Hello, teachers. We find ourselves in session number 10 in our study of the book of Exodus
and Leviticus. This week is kind of among the last in Exodus and then next week we go
into Leviticus. And we go into the part of the story where Moses is building the tabernacle
and God is...we kind of talked about that last week. We're moving more into that this
week. We find ourselves in Exodus chapter number 40, verses 16 through 21 and then the
34 through 38, all in chapter 40. The objective statement that we wrote was this, that we
can be motivated to properly worship God when we see three steps in how God related to his
people through the tabernacle. We're going to see this over the next couple of weeks
as we talk about the tabernacle, about the offerings and all that happened there. And
it's a pretty incredible thing. So the first way that God relates to his people in worship,
again, through this tabernacle is that he expects obedience. So the first step that
we see is obedience and we see that by Moses. It's Exodus chapter 40, verse 16. It says,
this, dusted Moses according to all that the Lord commanded him, so did he. And it came
to pass in the first month and the second year on the first day of the month that the
tabernacle was reared up. And Moses reared up the temple, tabernacle, fastened his sockets,
set up the boards there, put in the bars thereof, reared up his pillars, and he spread
abroad the tent over the tabernacle and put the covering of the tent above it. And as
the Lord had commanded Moses, I'll pause there for a second. There's a lot of detail
that's going on showing what Moses did in putting up the tabernacle. He had asked for
an offering from the people. God said last in the lesson last week that God asked for
Moses to ask an offering of the people and people were to willingly have their own heart
gift towards that. He had given him the leaders that he had prepared to be able to be skilled
and preparing all that needed to be done artistically and from an artisan perspective and putting
that together, the actual tabernacle. Now it's all been put together. Sorry, now it's
all been crafted. Now it's time to put it together and to set it up. This tabernacle
is like a series of tents. There's curtains and rods, and that's what it's describing
here. But I think the key phrase that we see in this particular first point in the text
of this first point is in that phrase, as the Lord commanded Moses there in verse number
19, verse 16, right at the beginning, dusted Moses according to all that God commanded
him. So did he. So it's very kind of clear. It's not kind of clear. It's very clear that
God had given Moses specific instruction exactly as God told Moses to do it. That's how he
did it as God commanded him. Verse 20, he took and put the testimony into the Ark says
the stable on the Ark and put the mercy seat above the Ark. This is talking about the Ark
of the Covenant. He's literally doing that as God commanded him. And he brought the Ark
into the tabernacle and set up the veil of the covering, the cover to the Ark of the
testimony as Lord commanded Moses. There's that phrase again, as the Lord had commanded
Moses. This is describing God putting, this describing Moses putting the Ark where God
had told him to put it. He moved it the way God told him to move it. He put the commandments
in the Ark like he was commanded to do. And this is exactly all according to what God
commanded. And so you see this narrative is just telling you what happened, but it's
awesome. But what happened was Moses being obedient and this is on their way to God's
presence showing up in and among the people residing with the people resting in the tabernacle.
We're going to see that in the next point. What were the prerequisites was that God gave
instruction on what that would look like and Moses followed it. And here in this matter,
he followed it to a T. The application is pretty seems pretty important that God has
a will about how and where and what constitutes proper worship. And when God says to do something,
we got to do it. We are not worshiping God when God tells us to do something and then
we don't do it. And so we see this first kind of principle, this first step is Moses being
obedient. Then we move on to God's presence. We see that as part of the factors of what's
going on here. Verse 34, then a cloud covered the 10 of the congregation and the glory of
the Lord filled the tabernacle. And Moses was not able to enter into the temple, 10
of the congregation because a cloud upon a boat there on and the glory of the Lord filled
the temple. God's glory is a very incredible thing. It's a weighty matter. It's substantive.
A lot of times as glory is described in terms of light, we know that this glory of the Lord
in other places is called Shekinah glory was something that was so immense and so terrifying
and so just awe inspiring that and you see it here too. God's presence meant and God
in his glory meant that men could not be in and men could not approach him. It says literally
here that Moses could not go into the tabernacle because of God's glory filling the tabernacle.
God's presence is an amazing thing. And that makes us kind of consider what God said even
to the woman at the well where she goes, Hey, some people say we ought to worship God in
Jerusalem and some say that we ought to worship him in these mountains and Jesus tells her
is coming a day where neither in these mountains or in the temple will someone worship God.
Those who worship God will worship him in spirit and in truth. We're told in Hebrews
that we become the temple of God and that God resides in us. And so this is an amazing
idea that God's glory, God's presence would show up in worship. That is something that
we're looking for and he is manifesting his presence in this moment. That leads to a third
point that we want to look at. And that's this idea of guidance. We see that part of
God's presence in the tabernacle and his in response to the obedience of Moses and others
to build the temple. God now continues to give them direction in and around that tabernacle.
You look at verse number 36, it says this, and when the cloud was taken up from the over
the tabernacle, the children of Israel went onward in all their journeys. But if the cloud
were not taken up, then the journey, then they journey not till the, till that the day
that it was taken up for the cloud of the Lord was upon the tabernacle by day and fire was
upon it by night. And then the sight of all the house of Israel through all their journeys.
You see here this presence of God responding in this worship that needed to happen up at
the tabernacle, being what literally moved the people of God through the desert. When
it stayed, they stayed. When it left, they left. And it was the visible manifestation
of his presence that was guiding them. This is a, I think there is a principle here that's
important that when we're obedient to God and when we're right with God, the Bible calls
even the Holy Spirit, being obedient to the Holy Spirit, being filled with the Holy Spirit.
When we are letting the word of God dwell in us richly and all wisdom, it's in those
moments that he guides us. And I'm not, I'm not calling for some kind of a supernatural
new revelation, that kind of a thing. But the Bible says, for instance, that the God's
word is a lamp into our feet and a light unto our path. He gives us direction. And so I
think we ought to be directed by our worship. And what I mean by worship, sometimes people,
when they think about worship, they automatically think about music, but I'm using worship in
a much broader sense. For sure it could be expressed in our worship corporately together
on a Sunday morning. I'm also referring to the idea that we put God in his proper place
in our life to know God is ought to be to worship him, to understand who he is compared
to us and to, to know him as someone to be worshiped. Someone who is in authority, someone
to obeyed is to follow him when he directs, when he directs through his word, when he,
when, when we pray, our prayers ought to be thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth
that is as it is in heaven. God guide me, direct me to exactly what you want me to do
today. So worship is way more than just what happens in a service. It should be the pattern
of our lives as we're obedient to God, as we're longing for his presence to guide us
to where he wants us to be. I hope this helped you. I hope this lesson was something that
you can apply to yourself and then you can apply it to your class. Have a great day.