Welcome to the Hackberry House of Choson. My name is Bob. I'm reading today from a study of Ezekiel, and we're in the final part of the final part, part two of part five. We're talking about the restoration of Israel, of Israel's temple, and of a whole lot of other things that Israel has been waiting for, Israel's Messiah for sure. The permanency of this temple is the subject of chapter 43, verses six to nine. Let's read it. While the man was standing beside me, I heard one speaking to me out of the temple. And he said to me, son of man, this is the place of my throne and the place of the soles of my feet, where I will dwell in the midst of the people of Israel forever. And the house of Israel shall no more defile my holy name. neither they nor their kings by their whoring and by the dead bodies of their kings at their high places, by setting their threshold by my threshold, and their doorposts beside my doorposts, with only a wall between me and them. They have defiled my holy name by their abominations that they have committed, so I have consumed them in my anger. Now let them put away their whoring and the dead bodies of their kings far from me, and I will dwell in their midst forever." Forever is the word. Until the end of the world, as we know it, Jesus will reign from this temple. Here is another affirmation that the temple we are describing is not that second temple, even though beautified by Herod and a wonder of that day. No, that temple is gone, as decisively as the first one. So what does the Lord mean by speaking of carcasses of kings in the high places? Commentators mostly try to sweeten this passage and explain it away. I will join the few who agree with the original text and just say that although we have no history of Jews dragging the dead bodies of their kings into pagan worship areas and burying them there close to the Temple Mount, nevertheless, it happened according to this passage. I imagine there is other wickedness of which we have not heard yet also. But the new Israel, restored and revived Israel, will not behave this way, because the Spirit of God will be in them, and therefore God will be pleased to live among them forever. Verses 10 to 12, the law of the temple, holy. As for you, son of man, describe to the house of Israel the temple, that they may be ashamed of their iniquities, and they shall measure the plan. And if they are ashamed of all that they have done, make known to them the design of the temple, its arrangement, its exits and its entrances, that is, the whole design, and make known to them as well all its statutes and its whole design and all its laws, and write it down in their sight, so that they may observe all its laws and all its statutes and carry them out. This is the law of the temple. The whole territory on the top of the mountain all around shall be most holy. Behold, this is the law of the temple." Now, John MacArthur wants to make these three verses the key to the entire nine-chapter description of the future of Israel. The very layout of the temple, the fact of its separation from the rest of the land, its activities, its personnel, everything in it will make true men or women of God ashamed of their unholiness in years past. Well, we've seen the grounds, we've seen the structures enclosed by the boundary wall, we've seen the return of the glorious one to his temple, and we've heard the promises of God. Now, what exactly will take place inside those hallowed walls? I'm going to talk about the altar now being measured. These are the measurements of the altar by cubits. Again, the cubit being a cubit and a hand breadth, 21 inches. And it goes on to tell every little detail about the altar in terms of cubit or feet. And the steps of the altar shall face east. For those who wish to compare, I'm offering Ellicott's commentary. He says, the altar in Solomon's temple was of brass, 20 cubits square and 10 cubits high. That's different. That in the tabernacle had been 5 cubits square and 3 cubits high. In Herod's temple it's said to have been 32 cubits square and 10 cubits high and was of hewn stone. The dimensions of Ezekiel's altar seem to have been selected for the symmetry of the numbers in the several parts. In height, it exceeded any of the others." I'll just let this go at that. I just want you to see in this little passage that there was a difference. And I don't think I need to keep pointing out differences, but this temple that Ezekiel is describing is not Herod's temple. Obviously, it was to be eternal and it's gone. It's not the first temple, obviously. It's not some other temple that has come up in between. It's a future temple. Just want you to see that. Chapter 43, verses 18 to 27, the ordinances of the altar, and I'm sorry, this is... Reminding you again of the book of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, where all those laws are gone over. Son of man, thus says the Lord God, these are the ordinances for the altar. On the day when it is erected for offering, burn offerings upon it, and for throwing blood against it, you shall give to the Levitical priests of the family of Zadok, who draw near to me to minister to me, declares the Lord God, a bull from the herd for a sin offering, and you shall take some of its blood and put it on the four horns of the altar and on the four corners of the ledge and upon the rim all around. Thus you shall purify the altar and make atonement for it. You shall also take the bull of the sin offering, and it shall be burned in the appointed place belonging to the temple outside the sacred area. And on the second day you shall offer a male goat without blemish for a sin offering. And the altar shall be purified as it was purified with the bull. When you have finished purifying it, you shall offer a bull from the herd without blemish and a ram from the flock without blemish. You shall present them before the Lord and the priests shall sprinkle salt on them and offer them up as a burnt offering to the Lord for seven days. You shall provide daily a male goat for a sin offering, also a bull from the herd and a ram from the flock. Seven days they shall make atonement for the altar and cleanse it and to consecrate it. And when they have completed these days, then from the eighth day onward, the priests shall offer on the altar your burnt offerings and your peace offerings. And I will accept you, declares the Lord God." Well, we discussed earlier what seems to many a troubling aspect of what is coming, namely a return to ceremonial sacrificial law, mosaic sacrifices. Remember what we concluded then, Jesus is the offering once for all. Nothing changes that. Old Testament sacrifices, millennial sacrifices, none of them are efficacious, only descriptive. like that communion service in your church. Does it take away sins or simply bring forgiveness to your remembrance? Verse 19 reintroduces us to Zadok's family of the Levitical order. Here's a resurrected clan with perhaps modern descendants who will be considered worthy to serve the Lord because of their unswerving faithfulness to the original David. I might put an aside here. Do you think the Lord is watching your life and my life right now? Does he have a place in the kingdom for us that is equal to the kind of service we gave him here? Were we faithful here? I believe that's what the parables of Jesus teach us, that if you are faithful here, he has many things for you over there. That which is before us in this passage is not the everyday usage of the altar of offerings. but the process for it to be consecrated and made ready for use. Kyle and Delish. in their commentary explain it this way. As the altar of the tabernacle and that of Solomon's temple were consecrated before they were used, and he gives a list of scriptures to prove that, and God commanded and regulated this consecration of the altar of the tabernacle, so also is the altar of burnt offering in the new sanctuary to be consecrated before it is used. Okay, verse 27 tells us that when all of the preceding has been properly done, the priests may proceed with the daily offerings. And then he says, I will accept you. That's the promise God offers to his people after that. So laws and rules and ordinances, does that bother you? I ask you, what did you think Isaiah meant when he said, the government shall be upon his shoulders? Government implies laws to be kept. The holiest laws of the coming kingdom will center here in the house of God, as they were supposed to do throughout Israelite history. Now, if you can't handle the laws just in the temple area, what about when the whole earth is filled with the glory of the Lord and the government of the Lord? What happens when you find that Jesus is going to come and rule with a rod of iron? It's not what we had pictured, you know, we're going to heaven and just kind of lay around and do nothing forever and playing a harp and whatever. No, he's coming to earth and he's setting up a government and there will be rules and they will be enforced. It will be a wonderful time. Just think of how in America anyway today the rules aren't being enforced in so many places. and how awful that is when you have good rules that are not enforced by good people. Well, we're going to have a good king. The good king will have good rules for sure, and he will keep those rules and make others keep it. Now, next time, more about the coming glory and who shall and shall not participate in this coming glory. We're gonna talk about the prince. Who is the Prince? We talked about that a little bit before. Ezekiel 44 to 46, we start next time. All right, thank you so much again for being here. I wanna share with you a different book every day so that you'll know what's out there. When you hear the title to this one, you're not going to jump for it because everybody has written a book like this and everybody thinks they know who the Antichrist is and I'm no different. But I believe there's no need to scan the newspapers or the daily cable offerings The Bible itself identifies the Antichrist, in my opinion. I want you to walk with me through only seven sections of the Word of God, and I'll show you, I believe, who will be coming to take over this planet before Christ returns. It's called simply, Who is the Antichrist? It's available right there at your website. Just click on Store, and it'll direct you over to amazon.com, where all my books are. Thank you so much again for being here today. Look over the site, see what other things are there. I think you're going to find some things that will bless you. This is the Hackberry House of Chosun. Lord willing, we'll talk again real soon. Bye-bye.