Exodus 37:1-9 • Glory in a Box

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(This transcript was prepared using software tools and has not been reviewed for complete accuracy.)

It is His glory that's on display in Exodus chapter 37, and I'll ask you to turn there. We're approaching that time of year in which our cliché is that the best gifts come in small packages.



 And here we have a small package, at least by ancient estimations, which has nonetheless great glory in it. Already God has given Moses instruction for the building of the ark of the covenant, and now we see it being built. Let's stand as we honor God's Word and look at the first nine verses of Exodus 37.



 "Bezalel made the ark of Acacia wood.



 Two cubits and a half was its length, a cubit and a half its breadth, and a cubit and a half its height." Do you remember what a cubit is? The length from your elbow to your fingertips. So that's a cubit. Verse 2, "And He overlaid it with pure gold inside and outside, and made a molding of gold around it. And He cast for it four rings of gold for its four feet, two rings on its one side and two rings on its other side. And He made poles of Acacia wood and overlaid them with gold, and put the poles into the rings on the sides of the ark to carry the ark.



 And He made a mercy seat of pure gold. Two cubits and a half was its length, and a cubit and a half its breadth, and He made two cherubim of gold.



 And He made them of hammered work on the two ends of the mercy seat, one cherub on the one end and one cherub on the other end. Of one piece with the mercy seat, He made the cherubim on its two ends."



 The cherubim spread out their wings above, overshadowing the mercy seat with their wings. With their faces one to another toward the mercy seat were the faces of the cherubim. Let's pray together.



 "Father, the images are ancient to us, but the truth dear and present.



 So would You give to us the gift of understanding, the guidance and the presence and the pardon that You provide by what You tell us in this ancient box of great glory. So bless us with Your Word, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen."



 Please be seated.



 So if your perception of the Ark of the Covenant is determined only by Indiana Jones, remember the gold box established by Bezalel, who apparently, according to Indiana Jones, was history's first electrical engineer, establishing that box with its two golden angels, like two terminals to receive the electricity off of Mount Sinai, so that we have some sort of super-capacitor able to store energy and discharge it in some sort of laser plasma ray that Indiana Jones wanted to get. Now if that's your view of the Ark of the Covenant, let me say to you, you ain't seen nothing yet.



 Because that fantasy portrayal is actually small in discerning what the Ark of the Covenant was actually about. If you have to go to some fantasy figure to identify what the Ark of the Covenant is about, the better one, honestly, is Dr. Who. Now a few of you in the room are enough of science fiction buffs that you recognize the low-budget British science fiction series that stars the hero Dr. Who, who gets around the universe in an antique police phone box known as the TARDIS, see? You know.



 And the TARDIS is itself something of an anomaly and even a miracle, because even though it's only about two cubits square, when you walk inside, you find it has many rooms and can take you anywhere in the universe. According to the science fiction series, it has, here's the word, dimensional transcendentalism.



 Believe it or not, that's small potatoes compared to what God Himself is showing us about Himself in the Ark of the Covenant, which is meant in one fell swoop to show us heaven and earth, time and eternity, hell and its prevention, all in a little box about as big as the trunk at the base of your grandmother's bed.



 What is that Ark of the Covenant all about? It's first just supposed to provide guidance in the opening verses. You may remember that not only is it surrounded with gold, but verse 3, "Bezalel cast for it four rings of gold for its four feet, two rings on its one side, two rings on its other side, and he made poles of Acacia wood and overlaid them with gold." What are the poles for?



 To carry the thing. And you recognize this is a mobile Ark. It's supposed to be able to go with the people. Actually it's meant to head the column of the millions of people who are now following Moses' instruction through the desert. And you actually read in Exodus God's description of what was going on. "The Ark of the Covenant of the Lord went before them," says the book of Numbers, "to search out a resting place for the people." We know there was the pillar of cloud and the pillar of fire at night, but apparently the Ark of the Covenant had, I don't know what it was, if it's some sort of gyroscope or magnetic, I don't know, but it takes them to the place of rest and is perceived by the enemies of God's people as protection for them. In that way, the Ark of the Covenant is just about physical guidance.



 But of course there is something else even more important going on. You may remember that we're just told simply enough in verse 2 that "Bezalel overlaid the Ark with pure gold inside and outside and made a molding of gold around it." Just reminding yourself that it's this box that has not just an outside but an inside. Do you remember what was to go inside the Ark of the Covenant? You actually have to go all the way to the New Testament, to Hebrews chapter 9, to discern what's actually there. Hebrews chapter 9 and verse 4 says, "Of the Ark, He was covered on all sides with gold,



 in which was a golden urn holding the manna, and Aaron's staff which had butted, and the tablets of the Covenant." What are the tablets of the Covenant?



 The Ten Commandments. And you may remember God is saying to His people, "I will show you My ways," which is more than just the physical way through the desert, "I will show you the ways to live." And He does that with the Ten Commandments. There's instruction for your life. And this Ark of the Covenant that's leading the people physically is also leading them spiritually by saying, "These are the ways of God that you should follow." But even as that description is there, we begin to recognize other purposes of what is inside the Ark of the Covenant, despite the fact that God's ways are being showed to the people of Israel. They do not always follow those ways. By the time you get to the middle of the book of Numbers, there's a rebellion that's going on. And you have Korah, Dathan, and Abiram who are saying, "Why are we going through this wilderness to a land flowing with milk and honey? The land flowing with milk and honey is behind us in Egypt."



 And they say, "We need to go back and not follow the ways of the Lord." And so Moses devises a means to say, "Who really has the authority to determine the way to life?" And so he calls the rebels and the heads of the tribes, 12 of them, and he says, "Bring your staff with you that shows your authority, and we are going to put it in the tent of meeting overnight." And they all do that. And Moses says, "And the one that sprouts of these dead sticks that represent your tribe, the one staff that sprouts is the one that will show the life-giving force of God and will be the way that we follow."



 Aaron, put your staff with the other staffs. Aaron puts his staff among the other staffs, and overnight one staff buds to show it has life. The one staff that show who has the true authority to lead God's people, whose staff buds.



 Aaron's staff. As God is saying, "Not only have I shown you my ways, I have confirmed my authority for you." Now all the people are terrified. If Jehovah is the one authority, and we have just rebelled against him, questioned his ways, what will happen to us? They actually say, "Behold, we perish. We are undone. We are all undone. Everyone who comes near the tabernacle of the Lord will now perish."



 But Moses says no, because not only within the Ark of the Covenant are the instructions and the proof of authority with Aaron's budded staff. What was the last thing that's in the Ark of the Covenant? The bowl of manna. When did the manna come to God's people first? When they were saying it a previous time, "We ought to go back to Egypt. What are we doing out here where there's no food?" And God provides for a people who cannot provide for themselves, who do not deserve his care. God says to those people, "I will show you my ways, and I will confirm my authority, and I will confirm my heart by providing for those who do not deserve it and cannot provide for themselves." Now, in that Ark of the Covenant is actually an entire worldview.



 How do we make our way in the world through the ways that God describes? How do we know those are right? He has shown his authority. Why should we go with his authority? Because he has shown us his heart that we should trust him. Now, I know it sounds ancient, but it's the worldview that God has established for us and his people in all times.



 This past week, I went with some of you to a lecture at a local university in which there was a speaker who said that materialistic evolution was as established a scientific fact as gravity, and that those who argue against it are willingly ignoring truth on the basis of what he called confirmation bias, which is just another way of saying, "You only listen to what you want to listen to."



 Now, I must tell you, this was a cordial, intelligent man, and I would say with good intent for those to whom he was speaking, but what he did not recognize beyond his own confirmation bias was that there were other people in the room of a different worldview who were just as academically credentialed as he, just as intelligent, just as cordial, with just as much good intent.



 And those people who were there felt that his proof might not have been the proof that they ought to receive. Now, you recognize that where we are is just now with two very competing worldviews, with each person saying, "You won't accept all that you should," and pointing opposite directions. Now, how do we solve that? Do we just roll the dice and say, "Whoever wins gets the worldview?"



 Do we kind of line up people and say, "You shove as hard as you can and you shove as hard as you can," or "We'll get the votes," or "We'll have the money," or "We'll have the power, we'll have the authority?" Even within the course of the lecture, the professor identified that the greatest threat to science in our present era comes out of the English department.



 And those of you who've got some academic training now or some philosophical training know why that is, because if you look at the philosophers who are holding sway right now, and I'll say names that some of you know, Foucault or Derrida or Merleau-Ponty, they will simply say, "You cannot prove your facts.



 All you can do is establish which perspective will have the most power and glory for the moment, and whoever's got the most power and glory wins, and that's the perspective that will hold for the day."



 Now, is that simply where we're left?



 That you have your facts and we have our facts and you believe in brute force and we believe in intelligent design and we're just kind of stuck?



 I recognize that when I say that there is a worldview that comes out of Scripture, not everyone will accept that.



 My concern is not everyone else for the moment. My concern is you.



 What will be the basis of your worldview?



 Because what God was establishing for a people so long ago was not simply saying, "Here are the ways in which I will guide you," but I am saying, "I'm the creator of the universe. I am the source of life, and because I am the creator and the source of life, I speak with authority.



 And the reason you should trust me is because I provide for people who cannot provide for themselves. I have shown you my ways, I have shown you my authority, and I have shown you my heart so that you will walk with me."



 Having said all of that, again, you and I know that there are people who will largely question that. In fact, the major questions of our age are not ultimately solved by science.



 They are solved by worldviews and who's won the latest vote and who can establish public policy, who can establish policy in the companies, who can establish policy in the world. Public policy in the school systems, who can establish just the way we're going to think about things. Nothing says that more than our current debates over things like sexual orientation and gender identity issues that are pressing on us every day, in every way, in every election, in our neighborhood relationships, in educational practices and company policies. People are making decisions and ways of life being determined by worldviews that are competing.



 One worldview in the area of sexual and gender identity, simply ask this, "What's wrong with loving whomever you want in whatever way you want for as long as you want or until either of you ceases to want the other through a change of mind or a change of identity?"



 This worldview sees sexuality as a product of morally neutral biological factors that have simply been adapted to social conventions that should be seen as fluid rather than fixed because these factors are assumed to be genetically predetermined, chemically driven, and not personally chosen. Any instruction on policy that limits their expression is perceived as oppressive, unfair, and an imposition on personal freedom.



 A biblical worldview counters that our God is not bound by our biology or our sociology,



 nor are you bound by your biology or your sociology. But rather the gospel breaks chains imposed by our bodies and backgrounds and warns of the consequences to women, to children, to families, to relational intimacy, to marital fidelity, even to personal dignity, when sexual expression knows no boundaries, is disconnected from the unity of spirit that comes with mind and body and soul being connected as the Bible explains they are, that we actually deprive love of beauty when it is only driven by biological impulses and has no moral context for expression and no physical basis for identity.



 Now we readily acknowledge because the Bible tells us so that in this fallen world every aspect of our minds and bodies and backgrounds has some degree of brokenness that affects our sexual choices and identities and can make them difficult and confusing, particularly in transitional stages of life. We all should acknowledge and confess that it's a broken—we're broken, every single one of us, broken in numerous ways. Questions with real struggles may very well have underlying genetic and physiological and familial roots in a world where every dimension has been corrupted by sin.



 And those people should be able to find understanding and compassion and guidance in the church of Jesus Christ where every person here should be able to say, "I too am broken and in need of the grace of God."



 But when it comes to which worldview we will hold, we are committed to the instruction of God that has been communicated with His authority and has been shown trustworthy by His provision. We trust Him to guide us even as the people of God did in all ages. We trust God more than cultural trends or political leanings or biological impulses because something in us instinctively knows that those are not stable ways to establish our values or our relationships.



 The instability of our culture's standards were curiously stated from an unusual source in the professor's talk.



 He actually established it. Toward the end of his talk, the professor who had told us that evolution was as established as gravity confessed the difficulty of navigating what he calls a post-truth world.



 He even showed us video of political figures that had been manipulated so that an actor had his words and facial expressions superimposed on the political figure in real time, even as the political figure was talking, so that the actor could put on the video or make appear on video anything the actor wanted to say and you could not discern by voice or expression anything but that the person on the video was supposedly the one talking.



 The consequence was, as the professor told us, you can produce in this media dependent and expert age whatever truth you want so you can trust no truth that you see or hear.



 Now if you cannot believe your eyes or ears anymore, who can you believe?



 There was a student who was brave enough to ask that question and the answer of the professor was I do not know what the answer will be going forward.



 What is your answer?



 Ultimately, we say we recognize the difficulty of establishing with confirmation bias and cultural trends and political leanings and everybody going for glory and power of their perspective, how difficult it is to establish the way we should go.



 And so we turn to the authority of the one who gave his life for us and showed us not only the way but the authority and the heart that we should trust. When we don't know the way forward, we follow the one who went before us and is always with us.



 After all, that is what the Ark of the Covenant was meant to establish, not just instruction and authority and heart, but ultimately say this God will always be with you. What are the pole and the rings about? Do you remember they carried it wherever they went? And Moses expressing to us what God was communicating put God's words before the people in the Ark of the Covenant. God said, "There I will meet with you from between the two cherubim that are on the Ark of the testimony."



 God said, "There are those great cherubim, those angels of glory, and I will come and I will dwell between them to be with my people." Now, I must tell you that because of the Indiana Jones movies and just our own imaginations, when we hear about the cherubim, our imaginations take off and cannot possibly do justice to what God is talking about.



 Ezekiel, the prophet, explains the cherubim saying this, "Each had four faces, an ox, a human, a lion, and an eagle, and each four wings, and underneath their wings the likeness of human hands. Their appearance was like burning coals of fire, like the appearance of torches moving to and fro, like the appearance of flashes of lightning that sparkled like burnished bronze."



 That's why George Lucas just can't do it justice.



 But it wasn't just the cherubim here that we're supposed to remember. We have seen the cherubim before in the writings of Moses. Do you remember? This appearance of the cherubim now is to safe-keep the ways of God in which He has shown people the path to life and His heart. There is another place in the Bible, much earlier, where God sent cherubim to protect the place of life.



 Where was that? Where did the cherubim appear before?



 The Garden of Eden. As the cherubim appeared to protect the garden of life when the sin of Adam and Eve has driven them from the garden. It's not the last time that we will see the cherubim. The next time that they are described in this kind of detail is in Revelation chapter 4, at the consummation of all things. And there we are told they sing, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and is and is to come." And there was a loud voice from the throne saying, "Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them and they will be His people and God Himself will be with them." When is the next time the cherubim appear? It is in the great glory of the revelation when God says, "I will again dwell between them in the midst of my people." There it is at the beginning of time as we see the angels appearing, God saying, "I will dwell in the life-giving force among my people." Then at the end of time, but that's not the last time, when else do you see the angels of God appear to say, "This is now the glory of God to dwell among you." We're about to enter that time of year. What time next? At the Nativity. "Glory to God on the highest, peace on earth, good will to men, because who has come? His name is Emmanuel, which is God with us." Suddenly the purpose and meaning of the ark is made clear. This is the God who is present with His people from Eden to eternity and by His Son and Spirit every step between. As though God is saying to His people, "What I am showing you is I will never leave you. I will never forsake you. I will always be with you. I will always be present." And that is not just an ancient message.



 That is the message our hearts yearn for over and over again.



 I recently read the testimony of the economist Joanne Reed Shelton, who said that she received in her inbox an email in which she was being invited to a church anniversary celebration in Osaka, Japan.



 Her great grandfather had established that church a hundred years previous, and they were asking this great granddaughter, this famous great granddaughter, to come and be part of the celebration.



 She wrote her response.



 My grandfather established the church in Osaka, but my own church experience was quite different.



 I hated it.



 What stood out to me in my youth were the Sunday School picture books with the barren wastelands of desert sand. The books' messages were lost on me. When I was 13 or 14, I began to have some longing for church, but my parents had moved far enough away that they did not want to drive me.



 And then on, my life was occupied by college, grad school, a high-flying career as an international economist and trade negotiator.



 I held religion firmly at arm's length.



 Then came the email to my inbox.



 To honor her grandfather, she went to Osaka and participated in the church celebration,



 where she said, "People recited the Lord's Prayer and sang amazing grace.



 For the first time," she writes, "I began to read the Bible in a meaningful way."



 Luke 17, where Jesus says, "The coming of the kingdom of God is not something that you can observe, nor will people say, here it is or there it is, because the kingdom of God is in the midst of you." And there it was again. God will dwell among His people. And she recognized it wasn't the Sunday School and it wasn't the wastelands. It was God who was dwelling with her. He'd been present all along. He would have been present with her grandfather.



 And He'd been present with her in the Sunday School. He'd been present with her in the grad school. He'd been present with her when she'd forgotten entirely about God. What she was saying was, "My life so much as it was wandering in the wilderness, but God was still present.



 Even when I had wandered a long way from Him, God was still present."



 And that's not just a message for famous people or people long ago.



 I think of those of us who minister in this congregation know who are wandering in a far country right now, whose spirituality is a desert.



 And I know the tendency for all of us just to kind of give up and walk away and turn our backs. What if we actually believe that what God can say to that young person or that older person down the road is when you were in the wilderness, "I was present."



 When you wandered away from Me, "I was with you.



 I will never leave you or forsake you." And when you have turned from your path and wonder where I am, "I'm right there.



 I was always right there.



 I dwell with My people. I am present. I show them My ways. I show them My authority. I show them My heart. And even when they wander away, I am present." Now for certain people, that just brings a sense of dread.



 The God who knows My wilderness, the God who knows My shadows and My dark corners, that God is present. Oh, no!



 Except for what that God also says. Verse 9, "The cherubim spread out their wings above, overshadowing the mercy seat with their wings, with their faces one to another toward the mercy seat where the faces of the cherubim." These great, glorious figures are turned by the plan and design of God to witness and confirm mercy.



 Do you know how that happens? We kind of lost it in the dust of the desert years between us and ancient Israel. But let me just remind you what would go on with that mercy seat.



 The mercy seat, the Ark of the Covenant, was placed in the tabernacle of God in the Holy of Holies. Not just where people gathered week to week or month to month, but once a year in the Holy of Holies, the high priest would enter the Holy of Holies where the Ark of the Covenant was placed. Before entering behind the veil of the Holy of Holies, he would make a sacrifice of atonement for the sins of the people.



 An innocent animal would be slain, its blood collected, life for life, the innocent sacrificed for the guilty.



 And then that high priest would go behind the veil before the Ark of the Covenant and he would sprinkle on the mercy seat that cover, that covers the law of God that the people had broken, the law that would have condemned them to die had there not been mercy. God sprinkles blood on the mercy seat to say life has been provided for your life, covering for your sin, atonement for your law breaking. This is what God is providing for you. And as a consequence of God's provision for you, you can be made right with God, though you have not followed his ways, though you have not honored his authority, though you have not trusted his heart. He who has been present with you now offers you his pardon.



 Is it real?



 Does it work?



 The way in which the priest would show the people is this. He would come out from the Holy of Holies and he would confess the sins of the people



 with his hands on the head of a goat.



 And then after placing the sins of the people on the goat, he would take the goat outside the camp and release it into the wilderness.



 Now you be the people of God.



 When you put yourself back in the situation, we have sinned, we know it. We have not followed God's ways. We have rebelled against him. We have gone to dark corners and believed he was not present.



 But now our sins have been confessed.



 The blood of an innocent has atoned for them.



 And now those sins have been put on a goat. Look there he goes.



 See that far hill? He's almost gone. He's gone.



 We don't see him anymore.



 And God would say, "As far as the east is from the west, so far have I removed your sins from you."



 It is God by the treasure of a golden box saying to his people a very simple message of the gospel. I will show you the way to go.



 Not only will I show you the way, I will always stay with you.



 And I will never say, "Go away."



 I will show you my way.



 That's his instruction.



 And I will not go away.



 That is his presence.



 And I will not send you away.



 That is his pardon.



 Praise God for a gospel that we all need and the God of grace offers.



 He says to you right now, "I'll show you my ways.



 And I will not go away.



 And I will never say to you, "Go away."



 Praise God.



 Father, bring the truth of your Word to our hearts, those of us who have not followed your ways, and that is every single person here, and those of us who doubt that you will stay because our own sin would seem to press you far from us.



 Teach us of the God who was teaching his people so long before Christ came of what it would mean for an innocent to take the penalty for the guilty, and then what that would mean



 for those who trust in him.



 Our sin would go far, far away, but not us.



 You would not send us away when we come to you. And so we do even now in these moments. Father, show us your ways.



 Join us again that you will always stay and that you will never say, "Go away." For that reason we confess our need of you, the presence of our sin, faith in our Savior, and the glory of the gospel in which we trust. We turn to you now in Jesus' name. Amen.