and the people begin to dance around it the scene in exodus 32 shifts back up to the mountain to god's discussion with moses there and all of a sudden verse 7 breaks into the golden calf episode with the dialogue between god and and moses look what it says chapter
32 of exodus verse 7. then the lord said to moses go down because your people whom you brought out of egypt have become corrupt interesting verse isn't it and can't you imagine the look on moses's face when god said your people whom you brought out of egypt are becoming corrupt i think moses said at that point excuse me just a minute i thought they were your people i thought you brought them out of egypt how did they get to be my people and how come i'm bringing them out of egypt all of a sudden and
god said to them to moses when they begin worshiping the golden calf instead of me they're your people not mine oh amazing moment for moses up in mount sinai isn't that just an amazing moment and so moses goes down to the camp and again in this same chapter one of the most astonishing dialogues in the entire bible takes place and i have to tell you that this conversation the one between moses and his brother aaron is for me one of the proofs of the inspiration of the bible it is a proof of the inspiration of
the bible to me because i'm sure no human being would have made this up look what happens moses comes down the people are dancing around the golden calf moses finds aaron in the middle of the crowd and he begins to say don't be angry with me aaron says to moses you know how prone these people are to evil and then he begins to tell his brother what happens and look at verse 24 i told them whoever whoever has any gold jewelry take it off and then aaron says to his brother they gave me the gold
i threw it into the fire and out came this calf is that not amazing nobody would have made that up moses who we believe wrote the story surely would not have put those words in his brother's mouth he didn't dislike his brother and want us all to think he was an idiot no this is a true story it happened this way and moses remembered aaron's word i threw in the gold and out came this calf which obviously is not the way it happened just a great example of the spiritual wandering that was going on with
the people and with aaron their leader at that same time moses you remember what happened then punishes the people he goes back up to the mountain and another great conversation takes place in in chapter 33. moses has gone back up to the lord and the lord has said to him i want you to go ahead and go into the promised land there you'll you'll defeat all the enemies that are going i'm going to send an angel ahead of you your enemies will be defeated you will love the promised land but i have to tell you
i'm not going to go with you god says to moses early in chapter 33 verse 3 go up to the land flowing with milk and honey but i will not go with you because you're a stiff-necked people and i might destroy you on the way god understanding that evil and divinity do not coexist and so he says i i'm a little fearful of my own power here and my temper might break out about something if somebody comes up to me and says i threw in the gold and the fire and out came the calf i'm
not sure what i might do to them he says so the angel will go with you but i'm not going and again moses moses mouth drops open as he hears god's words to him and this beautiful plea that he has in verse 15 and 16. look in the look in 16 how will anyone know that you're pleased with me and your people unless you go with us what else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth what else will distinguish us from everyone else unless your presence
is with us my friends it is the same for you and me today what distinguishes us you and me from everybody else in the world is not that we go to church on the seventh day of the week it's not that we pay tithe it's not that we expect jesus to come again what distinguishes us from all other people is only if the presence of god is with us is the presence of god with us as we worship on the seventh day of the week is the presence of god with us as we talk to
each other about the second coming is the presence of god with us as we meet together in the big tent a camp meeting here this morning if it is then we are the happiest people in the world and god's presence is fullness of joy if we're grumpy with each other if we're giving only to build golden calves if we are critical of each other if we can't find joy in the sun and the rain that are sent to us if we're constantly complaining if spiritually we're wandering around and god's present isn't with us and we're
no different than anybody else in the world if we want to be a unique people a peculiar people then we must go back to exodus 33 and say to god the same thing that moses said to him what else will distinguish us from all the people in the world unless your presence is with us degree we must wake up every day and make sure that we are aware of god's presence because frankly god's here isn't he he's here in the tent he's here in the campgrounds he's here in your lovely country he's here with us
god's presence is in everywhere but unless we are aware of his presence we don't act like he's here we can deny that god's presence is with us if we just ignore it and act like he's not around when you whisper conversations to the person next to you are you aware of the fact that god's presence is here and he hears the words you whisper as well when you are critical of of your neighbor or the leaders in the campground when you don't like the way the security guards are are keeping the parking lots dry they're
not doing a very good job of that so let's criticize those people with the hats and the you know god's listening to that too why don't we start acting like god's presence is here why don't we begin to treat each other like god's presence is here one more point before we leave this episode just over in chapter 35 as they begin to build the tabernacle which moses brought the instructions down from the mountain when he came they need the all of the materials to to build the tabernacle you remember all the things that they have
to put together they've got to build from something nobody went to the building supply store and brought out all the building supplies into the desert and so they asked the people in a big congregation we need you to bring and they give them a list of the things that they need and verse 20 says of chapter 35 the whole israelite community withdrew from moses's presence everyone who was willing and whose heart moved came back and brought an offering to the lord for the work of the ten of meeting and for all of its services and
for the sacred garments all who were willing men and women alike came and brought gold jewelry of all kinds brooches earrings rings and ornaments they all presented their gold as a wave offering to the lord anyone who had blue or purple or scarlet yarn fine linen the same thing it's interesting to me that the process is exactly the same for people bringing their gold and their silver and their finery there are two things that can happen with our possessions we can give them to aaron to make a golden calf or we can give them to
moses to build the tabernacle the same kinds of things are given the same giving process is there only with one giving we create golden calves and with the other giving we create tabernacles where are your what is happening to the giving that you're doing where are your possessions going i don't think this is about the particular kind of possessions that people gave i think it's about the purpose of the giving you can give your gold and your silver to make golden calves and many of us do much of our lives we create things that ultimately
will be crushed into little pieces and strewn on the ground or we can create places for people to worship god places for people to understand the god the presence of god with us it is the purpose of our giving that's important here so that people begin to learn some lessons about wandering and one of the lessons that keep us from wandering is to follow god's direction and here he gives us the directions for building a place of worship exodus 25 8 earlier in the story he said make me a sanctuary that i might dwell among
you you know the only other place in the bible where this kind of language is used is in john chapter 1 verse 14 where jesus became a human and dwelt among us the message bible paraphrases this jesus became a human and he moved into our neighborhood i like that translation he moved into our neighborhood it's an important thing to understand that the incarnation of god's ministry to humans happens in our neighborhoods in the year 1444 in switzerland one great artist who lived in geneva decided to paint a picture of jesus walking on the water out
to the disciples in the boat and peter getting out of the boat and walking to jesus the theme of biblical stories has always been one of the three major themes that great artists use they use the stories of mythology especially roman and greek mythology they use contemporary slices of life portraits of people um still lives still still paintings of bowls of fruit and flowers or they'll walk outside and put up an easel and and paint an avenue of trees but the bible story is also a constant inspiration to people who who paint and throughout the
years of painting up till 1444 people always tried to paint the bible stories in exactly the way that they thought the bible characters would have appeared in the bible bible robes the costumes and they tried to picture what what the holy land would look like but conrad vitz in 1444 had a different idea and when he finally unveiled this huge painting that's still in the art museum in geneva the people who were looking at the painting suddenly gasped because they recognized the place where they lived vitz had done the painting not of jesus on the
sea of galilee but jesus walking out on lake geneva and in the background were not the rolling hills in the background of the sea of galilee but way in the back you could see the alps there's mont blanc there to the left of the painting is the salive the mountain under which the adventist school of colon still sits today and the people recognized their lake their mountains and suddenly they looked at the bible characters and they were dressed like the people in the middle of the 15th century in geneva would have been dressed jesus has
a long flowing red robe the disciples looked like fishermen on the lake of geneva in the middle of the 15th century and vids started in that year that was the first time anybody painted a biblical story in contemporary settings in costumes but from that point on all great artists to follow that that example and from then on the next few centuries were all about painting the biblical characters and the biblical scenes in the time of the people that lived who viewed the painting and i believe it ought to be called the incarnation principle of art
and all the rest of the great artists do it until our day in our day the people that paint the biblical stories are again trying to put jesus and the bible characters back in their time you seldom see a picture of jesus do you in a suit or dressed like any of us are dressed here at camp the adventist painter harry anderson came close when he painted the picture of jesus knocking at the united nations building in new york it's frequently on the cover of his steps to christ at least we have a contemporary building
and a in a modern city but jesus still in his long white robes knocking at the united nations building the closest i remember seeing to it was a series of illustrations that insight magazine created to be shown to young people must have been in the uh mid-80s when i was working at the review in herald and were done by the artist daryl tank and perhaps you remember them they're they're hanging in walls and churches many places now jesus in one place is sitting in a in a chair reading a newspaper have you seen the painting
and and uh the headlines in the front or on some of the terrible things that are happening in our worlds today and there's a tear coming out of jesus's eye as he's reading the newspaper another painting jesus is leaning out of a window in a house and he's watching two young boys paint the side of the house they have overalls on and they're painting with big rollers and they're having a great time and there's as much paint on the boys as on the side of the house and jesus is leaning out and he's watching and
he's got a smile on his face laughing at what the boys are doing in another painting jesus is holding a little puppy that apparently has been run over by a car on the highway and you can see the sadness in jesus face the artist daryl tank took jesus and tried to put him in contemporary situations interestingly enough that series of artwork received more criticism from people who saw the artwork and then wrote to the review in herald than any other set of artwork ever published by the reviewer and the theme of most of the criticism
was how dare you put jesus in a contemporary situation it seems to me the question is how dare we not put jesus in a contemporary situation what what do we believe that jesus quit walking among us years ago the presence of the of jesus through the holy spirit is walking on the campground today how dare we not talk about jesus's presence here among us well the incarnation is an incredible principle of divine ministry and by the way it is a principle of our ministry as well effective ministry is always incarnational it moves into the neighborhoods
where we live in your churches every one of them if we if we moved in for a month or so and did a demographic study of just the members of your church we would find out all the neighborhoods that are in your church i'm a pastor at a large church in southern california we have 2600 members in our church and we have many communities in our membership we have we have caucasian communities and hispanic communities and indian communities and thai communities and filipino communities all worshiping together in the same church in my church like in
your church we have communities of senior citizens we have communities of children we have communities of teens and young adults and older adults all different communities with different needs and if ministry to each of those communities is going to be effective it must be incarnational it must come through the community the neighborhood that those people dwell in it's no good in southern california to talk about exactly the same issues that you people face in new zealand it would be no good in new zealand to talk about the issues that they're facing in holland when they're
not the same issues that you face here each community each neighborhood has its own issues and its own community flavor and if our ministry is to be effective it must be incarnational just like jesus is to us well you remember what happened is the people built the sanctuary and all the wonderful things took place there there is the court where they built the the tabernacle in the middle the curtain on the outside and between the curtain and the tabernacle the court and there was a place of sacrifice where sinners would come and present their offering
usually a lamb for poor people perhaps a dove or two they would come sometimes with just a handful of grain if that's all they could do and they would offer their sacrifice if it was a lamb the priest would would help kill it at that point take it over to the labor and it would be washed and then will be offered on the altar burnt offering and then you remember that the the entrance to the holy place was on just one side the priests who were allowed to go into the holy place would go in
and on the right hand side as they entered was the candlestick constantly lit always being always kept going the fire was never let out on the left hand side on the right side was a table showbread wasn't it when they went in the candlestick on the left there toward the most holy place was the altar of incense and then you remember that one time a year the high priest would go into the most holy after taking the sins of everyone in the camp onto his heart and confessing them all before god he would walk to
the one side of the of the curtain move it aside and you remember that the children of israel afraid that some sins would go in unconfessed wove little bells on the bottom of the high priest's garment so they could always hear him moving and if he didn't move for many many hours they would think maybe something was happening and they would try to figure out how to get him out we're told that the way that they figured out how to get him out of the most holy place was they tied a rope around one of
his ankles and if he ever died in front of the the ark of the covenant and many hours would pass and he didn't come out they'd pull on the rug on the rope and try to pull him out you remember that the high priest would go in he would back up to the curtain he would pull it aside he would back into the to the most holy place back in now he was in that place the most holy place of all the places where israel worshiped he would begin to inch his way to the right
until his foot came in contact with a pole there were two long wooden poles overlaid with gold that were put through the rings on the bottom of the ark of the covenant and they stuck this way out underneath the curtain into the holy place and the high priest would move until he came in contact with that pole and then he would lift his leg up and he would step over the pole and now he was right in front of the ark of the covenant and he would turn around and he would begin to communicate with
god there doesn't make you wish you were a high priest just one day of the year you could meet face to face with god and god communicated in a number of ways there well you remember all of those articles of furniture but you remember that they didn't always stay in that very place but that from time to time the israelites would get up in the morning and they would the first thing that they would do would be to go to the to the center of the encampment sometimes we picture the sanctuary the tabernacle right in
the middle and all of the tents crowded around much like we are here but the bible tells us in joshua that there was a large space a thousand yards sorry i can't translate that to meters between the tabernacle and the first row of tents so in the middle of the camp of israel there was this large hollow square a thousand yards in diameter from the from the edge of the square into where the tabernacle was and another thousand yards out to the edge in all directions a thousand yards so people would come to the edge
of the of the great hollow square in the middle of the encampment and they would look there to see if the tabernacle was still there and if it was then everything was fine they would go back to their tents and they would go about their daily experience but sometimes frequently they would come to the edge of the hollow square and they would look and they would notice that the priests were packing up this tabernacle and that the cloudy pillar that was right over the most holy place had gone up into the air and taken off
and whenever that happened people would run back to their tents pack their suitcases pack their tents and then they would begin to get in the order and everybody in the camp would follow the cloudy pillar until the cloudy pillar stopped and they would make camp again the priests who were distinguished to do this kind of thing would run into the most holy place now god's presence had risen and gone on they would take down the uh the tent around it they would pick up the ark of the covenant by those four poles put it on
their shoulders and they would begin to march they were the first ones out of the camp and they marched following the cloudy pillar and they would go until the cloudy pillar stopped and when the pillar stopped the four priests that had the ark of the covenant on their shoulders would march until they were directly underneath the cloudy pillar they would go right underneath it they would orient themselves north south east and west they would put the ark of the covenant down in the right position and then the entire tabernacle was built up around it and
then the people would come and they would build their camp around that very thing just take a minute and and look at uh numbers chapter nine know you know what let's look at the last uh the last chapter in exodus where the same story is given in a little uh less way we won't take time to read numbers nine now but you see in exodus it's uh chapter 40 verse 36 and all the travels of the israelites whenever the cloud lifted from above the tabernacle they would set out but if the cloud did not lift
they did not set out until the day it lifted so the cloud of the lord was over the tabernacle by day and fire was in the cloud by night in the sight of all the house of israel during all their travels it occurred to me studying for this morning that the only time that the children of israel are called travelers instead of wanderers is when they're following the clotted pillar on their own they're lost and they don't seem to understand it and they wander about in the wilderness but when their eyes are fixed on the
presence of god and they're following the cloudy pillar they're travelers sojourners pilgrims wanderers or pilgrims wanderers or travelers it's a good distinction isn't it at the center of the israelite camp was the presence of god in the tabernacle and it is exactly the same for you and me today at the center of our existence is jesus our savior and everything in the tabernacle represents him and his ministry to us the lamb that was sacrificed remember john 1 29 says behold the lamb of god that's jesus the sacrifice itself first john 4 verse 10 this is
love not that we loved god but that he loved us and sent his son as an atoning sacrifice for our sin the sacrifice is jesus the labor where the sacrifices is washed titus chapter 3 verses 4 to 6 when the kindness and love of god our savior appeared he saved us not because of righteous things that we had done because of his mercy he saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the holy spirit who he poured out on us generously through jesus christ our lord the washing represents the ministry of jesus to
us through the holy spirit inside the holy place is the bread of showbread in john 6 51 tells us that that's representing of jesus as well i am the living bread that came down from heaven if anyone eats of this bread he will live forever on the other side of the tabernacle the light john 8 verse 12 i am the light of the world whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life you know when solomon built the temple and the worship was going on it was a great golden
candlestick that was there inside the holy place of the temple as well a copy of what was there in in the wilderness sanctuary and we're told in the mishnah the jewish commentary in the talmud that the wicks of the candlestick were made from the robes of the priest when the priests robes began to wear out and get frayed they wouldn't just throw them away but they would take the robes and they would tear them into strips and plate them together and the wicks of the of the candlestick in solomon's temple were made from the robes
of the priests the robes of uh of the high priest what we often talk about is christ's righteousness what a wonderful picture that is the incense ephesians 5 2 live a life of love just as christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and a sacrifice to god even the curtain into which the high priest went to go into the most holy place john 14 6 says i am the way in the truth and the life jesus says no one comes to the father except through me even the curtain represents
jesus and the mercy seat is where jesus is today ministering in our behalf hebrews 12 verses 2 and 3 let us fix our eyes on jesus the author and perfecter of our faith who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross despising its shame and is set down at the right hand of the throne of god consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men so that you will not grow weary and lose heart and the high priest of course is jesus hebrews 3 verse 1 fix your thoughts on jesus the apostle
and high priest whom we confess at the center of our life at the center of our worshipping is jesus the son of the living god everything we are everything we want to be every behavior we profess every belief that we hold dear is centered in jesus and to the extent that we get away from that core of our behavior and our theology to the extent we get away from the core we are less christian and less seventh-day adventist as we find jesus at the center of everything we do we become what seventh-day adventist christians are
all about followers of the lamb wherever he goes instead of wanderers in a dry and empty desolate wilderness this morning aren't you glad you are a follower of the lamb and not just a wanderer let's pray father it is good for us at this time in our daily activities to pause and to admit that without jesus in our life we're lost we don't know where we're going we have no way to get there but we have awakened this morning and looked into the center of our existence and seen there jesus the son of the living
god our creator our sustainer our savior our master and lord our brother and we are confident walking through this day because we are following him wherever he leads us we thank you for your continuing presence with us and for the joy that your presence gives us in jesus name amen you
