March 16

Exodus 27; John 6

Daily Catechism

QUESTION 50: WHAT DOES THE PREFACE TO THE TEN COMMANDMENTS TEACH US?
Answer: The preface to the Ten Commandments teaches us that because God is the Lord, and our gracious Redeemer, his commandments are for our good and he does not will for us to depend on ourselves in keeping them, but to trust his grace and power.
Scripture: Deuteronomy 10:13, 16; 30:6.

Exodus 27

Ready:
The previous chapter was about the design of the tabernacle and it seemed to express the holiness of God and the fact that he intends to dwell in the midst of his people in this place, despite their sin and brokenness. 

Seeing what’s there:
This chapter is about the design of the bronze altar and the court of the tabernacle.  The court is the area surrounding the actual tabernacle where the bronze altar and bronze basin were placed.  Like the tabernacle itself, which is referred to here as a tent of meeting, the courtyard has a blue, purple, and scarlet colored screen or drape at the entry.  The entire setup is made for potability and yet maximizes the majesty and holiness of the space by things like regulations against touching most of the objects with hands and using poles slipped through the rings to move the items. 

Key Verses:
Exodus 27:6-7, 9-10, 16, 19, 20, 21

Theme:
God reveals the specificity of his requirements for the place of meeting in order that we can commune with him, and live. 

Thinking about the message:
    v1-8.  This is the altar where burnt offering will be made.  Like the other “furniture” pieces it is to be made ready to carry by poles. 
    v9-19.  This section describes the court of the Tabernacle and determines it’s size.  This courtyard would still be a place of restricted access where sacrifices will be made on the altar.

Bronze Altar

Court of the Tabernacle

     v20-21.  Here the Lord determines that it will be Aaron and his family after him who will serve as priests in the tent of meeting, which is within the Holy Place of the tabernacle but outside of the Most Holy place.  In this area is the table for the bread of the Presence, the golden lampstand, and the altar of incense.  The Lord stipulates that Aaron’s family will serve here in the tabernacle and maintain a burning lamp all night long, every night, forever.

Meaning, Implications, and Significance
    The Lord is here explaining the manner in which we will be able to commune with him and he holds all the authority in this.  We are completely helpless and reliant upon his mercy to provide us with some means of knowing him and meeting with him.  There will be a great deal of ritual and ceremony involved as the location of meeting is elaborate and specific and contains multiple layers of separation for the protection of the priests and the public.  The implication is that we cannot approach God in any manner we may choose but we must approach him as he stipulates and according to his holiness.  The significance to me is that I must approach the Lord in prayer in a certain way and my attitude toward him ought to reflect his holiness.  As the tabernacle of God, I am to show awe and reverence and have a fear of the Lord.  I do not have one iota of control over my God and he is a consuming fire.

Valuing the message:
I value this message because I think I too easily fall into habits or ways of speaking to him that do not adequately recognize his holiness and my dependence upon his mercy. 

Reflecting on the message:
I need to reflect upon my patterns of prayer and the ways in which I meet with God. 

Questions to ask:

1. Do I honor God with my undivided attention in prayer?
2. Do I recognize the sheer holiness of God and the fact that he is a consuming fire when I come before him?
3. Do I try to mold him into my pattern and plan or do I search his Word and place myself in subjection to his plan and his direction for me?
4. Do I see the tabernacle like a vending machine at the convenience store or like the throne of The Lord God Omnipotent?

Responding to God & Reacting to His Lesson:
Tell God about your observations and your thoughts and your struggles with the chapter and determine how it will change or impact your thinking and your decisions.  Be sure to react in some way to the truth rather than remain silent.

Proclaiming the Truth to Others:
Decide who you can share what you have learned with and ask for God’s help in reaching out to love others.

John 6

Ready:
In the previous chapter I saw Jesus choose a man to heal and I heard him describe his absolute divine authority in context of his complete submission to and reliance upon the Father.  Jesus made it clear that he is not bringing a new message but he is fulfilling what Moses received at Sinai.

Seeing what’s there:
This chapter begins with a transition to a new unit by John as indicated in the wording of the first verse.  It contains one public sign, one sign to the disciples, and a hard teaching to the crowds that follow primarily to be fed.  By the end of this teaching Jesus’ following may be down from greater than 5,000 to only the 12 disciples, among whom one is a trader.  This chapter is pretty hard because I think the Lord speaks against the way that many follow Jesus merely to improve their life and meet their temporal needs.  He also calls attention to the fact that salvation is again a work of God and depends not upon us to bring it about by our seeking or willing or choosing.  He teaches about life being only in him and unless we find our sustenance in him and not in what the world offers, then we do not have life.  Most of the crowd, including many disciples split at this teaching, partially because he uses language that may have been taken too literally and would therefore be quite offensive. 

Key Verses:
John 6:9, 11, 14-15, 19-21, 26, 28-29, 35, 37-38, 39-40, 44-45, 47, 53-54, 57, 63, 65, 66-67, 68-69

Theme:
The Son of God did not come to earth and die in order to feed our idolatry or to merely meet our temporal needs but to feed our souls and to give himself to us as our treasure and our only true sustenance.  He does the Father’s will by giving this gift to those whom the Father draws unto himself.

Thinking about the message:
    v1-15.  Jesus feeds the 5,000  in this passage.  Here I take it that Jesus is demonstrating that he has come to divinely meet the needs of his people and that he has unlimited resources and that he bears the authority of God himself.  Before he feeds them the narrator fills us in on the fact that Jesus knows that the crowds are following him because of the sings he has performed in healing the sick.  Recognition that he can bring wholeness and can take away illness and can restore fullness of life is good and so this comment is probably not indicating anything nefarious about the crowd… yet.  This changes after the miracle is performed and the reaction of the crowd is one of aggression and a desire to claim Jesus as their King in order to get what they really want…something other than him.  It would appear that they see Jesus as the solution to their troubles…not their sin troubles between them and God but their earthly troubles between Israel and Caesar.
    v16-21.  Here he adds to the public revelation by privately evidencing his deity to the disciples.  Using the same word translated “trampled” in the Greek Septuagint of their time, John says that Jesus “trampled” the sea here (Job 9:8) and so makes a likely reference to the deity of Jesus.  This also illustrates his sovereign control over all things.  Jesus makes the water hold his weight because he made the water and he keeps its molecules together moment to moment even now (Heb 1:3, 10; Col 1:16-17; Psalm  89:9).  Clearly Jesus was not merely entertaining the disciples but he was educating them and revealing his identity to them.  This would be important because he was about to give a hard teaching that will send many away.
    v22-59.  This is a long discourse and Jesus gives four escalating cycles of teaching on the same point.  It seems that he does this to weed out those who are not believing and who are therefore evidenced as not being drawn by the Father.  Most were not “following” him for the right reasons.
    v22-34. “The bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”  This is his message (John 6:33), but Jesus knows that they are not coming for the true bread but merely for the bread that fills their gut.  They somehow determined that there was some mystery in how Jesus came to the other side of the sea (John 6:25) and they saw him feed the 5,000 but these signs are not seen as divine revelation by the people.  They are blinded by his ability to meet their physical needs.  They are interested not in who he is but in what he can do for them according to their own perceptions.  Jesus knew this and he called them out on it in John 6:26-27.  
    v35-40.  “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me…”.  The message escalates to identifying Jesus himself as this bread because they do not get it yet and they think the bread is something Jesus can hand them.  He explains that life means not hungering and not thirsting but being satisfied in him.  This comes by believing in Jesus.  Jesus does not cast out any who will come but the only ones who will come, due to the total depravity of man, are those that the Father specifically calls out by new birth.  All of these receive Jesus precisely because the Father calls them out (John 6:37).  Jesus also makes it clear that he is not operating independently but he is specifically carrying out the very will of God.  He has been charged to hold on to those whom the Father gives him, those whom the Father calls.  These who will look to Jesus and believe are kept by Jesus to be raised up in resurrection life (John 6:39-40).    
    v41-51.  “I am the bread of life; whoever eats of it…”.  Now Jesus escalates again to speaking of actually eating the bread of life and the metaphor of eating Jesus himself starts to emerge more clearly.  He does this because they grumble and they do not believe and they contest his authority.  Jesus makes it known that they do not believe because it is only those whom the Father draws to him that believe.  Those who have heard and learned the true lesson of the law will know their spiritual need (not just physical) and recognize Jesus as the answer.  Jesus points out that their ancestors who ate the manna from heaven still died and yet the bread of life give unending life.  Then Jesus reminds them that he himself if this bread that must be eaten if one is to have eternal life.  The teaching becomes harder because it is very spiritual and even if they ascend to try to imagine the metaphor and its meaning there is a block and a hindrance in that he tramples upon their heritage (so it seems to them).  
    v52-59.  “I am the bread of life; whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood…”.  Now Jesus goes to the extreme of describing very graphically what must take place for anyone to have eternal life.  He speaks plainly of eating his flesh and drinking his blood and this pushes most of the crowd out the door (figuratively speaking).  He does this because they insist on looking merely to the physical and do not recognize the spiritual level on which he is speaking.  Not recognizing his identity, they assume he only has human means and therefore cannot understand how he would offer up his flesh for the feasting.  Jesus simultaneously drives away the hard hearted unbeliever and wavering seeker while giving gold to the children of God.  He gives the wonderful revelation that we abide in him and he in us when we feast upon him and make him the source of our sustenance.  God call me to feast upon the Son and I do so by intake of the Word of God and by confessing my sin and relying upon his cleansing blood.
    v60-71.  This teaching was quite difficult for the crowd to receive probably for a couple reasons as I have mentioned, but perhaps the one today that is difficult for many is the monergistic regeneration whereby God decides to give me new birth prior to me ever having faith in Jesus and unless he does this for me I am left to my own devices and therefore choose sin until the day I die.  Verse 63 tells me that my flesh is no help and that it is the Spirit who gives life.  Jesus explains here that he knew who it is that were true believers and that this was the reason he said that no one can come to him unless the Father draws them.  The only way I see to bring together the various claims in this chapter is to say that God only draws some.  It would not make sense to say he draws all and then some resist because of John 6:37, 39.  My faith truly is a work of God that I do not help him with, but it is a gift by his sovereign grace and is created from nothing (John 6:29; Eph 2:8-9; Rom 4:16-17).  The Lord also keeps me through the faith that he has given me (1 Pet 1:4-5).  Jesus asks the 12 if they too are going to leave as the whole crowd vanishes, but Peter speaks for the group and confesses that Jesus has the very words of life and that they trust him to be the Holy One of God and that there is nowhere else that they can imagine going.  The unit closes with Jesus reminding Peter that it was Jesus who chose them and that he even chose one who will serve the purpose of God by betraying him…a unique purpose for the son of destruction.

Meaning, Implications, and Significance
    Following Jesus to get something other than Jesus is not true faith and is not a renouncing of all and being a disciple (Luke 14:26-27, 33).  Jesus teaches here that we are to live on him and not simply use him.  Our satisfaction and life is to be found in him (Psalm 73:25-26).  This kind of faith and reliance on Jesus only comes to those whom the Father calls and this is the new birth that opens our eyes to what was foolishness (1 Cor 1:23, 2:14; Eph 1:17-18).

Soli Deo Gloria!