This is Chad Harrison, and you're listening to hope alive, applying God's word to your daily life. Hi, this is Chad Harrison, and I am the teaching pastor of Lake Community Church and have been serving as a pastor for 25 years. I'm also a practicing attorney. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word and find God's will for your life. I pray in the name of Jesus right now that God would open up his word to you and allow you to see him and to know him and to know his will, that you might glorify him and that you might walk in faith and power each and.
Every day, especially today, in Jesus name. Well, good morning. Welcome to Lake Community Church's morning Bible study. We are in Leviticus, chapter 24, and we are dealing with the, what's called the show bread. It's the bread that was on the actor across from the lampstand in the inner courts, which is just outside the holy of Holies. And I've always thought this was such a wonderful, beautiful picture in scripture. We've been through it several times. We've been through it in Exodus, where God was telling them how to make things. Now he is telling them how to arrange things and who's in charge of it. And we know. But Aaron's in charge of the lampstand. Well, he's also in charge of the showbread. However, that didn't require as much work because the showbread would been laid out once a week. It would have been placed there. And it is. It is a picture of, really, if you think about it, you're in a room. It's not a very huge room, but it's a room that's got a giant lampstand with seven lights on top. It really several fires on top. It's not just. And it's not a lampstand. It's a. It's a. It's. It's a stand where Ozil is being burned as. As the light. And it's on top of it. It's a lampstand, but it's. It's not candles. It's. It's bigger than candles. It's way bigger than candles. So you've got a. A pretty big fire on top of it. And then crash the room. Both of them are golden, golden tables. And. And across the room for them is a. Is a table that has these. These cakes of flour. They're cakes. Now, they're not cakes in the sense that you think of a cake, because cakes have leaven in them, and they rise these are made without leaven. They're made of fine flour. And they're baked as cakes. But the reason they're called cakes is because they're really big. They're not small. They would be kind of the size of a. Probably a medium or a large pizza of the day we live in. And they are. There are twelve of them. And that's what he says, do. And it says. And you shall take the fine flour. And bake twelve cakes with it. Two tenths of an eiffel shall be in each cake. And you go, well, how much is an ifa? Well, this is a lot of cakes. One 10th of an ifa is a liter. And so two tenths of an e four would have been two liters. So if you think about baking two tenths of a liter of cake that doesn't rise. That would be a fairly. You know, you pour it and bake it. And however you bake it. And I mean, that would be some fair, you know, medium sized pizzas. Probably. Maybe. Maybe no bigger than the hunts brothers pizza. But. But a whole pizza. Whole hunts brothers pizza. Not just the chunk. And he says, and. And to it would be on each cake you shall set them in two rows. Six in a row. On the pure table of gold before the Lord. And you shall put pure frankincense on each row. Now remember, frankincense is the perfume that God had told the Israelites to make in the temple. And that perfume was to be the smell that most people smelt when they went in the temple. And it also is a picture of prayer. It's a picture of God's people. And their presence in. In God's house. And their presence before God. Being a sweet aroma to him. It's something that he wants. It's something that he desires. It's something that he would look feather to. And so when you're. When you're thinking about this, it's more a picture for us. But for God, it's a picture. It's really a picture for him. Because when we come before him. And when we seek him out. And when we do do things by faith. And when we. When we act as God has directed us. Has led us to act when we do those things. It's beautiful before him. He loves that. He loves to be in our presence. He loves for us to be around him. And so frankincense is one of those symbols that when God's people are together with God. It is a beautiful, sweet smell before him. He says, you shall put on each row meaning? Meaning the. The actual bread would smell like frankincense. I don't know how it would taste, but it wouldn't have tasted good anyway because it doesn't have any leaven in it. It's more like those crackers. And it wouldn't have had any SAP either. And so he says. He says it may be on the bread for a memorial, an offering made by fire to the Lord. Every Sabbath, you shall set it in order before the Lord continually being taken from the children of Israel by an everlasting covenant. Meaning you're going to take. Take that bread from their offerings and you were going to bring it in and you're going to place it before the Lord on this table as an offering. It's a continual thing. It's being done every week. It's being done on Sabbath every week. And it shall be for Aaron and his sons, and they shall eat it in the holy place for some most holy to him from the offering of the Lord, made by fire by perpetual statue. So they would make it. They put it out, it'd be there for a week, and then they would eat it. They'd make it, put it out, it'd be there for a week. They'd eat it every week. They would do that. Now what does this represent? What does this stand for? Why are we even looking at this? Well, I mean, it's, you know, it is it for me, it can't be any more clear. It's not even. It's not even something that's really even hard to figure out once you've been studying through scripture and kind of see how scripture directs you and leads you, ties itself after the rest of scripture. As you study through the Old Testament, New Testament books of the Bible, and you begin to understand the nature of the author, the character of the author of the Bible, which is God, but also the different ones who've written in the Bible. And you even begin to see God moving through their hearts to reveal his will, even in scripture. And so when, when you're reading this, it just seems so obvious. What? What is it? Well, it's a picture of God's word. The bread of life is God's word, and Jesus is the bread of life sent down from heaven. He said, I am the bread of life come down from heaven. He is the. He. He was directly saying, I'm, you know, the bread that was in the temple that you ate once a week. I'm that bread. And I want you to notice that, that it's a sweet aroma. It, it is a, a beautiful smell before God when God's people consider what he says. And it is a. It is a, it is supposed to be done. What, every week, once a week, they're to come together on the Sabbath and there to eat that bread and there to, to fill themselves up with what God is saying and doing. And once they eat that bread and they, and they sense the presence and the power of God, they, they have the Holy Spirit lighting the bread. Meaning the Holy Spirit is, is giving us insights. You go, what's the Holy Spirit? Well, it's the lampstand, remember? It's that fire. It's that oil of the Holy Spirit being, being burned and providing that energy or that light so that you can, so that you can see and understand things that are unimaginable and beyond what your human mind can ponder. Because God is now revealing himself to you. And as you eat that bread, you begin to understand and see God in a new way. You have fellowship with him and, and you are filled up. And it is. Well, he says it's holy for you. It's, it's, it's wonderful. And notice the, the priest ate the bread. Aaron and his family, his sons ate that, ate that bread. Well, that's, that's a picture of us. We're the priesthood, remember? We go in and we eat that bread once a week. It, you know, it is a clear picture that God wants on a regular basis for his people to get together to take the bread of life, to break it and to eat it, and to, and to fellowship with him and be there in his presence and allow that, allow that table of pure gold, that altar, which is picture of his royalty, to be in the room and in his power. And when God's people show up, expecting God to move, expecting God to reveal his word, expecting to worship him, there is a palpable feeling, a palpable intensity about the place that you come into. I've had so many people say you feel the Holy Spirit when you walk in. You can, because God is already there, preparing and preparing hearts for worship, preparing hearts to be in his presence. And that's what it's all about. That's why we get together once a week. And this is a beautiful picture right here in the book of Leviticus of something that's been going on for well over three millennia. This has been going on for well over 3000 years. First in the Old Testament, first with the jewish people, and now with, with God's people and, and the church. It is. It is, it is a beautiful aroma before God. And he says. He says the priests are supposed to eat it. And it's supposed to be holy. And. And then it's an offering that passes through the fire and it's in. And remember, the fire is always a picture of the Holy Spirit. And it is what we should be doing on a regular basis. And the church, when they do it randomly, in several different ways. They miss out on what this is really meaning. First of all, then the church doesn't really consider God's word. Maybe we may read a verse or two. But what we're discussing is not really what God has said. But maybe man has said that. That's when we mess up. When we don't come expectant to eat of the bread of life or hear from the Holy Spirit. Well, that can inhibit us from experiencing God. When we share it irregularly, when we're not there, when it's possible. Now, you know, the life we live is oftentimes we're going to be traveling and doing things. I understand that. But when you regularly take yourself out of the body. You're not regularly. With who? With God. And in his presence. You inhibit the ability for the Holy Spirit. To begin to really reveal things. And tie things off in your mind. Because it's a steady thing. It's. He said, this is a statute that for the generations. We're supposed to be doing this every. All the time. Regularly. Generation after generation. With each generation passing. Passing it on, doing it. Why? Because when you. When you. When you regularly make it a part of your life. That you're going to be showing up and eating the bread of life. You pass on the power of the presence, the purposes of God. To your family and to your children. We, we. And when we show up expectant that God is going to reveal himself. Because that's what he does. When. When you show up. And when you expect God to be God. I can't say this more pointedly to you. If when you show up expecting God to do well, he says he is. When you show up and say God, you are this. And the way I know you are this is because your word says you are this. You say you are this. And I expect that you are this because you wouldn't lie. You are. You are God. And I'm going to. I'm going to act as if that is the whole truth of everything that I need to live my life by. When you do that, you honor God. You honor God as he is. Because you're saying, I believe you to be who you say you are. You honor God and his work and his revelation on the earth because you say, I believe what you have shown me. I believe what you've told me. I know. I know you are what you say you are, because I live it out in my life. I expect it. And then you honor God to others because others benefit from your faith. You benefit from your faith. God's honored by your faith, but others benefit from your faith. And when we show up and we allow God to do these big things, do this big work in. In his kingdom, we honor him with that. And. And we honor. We honor his presence, and. And we. And we are benefit to the people that are there, to the people that we associate with during the week, and we're a benefit to the community that we live in. And if we don't do these things, if we're not expectant, if we don't expect God to reveal himself through his word or reveal himself by his holy spirit, if we're not showing up to be that sweet incense before him, that frankincense, that worship, and that prayer that goes up in his presence when we show up expecting, not expecting to do that, or we don't show up at all, well, what we do is we dishonor God. He says, this is gonna be something that needs to be done by. It's an everlasting covenant. It's a covenant that doesn't end. It's a covenant that keeps on going. It's a covenant that's gonna. I won't. You hear me? It's gonna go into the millennial kingdom. It's gonna be a part of. It's gonna be part of the everlasting life that we have with him. We have eternal life, but that life is also definable by being everlasting. Eternal means it's outside of time, but it's also everlasting if there is is time, if there's time to be. To be had, it's in the middle of it. Something you should be doing all the time, if you're in time, and we are. And so I would say to you, you have to. You have to take this seriously and take what we're doing, this living this life with God seriously, and quit treating it as if it's just some aspect of your life. It is the center of who you are, and it's the center of what you do. And all the aspects of your life, how they turn out and how they work out, flow from this. This is the fount of life. This is the fountain of life. And when we don't treat it that way well. We become who we were going to be when we didn't have God, rather than experiencing all that God is because he's revealed himself to us. I pray that, and I expect for you that that won't be the case. That you will. You will experience the fullness of God because you will believe in the fullness of God. And your actions and your lifestyle will illustrate that. Because you seek him out as a everlasting covenant, you seek him out on a regular basis, at least once a week, gathering together in his presence to pray, to sing, to allow the holy spirit to reveal God's word to you as you go today, I pray that.
The Lord will bless you and keep.
You, that he'll make his face to.
Shine upon you, and that he will give you hope and peace today, in Jesus name.
