I'll bring the blood and sprinkle the blood
round about on the altar that is by the door
of the tabernacle of the congregation.
And he shall flay the burnt offering
and cut it into his pieces.
And the sons of Aaron and the priests
shall put fire upon the altar
and lay the wood in order upon the fire.
And the priests, Aaron's sons,
shall lay the parts, the head and the fat,
in order upon the wood that is on the fire,
which is upon the altar.
But his inwards and his legs shall he wash in water.
And the priest shall burn all on the altar
to be a burnt sacrifice, an offering made by fire,
of a sweet savor unto the Lord.
And if his offering be of the flocks,
namely of the sheep or of the goats,
for a burnt sacrifice,
he shall bring it a male without blemish.
And he shall kill it on the side of the altar
northward before the Lord.
And the priests, Aaron's sons,
shall sprinkle his blood round about upon the altar.
And he shall cut it into his pieces
with his head and his fat.
And the priest shall lay them in order
on the wood that is on the fire, which is upon the altar.
But he shall wash the inwards and the legs with water.
And the priest shall bring it all
and burn it upon the altar.
It is a burnt sacrifice,
an offering made by fire of a sweet savor unto the Lord.
And if the burnt sacrifice for his offering
to the Lord be of fouls,
then he shall bring his offering of turtle doves
or of young pigeons.
Priest shall bring it unto the altar
and wring off his head, burn it on the altar.
Blood thereof shall be wrung out at the side of the altar.
He shall pluck away his crop with his feathers
and cast it beside the altar on the east part
by the place of the ashes.
And he shall cleave it with the wings thereof.
But shall not divide it asunder.
And the priest shall burn it upon the altar,
upon the wood that is upon the fire.
It is a burnt sacrifice,
an offering made by fire of a sweet savor unto the Lord.
Let's bow our heads for a word of prayer.
Father, thank you once again for gathering us here
this evening in your house to worship you.
Lord, we thank you for your word.
We thank you for adopting us into your family, Lord.
Please fill Pastor Reyes with the Holy Spirit
and just bless the sermon and have everything that is said
glorify you.
We thank you, Lord.
We ask this all in Jesus' name, amen.
- Amen.
Man, we know it's time change and people are getting sick
because this is the lowest turnout we've had all year.
But the Bible says we're two or three together.
There he is in the midst of us.
We're there in the book of Leviticus
and we're gonna start with an overview
or we're gonna start in the book of Leviticus now.
And like we've been doing for the better part of a year
in the evening service,
we're doing an overview of the Bible.
So let me set up a couple of things
before we go too deep into it.
Number one, this is an overview.
I mean, these chapters pack a lot.
And so there is a lot of imagery.
There's a lot of metaphors.
There's a lot of foreshadowing
that we're just not gonna cover
when we're doing an overview like this.
But the goal is twofold.
Number one, we do wanna see some of that
because Jesus is on every page, in my opinion,
or in a lot of the pages.
But the other thing also is that we,
that we actually bring people up to speed
'cause as I was talking to Brother Matt earlier,
which, by the way, it's been a good day,
even with the lower numbers, we had a baptism today.
We had one soul won, we had good soul winning,
we had good fellowship.
But just, I just wanted to say that
'cause I thought that in my head.
But to bring it back, also, I realized that sometimes
we take the fact that people come to church for granted
and that they actually know some of the stuff.
So I think it actually will be edifying
because I think a lot of people don't take a lot of time,
including myself in my younger years,
and even now sometimes I gotta slow down,
so just go through a lot of this
and just try to understand it
from the viewpoint of the New Testament,
and also even for the sake of the viewpoint of that time.
Remember, all of this was done,
Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy.
The Lord had a very specific sanctification process,
not only for the people of Israel from the world,
but also from within the group, right?
Because you gotta remember,
we've gotta always be separating or sanctifying ourselves
even from other brethren in Christ
that aren't necessarily living godly for God, right?
I'm not talking about, I was listening,
and I'm almost done with a sermon by Pastor Shelley
where he's like super mega ultra separated.
He's saying, we don't wanna just take it too far,
but there is a balance of the fact
that even within the congregation,
you're gonna have people
that you don't necessarily agree with,
and that's fine,
but there's people that might be preaching something weird
or a false doctrine,
or they just got caught off a heresy
or maybe some grievous sin.
That sanctification process is important as well
in the church,
but also it keeps us also always sanctified in the world.
And remember, a lot of this was done
'cause the world is a pagan,
they're surrounded by paganism, right?
False idols, false gods,
and this is what the world sees,
that they realize there's a group of people
that just do things differently, right?
They're not sacrificing their children to Moloch,
they're not making them pass through the fire,
not yet at least, you know, they're literally separate,
they're even in the wilderness,
they're just, they're doing things differently, right?
And these stories are being passed through generations,
they know of the parting of the Red Sea
and what happened in Egypt and how God is with them.
And so we see a lot of this,
but this is, now you get to the book of Leviticus.
Leviticus really takes a lot of time
to explain a lot of the offerings,
a lot of the priestly duties,
especially for Aaron and his sons,
and then a lot of the Levitical laws, right?
Whether they're breaking the law by sin
or they're breaking the law by sin and criminality,
which we spoke about even earlier today.
So today we're gonna go through the first seven chapters
'cause those really talk about the offering.
We're gonna cover them as an overview,
but we are gonna see some really important things.
So we're there in Leviticus 1
and we're there in verse number nine.
But before we do that, let me just point out,
actually, let's go to Leviticus 1 in verse number one.
And I like the way that this starts.
It says, "And the Lord called unto Moses
and spake unto him out of the tabernacle
of the congregation, saying, 'Speak unto the children.'"
Sorry, guys, let me just do this 'cause I don't wanna forget.
And now I've already gone like five, 10 minutes into it.
And then it says there in verse two,
"Speak unto the children of Israel and say unto them,
'If any man of you bring an offering unto the Lord,
you shall bring your offering of the cattle,
even of the herds and of the flocks.'"
And so we see that where is this coming from?
It's from the Lord through Moses,
which is just a picture of what the church today, right?
What am I doing right now?
I'm bringing a word to you from the word of God, from God.
Obviously, I'm not going up a Mount.
I'm not in Mount Sinai.
I'm not spending time doing that.
But God speaks to us through the New Testament,
through the entire Bible, old and new.
And we have a better Testament,
and we see things that they didn't even see.
Now, we're there in Leviticus 1 and verse number 9.
And the first point I have for you today
is the burnt offering, right?
And it's really kind of a picture of what?
The complete consecration.
Leviticus 1 and verse 9 says,
"But his inwards and his legs shall he wash in water.
And the priest shall burn all on the altar
to be a burnt sacrifice,
an offering made by fire of a sweet savor unto the Lord."
And every time I see this, I think of two things.
Obviously, who's the lamb?
Who is the burnt sacrifice?
What is this picturing?
Jesus Christ, right?
He died, he was buried, he rose again,
he suffered for us for all the sins of the world.
But also the Bible says that there's a renewing
in Galatians 3, 5, it says,
"Not by works of righteousness, which we have done,
but according to his mercy,
he saved us by the washing of regeneration
and renewing of the Holy Ghost."
So the first things I just want to point out
when you're looking at this, you see that it's burning,
but I like that it says,
"But his inwards and his legs shall he wash with," what?
In water.
And isn't that what we see in the New Testament?
I mean, literally, we just baptized someone today
and it's the washing, right?
It's not necessarily, it's an outward expression
of an inward change.
That's really what we're signifying with the death,
burial, resurrection, with the baptism, right?
That's the symbolism is that we're burying the old man
and out comes the new man.
And where does the new man start?
In the heart, right?
In the soul, in the spirit.
As a matter of fact, oftentimes after salvation,
we still don't recognize the new man
because the old man is still ruling, right?
He's still the one running around.
So if you want to go to Philippians 3,
but in Romans 12, Romans 12, we see there in verse 1,
it says, "I beseech you therefore, brethren,
by the mercies of God that you present your bodies,
a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God,
which is your reasonable service."
So why do we present our bodies?
Because Christ already presented his body, right?
He's the one that did the ultimate sacrifice.
But now he wants us to partake in his sufferings
in their approaches.
If that's what, we don't have to do that,
but that's what is our what, reasonable service.
You know, I keep telling my kids
that they need to get some common sense, right?
Reasonable service would be the equivalent
of just getting common sense.
This is not like some rocket science, you know,
heart surgery, brain surgery type of execution.
This is just, hey, what you're reading in the words
that are evident and easy to understand, do those things.
The rest of it, work at it, study to show thyself approved,
you know, get better at it, right?
And so the burnt offering, it's symbolizing
like the total surrender, where you hold nothing back.
Everything is consumed in the fire.
And what does it represent?
It's us, well, besides representing Jesus,
'cause of the symbolism, like I said,
we're not gonna spend a lot of time, it's there.
We will touch on it, but for us,
I wanna give you an application is
that we are to wholly give our life to God, right?
I mean, you think about it,
they were wholly dedicated to this.
This is done on a daily, regular basis, right?
The priesthood, the Levitical priesthood
had a lot of daily duties.
Think about it, we come to church three times a week,
they were there all the time.
You know, there's constantly people coming
and they're like, here's the offering for this
and here's the offering for that
and the priests have to get ready.
I mean, it's a lot of work.
And then verse two of Romans 12 says,
"And be not conformed to this world,"
which is what's going on in the Old Testament, right?
"But be transformed by the renewing of your mind."
And I like this verse, "That ye may prove,
that ye may prove what is good and acceptable
and perfect will of God."
And right there, it's not proving like,
I need to prove like evidence,
but proving like you're doing the work
and the proof is in the work that you've done, right?
What is it that you're saying?
It says you're not conforming to this world,
you're transforming the renewing of your mind
that you may prove.
In other words, your faith,
just what we're talking about today, right?
If we do these things,
you know what we're gonna prove?
That God is good and acceptable
and perfect in the will of God.
Like things are good and perfect
and acceptable in the will of God.
Which makes perfect sense, right?
I mean, when we're in the spirit today,
we're out soul winning.
You know what we're proving?
The perfect, good, acceptable will of God.
'Cause we're not talking about all kinds of dumb stuff.
But you know what we did do?
Where, you know, I'm not picking on ourselves.
I don't even know if necessarily it's sin,
but we weren't in the spirit.
We get in the car and my brain remembered a stupid movie
from the 1990s called Dumb and Dumber.
I don't remember even what triggered it.
And you know, we were reminiscing about how funny
that movie was when we were teenagers.
Well, that's not in the spirit.
I mean, let's just be honest.
That's not a worldly movie.
I mean, that's not a Christian movie.
It has no Christian foundation.
It just does that.
And I know I look like I'm smiling,
but really, I mean, that's just the way the flesh works.
If you're not constantly engaged in the spirit,
you know what it does?
It immediately brings to mind
things that are not reasonable service,
that are not easily proved, right?
I mean, I'm gonna be honest.
I'm just, I'm telling myself that's not, you know,
good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
Now, am I gonna beat myself up over it?
No, I'm just gonna move on and just fix it.
It's kind of like when you get that worldly song
that you were thinking about when,
'cause you learned it at 15.
You know what I try to do?
I just try to replace it with what?
A hymn or just some other song.
And I'm not saying all songs are bad.
I'm just saying the ones that were bad that we learned
that you, you know, that come to mind.
Same thing with, with, you know,
reminiscing about something like that.
You know what ends up happening?
I forgot about it until right now
because I'm already thinking about, you know,
I'm in church.
I don't have time to keep thinking about stupid things
'cause I got to prepare a sermon
and we're preaching the word of God.
And I'm praying the Lord just fill me with his spirit.
And that it's his words and not mine.
You know, in Galatians 2 20, the Bible says,
I am crucified with Christ.
Nevertheless, I live, yet not I,
but Christ liveth in me,
and the life which I now live in the flesh,
I live by the faith of the Son of God
who loved me and gave himself for me.
I do not frustrate the grace of God,
for if righteousness come by the law,
then Christ is dead in vain.
And I love this because this is the contrast, right?
The Old Testament focuses so much on the ceremonial laws,
on the moral laws, but they got lost in the weeds.
They forgot that it was all pointed to Christ, right?
Even the snake, the serpent, it's held up.
And at the beginning, that's a good thing.
By the end, they have to destroy it
because they're worshiping the serpent instead of Christ, right?
And with us, righteousness doesn't come by the law,
it comes by Jesus Christ, right?
I had you turn there to Philippians 3 and then verse 8,
the Bible says, "Yea, doubtless."
and I count all things but loss
for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ.
Hey, what was burned up?
Everything, everything was lost, right?
For the knowledge of Christ, Jesus my Lord,
for whom I have suffered the loss of all things
and do count them but dung,
that I may win Christ and be found in him,
not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law,
but that which is through the faith of Christ,
the righteousness which is of God by faith.
And I mean, honestly, these are the quintessential contrasts.
The Levitical priesthood, the book of Leviticus,
it's a lot of works.
Now, that being said, when we get to the latter end
and you start to see some of those laws,
hey, if we were in a theocracy, those laws would apply.
But you know what doesn't apply anymore?
This, 'cause we get to the book of Hebrews,
there's no more bollocks and bulls and blood,
but this was necessary at the time.
This is specifically for this group of people
because they're going through, and you know what?
Even with all of this, guess what happened?
They still got influenced.
They still got off the beaten path.
I mean, when Caleb and Joshua go out with the other 10,
they come back and there's 10 that are,
they're shaking in their boots.
They're scared.
The second point I have for you for today
is go to Leviticus 2.
Like I said, we're just gonna cover the,
basically my points are like a quick
scene thematic point of each chapter
is the grain or the meat offering.
And a couple of things to stand out
'cause I know I was reading some,
somebody posted an article, I didn't get to read it
'cause I don't know if you know how Facebook works,
but if it pops up on your feed,
and if you don't click on it and you close the app
and you open it, it's like a whole other feed.
Like you can't just go back as easily.
So, but the article said that 56% of Americans
like read at a low grade level,
like sixth to seventh or eighth grade.
In other words, literacy is on a decline.
And you say, what do you say this for?
Because right here in Leviticus 2.1 it says then
when any will offer a meat offering unto the Lord,
his offering shall be a fine flour
and he shall pour it upon oil.
I mean, pour oil upon it and put frankincense on it.
By the way, just on a side note,
you know, I don't know if necessarily,
maybe the sin is all the sugar and stuff,
but all the fried food that we get at the fair is,
you know where we get fried food from?
The Bible, you know, that's how you fry food.
You put flour and oil and some good spices
and then you burn it up.
But right there, that word meat
just means nourishment or food.
It's not speaking specifically of meat.
And I know some of you may know this,
but there are a lot of people who wouldn't know this.
And so it's just good to cover it, right?
But the meat offering, you know,
this is the consecrated service, right?
In Genesis 1, 29, the Bible says, "And God said,
'Behold, I have given you of every herb bearing seed,
which is upon the face of all the earth and of every tree,
in the which is the fruit of the tree yielding seed,
to you it shall be for meat.'"
So just letting the Bible define itself, right?
But what's the point of Leviticus 2?
Well, the meat offering, if you notice,
or the grain offering, just so we stay on track,
there's no blood, right?
It represents the renewing daily,
the labor of our hands.
And, you know, well, for Christ,
it's the perfect sinless life.
For us, it's to just kind of continue to purify ourselves.
What is the oil?
Oil always signifies what?
The Holy Spirit, right?
So we're living in the Spirit,
we're anointed with the oil of Christ.
And in Colossians 3, verse 23,
you can turn to 1 Corinthians 10,
but in Colossians 3, it says,
"And whatsoever ye do,
do it heartily as to the Lord, and not unto men,
knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward
of the inheritance for ye serve the Lord Christ."
You know, we do things for the Lord.
We were talking earlier about just even the fact that,
you know, our desire,
I guess I didn't realize Brother Matt and I,
we just, you know, sometimes when you're so,
we were actually striking out.
If it wasn't for the last door,
like we knocked, I don't know, some like 50 doors,
and we only like talked to like one person,
but that person got saved, praise the Lord.
But sometimes when you do that,
you get a lot of conversations in there, right?
And one of the things that we were discussing was just like,
why don't people just read their Bibles for what it is?
Right, too many times people are reading other things,
and they're not even confirming them in the Bible,
or they're not doing that.
And so then when you do things,
are you really doing it for the Lord?
Well, you don't know what you're doing for the Lord,
unless you're in the Word of God.
It says, "Whatever you do, do it heartily as to the Lord,
and not unto men."
You know, the reason I had someone
kind of challenge me on some stuff,
and the articles that I found with that doctrine,
were talking about the church fathers,
and the church fathers, and the church fathers.
Look, I don't care about men.
I care about the Lord Jesus Christ,
knowing that the Lord, you shall receive
the reward of inheritance
for what we serve the Lord Jesus Christ.
Well, even right now, I mean,
we have a smaller group, the time has changed,
the weather's changing, so you're probably tired.
Let's just be honest, you may be a little groggy,
you're just not feeling great, but you know what?
You're here, you know why you're doing it?
You're doing it hardly for the Lord.
The Lord knows that, he knows when,
he knows we're weak at times and he knows we're not,
and I'm not picking on him, I'm just saying,
it's the same thing with me,
like I had to drink a cup of coffee
just to get myself going again
for the evening service, right?
1 Corinthians 10, verse 31, the Bible says,
"Whether therefore ye eat or drink or whatsoever ye do,
"do all to the glory of God,
"give none offense neither to the Jews,
"nor to the Gentiles, nor to the Church of God,
"even as I please all men in all things,
"not seeking mine own profit,
"but the profit of many that they may be saved."
Stop seeking your own profit, right?
Why do we do the sacrifices that we do on Sunday?
You know, Sunday's a super long day for me,
and we're still not big enough
where even if we were bigger,
it would still be a longer day.
But it's my desire that one day
we would have enough men to fill in the gaps
where I could come in just a few minutes
before the preaching so that I could spend the morning
just reviewing the sermon and reading.
And then after the service, go home or go get a meal,
go soul winning, and then kind of come back to the office
and just maybe shut myself in there,
read a little bit more, and preach.
You're saying all you want, no, it doesn't have to happen.
If it never happens, it's fine.
But, I mean, let's just be honest,
the more time I spend preparing for a sermon,
the better the sermon's gonna be.
I mean, that's just the truth, right?
And so I hope they're not horrible sermons,
but also we just need to be mindful
that things are for Christ.
And so, well, why do we do it?
'Cause we're not seeking our own profit, right?
The goal is, regardless of whatever the situation is,
I'm here early on Sunday, I leave late,
I'm probably one of the, I used to be,
I'm probably the first one in,
except that Pastor Cobbler's like two minutes from here,
so he always beats me.
But one day, everyone wants to know why I beat him
to church, but not all the time.
Then Galatians 5, the Bible says,
"And they that are Christ have crucified the flesh
"with the affections and lusts.
"If we live in the Spirit,
"let us also, what, walk in the Spirit."
And of course, this is a lot easier said than done.
I mean, even today at lunch, after the baptism,
I said, "Aden, the hardest thing is staying in the Spirit."
'Cause Aden's 20 and he's young and he's excited
and he's saying the things that young people say.
He said, "Oh, now that I'm saved,
"I'm gonna just fix these things and it's gonna happen."
And I didn't wanna poop on his parade
and I believe that he'll do it,
but I'm just like, "Aden, life happens
"and inconsistencies happen."
But you gotta remember that you can always come back
'cause it's not of works, right?
We just keep driving those points.
And a lot of times, we're not just driving the point across
because we wanna clear a gospel message.
It's also a good reminder that a clear gospel message
reminds us that we're just not perfect, you know?
Think about all the things that God had to have them do
because of all the sin and distraction and criminality
and lust of the flesh in their lives.
I mean, we're three chapters in,
and it's just like offering of this and offering of that.
Let's go to Leviticus 3.
And then in verse 1, it says, "And if his oblation be
a sacrifice of peace offering."
So here's a peace offering sacrifice.
It says, "If he offer it of the herd,
whether it be male or female,
he should offer it without blemish before the Lord."
And this is, I mean, here's the foreshadowing, right?
Jesus Christ was blameless.
He was without blemish.
So that's why they did that.
That was the foreshadowing.
But also these are the sacrifices, right?
The peace offering is an offering of communion and fellowship.
And it's shared with the priests and the worshiper.
And it's for reconciliation.
These are the things that people are bringing
because people are looking for what?
Peace.
They're looking for atonement of sins.
They're looking for consecration.
And back then, that's what you did.
You know what we do now?
We pray to the Lord.
We go to our closets.
We get on our knees and we ask the Lord to forgive us our sins.
And he's faithful and just to forgive us our sins, right?
And in Ephesians 2 verse 14, the Bible says,
"For he is our peace who hath made both one
and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us."
And it's interesting because in the Old Testament,
what they have to do with the bullocks, right?
He had to sprinkle it seven times.
And then, but it was on the what?
On the veil, on the partition.
Now, that's broken.
It says, "Having abolished in the flesh the enmity,
even the law of commandments contained in ordinances,
for to making himself of twain one new man,"
so making peace,
"and that he might reconcile both unto God
in one body by the cross,
having slain the enmity thereby."
What's the enmity?
When we're in the flesh, we're at enmity with God.
"Emnity" just means in opposition or enemy of God.
In Romans five, verse one, the Bible says,
"Therefore, being justified by faith,
we have peace through God, our Lord Jesus Christ,
by whom also we have access by faith into His grace,
wherein we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God."
And I love that verse, this is by whom we also have access.
How do we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand?
It's by faith that we have access to the Lord Jesus Christ,
and we stand on that grace.
And in Philippians 4, 7 the Bible says,
"Be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer
and supplication with thanksgiving,
let your requests be made known unto God.
And the peace of God which passeth all understanding
shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus."
Hey, we need that peace, right?
I mean, even today there was a little bit of,
you know, just tumult in the church.
And I told Brother Matt, I was like, you know,
nothing major, but it's just, you know why?
There's a little bit of unsettling
because people are getting baptized,
because we're consistently soul winning.
Are we the greatest soul winning church in America?
No.
Are we the greatest baptizing church in America?
No, but you know what?
We're consistent.
And when we're consistent, the devil is going to find out,
you know, our light shines and darkness hates it.
And so we need to constantly just be reminded
of these things.
And the Old Testament, I think the Old Testament is great.
You know, I know people want to,
there's two types of people you run into,
those that like, they make the Old Testament
the greater Testament, and that's not the fact.
But I think the Old Testament is great
'cause the Bible tells us in the New Testament,
and I don't have the verse with me right now,
but it says that it was made for our admonition.
It's there to remind us of the things
that we're capable of, both good and evil, right?
Let's go to Leviticus four.
We have the sin offering here on Leviticus four, right?
For atonement and cleansing.
And in Leviticus four, verse 27, it says,
"And if any one of the common people sin through ignorance,
while he doeth somewhat against any of the commandments
of the Lord concerning things which ought not to be done,
and be guilty, or be sinned,
which he hath sinned come to his knowledge,
then shall he bring his offering, a kid of goats,
and a female without blemish,
for his sin, which he hath sinned."
And by the way, this is one of my favorite chapters
in the Bible, 'cause people will be like,
well, you know, I don't sin that bad, or I haven't sinned.
And I'm like, bro, whenever people tell me stuff like that,
I'm just like, did you just not read the book of Leviticus?
There's literally an entire chapter
dedicated to the fact that you're not even aware
of certain sins.
Like you live in ignorance.
Ignorance is not stupidity.
Stupidity is when you know better and you still do it.
Right?
Hey, don't stick your hand in the electrical socket
because you're gonna get electrocuted.
You're like, nah, I'm not gonna get electrocuted.
You know, there's adults that still think that that's funny
and all or something like that, right?
Ignorance is when you just don't know.
And here it says, hey, sometimes you need to bring
an offering when somebody else calls you out
or it comes to your mind that you realize,
oh man, I'm actually in sin.
And I know that this is like true.
Like there's times where I'll do something,
I'll have a conversation with someone in church
or whatever and then I get home and I'm like,
I'll replay the conversation.
I'm like, man, maybe I shouldn't have said the things
that I said or maybe I didn't go about it the right way.
And then I'll just be like, hey, I'll call that person
and be like, hey, I know it was probably not a big deal,
but I think I said this way, you know, I'm sorry,
I didn't mean to offend you or whatever.
Nine times out of 10, the person on the other phone's like,
you know what, I didn't even think about it that way,
but I appreciate you calling and apologizing.
'Cause it's an ignorance, like we're just excited
or we say something.
I probably, I don't know, I wouldn't say it's a sin,
but I definitely make mistakes.
I constantly get things wrong here in ignorance,
not knowing that I'm doing it until I listen to it later.
And I'm like, "What was I even trying to say there?
What was going on?"
So we gotta be careful.
The Bible says the thought of foolishness is sin.
Like don't be so high and mighty and haughty
that you think that you're not messing up.
As a matter of fact, you should probably just live life
knowing that you're just in some form of ignorance
at some point at any time.
And that way you remind yourself
that you need to just clean stuff up.
Because you walk around thinking
that your dung doesn't smell.
So, for lack of better words.
And what ends up happening is everybody around you is like,
do you not smell that?
You just not, you know, you ever,
I've walked into homes where like hoarder homes,
where it's just like, people have pets
and there's dog urine and dog feces and cat urine,
and like it hits you, right?
All that ammonia is like you get sick.
And you wonder, how do people live like that?
You know why?
Because they just decide to continually be ignorant.
Because there's no way you get like that by accident.
It's not like the dog pees and you don't smell it.
What you do is you just like ignore it, right?
And then the dog pees again and you ignore it.
And eventually your nose is like, I've had it.
So what we're gonna do is we're gonna rearrange
the brain chemistry so that you now get accustomed
to living in this filth by not smelling anymore.
And so you get there, you're like, do you not smell that?
And they're like, what?
What is there to smell?
You don't smell all this dog pee
and cat pee all over your carpet?
No, what's wrong?
Because they're just not aware
that they're living in sin, right?
Go to Hebrews 9, go to Hebrews 9.
And so what's the sin offering?
Well, it reveals that sin is going to be judged.
You know, there's a saying, the IRS has, right?
It doesn't matter if you didn't know,
ignorance is not an excuse.
As a matter of fact, most regulatory agencies
don't care if you didn't know.
If you commit, like,
it's not like you're going to get slapped in the head.
If you commit a crime in ignorance,
you're still going to get punished.
And so we need to be aware
or someone needs to call us out, right?
And the blood sprinkling is just on the veil foreshadows
that Christ entering in, right?
From heaven, He's our redemption.
And Hebrews 9, the Bible says in verse 20,
saying, "This is the blood of the testament
which God hath enjoined unto you.
Moreover, He sprinkled with blood
both the tabernacle and all the vessels of the ministry,
and almost all things are by the law perched with blood."
And without shedding of blood is no remission of sins.
It was therefore necessary, and I like this,
that the patterns of the things in the heavens
should be purified with these,
but the heavenly things themselves
with better sacrifices than this.
See, everything that we see in the Old Testament
is patterned after those things in heaven,
but what's the better pattern?
The one in heaven.
That's why Jesus Christ had to only die once.
In 1 John 1-7, the Bible says,
"But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light,
we have fellowship with one another,
and the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son,
cleanseth us from all sin."
Hebrews 10-12 says, "Then said I,
Lo, I come in the volume of the book,
it is written of me, to do thy will, O God,
above, when he said, sacrifice, and offering,
and burnt offerings, and offering for sin,
thou wouldest not, neither hast pleasure therein,
which are offered by the law.
Then said he, lo, I come to do thy will, O God.
He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second,
by the which we are sanctified, through the offering
of the body of Jesus Christ, once and for all.
And every priest standeth daily ministering and offering,
often times, the same sacrifices,
which can never take away the sins.
But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice
for the sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God.
Man, there's a lot, I mean, I wish we could just,
we could just spend an hour just on that.
You know, I mean, we see so many things there.
But what I like is, that's still true today.
And every priest standeth daily ministering
and offering, often times, the same.
You know how we do it today?
When we're asking people to pray for one another.
You know, one of the things that we should pray for is also,
hey, I pray for so and so, I just, you know,
Pastor Cobb always closes with, forgive us our sins.
Not my sins, but our sins, right?
Because it's a daily thing.
It says, and oftentimes the same sacrifices.
Hey, you know what?
This reminds me of in modern day New Testament church.
And oftentimes I'm preaching the same thing and the same thing.
And I say the same thing.
And I give it to you in 20 different verses that say the same thing.
And then people are still like, well, I just don't know.
You know, it's like, especially when it comes to salvation, it's like,
well, what about James 2?
What about James 2?
I mean, there's John 12, and John 6, and John 1, and Ephesians 2,
and the whole book of Romans.
And, you know, even in the Old Testament, Abraham called upon it.
Then men started to call upon the name of the Lord.
And you show a verse after verse after verse after verse after verse.
You're like, see, I proved it to you.
And they're like, well, what about James 2?
They're like, oh, my goodness, man.
Like, you know, that's probably how the priest felt, right?
They're really tired.
They're like, John, you're coming back again for the same sacrifice?
All right, let's go through this thing.
You know, obviously, because they're in the flesh.
And I mean, I'm giving you now like an acting,
in my opinion, of just the way I see things.
Obviously, just if you don't agree with it,
then just go with what the verse says.
I'm not asking you to go along with that.
But we need to have the ability to recognize not only sin,
but the fact that we sin ignorantly,
and it's still willful, and it's still judged,
and it's not an excuse.
The Bible says that we're going to be without an excuse in Romans 2.
We're inexcusable, right?
Nobody walks around thinking that, well,
nobody should walk around thinking that they don't do anything wrong.
But the majority of the world actually lives like that.
You know, you knock on people's doors and they think,
well, as long as I'm not murdering and raping and pillaging, I'm good, right?
Oh, I don't treat anybody bad.
I never harm anybody.
You know they're lying to you because, I mean, I'm pretty sure you could just be like,
so you're telling me you didn't call a family member that you got mad with
or there's not someone in your life you're just, you know, bitter against?
Most people hate somebody in their family.
Most people have like some sworn enemy.
Most people have a grudge to, you know, to that they're holding against someone.
I mean there's families that don't speak for years.
I literally just, I think we were talking to someone who they haven't spoken to one
of their family members for over 30 years and it wasn't that person's fault, it was the other.
These things happen.
This is real, right?
Like I was, I think after I got ordained I don't think that I've really
spoken to my dad's side of the family.
I don't remember the last time I spoke to anybody.
People are starting to die on that side of the family.
There's not a single funeral I'm going to go to.
There's not a single person I'm going to go shake hands with.
Life goes on.
These things happen.
Let's go down to the fourth point.
And it's the trespass offering or the guilt offering, right?
The restitution.
And these are found both in Leviticus 5 through 6.
We're covering a couple here, but in Leviticus 6, the Bible says,
then verse 4 says, "Then it shall be because he hath sinned and is guilty,
that he shall restore that which he took violently away,
or the thing which he hath deceitfully gotten,
or that which was delivered him to keep,
or the lost thing which he found,
or all that about which he hath sworn falsely.
He shall even restore it in the principle,
and shall add the fifth part more thereto,
I mean more thereto, and give it unto him
to whom it appertaineth in the day of his trespass."
You know, I wish we could spend time here
and that's probably a whole other sermon,
but robbery and taking people's possessions
and just taking things is on a rampant uptick in the United States.
People think that this, we were just talking about that on Friday,
how some lady, you know, with this whole, you know, food stamp thing,
was just mad that she found an item.
Somebody was talking about a video where she found an item that she likes,
but it was too much money in her opinion, so she just took it.
And then she had the gall to make a video saying,
"I didn't agree with the price, so I just took it."
You know why people are stealing comfortably today?
Because they're not reading their Bibles.
You know, the Levitical law should remind us,
"Hey, what's not yours, don't take it."
I mean, my mama taught me that from a little kid.
I remember whoever stole something from Walmart or H-E-B or some superstore
by accident as a kid.
And what I mean by that is, you know, you'd go to the toy aisle,
and you grab the toy, and then you're playing with the toy,
and your mom's busy doing whatever,
and you get to the aisle, and back then,
there wasn't like all the barcodes.
And I remember one time I had a toy in my hand,
and I'm playing with the toy, and I'm playing with the toy,
and my mom pays for all the groceries.
She probably pulled out the credit card reader.
Do you remember that?
Never mind, I'm getting too old now.
Do you remember that, Marcel?
Back then, the way they charge credit cards is you take the credit card,
and you know how there's all the numbers,
and they would put it on the ink,
and they'd have to get this big machine,
go junk, junk, so they could make a copy of your credit card,
and then that lady would have to call the credit card company to make sure it was real.
Do you remember that, bastard?
And then they're like, and then they would call and verify,
and then you could take your groceries.
Anyways, I just dated myself really bad.
But we walked out of the store, and I remember succinctly holding the toy,
and my mom was like, "We didn't pay for that."
And you know what we did, which took me back, and we made sure that,
I mean, I returned it.
We've gone through the drive-through where they've given us too much change,
my wife and I, or they've given us something we didn't order,
and we'll just go back and give it to them.
And they're like, "Nobody ever comes and does this."
Why do we do it?
Because we're so good at tissues?
No, the temptation to keep it and the convenience to keep something like that,
especially for a couple of dollars for a multi-billion dollar corporation is there.
But it's because we read verses like this, right?
Because we have the Bible and we're willing to do truth.
We're doers of truth, not just hearers of truth.
This is not a bragging sermon.
If you do it or not, that's between you and God.
I'm just saying I just don't want to think about it.
I just want to clear my mind, clear my conscience and move on, right?
And the trespass offering, it's a way to reconcile when you do damage to others.
And we should be willing to humble ourselves enough
and swallow our pride to just apologize or give restitution
or just own up to our mistakes with other people.
We don't just sin against God.
Sometimes we sin against our brothers and sisters in Christ.
And we need to be loving.
Hey, I'm sorry I wronged you in this.
I apologize.
How do I make things better?
How do I make things right?
Let's go to Colossians 2 verse 13.
The Bible says there, "And you, being dead in your sins
and the uncircumcision of your flesh,
he hath quickened together with him, having forgiven all your trespasses,
blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us,
which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way,
nailing it to the cross." Look, if God forgave us,
then we can either forgive or ask for forgiveness.
And we should do it without expecting anything in return when we ask for
forgiveness. They're not forced to forgive us, but we
shouldn't be doing it. We should just do it because we want to please the Lord.
In Luke 19, verse 8, the Bible says in Zacchaeus,
I'm saying it wrong. I know that my tongue is tight, but Zacchaeus
stood and said unto the Lord, "Behold Lord, the half of my goods I give to the
poor, and if I have taken anything from any
man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold." Where is he getting this from?
From the biblical law. When Jesus said unto him, "This day salvation comes to
this house, for as much as he also is the son of
Abram. For the son of man has come to seek
and to save that which was lost." Now it's not because
he's given restoration, but because the heart is in the right place.
Right? Whereas remember with Nicodemus, Nicodemus is kind of a jerk. He's like,
"So do I go back in my mother's womb? Is that what I'm having to do? How do I even
do that?" I mean that's kind of a jerk response to
the Lord telling you exactly how to have eternal life.
Romans 4 verse 7 says saying, "Blessed are they whose iniquities are
forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will
not impute sin." You know there's a way to just not have that guilty conscience.
You know thank God that we have the grace of God that he forgives us
a lot of those sins. That restitution even though we might not do it
perfectly the Lord doesn't hold us accountable to that
in that respect. And by the way this is not hyper
grace but what I mean by that is there's times where probably
the right thing to do would just be death or some kind of harsh punishment.
The Lord shows his grace. You know David was shown grace. He
committed adultery and he should have been put to death and God gave him grace.
He did punish him but it wasn't the most extreme
punishment. So we need to remember that God will
punish us but sometimes even in his punishment it might be graceful.
It might not be exactly what we deserve thanks to his grace.
This is what this is picturing right that they went there for that.
Let's go to the the sixth point. This is the priests and the offerings right
for mediation and ministry. In Leviticus 7
in verse 35 the Bible says this is the portion of the anointing of Aaron
and of the anointing of his sons and out of the offerings of the Lord made by
fire in the day when he presented them to
minister unto the Lord in the priest's office
which the Lord commanded to be given them of the children of Israel
in the day that he anointed them anointed them
by statue forever throughout the generations. Which obviously points to
what? Our eternal priesthood. You know the
Levitical priesthood doesn't exist anymore. It's those saved by grace, right?
And our duty is obviously to intercede, to minister, and to keep the fire burning.
I don't even know if I told you guys the the uh but this is where I drew it from.
The title of the sermon, sorry you know this is just the kind of odd day we have,
is that the fire never goes out, right? They were supposed to keep the fire going.
Well how does that fire keep going now? Through us, those that are saved.
Jesus already did the final sacrifice, right? We keep this going by doing the priestly duties,
the ministering, the interceding, the soul winning, the you know the conversations before church
about doctrine. You know I love, you know why I mention certain people? Because those are the
people that are willing to talk to me about doctrine. You know before we got here we spent
like 30 minutes just talking about Balaam and we talked about you know the young prophet that got
you know mauled by a lion. We're just you're going through stuff. This is what this is right? Well
this is the ministry of the priesthood, the royal priesthood. And let me just say this you're saying
man pastor you're just picking like one verse and kind of just giving us this brief overview
because if we were to go through each one of these they get very repetitive because it's giving you
very minute detail of how to do these things. Like I'll give you an example like in the first few
chapters it's like hey you got to hold the head of the balac you got to kill them then you got to
sprinkle the blood then you got to wash the innards then you got to burn the whole thing
and if you do it this way do this again and so it just kind of repeats all this process that's
the details but I'm just giving you the overview of the symbolism so don't think that we're just
skipping over this for the sake of skipping there's a lot of just detail it's kind of like if we were
preaching about you know the building of the temple and all that we would give you the the
reason for that I'm not going to go through all the qubits necessarily I might give you some
examples but there's a lot of that in the Bible where it's like hey they put the thatchets together
at the knobs and you're just reading a lot of detail which is really important if we're going
through those specific things but they can all be their own sermons for the imagery or symbolism
that they represent so right here this representation we go to first Peter 2 verse 5 it says ye also as
lively stones are built up as a spiritual house and holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices
acceptable to God by Jesus Christ so the sacrifices haven't ended they're just different sacrifices
are spiritual sacrifices that's why sometimes the carnal doesn't match up right now there's a carnal
sacrifice in my flesh where you everybody here today sacrificed the entire Sunday to be here
whether you left for a little bit and came back or you were here you went soul winning
but why did we do it for the spiritual sacrifice right the reason we did for Christ others will
spend all day at church but it's to be seen of men they have this program and that program and
this thing and that thing and doesn't do anything for the Lord in Hebrews 4 verse 14 the Bible says
seeing then that we have a great high priest that is passed into the heavens Jesus the Son of God
let us hold fast our profession for we have not in high priest which cannot be touched with the
feelings of our infirmity but was in all points tempted like as we are yet without sin let us
therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to the
help in time of need hey Jesus is not so high and mighty that we can't touch him so the pastor or
the leadership in the church shouldn't be so high and mighty that nobody has access to them
I remember one time I went to go see um I hate when I do this because I know those names Tony
Evans who's ever heard of Tony Evans he runs one of the biggest black churches like in well now he
stepped down for impropriety whatever that means but I remember this is back in like 2009 I moved
to Dallas and I looked it up and it was it was nearby and I went to the church and he preached
and there was like man there was a like thousands of people there I was like way up in the nose
bleeds and I made my way all the way down to try to shake his hand and he like barely acknowledged
me I was like hey Pastor Evans you know I really wanted to meet you and you know I'm excited I was
a young man I wanted to meet this guy I wanted to ask him some questions and he's just like
and went away like he was inaccessible and it shouldn't be like that if anybody should be
accessible it should be the pastor now of course there's a balance right he also has his family
and things but that's my duty is that we need to take care of the flock and if the flock has
questions or the flock needs something I shouldn't be like well you know I I'm I'm I'm too important
for that I'm you know and let me let me tell you that's the majority of pastors in America
they're too important for the laymen they're I mean I'm not going to go into examples because
I'm running out of time and I just don't want to belabor the point but in Leviticus 6 verse 13 and
we just go back one one it says in the fire upon the altar shall be burning in it and it shall not
be put out and the priest shall burn wood on it every morning and lay the burnt offering and
order upon it but he shall burn there on the fat of the peace offering the fire shall ever be burning
upon the altar it shall never go out and it's just a representation of what Christ or God the Bible
says that God is a consuming fire he's an eternal flame I don't can explain everything about it
recently I've had conversations about God and the trinity and even pastor was like he asked one of
his mentors he told us over lunch he said that he he said hey I want you to expound the trinity to
me and he's like it's too too big what was the exact term pastor what did you say your mentor
when you asked him to about the trinity yeah what did he what was his response yeah he said his
response was like it'd blow my mind if i could grasp it right that's why we just stick to the
semantics of the bible whatever the bible tells us that's it because he he's he just on the fact
that god has no beginning we might as well just close the book there because that's that's really
tough for us to understand we want to put a beginning to god because all we know is beginning
and end we're finite and the fact that god has never had a like i just can't even where in his
eternity timeline are are we we won't we don't know and that's why we need to focus on the
spiritual things if you think about your life actually if you think about the life of the
earth let's say that if we follow the the seven days of creation right that the earth will be
about seven thousand years old i don't know i'm not predicting i'm just using common sense here
to just give you some explanation if god has not if god god is eternal we don't know what millennium
he was before he created the earth i mean see i'm even just that we don't know i mean then
now we're eternal in christ what percentage of seven thousand years is eternity like it
wouldn't even calculate and i know i've used this example before but it doesn't even compute
right you know the the the the the because i'm on the last point you know the my one of my favorite
verse is in amazing grace when we've been there when we've been there 10 000 years bright shining
as the sun and you think about it 10 000 years if you were to take your 100 years of life assuming
you live 100 years what is that like not one percent it's like 10 000 years 10 is uh 1000
so one percent is like 100 yeah so it'd be like one percent thank you for your math right there
because i'm not that good one percent of your life this life represented here is what it would
represent in 10 000 then you add another 10 you might as well just go half then you go another
10 now you're in the like the point zeros then you just go another 10 and that's it
it's not even worth calculating numerically it's over our life is but a vapor what matters is the
eternal let's go to the final point in conclusion these carnal practices were shadows of the
spiritual substance that we have today right they had to do those ceremonial laws when christ came
and died for us and did all that that's one of the first things i learned as a baptist was
that jesus basically got rid of the ceremonial laws but he didn't get rid of the moral laws
the moral laws have always existed if anything he made them tougher right if you look upon another
woman with lust you've committed adultery with her in your heart already right and so these are
shadow they're there pointing to jesus christ and the carnal laws really reveal what the necessity
to just be holy the fact that we're sinful the fact that we have to surrender that there are
things that we have to kind of discipline ourselves to do in life in order to just you know get the
rewards of life right they had to benefit because they were willing to do the levitical priesthood
and you know the consecrations they were protected by god through the wilderness
unfortunately they messed up but even then once that group died and the new one came in
the fall of joshua and caleb if you look one of the chapters that has very little drama
and just a lot of victory is what the book of joshua because joshua goes into the promised land
and he just kicks butt there's very little i mean there's there's some stories there that you could
make an argument for but for the most part you read other books of the bible it's constantly
like judgment and drama and what is that because we're just constantly falling we're a fallen man
we're and so the picture here is that the only the only solution is jesus christ they they did
thousands of years of levitical priesthood and all this stuff and you know what they failed they
dropped the ball we've had thousands of years of baptist churches in america and you know what
we have failed in the flesh not in the spirit but in the flesh let's go over to romans eight and
we'll close out there it says for what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh
sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh
that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh
but after the spirit. So I guess the conclusion of this is that Leviticus reminds us that we need to
walk in the spirit. God gave them all these laws these covenants and they just dropped the ball
and he's like well you know what I need a new testament a better testament. Now we know this
was all pre-ordained and but with us we have our free will to choose these things so the main thing
is never let your fire go out let your light so shine throughout the world. You know my prayer is
I would love a big church I would I'm not gonna lie to you if we could have a big church and have
you know all the tides in the world to just do great things for the Lord and he allows that
in the decades to come amen. But that's not my prayer my prayer is that we would have the
people necessary to continue doing the work whether it's eight or eight hundred that we would just
show up and then we would continue to fight the good fight because it's going to wax worse and
worse you know the minute Trump leaves office hold on to your butts you know I don't even know
I don't even know if what's with the reply it's just just get ready they're pushing the third
temple pretty rough so you know we'll see how that goes but let's close in a word of prayer
heavenly father lord thank you so much for today thank you for your blessings lord thank you for
the book of leviticus and thank you for a good start thank you for all the foreshadows i mean
in every page almost in every other verse you could see just a picture of christ and the sacrifice
and the foreshadowing and just how people don't see that is evident of the fact that the natural
man understandeth not the things of the spirit of god because they are foolishness unto him
neither can he know them for they are spiritually discerned lord so lord just to help us to have a
good week thank you for all those in attendance here today be with all those that missed for time
change but also i know there's a lot of people just not feeling well today my kids are included
in that so just help them to heal and get better and give us a good week in jesus name we pray
amen you'll turn your hymnals over to page 499 we'll close out with 499 when we all gotta pick
the the ones we know real well because we're acapella i didn't televise any of the acapella
except for this one or stream it sorry that's how i but here we go guys 499 uh when we all get to
heaven i mean when the role is called of yonder i'm sorry when the role is called of yonder on the
first when the trumpet of the lord shall sound and time shall be no more and the morning breaks
eternal bright and fair when the saved of birth shall gather sure and the roll be there and the
gold resurrection shared to their home beyond the skies and the roll yonder be there from the sun
tell said his son let us talk of all his wondrous love and can the roll be there off the streamer lucy thank you