(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Thank you very much. Thank you very much. We can open up your panels. Song number 336. Hit number 336. Constantly a bite. Hit 336. Earth is sinking, I'll take away. Though the trial of life is around like a cloud, I believe that has come here to stay. Constantly a bite. Jesus is mine. Constantly a bite. Rapture divine. He never leaves me lonely. Whispers much so fine. I will never leave. Jesus is mine. All the world seems to see. Of a savior and king. When he speak, he came to my heart. Drows on and away. May my night turn to day. Blessed Jesus, how glorious thou art. Constantly a bite. Jesus is mine. Constantly a bite. Rapture divine. He never leaves me lonely. Whispers much so fine. I will never leave. Jesus is mine. His pleasure I have. His hair full of clay. While here on his footstool I know. What is coming today is a glorious day. Over there to my heavenly home. Constantly a bite. Jesus is mine. Constantly a bite. Rapture divine. He never leaves me lonely. Whispers much so fine. I will never leave. Jesus is mine. Amen. Father Matt, can you open this up in a word of prayer? Father God, thank you for this church. Thank you for the soul we have today. Thank you for our pastor. Give us eyes to see and ears to hear. Let's turn to our next song. Song 272. Song 272. Jesus, I come. Hymn 272. On the first. How do I want this faraway night? Jesus, I come. Jesus, I come. Is my freedom that is in mind? Jesus, I come to thee. How do I sickness into thy health? How do I want it into thy wealth? How do I sin it into thyself? Jesus, I come to thee. Out of my shameful failure and loss. Jesus, I come. Jesus, I come. Into the glorious pain of my loss. Jesus, I come to thee. Out of her sorrows into thy bond. Out of us, Lord, and into thy bond. Out of this breast to chew this song. Jesus, I come to thee. Out of unrest and therapy cry. Jesus, I come. Jesus, I come. Into thy blessed veil to abide. Jesus, I come to thee. Out of my stealth to dwell in thy love. Out of despair and into fashers of love. On her forehead on things like a dove. Jesus, I come to thee. Out of the fear and veil of the tomb. Jesus, I come. Jesus, I come. Into the joy and light of thy love. Jesus, I come to thee. Out of the depths of truth untold. Into the beasts of my sheltering form. Out of my glorious ways to behold. Jesus, I come to thee. Amen. All right. Great singing this afternoon. We're going to go through our announcements right now. If you don't have a bulletin, slip up your hand real high. We'll make sure that we get one out to you. And if you open up to the first page, you'll see our service times listed there. As always, Sunday morning at 1030. Sunday afternoon again at 4 p.m. Wednesday night, 7 is our Bible study. We're in Isaiah chapter 21 this week. If you can make it out to the midweek service, we go through verse by verse. It's actually a little bit different than we do on our Sundays, so I encourage you all to come out for that because we literally just go through the entire chapter verse by verse. It's slightly different than how we do it on Sunday, but if you can't make it, tune in. View the live stream. Check it out on video afterwards. There's always something different that we learn. On Sundays, I tend to hit on hotter topics or major topics or things like that, but on Wednesday, we go over all manner of things because whatever the Bible says in that passage is what we go over. There's things that I preach on on Wednesday night that I wouldn't even necessarily normally think to preach about on a Sunday just because you're kind of forced to preach through everything, so we go through it. There's extra things there. If you want to learn and grow a little bit more, then try to come out to Wednesday night. If you can't make it, still try to catch it and check it out online. We've got the soul-winning opportunities listed there, salvations and baptisms. I'll just bring this up now. I've heard some talk of people wanting to do ladies potentially doing a soul-winning time, so if there's any ladies that are interested in that, just go ahead. Anyone for this matter, ladies or not, if people want to start another soul-winning time, I'm all for it. I think that's a great idea, and especially for the ladies because I know the bigger the families are, sometimes it's harder to manage who's able to go in and everything like that. What I recommend doing for anybody, if you want to start a new soul-winning time, first just start talking to people and see if there's enough interest to get something started. If there's enough interest in saying, hey, we're going to be doing this soul-winning time, then I'll put it in the bulletin as an official soul-winning time if it's something that's going to happen on a regular basis consistently and someone's willing to say I'm always going to do this or whatever. But if it's something that you do amongst friends and you're going, okay, well, me and this person sometimes are going this day, sometimes are going that day. That's great, do that, but I'm not going to put it in the bulletin as an official soul-winning time. So anyone who wants to do something like that, the question came up. I'd love for that. I'd love to see people just go out soul-winning more. You don't have to only go at our official soul-winning times. I know some people already are going out with their families, going out and doing their own times. Amen. I'm all for it. Please, do as much as you can. But if you want to get a little bit more interest and stuff, first, just start by talking to the people that you know and if you are not sure, then you can come and ask me. Mrs. Johnson is the one who approached me. It's not a secret or anything. She's the one who's talking about a lady's soul-winning time. So if you are a lady and you're interested in that, talk to her so that she knows that you're interested too because this is the same advice I just gave her earlier today. Just say, hey, see who's interested. And whatever's going to work for everyone who's interested. If you're able to come to an agreement and say, yeah, we could do this and meet at this place, great, I'll put it in the bulletin and we'll have a lady's soul-winning time in the bulletin. I'd love to do that. And also, even if it's not a weekly thing, if it needs to be biweekly, if it needs to be once a month, whatever it is, we could schedule it out if we were willing to do that. We had one when I was in Arizona that was lady's soul-winning time and they met every other week. And it was always this day, every other week, this time, just because that's what worked for everyone that was coming and we'll do that. So, by all means, anyone who wants to do this, you know, just please just let me know. More soul-winning the better, right? We've got the salvation and baptisms listed there. Let's go ahead and count up. Before we do today, salvation's from the week? Two, amen. Anyone else or anything to report from earlier in the week? And then how about for today? Two, one. One. All right, in our group we had three. It was awesome. It was really cool. So, three teenage-ish kids at the door. So, that was exciting. Anyone else? All right. Well, very good. Keep up the good work. You know, knocking on those doors. Even in rain or shine, right? Or rain and shine, rain and humidity, right? It doesn't matter. Sometimes the rain's better than the shine, depending on how it turns out. But, you know, either way, preach the gospel. Today we were blessed because everything was under cover. So, even with the rain it wasn't that bad. But, yeah, keep up the good work. We've got the offering totals listed down there at the bottom of the page. Prayer requests. I forgot to add, Pastor Ed Williams' daughter got in a car wreck. And thankfully she's okay. She's safe. Her health is good. But apparently her car is totaled. And that was her only means of transportation, as far as I understand. And so she's in a little bit of a bind, I believe, not having transportation. So, pray for her. But thank God that she's not injured. I mean, that's the most important thing that she's okay. As far as I know, again, I don't know if there's anything that might come up. But the best of my knowledge is that she's physically okay. And then continue to pray. Brother Peter's father, he was hospitalized. But he's home. But he's still on oxygen. But his wife is still hospitalized and has COVID. So, just be in prayer for them, as well, as far as that update. Midah is a kidney stone. And we received an update earlier that she is, they're going to do scheduling for her to have a procedure. They're scheduling tomorrow so they could break up that stone because it's two centimeters. It's really big. And she's not going to be able to pass that. So, she's going to need to go in and perform that operation to get that done. And so to be in prayer for her this week. And then I don't think I had really any other updates from everyone else on here. Brother Devin's brother, who's not on here again, but Daniel had surgery that was a success. But he's going to be recovering for a long time. So, be in prayer for him that he'll recover quickly and that everything will go well. And then continuing on the next page. Oh, I forgot to make this announcement, too. We got a whole box full of psychopath reprobate DVDs. Tons of them. So, thank Verity Baptist Church. They sent those over free of charge to us here to distribute. So, help yourselves to those. I don't know if you want to bring them out with you. By all means, do so. I like those for people. Obviously, it's a great teaching tool for the reprobate doctrine. It really does a good job of explaining it and even showing the world's knowledge versus what the Bible says because you have to have an explanation. What about these people that are psychopaths? How do they fit in? Well, you know, the Bible talks about these people with a lot of clarity, actually. It makes perfect sense. So, it's a good doctrine that people can... I think maybe many people, especially believers or saved people, can accept and understand that from that perspective better than maybe just talking about sodomites and referring to it that way, right? If you hear it the way that's presented there, it just makes sense. It's really well done. Anyways, those are out there in the foyer. Help yourself to those. Take them, distribute them, do everything that we do with all the rest of them out there and looking forward to sharing that with people. On the next page is the August challenge. It's a visitor challenge. We're trying to invite people to come to church this month and beyond, but this month, if you bring a first-time visitor to church, you'll get a prize for that that we'll be distributing in September. The upcoming events are all listed there. The one I squeezed in there, just in case you don't just read over this, is the reception that we have planned for Denzel and Kristen. Everything else is the same as it has been for the past few weeks, but Brother Denzel's wedding is going to be in Montana on September 10th, so they're going to go on their honeymoon and then come back here. Yes, Leslie? Oh, the homeschool field trip. The 17th? Yeah, you guys were doing that. I forgot about that. So that's a Friday. So we're starting up, okay, starting up the homeschool field trips again, right? Those had been postponed because of all the restrictions and all the COVID stuff and everything. Now, hopefully we can just continue to do this stuff. Everything in Georgia at least has been pretty good as far as things being open and available, whatever, but we're going to start those back up again. All homeschool families are welcome to attend. Everything is free of charge, like normal, as everything else we do here, all the activities. And we had been to this place once before. The kids had a lot of fun there. It's tiny town. Is that Lilburn or Norcross? Like, it's right around here. It's not far. I think it's... Yeah, it's not far from here at all. Beaver Run Road, tiny town. The kids get their little driver licenses for their little cars and stuff, and it's a little town for the kids. They have a lot of fun with that. So if you want to attend, that is going to be September 17th, Friday at, do you have a time, 10-ish? So we need to nail down the actual start time. It's probably right around the time they open, I think it was last time, somewhere around 9 or 10 in the morning. So just plan on something like that. I don't know exactly when it'll be, but we are starting those back up again. And if you have any ideas, you can bring them up to my wife, or is Mrs. Masler helping you? Is she mainly doing a lot of the legwork on that? So good, she's going to be doing that. If you have any ideas for homeschool field trips, you could talk to her. And my thing with the homeschool field trips, you know, I like having, it's not just all about fun. There's got to be some type of value, of educational value to it. That's why I like to see on these homeschool field trips. Obviously, they can be a lot of fun. They should be fun. Field trips should always be fun, but you need to have something that you're learning there. It's not just like a theme park. I want kids going on these field trips and learning things out in the field. That's the whole point. So that's what we're going to be doing, and happy to see that start up again. Bible memory passage, deadline is today, it's tonight. I counted people already this morning. If you have completed this, or will have this completed tonight, and you didn't already raise your hand, just slip your hand up right now. Just make sure I didn't miss anybody. I counted six people. If you're going to have this done, or already have this done, and I didn't count you already, all right, I'm going to go with six as the final count. And we'll be good with that. You'll have to get in touch with me on the details of the prize for this. So because it's a two night stay at a state park in Georgia, you figure out where you want to go, and then give me the details for that so that we could. And you might not know right now, and it's fine. You don't have to use it immediately. I mean, just figure out what's going to work for you, and we'll make it work. So just let me know on that for those of you who did complete this challenge. And then the upcoming birthdays and anniversaries are listed down there at the bottom of the page. I think that's it. Are there still any cookies left? I don't know. Brother Matt brought a box full of all these individual packages of cookies. So they are free for the taking. Go ahead and help yourself to that. And I don't know if there's still any remaining out there. If you've already had one from this morning, go ahead and grab another one, and we'll distribute those. So go ahead and help yourself to that after service. And that is it for announcements. So I'm going to ask Brother Peter to come up and lead us in our next song. All right, church, if you can open up your hymnals to song number 325. Song 325, Trust and Obey. Hymn 325. On the first. When we walk with the Lord In the line of His word What a glory He sheds on our way For on due His good will He abides with us still And with all who will trust and obey Trust and obey For there's no other way To be happy in Jesus But to trust and obey Not a shadow of their hearts Not a cloud in the skies But they smile with each rising away Not a doubt or a fear Not a sign or a tear And I'll find while we trust and obey Trust and obey For there's no other way To be happy in Jesus But to trust and obey Not a burden we bear Not a sorrow we share But our story does richly repay Not a grief or a loss Not a frown or a cross But as blessed if we trust and obey Trust and obey For there's no other way To be happy in Jesus But to trust and obey But we never can prove That the light of His love Until all of whom alter He lay For a favor He shows And a joy He explodes For for them who will trust and obey Trust and obey For there's no other way To be happy in Jesus But to trust and obey And in fellowship sweet We will sit at His feet Or we'll walk by His side in the rain What He says we will do When He says we will go Never fear, only trust and obey Trust and obey For there's no other way To be happy in Jesus But to trust and obey Alright church, while the offering plate is being passed around, if you can open up your Bible to the book of Exodus chapter 34. That's Exodus 34. And as we do customary here at Strong Old Baptist Church we'll read the entire chapter. I'm going to ask Brother Devin if he can please do that for us. That was Exodus 34. And the Lord said unto Moses, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first. And I will write upon these tables the words that were in the first tables which thou breakest. And be ready in the morning and come up in the morning unto Mount Sinai and present thyself there to me in the top of the mount. And no man shall come up with thee, neither let any man be seen throughout all the mount. Neither let the flocks nor herds feed before that mount. And he hewed two tables of stone like unto the first. And Moses rose up early in the morning and went up unto Mount Sinai as the Lord had commanded him and took in his hand the two tables of stone. And the Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there and proclaimed the name of the Lord. And the Lord passed by before him and proclaimed the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and glorious and gracious, long suffering and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin. And that will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and upon the children's children unto the third and to the fourth generation. And Moses made haste and bowed his head toward the earth and worshiped. And he said, If now I have found grace in thy sight, O Lord, let my Lord, I pray thee, go among us. For it is a stiff necked people and pardon our iniquity and our sin and take us for thine inheritance. And he said, Behold, I make a covenant before all thy people. I will do marvels such as have not been done in all the earth nor in any nation and all the people among which thou art shall see the work of the Lord. For it is a terrible thing that I will do with thee. Observe thou that which I command thee this day. Behold, I drive out before thee the Amorite and the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Perizzite and the Hibite and the Jebusite. Take heed to thyself, lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land with thou goest, lest it be for a snare in the midst of thee. But ye shall destroy their altars or break their images and cut down their groves. For thou shalt worship no other God for the Lord, whose name is jealous, is a jealous God. Lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land and they go a whoring after their gods and do sacrifice unto their gods. And one call thee and thou eat of his sacrifice and thou take of their daughters unto thy sons and their daughters go a whoring after their gods and make thy sons go a whoring after their gods. Thou shalt make thee no molten gods. The feast of unleavened bread shalt thou keep. Seven days thou shalt eat unleavened bread as I commanded thee in the time of the month Abib. For in the month Abib thou camest out from Egypt. All that openeth the matrix is mine and every firstling among thy cattle, whether ox or sheep, that is male. But the firstling of an ass thou shalt redeem with a lamb. And if thou redeem him not, then shalt thou break his neck. All the firstborn of thy sons thou shalt redeem and none shall appear before me empty. Six days thou shalt work, but on the seventh day thou shalt rest. In erring time and in harvest thou shalt rest. And thou shalt observe the feast of weeks of the first fruits of wheat harvest and the feast of ingathering at the year's end. Thrice in the year shall all your men children appear before the Lord God, the God of Israel. For I will cast out the nations before thee and enlarge thy borders. Neither shall any man desire thy land when thou shalt go up to appear before the Lord thy God thrice in the year. Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leaven. Neither shall the sacrifice of the feast of the Passover be left unto the morning. The first of the first fruits of thy land thou shalt bring unto the house of the Lord thy God. Thou shalt not see a kid in his mother's milk. And the Lord said unto Moses, Write thou these words. For after the tenor of these words, I have made a covenant with thee and with Israel. And he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights, and he did neither eat bread nor drink water. And he wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments. And it came to pass when Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tables of testimony in Moses's hand. When he came down from the mount, that Moses wished not that the skin of his face shone while he talked with him. And when Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come nigh him. And Moses called unto them, and Aaron and all the rulers of the congregation returned unto him, and Moses talked with them. And afterward all the children of Israel came nigh, and he gave them in commandment all that the Lord had spoken with him in Mount Sinai. Until Moses had done speaking with them, he put a veil on his face. But when Moses went in before the Lord to speak with him, he took the veil off until he came out. And he came out and spake unto the children of Israel that which he was commanded. And the children of Israel saw the face of Moses, that the skin of Moses's face shone. And Moses put the veil upon his face again until he went in to speak with him. Let's pray. Dear Lord, thank you for your word here in this chapter and this great story. I pray that you would be with our service now, Lord, and bless our pastor as he comes to preach your word. I pray that you would just fill us all, including pastor, with your spirit. Help us to not have any distractions and to have hearts and ears that are ready to receive your word right now. And in Jesus' name I pray, amen. Amen. All right, so I'm hoping that the sermon's not going to be too dry. But we're going to be covering a topic that I think is pretty interesting. And maybe if you've read this story, this is a really fascinating chapter in Exodus here in chapter 34. And I'm going to be focusing on the area where Moses is speaking directly with God. Moses goes up on a mountain and God's delivering, you know, essentially the law unto Moses. And he's communing with God. And he spends 40 days and 40 nights with the Lord in the mountain. And that alone in itself is pretty amazing where he's there 40 days and 40 nights and he's not eating or drinking. So he's not even having any water for 40 days and 40 nights, showing us that God is miraculously sustaining Moses. And when you're that close to God, right, and communing with him. And we're going to see here actually, flip, keep your place here, go back one chapter to chapter 33. This is the relationship that Moses has with the Lord and how close he is. Exodus 33 verse number 9, the Bible reads, And it came to pass as Moses entered into the tabernacle, the cloudy pillar descended and stood at the door of the tabernacle. And the Lord talked with Moses. And all the people saw the cloudy pillar stand at the tabernacle door. And all the people rose up and worshiped every man in his tent door. And the Lord spake unto Moses face to face as a man speaketh unto his friend. And he turned again into camp, but his servant Joshua the son of Nun, a young man departed not out of the tabernacle. So what we see here is the majority of the people, they're back at camp and they're just standing in their, you know, in their tent doors. And they're worshiping afar off, right? They're worshiping the Lord from there. They see the cloudy pillar of the sand and they know that the Lord's presence is in the tabernacle. But Moses is right there in the middle of it, like, as it were, face to face with the Lord. And he's communing with God and receiving from God and having this, just receiving the law and everything from the Lord and being able to have a conversation with God as a man speaketh unto his friend. Now, that in itself is just, you know, what an amazing place to be, to be Moses, to have a conversation with the Lord as if he's your best friend, right? And to have that closeness and that fellowship with God and to be so close. And he's so close there that even then just being able to survive physically, you know, Jesus, we see that, you know, that he says, I have meat that ye know not of. Remember his disciples were going to get food and everything. He talks to women at the well and he quotes the Old Testament, so, you know, man that does not live by bread, aloma by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. And obviously there's a lot of symbolism there and there's, you know, the life that really matters. That's completely true, but I believe that also, you know, in another sense, you could be physically sustained just by being that close to God, which is evidenced here with Moses, and we're going to see glimpses into what the future is going to be like when the New Jerusalem comes down out of heaven. And the Bible says there's not going to be a sun or a moon, you know, the sun's not going to be providing the light thereof, but the Son of Man, the Lamb, is going to be the light in the New Jerusalem. And this is really, really cool and kind of interesting to think about because what we see in this story and what I'm going to focus on, there's two things I'm focusing on. So my sermon this evening, I keep saying morning, I apologize for that, this evening or this afternoon, the title is The Veil is Done Away, and we're looking at two instances where there's a veil used. The first one is the veil over Moses' face, and we're going to see how the New Testament expounds on this story here, and then we're also going to just consider and look at the symbolism of the veil that separated the holy place from the most holy place and just kind of go over all of the symbolic meanings for this. It's actually, I mean, it's a really interesting chapter and sometimes can just kind of go unnoticed. And to be honest with you, what prompted me to preach this, my daughter asked me a question when we were doing our personal Bible reading. I said, you know what, that's a great idea for a sermon topic, so listen up, you can get your answer because this was actually a little bit more in-depth than a real simple answer, and I thought, hey, why not take this opportunity and just teach the church because if she's asking, you know, and I'm looking at this going, you know, this is actually a really good topic to go over. We're going to look at this in-depth. And that first, so the first part, though, is Moses having this veil because it says here, go back to chapter 34 and jump down to verse number 28, the Bible says, And he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights. He did neither eat bread nor drink water. That's where he's communing with God. And he wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments. So this is after they already, he broke the first set of Ten Commandments that he was given because the people were, you know, committing sin and idolatry and everything else, and he gets down and he's real angry, and that story itself is interesting because, you know, God is extremely angry, and Moses entreats for them before he even, like, really knows what's going on because God's ready to destroy them, and then Moses sees what's going on, and then he's really angry, too, and he, you know, breaks the Ten Commandments, like, you know, what's wrong with you people, and forces them to drink the idol that he ground down the powder and put it in the water and be like, you guys are drinking this now, and, you know, I mean, he really let them have it, and I think he more fully understood why God was so angry, even though he entreated for their, you know, for their sparing of their lives from the Lord. But this happens after that, right? So I don't want to get too far into that because that's, we'll never leave. Just start preaching through all of Exodus. But, so here's where he is. He's now receiving the Ten Commandments again, and along with other aspects of law, obviously, he's there for 40 days and 40 nights. It's not just the Ten Commandments, but he's receiving that, and when he comes down from the mount with the Ten Commandments, verse 29 says, and it came to pass when Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tables of testimony and Moses' hand. When he came down from the mount that Moses wist not, that means he didn't know, that the skin of his face shone while he talked with him. So Moses is having this communication with the Lord, and he has no idea that his face actually begins to shine. It begins to have a glow from his own, and I think the only thing that makes sense is that what he's doing is he's been receiving the glory of God. And just so you know, when the Bible talks about glory, it's talking about a shining or a brightness. Sometimes we might think of it a little bit different because you're saying, oh, when someone does really good, that's glorious, or they have this glory, and it's kind of something maybe you could brag about, whatever, but more specifically, the glory literally comes from a shining, and you see that in Scripture. The Bible says there's one glory of the sun, another glory of the moon, another glory of the stars. Why? Because they vary in brightness. So you've got the glory of the sun, which is really bright. You know, the moon's a little bit darker, but it's still kind of bright at night, and the stars and everything like that. That's what it's talking about glory here. So when it talks about the glory of the Lord filling up the tabernacle, it's talking about the brightness that's coming from God out, and people can see that. Moses is having his conversation, and because he's on the receiving end of God's glory, now it kind of transfers to him where he's reflecting that glory or that light of the Lord, and that's why I think what's happening here is something similar, and you know, the flat earthers don't get this concept, but they think that the moon just shines on its own because they don't understand a lot of things, but I'm not going to go down that rabbit trail either, but we know that the sun has the glory, and the moon is reflecting the light from the sun, right? So when the Bible refers to the moon having its light, it's still a reflection of that light, but there's this glory, and I think this is exactly what we're seeing here with Moses, that it's not like his own flesh is producing this glow, but he has been receiving that glory emanating from the sun, probably from the son of God. If he's face to face, I see this as he's actually speaking to the sun because later when he wants to see God, you know, the father, no one has seen his face. He sees his hinder parts and everything else, but anyways, that's neither here nor there. If he's speaking face to face, you know, obviously people have seen the sun's face, which is another concept that the oneness people don't seem to understand. People literally believe that people haven't seen Jesus' face. It's bizarre. When you get to that level of ignorance, it just means you're unsaved, honestly, because you have to have blinders over your eyes, which actually ties in with what a lot of this is talking about. We're going to see the New Testament explanation of this passage of people who are blinded because the things of the Bible, things of the Lord are spiritually discerned. If you don't have the Spirit of God, then you're going to come up with all kinds of weird things that only an unsaved mind could even come up with because it's so far removed from the truth and just makes no sense. Man, enough rambling. I've got lots of scripture I want to look at, so let's continue here. His face is shining, right? So he doesn't realize this, but his face is literally shining as a result of being with God for so long, being so close to God, being in his presence. And it says in verse 30, it says, And when Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come nigh him. So he's coming down from the mound. He's got the two tablets right up stone. He's ready to start teaching children of Israel everything, tell them about what God's told them. And they look at this guy, and they're like, whoa. I mean, he's got this big glowing face coming down the mountain, probably got a big smile on his face. Imagine seeing someone whose face is shining like a flashlight or something, just having this great glow coming off of them, look like an alien or something probably, I don't know. But they're kind of freaked out about this, and they don't even want to get close, right? They're thinking, you know, is this, is there radiation up there? You're glowing, some kind of, what's going on? And he comes out, and it's such a big deal that what we're going to see here is that he has to put a covering over his face. So they think he's got COVID or something from being up in the mound too long, and I don't know what this shine is. You've got COVID, cover up your face. No, I'm just kidding. So the veil, though, it is a covering. He's putting something to block that glow so that people aren't just so distracted and basically be like, man, we can't, I mean, we're afraid to even look at you because that's just weird that your face is glowing. So he has to put this veil on. Verse 31 says that Moses called unto them, and Aaron and all the rulers of the congregation returned unto him. They left. He's like, no, no, no, guys, come back, right? They returned unto him, and Moses talked with them, and afterward all the children of Israel came nigh, and he gave them in commandment all that the Lord had spoken with him in Mount Sinai. Until Moses had done speaking with them, he put a veil on his face. So Moses is delivering the law unto them. All joking aside, now let's think about this because this is going to go to the meaning and interpretation and understanding of what's going on here. He has to have this veil over his face because that glory, even the transfer of glory onto his face was too much for the people to be able to receive. And he has to put on this blinder on his face as he's delivering the law unto the people. And while he's speaking and giving the law, there's a veil between the people and him where his words are coming out, obviously speaking the word of God, but that veil is kind of blocking and being a divider between them and the law. And we're going to see why that's important, especially symbolically. Right, now this literally happened. We have to understand, these things in the Old Testament, they literally happen, but they also carry, you know, symbolic truths. And the reason why they even happen is because they, you know, a lot of times examples, actions, these events that happen will stick with people longer than just words. So, you know, on Wednesday we're talking about, we saw how Isaiah had to do some extreme things and humbling things that God commanded him to do as a preacher to get through to people. And Ezekiel had to do the same thing. And we're talking about, you know, eating dung or just being naked and, you know, like these things that it's like, and again, listen to the sermon on Wednesday if you missed that, but God's really trying to get hold of people and they have a long meaning. And also then with the sacrifices and the way that you do everything, kind of ritualistic and doing things the same way every time, God packed meaning into all of the services, all of the, you know, each one of the sacrifices, the way it's performed, all the details of the tabernacle, all the details of the temple, they all held significance and were showing a picture of something that was to come. And because they saw that and had that in their face, day in, day out, it's something that God was just trying to make sure would stay in their heads, that then they could learn from and see the bigger picture as it's a part of, say, like daily life, okay? With every sacrifice, it's got to be done this way every time. Why do you always do this? Well, there's a reason for that and there's meaning behind all of it. So the meaning is, you know, hopefully going to transcend. And, you know, with the learning of the Psalms and songs, they're just going to stay with them and God even says, you know, hey, so in time to come, this is a testimony so that when the children of Israel get just way off base and just turn from the Lord, they're still going to know this song because it's just been taught and passed down from generation to generation. And that's one of the purposes for having all of these various rituals in the Old Testament under the Levitical priesthood was that if they start to stray, they should still hopefully continue to do things because people will continue to do, even if they don't fully understand them, they just keep doing them because that's what's been done. And there's truth in these things that's going to, oh, that's why, you know, so then they could later on, you know, when future descendants maybe are going to get right with God and hear the word of God and go, oh, well that's why we do this thing and now it all makes sense and then they could teach again and pick, get right back into it. But let's continue here. So he puts a veil on his face and verse 34 says, but when Moses went in before the Lord to speak with him, he took the veil off until he came out. So obviously Moses isn't going to speak through a veil to God. He's speaking to him like a friend speaks face to face. He's got that close relationship, but then when he comes back out, the veil goes back on for the people. It says, and he came out and spake unto the children of Israel that which he was commanded and the children of Israel saw the face of Moses that the skin of Moses' face shone and Moses put the veil upon his face again until he went in to speak with him. So this is what he sees going back and forth with God and then the people. He's delivering a message from God and every time he's putting this veil on his face. Now, keep your place in Exodus because we're going to come back here, but flip over if you would to the New Testament, 2 Corinthians chapter 3. So the literal purpose for the veil was just because the people were kind of scared and freaked out that his face was shining. So he's going to say, okay, we'll solve this by putting a veil on. You don't have to look at me in the face and then I could still talk to you without you getting freaked out and running away, right? You could still hear what Moses has to say. That would be like the very top level surface, okay, practical reason for it, but it goes way deeper than that. The whole purpose of this and the meaning is trying to illustrate and show something that especially in regards to the law and the old covenant as a whole, even when it's being delivered, that's going to show a truth here about even seeking the end of the law, which is explained thoroughly in the New Testament, which is why we're going to 2 Corinthians chapter 3. So let's see how this is interpreted already for us and what I'm doing tonight or this evening, you know, I'm not adding any interpretation to these other than if you want to say, okay, well, maybe it's my thought or idea that the reason why his face is shining is because he's close to God, okay, whatever, but we're going to see here what the Bible is saying this means, right? So we're looking to Scripture to even just tell us what these things mean. I'm not just coming up with my own stuff here. Let's look down to verse number 6, 2 Corinthians chapter 3, the Bible reads, who also hath made us able ministers of the New Testament, not of the letter, but of the Spirit, for the letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life. And, you know, you could go back later and read the whole chapter in context, but this is exalting the New Testament, right? Oh, it's a better covenant. It's a better promise. It's a better deal with the New Testament being, you know, salvation by grace through faith through Jesus Christ and, you know, not having to keep the law in order to be saved, which obviously, look, we know that no one has ever been saved that way because by the law is the knowledge of sin. That's what makes you a sinner is the law. So even back in the Old Testament, nobody was saved by obeying the law because no one could completely obey the law, but that is the old covenant is just saying, okay, well, here's the law. If you keep all these things, then you're blessed, and if you don't keep all the words of these sayings of this law, then you're cursed, and everyone ended up being cursed because no one was able to keep all the law except for Christ. That was a plan all along, but here's the thing. They were still under that covenant until Jesus Christ came, and again, the individual soul being saved, people were always saved by grace through faith, but until the time that Christ actually came to bring in that new covenant, they're following all these truths that were being set forth through the old covenant. So let's continue here. Verse number seven, the Bible reads, but if the ministration of death, why do I say ministration of death? Because the law doesn't bring life. It only can bring death because by obeying the law, you're doing what you're supposed to be doing anyways, and then as soon as you break it, then you've got to suffer a consequence for the law. So it's not like you're achieving it, and this is why I try to explain to people I'm stalling, and hopefully, you know, maybe if you haven't used this before, it could help people with this concept. When you do right, and doing right just means obeying the law, it means you're not doing wrong. When you're not doing wrong, you're just saying, okay, well, I'm going to do this, this, this, this. You're just doing what you're supposed to do. So when those commandments, commandments go forth, then you must do those commandments from God. If God commands something, then you have to do it. It's a command. So the best case is that you've just done what you were told to do. That's the best case. In obeying the commandments, you've done everything you were supposed to do, with the worst case being you fail in one area. Well, now you didn't do everything you're supposed to do, and now you're going to have to suffer a consequence for that, whereas if you just do everything you're supposed to do, well, that's what you're supposed to do. It doesn't make up for anything wrong that you've done. It doesn't pay it. It's not like you're going above and beyond. You're just doing what you're supposed to do. It's not like you're not going, oh, well, I'm doing what I'm supposed to do, and I'm doing all this extra stuff. No, because that encompasses, ultimately, well, God's telling you just to do all this stuff, and no one does all that to go above and beyond. So it's administration of death because no one can keep the law. Everybody ends up failing, and the wages of sin is death. It says the administration of death written and engraven in stones was glorious so that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance, which glory was to be done away. Now, the Bible also says, you know, there's nothing wrong with the law. You say, but it's administration of death. Yes, but it's not like the law is bad or evil or wicked or anything like that. The law is the law. The law is actually good. The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul. The law of the Lord is great. It's glorious. It's wonderful. It's a very good thing, but it is still the administration of death. You see, the New Testament teaches us, especially, just over and over again, that the purpose for the law is to expose to us that we are sinners and we need a Savior and that we need God. It's a schoolmaster to instruct us and to teach us and to help us to know the right way and also to know that that right way is Jesus and not ourselves, right? That Jesus, it should bring us to him by showing us, wow, I need a Savior. Wow, I'm not as good as I thought I was. Oh, man, I need to do all these things because this is the right way and one, inherently, in the law, everything that God says is good. Following the law is only good for you every single time and not obeying the law is going to end up bad for you in one way or another. And I've said this before that it's this collection of truths that God has given us. It's like even if God decided not to punish you, just no extra punishment on top because you sinned, by break, just by not doing what he's saying to do is not going to be the best for you and you're going to end up suffering as a result of not following because intrinsically and inherently there's hardship that goes along with sinning. A simple example is just committing fornication. Committing fornication has a lot of ramifications that's going to knit you together with someone who's not your spouse, first of all, in a way that you may not even be able to fully grasp or understand, especially if you haven't done it, but it's something that you're getting intimacy with somebody that's only meant to be with a spouse the way that God designed it. And it's going to cause you more problems. It could bring disease. It could bring, you know, it introduces a whole host of problems that even if God just didn't punish you for fornicating, in itself is not the best way to live and is going to bring you problems just by doing it. And every sin, every commandment is like that where God is saying, look, you need to do, follow all these things because it's good for you, let alone the fact that you just being disobedient is going to make God angry and bring more, you know, punishment on you. So my point is the law itself, it brings death, it's minister of death because no one follows it. No one can fully just follow all the commandments, but it's still glorious and good because it's telling us how we should be living and what we should be doing. It's still very good. And the comparison here is the difference now between that old covenant and the glory of that old covenant versus, well, how much better is the new covenant? If that is glorious and no one was able to keep that and that brought death, then how much better is the New Testament? That was so glorious in verse 7 in the middle part there says, so that the children of Israel cannot steadfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance, which glory was to be done away, how shall not the ministration of the Spirit be rather glorious? For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, much more does the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory. So not to understate that glory of the Lord, I mean, Moses had to cover his face because he's shown so much, and that's from receiving the glory of the law. And now this is saying, well, how much better is this new covenant than that because no one was able to keep that and that brought death? The law is still good. So the Bible says in Romans, is the law sin? No, of course not. The law is good. Verse 10, for even that which was made glorious had no glory in this respect by reason of the glory that excelleth. So he's saying even that which was made glorious, the law, had no glory in this one respect in comparison to the glory that was of the New Testament. So if you have two things, one thing shining and the other thing shining way, way, way brighter, you won't even notice the one that's shining if this other one is just shining so much greater. It just overpowers the other one, right? And this is the comparison being brought here. That law is very glorious and amazing, and that glory of the law coming forth through most of us is saying how much better it is that that one does. It's like it's not even shining compared to what Jesus is bringing. Verse number 11, for if that which is done away was glorious, much more that which remaineth is glorious. Seeing then that we have such hope, we use great plainness of speech. I mean, he's saying we're going forth, we're preaching the New Testament, plainness easy to be understood, nothing complicated, very simple. The gospel is simple. It's not hard to understand. It's simple. You're a sinner. You need a savior. Get saved by putting your trust in Jesus Christ. Very plain, very easy. And he says, and not as Moses. So the contrast here is, hey, we're using great plainness of speech, but not as Moses, which put a veil over his face. So it's harder, right? And it's showing the difference between how hard it is, one, to even just keep the law, and it's not that plain, it's not that simple to have to obey everything and to follow the law. He put a veil over his face that the children of Israel could not steadfastly look to the end of that which is abolished. They couldn't see what that's going to bring. That's what the end is. What is the end result? They couldn't even see that because there's a veil covering it, because they're never going to get to the end by trying to follow the law that way of what's being revealed to them. They're never going to get that glory and that brightness and shining because that path won't lead them there. They're not going to get it. It has to be by grace. It's blocked off. So if you're going to try to obey all the commandments to get to God, you're going to fail and fall short. They've already got a veil covering you to get to that point. You can't see the end of that. You can't make it. It says in verse 14, but their minds were blinded. For until this day remaineth the same veil untaken away in the reading of the Old Testament which veil is done away in Christ. And this is also showing illustrating the blindness of the people who just think that you can obey the law and follow the works of the law to be saved. You're blind. See, the veil is done away with Christ. You can see clearly. You're going to be able to see, oh, okay, now I understand. Now I can see because you're not just focused on trying to obey the law to achieve righteousness with God because you can't. You need to receive the righteousness which is by faith in Jesus Christ. And verse 15 says, but even unto this day when Moses is read, the veil is upon their heart. So that veil that was physical is now being symbolically applied continuing on even, you know, the veil was on Moses' face, but it's still on their heart. They still don't get it. They still don't understand. They're still trying to look to the law which Moses gave the law, but that's not the way of salvation. That's not the way to be saved. The veil is upon their heart, but then it says, nevertheless, when it shall turn to the Lord, the veil shall be taken away. Now the Lord is that spirit, and where the spirit of the Lord is there is liberty, but we all with open face beholding as in a glass, the glory of the Lord are changed into the same image from glory to glory even as by the spirit of the Lord. Now go back if you would to Exodus, chapter 26. And this is gonna take a little bit more time but I'm gonna try to get through it quickly. So that's the veil upon Moses' face. The veil separating the most holy from the holy place is very similar in its meaning, but we're gonna see some differences here as well. Look at verse number 31 in Exodus, chapter 26. Verse 31 reads, and thou shalt make a veil of blue and purple and scarlet and fine twine linen of cunning work with cherubim shall be made, and thou shalt hang it upon four pillars of shidam wood overlaid with gold, their hook shall be of gold upon the four sockets of silver, and thou shalt hang up the veil under the tatches that thou mayest bring in thither within the veil the ark of the testimony, and the veil shall divide unto you between the holy place and the most holy, and thou shalt put the mercy seat upon the ark of the testimony in the most holy place, and thou shalt set the table without the veil and the candlestick over against the table on the side of the tabernacle toward the south, and thou shalt put the table on the north side. So it's laying out how the tabernacle is supposed to be arranged, and the key takeaway here is you need to understand that the veil separates the holy place from the most holy place. The most holy place had the ark of the covenant, which was the Old Testament, the literal stones, the Ten Commandments, right, and the mercy seat of God with the two, with the cherubims pointing, facing each other, and having their wings connected and all that, and having that was in that most holy place, and we're going to read in Leviticus, turn in view of Leviticus chapter 16, why that area's so important, and we need to understand that the images and the pictures here of the tabernacle are representative of what actually exists in heaven. So the things that were created and God ordained, I read this morning, we saw this morning about Bezalel, you know, God gave him some wisdom and understanding to make these things. Why was that so important is because they were, it's an image or a picture of what it's like in heaven, like God's throne, because God has, there's a mercy seat in heaven, right? There's God's throne in heaven, and the representation on this earth of the tabernacle is supposed to be a picture of what heaven's like, and the mercy seat that we're going to see in Leviticus 16 with all the sprinkling of blood, we're going to see all of the importance for why they had to do everything they did in relation to Jesus Christ and the new covenant. It's all a picture of what's to come, of the better covenant, of the new promise, and even the fact that the veil was made of blue and purple and scarlet holds meaning. The blue and purple are colors that you receive when you get bruised, when your body is bruised, when you get beat up and bruised, and scarlet is red, which is a color of blood when it's pouring out of your body. So this veil is representative of the body of Jesus Christ that he hasn't come yet, which we're going to see again later on when the veil's rent and twain that he's going to allow the access from the holy to the most holy place to bring access to bring you into God's presence because God is a holy God and the only way that we can be close to God and actually be in his presence, like Moses was talking to him face to face, is by grace. It's by the blood of Jesus. It's by faith in Jesus Christ. It's the only thing that's going to get you close to him. Otherwise, there's a barrier. If you're going to try to make it through the law, you're not going to make it. You're separated because you don't keep the law perfectly. You can't make it there. Now, the law's great, but we're all sinners. We can't follow that the way we ought to. So this is what the veil is representative of. The veil is blue, purple, scarlet. All has meaning. And it's easier. I think it's easier for us to see that, but the people in the Old Testament, they weren't ignorant either. They didn't just not know anything. They don't know as much as we know. God has given more revelations, more understanding, and has helped us to learn more through the New Testament. But it's not like they just had no idea what any of this stuff meant. The whole purpose of it was for teaching. And using these symbols and everything went a lot longer and farther for people to understand it and to retain that without having all the benefit of all of the prophets and God's word being revealed. Leviticus 16, look at verse number one. The Bible reads, The Lord spake unto Moses after the death of the two sons of Aaron, when they offered before the Lord had died. And the Lord said unto Moses, Speak unto Aaron thy brother, that he come not at all times into the holy place within the veil before the mercy seat, which is upon the ark, that he die not. So it's saying, you can't just come and go out of the most holy place. Let him know that because, and this is important, Aaron needs to know he's a priest in the priest's office. They're ministering to the Lord and they're doing various aspects and he's saying he needs to understand you cannot just go in and out of the most holy place any time you want. You can't just do this. And now that two of his sons have died, it's going to sink in of how serious the Lord is with what he says and the way things need to be done. Right? I mean, he just lost two sons. Don't mess with God and just thinking you can do whatever you want. No, it needs to be done God's way. And when God says something then it's real. And he's saying, look, you can't just come in here that you deny. Why? Because the picture is so important that people need to understand of who God is and you can't just go and taint and mess with the truths that God's trying to portray through this service of the tabernacle, the greater truth he's trying to give us about reality, about who he is, about the way things operate in heaven and about salvation, about every other. There's so many important, symbolic truths intertwined in this that he's saying you can't mess with this and if you mess with this then you're just gonna have to die as a result because it's that serious and it's that important. And whether you understand it or not, the bigger picture that's being portrayed here is extremely important. And that's why even, you know, it's not part of my sermon notes, but any priest that was to come, a Levitical priest that's supposed to be able to go and do these offerings and stuff, if they had a defect or a blemish, you know, if they had these problems, the Bible says they're not allowed to go in and perform this. He said they're still gonna be able to eat of the sacrifice and stuff but they're not allowed to go in unto the holy place and do these things. Why? Because the priest, the high priest that would go in and do this is representative of Jesus Christ. That's why. He's the picture. He's not Jesus Christ himself. He's not perfect but he's the picture of who is going to be able to one day go into heaven to the mercy seat and do the things that are actually listed here in Leviticus 16 that we're gonna read about the sprinkling of the blood and everything else that's done as an atonement for the sins of the whole world. And because this is going to happen a particular way, God's saying, no, this needs to be done now and every time when you do it on earth, it needs to be done this way. So he's telling him speak unto Aaron, right, verse 2, for I will appear in a cloud upon the mercy. Verse 3, Thus shall Aaron come into the holy place with a young bullock for a sin offering and a ram for a burnt offering. He shall put on the holy linen coat and he shall have the linen britches upon his flesh and shall be girded with a linen girdle and with a linen mitre shall he be attired. These are holy garments, therefore shall he wash his flesh in water and so put them on. So again, cleanliness, clean, white garments, it's like a white, yo, he's coming in to serve in a fashion as much as possible to be clean, pure, holy things undefiled to do this service because he's representing Jesus Christ. Verse 5, And he shall take of the congregation of the children of Israel two kids of the goats for a sin offering and one ram for a burnt offering and Aaron shall offer his bullock of the sin offering which is for himself and make an atonement for himself and for his house. Now we're gonna go through and see in Hebrews how this relates to Christ but the only slight difference here is that, you know, Jesus isn't a sinner and so Aaron having to offer up for himself is different than actual Christ but that's just also showing how holy God is. He's saying, look, you need an offering for yourself first and then for the people and for everyone else. Jesus Christ didn't need an offering for himself. He is the offering. Verse 7 says, And he shall take the two goats and present them before the Lord at the door of the tabernacle congregation and Aaron shall cast lots upon the two goats, one lot for the Lord and the other lot for the scapegoat. Now there's so, like this whole chapter is just full of illustrations of salvation. The offerings to the Lord, all of them full of these salvation truths, even the scapegoat itself. Let's keep reading here. Verse number 9, And Aaron shall bring the goats upon which the Lord's lot fell and offer him for a sin offering. But the goat on which the lot fell to be the scapegoat shall be presented alive before the Lord to make an atonement with him and to let him go for a scapegoat into the wilderness. So, you know, there's more detail elsewhere in scripture about the scapegoat, but basically what they're doing, the scapegoat was gonna be the one that was set free that's supposed to bear the sins and take them off away and just able to go off and go free and just go off into the wilderness, off by itself. That's that release and you also have this, you know, these two goats, one of them's being set free and the other one is being offered as a sacrifice. So even the scapegoat itself can represent Jesus taking our sins far away. It also represents that, you know, what happened with Jesus and Barabbas, right? Where Barabbas was set free and even though he was a sinner and he was able to go free while Jesus was the one who was offered up as the sacrifice and he was put to death, same illustration here with the two goats, right? One goat is being offered as a sacrifice, the other one's being set free. Verse 11, And Aaron shall bring the bullock of the sin offering which is for himself and shall make an atonement for himself and for his house and shall kill the bullock of the sin offering which is for himself and he shall take a censer full of burning coals of fire from off the altar before the Lord and his hands full of sweet incense beaten small and bring it within the veil and he shall put the incense upon the fire before the Lord that the cloud of the incense may cover the mercy seat that is upon the testimony that he die not. Every single one of these aspects is important and I wish I had more time to get into all the details of this because, and you know what, if you want to study this how later do so, the order of all these things is also important. There's an order taking place of each one of these sacrifices and the symbol of this incense too. We know that the incense is being referred to as it goes up in a cloud like the prayer of the saints going forward and clouding the mercy seat. Again, I don't have time literally to go through all of this because we're going to go through all of Leviticus 16 but it's fascinating to see how much New Testament truth and knowledge and understanding that we have is all packed into this one chapter in the Old Testament on how they did things and I love seeing this stuff because it just demonstrates how God doesn't change. And the truth has been the truth. The way that God has presented the truth might have changed a little bit and our understanding has grown a little bit but obviously things are slightly different than they were under the Levitical priesthood but he's still preaching the same truth. He's still showing and demonstrating the same truths. Verse 14, And he shall take of the blood of the bullock and sprinkle it with his finger upon the mercy seat eastward. And even just the direction eastward is towards the rising of the sun. And the rising of the sun, think of the s-o-n, the sun rising from the dead, that's the reason why east is important. And don't get fooled by these people who want to try to New Age everything and tell you, oh, there's all these other, look, it's not, we don't believe in a sun, s-u-n worship, we believe in a s-o-n worship and God set things up a certain way to, again, show us his glory and provide his truth in many areas of his creation. And the fact that the sun rises is testimony to the resurrection of the son of God, Jesus Christ. It's, I mean, it's all absolutely brilliant. And before the mercy seat, shall he sprinkle the blood with his finger seven times. Then shall he kill the goat of the sin offering, where on verse 15, that is for the people and bring his blood within the veil and do with that blood as he did with the blood of the bullock and sprinkle it upon the mercy seat and before the mercy seat. And he shall make an atonement for the holy place because of the uncleanness of the children of Israel and because of their transgressions in all their sins. And so shall he do for the tabernacle of the congregation that remaineth among them in the midst of their uncleanness and there shall be no man in the tabernacle of the congregation when he goeth in to make an atonement in the holy place until he come out and have made an atonement for himself and for his household and for all the congregation of Israel. And he shall go out unto the altar that is before the Lord and make an atonement for it and shall take of the blood of the bullock and of the blood of the goat and put it upon the horns of the altar round about. So he's sanctifying the altar, he's sanctifying the people, he's sanctifying himself, he's sanctifying all these things he's sanctifying all these things through the blood of these sacrifices because everything needs to be holy even just to continue to use this or to use this once a year. Now let's keep reading here verse 19 and he shall sprinkle of the blood upon it with his finger seven times and cleanse it and hallow it from the uncleanness of the children of Israel. Again, the blood is being used to cleanse. Verse 20 made an end of reconciling the holy place and the tabernacle of the congregation and the altar he shall bring the live goat and Aaron shall and you know all of this stuff matters. Every detail has meaning to everything being prepared and ready now for the live goat. Verse 21 and Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel and all their transgressions and all their sins putting them upon the head of the goat and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness and the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto a land not inhabited and he shall let go the goat in the wilderness. So again, the concept here of this goat carrying away all of the sins of all the people into some uninhabited land is like Jesus bearing the iniquities of the world in his own body on the tree like 1 Peter says that he did for us and again, it's just another symbolic reference. You say, yeah, but he wasn't sacrilegious. I know, but this is still the concepts and what he actually did is there. Verse 23 and Aaron shall come into the tabernacle of the congregation and shall put off the linen garments which he put on when he went into the holy place and shall leave them there and he shall wash his flesh with water in the holy place and put on his garments and come forth and offer his burnt offering and the burnt offering of the people and make an atonement for himself and for the people and the fat of the sin offering shall he burn upon the altar and he that let go the goat for the scapegoat shall wash his clothes and bathe his flesh in water and afterward come into the camp and the bullock for the sin offering and the goat for the sin offering whose blood was brought in to make atonement and the holy place shall one carry forth without the camp and they shall burn in the fire their skins and their flesh and they're done. Now, again, the order I think is important here because one of the things we see is that you've got the veil, the blue-purple scarlet representing the body of Jesus being sacrificed. We've got the blood that needed to be shed for all the sanctification and the cleansing. And then you have the illustration or the scapegoat where all the sins of the world were being born. All of these things happen to Jesus, right? His blood was being shed when he was whipped and beaten, right? He's hanging on the cross is when he takes on the sins of the world, right? And then when he dies on that cross, what happens to his soul? It goes to hell. Well, in this order, what do they do then after they do the scapegoat, after they do all this? Now they're taking the bullock and the goat that they offered up already, that they already used the blood, they already shed the blood. Now they're taking it without the camp and they're burning all the rest of it, right? Because they're supposed to, you know, they eat the flesh thereof and they burn the fat thereof and they burn, ultimately everything similar to the Passover lamb, but this is, they're going out and now they're just burning the rest of it. The rest of it gets burned and in this order, this is what happens. I mean, this is, you know, people might say, well, why wouldn't you just shed the blood and then just burn it right away? Well, because that's not the way that God said it needed to be done and for a very good reason because it's representative of what's going to come. He says you do things in this order and it's incredible, it's amazing, not incredible, this is, it's just miraculous, it's how God's word is so infinite and it's wisdom and depth and cannot be the word of man. I mean, it's too perfect. It's too perfect. It matches up unto perfection without error. Praise the Lord. Verse 28, and he that burneth them shall wash his clothes and bathe his flesh in water and afterward, he shall come into the camp and this shall be a statute forever unto you that in the seventh month on the tenth day of the month you shall afflict your souls and do no work at all. Whether it be one of your own country or a stranger that sojourneth among you for on that day shall the priest make an atonement for you to cleanse you that ye may be clean from all your sins before the Lord. And it's just fitting that the Bible is saying, hey, when you're being cleansed of your sin, you don't do any work. You can't do any work because now you're being, your sins are being atoned for. They're paid for. So it's not your own work at all. It's what's been done for you. Salvation. Verse 31, it shall be a Sabbath of rest unto you and ye shall afflict your souls by a statute forever and the priest whom he shall anoint and whom he shall consecrate to minister in the priest's office in his father's stead shall make the atonement and shall put on the linen clothes, even the holy garments and he shall make an atonement for the holy sanctuary and he shall make an atonement for the tabernacle of the congregation and for the altar. He shall make an atonement for the priests and for all the people of the congregation and this shall be an everlasting statute unto you to make an atonement for the children of Israel for all their sins once a year and he did as the Lord commanded Moses. Now turn, if you would, to Hebrews chapter nine. There's a lot here. I'm trying to read through this as fast as I can. But there's so much here. There's so much. It's painful to go over some of the symbolism that is just packed into this chapter. I mean, it's chapter 16 itself. Hebrews now is going to help relate a lot of these things to the new priesthood, Melchizedek, and Jesus Christ. I'm going to read from chapter seven, verse 26. The Bible says, For such an high priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners and made higher than the heavens, who needeth not daily as those high priests to offer up sacrifice first for his own sins and then for the peoples. That's what we just read. The priest needed to offer up a sacrifice for himself and then for the people. Jesus doesn't need to do that. That high priest, Melchizedek doesn't need to do that. It says, For this he did once when he offered up himself. So this was a yearly event. They would go in to the most holy and do these sacrifices and everything was done the way it was because it hadn't happened yet. So it's continual reminder to the children of Israel, this is going to happen. This is coming. This is coming. This is coming. This is coming. And then once Jesus came and did it, done. Don't need to do it anymore because that's what it's all about anyways. All the sacrifices, all of the animal sacrifices, the whole Levitical priesthood was just to point to Jesus. And once Jesus came, there's no need for a Levitical priesthood because he's the high priest and he brings, he ushers in that new covenant. That whole old covenant is pointing to the new covenant. It wasn't a mistake by God. Oh, let's try this out and see if they could do this. Oh, they screwed that up. I guess I have to come up with something new. I've heard blasphemers say weird things like that and it's total garbage as if God doesn't know all things and that he needed it. Let's try this out. Oh, you can't do that. The whole, I mean, everything points to Christ. Jesus Christ is a lamb slain from the foundation of the world. That's always been the plan. But the old covenant gave a testimony to the new covenant. It's a schoolmaster. It points the way to Christ. And it's not just the schoolmaster in the New Testament. It's always been the schoolmaster. I mean, why would that, how could that possibly change as the tool, you know, for that purpose? It doesn't even make sense that it wouldn't have the same purpose back then. Okay, Hebrews chapter nine, verse number one, the Bible reads, Then verily the first covenant had also ordinances of divine service and a worldly sanctuary. For there was a tabernacle made, the first, wherein was the candlestick and the table and the showbread, which is called the sanctuary, and after the second veil, the tabernacle, which is called the holiest of all, which had the golden censer and the ark of the covenant overlaid round about with gold, wherein was the golden pot that had manna and Aaron's rod that putted and the tables of the covenant. So these are all the things within that holiest of holy places, you know, behind the veil. And over it, the cherubims of glory, shadowing the mercy seat, of which we cannot now speak particularly, saying we don't have enough information right now to tell you all the details of that, but that's what was there. Verse six, Now when these things were thus ordained, the priests went always into the first tabernacle, accomplishing the service of God. So, you know, there's this separation. So that first part, they were always going in there every day accomplishing the service of God. There's an altar out there and they were performing all this other work for God. It says in verse seven, But into the second went the high priest alone once every year, not without blood, which he offered for himself and for the heirs of the people. So the most holy of all would be, you know, that's the place where God dwells. That's the mercy seat. That's getting up close to God. You cannot get in there without blood. He says they would come in once a year and do all of this, all the symbolism of salvation, and you have to be in there with blood. Blood is the only way into that place. Verse eight, the Holy Ghost, this signifying, so this is the meaning, right? This is what it signifies, that the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest while as the first tabernacle was yet standing, which was a figure for the time then present in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices that could not make him that did the service perfect as pertaining to the conscience. And again, if you got people who are dispensationalists and they believe that salvation was different in the Old Testament versus the New and oh no, they had to do this, otherwise their soul wasn't saved and they had to... Hebrews 7, 8, and 9 and 10 will, you know, I mean, just keep on going, right? But Hebrews 7, 8, and 9 primarily is gonna talk about why the blood of bulls and of goats was never able to take away sin. It's always been a picture. As it says here, hey, all of this was a figure. It's a representation. It's a picture showing you for them, for the people of that time, to understand that as long as that tabernacle stood, you know, until Jesus came, you know, he didn't come yet. And, you know, the gifts, the sacrifices, they could not make him that did the service perfect as pertaining to the conscience because there's still remembrance of all your sins. It didn't really absolve you of your sins. That's what he's saying. That couldn't have. Verse 10, which stood only in meats and drinks and divers' washings and carnal ordinances imposed on them until the time of reformation. But Christ, being come and high priest of good things to come by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building, neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us. Now, I believe this verse that Jesus entered in to the holy place once, and I do not believe that he's, this is referring to the holy place on earth because as I mentioned before, the tabernacle is a representation of what exists in heaven. Why am I even pointing this out? The reason why I'm pointing this out is because there's some people who will teach that when Jesus said it is finished on the cross, that that meant that every single thing that needs to be done for our salvation was accomplished when he died on the cross. So that's what people will interpret, and that's an interpretation of what Jesus meant when he said it is finished. Now, did he say it is finished? Absolutely he did, but what did he mean? What was finished when that was said on the cross? Well, you know what was not finished when he said that on the cross? The sprinkling of his blood on the mercy seat. That was not accomplished yet. Now, his blood was shed, yes, on the cross, but you know what he had to do? He had to enter into the holiest of holies and sprinkle the blood of his sacrifice on that mercy seat because without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sins, and this was taught over and over again in the Old Testament by having all these ordinances and saying this is what needs to be done. Why? If the blood of the bulls and goats never were able to wash away, then why did you have to do and focus on the blood so much is because it's Jesus' blood that needed to be offered to be brought into the most holy of all in heaven for us. On earth, it's just a picture. In the presence of God, that's the real deal. He entered in once, verse 12, into the holy place, for if the blood of bulls and of goats and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean sanctified the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God. And for this cause, he is the mediator of the New Testament that by means of death for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the First Testament, they which are called might receive the promise of an eternal inheritance. For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator, for a testament is a force after men are dead, otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator liveth whereupon neither the First Testament was dedicated without blood. For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and of goats with water and scarlet wool and hyssop and sprinkled both the book and all the people saying this is the blood of the testament, which God hath enjoined unto you. Moreover, he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle and all the vessels of the ministry, and almost all things are by the law purged with blood, and without shedding of blood is no remission. It was therefore necessary, look at this, that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. The patterns of what's in heaven is what he's saying. It was necessary, of course, that we would have the blood of the bulls and the goats being shed in order to do these things and act them out here on earth. That was necessary. But the actual heavenly things that the picture on earth represents, the actual heavenly things that do exist, it's not just imagination. This isn't just made up. The actual things in heaven exist with better sacrifice. What better sacrifice? Jesus. For Christ, verse 24, is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true, but into heaven itself now to appear in the presence of God for us. It can't spell it out any more clearly that he went into heaven, into the real holy place, and was there as the sacrifice for us. I think some people just think, oh, this is all just trying to teach the truth here on earth, but they don't believe that it actually exists in heaven. And I don't know how you can't, again, unless you've got the blinders on. That'd be the only way you've got blinders on. You can't see this. Or, if you're just completely ignorant to know it, you've just never heard it before and you're not reading your Bible. Obviously, if people just aren't reading and not hearing from God, then, you know, what are you going to know? But verse 25, nor yet that he should offer himself often as the high priest entereth in the holy place every year with blood of others, for then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world, but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacraments of himself, and as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this a judgment, so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many, and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation. Flip over to chapter 10 real quick. Verse 18. I'm almost done. I'm trying to wrap things up real quick here. Lots of scripture, lots of great symbolism here. Hardly enough time to get into everything, but I think these are just really great examples here, all revolving around salvation and this veil separating between the law and salvation and between the saved and the unsaved not being able to see, being upon their hearts, but here we're gonna look at this veil now, the veil that's hanging between the holy and the most holy of all in the tabernacle. Verse 18 of chapter 10 says, Now where remission of these is there is no more offering for sin, having therefore a brother in boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which he hath consecrated for us through the veil that is to say his flesh. So that veil is representative. Remember we looked at the colors earlier, the purple and the blue and the crimson? That's representative of the flesh of Jesus which he offered to then allow entrance into the holiest of all because you have to come through Jesus to get entrance in, you know, no man cometh unto the Father but by me is what Jesus said. So I'm the way, the truth, and the life. So that veil was representative of the body of Jesus Christ and what he had to go through in order for us to gain access because otherwise you can't get access to God. He's the mediator. And in Matthew 27, we see what literally happened with that veil in the temple physically here on earth. Verse 50, the Bible says, Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost, and behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom and the earth did quake and the rocks rent and the graves were open and many bodies of the saints which slept arose and came out of the graves after his resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared unto many. Just that force of the impact of Jesus's, the importance of that death, him dying on the cross and satisfying being that sacrifice, offering himself up, the whole deal. And then, of course, after his resurrection, it says that there was other bodies that had resurrected of the saints, came back to life. But that temple, excuse me, the veil being rent in twain, it's ripped apart, showing that now that he had done this, there's no more cause for division because he made the payment. He fulfilled that symbol, that picture. He fulfilled that now that you don't need that veil anymore. The veil was important. It's to show the truth that you need to get there through Jesus, right? Of course. The truth is still there, but once he's fulfilled that, now it's we've got openness through what he did. He hadn't done it yet. Now he's done it and it's all just where are we looking, forward or backward? Same truth. Same gospel. Same salvation. Are we looking forward? Are we looking backward? Either way, it all lines up and it shows that Jesus is the way. He is who was prophesied all the way back from the first covenant. The veil's been done away. The veil that is in front of people's eyes when they try to read the Bible, when you come to Christ, when you accept Christ, when you put your faith in Christ, that veil's done away. Then you can understand what God has for you. You can see clearly. People who are still trusting in the law and trying to look to the law, they're like trying to look Moses in the face. They can't. There's a veil there. They're kind of here and they think they hear, they know that they're here. Okay, well, let's just try to be good people and maybe we'll make it. No, you're not going to get the glory of God. You're not going to be able to sit in the place where Moses was sitting. Moses found mercy in the sight of the Lord, just like Noah did, just like all the prophets of God did, and that's why he was able to have communion with the Lord. But if you're trying to follow it through the law, through the works of your own righteousness, you're not going to make it. It's a great symbolism, and again, study that out. I've said this multiple times. I hope somebody at least here is listening to go home and study some of these things just because they are fasting. There's so much to learn. There's so much more, so much more that you could go on. I think when I do a Bible study on this, I might have to break it up into multiple weeks even just to really hammer out. It's so dense. I mean, study it, meditate on it, and think about what all these different, you know, all the things that God had said for them to do, what it all means. It really is just exalts the glory of God by His greatness. So let's borrow this word of prayer. Dear Heavenly Father, Lord, thank you so much for all the great truths that we can learn from your word. This is more of a doctrinal sermon, just kind of teaching helping us understand all the reasoning for the various things that we read in the Old Testament and the truths, dear Lord. And while it may be hard to figure out how to apply this in our lives today, God has helped us to continue to grow in our knowledge and understanding and that your words wouldn't be a mystery unto us, but that we could just learn truth. And it's good to have this knowledge, dear Lord. I pray to you, please just help us understand more and more from your word. And Lord, just we need your guidance and teaching the Holy Ghost to open up all wisdom and understanding to us so we could just be better servants. Lord, we love you. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen. All right. We're going to sing one last song before we're dismissed. Brother Peter, please lead us in our last song. All right, church, if you could open up your handouts. I'll close song number 331. Song 331, Wherever He Leads, I'll Go. Pimp 331. On the first take of my cross and follow me, I heard the master say, I gave my life to wrestle thee, surrender all today. Wherever He leads, I'll go. Wherever He leads, I'll go. I'll follow my Christ who loves me so. Wherever He leads, I'll go. He drew me closer to His sky. I saw His will to know. And in that will, I now abide. Wherever He leads, I'll go. Wherever He leads, I'll go. Wherever He leads, I'll go. I'll follow my Christ who loves me so. Wherever He leads, I'll go. He made me through the shadows clear for o'er the stormy sea. I take my cross and follow Him wherever He leads, I'll go. Wherever He leads, I'll go. Wherever He leads, I'll go. I'll follow my Christ who loves me so. Wherever He leads, I'll go. I'll follow my Christ who loves me so. He is my Master, Lord, and King. Wherever He leads, I'll go. Wherever He leads, I'll go. Wherever He leads, I'll go. Wherever He leads, I'll go. I'll follow my Christ who loves me so. Wherever He leads, I'll go. Amen. Great singing. Thank you so much for coming. Thank you.