Lamech at the end of chapter 4, instead of protecting her from her.
The first lonely wanderer.
And so on and so forth.
And the patterns set in Genesis 3 continue to play themselves out
in the history of the world, in the history of our families, in the history of our lives.
Adam and Eve and all of their descendants not only lost their clear conscience,
they lost their access to God's presence,
and God's bountiful provision, and God's life-giving power.
They were exiled from God's tabernacle and sent into the wilderness.
Genesis 3.24, God drove out the man.
And at the east of the Garden of Eden, he placed the cherubim, mighty warrior angels.
That's what cherubim were.
And a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.
So stage one in creation, we see unhindered access to God.
And a clear conscience with no shame.
Stage two, after the fall, driven out of God's presence with no way back in.
Guilty, ashamed, and avoidant.
And this is the world into which we are born and in which we live.
It's what many biblical writers, including the author of Hebrews, refer to as the present age.
But thankfully, the story of the Bible doesn't end here.
Because God, in his mercy, continues to seek out a dwelling place with his people.
And this leads us to stage three.
The tabernacle in the wilderness.
We read from Exodus in our first scripture reading.
Exodus 25, where God commanded Moses to build a tabernacle in the midst of the wilderness.
Exodus 25, 8, let them make me a sanctuary.
In other words, a holy place set apart that I may dwell in their midst.
Exodus 29, 45 and 46, I will dwell among the people of Israel and I will be their God.
And they shall know that I am the Lord their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt, that I might dwell among them.
And at the end of Exodus, as we read, the tabernacle was finally finished and the cloud of God's glory descended and came to dwell among his people and filled the tabernacle.
This is the conclusion of the book of Exodus.
It's the climax.
God has come to dwell among his people once again.
That's what the tabernacle was about.
What we had lost in the Garden of Eden was now being restored.
But not quite.
And that's what the author of Hebrews is pointing out.
If you turn back to Hebrews, chapter 9, he begins by saying,
Even the first covenant had regulations for worship and an earthly place of holiness.
In other words, the tabernacle was limited by its earthly nature and by its regulations.
So first, the tabernacle was limited because it was earthly.
In other words, it was made out of temporary materials donated by the people.
Now, they were the best materials that we have.
But it wasn't made to last forever.
In fact, the tabernacle in the wilderness had already been destroyed and replaced twice.
First, it was replaced by Solomon's temple.
But then that was destroyed in the exile.
And then that was rebuilt after they came back from exile.
So the original tabernacle didn't even exist anymore.
The point is, it was a temporary structure that would decay over time.
And as it says in verse 9, that's a symbol for the world that we live in.
The present age of decay and a fallen world.
So the tabernacle was limited because it was earthly.
But second, it was limited by its regulations.
You know, it wasn't like the cherubim, the mighty warrior angels,
standing at the entrance to the Garden of Eden,
had just been, and that flaming sword flashing back and forth.
It wasn't like that was just suddenly removed,
and the gate was opened for any and everyone to come back into the Garden of Eden
and enjoy all of its bounty once again.
No, there were detailed regulations about how you could approach the presence of God.
So he says, and he talks about some of these here.
If you want to read all of them, you can read the full text in Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers.
But he summarizes some of the main ones here.
In verse 6 and 7, he says there are two sections in the tabernacle.
And he says the priest would enter regularly into the first section
to offer gifts and sacrifices.
Now, if you weren't a priest, you couldn't even go in there.
If you weren't a priest, you were pretty much on the outside, period.
But the priest could go regularly into the first section.
But then he says, but the second section,
the most holy place represented the very presence of God.
The most precious things were kept in the most holy place.
In particular, the Ark of the Covenant,
representing God coming to dwell with his people.
The promise that God had made to bind himself to his people
and the covenant that he had made.
That was put in the most holy place.
As well as the manna, a sign of God's provision for the people in the wilderness.
Aaron's staff that budded, a sign of God's life-giving power and authority.
And the tablets of the covenant, as we said.
And then he says, above it, verse 5, were the cherubim of glory.
The glorious angels overshadowing the mercy seat.
And if you read in Exodus, the description of that,
in Exodus 25, God says,
that's where I will meet with you.
He says, there I will meet with you,
above the mercy seat, between the two cherubim.
Exodus 25, 22.
That was the place where the presence of God would come to dwell
with his people in that innermost place.
But the problem was,
only the high priest could go in there.
And only once a year.
And only with a sacrifice.
And then he'd do his thing,
and then he'd leave.
And he couldn't go in for another year.
You see, the tabernacle in the wilderness was built to be
the dwelling place of God among his people.
But its very structure and its regulations
communicated the distance
and the barriers
that still remained
between people and God.
And all the sacrifices
that had to be repeated
over and over again
could never restore us
to the freedom
that Adam and Eve enjoyed
in the garden before the fall.
Because as he says in verse 10,
there were only regulations for the body.
Dealing with food and drink
and various washings.
They could never definitively
cleanse our conscience.
Otherwise, they wouldn't have had to be
repeated all over again.
They could never wash away
our guilt and shame.
Now, probably none of us here
are planning to go to a tabernacle in Israel
to be cleansed of our sins
and our guilt.
It doesn't even exist anymore.
Nobody's going there.
It was destroyed in 70 AD.
But think for a moment.
Think for a moment about all the other
bodily regulations
that we come up with.
Seeking to cleanse our conscience.
Seeking to bring us back
into that life with God
that Adam and Eve had
in the Garden of Eden.
I mean, isn't that the promise
of many diets?
Rules about food and drink
that promise cleansing
and freedom
and long life
if you follow them strictly.
These foods are good.
These foods are bad.
If you follow these rules,
you can feel good about yourself
because you're better
than everybody else who doesn't.
Of course, it's unstable
because the rules are always changing.
If you read a dieting book
from 20 or 30 years ago,
it's completely outdated
and been proved wrong
by more recent research.
But isn't it interesting?
It's striking how we can look to food
as a means
not only to physical well-being
but even to spiritual well-being.
My wife and I are members
of the co-op down the street,
the Elm City Market.
And a few months ago,
I was walking by
and they had an advertisement
in the window
that said something like,
buy natural foods
here at the co-op.
Health for your body,
mind, and spirit.
And I thought, really?
You know, if eating raw foods
could make me
or keep me spiritually healthy,
I'll eat them every day of the year.
I mean, hey, I'm okay with kale.
I'm okay with broccoli too.
But neither one
will cleanse our soul.
Now, of course,
we can go to the other stream too.
Overeating.
Or compulsive eating.
Not so much to cleanse our conscience
as perhaps to dull our conscience.
When we're feeling lonely
or sad
or ashamed
or overwhelmed,
we turn to food
or coffee
or alcohol
or sweets
to comfort us.
But of course,
the more we eat
or the more we drink,
the less pleasure
we experience.
And then sometimes
we go back and forth
between rigid legalistic dieting
and unrestrained indulgence.
And neither of them works.
They only expose
our shame
and insecurity
and our need
for something more.
Which brings us to stage four
in God's plan
to dwell among His people.
verse 10 says,
the tabernacle
and its regulations
were a temporary measure
until the time
of reformation.
Reformation.
You might ask,
what does he mean
by that phrase,
the time of reformation?
Well, that word
reformation
could also be translated
reconstruction.
It referred to something
being reformed
or reshaped
or rebuilt.
Reformation was needed
when a building
was in disrepair,
when an account
was overdue
or when a law
became ineffective.
And the Old Testament
prophets,
including in particular
Ezekiel and Zechariah,
looked forward to a day
when the tabernacle,
God's dwelling place
with His people,
would be gloriously restored
and all the world
would see it.
And a river
would flow out from it.
Ezekiel described it.
A river flowing out
from the new temple
giving life
to all creation
like the Garden of Eden
once again.
Now the message
of the New Testament
is that in the coming
of Jesus Christ,
that day
has arrived.
That in Jesus Christ,
God has established
and anchored
a permanent dwelling place
among His people.
As we heard earlier,
Matt read this
at the beginning
of the service,
the Word became flesh
and dwelt among us.
We have seen His glory.
Jesus Christ
is now the place
where God
and humanity
meet together.
and are inseparably joined.
He is the one
through whom our conscience
can be cleansed,
not just temporarily,
but forevermore.
And because Jesus has come,
the physical tabernacle
and all its rules
and regulations
and all the other rules
and regulations
that we come up with
to try to cleanse
our own conscience
and make us right
with God
have been superseded.
Jesus said
in Matthew 12, 6,
I tell you,
something greater
than the temple
is here.
Or John chapter 2,
Jesus goes into the temple
and He drives out
the vendors
and the money changers
and the religious leaders
confront Him
and say,
what are you doing?
You're acting like
you own this place.
And Jesus said,
destroy this temple
and in three days
I will raise it up.
They didn't get
what He was saying,
but John explains
He was speaking
about the temple
of His body.
Jesus' own body
that would be
demolished on the cross
but gloriously rebuilt
in His resurrection.
You see,
through Jesus' death
and resurrection
He has established
a permanent dwelling place
of God
with His people.
Because through Jesus'
sacrifice on the cross
He's made provision
for our conscience
to be cleansed,
for our guilt
and shame
to be removed,
for our access
to God's presence
to be restored,
for our lives
to be rebuilt.
Once more,
in Him.
When Adam and Eve
were sent away
from the garden,
God placed
at the entrance
the angels
to guard
the entrance
with a flaming sword
flashing back and forth,
the sword
of divine justice.
For Adam and Eve
had sinned
and the wages
of sin is death.
But when Jesus Christ
who was without sin
died on the cross,
He went under
that flaming sword
of divine justice.
And because He died,
the way is now
open for us
to enter into
God's presence
once more
without hindrance.
the price
has been paid.
And because Jesus
has offered
that once-for-all
sacrifice,
we now have access
to that life-giving river
that flowed
through the Garden of Eden
and that Ezekiel
foresaw
would one day
be restored,
the life-giving river
that never runs dry.
And when Jesus
was on earth,
He talked about that.
And He said,
that's the Holy Spirit.
John chapter 7,
Jesus went to Jerusalem
for the Feast
of Tabernacles,
the feast
that celebrated
God's dwelling
among His people
when they came
out of Egypt
in the wilderness.
And on the last
and greatest day
of the feast,
He stood up,
John 7, 37,
and He cried out,
if anyone thirsts,
let him come
to Me
and drink.
Whoever believes
in Me,
as the Scripture
has said,
out of his heart
will flow
rivers
of living
water.
He said this
about the Spirit
whom those
who believed
in Him
were to receive.
You see,
through Jesus
we have access
once more
to the presence
of God,
to the life-giving
power of God,
to the provision
of God.
It's the same
promise that Jesus
made when He met
the Samaritan woman
at the well.
She had been
married and
divorced five times
and was living
with another man
who wasn't her
husband.
For all kinds
of reasons,
she would have
been excluded
from the temple
in Jerusalem,
not even able
to go in
to the outer court.
And yet,
Jesus comes to her
and she's sitting
at the well
and He says
to her,
everyone who
drinks this water,
He engages her
in conversation.
In the course
of the conversation
He says,
everyone who
drinks this water
will be thirsty
again.
But whoever
drinks the water
that I give him
will never
be thirsty
forever.
Because the water
that I give
will become
in that person
a river,
a spring of living
water,
welling up
to eternal life.
Jesus,
wow,
no one else
has ever
promised that.
That's what
Jesus promises.
No matter
what our past,
no matter
how qualified
we might seem
on the outside
before others,
Jesus offers
a way
into God's
presence
and living
water
that will
never run
dry.
When Jesus
talked about
the work
of the Holy
Spirit,
He said,
peace I leave
with you.
My peace
I give you.
I do not
give to you
as the world
gives.
Do not let
your hearts
be troubled
and do not
be afraid.
And then
He went on
to talk
about joy.
He said,
you will be
sorrowful,
but your sorrow
will turn
to joy.
You have sorrow
now,
but I will
see you again
and your
hearts will
rejoice
and no one
will take
your joy
from you.
Ask
and you
will receive
that your
joy may
be full.
This is the
promise that
Jesus offers.
Joy
and peace
from the
Holy Spirit,
the river
of life-giving
water
flowing through
us,
cleansing
from all
of our
guilt
and shame.
Finally,
stage five,
the tabernacle
yet to come.
You see,
what we have
now,
according to
the Bible,
it's only
the beginning.
Because at
the end
of the Bible,
Revelation 21
and 22
gives us a
picture of
the tabernacle
yet to come,
the eternal
dwelling place
of God
with His
people.
I want
to close
by simply
reading
some of
the
description
that it
gives.
Revelation
21,
then I
saw a
new heaven
and a
new earth.
For the
first heaven
and the
first earth
had passed
away,
and I
saw the
holy city,
the new
Jerusalem,
coming down
out of heaven
from God,
prepared as a
bride adorned
for her
husband.
And I
heard a
loud voice
from the
throne saying,
behold,
the dwelling
place of
God
is with
man.
He will
dwell with
them,
and they
will be
his people,
and God
himself will
be with
them as
their God.
He will
wipe away
every tear
from their
eyes,
and death
shall be
no more.
Neither
shall there
be mourning,
nor crying,
nor pain
anymore,
for the
former things
have passed
away.
And he
who was
seated on
the throne
said,
behold,
I am
making
all
things
new.
Verse 22,
he says,
I saw
no temple
in the
city.
There's
no need
for a
physical
structure
set apart,
for its
temple is
the Lord
God,
the Almighty,
and the
Lamb.
And the
city has
no need
of sun
or moon
to shine
on it,
for the
glory of
God
gives it
light,
and its
lamp
is the
Lamb,
Jesus
Christ.
Chapter
22,
then the
angel
showed me
the river
of the
water
of life,
brightest
crystal
flowing
from the
throne
of God
and of
the
Lamb
through
the
middle
of the
street
of the
city.
On
either
side
of the
river
the
tree
of
life,
with
its
twelve
kinds
of
fruit,
yielding
its
fruit
every
month.
The
leaves
of the
tree
were
for the
healing
of
the
nations.
No
longer
will
there
be
anything
accursed,
but the
throne
of God
and of
the
Lamb
will
be
in
it
and
his
servants
will
worship
him.
They
will
see
his
face
and
his
name
will
be
on
their
foreheads
and
night
will
be
no
more.
They
will
need
no
light
of
lamp
or
sun
for
the
Lord
God
will
be
their
light
and
they
will
reign
forever
and
ever.
You
see,
in Jesus
Christ,
we can
face our
greatest
problems
because
in
Jesus
Christ,
we
have a
completely
sufficient
solution.
The price
has been
paid.
The way
has been
opened.
This is
the promise
that he
offers.
So he
invites us,
let us draw
near to
God through
him.
That's how
the Bible
ends.
The spirit
and the
bride
say,
come.
And let
the one
who hears
say,
come.
And let
the one
who is
thirsty
come.
Let the
one who
desires
take the
water of
life
without
price.
Let us
pray.
Almighty
God,
we thank
you
that in
your mercy
you have
sought to
establish a
dwelling place
with us,
your people.
We thank
you,
Lord,
for the
price you
paid to
cleanse us
from guilt
and shame,
to open
the way,
a new
and living
way of
access to
your presence.
Lord,
we pray that
we might
come.
And Lord,
as we look
forward to
that day
when what we
just heard
will be
the complete
reality,
we pray
that we
would
experience
the
life-giving
river of
your Holy
Spirit
flowing through
us today.
We pray
that we
would experience
the assurance
of sins
forgiven,
of conscience
cleansed,
of death
defeated,
and life
without end.
In Jesus'
name,
amen.
Amen.
Well,
as the music
team comes
forward,
we're going
to sing
our closing
song,
Beautiful
Savior.
This speaks
about the
assurance and
the confidence
that we can
have in
Christ and
how he's
come to
dwell among
us.
So let's
stand as we
sing in
praise to
him.
Amen.
All my days
I will sing
this song
of gladness
Give my praise
to the fountain
of delight
Lord of history
You're the way
that we are
Lord of history
For in my heart
You heard my cry
And waves of mercy
Pour down on my life
Beautiful Savior
Wonderful Counselor
You're the way
Father
Cloth and majesty
Lord of history
You're the way
The truth
The light
Star of the morning
Glorious in holiness
You're the risen one
Heaven's champion
And you reign
You reign over all
And I will trust
In the cross
Of my redeemer
I will sing
Of the blood
That never fails
Of sins forgiven
Of conscience closed
Of death defeated
And life without end
Beautiful Savior
Wonderful Counselor
Lord of the Lord
You're the faithful
Counselor
Cloth and majesty
Lord of history
You're the way
The truth
The life
Star of the morning
Glorious in holiness
You're the risen one
Heaven's champion
And you reign
You reign over all
And I long to be
Where the praise is never ending
Turn to dwell
Where the glory never fades
Where countless worshipers will shine
Will share one's soul
And Christ the Lord
And I long to be
Where the praise is never ending
And I long to be
Where the praise is never ending
Turn to dwell
Where the glory never fades
Where countless worshipers will share one's soul
And Christ the love worthy will honor the Lord
Beautiful Savior
Wonderful Counselor
Lord of majesty
Lord of history
You're the way
The truth
The life
Star of the morning
Glorious in holiness
You're the risen one
Heaven's champion
And you reign
You reign over all
Thanks for joining us this morning
We invite you to stay around either up here or downstairs
Where there is coffee and refreshments
To greet and encourage one another
I receive God's word of blessing
From the book of Revelation
He who testifies