Sunday May 1, 2022 – God Is Near
Introduction:
God is One who is near.
He made Himself accessible intentionally.
2 Chronicles 15:2 The Lord is with you when you are with him. If you seek him, he will be found by you, but if you forsake him, he will forsake you.
The High Priest would come as far as He could on his own and not with out blood and coals from the altar.
Leviticus 16:12 “Then he shall take a censer full of burning coals of fire from the altar before the Lord.
No one was to dare to enter except the one High Priest.
1. The veil was torn to be able to access the Glory of God.
Hebrews 10:20 by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh,
The Holy of Holies was the place of the Shekinah of God’s Presence separated by a veil.
Tow words for God’s glory:
Shekinah = the glory of the divine presence
Kabod = the “heaviness” of God, and in this case it is most commonly translated as referring to his “glory”
The place of the Shekinah of God is the English transliteration of a Hebrew word meaning “dwelling” or “settling” and denotes the dwelling or settling of the divine presence of God.
Leviticus 16:2 … I will appear in the cloud above the mercy seat.
The curtain indicated that no passage was to be made except once a year and not without burning coals from the altar and blood from the offering and entrance was only accessible by the provision of God.
At the dedication of Solomon’s Temple the Priest could not stand to minister because of the weightiness of God.
2 Chron. 5:14 so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the LORD filled the house of God.
Ez. 43:5 The Spirit lifted me up and brought me into the inner court; and behold, the glory of the Lord filled the temple.
The weightiness of God’s glory.
1 Kings 8: 10 And it came to pass, when the priests came out of the holy place, that the cloud filled the house of the Lord, 11 so that the priests could not continue ministering because of the cloud; for the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord.
2. God wants His glory and presence in the center of His people.
Numbers 1:50 but you shall appoint the Levites over the tabernacle of the Testimony, over all its furnishings, and over all things that belong to it; they shall carry the tabernacle and all its furnishings; they shall attend to it and camp around the tabernacle. 51 And when the tabernacle is to go forward, the Levites shall take it down; and when the tabernacle is to be set up, the Levites shall set it up. The outsider who comes near shall be put to death. 52 The children of Israel shall pitch their tents, everyone by his own camp, everyone by his own standard, according to their armies; 53 but the Levites shall camp around the tabernacle of the Testimony, that there may be no wrath on the congregation of the children of Israel; and the Levites shall keep charge of the tabernacle of the Testimony.”
The levites were to camp with the Glory of God at their center.
Life revolved around the Glory.
Their comings and goings was all dependent on what the Presence of the Lord was doing.
The people lived according to their standard but the levites according to God’s.
52 The children of Israel shall pitch their tents, everyone by his own camp, everyone by his own standard
Joshua was from the tribe of Ephraim, not Levi, yet He came close.
Will the Presence of God be at your center?
1 Peter 2:9-10 (NKJV) 9 But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; 10 who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy.
3. The glory of God is the outshining of His beauty and holiness.
Isa. 6: 1-7 In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple. 2 Above it stood seraphim; each one had six wings: with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 And one cried to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; The whole earth is full of His glory!” 4 And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who cried out, and the house was filled with smoke.
Isaiah 60: 1 Arise, shine; For your light has come! And the glory of the Lord is risen upon you.
Glory: Being marked by beauty and a state of gratification
We are affected many ways by the Glory of God: x
The beauty of Glory captures our affections.
PS 27:4 One thing I have desired of the Lord, That will I seek: That I may dwell in the house of the Lord All the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the Lord, And to inquire in His temple.
The hope of glory motivates us.
Col. 1:8 To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
The riches of His glories of God draws us
Eph. 3:16 according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, 17 that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height— 19 to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. [1]
4. The allurement of God’s Glory.
Mark 9:2-3 (NKJV) 2 Now after six days Jesus took Peter, James, and John, and led them up on a high mountain apart by themselves; and He was transfigured before them. 3 His clothes became shining, exceedingly white, like snow, such as no launderer on earth can whiten them.
We saw just a glimpse of this glory when Jesus was transfigure, transform, change allowing His glory to be seen but only for a moment.
Christ appearance was changed and was resplendent with divine brightness on the mount of transfiguration
The glory and attraction of Christ keeps us coming back.
We only see in part, we better understand that as we know God more the more we know what we are to do.
When is the last time you have seen Him?
5. We are being transformed by His glory.
2 Cor. 3: 18 But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.
We are changed.
The whole earth to be filled with the Glory of God.
Jesus is the fullness of the Glory of God.
Hebrews 1:3 (NKJV) who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
Being filled with the fullness of God.