"Preparing for Worship (Numbers 7-8)" | 2/16/25
Numbers 7-8 | 2/16/25 | Will DuVal
This morning we’re talking about PREPARATION. What do you PREPARE for? Perhaps you prepared for a nice Valentine’s Day dinner last week by getting all gussied up. Or you prepared to host your SUPER BOWL party by cooking and cleaning. (I hope you were better prepared for the game than the CHIEFS were… ouch!)
The more important the OCCASION, the more important your PREPARATION. Imagine you got asked to attend a meeting with your boss’s BOSS’S boss, the CEO of the company… or invited to dinner at the WHITE HOUSE, or Buckingham Palace. You would be sure to be PREPARED.
Now imagine you are invited into the presence of the almighty God of the UNIVERSE! How much MORE so, would you - OUGHT you - make sure that you CAREFULLY prepare? Ecclesiastes 5 advises us to “Guard your steps when you go to the house of God” (5:1). We don’t just WALTZ carelessly, recklessly into God’s presence; we do well to PREPARE.
That is the unifying theme of chapters 7 & 8 of the book of Numbers. God is instructing His people here, Israel, how to prepare for WORSHIP. The most important thing that you and I can DO in life is worship. God says He created us for this very purpose: Isaiah 43:21 - “I formed [you] for myself that [you] might declare my praise” (Isa 43:21). In John 4:23, Jesus said “the Father is seeking… people to worship him”; Kent Hughes notes that “nowhere else in the entire corpus of Holy Scripture do we read of God’s “seeking” anything else from [us]. God desires worship above all else.” (Disciplines of a Godly Man, p139). “Leviticus amounts to a 27 chapter liturgical manual. The Psalms are a spectacular 150-chapter worship hymnal.” And “Exodus devotes 25 chapters to the construction of the tabernacle, the locus of divine worship” in the Old Testament. (140)
And that’s where we pick up the story this morning in the book of NUMBERS. We’re actually going BACK in time a bit. Numbers isn’t written in strict chronological order; ch7 tells us “On the day when Moses had finished setting up the tabernacle and had anointed and consecrated it” - which happened in Leviticus 8 & 9. So this morning’s events actually happened BEFORE the census of Numbers ch1.
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Because right after God told Israel how to WORSHIP him by constructing the tabernacle, the very NEXT thing he instructed them to do was PREPARE for worship. You don’t just WALTZ in; worship - acceptable worship - takes preparation.
And this morning we’ll observe FOUR PRINCIPLES of preparing to worship God.
I invite you to stand…(SCRIPTURE: Num 7-8 (selected texts))
“On the day when Moses had finished setting up the tabernacle and had anointed and consecrated it with all its furnishings and had anointed and consecrated the altar with all its utensils, 2 the chiefs of Israel, heads of their fathers' houses, who were the chiefs of the tribes, who were over those who were listed, approached 3 and brought their offerings before the Lord, six wagons and twelve oxen, a wagon for every two of the chiefs, and for each one an ox. They brought them before the tabernacle. 4 Then the Lord said to Moses, 5 “Accept these from them, that they may be used in the service of the tent of meeting, and give them to the Levites, to each man according to his service.” 6 So Moses took the wagons and the oxen and gave them to the Levites. 7 Two wagons and four oxen he gave to the sons of Gershon, according to their service. 8 And four wagons and eight oxen he gave to the sons of Merari, according to their service… 9 But to the sons of Kohath he gave none, because they were charged with the service of the holy things that had to be carried on the shoulder. 10 And the chiefs offered offerings for the dedication of the altar on the day it was anointed; and the chiefs offered their offering before the altar. 11 And the Lord said to Moses, “They shall offer their offerings, one chief each day, for the dedication of the altar.”
12 He who offered his offering the first day was Nahshon the son of Amminadab, of the tribe of Judah. 13 And his offering was one silver plate whose weight was 130 shekels, one silver basin of 70 shekels, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, both of them full of fine flour mixed with oil for a grain offering; 14 one golden dish of 10 shekels, full of incense; 15 one bull from the herd, one ram, one male lamb a year old, for a burnt offering; 16 one male goat for a sin offering; 17 and for the sacrifice of peace offerings, two oxen, five rams, five male goats, and five male lambs a year old. This was the offering of Nahshon the son of Amminadab… [and we’ll skip ahead to v84 now, because vv18-83 just REPEAT that paragraph TWELVE times almost VERBATIM, as each of the 12 tribes bring an IDENTICAL offering; so…]
v84: “This was the dedication offering for the altar on the day when it was anointed, from the chiefs of Israel: twelve silver plates, twelve silver basins, twelve golden dishes, each silver plate weighing 130 shekels and each basin 70, all the silver of the vessels 2,400 shekels according to the shekel of the sanctuary, the twelve golden dishes, full of incense, weighing 10 shekels apiece… all the gold of the dishes being 120 shekels; all the cattle for the burnt offering twelve bulls, twelve rams, twelve male lambs a year old, with their grain offering; and twelve male goats for a sin offering; and all the cattle for the sacrifice of peace offerings twenty-four bulls, the rams sixty, the male goats sixty, the male lambs a year old sixty. This was the dedication offering for the altar after it was anointed.
89 And when Moses went into the tent of meeting to speak with the Lord, he heard the voice speaking to him from above the mercy seat that was on the ark of the testimony, from between the two cherubim; and it spoke to him.
8:1 Now the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Speak to Aaron and say to him, When you set up the lamps, the seven lamps shall give light in front of the lampstand.” 3 And Aaron did so: he set up its lamps in front of the lampstand, as the Lord commanded Moses. 4 And this was the workmanship of the lampstand, hammered work of gold. From its base to its flowers, it was hammered work; according to the pattern that the Lord had shown Moses, so he made the lampstand.
5 And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 6 “Take the Levites from among the people of Israel and cleanse them. 7 Thus you shall do to them to cleanse them: sprinkle the water of purification upon them, and let them go with a razor over all their body, and wash their clothes and cleanse themselves. 8 Then let them take a bull from the herd and its grain offering of fine flour mixed with oil, and you shall take another bull from the herd for a sin offering. 9 And you shall bring the Levites before the tent of meeting and assemble the whole congregation of the people of Israel. 10 When you bring the Levites before the Lord, the people of Israel shall lay their hands on the Levites, 11 and Aaron shall offer the Levites before the Lord as a wave offering from the people of Israel, that they may do the service of the Lord. 12 Then the Levites shall lay their hands on the heads of the bulls, and you shall offer the one for a sin offering and the other for a burnt offering to the Lord to make atonement for the Levites. 13 And you shall set the Levites before Aaron and his sons, and shall offer them as a wave offering to the Lord.
14 “Thus you shall separate the Levites from among the people of Israel, and the Levites shall be mine. 15 And after that the Levites shall go in to serve at the tent of meeting, when you have cleansed them and offered them as a wave offering. 16 For they are wholly given to me from among the people of Israel. Instead of all who open the womb, the firstborn of all the people of Israel, I have taken them for myself. 17 For all the firstborn among the people of Israel are mine, both of man and of beast. On the day that I struck down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt I consecrated them for myself, 18 and I have taken the Levites instead of all the firstborn among the people of Israel. 19 And I have given the Levites as a gift to Aaron and his sons… to do the service for the people of Israel at the tent of meeting and to make atonement for the people of Israel, that there may be no plague among the people of Israel when the people of Israel come near the sanctuary.”
20 Thus did Moses and Aaron and all the congregation of the people of Israel to the Levites. According to all that the Lord commanded Moses concerning the Levites, the people of Israel did to them. 21 And the Levites purified themselves from sin and washed their clothes, and Aaron offered them as a wave offering before the Lord, and Aaron made atonement for them to cleanse them. 22 And after that the Levites went in to do their service…
Verse 23: And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 24 “This applies to the Levites: from twenty-five years old and upward they shall come to do duty in the service of the tent of meeting. 25 And from the age of fifty years they shall withdraw from the duty of the service and serve no more. 26 They minister to their brothers in the tent of meeting by keeping guard, but they shall do no service. Thus shall you do to the Levites in assigning their duties.””
[This is the word of God…]
FOUR THINGS these two chapters teach us about preparing for worship:
#1) We prepare for worship with SACRIFICIAL GENEROSITY. (7:1-89)
We will spend the BULK of our time this morning here in ch7 because most of ch8 concerns the cleansing & consecration of the Levites, which we kinda already covered back in chs3 & 19… and ALSO because even though we skipped over 66 verses of it, Numbers ch7 is the second longest chapter in the BIBLE, and we want to do it JUSTICE. What’s the LONGEST chapter? (Psalm 119…) But Numbers SEVEN is SECOND longest - 89 verses! - and what’s it all about?
WORSHIP! Yes, Israel is PREPARING for worship here - they can’t worship God at the tabernacle until they’ve DEDICATED it. So this is a “ribbon cutting” ceremony of sorts (except instead of cutting ribbons they’re cutting animals’ throats). But the first thing they do here to prepare is CONTRIBUTE; you can’t have a ribbon cutting ceremony without the ribbon and scissors and champagne.
But let’s not overlook the fact that in offering their gifts, Israel isn’t JUST “preparing”; giving is itself an act of WORSHIP. Remember, to worship literally means to “assign worth”. So in that sense, our GIVING - tangibly, materially, financially contributing to God’s work - is perhaps the most EXPLICIT, objective act of worship there is. Like Michael Scott said, “Presents are the best way to show someone how much you care. It’s like this tangible thing that you can point to and say, “Hey man - I love you THIS many dollars worth”.” Giving IS worship. And I think it’s SIGNIFICANT that the LONGEST chapter in the Bible - Psalm 119 - is all about God’s gift to US, of his WORD, but the SECOND longest - Numbers 7 - is all about our RESPONSE, our gifts to HIM, in return.
AND… it is ALSO about preparation for worship. Because you can’t worship at a tabernacle you haven’t BUILT and dedicated, and in order for Israel to both build it (in Exodus) and dedicate it (here in Numbers), everyone had to CONTRIBUTE.
And the same is still true TODAY. We give as an act of WORSHIP, AND as preparation for it. We can’t WORSHIP together in a church building that we haven’t BUILT, and MAINTAINED, and HEATED… and all that takes MONEY. But generosity ALSO prepares our hearts for worship by OPENING them to the Lord. When we give we open our hearts and our HANDS - our WALLETS - and say, “God, this is yours, because I am yours.”
And what we find here in ch7 are TWELVE TRAITS that ought to be true of our giving. 12 tribes with 12 gifts of tribute, typifying 12 traits. We could easily spend all morning just on ch7, but I’ll make you a deal: I’ll try and cover “giving” QUICKLY so we can get to ch8, as long as Y’ALL prove you don’t NEED a whole sermon on it by giving so GENEROUSLY! Deal? A less trusting pastor would say: “We’re trying to raise a couple million dollars this year for our OWN building expansion project; maybe I’ll just drag out Numbers ch7 for a few weeks…”. But I trust that y’all are quick learners, and I’m gonna give you all 12 principles here in just 2/3 of a sermon - Ready??
First, our giving should be: 1) VOLUNTARY. Notice, God doesn’t COMMAND the offerings that the Israelites bring here; they gave fully of their own accord. Commentator Iain Duguid notes that (101): “No guilt-driven appeals were launched to fund the ministry of the tabernacle; the people saw what needed to be done and gave generously and unitedly to meet those needs.”
I told y’all: we’re not gonna twist your arms to give to our building campaign. We won’t guilt or coerce, shmooze or beg; the Bible says, “Each one must give as he has decided in his own heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion” (2 Cor 9:7). Listen to how the Macedonians gave to help out the church in Jerusalem in 2 Corinthians 8; Paul writes, “their abundance of joy… overflowed in a wealth of generosity… For they gave… beyond their means, of their own accord [VOLUNTARILY…] begging us earnestly for the favor of taking part in the relief of the saints” (vv2-4). They BEGGED to give! For the BLESSING of giving - Jesus said, “It’s more blessed to give than to receive” (Ac 20:35). “WE want the blessing! PLEASE let us give!” That is godly giving.
Second, our giving is RESPONSIVE. Our generosity, like ALL worship, is always a RESPONSE to what GOD has ALREADY done for US. Duguid points out (101): “Their giving was not an attempt to buy God’s favor, but rather flowed out of the experience of God’s favor. It is not coincidental that this chapter comes AFTER [the Aaronic Blessing] and not before. The Israelites did not give generously to God so that they could hear him say in response, “I will surely bless you”. On the contrary, God blessed his people first, and then they gave.”
“Perhaps they recognized that they could afford to be generous because they remembered where they got all of these riches in the first place. God gave this wealth to them by enabling them to plunder the Egyptians on their way out of slavery (Ex 12:35-36)... God had given it to them in the first place, and now they simply gave it back to him.” (102).
That’s all OUR giving is; it all belongs to God anyway; we’re just BORROWING it. The Bible says not only our wealth, but even the “power to GET wealth”, to MAKE the money, had to be GIVEN to us by GOD (Dt 8:18). The LEAST we can do is say, “THANK YOU!”, by giving just 10% of it back to Him (...or 12%, during a capital campaign 🙂).
Third, our giving should be THOUGHTFUL. Notice the very FIRST thing Israel gave here, in v3; what was it?
6 WAGONS, and 12 OXEN to PULL them.
Remember back in ch4, God assigned which CLANS of the Levites were gonna carry which PARTS of the tabernacle through the wilderness. And if you’re MERARI, you had to be SWEATING it, literally, because the Kohathites are over here carrying dishes and bowls and tongs… the GERSHONITES were in charge of carrying the curtains and screens and cords… meanwhile, YOU’VE got to carry the “frames and bars and pillars and bases”. All the HEAVIEST stuff.
So what does God do? He stirs Israel’s hearts - all 12 tribes - to chip in and provide wagons and oxen to help the Levites, and ESPECIALLY Merari - to whom God assigned the MOST carts and oxen - to help them bear their burden.
What a THOUGHTFUL gift, by the OTHER 12 tribes. Duguid notes (99): “It’s one thing to write a weekly or monthly check and drop it in the offering plate. It’s another to look around at the ministry needs of the church and, without being asked, find a need that we can meet, then MEET it. What a blessing to have such people in a congregation.”
“You just had a baby? Here’s a MEAL…” - “SEE a need, MEET a need”.
“Pastor, I heard there’s no storage space over at Westminster while we’re renting there next year; I’ve got a covered trailer the church is welcome to use…” – see a need; MEET a need.
Now, it’s still important to have LEADERS who evaluate those gifts. Israel gave to MOSES, and then HE decided, with God’s direction, where to use the carts & oxen. YOU might “see a need” and want to “MEET a need” for flannel graphs in every kids classroom; let’s run that by HOLLY. What is thoughtful and HELPFUL sometimes changes, generationally. Please don’t donate wagons & oxen to “help” with our upcoming storage & transportation issues. Run those gifts by us.
But FOURTH, our giving should be FAITHFUL. While it is TRUE that we don’t hear God explicitly command their offerings here, I don’t think it’s any coincidence or MIRACLE that all 12 gifts from all 12 tribes were EXACTLY the SAME. Either God told them what to give and it’s just not recorded here… OR, they all got together and decided, “Hey, let’s all go in TOGETHER on this…” Either way, just because we give from the HEART doesn’t mean we are to give haphazardly, erratically, without any rhyme or reason. Giving can be HEART-feld, and still be DISCIPLINED, organized.
Your giving can be CONSISTENT - 10%, 12%, faithfully - and still be earnest.
And we should note Israel’s faithfulness in WHAT they gave as well. “What do you GET for the GOD who has EVERYTHING?”
Answer: you give him what he “ASKS for”, explicitly, back in Leviticus 1-7: sacrifices.
Every voluntary offering that Israel BRINGS here is in faithful accordance with God’s revealed WISH list; they paid God the RESPECT of checking His REGISTRY, that he had carefully put together for them.
And it’s quite a GIFT registry, isn’t it? It reads like the “12 Days of Christmas”; you can almost imagine God singing:
“On the twelfth day of Dedication, my people gave to me… one plate of flour, one basin of oil, one dish of incense, one bull a’snorting… FIVE GRUNTING RAMS!”
And if that’s what God says He WANTS, that’s what his people will GIVE. Sometimes “just give from your HEART; however the Spirit LEADS you” can be overwhelming; it’s NICE to have a little DIRECTION: “10%? 12%? Alright, got it; you got it, God.”
Fifth, our giving should be UNOSTENTATIOUS. NOT conspicuous, so as to attract attention or impress others. Pastor David Guzik points out: “By [receiving] the same gift from every tribe, God made sure that no tribe… glorified itself through their giving. We must resist the tendency to give in order to be seen by men.”
Jesus said, “when you give… [Notice: like last week with “fasting” - not “IF you give”, but “WHEN you give”...] sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues… that they may be praised by others… But when you give… do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.” (Matt 6:2-4)
And yet at the SAME time, sixth point, we ought to recognize that our giving is SIGNIFICANT. Just because it’s MODEST doesn’t mean it’s minor. No, our giving should be MEANINGFUL. I know we didn’t READ them all, but why do you think God made sure that all 12 gifts, from all 12 tribes, and all 12 CHIEFS’ NAMES got included here? 89 verses! In the most important book ever WRITTEN; this is VALUABLE literary real estate. And SOME would say, “What a WASTE!”
But GOD says, “EVERY gift… and every GIVER… is IMPORTANT to me.” So HE records every last detail. What’s BORING to us is BEAUTIFUL to God.
And not just the BIG gifts, either. Remember the story of the “Widow’s 2 Mites”? “Jesus… saw the rich putting their gifts into the offering box, and he saw a poor widow put in two small copper coins. [Just a few CENTS; MAYBE a dollar…] And he said, “Truly, I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty put in all that she had.”” (Lk 21:1-4)
THAT is “significant” giving, sacrificial GENEROSITY. The less you’ve got to give, the more SIGNIFICANT the gift.
Which brings us to a SEVENTH trait: our giving should not only be significant in GOD’S eyes, but it should be COSTLY in our OWN. That is WHY the widow’s two mites were so “significant” to Jesus: because they were so COSTLY to HER… it cost her EVERYTHING! Yet she gave it WILLINGLY, cuz she knew God was WORTH it.
What’s he worth to YOU this morning? To US, Church?Here in Numbers 7, Israel gives COSTLY gifts. Skillfully hand-crafted plates & dishes of SILVER and GOLD, “FINE flour” which was hard to produce and thus usually reserved for ROYALTY, pricey incense like frankincense that had to be imported, LOTS of big expensive animals… this is NOT “drop 20 bucks in the offering box just to assuage your GUILT.”
God says, “Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will reap bountifully” (2 Cor 9:6). So give LAVISHLY!
Give, #8 now, WHOLE-HEARTEDLY. That is what the “whole burnt offerings” of v15 here - and if you remember back to Leviticus ch1 - what they represent: “the wholehearted giving of oneself to God… our willingness to devote our entire existence to the God’s service [because] Yahweh is worthy of supreme devotion” (Geoffrey Harper, Leviticus, 65-6). And the GRAIN offering of v13 as well, was a way of symbolically DEDICATING oneself to the LORD.
What’s the most important commandment in ALL of God’s word? ““You shall love the Lord your God with all of your heart and with all your mind and with all your soul and with all your strength.” (Mt 22:37) God deserves nothing LESS from us.
And yet so often, we GIVE him so much less, don’t we? The Bible calls this “SIN”. And it’s the REASON for the NEXT kind of offering in v16: “the SIN offering”. Which reveals WHAT, about our giving?
That is should be #9) GRATEFUL. If the ancient ISRAELITE would have been filled with gratitude, looking down at this poor, bloody GOAT… DYING in their place, how much MORE so when you and I today look to the CROSS!
THAT’s why we GIVE, Church. It is a response of WORSHIP indeed; a GRATEFUL response, to what CHRIST did for us at CALVARY - our once-and-for-ALL time sacrifice… NO more animals necessary… “it was FINISHED upon that cross!” Hallelujah!
Which brings us to the message of the PEACE offerings, in v17 now: #10- our giving should be JOYFUL! Back in Leviticus ch3, we saw that the PEACE offerings were a CELEBRATION - a big, communal PARTY - after the SIN offering, after atonement had been made, to CELEBRATE Israel’s newly re-established PEACE with God, their RESTORATION to right relationship with God. What a JOYFUL occasion!
Ephesians 2 announces that “now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off [from God] have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace” (2:13-14). THAT’s why we GIVE, Church; it is the tangible, external overflow of a heart that is overJOYED to now be FORGIVEN of sin, reconciled to God, at PEACE with our loving heavenly FATHER.
And “God loves a cheerful giver”, 2 Corinthians 9:7 reminds us, a JOYFUL giver.
But not just “giv-ER”; God loves joyful giv-ERS, plural. Because #11 - our giving should be COMMUNAL. Not only is every individual gift and giver from all 12 tribes recorded for us in vv1-83, but THEN God decided to tally them all UP, in vv84-88! Why?
Because our giving - both as an ACT of worship AND as preparation for it - really is a collective endeavor, a “team sport”. The sum really is greater than the whole of the parts. We can do more together than we EVER could independently of one another. On our own, Polly and I could sponsor a child through Compassion, and change a life. But TOGETHER as a CHURCH, we can sponsor a Compassion CENTER and change not just a life but an entire COMMUNITY, bring the gospel to a whole VILLAGE!
On my own, with just MY giving, I may be able to fund a few of the URINALS for our renovation of the men’s bathroom (which I’d really love to get NAMED in my HONOR, if we could, with a nice placard… so much for UNOSTENTATIOUS giving 🙂). But TOGETHER, we can get this whole project DONE.
And that’s what ISRAEL did here; they FINISHED the job. Because #12 - our giving is EFFECTIVE. It WORKS!
Look at how chapter 7 ENDS now, in v89: “And when Moses went into the tent of meeting to speak with the Lord, he heard the voice speaking to him from above the mercy seat…”. This PLACE where heaven would touch EARTH, where God promised that his very own PRESENCE would reside WITH his people, and they could MEET with Him - it WORKED. Duguid notes (101): “The end result of this generous giving was that the tabernacle functioned exactly as it was intended to do… there was fellowship between God and his people.”
But we have an even BETTER reason to give today, church: we don’t give to SECURE OUR fellowship with God, but to celebrate it. We don’t give to GET relationship with God; we’ve already GOT it, because GOD gave his only SON, to REDEEM us. So now we give as a willing, grateful, joyful, and yes, EFFECTIVE response - if our goal is still, ultimately, to PLEASE God, we know He “LOVES a cheerful giver”; it is PLEASING to him… so we GIVE.
That was all ch7. Now we’re gonna cover all of ch8 in about 8 minutes. Not because it’s not important, but because as I said, there’s a fair amount of REVIEW here. Vv1-4 recap the golden LAMPSTAND, from Exodus 25. Vv5-22 review the ordination of the Levites, which is very similar to that of the priests, in Leviticus 8. So we’ll be QUICK.
But the FIRST thing we need to note here in ch8, and point #2 in your bulletin, after those 12 sub-points for #1, is that BECAUSE our worship is a RESPONSE to what God has done for US, we prepare for worship, then, with COLLECTIVE REMEMBRANCE. (8:1-4)
The extent to which we REMEMBER what God has done for us is the EXACT extent to which we will necessarily WORSHIP him for it. If you don’t WORSHIP much, it’s cuz you don’t REMEMBER much; you don’t often CONSIDER all that God’s done for you.
What is this LAMPSTAND all about? Duguid explains (109): “The lampstand symbolized… God himself. This is why [it] was made out of pure gold… unlike all the other objects in the Outer sanctuary, which were made of wood and merely plated with gold. It had seven lamps, symbolizing the completeness and perfection of God’s presence… It was to “give light”, exactly the same Hebrew word that the priestly blessing used of God’s face shining upon his people (in 6:25)... It is to shine forward [that is actually the only NEW detail included here in Numbers 8; how Aaron was to ARRANGE the lamps, specifically, to “give light in FRONT of the lampstand”]… upon the place where the table of the showbread stood. This table had on it twelve loaves representing the 12 tribes of Israel… Number 8:1-4 is a visual metaphor… The light of the Lord’s blessing rested upon all of the tribes of his people”.
And we might ADD that the “bread of the presence” itself was intended to be a reminder of God’s faithful PROVISION for Israel. The extent to which we remember God’s provision in our lives, his BLESSING - God’s gracious “shining of his FACE upon us” and giving us PEACE with Him, through our Savior Jesus… our WORSHIP will be directly proportional to our REMEMBRANCE.
And I say “OUR” remembrance - collectively remembering OUR blessing - because not only did the 12 loaves upon which these golden lamps shone remind Israel of God’s provision, but it was a reminder of their COMMUNITY as well. 12 tribes united as one people of God.
We can’t miss the connection with our OWN collective remembrance today, at the Lord’s table. Where we are reminded most importantly of God’s provision of his Son JESUS - the “Bread of Life”, who poured out his blood to save us. But he saves “US”; not just ME, or YOU… but US! And we are reminded ALSO not just of our fellowship with GOD, but with ONE ANOTHER, his PEOPLE. As 1 Corinthians 10 puts it: “The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread.” (vv16-17).
#3- We prepare for worship with CLEANSING & CONSECRATION. (8:5-22)
We’re not gonna comb back over every line and detail of vv5-22; I can pretty much sum it up for you in one sentence: You are not prepared to worship a HOLY God, until you have been MADE holy, through CLEANSING and CONSECRATION.
It’s a 2-step process: first, the Levites had to be CLEANSED - “sprinkled [with] the water of purification… wash their clothes and cleanse themselves”. But their external, ritual cleansing was just symbolic of their DEEPER need for internal, spiritual cleansing. That’s the MAIN emphasis of this section: “the sin offering and… burnt offering… to make atonement for the Levites” so that the LEVITES, in turn, can actually “make atonement for the people of Israel”, v19 says! “They were a living sacrifice,” David Guzik explains, “that took Israel’s place in the work of serving God. The Levites were God’s chosen substitutes to [be wholly] consecrated to the Lord” (Enduring Word, “Number 7”).
And that’s step TWO: CONSECRATION. Being “set apart” exclusively for the Lord. We talked about it a LOT last week in ch6, with the Nazirites, same idea here, with the “wave offering”, which was a way of saying, “HERE, God. This belongs to YOU!” Usually it was a cut of meat from a sacrifice, but in this case, the LEVITES got waved! We don’t know if they got PICKED UP, like they were CROWD SURFING, or if Aaron just walked down the line of all 22,000 of them, SHAKING them (“YOU belong to the Lord… and YOU belong to the Lord…”). But whatever the method, the MESSAGE was clear: the Levites were “separated from among the people of Israel”, God said, “For they are wholly given to me” (15-16).
So let me just ask YOU this morning: have you been CLEANSED and CONSECRATED? Listen: God created you and put you on this earth for WORSHIP - to bring HIM glory. But you can’t DO it - the Bible says “it is IMPOSSIBLE to please God” without FAITH (Heb 11:6). And what is FAITH? Faith is the humble recognition that 1) God is HOLY, 2) You are NOT; you’re SINFUL; and therefore, 3) You need a SAVIOR. For CLEANSING from your sin, AND for CONSECRATION - God says, “Be HOLY as I am HOLY”; he says, “without holiness, you’ll never even SEE me” (Heb 12:14), make it into my presence. Friends: that is a holiness - a PERFECT holiness - that CANNOT come from you or me; it HAD to come from the “better Levite”, Jesus Christ, who CLEANSES us from our sins and CONSECRATES us for God-pleasing, holy living. You wanna BE PREPARED… for ETERNITY?? Trust in JESUS.
And lastly, #4 - ch8 ends by preparing Israel for worship for GENERATIONS to come. Because we perpetuate worship with SELFLESS SERVICE. (8:23-26)
Chapter FOUR told us “a Levite’s time of active service began at age thirty and lasted until fifty (4:3,23,30). Yet their formal training (we see here) began at age twenty-five, with a five-year apprenticeship.” (Guzik)
And who TRAINED them? The OLD Levites. “They minister to their brothers”, v26 says. They PAY IT FORWARD, by equipping and empowering the NEXT generation of worship leaders.
Pastors share the same goal as parents: to work ourselves out of a JOB. I want my kids - both biological and spiritual - to be SO mature one day that they don’t NEED me. Maybe they still WANT me, and they keep me around to “minister” to them and “keep guard”, keep an eye on their blind spots. But the goal is to serve so selflessly, pouring your LIFE out into the next generation, that the worship - the CHURCH - LONG outlives you.
This is how we prepare for worship: we give sacrificially, we remember collectively, we receive Christ’s CLEANSING and CONSECRATION, and then we pay it forward. Because Jesus is WORTHY; worthy of it all.
Amen?