January 13, 2008
Scripture:
Scripture:
Ministry:
I’d like to look at a few references in Leviticus, in the offerings. I want to look at the fourth verse of chapters 1 & 4. In chapter 1, we have the burnt offering: “And he shall put his hand upon the head of the burnt offering; and it shall be accepted for him to make atonement for him.” In chapter 4, we have the sin offering: “And he shall bring the bullock unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation before the Lord; and shall lay his hand upon the bullock’s head, and kill the bullock before the Lord.” What a difference between these offerings and what we have had this morning: to put one’s hand on the head instead of a crown of thorns. When we see that in the gospels, we see the dreadful exposure of the heart of man. But to put the hand on the head of an animal, in the burnt offering, is to transfer all the perfection of the sacrifice to the offerer. In the sin offering, the sin of the offerer goes to the sacrifice. The Lord was both of those for us; we receive his perfection, and He received our sin. How precious to lay our hands on His head!
EG Hymn 305 – The Saviour is loving, the Saviour is kind,
Prayer
Last time we talked about Creation; we looked at Genesis 1:1. What did God make? He made the earth and heaven—the visible creation—and angels and spirits—the invisible creation. Everything was beautiful and perfect; but did it stay that way? No, but how do we know?
Read Genesis 1:2 and Isaiah 45:18. In Darby, Isaiah 45:18 says “not as waste did he create it.” If you read Gen. 1:2 in Mr. Kelly’s translation, it says, “And the earth was (or became) waste and empty.” The earth didn’t start as waste, it became that way. We don’t know what happened, how it happened, what the earth was like at that time, or how long it took.
But what was going on in the invisible world at this time? Read job 38:6–7. The sons of God are angels; when the earth was made, the angels were there and rejoiced over it. But the earth was darkened; read Ezekiel 28:14–16. Here we see an anointed cherub, the highest angel in the hierarchy; he was a perfect, bright, amazing angel. But something happened to him. Read Isaiah 14:12–15. This Lucifer, son of the morning, is probably the same angel we read about in Ezekiel. But something happened to him. He said he wanted to be like God; he wanted the highest place. He became the enemy of God, and today we know Him as Satan.
In the next 30 verses of Genesis, we’ll see how God dealt with the problem in the visible creation. It takes the rest of the Bible to deal with the conflict in the invisible creation. But that conflict did not take God by surprise; He knew it was coming.
Now think of this. In the six days of creation, God remade the world and filled it with animals, and then made man. All the animals He made could be called the lower creation, because they do not communicate with God; they have a body, but no spirit. The invisible creation has a spirit, but no body. Where does man fit in? We are a very special creation; and it is by this special creation that God was able to deal with the invisible conflict; He sent His Son as a man to die for sin. Man is the top of the lower creation and the bottom of the higher creation, the link between the two. When the Lord was here, He was tempted by Satan twice, in the wilderness and in Gethsemane. Even at His resurrection, it seems that evil forces were trying to keep Him from rising from the dead. But they were unable to hold Him back. This is just a little resume of where we will be going, D.V.
I Peter 4:1–19
Our first verse seems to connect with v. 18 of the previous chapter, a verse full of the aspects of salvation. When you read Peter, you can’t help but be impressed with how much suffering is a part of the Christian pathway. If believers walk as they should, they will suffer, but not as evil doers. We have in Romans that if we suffer together, we will be glorified together. Suffering helps us to go on in dependence, counting on Him for faith. It is a test of faith, and should bring joy. The sorrow is on the part of our old nature, when we put on the new man and live in it. Our old nature wants its own way, as did Satan: “I will.” But the new nature has the spirit of the Lord: “not my will, but thine, be done.” Our flesh wars against our spirit. This is a battle, and v. 1 tells us to arm ourselves; with what? The same mind; it reminds us of Philippians 2:5 “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.” If we suffer, we are holding our old nature in a place of death; it is denying our flesh its lusts. As the Lord in Philippians 2, we need to humble ourselves and be obedient to God.
This seems to talk about our lives in two different sections: v 3-“the time past of our life”; and v. 2-“the rest of his time.” Where is the division between these times? It is at salvation; we are in the second section, the rest of our life. We should no longer live for the flesh, but do the will of God (v. 2). How do we know what is the will of God? For those Christians, they had to stay away from idolatry and other sins of the Gentiles around them (v. 3); God’s will for them was apparent. But what about for us in our daily lives? The better we know the Lord, the closer we are to Him, the more we will see His will.
EG Hymn 342 – Jesus came from Heaven,
Prayer