to Exodus chapter 40. It might be a shock to some of us as we're going to Leviticus, but hopefully that will become clear why we're reading from Exodus this morning. We're gonna read from the 34th verse of the 40th chapter of Exodus into the second verse of Leviticus today. Exodus 40. Verse 34, please stand with me as we read God's word today. Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. And Moses was not able to enter the tent of meeting because the cloud settled on it, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Throughout all their journeys, whenever the cloud was taken up from over the tabernacle, the people of Israel would set out But if the cloud was not taken up, they did not set out till the day that it was taken up. For the cloud of the Lord was on the tabernacle by day, and fire was in it by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel throughout all their journeys. The Lord called to Moses, or in some of your translations, then, or and the Lord called to Moses, and spoke to him from the tent of meeting, saying, speak to the people of Israel and say to them, when any one of you brings an offering to the Lord, you shall bring your offering of the livestock from the herd or from the flock. Pray with me today. Lord, as we enter in to an introduction of Leviticus today, I pray, God, that you would help us to see what I believe is clearly laid out in the scripture today. As we're going to go from Genesis all the way to Leviticus, and show how this book fits in with the canon of scripture and within the first five books of the Bible, I pray that we would come away today with a greater appreciation for your unimaginable wisdom, for putting together these doctrines and these books, and I pray that we would be anticipating going through Leviticus that we might see the sketches of our beautiful and wonderful Savior, Jesus Christ, to whom all of these things point. Lord, we love you, and we ask you that you would come and help us today. Lord, I need your help to explain these things properly, and we all need your help that they might be applied to our heart and that we might love you more through them. Lord, we ask your blessing today and believe that you will give it. In Christ's name, amen. You may be seated. You may have noticed the theme or the title of our sermon today does not have a whole lot of creativity called Introduction to Leviticus. And this is actually part one of part two. We're going to have two introductions to Leviticus because I think it's really necessary for us to understand the whole concept of where this book lies before we dive in to the specific exposition of it. And what we're focusing on today is really Leviticus showing the nearness that God had planned for the people of God to come into with him. And we will certainly get into that. But Leviticus in and of itself is one of the most difficult and I would even say scary books of the Bible for Christians, especially new Christians, to come into. and read. We often don't know what to do about all the different offerings. How are we to understand that and apply that to our lives? The rules and regulations that are given to the priesthood, the holiness code that has very strange laws on how we're supposed to deal with different fabrics, different ways of planting fields, how we treat our animals by muzzling them, and all of these different things. And this isn't new to the people of God. In fact, I came across a story by somebody that was not a believer, Gandhi was given a Bible at one time by a Christian and was asked to read it. And as he did, he picked it up. And this is what Gandhi said about the Old Testament. He said, I could not possibly read through the Old Testament. I read the book of Genesis and the chapters that followed invariably sent me to sleep. Just for the sake of being able to say that I read it, I plotted through the other books with much difficulty and without the least interest or understanding. Now, I can understand that coming from an unbeliever, but if we're to be honest today, that's often been our mind and our heart when we come to certain books of the Old Testament. And I would say Leviticus and probably Numbers are right up there with the books that we really don't know what to do with in the scripture. But I hope to show us today that the book of Leviticus sums up and kind of hits the crescendo of a major theme that's been flowing all the way from Genesis chapter 3 until this very moment. The people of Israel have been guided through the wilderness. They have come In Exodus chapter 19 to the mountain of God, they have received the law. And now the question comes to the mind that we read in the Psalms, who shall ascend the mountain of the Lord? Exodus makes it very clear that only Moses can ascend the mountain of the Lord. But the scripture is very interested in showing how all of the people of God one day will be able to ascend that mountain and be in God's presence forever. And the tent of meeting that we're going to look at today is a specific and particular representation of us entering into the presence of God that we once lost back in Genesis. And so, in short, Leviticus is a book that should be diligently studied by Christians because its shadows sketch many vivid illustrations of our redemption. I remember one time, one of my friends from high school He was, his wife was pregnant with their first child and they got one of those 4D ultrasounds and she posted it on Facebook. And when I saw it, I was really shocked. Maybe it was my imagination, but that this child looked almost exactly like my friend. from high school. I could see definite facial characteristics and I was really mind-blown that that would be the case. Now, the only reason that I was able to look at the picture of that 4D ultrasound and connect it to this other person is because I intimately knew the one person in reality. While this representation given on this ultrasound, it was shadowy, it was vague, but because I knew this other person so well, I could discern the particular facial features, right? And that's the same way with Leviticus. We might look at it as shadowy and sketchy, which it is, and think, what's the use in studying such a thing when we have the full glory of Christ revealed to us? in the New Testament? Well, I would say for the exact same reason, that often the shadow can teach us much more about the reality when we come to know the reality in its fullness. We see Christ as it was wrapped in a cloak and behind a veil in Leviticus, but as we study these different elements, I believe that we can even learn more about the beauty of what Christ has done for us in the gospel as we look at these different sketches of the Savior. But in general today, I want us to see that Leviticus vividly illustrates the vast distance between God and man, and the solution that was going to be given in Jesus Christ. So, the first point that we need to see today is that the book of Leviticus should be studied because it shows this vast difference, this vast distance rather, between God and man. But for us to understand that distance, we must see where this book fits into the whole of the Bible, all right? Now, much could be said about Leviticus being a worthy book of study because it's mentioned in 40 different passages of the New Testament. It's where we get the idea that we ought to love our neighbor as ourself, that we should be holy because the Lord God is holy. As we enter into this general understanding, we also need to see how Leviticus fits within the story of redemption. And we're all aware that there's always a danger in Christianity of coming to the Bible and reading any passage of scripture without a clear understanding of the context that we're reading it in. And especially within our circles, right? We often ask the question, what's the context of that? Are we sure we're reading that passage in context? Or are we trying to find a doctrine within the scripture by proof texting something that really doesn't fit? And that method, of constantly seeking for the context has helped the church to avoid errors. It's probably helped us individually out of many personal errors that we have held in our past life. And it's taught the church to avoid these errors and learn what the Bible has to say, even in very difficult circumstances. And we all know that. But today, as we read Leviticus, we must ask another question into our mind. Not, what is the context of Leviticus 1.1 to the book of Leviticus itself, but what is the canonical context of this book? Many of you have probably heard the term canon of scripture, a collection of books that are known to come from one author. We believe that the Bible is written by the Holy Spirit of God using men, moving them throughout history to write. And to state that maybe another way, the question we should ask is what is the relationship that Leviticus holds to the other inspired books that surround it in its context? And we even use this way of thinking in the New Testament, but we might use it in an unthinking way. For example, we would never go to Galatians, Ephesians, or Romans and read those books without first having it clearly fixed in our mind what's the canonical context that Paul is writing in. What is that? context of the canon? Well, we know that Paul is writing those epistles because the Gospels have already been known, right? We know that the Gospels are a reality, and all of the apostles' warnings, encouragements, and doctrines are based upon the salvific event of Christ's life, death, burial, and resurrection. Therefore, when we read the New Testament, we know that the epistles must be read in light of the events of the gospel. Otherwise, we would have little success in making sense of what is said there. And that's done unconsciously by us, almost. But the same thing is true for Leviticus. As we approach this third book of the Bible, we should realize that Moses pinned the words of the first five books to be taken in the order that was given to us in our scriptures today. They're not out of order. They weren't arranged haphazardly by some editor in church history, but there is a narrative that continues from Genesis 1 all the way through Deuteronomy 34. And that narrative can be clearly seen in that it is chronological, right? We know that there is a clear timeline of events that runs from the first book all the way through the last book, but this fact can be difficult to keep in our minds when we enter into Leviticus. It seems to be without timestamp. It seems to be kind of floating in the midst of this story without being rooted in any particular narrative or story. It can seem that Leviticus comes out of left field without any markers of when it was written and where it fits into the overall story of Genesis through Deuteronomy. But we have a substantial clue given to us in the first word of this book that can help us place the time that it was written. And this is why I started in Exodus chapter 40 this morning. Now, if you have an ESV or an NIV in your hands today, this is going to be may be unhelpful just to look in your scriptures to see it, because they leave this word untranslated. In the Hebrew, it's what's called a eval consecutive, and we translate it and, or then, or now. And if you have another translation, such as a King James, New King James, or a New American Standard Version, then you will have this word translated properly as now, then, or and. And all of those words show that it's coming from the previous context that has been given. It communicates to us that this entire book is directly linked to what went before it in Exodus 40. So, as we saw in Exodus 40, what is going on there? This comes directly after the golden calf incident, where Moses comes down the mountain, sees the people engaged in idolatry, And then in chapters 35 through 40, there is given, once again in Leviticus, the details of the tabernacle, how it's to be constructed, and this tent has been set up. And the people of Israel, in the first verse of Leviticus, are there, and Moses hears the word of the Lord coming from this tent to instruct the people on how they are to behave as the people of God. So that is the general chronological context that Leviticus finds itself. It's right after the building of the tabernacle and the voice of the Lord comes out and tells Moses how they are to behave in this tabernacle. And next week we're going to discuss, Leviticus is really divided into four sections and these are four different manuals for how to come and worship the Lord. But to understand where this book fits in the history of Israel is really only the tip of the iceberg and not really the main point of what we are here to discuss today. If we are going to understand Leviticus, we must pay special attention, not in the chronology of how it fits into the scripture, but also how it thematically fits with the story of redemption. That is, there is a great theme woven throughout all five books of the Old Testament and continues all the way through until Revelation 21. And this great theme is how is it that an offended God, a holy God who is perfect in every single way, can be reunited with the sinful people? How can a bridge be gapped in any way possible between people like us who are sinful and a God who is absolutely perfect and holy and beautiful. We know that in Genesis 1 that man was created on the sixth day and the whole earth was given to him. Man was really the pinnacle of all of God's creation and all the earth was given to him for his use and was good. But we notice something very interesting in the second chapter of Genesis. that although the whole earth was given to man, God planted a garden. And that's the words used. God planted a garden in Genesis, and he put man within that specific location to tend that garden. It was in the Garden of Eden that God would have special communion with Adam and Eve. This is the place that was specially given to them where they could enjoy the blessings of God and the nearness of God that he had given to them. And while in this garden, mankind enjoyed a perfect communion and absolute felicity, absolute happiness in the presence of their God. There was no sin that interfered with their love for one another. And there were no obstacles to the fellowship that man enjoyed with his creator. But as we know, Adam and Eve were tempted and fell into sin. They committed treason against the king of the universe. And with malice, they attempted to take the place of God as ruler over their lives. And the penalty for such a high crime was stated clearly by the Lord. And the day that you eat of it, you shall surely die. Now, we come to this point, we're familiar with all of these things. Justice. Perfect justice from God was what was expected in the mind of Adam and Eve, and that justice for committing one single sin was physical and spiritual death, which equals eternal separation from the presence of God, from the blessings of God, represented by Eden, and the eternal presence of His wrath. So, eternal death. Separation from God was justice, but God in his great mercy did not immediately bring upon man the eternal death that he deserves. He forestalled it for a time. He promised that one day there will be born a man from a woman who will crush the head of the serpent. And the implication is that that fellowship would be restored to God once again. But until that savior would come, Man was under a curse seen in particular in his banishment from God's presence. Okay, to clear this up, before we read this passage, what we're focusing on today is that man has been banished from the particular good presence of God, and that is seen in Genesis 3.22. Then the Lord God said, behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take of the tree of life and eat and live forever. Therefore, the Lord God sent him out of the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken. This special place that was created by God, planted by God, that man would enjoy. He's driven out of, he's driven away from the blessings of God. And at the east of the Garden of Eden, he placed a cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way of the tree of life. Man was expelled from the special and favorable presence of God because of his sin. And the whole scripture tells the story of how he can be united to him once again. God doesn't dwell with man anymore. And that's the great problem that is being seen here. But after Genesis 3, even after such a great curse is told to man, even after he's driven out of the garden that represented God's blessing, we don't see man trying to correct their sin. We see actually the very opposite of that. We see a dramatic downward spiral in the first 11 chapters of the first book of the Bible. And only eight verses after man was driven out of the garden, We read of the first act of murder on the earth as Cain kills his brother for offering a proper sacrifice to God. This downgrade of humanity is so extreme that by the time we get to Genesis chapter six, the whole of mankind is described from God's perspective in the darkest terms possible. Genesis six, five, the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth and that every intention Every intention of his thoughts was only evil, of his hearts was only evil continually. And the Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth and it grieved him to his heart. All of creation was then purged with a violent flood. But only two chapters after Noah steps off the boat, we read of another rebellion in the Tower of Babel. Genesis 11, we see that man tries to enter the presence of God by building a tower and using another means to attain his presence rather than through the angel that guards the way of the tree of life. Man tries to enter the presence of God and is further cursed by confusion of language, further dispersed from one another and from the favor of God. They're driven throughout all the earth In the first 11 chapters of Genesis, mankind is clearly shown to be a species that is absolutely unable to do good, unable to obey God and enter into his presence by themselves. And left to ourselves, we will only further alienate and aggravate the distance between God and man. But where sin increased, grace abounded all the more. Although man has shown that he will not come to God and that his mind is at total enmity with the Lord of the universe, God chooses one of these sinful men for himself. In Genesis chapter 12, Abram is called out of his father's house and land in Ur in order that God might bring him to a special land once again, a land where he promises that his presence would dwell once again. In this land, there will be a people who once again have the blessing of God's special presence. And the message is clear. Even though man is banned from the presence of God because of his sin, and even though man is so evil that his actions only serve to distance himself further away from his God, the grace of the Lord alone is able to bring men back into right relationship with him. He has to call a man out of another country, give him a new heart, and have him to follow him. And to this man, Abram, to his offspring, he would further reveal the plan of eternal salvation that was shown in the garden. The story of Exodus, fast forwarding a little bit. We'd be here a while if we didn't. The story of Exodus shows in graphic detail What must happen to be brought into God's presence? He must come and break the chains of slavery and save us from a land of curses and death, from Egypt, another particular place, a particular land where God's presence is not there. And the culmination of this book is the giving of the law on Mount Sinai. And most of the remainder of Exodus details the building of a tent where God would come and be present with his people. So they're promised a land. where partial presence of God is going to be restored to them. And now they are promised a tent, a tabernacle, where God's presence is going to be more fully realized and displayed among his people. Man has been cast out of God's presence and can never come back by his own work and will. And God tells them to build a tent that he might dwell in their midst. He does not tell them to build a great tower. and to build something great that they can come up to him. Rather, he tells him to build a tent so that he can descend, condescend, and live with his people. And this is the exceedingly good news of Exodus and Leviticus, that God has condescended with unimaginable grace to dwell with his people. And that is why we're focusing on the tent of meeting today. This tent was situated in the middle of the 12 tribes as they camped around them. And God was showing through this illustration of the tent that he would come and dwell with his people, that he would be with them and these These shadows represent an incredibly good news to the people of God. They have always had the testimony that God was going to come and save his people and that fellowship would be restored. And with this tent, there's great hope restored once again, that God is coming near to them. He's going to save them. But even though that is incredibly good news, Leviticus is merely a shadow of the greater tabernacle and the greater presence of God that would come through Jesus Christ. We're presented with a problem in Leviticus, even though it's great news. It's that man does not have full access to his God. There are sacrifices in the way that he has to go through to be able to enter in his presence. And furthermore, the Holy of Holies, which represents the pure glory of God, is unable to be accessed except for by one man, and by that one man only once a year. We see this in Leviticus 16. Now, interestingly, Leviticus 16 is seen by almost all scholars to be the very center of the Pentateuch, of the first five books of Moses. It's seen to be the culmination of everything that has been given thus far. And in this chapter, we see the theology of this very special place that was within the inner tabernacle of God. Turn with me to Leviticus 16, please. And notice the context. that's given in Leviticus 16, even though Aaron and his sons that offered strange fire before the Lord in the 11th chapter of Leviticus, we see here in 16, rather the 10th chapter, but we see in Leviticus 16 that he references that once again. It says, the Lord spoke to Moses after the death of his two sons, Aaron, the two sons of Aaron, when they drew near before the Lord and died. And the Lord said to Moses, tell your brother not to come any time into the holy place inside the veil before the mercy seat that is on the ark, so that he may not die, for I will appear in the cloud over the mercy seat. And if we look down to the bottom, we see very clearly that this was only to happen once a year. So, in this shadow, even though we have good news There is much restriction placed upon the people of God. This is not anything close to what the Garden of Eden was like. Even though the tabernacle and within it was meant to represent the Garden of Eden, there was many flowers and buds put within the tabernacle to point us back to that. And there was even on the veil that separated the holy of holies from the rest of the tabernacle, there was an angel painted. This representing the cherubim. This was guarding the way to the tree of life. And Hebrews 9 gives us the absolutely perfect and apostolic interpretation of these things. Hebrews 9 says, these preparations having thus been made, the priests go regularly into that first section. That is, not to the holy of holies, but into that first section, the holy place, performing their ritual duties. But into the second, the holy place, the holy of holies, only the high priest goes, and he but wants a year, not without taking blood, which he offers for himself for the unintentional sins of the people. Verse eight is very important. By this, the Holy Spirit indicates that the way into the holy places was not yet opened as long as the first section was still standing, which is symbolic for the present age. According to this arrangement, gifts and sacrifices are offered that cannot perfect the conscience of the worshiper, but deal only with food and drink and various washings, regulations for the body imposed until the time of Reformation. So while Leviticus in the tent of meeting is extremely good news, it was forward looking to something else. It was only a pattern of greater things to come. And that is what is accomplished by the grace of Jesus Christ. He alone has entered into the veil. He alone is the one that gives us perfect access once again to our God. Now as we think about the tabernacle, what do we know about it? Well, we know it was a tent and it was made to sit within the midst of the people of Israel who also dwelled in tents. And that's a very important thing for us to realize that God, when he condescended, he did not make a building that represented his presence that was unlike what we live in. Rather, he came and dwelt in a tent that was just like the other people's tents. This was to show God's condescension, but more importantly, that God would one day come in a tent that was even more like ours. In John 1.14, we see the word became flesh and dwelt among us. That word dwelt there literally means tabernacle. The word became flesh and he tabernacled among us. That when we look and we think about the Lord Jesus Christ, his presence in the flesh is representative of God coming and dwelling with His people once again, just like the tent in Leviticus shows us. And it continues, we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. But even more shocking is the fact that God has not only sent His Son to represent His presence with us, But after his son ascended into heaven, he poured his Holy Spirit into our hearts to indwell his people. That the Holy Spirit dwells within us now and we have a more perfect fellowship with God than previously. But even further than that, he promises that the church of God is his temple, that he is building with living stones. God indwells us in a very special way in the new covenant that was unknown to the old. In Hebrews 9 24. We have this written as we think about the holy places and the high priest only entering there once a year, which which showed that this was a holy location that man was not able to go into any time at any time that he came into his head. We see For Christ has entered not into the 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. Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly as the high priest enters into the holy places every year with blood not his own. for then he would have 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. And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes the judgment, 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. So I want us to see we have steps given to us here. The tabernacle represented God's presence among his people and that he would restore fellowship. And when God came down to the earth, he showed that in a more full fashion. But when he sent the Holy Spirit, he gave a promise. a down payment of the inheritance that one day we will fully and finally come to dwell with the God who has come to save us. The problem that was presented in Genesis, that we're banished from his presence and from the garden, will be totally done away with. In Revelation 21, John says, then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, Behold, the dwelling place. And this, again, is the word skeino, the tabernacle. Behold, the tabernacle of God is with man. and he will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away." As we look at the first verses of Leviticus and try to understand how they fit into the whole context of the scripture, Primarily, what should be in our mind is that although we have been banished from the favorable presence of God in the garden, Leviticus shows a shadow that one day that will be completely and fully restored to his people. We will live with him forever and without the possibility of ever falling away again. This is the main theme of Leviticus. And what I want us to, how I want this to affect us today is that we should see that the word of God is exceedingly divine, that no man could have put all of these things together from the first chapters of Genesis to the last ones of Revelation, and that God has planned from the beginning of time to be able to bring sinful people back into his presence. Now next week, We're going to look at the four different sections of Leviticus and how Christ has accomplished and fulfills every one of those elements that we read in it. And as we turn to the Lord's Supper and we think about the tabernacle that came down from heaven to dwell with men, we know that it came down and was beaten, was bruised, was broken and died for our sins. And as we think about that today, let us praise the Lord for giving us such a visible representation of the gospel of Jesus Christ.