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Preached in Markham Baptist Church, January 14, 2007
INTIMACY WITH GOD - A STUDY OF THE TABERNACLE
PART 1: GOD'S FOREMOST DESIRE
Exodus 25:1-9
During the next 10 weeks I’d like to
journey with you into a deeper relationship with God. It was Augustine who
said, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless
until it rests in You.” And so I’d like us to go on a journey together to
find our hearts resting place. To find that place of intimacy with God.
It is my prayer that at the end of
this series we will all have a deeper hunger for God, a deeper love for God
and we all could say that we live in his presence, we are intimate with God.
Our guide book for the journey of
course will be God’s Word. For it was written by God and is the key to
intimacy with Him. As I expressed last week, the Scriptures bring us into
an intimate knowledge of God. It is through God’s Word that we are able to
delight in God’s presence and may taste the very sweetness of God Himself.
Our traveling companions will be the
Israelites, recently released from captivity from Egypt by God’s mighty
power and destined to wonder in the wilderness for 40 years as a result of
their unbelief – but all the while experiencing the power of God and the
provision of God and especially the presence of God in a significant and
meaningful way.
The object lesson that we will be
looking to throughout this series is the tabernacle. The tabernacle is a
very large structure that God instructs His people to build after they are
freed from Egypt. It is a very simple structure. It consists of an outer
court, an inner court called the Holy Place, and a third court called the
Most Holy Place. It is a very simple structure but one which God uses to
teach His people and ourselves about the plan of redemption and what it
means to be intimate with Him. It is a very simple structure, but
incredibly fascinating as every piece of it is designed by God and every
piece, every thread, every pin has significant spiritual meaning. I pray
that we will have the eyes to see the mysteries that are contained here.
To help us on our journey, three of
our small groups will be studying the tabernacle – based on the sermon
series and I have developed a daily devotional for you to go through
that will lead up to the next sermon and will prepare your heart for what we
hear God saying to us Sunday morning. These will be available each week as
well as on our website.
So, our goal is intimacy with God,
that we would know a closeness with God, a relationship with God that is so
close that, like Moses, we will know what it means to speak to God face to
face. Do you know that Exodus 33:11 describes the relationship between Moses
and God saying that the “Lord would speak to Moses face to face as a man
speaks with his friend”? That is our goal - that our relationship with God
would be that personal, that close.
Unfortunately in the evangelical world
there is a great deal of emphasis on accepting Christ -making the first
decision. And maybe you have got the impression that if after you’ve found
Him, you’ve arrived. You don’t need to crave anything more of God, and don’t
need to seek any further. But that is false.
There is so much of God to discover,
so much of Him to experience in our lives. Salvation as wonderful and
thrilling as that is – is a doorway into greater wonders and greater truths
and more mind blowing experiences of God. Salvation is a door – it is not a
destination.
We begin our study this morning at
Exodus 25:1-9. The background to this text is that Moses has heard God’s
voice thunder from Mount Sinai, “Come up to me.” (Exodus 24:12) So Moses
obeys and leaves the people to go to the summit of Mount Sinai. In chapter
24 we read that Moses was there for six days and the glory of the Lord
surrounded him. On the seventh day the Lord spoke to Moses and chapter 25
is part of what God says to Moses.
We’ll be looking at the details of the
tabernacle in the coming weeks, but this morning as we think about intimacy
with God, I want to lay the foundation for our study. And the foundation is
found at verse 8 of our text - “Then have them make the sanctuary for me,
and I will dwell among them.”
What we learn here are three
foundational truths.
The first foundational truth is that
intimacy with God is possible. It
must be possible - God promises if the sanctuary is built, He will live
among them. So, it is possible for us to have a relationship with God that
is so close, so personal, so intimate that if ever He should move we would
know it.
If all of a sudden God would lead us
in a different direction we would sense it – like the Israelites we would
see his direction clearly. It is possible to have such a close relationship
with God that if God should speak to us we would hear it – like the boy
Samuel we would know his voice.
It is possible to have such a close
relationship with God that if he called us as a church to set aside two
people for the work He had called them to do – we would know it like the
church of Antioch when they set aside Paul and Barnabas.
It is possible to be so close to God
that if He told us to share the gospel with a certain person we would know
it – like God told Philip to go to that chariot and stay near it (Acts 8:29)
and like God told Paul to go to Macedonia (Acts 16:9).
We may think that all these events we
read about in God’s Word are freakish events for the super-spiritual. But
they are not freakish. This is normal behaviour for the people of God who
live intimately with Him.
I remember listening to one of my
mentors Michael Cassidy and he would constantly say, “The Lord said to me
…” His conversation is always peppered with that phrase. And most times
when I hear someone say that I roll my eyes and say, “O boy, here we go.
What prayer tower has God told you to build? Or what amusement park has God
told you to create with other people’s money?” But with Michael, he never
says anything like that and it doesn’t take long to sense his genuineness.
I asked him how he could always say, “The Lord said to me ..” Michael said,
“It’s because the Lord DID say to me. I was listening. And the Lord will
speak to you to if you allow Him. And you can say, the Lord said to me, if
you allow Him to speak.”
An intimate relationship with God is
possible and is normative for every Christian.
Why is it possible? Because God
is a person and as a result, we can be close and intimate with Him as we can
with other people. God is a person. Please don’t think I’m pulling God
down and being irreverent. But I am trying to share the good news with you –
God is a person who thinks, wills, enjoys, feels, loves, desires, suffers as
any person may. “In making himself known to us he stays within the
familiar pattern of personality. He communicates with us through the
avenues of our minds our wills and our emotions.”1
God said to Moses, “Have them make
a sanctuary for me and I will dwell among them.” We can be intimate
with God - it is possible. That’s the first truth.
The second foundational truth is this
– God seeks intimacy with us. God
wants to live among us. Look at Exodus 29:44-46 - “So I will consecrate
the Tent of Meeting and the altar and will consecrate Aaron and his sons to
serve me as priests. Then I will dwell among the Israelites and be their
God. They will know that I am the Lord their God, who brought them out of
Egypt so that I might dwell among them. I am the Lord their God.”
Now turn to Exodus 40:34 to see this
promise fulfilled - “Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the
glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Moses could not enter the Tent of
Meeting because the cloud had settled upon it, and the glory of the Lord
filled the tabernacle. In all the travels of the Israelites, whenever
the cloud lifted from above the tabernacle, they would set out; but if the
cloud did not lift, they did not set out until the day it lifted. So the
cloud of the Lord was over the tabernacle by day, and the fire was in the
cloud by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel during all their
travels.”
You see God is intent on this. He
seeks to be intimate with you and with me. He wants to be in relationship
with us. It has been said that Christianity is the only religion which
claims that God has taken the initiative in revealing Himself to humanity.
All other religions describe humanity’s search after God. We have a God who
searches after us. He longs for an intimate relationship with you and with
me!
Think of it - we are created to be
intimate with God! That was the original intent. If you turn to Genesis
3:8., there we see that Adam and Eve have been created, they’ve been placed
in the Garden, they are given responsibility, they have been given one
another AND they have been given intimacy with God. Genesis 3:8 says, “Then
the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in
the garden in the cool of the day …”
Isn’t that a beautiful picture? It’s
a picture of God relating to His creation particularly relating to humanity
intimately. I don’t believe this was a one time event. I believe it was the
usual practice of God, enjoying His creation, relating intimately with Adam
and Eve. Because when Adam and Eve don’t show up for the afternoon stroll,
God says in the next verse, “Where are you? We had a lunch date!”
This was a usual experience. Can you
imagine what those walks with God must have been like for Adam and Eve? How
thrilling that must have been! Think of the wonders that Adam and Eve
discovered about God as they walked and talked to one another. Think of the
thanksgiving. “Wow! God that is a great sunrise – thank you!” Think of the
unbridled joy. “God, that sun set is spectacular!” Think of the laughter
they shared. “Lord that giraffe just cracks me up!” And there would have
been the feelings of acceptance and kindness and gentleness and the
overwhelming sense of peace, of contentment that must have pervaded that
relationship, for there was nothing separating them - no selfishness, no
agendas, no need, no clocks, no sin. Those walks in the garden must have
been wonderful!
But those walks were disrupted,
weren’t they? That intimacy was broken by Adam and Eve’s sin. The reason
God asks, “Where are you?” in verse 29 is that Adam and Eve are
hiding. Having sinned, they tried to hide from God. Their sin broke that
intimacy with God. In their rebellion they said, “God we don’t want you, we
want our own way.” And so for us all, God’s Word tells us, “There is no
one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who
seeks God. All have turned away …” (Romans 3:11,12)
The marvel of it all is that God still
desires to be intimate with us. He desires to have that relationship
restored, that intimacy He had with Adam and Eve is the intimacy He wants
with you and me. The fellowship He enjoyed with Adam and Eve while walking
in the garden is the fellowship that God wants with you and me.
This is why God brought the Hebrews
out of Egypt. Exodus 19:3,4 -“Then Moses went up to God and the Lord
called to him from the mountain and said, “This is what you are to say to
the house of Jacob and what you are to tell the people of Israel; You
yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles
wings and brought you to myself.”
As I read that, the image that
immediately sprung to mind was of a wife “kidnapping” her husband and
whisking him away to Ste. Anne’s Spa or some other remote retreat for a
weekend and we ask, “Why did you do that?” And she responds, “Because I
wanted him all to myself.”
That’s the picture of God for His
people then and now. He longs to have you to Himself. His love for you is
that strong. This is foundational for us to understand, intimacy with God
is possible because God desires it!
Some time ago Francis Thompson wrote a
famous poem about his relationship with God. He speaks of how he tried to
run away from God.
“I fled him, down the nights and down
the days;
I fled him, down the arches of the
years;
I fled him, down the labyrinthine ways
Of my own mind; and in the mist of
tears
I hid from him, and under running
laughter.
Up vistaed hopes I sped;
And shot, precipitated
Adown titanic glooms of chasmed
fears…”
And how does Francis Thompson describe
God? He calls Him the hound of heaven whose
“Strong feet that followed, followed
after.
But with unhurrying chase,
And unperturbed pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy
They beat.” 2
They beat, they beat they beat. The
hound of heaven. God desires an intimate relationship with you.
He desires it so much that He has made
intimacy possible by sending His Son to be a sacrifice for our sin. So that
we can be cleansed of our sin and live in close intimacy with Him. Do you
know that God’s heart hasn’t changed since the days of the Israelites? He
still longs to have an intimate relationship with you. But now because of
Christ, God has made it possible to live as intimately as possible with us –
by living right inside us.
Turn to Ephesians 2:19 - “Consequently,
you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with god’s
people and members of God’s household, built on the foundation of the
apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone.
In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy
temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a
dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.”
We Christians need to take it in that
Christianity is not about agreeing to a certain set of truths and getting
all the doctrines right. It is about having a living relationship with God
who has rescued us out of slavery to sin so that He can dwell in us. It is
about intimacy with God - He desires it!
But you still may doubt it, so let me
give you one more text. It is found in Revelation 4:11-12.
The NIV reads, “You are worthy, our
Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all
things, and by your will they were created and have their being.”
The King James Version reads, “Thou
art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power; for thou has
created all things and for thy pleasure they were created.”
Eugene Peterson’s The Message reads, “Worthy,
Oh master, Yes our God! Take the glory, the Honour! The power! You created
it all; I was created because you wanted it.”
That word translated - will,
pleasure, wanted it - is “thelema”. It means the result of the
will not created because it had to be done. “It is an expression or
inclination of pleasure toward that which is liked, that which pleases and
creates joy.”3 It is a beautiful word and it is a word that God applies to
you.
My friends, I’ve said it before and
I’ll say it again because it’s true. God not only loves you, but He likes
you! This is what this text is saying - He likes you and longs to have a
relationship with you.
Unfortunately we keep turning away
from Him. We are so easily distracted and amused by the most superficial
things. I will never forget being in Florida when John was only 2 or 3
years old, just able to speak. We visited Disney World and then had a long
drive down to Venice where my mom and dad were staying. And because we were
travelling, we had no toys to amuse a little child in the back seat. We
were kind of in a panic to find something to amuse him with, so I took off
my wrist watch and for the next two hours John amused himself, with the help
of Janet’s creativity with a simple wrist watch – not even digital!
Some of us are still like children so
easily amused with the trivial, when all along the God of the universe is
calling us to come and walk with Him!
And if it’s not things, it’s religion
itself that distracts us. We think that attending events and doing
Christian things is what this Christian life is about – but we still are
kept from the most important thing - intimacy with God. Going through the
motions of religiosity will not fill the emptiness. Only an intimate
relationship with God will do it.
Perhaps it is Satan himself keeping
you from intimacy with God. Perhaps he has told you that you are not worthy
to experience the presence of God - that only the very special few can ever
get near to God.
Or maybe your own unbelief, your own
doubt, your reluctance to separate yourself and be holy, or your own
unwillingness to pay the price and draw near to God is what keeps you from
claiming what is rightfully yours – a close and intimate relationship with
God - to behold His face, to hear His voice, to feel His touch, to walk with
Him in the garden.
In the words of Dennis Ignatius,
Ambassador of Malaysia to Canada and devoted Christian:
“There are many in the church today
who are deeply dissatisfied, deeply unfulfilled, frustrated: saved but still
missing something, set free yet burdened down, given the promise of peace
yet not knowing it, given the promise of joy but still filled with sadness,
given the promise of rest but still ever so weary, knowing that he is always
with us but still feeling very alone.” 4
You need to hear the good news - it
is possible for you to have an intimate relationship with God! It is
possible for you to know Him intimately, because God is a personality. He
can be known.
And God seeks you. He wants to meet
with you in that place of intimacy. He’ll meet you, He’ll reveal His glory
to you, He’ll fill you with his presence. That’s His heart’s desire, that’s
His purpose, now and forever.
I said there
are three foundational truths from our text. “Have them make a sanctuary
for me, and I will dwell among them.” Intimacy with God is possible.
God seeks intimacy with us. And third, it is simply this.
Intimacy with God requires something of us.
We have to move to get it. It was the same for the Israelites and it is the
same for us and it is this. “If we seek the Lord with our whole heart we
will surely find him.” (Deuteronomy 4:29) Will you seek Him? You
will find Him.
Copyright MBC and Tom Cullen - January 2007
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A.W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God,
(Harrisburg, PA: Christian Publications, 1948), 13.
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Beth
Moore, A Woman’s Heart (Nashville: LifeWay Press, 1995), 14.
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Francis Thompson, The Hound of Heaven
in Nicholson, D. H. S., and Lee, A. H. E., eds. The Oxford Book of
English Mystical Verse. (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1917).
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Dennis Ignatius,
Fire
Begets Fire (Vancouver: Vision Publications Ltd., 2006), 14.
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