[0:00] This message was recorded at Vision Baptist Church in Alfred, Georgia. It is our prayer that you will be blessed by the preaching of God's Word. All right, take your Bibles if you would and go with me to the book of Numbers.
[0:11] And we're in chapter 19, Numbers chapter 19. How many of you enjoyed tonight having Christmas carols sung, say amen? Amen. And how many of you enjoyed Brother Tim preaching tonight, say amen?
[0:25] Amen. And you might not know this, but it's a lot harder to stand back here than you think it is. And so I appreciate it. It's probably harder than wrestling a whole match, isn't it, Tim?
[0:36] And so it is, and I understand that. I appreciate that. I remember preaching my first messages at the grand old age of 15, and I took, I had all these notes.
[0:48] I don't know, maybe 20 pages of notes. And I knew it was going to take me I would never get through. And in five minutes, I finished everything. I had written. And so I did what a regular preacher does. I filled the rest of it with hot air.
[0:59] I just stood up there and kept talking. And so I learned a little bit of a lesson there. And I remember also one evening getting, I was getting ready to preach. And I was so, I knew I was living wrong.
[1:11] I knew that my life wasn't right. And so I got up and started preaching. I got about five minutes. And I just had a conscious attack. But a conscious, it ate me alive. And I took off running and went and hid in the bathroom.
[1:22] And I was the only preacher that had any preacher. I was the pastor for that night at the age of 15. And so it is a wild thing to be able to preach. And I'm excited. I'm excited for Tim to have his family here.
[1:34] And so looking forward to what God's going to do. Go with me to Numbers 19. Now, how many of you ever heard about the red heifer? Raise your hand if you heard about the red heifer. Well, so we're going to study the red heifer a little bit tonight.
[1:46] If you are a prophecy buff, you probably talk about the red heifer. You talk about the fact that they may have found it. They're trying to raise red heifers back in Israel again.
[1:57] And you can find all sorts of things on that in the Bible. Or excuse me, on the Internet. Not so much in the Bible. This is the only place we get much information. And so I'm going to kind of stick away from all the speculation.
[2:09] But I would like you to see three things out of chapter 19. Numbers chapter 19. And so as not to read the whole chapter just to go through it a little bit later. Go to verse 2 and underline.
[2:20] Bring yourself, bring thee a red heifer. Bring a red heifer. Circle red heifer. Without spot, no blemish. Three things about the heifer.
[2:31] Without spot, no blemish. And they never had a yoke on her. She never had a yoke on her. So underline those three things that you'll find in verse 2. And so they were to take her outside the camp.
[2:42] And they would kill her before the high priest. But they gave her unto the priest. And he would bring her forth without the camp and slay her. And Eliezer takes her blood. And he sprinkles some of it directly towards the tabernacle seven times in verse 4.
[2:57] And in verse 5, they burn the heifer and her skin and her blood. And even her dung is all burned there. And then they gather up the ashes after it's over in verse 9.
[3:08] And they lay them up without the camp in a clean place. And later on, they mix it with the water of separation. And that is for a ceremony of purification of sin. And so then you go through a whole lot of other things in the chapter that are very interesting.
[3:25] How many of you believe that you have the word of God in your hands? Say amen. Before you're finished tonight, if you don't believe that, you'll have to believe. You'll have to believe that the book of Exodus was written in the 1800s.
[3:37] You'll have to believe that the book of Exodus was written in the 1800s. Because that's when they're going to figure out what Moses is going to tell them. And I don't think Moses was that smart. I don't know if you've ever thought about this.
[3:49] But how did a Jew, an Egyptian running around Egypt and then going out into the wilderness to live with you? How in the world can you come up with the things you're going to find in Exodus chapter 19? So go with me, if you would, through three things that you might write down.
[4:03] The first thing is we have a picture of Jesus. We have a picture of Jesus. Look in verse 2. We have a picture of Jesus. We have a red heifer. Then this heifer is without spot and no blemish and never came a yoke.
[4:16] The only person that can be is the Lord Jesus. Because everybody else has sinned. The Bible says in Romans 3.10, there is none righteous. No, not one in Romans 3.23, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
[4:29] And in this story, it's a different story because it's a heifer. It's a different story because there's no altar. It's a different story because it's outside the camp, not inside the camp.
[4:39] It's a different story because not even the high priest takes a life of this. But I do believe it represents the Lord Jesus. And I'll get to you what I think makes the strange things. But write this down in the margin of your Bible, if you would, in Hebrews chapter 9, verse 14.
[4:53] You can write that in the margin of your Bible beside verse 2. The Bible says, And how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal spirit offered himself without spot. Underline that.
[5:04] Without spot. To God purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God. It was the blood of Christ. It was the blood of Christ who through the eternal spirit offered himself without spot.
[5:16] Nobody else has ever lived that didn't mess up. No one has ever lived who didn't get contaminated by the world but the Lord Jesus. And he was that person.
[5:27] He is the lamb without spot or blemish. Write down 1 Peter chapter 1, verse 19. Beside this verse. But with the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.
[5:40] So you have a picture. This is a heifer. I'll mention that in a minute. We'll get to the fact that there's some strange differences here. But we're talking about without spot and without blemish.
[5:52] And only Jesus fills that list. And then the next thing he said was it was without the yoke. Never bore the yoke. And in John chapter 8, in verse 32, the Bible says, And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
[6:08] And they answered him, Well, we're Abraham's seed. We were never in bondage. How can you say that somebody's going to make us free? You can't tell us we're going to be made free. We've always been free. We've never been in bondage.
[6:20] But Jesus said in verse 34, He answered and said, Verily, verily, I said unto you, Whosoever committed sin is the servant of sin. Sinners are the servant of sin.
[6:32] They're the slave of sin. Sin owns them and rules over them. And then in verse 36, He said, If the Son, therefore, shall make you free, you shall be free indeed.
[6:44] And Jesus is the only person who never was taken by sin, never owned by sin, never sinned, never bore that yoke, and was never in bondage.
[6:54] So somehow, this has to be a picture of the Lord Jesus. In Galatians chapter 5 and verse 1, it says, Stand fast, therefore, in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage.
[7:08] I don't want to go back into the bondage. So before you got saved, you were in bondage. Sin owns you. Sin controlled you. Sin ruled your life. You were in bondage.
[7:19] Jesus never knew that. He was never freed from sin. He frees from sin, but never needed to be freed from sin. Some interesting things.
[7:29] The animal's not male. That's crazy. All the other animals are males. This animal's not male. It had to be red. The Bible doesn't even tell us why it had to be red.
[7:41] It had to be a heifer. It had to be red. Maybe it's red because of the blood. Maybe it's red to speak of the earth. Maybe it's red to speak of Adam who's taken from the earth, which is a Hebrew word that means red earth.
[7:55] Whatever. We don't really understand. And I could speculate with you, and you can go on the internet and find all kinds of speculation. We're simply not told. But I think it's going to take you to this. I think that chapter 19 leads you to this.
[8:09] I'm saved by what happened in the camp, but I'm fixed. I'm kept in relationship. I'm kept in my walk with God, but what happens outside the camp?
[8:20] I get saved by what he did on the cross, but it's still him who helps me continue to have that relationship with him. This animal is killed outside the camp. Look at verse 3.
[8:31] Numbers 19.3, And you shall give unto her unto Eliezer the priest, that he may bring her forth without the camp, and one shall slay her before his face. Not even a priest.
[8:42] Not the high priest. Not a priest. Somebody else is going to come forth and slay her. Eliezer is Aaron's son and successor. He leads the animal out, but somebody else comes and kills the animal in front of them.
[8:55] And then the blood was burned with the carcass. It wasn't caught and poured out before God like it had been every other time. Something different about this story. The ashes are then gathered and mixed with water to use in the ceremonial purification.
[9:10] Interesting thing. In Hebrews chapter 13 and verse 13, we find this phrase, Let us go forth therefore unto him without the camp, bearing his reproach.
[9:22] Jesus died outside the camp, and so there's a comparison again. No altar is being used. That's unusual. The blood is only sprinkled towards the door seven times.
[9:35] There's cedar wood and hyssop and scarlet wool. They're thrown in the fire in verse 5. And they're burned with the heifer and her flesh, her blood, and her dung.
[9:46] And then you put all that in there. And all that's going to be involved in a ceremony for the unclean. And anybody that's involved is unclean. If you helped in the killing, if you helped in her death, they were unclean.
[9:59] But it would be used later to cleanse them when they messed up. Verse 9. And a man that is clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer and lay them up without the camp in a clean place.
[10:09] And it shall be kept for the congregation of Israel, of the children of Israel, for the water of separation. It is a purification for sin. So let me just stop and show you something. I really believe what you got here is we have a remedy for my daily sins.
[10:25] I got saved by the grace of God. And I was made pure in Jesus Christ. And in position, I am everything the Bible says about me.
[10:35] In position, I am seated in the heavenlies. In position, I'm accepted. In position, I am perfect before the Lord. But there is a very strong teaching in your Bible that I want to live out to be a holy person.
[10:48] I want to be careful with sin. I want to realize, man, I belong to Jesus. I've been saved by him. And to get saved, it took the death of an animal, a substitute animal. And to get right with God after you got in touch with something that wasn't right, it needed the death of an animal.
[11:03] So I believe that's what this is going to. But let me show you the second thing, and then I'll bring it all together with number three. Look, if you would, at verse 11. But here's hygiene before scientists understood it.
[11:15] I'm going to be honest. I love the Old Testament. Almost everybody doesn't like the Old Testament. And people hate the book of Numbers. And they hate all the other Old Testament books that they don't understand. But here in this chapter is the wildest story because nobody knew this stuff until the 1700s is the first time they're starting to catch on.
[11:34] It's the 1800s before they understand it. It's the late 1800s. It says, my granddaddy was almost born before they figured out what I'm about to read to you. How in the world did God's book know that when nobody knew that?
[11:49] Because it is God's book. People may make you doubt the Bible. People may say, it's a modern age, and we're scientific, and we understand, and we know things, and the Bible's not as clear.
[12:01] And the Bible's just a book of fables, and the Bible's a book of stories. That's just not true. Go with me through the chapter and consider some interesting things. Chapter 19, verse 11.
[12:13] If you touch the dead body of any man, you're unclean for seven days. Underline that. If you just touch a cadaver, if you just touch a dead guy, you're unclean for seven days.
[12:27] Verse 13. Whosoever touches the dead body of any man that's dead and purifies not himself. If you don't go through this ritual, if you don't do what I'm telling you to do, you're still unclean. You're going to get cut off from the nation of Israel.
[12:38] God said, I want you to understand how nasty death is. I want you to understand how nasty death is. I want you to understand that there's a right way to fix things with me.
[12:51] In verse 14, you don't even have to physically touch the body. You just have to breathe the same air in the same room with the body. Look at verse 14.
[13:01] This is the law. When a man dies in a tent, all that come into the tent and all that's in the tent is unclean for seven days. So Moses said, if somebody dies, you touch them.
[13:15] You can't be around the rest of us. We're going to separate you and put you over here. You don't spend any time with us. Moses said, by the way, if you happen to be the guy that has to go clean up the tent and pull the body out, we're separating you away from us.
[13:26] We don't want you around us. You've touched a dead body. You've breathed in dead body air. I love this verse. Verse 15. Notice what the Bible says. And every open vessel which had no covering bound upon it is unclean.
[13:42] So in the room, you have some chicken you're going to fix for lunch and somebody dies. And there's nothing covering the top of it. It's a Tupperware bowl with no lid on it.
[13:52] Unclean. Now how in the world did they know that? How in the world did they know that that bowl and everything in that bowl was unclean, but they knew that in chapter 19 and verse 15.
[14:05] If you went out on a battlefield where people had been killed, they were unclean. Look at verse 16. And whosoever toucheth one that is slain with a sword in the open field or a dead body or a bone of a man or a grave shall be unclean seven days.
[14:20] So if you touch a dead body, if you breathe the air, a dead body's breathed. If you touch a guy that got killed in battle, whatever, you touch a dead body, we're going to separate you away for seven days.
[14:32] And there's a ritual before you can come back. Verse 22. Here's a wild one. Contagious diseases. Verse 22. And whatsoever the unclean person touches shall be unclean.
[14:44] And the soul that it touches shall be unclean. So Cannon goes in the room. Cannon touches a dead body. Cannon comes out and shakes hand with Chuck. And the priest says, all of y'all get out of town.
[14:56] You shouldn't have touched anybody. You touch the guy that touched the guy, you're out. Get outside. But if you touch any of the stuff in there, you're unclean. You're unclean.
[15:07] I don't know if you know this, but you're watching something happen across your country. Everybody is scared to death of a disease. And they are showing us how you quarantine that and how you separate that and how airplanes are fixed to even bring them in here to get help.
[15:22] And it's amazing. They're playing this unclean game. But this unclean game was known about 3,000 years before scientists figured it out.
[15:35] That's amazing. The Bible you hold in your hand, the Word of God, it's imminent proof of the divine origin of your Bible. It was the 17th century before man understood microscopic organisms or bacteria.
[15:49] It's the mid-1800s before they began to understand that typhoid and cholera could be contagious from contaminated water. And the mid-1800s pasture proved that certain diseases were caused by infectious agents.
[16:04] Moses lived over 3,000 years before those scientists discovered those truths. And Moses told his people, when somebody dies, we're going to be very careful about that. When somebody dies, we're going to be, I don't know, you probably aren't even shocked.
[16:17] But you hold in your hands a book that knew what scientists did not know. And the educated people of Egypt didn't know it. They moved the dead bodies of their family into their house.
[16:30] They put the mummies in the house with them. But the Israelites were like, we don't put dead people in our house. We don't want to touch dead people. We don't want to be around death. There's going to be tons of other verses about don't eat an animal that dies of itself.
[16:45] And we don't know why it died. Don't you eat that animal. You don't know why it died. God told them things that proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that God's word is true.
[16:55] If a person was contaminated, then they were to be quarantined for seven days. There was a purification process mentioned in verse 12. On day three, they came and did certain parts of a ritual.
[17:07] And then on the seventh day, they did some more things. And if they did all that, they were clean. Verse 12. He shall purify himself with it on the third day. And the seventh day he shall be clean. But if you purify not himself the third day, then on the seventh he shall not be clean.
[17:19] I'll stop and just say this. I'm going to have to show it to you in other chapters. But you realize, even if you had mold growing in your house, if you had mold growing on the wall in your house, Moses told them, that might not be good.
[17:32] We're going to get people out of that house. We're going to scrape that house. We're going to come back in a certain amount of time and see if that stuff's still growing. If it is, we're going to tear the house down. They didn't do that when I was a kid.
[17:46] They didn't know that when I was a kid. Moses knew that. I have no idea if you realize, when you come to church and you listen to me talk about the Bible, you may think we're just talking about an old book and he's trying to explain the old book so we can understand it.
[17:58] We're talking about a divine book. It's a book that ought to make you sit in awe and say, I am privileged to even own a copy of this book. In verse 17, they took the ashes of the heifer and running water for the ritual.
[18:11] And it says, and for the unclean person, they shall take of the ashes of that burnt heifer a purification for sin and running water shall be put there into in a vessel. And they put that same water on any bowls and plates and vessels and dishes that were in the house and any dwelling.
[18:28] They did the same thing, verse 18. And even the person, after they'd gone through all the process, they were to wash their clothes and take a bath. And after a week, they could finally be clean.
[18:41] Look at verse 19. And the clean person shall sprinkle upon the unclean on the third day, on the seventh day, on the seventh day, shall be purifying himself, wash his clothes, bathe himself in water, and he shall be clean.
[18:52] Seven days in the evening, he'll be clean. So on the eighth evening, he would be clean. I'm going to talk to you about what I think is the application to you and what I think of the application of the heifer is in just a second.
[19:06] But I hope you stop and think a second and realize the book you hold in your hands. I could never emphasize I would not give my life to explaining Shakespeare to you.
[19:18] I would not give my life to explaining some old textbook to you. Scientists have to write new textbooks because they're constantly learning. But I am reading from a book written 3,000 years before scientists knew it and God already knew it.
[19:31] And he put it in a book and you hold that book in your hands. You say, why should we read our Bibles every day? Because the Bible is a holy book. It's a Bible. It's a God book. It's a divine book.
[19:42] It's a book that knows stuff that nobody knows and nobody figured out. And if you can only imagine, if you can only imagine, this is known 3,000 years before anybody figured it out.
[19:54] God was concerned with our health. Cleanliness was very important to avoid getting sick. Separating from those that are sick would have been vital. Stopping the spread of disease by cleaning and quarantine was very important in that chapter.
[20:08] But here's the application for us. And now I'll get to something. Maybe it's more down your line. I want you to realize that sin is dangerous. In chapter 19, he's talking about this red heifer has to die and this red heifer has to die because they're going to get, they're going to be people dying and there's going to be death around them.
[20:26] And he's going to set up a way that we get clean from this accidental being around a dead person or touching a dead person or touching a person who touched a dead person or getting something that was not cleaned.
[20:37] They're going to have a way to do it. And that heifer dies. So the third thing I would like you to see is this. The real lesson in chapter 19 is about clean and unclean, holy and unholy, pure and not pure.
[20:51] Look at verse 20. Numbers chapter 19 and verse 20. But the man that shall be unclean and shall not purify himself. That soul shall be cut off from among the congregation because he defiled the sanctuary of the Lord and the water separation had not been sprinkled upon him.
[21:08] He is unclean. The real lesson was clean and unclean, holy and unholy because God was teaching his people all through the Old Testament. You've got to realize what's clean and what's unclean, what's holy, what's unholy.
[21:20] You've got to learn to put a difference between what's right and what's wrong because I'm making the rules. I'm making the rules. You say, well, I don't think that water with those ashes did any good. It has nothing to do with it.
[21:31] God was saying, I'm going to tell you what's clean. I'm going to tell you what's dirty. You're going to follow my way of doing it. I know the Egyptians don't do that. And I know I just pulled you out of the nation of Egypt. They've been living in Egypt for over 400 years.
[21:42] They have bound to have picked up a lot of Egyptian habits. He said, no, we're not going to do that. It's going to be different. In Leviticus chapter 11 and verse 44, the Bible says, for I am the Lord, your God, and you shall therefore sanctify yourselves.
[21:56] You shall be holy for I am holy. You should underline that in your Bible if you don't have that. You shall be holy for I am holy. In verse 45, it says, I am the Lord that brings you up out of the land of Egypt to be your God.
[22:11] You shall therefore be holy for I am holy. You shall be clean for I'm clean. You shall be holy for I'm holy. You shall be pure for I'm pure. You shall realize we don't do what they do. We're different than them.
[22:22] You're going to get to a place in Romans chapter 12. It says, don't think like they think. Be not conformed to this world. Don't have their mindset. Don't think like them. The second Corinthians chapter seven and verse one, the Bible says, having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all the all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness and the fear of God.
[22:45] Now, listen to what I'm going to tell you real quickly. This didn't take place in the city. It didn't take place in the tabernacle. It didn't play because that's already taken care of.
[22:55] And there's sacrifices going on there. This took place outside the city. And it had to do with them being in contact with death. And you and I get saved. We're not fascinated with death or sin.
[23:08] We're not fascinated with rotting or impurity. We're fascinated with holiness. And we want to be different than the world we're around. Can you say amen there? In second Corinthians chapter seven and verse one, I'm supposed to realize God's holy.
[23:21] And I want to be holy like God is. I want to separate myself to God. I want to live that life. Every time they got clean, it was the death of an innocent animal. Every time.
[23:33] And that animal represents Jesus. In John chapter one and verse twenty nine, the Bible said the next day, John sees Jesus coming into him and said, behold, the Lamb of God, which takes away the sin of the world.
[23:46] An animal dies. It's a heifer in this story. By the way, tons of everybody tries to guess why she's a heifer. Maybe she represents women. And the fact that Christ can he saves women, too.
[23:57] Who knows? The whole point was an animal had to die. An animal had to die. In first Peter, chapter one and verse 18. Listen to what it says. You know that you are not redeemed with corruptible, rotting things, things that have no value like silver and gold.
[24:14] From your worthless way of living, your vain conversation that you learned from your mama and your daddy, the tradition of your fathers. But you were saved with the precious blood of Jesus, precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.
[24:28] We do not want to be part of this world. This world system that's in rebellion to his will for our lives. When you got saved, he made a difference in you.
[24:39] And you are saved by grace. And it's not about what you do. But as you got saved, he changed you. You're his people now. And as his people, our heart yearns to be with him and not with the world that hates him.
[24:52] Our hearts yearn to say, I'll trust you and not with the world says. In Galatians chapter one and verse three, the Bible says, Grace be to you and peace from God the Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world.
[25:09] He saved me so I don't have to suffer what this world suffers. He saved me so I don't have to go to hell like they're going to go to hell. He saved me. I want to be his. I want to live like his.
[25:19] I want to live like I belong to him. In Titus chapter two and verse 13, we're waiting for the blessed hope when Jesus will come back. In verse 14, it says Jesus gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto himself a peculiar people.
[25:36] And look what the word says, zealous of good works. Sometimes because we do teach and preach grace, you could get apathetic about a holy life. You could get like, well, you know, I'm saved by grace.
[25:49] It don't matter what I do. But honestly, if you're in love with Jesus, it ought to be a hunger and a desire in your heart to please him, to honor him and to live a holy life. To change the way you think, to change the way you talk and change the way you act because you're serving God.
[26:04] And it ought to be like, I don't really care what everybody else thinks. I just love God and I want to please God. That ought to be the lesson. It's a lesson of separation from sin.
[26:15] A lesson of separation from sin. In James 1.27, he says, pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this. To visit the Father, listen, the witness in their affliction, and listen to this, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.
[26:31] I got saved out of the world and I don't want any more of the world stains on me. I don't want any more of the world stains on me. I don't want to be like them. I don't want to go where they go.
[26:42] I don't want to think like they think. If you're a friend of the world, you're an enemy of God, the Bible says. And in my heart, I've said, boy, I love you, Jesus. I want to be with you. It's contagious.
[26:54] If you run with sinners, you'll likely do what they do. The Bible says in Proverbs 1.10, My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not.
[27:06] If they say, come with us, let us lay wait for blood, let us lurk privately for the innocent without cause. But here's the deal. Don't do what lost people do. Don't go run with them.
[27:18] Don't rebel with them. Sin is contagious. Sin is contagious. You need to understand that. So they got in touch with death.
[27:30] And it doesn't explain anything. You know, in the Old Testament, he doesn't say, this is why I'm doing this. Later on, y'all are going to figure out that you should not be around dead stuff. Dead stuff could make you sick. He doesn't explain that.
[27:43] He just said, I want you around dead stuff. And if you're going to be around dead stuff, you separate yourself. You pay a price to get cleaned up. And you wait and make sure you're not sick. And then you can come back in the camp. He doesn't explain it.
[27:54] He just said, I want you to be around it. It's contagious. It's contagious. Number two, it contaminates. It contaminates. The Bible says in Amos 3.3, can two walk together except they be agreed?
[28:08] There's an old saying, if you lie down with dogs, you'll get up with fleas. If you lie down with dogs, you'll get up with fleas. Birds of a feather flock together. That's an American saying.
[28:20] The Peruvian saying is better than any of them. Spanish saying says this, tell me who you run around with and I'll tell you who you are. Tell me who you run around with and I'll tell you who you are.
[28:35] Sin is contagious. Sin contaminates. Sin contaminates. Can two walk together except they be agreed? You and I ought to realize you don't play with dead bodies.
[28:47] You don't save your grandmama's mummy in your living room. You don't put it in your bedroom. You definitely don't put it in your kitchen. We just get away from death. We want to live holy lives.
[29:02] Sin has consequences. Sin has consequences. I want you to think about this. Suppose somebody died in battle and you went out to get their body and bury it. It was your uncle, your aunt, your brother.
[29:14] Somebody got killed in a war and you went and got their body. It always has a consequence. Somebody, your wife dies in the bed with you. It has a consequence. Your house is going to be separated.
[29:25] Nobody's going to go in your house. You're going to go outside the camp. You're going to be alone for seven days. On the third day, you're going to come. You're going to follow the ritual, bathe yourself the right way. On the seventh day, you're going to come back. They're going to look you over and check you out again and make sure you're okay.
[29:37] Then they're going to approve you. And then in the evening, they're going to let you be free. The person who helps you get cleaned up is also unclean just for helping you get cleaned up.
[29:50] Sin has consequences. Even though you are forgiven and even though you are free, we have to be real careful about sin.
[30:00] It's very easy because I'm not your typical independent Baptist preacher. If you don't act like, hey, it's no big deal. Sin's okay. No, it's not. It's contagious. You know, if you run around with people that think it's okay to cheat on your wife, you're allowed to do the same thing.
[30:16] Stay away from them. Stay away from them. If you run around with people that think it's okay to violate what the Bible says, it's contagious. It contaminates you. It has consequences.
[30:28] You're going to be very sorry you were involved in it. He cleanses us. He cleanses us. We come knowing our sins are forgiven. And here's the beautiful thing.
[30:39] They were like, if somebody dies, what are we going to do? He said, it's going to be okay. I already got it under control. That's what he does with us. You mess up. You mess up. He said, it's okay. It's okay. You're saved by the blood.
[30:50] You're cleansed by the blood. You're going to walk in the blood. I'm going to take care of everything. Your sins are forgiven. A substitute has died in your place. But forgiven sin doesn't mean that there aren't consequences that can hurt us and even destroy us physically.
[31:05] Somebody died in that house. They have some disease. You go in that house. They want you separated. That wasn't just a ritualistic thing.
[31:16] They want you out there. They find out what caused that death. They want to know. Are you contaminated? Are you going to come into camp and call all of them? You've been around Ebola and you're going to bring Ebola into the camp and mess around with the rest of us?
[31:26] Who knows what's going to happen to you? We want you out of the camp for seven days. God's got a plan to check you out, to bathe you, to cleanse you, to purify you, to let you come back in. He has a plan.
[31:37] And so you need to realize that you are forgiven for sin. If right now you go out and do something wicked and vile as a Christian, oh, your sins are forgiven. But don't you dare think there are no consequences.
[31:48] And young people, you may take, sometimes your mom and dad have been teaching you holy things. And then you know that there's grace and you know God is good and you know your sins will be forgiven. And you're easily thinking, well, it's okay.
[31:59] God's going to forgive me. He will forgive you. But there are consequences. One of the sad things in Peru, when I first started working with them, some of the guys would say stuff like, we know we can be forgiven, so we'll just sin today and ask forgiveness tomorrow.
[32:14] But you will get burnt doing that. You will get burnt doing that. You will get hurt doing that. Don't do that. Our marriages can be destroyed. You realize pornography is just so innocent, isn't it?
[32:29] You just look at it. You're not doing anything wrong. You're not with people that are doing anything wrong. You're just looking at it on the Internet or you're looking on your phone or you're looking at it on your tablet. And you're just looking at it and you're not doing anything.
[32:42] You're just thinking about it. But a Christian would say, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. That's like death. Death. And death is contagious. And it's contaminating.
[32:55] And it has consequences. And he may cleanse me, but I know it's dangerous. I know that it's dangerous. It could destroy your marriage. That flirting at the office and flirting with that other person and having that relationship could destroy.
[33:11] Stay away from it. You and I ought to be like, sin put Jesus on the cross. I love Jesus. I hate sin. There ought to be nothing in your mind, nothing in your vocabulary that says, we're saved by grace.
[33:24] Sin's not that bad. It's horrible. Sin's not that bad. And we hate it. Remember that if you were in contact with a contagious, you'd be alone for a week. He cleanses us, but you're still alone.
[33:36] How many of you remember when old Miriam stood up against Moses? And God came down and put the whammy jammy on her and gave her leprosy? And Aaron and Moses run to God and say, God, please forgive her.
[33:51] And he said, let her get outside the camp for a week. Let her get outside the camp because if her daddy had just spit in her face, she'd have to stay outside the camp. And though she was cleaned up, there was seven days, the whole camp stopped.
[34:04] Seven days everybody waited for her to come back in. And the last thing I'll say to you tonight is this, be cautious about sin. Be cautious. I was in Taiwan.
[34:21] You probably mocked me for this too. And there was one of the missionary wives and she was back by herself. And everybody kind of left her. And I think it was Ben that was maybe 20 feet in front of me or 25 feet in front of me.
[34:33] I said, hey, Ben, come back here and walk with me. So we don't have to leave her by ourself. And so we started walking and her husband came up and he said, boy, you're old-fashioned, aren't you? You're that concerned about being alone with my wife here in the park?
[34:45] And I said, yeah, I'm old-fashioned. I'm just going to be cautious. I just didn't want to be alone with her, pushing her baby, me and her. You say, well, was anything going to happen? No, not at all. But, you know, when you understand how bad death is and you understand the consequences and you understand it's contagious and it contaminates, you ought to be a little on the cautious side.
[35:06] Could you say, man? Say, Brother Austin, how bad do you feel like pornography is? Horrible. You may say, well, I don't think it's that bad. That's because you're not smart enough.
[35:17] If you were smarter, you'd know it was pretty horrible. Horrible. And you may say, how big a deal is it if I have this relationship with this girl I work with? It's horrible. Be very careful.
[35:29] Be very careful. Even the one helping clean the contaminated was unclean until the evening. Can you understand? Isn't that a crazy thing? The guy who brought the heifer out and killed the heifer?
[35:41] The guy who got the ashes together and put the water with it? The guy who went in your tent and cleaned up your tent after seven days? He was even unclean. So he got through with it. Maybe he started at 7 o'clock in the morning.
[35:52] He gets through with it. And when he's finished cleaning up the tent, his wife says, well, come on home for lunch, baby. And he says, not allowed to. I have to go outside the camp. Got to take a bath. Got to wash my clothes. Got to clean up.
[36:03] Can't come in. But that's not how it is. Even when you get around helping it, you could get all messed up. We want to get close to God and away from sin. We want to live out who we are.
[36:14] Let me just give you this last thing. Separation is a wonderful Bible truth. And some of us rebel against it because of our past. We're like, man, preachers preached about that and they were so ugly about it.
[36:26] And all of a sudden we're like drinking a beer here and there is okay. And hanging out with these people doing this and being friends with these sinners. And all that's okay. It's all okay because we're under grace.
[36:37] And you're rebelling really against your past. You're rebelling against your past. But in the Bible, holiness was what we seek. Holiness is what we seek. Living for God and honoring God and staying away from sin.
[36:50] And staying out of the tent that's got sin in it. And not breathing the same air and not touching the guy who touched the guy. It's a whole big deal that we be very careful. And so separation is beautiful.
[37:03] Everybody, it's like it's a negative thing. And it can be if a preacher just preaches, stay away from sin. Stay away from sin. Stay away from sin. That would be a negative thing. But really, it's a positive thing.
[37:16] Because it's not so much about staying away from sin as it is staying close to Jesus. And sin is, the Bible is represented as darkness. And Jesus represented as light.
[37:27] And I don't want to run in darkness. I want to run in the light. I want to be close to Jesus. And so that means I'm really far away from the darkness. Every girl in this room practices separation if she's married.
[37:39] I hope because you say no to every other guy and every other person. You say no to your parents. You say no to everybody. And yes to your husband. Because your love.
[37:49] So separation is a positive, negative, and a negative, positive. Because I'm saying no to sin and yes to Jesus. No to the world and yes to Jesus. No to everybody else and yes to my spouse.
[38:01] It's a beautiful thing. So I hope you go home knowing this. In Numbers 19, this heifer dies. She didn't do anything wrong. She didn't do anything wrong.
[38:13] She represents Jesus. She was unspotted, unblemished, and never even been a slave to sin. But she had to pay the price. And tonight, when Austin messes up, it is Jesus who cleanses up my messes.
[38:24] It is Jesus who cleanses up. Isn't he good? Amen? But I don't want to take advantage of that. I never want to think of grace as a license to sin. Sin is really liberty to serve.
[38:36] Not a license to sin. But liberty to serve God. So in the chapter, a heifer dies. And the story is told. Stay away from dying stuff. If you get dying stuff, you've got to be cleansed.
[38:47] And that heifer died to clean you up. And we're going to take her ashes and take the blood. And take the ashes of the blood and the dung and the skin and everything. We're going to mix that with some water. We're going to clean you up. And still you're going to take seven days out of the camp.
[39:00] So sin is dangerous. And you probably don't like me saying that. But it's dangerous. And as a Christian, I do not want to play with fire.
[39:15] I want to honor God. Father in heaven, I love you. And I thank you for the chance to serve you. And I pray that your people would draw close to you. Your name would be glorified and honored tonight.
[39:25] And I'll give you praise for it all. In Jesus' name. Brother Trent. This message was recorded at Vision Baptist Church in Alfredo, Georgia. For more information, log on to www.visionbaptist.com where you can find our service times, location, contact information, and more audio and video recordings.