Episode Transcript
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This morning we continue looking and hearing
God's Word Proclaim from Jonah Chapter two.
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I'm going to be focusing on one
verse there and then we'll move on to
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Jonah three. Next time, one
verse in Jonah Two and then we'll be
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in several other portions of scripture.
One I'd like to read to you now
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from Hebrews A, Hebrews chapter nine. So I'm going to start in Hebrews
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nine and then I'll refer back in
a moment to Jonah too. I won't
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read all of it, but you
can turn there in a moment. But
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let's just look at Hebrews, Hebrews
nine. I'll get my page is marked.
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There we go. Let's hear God's
word. Now, if the First
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Covenant had regulations for worship and an
earthly place of holiness for a tent for
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or sorry, I read that wrong. Let me start again now. Even
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the First Covenant had regulations for worship
and an earthly place of holiness for a
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tent was prepared the First Section in
which the lampstand and the table and the
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bread of presence. It is called
the holy place. Behind the second curtain
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was the second section, called the
most holy place, having the Golden Altar
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of incense and the Ark of the
Covenant, covered on all sides with gold,
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in which the golden urn holding the
manna and Aaron staff that budded in
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the tablets of the covenant above it, where the Cherubim of the glory overshadowing
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the mercy seat. Of these things
we cannot now speak in detail. These
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preparations having thus been made, the
priests go regularly into the first section performing
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their ritual duties, but into the
second only the high priest goes, and
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he but once a year, and
not without taking blood, which he offers
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for himself and for the unintentional sins
of the people. By this, the
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Holy Spirit indicates that the way into
the holy places is not yet opened as
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long as the first section is still
standing, which is symbolic for the present
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age. According to this arrangement,
gifts and sacrifices are offered that cannot perfect
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the conscience of the worshiper, but
deal only with food and drink and various
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washings. Regulations of for the body
imposed until the time of reformation, but
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when Christ appeared as a high priest. Of the good things that have come
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then through the greater and more perfect
tent, not made with hands, that
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is not of this creation. He
entered once for all into the holy places,
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not by means of the blood of
goats and calves of but by means
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of his own blood, thus securing
an eternal redemption. For if the blood
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of goats and bowls and the sprinkling
of defiled persons with the ashes of a
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heifer sanctify for the purification of the
flesh, how much more will the blood
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of Christ, who, through the
eternal spirit, offered himself without blemish to
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God, purify our conscience from dead
works to serve the Living God? Therefore,
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he is the mediator of a new
covenant so that those who are called
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May receive the promised internal inheritance,
since a death has occurred that redeems them
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from the transgressions committed under the first
covenant. Now I'm going to skip a
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few verses and in go to verse
twenty three. Thus it was necessary for
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the copies of the heavenly things to
be purified with these rights, but the
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heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than
these. For Christ has entered not into
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holy places made with hands, which
are copies of the true things, but
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into heaven itself now to appear in
the presence of God on our behalf.
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Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy
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places every year, with blood not
his own, for then he would have
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to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of
the world. But as it is,
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he has appeared once for all,
at the end of the ages, to
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put away sin by the sacrifice of
himself. And just as it is appointed
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for man to die once and after
that comes judgment, so Christ, having
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been offered once to bear the sins
of many, will appear a second time,
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not to deal with sin but to
save those who are eagerly waiting for
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him. Well and there for now, you may be seated. I feel
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like I have a lot to do
this morning, or at least a lot
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that I want to do, and
I'm not sure if I'm going to be
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able to get it all done.
So I learned somewhere that I'm not supposed
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to apologize before I start, but
there it is. So I'm asking for
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your grace and and perhaps for your
prayers and your your your attentiveness, that
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you might be able to buy God's
word that we have heard already. Perhaps
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fill in the gaps and connect the
dots where I may perhaps leave them unconnected
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or unfilled. With that throat clearing
out of the way, why are we
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reading from Hebrews nine when we're supposed
to be reading from Jonah to one reason
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is that I am assuming at least
many of you who have been with us
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we are now somewhat familiar with Jonah, chapter two. We've gone we've read
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it at least twice now in worship
here. I've preached on it a couple
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of times. I also think that
Jonah is one of the more popular stories,
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meaning one of the war wellknown stories
of the Bible, and so I'm
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I'm sort of banking on that a
little bit, but I will take a
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moment to remind you what is going
on there and how it connects to Hebrews
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nine. You remember that Jonah is
a prophet WHO's fleeing. What he says
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is the presence of the Lord.
He's been given a direct command to go
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and preach to the Ninovites and he
says, I don't think so, I
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don't want to do that, I'm
going another direction. Well, the Lord
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is not mocked and he is perhaps
present in some special ways to his people,
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but he is present everywhere to all
men, a particularly in his power,
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in his abilities to stop, to
judge, to discipline, and Jonah
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finds that to be very true.
He's fleeing on this ship and the Lord
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stopped him dead in his tracks,
so to speak. He throws a tempest
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upon the water and eventually Jonah ends
up in the water, drowning. And
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in Chapter Two we have a prayer
recorded in which Jonah tells us what he
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prayed both in his drowning and then
eventually from the point of his salvation,
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point which was surprising, but nevertheless
the work of the Lord, and that
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is from inside a fish, a
fish that had come pointed by God to
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snatch him from these waters of judgment
so that he might so that he might
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live well. In his prayer is
he calls out from the depths, using
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language from the Psalm that we've just
sung. He says in verse seven,
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when my life was fainting the way, a fainting a way, I remembered
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the Lord, and my prayer came
to you into your Holy Temple. My
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prayer came to you into your Holy
Temple. And then he describes those who
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seek false gods in contradiction to the
temple and God who is present there.
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And he says in Verse Eight,
those who pay regard to vain idols forsake
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their hope of steadfast love. But
I, with a voice of Thanksgiving,
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will sacrifice to you. That's Temple
language. there. I will sacrifice to
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you, I what I have out. That's more temple language. There I
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will pay, presumably at the temple. So what I want to focus on
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this morning, before we move on
from Jonah Chapter Two, is this temple
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language. I want you to think
about this and ask yourself a maybe in
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this way, two questions. One, why does Jonah pray in this way?
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Why does he not just say I
pray to God, right, I
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pray, do you? Why does
he add this my and my prayer came
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to you, into Your Holy Temple? Another words, why does Jonah think
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about his relationship with God in terms
of the temple, terms of sacrifices in
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the vowels and these kinds of things? When Jonah cries out from the deep
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and he lifts his voice up to
God and and says save me, I'm
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dying, why is the place that
his mind go? Why does it go
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to the temple? Okay, so
that's the first question that we want to
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ask, and we want to ask
that because, as the Holy Spirit is
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recorded us, and here he's not
recorded it accidentally. This isn't just Jonah's
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prayer, but it's God's spirit recording
this for our benefit so that we might
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know and understand something. And indeed
this isn't just Jonah's sort of odd way
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of expressing things. This is the
way things are expressed throughout the whole testament.
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This is a major, Major,
one of the most important themes in
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all of the Bible. So if
you don't understand why Jonah speaks in this
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way, you are missing an essential
element of Biblical doctrine. Or, to
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put it in a more personal and
perhaps more a more personal way, I'll
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say it that way, you're missing
an essential part of how God has revealed
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himself to you. If you don't
know the answer to that question, particularly
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on this question, because it's not
only revelation, but the temple, as
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we will see, is all about
the presence of God. So if you're
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not understanding this core teaching, this
central teaching about the presence of God,
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likely you are not understanding something about
the presence of God, who he is,
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what he has done, how he
has revealed himself. So why does
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Jonah pray in this way? How
are we to understand God's teaching on this?
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The second question that I want you
to lay out before yourself, then,
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is this. Should I pray in
this way right? Is this an
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example to follow? Should I be
thinking in temple terms when I think about
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prayer, when I think about God? Is this something that should be such
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a core part of my identity as
a Christian, as one who is following
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Jesus, who's living my life after
him, that when I think about my
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relationship with God, that I think
about it in terms of the temple,
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at least sometimes? I think you
should, because what Jonah? Because the
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way Jonah prays here, it's not
a private thing. The Temple of God
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and the way that Jonah is relating
to it at this moment of desperation is
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not just something he can cocks for
himself. The temple and God's presence there
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isn't a personal ceremony, a ritualized
habit, a spiritual practice that Jonah has
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brought into his life is something he
thinks is helpful. No, Jonah is,
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in praying this way, is entering
into something that is larger than himself.
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In praying to God in these sort
of in this temple context, in
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these temple terms, Jonah is entering
into something that God himself is revealed in
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this world, the God has revealed
not only for Israel but for all the
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nations. He enters not only into
this revelation but into the very presence of
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God. That's what I mean.
It'sas more than just a personal thing for
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Jonah. He concerts into the presence
of God, as God has chosen to
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reveal himself in this saving way in
the world. In some ways, this
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is immediately relevant even to what you're
doing this morning. Just like you today,
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when you came to church this morning, you didn't enter into a private
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ceremony, something that you've decided will
help you, to benefit you spiritually.
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Maybe that's how you're thinking about it, but that's not ultimately what's actually going
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on. When we come to church, we enter into something much larger than
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ourselves, something that God has established. It's not something that we just think
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well, this might be helpful for
me in my life. Is the place
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where God has established his presence and
has promised to be at work among his
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people. We enter when we come
to church on a Sunday morning. We
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come to enter into something much bigger
than our lives. Our decisions are desires,
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what we think is healthier good.
We enter into the very work of
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God in blessing and leading and protecting
US and strengthening us. It was like
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this with the temple. The temple
was not just a place that people decided
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would be a good thing to have. It was the place that God himself
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directed. Even its structure, it's
architecture, it's practices, it's priesthood,
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the furniture, the goal on the
walls, every detail minutely described and prescribed
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by God. That temple was the
place of his presence. Not because man
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decided that this would be a good
idea, but God said, I will
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be your God and you will be
my people. Thinking about Jonah's prayer in
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those terms helps us under understand the
relationship that God has made with his people
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and the relationship that we have with
him. So let's talk about the temple.
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When we talk about the temple,
as I've said, you have to
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talk about God's presence. That's what
it's all about. It's about God's presence
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in the world. But in order
to properly understand that you have to make
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some distinctions. Perhaps you're already thinking
along these ways, because how is God
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present in a temple when he's present
everywhere? How are we to understand that?
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One Way to think about God's presence
is in two ways, and we'll
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start with this using some theological terms. You can think about God in terms
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of his immensity. Immensity is the
way in which God transcends all spatial limitations.
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That's a definition and that Luis Berkhoff
gives in his systematic theology. God,
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in his immensity, transcends all spatial
limitations. But in terms of his
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omnipresence, his presence everywhere, Birkhoff
says, though, he transcends all spatial
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limitations. In other words, he's
not bound by space. He exists outside
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of it, he's not constrained by
it in the way we are. He
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is, quote, yet present in
every point of space with his whole being.
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So you have both God's transcendence,
that he is not contrained by space,
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but also his his eminence, that
he is intimately beyond even the ways
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that we can really fully understand close
in such a way that scripture describes it
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as him filling all and all and
being all in all. The transcendent part
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of that guards us against unbiblical doctrines
like pantheism. That God is not bound
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by space keeps us from keeps us
from thinking that God actually is creation itself.
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But knowing that God fills all and
is in all keeps us from Deism,
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which is the view that simply God
is exists outside of these things and
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has not really anything to do with
the creation that he has made. So
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God is has both immense city and
omnipresence. Now this is described in many,
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many, many many places. One
very important places first kings chapter eight,
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and you can, I'll ask you
to turn there. In first kings
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eight we have the ARC being brought
into the temple, right, the temple
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that has been constructed according to God's
design. And and in Chapter Eight,
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Verse Twenty Seven, Solomon, Great
King Solomon, is dedicating this temple and
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when he dedicates it he says this
in Verse Twenty Seven. But Will God
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indeed dwell on the Earth? Right
he's asking the same question that we were
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asking at the beginning. How can
God be in a temple. Right the
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scripture is a deal with this question. But Will God indeed dwell on the
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Earth? Behold Heaven and the highest
heaven cannot contain you. But how much
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are how much less this House that
I have built? You see that confession
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of scripture, this sense that Solomon
builds this temple based on the instruction of
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God and the promises of God that
his presence will be there. And yet
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Solomon recognizes, by the will of
God, that God is not constrained to
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a little box in the desert.
He never has been and it never will
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be. That the heaven and even
the highest heaven, as far as you
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can sort of think in creational terms, God is above it all. He
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is immense. His immensity is infinite. So this is what the way Solomon
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confesses it, this is the way
God is is teaching us about these things.
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Turning to Psalm one hundred and thirty
nine, and we'll come back to
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first king's chapter eight, but in
Psalm one hundred and thirty nine I'll read
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versus a seven through ten. A
David says, where shall I go from
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Your Spirit, or where shall I
flee from your presence? Right, this
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is very related to Jonah. We've
brought this up, I think, at
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least once. If I ascend to
heaven, you are there. If I
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make my bed in Sheol, you
are there. If I take the wings
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of the morning and then dwell in
the other most parts of the sea,
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even there, your hand shall lead
me in, your right hand shall hold
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me. You can't flee from God's
presence, Jonah. What are you thinking?
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You're trying to run away from him
that it is impossible. He is
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everywhere. You can go up,
down, left, right, east,
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west, north, south. He's
always there. So this is an important
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thing to understand about God's presence.
You have to start here. If you
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start by thinking, okay, right, the temple, that's the place where
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God lives, you know, like
your friend lives at a particular house and
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you go to his house to visit
him, but if you go to somebody's
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out there's some other other's house,
he's not there. It doesn't work like
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that. Right, unlike your friend, God is everywhere, which is helpful
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when it comes to prayer, which
is helpful when it comes to salvation.
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As David says, where shall I
flee from your presence? Thank God,
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I can't right. That's the confession
of his heart. He's he's happy.
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He's happy that he can't flee from
God's presence. He's happy that he everywhere.
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He is, God is but for
Jonah, Jonah, who is trying
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to flee from good as presence?
And it's not a hypothetical question, considering
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God's mercy. Jonah, Jonah,
is trying to get away and of course
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that he can't. And that reminds
us of this next point about God's presence
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as we move our way towards thinking
about the temple in particular. God It's
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presence is not a neutral power.
If you think about God's presence, is
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just sort of like this energy that's
humming in the background of all things.
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You're missing the point, because you
don't have a relationship with electricity, right,
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your relationship with the God who provides
the electricity, but you who you
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ultimately aren't in fellowship with energy,
and it's the same way with God.
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God's presence everywhere is a way of
saying relationship is everywhere, because there's no
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way to relate to God in any
kind of neutral way where he's just a
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power to be tapped into or to
walk away from. Or something like that.
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So when God manifests his presence in
the world, though it's everywhere in
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the world, it does relate to
different things and different people in different ways.
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So, for example, God is
in all and all and fills all
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and all, but that is a
very different kind of presence in a way,
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in terms of relationship for the Cactus
then it is for you or an
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animal or a boat or anything like
that. We wouldn't want to say that
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God is only present in and with
humans and has no control or presence over
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things like boats and bugs and other
things. But it's also different. Right.
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God is not pouring judgment out on
in the same way on the things
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of this the the created things of
this world that haven't sinned, and the
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way that he does on people that
have been made in his image, I've
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called to follow him, have been
made to be in a close relationship with
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him. We see this even in
the garden, when God created man a
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garden, which in itself was a
kind of temple. Then he creates man,
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he places him in a different places
him and over the creation, but
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under him. He gives a man
a particular kind of relationship to God that
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is different than the relationship God has
with the animals, with the plants in
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the water, in the sea.
So Jonah's right. If you remember back
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to Jonah when he says God created
the sea in the dry land. Right,
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this creation stuff really grounds at all
true. But the way that he
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relates to the creation, to the
sea, the water in the dry land,
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is different than the way that he
is relating to Jonah. And when
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we think about God's presence in relation
to human beings, if we can connuntinue
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making our distinctions finer and finer,
and I'll finish with this in terms of
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our distinction making section here, when
it comes to God's presence, we experience
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it in basically two ways, salvation
or judgment. And that's because we come
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to God not neutral either. When
God reveals himself, he's not just this
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MMM humming power. He is holiness
and beauty and goodness and truth. He's
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everything that's wonderful and delightful and pleasurable. That's who God is. When we
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come to God, we come as
people that are not holy, that are
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broken and unbeautiful and and ugly and
filled with wrath and all of these kinds
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of things. And so if that's
how we come to God, there's a
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kind of explosion that happens. There's
a break in that you you don't have.
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Holiness is holiness, is holiness.
Beauty is beauty. If you buy
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a beautiful dress at the store and
right as you're checking out the the cashier,
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let's say, signs the receipt and
then accidentally, the pain explodes on
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your what do they say? Dress, let's go to dress. If I
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didn't say that, the pain of
being explodes on your dress. You buy
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this beautiful dress that explodes on your
dress and you say, oh well,
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if the never mind, I I'm
not going to pay for that. I
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wanted to buy a beautiful dress.
The cashier says to you, still is
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a beautiful dress. Right, all
the rest of its beautiful is just this
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one little spot. You wouldn't buy
that, right the argument or the dress?
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It's like that with God. If
that's true, for it something as
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simple as a piece of clothing,
how much for for the thing that the
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one that is beauty itself? What
makes us think that we can go with
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our sins and our our our our
ugliness and our corruption and and come into
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the presence of God and say,
well, all that should be fine.
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Right, he'll still be beautiful in
some way. God as beautiful, God
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as good, God as holy,
protects that right because he's also just.
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He keeps holiness away from unholiness.
That's what holy people do, that's what
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good people do. They distinguish between
good and evil. So when we come
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into the glorious presence of God,
we are ejected from the glorious presence of
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God. In fact, we'd never
approach in Adam and his fall. We
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stand with him and Eve outside the
garden with a flaming sword, rising up
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an angel protecting the way and saying
you don't get to come in anymore.
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You are forever separated from this kind
of presence of God, walking with him,
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talking with him, communing with him, enjoying him, because your sin
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now set you outside of that place. It set you outside of the garden,
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it set you outside of the temple, it set you outside of that
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kind of presence and now you will
have the presence of God, but only
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in separation, only in judgment,
only in Ath and in curse. That's
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the distinction that we have to make
between the presence of God. So when
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Jonah Flees, the presence of the
Lord. He's not just sort of moving
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out into some sort of neutral territory
where God isn't and Jonah's King. All
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of a sudden. God is still
king, as he says, he is
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still the ruler of the heavens and
the earth, but he is no longer
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under God's special saving presence. Now, if that's what Jonah was understanding,
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that's what Jonah should have understand and
I guess we could say that's what Jonah
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was ignoring. He was not fleeing
the presence of the Lord in any way
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that he would ever escape God.
Where shall I flee from your presence?
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It's impossible. But well, he
was doing is he was moving out from
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the special protection, care, salvation
and blessing of God. So the wrath
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and curse and and and destruction of
God which he experienced on the boat,
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in the waves, in his dying
breaths. And so when he calls out
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to God in this place of judgment, in this place where God is pressing
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his presence down on him and in
in this in this this moment of curse
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and death for sin, how does
Jonah pray? He says he prays for
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Salvations. WE'VE CONSIDERED A couple sermons
ago. But he prays in terms of
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the Temple. Why? Because the
temple represents and is the context of that
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different kind of presence. It's the
context of salvation, of blessing. The
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way to see that and the context
for that is back in first kings,
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Chapter Eight. So if you want
to, you can turn there. We're
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going to read a little bit more
of Solomon's dedication. So he prays in
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Verse Twenty Seven, what we read. But what God, what will but
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what will god? Are Sorry,
but will God indeed dwell on the Earth?
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Behold Heaven, and the highest heaven
cannot contain you, how much less
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this house that I have built.
Then he says, have regard to the
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prayer of your servant and to his
plea. Oh Lord, my God,
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listening to the cry and to the
prayer that your servant prays before you This
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Day, that your eyes may be
open, night and day, toward this
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house, the place which you have
said my name shall be there, that
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you may listen to the prayer that
your servant offers toward this place. So
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you understand what PSALOM's do. It
Solomon is doing. He is responding to
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the revelation of God. Several things
that God has revealed. One that God
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is not bound by temples, but
to that he has established a temple and
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promised that his name will dwell there. Solomon Takes God's Word on both accounts,
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and so he says, when I
pray toward this place, the place
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that you have promised my name shall
be there, listen to my prayer and
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answer my plea, and then in
verse thirty and listen to the plea of
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your servant, and not just Solomon, but your people, Israel, when
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they pray toward this place and listen
in heaven, your dwelling place, and
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when you hear forgive. You see
how Solomnon frames that and understands of the
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dwelling place of God. It seems
that Jonah was understanding that very context when
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he prays and asked that the Lord
would hear him in his temple. He's
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taking God also at his word and
what he has said here. And then
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Plomon goes on in the next sections
to talk about various kinds of contexts in
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which people pray. Way. I
won't read through them all because we're running
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out of time, but he talks
about if there's a problem with oaths and
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neighbors. He talks about the defeat
of enemies. He talks about a crops
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and rain and famine and war.
In all of these situations, he says,
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whenever your people are in trouble,
when they call out to the name,
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hear them from Your Holy Temple and
answer. This includes, and is
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relevant for Jonah, even foreigners,
because, remember, Jonah is going to
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preach to these non Israelite Ninovites,
these Assyrians. He says Verse Forty One.
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Likewise, when a foreigner who is
not your people, Israel, comes
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from a far country, for your
namesake, for they shall hear of your
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great name, in your mighty highand
and you're outstretched hard. In other words,
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why I'll stretched, I'm in other
words, the Gospel will go forth.
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And when they hear of it and
they come from a far country,
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when he comes and prays toward this
House here in heaven, your dwelling place,
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and do all, and do according
to all for which the foreigner calls
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you to, in order that all
the peoples of the Earth May know your
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name and fear you, as do
your people Israel, and that they may
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know that this House that I have
built is called by your name. This
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goes on and continues. Again,
I don't have time to read it,
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but he goes on and talks about
sin. When people sin, let your
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forgiveness be here, and all of
these things, these wonderful, wonderful things.
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When you hear this prayer and when
you go and you read back about
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the Tabernacle and and even the garden
of Eden and and things coming up as
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well, what you will find over
and over again is that Solomon's prayer here
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rings true throughout all the Scriptures,
that this is the place where God has
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promised to be with his people,
it is the place where God answers prayers,
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it is the place where he dwells, and in the temple God signifies
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to us his presence with us.
I hope you can see that in Solomon's
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prayer. You can also see it
in the very architecture of the temple.
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I won't read to you passages about
that, but if you just bring to
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your mind perhaps things you have heard, things that we read, and Hebrews
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nine about the Ark, the Ark
of the Covenant, this Gold Box and
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the most holy place in which is
just made of Acacia wood covered with gold,
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with these two chair of them.
Angels are reaching out over the arc
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where there is no god in the
middle of it, though, unlike all
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the other temples of man in which
some sort of idol stood there, amazingly,
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in the temple of Yahway it's empty, the place where God says he
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will fill and bring his presence.
Why? Because it's symbolic that he dwells
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outside of this place, though he
puts his name there. In fact,
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this this Throne Room of God,
as it's called, the most holy place
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or the holy of holies in the
in the center or the deepest part of
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the temple, is in other places
like Isaiah Sixty six, is actually called
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the footstool of the throne. So
the image is that this grand, beautiful
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temple that, if you were to
walk into, you would look up wow,
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look at this place, the engravings
and the embellishment, the Gold and
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the curtains and the furniture, all
of the ceremony and the priests and the
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animals and the blood. It would
be amazing. And yet it's just the
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footstool we're God sort of relaxes his
feet, so to speak, from the
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place where he dwells, not bound
by this insignificant but significant temple, but
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even above the Heaven and the highest
heavens. This is our God who dwells
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with his people and rules the gold
and the glory and the priests and all
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of this signify many things which I
won't get into now. I'll just list
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for you. Holiness, we've heard
that word beauty, goodness, glory,
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wealth, transcendence, Eminence and,
of course, grace. Because what is
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Hebrews nine tell us was happening in
the temple? Every year, high priest
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goes in with the blood. Why? Blood? Because a sacrifice for sin
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had to be made. The people
had to be purified so that they could
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dwell in the presence of the Lord. This representative, high priest, would
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walk into that holy of holies,
would go into that place. Why?
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So that the people could dwell with
God, so that the promise could happen.
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That's what the temple signified. That's
what Jonah is praying toward. He's
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not just praying towards the power and
the glory of God, he's praying towards
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the presence of God, as God
comes not only in glory and power and
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wealth, is signified in the temple, but he comes into the presence of
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the glory of God, which also
comes to us in grace in the sacrifice
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of these animals to make us holy, to cleanse us of our sin.
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So knowing this teaches us a lot
of important things about God and Jonah's conception
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of God and of how we should
conceive of God. The temple is a
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kind of object lesson. The teaches
us who god is and how he is
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among his people. It teaches us
what we can expect of him and what
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he expects of us. But I
have to tell you that they temple is
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not just a just an object lesson. You like Sunday school teachers sometimes will,
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you know, bring in a little
object or something and make an illustration
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with it. We can't just pick
up the temple and say, look at
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what the shows. It certainly does
that and we've seen that, but it
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does more than that, and that's
because this temple that Jonah is praying towards,
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this physical, earthly temple, is, as we read in Hebrews Nine,
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a copy of something. That's what
he says. It's a copy of
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something. What's it a copy of? What does he say? He says
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it's a copy of a heavenly one. The earthly thing represents something that is
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true in heaven, a spiritual reality, not it's not just a metaphor for
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certain things. It actually represents actual
things, the dwelling place of God.
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Now there are important distinctions to make
there, but you have to understand this,
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because the truth is that the temple
isn't just something that's past. Oh
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okay, now I see why Jonah
was reaching out to God in this Old
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00:39:38.210 --> 00:39:45.050
Testament e kind of way, because
the temple still exists. The temple is
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still present, even though every last
block of Solomon's Temple, and indeed the
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00:39:52.050 --> 00:39:55.639
next one that was constructed after that, has been was torn to the ground.
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The reason is is because, as
he says in Hebrews Nine, Jesus,
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the better high priest, has entered
into the tent. He's using that
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language because he's talking about the Tabernacle, which was a precursor of the temple,
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but this ten, to this temple
which Jesus entered into, was a
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different one. It was one made, he says, without human hands.
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Well, now we know where that
we're talking about something on a Matt Order
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of magnitude that is quite different than
the old temple of Israel and the way
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that it's described to us. The
physical way in which it's described to us
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is found in revelation twenty one,
which will turn to and finish with.
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00:40:52.320 --> 00:40:55.679
Jesus enters just as you're turning there. I'll remind you what he brews nine
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says. Jesus enters into this new
temple to be the mediator of a new
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00:41:05.989 --> 00:41:10.590
and better covenant, where he will
offer not the blood of Bulls and goats,
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00:41:10.630 --> 00:41:15.510
which cleansed flesh and only temporarily and
had to be done year after year,
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00:41:15.590 --> 00:41:22.699
but he went once and for all, offering what a sacrifice of himself
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that forever all sin would be cleansed, so that when God comes among his
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people, he would do so in
a final and permanent way. Well,
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that way is described in its consummated
form in revelations Chapter A, revelation chapter
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00:41:44.570 --> 00:41:52.840
twenty one. First I'll read verses
one through three. Then I saw a
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new heaven and a new earth,
for the first heaven in the first Earth
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had passed away, in the sea
was no more, and I saw the
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00:42:00.039 --> 00:42:06.829
holy city, New Jerusalem, coming
down out of Heaven from God, prepared
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00:42:06.909 --> 00:42:15.980
as a bride adorned for her husband. Now let me give you just a
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little preview for tonight, which is
you can think of it as part two.
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The temple is connected to a people. You see that in that word
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there, bride, and tonight,
when we look at effusions chapter two,
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God will talk about us in this
way as his bride. is a people
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00:42:39.250 --> 00:42:44.170
being built up in him. You'll
have to come back for that. For
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00:42:44.320 --> 00:42:49.079
now, I want you to notice
what is happening here. Something new creation,
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00:42:49.119 --> 00:42:52.679
a new city, a new Jerusalem, but that is connected a to
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to something different. What he sees
coming down out of this city. It's
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described and versus nine and following.
All start in Verse Fifteen, and the
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00:43:08.869 --> 00:43:13.460
one who spoke with me had a
measuring rod of gold to measure the city
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00:43:13.699 --> 00:43:19.699
and its gates and its walls.
The city lies four square, its length
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00:43:20.300 --> 00:43:22.579
the same as it's width, and
he measures the city with its rod one
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00:43:22.619 --> 00:43:28.610
hundred stadia. It's length and width
and height are equal. He also measured
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00:43:28.650 --> 00:43:31.809
its wall a hundred forty four cubits
by human measure, which is also an
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00:43:31.849 --> 00:43:37.250
angels measurement. The wall was built
of Jasper, while the city was pure
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00:43:37.570 --> 00:43:44.480
gold, as clear as glass.
The foundations of the wall in the city
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00:43:44.519 --> 00:43:47.320
were adorned with every kind of jewel
and then he lists the jewels. I
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00:43:47.400 --> 00:43:52.320
want so desperately to read that,
but I'm not. Then, in Verse
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00:43:52.360 --> 00:44:00.150
Twenty Two, I saw no temple
in the city, for it's Temple is
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00:44:00.309 --> 00:44:04.869
the Lord, God, the Almighty
and the lamb. And the city has
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00:44:04.909 --> 00:44:07.269
no need of sun or moon to
shine on it, for the glory of
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00:44:07.349 --> 00:44:12.739
God gives its light and it's lamp
is the lamb. By its light the
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00:44:12.860 --> 00:44:16.219
nation's will walk and the Kings will
bring their glory into it and the gates
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00:44:17.139 --> 00:44:21.860
will never be shut and there will
be no night there. They will bring
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00:44:21.940 --> 00:44:27.409
into the bring into it the glory
and honor of the nation's but nothing unclean
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00:44:27.610 --> 00:44:31.170
will ever enter it, and no
nor anyone who does what is detestable or
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00:44:31.250 --> 00:44:36.130
false, but only those who are
written in the lamb's book of life.
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00:44:37.969 --> 00:44:45.159
What you see in this passage is
that most holy place, that cube of
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00:44:45.199 --> 00:44:51.239
a room that's covered in gold in
the back of the temple comes down out
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00:44:51.280 --> 00:44:55.269
of heaven in its final form.
But at this time it's not a cube
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00:44:55.309 --> 00:45:01.110
of a room in the back of
the temple in Israel, it is everything.
494
00:45:01.750 --> 00:45:06.829
It is itself, the new heavens
and the new Earth, the command
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00:45:07.030 --> 00:45:12.460
that God gave Adam to fill the
earth, to expand the glory of God
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00:45:12.739 --> 00:45:16.019
to all the ends. Has now
been done through the lamb, through Jesus
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00:45:16.019 --> 00:45:22.289
Christ, who is everything, and
now God's presence will not just be a
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00:45:22.570 --> 00:45:30.650
specially placed on earth, in this
one place, but will literally fill everything,
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00:45:31.929 --> 00:45:38.159
that his judgments will be outside of
the new heavens and the new earth.
500
00:45:38.960 --> 00:45:45.239
That The holiness that is bound up
in the temple now, or bound
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00:45:45.400 --> 00:45:47.239
or that is, I don't want
to put it that way. The holiness
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00:45:47.320 --> 00:45:53.230
that is expressed in the temple in
Jonah's Day is revealed on the last day
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00:45:53.630 --> 00:46:04.860
to consume and consummate everything. The
city is the temple. I saw no
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00:46:05.059 --> 00:46:08.699
temple because there's was no need of
the temple for God to place his special
505
00:46:08.739 --> 00:46:15.059
saving presence and spread it throughout the
world, because the entire world now is
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00:46:15.340 --> 00:46:22.130
filled with the saving presence and glory
of God. That's why I say when
507
00:46:22.170 --> 00:46:28.289
we pray to God, we have
to pray in light of the temple,
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00:46:29.050 --> 00:46:34.280
because God still sits and dwells in
his temple. Jesus Christ has entered that
509
00:46:34.719 --> 00:46:38.239
temple, this place made not with
human hands, and has given his own
510
00:46:38.280 --> 00:46:44.840
life. He is a high priest
interceding for us, and we belong to
511
00:46:45.159 --> 00:46:50.269
that. We belong to him.
The all the images that we have in
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00:46:50.309 --> 00:46:53.710
the Old Testament, we don't just
say well, that was interesting and leave
513
00:46:53.750 --> 00:47:00.550
it alone. Know, we allow
it to inform our sense of what is
514
00:47:00.670 --> 00:47:06.380
going on right now and what God
will give in the new heavens and the
515
00:47:06.500 --> 00:47:12.219
new earth. The old temple isn't
merely an object lesson, something to or
516
00:47:12.380 --> 00:47:16.329
something even to return to. It's
a foreshadowing of the things that God is
517
00:47:16.449 --> 00:47:22.050
doing even now. Get a sense
for this, a sense for the greatness
518
00:47:22.090 --> 00:47:25.849
and the glory of God, and
when you lift your prayers up to him
519
00:47:25.969 --> 00:47:31.480
in Jesus name, know that this
is what is happening. What is happening
520
00:47:32.159 --> 00:47:37.280
that your presence goes to God,
not unmediated, with you standing there and
521
00:47:37.400 --> 00:47:43.880
all of your sins and and in
judgment, but you coming before the Lord,
522
00:47:44.039 --> 00:47:47.190
in the name of the son of
God, into the temple, into
523
00:47:47.309 --> 00:47:53.150
the most holy place. And,
as we'll see tonight, indeed we even
524
00:47:53.469 --> 00:47:59.260
are that temple, that his presence
is so close to us, that he's
525
00:47:59.300 --> 00:48:05.059
said to dwell in us, and
that the temple is even his people.
526
00:48:06.940 --> 00:48:10.380
That is more than enough to reflect
on. Let's close in Prayer
