It’s Ordination Day

I invite you to turn in the Bible this morning to Exodus chapter 32. We're right in the heart of the golden calf event and you'll notice how appropriate this is for ordination, maybe not in a way that you expect, but one that in God's providence we land on in the order of preaching. It's one of the beauties of preaching through books. You see God's providence at work in where we come and when we come. And this is God's will for us. This is God's word. I have to every week sit down and say, what is your intention, Lord, here in your revelation? Let me speak your words. The results people may not like or the words they may not like, but that's not ultimately my great concern. My great concern is to speak the truth as it is in Jesus, speak the truth as it's been revealed and pray that the Spirit changes hearts to receive this truth and not as the children of Israel harden our hearts or stiffen our hearts against it. So we're going to read verses 25 through 35 this morning of Exodus, chapter 32. This is the word of the Lord. And when Moses saw that the people had broken loose, for Aaron had let them break loose to the derision of their enemies, then Moses stood in the gate of the camp and said, Who is on the Lord's side? Come to me. And all the sons of Levi gathered around him. And he said to them, Thus says the Lord God of Israel, Put your sword on your side, each of you, and go to and fro from gate to gate throughout the camp, and each of you kill his brother and his companion and his neighbor. And the sons of Levi did according to the word of Moses. And that day about 3,000 men of the people fell. And Moses said, Today you've been ordained for the service of the Lord, each one at the cost of his son and of his brother, so that he might bestow a blessing upon you this day. The next day Moses said to the people, You've sinned a great sin. And now I will go up to the Lord. Perhaps I can make atonement for your sin. So Moses returned to the Lord and said, Alas, this people has sinned a great sin. They've made for themselves gods of gold. But now, if you will forgive their sin, but if not, please blot me out of your book that you have written. But the Lord said to Moses, Whoever has sinned against me, I will blot out of my book. But now go. Lead the people to the place about which I have spoken you. Behold, my angels shall go before you. Nevertheless, in the day when I visit, I will visit their sin upon them. Then the Lord sent a plague on the people because they made the calf, the one that Aaron made. May the Lord bless the hearing of his word. Well, we are so used to hearing about the forgiveness, about grace, about gospel and love of the Lord. We never really think it could be any other way. It's a challenging time because of this dilemma. The message is incredibly lopsided and that people have actually, because it's so lopsided, refused to hear an entire another truth about the Lord and the attribute of His justice. They just throw it aside. And because the message is so lopsided today, notice that it's just brought little ability for people even to feel sorry about sin. I mean, you go through the course of your weeks, how much sorrow do you really even experience for sin anymore in the course of your lives? When you go through the Scriptures and this is a constant daily struggle for the saints of God. This really is challenging in a culture that tells us that we have the right to do with our lives whatever we want and God will not condemn in the end. And many people buy into that message, especially when it affects family. And this is where we'll notice today, we really have stripped God of His attribute of justice. No more do we feel the New Testament's message of what Paul said, knowing the terror of God, we persuade men. Let me think about it. We just ho-hum through our days and not even realize that there is terror coming. We've lost that today, and with that attitude, the attitude now typically comes, I'd almost universally get, is that anyone who takes these things seriously, anyone who defends the faith, anyone who stands for what's right or wrong, I see this constantly as viewed as judgmental. You deal with institutions who are worried about all kinds of things, and we prayed today for Calvin Christian, we prayed for Westminster Seminary, we're worried here. We're always worried today. We're always worried about consequences. We're always worried about things so that when we have to stand for truth, we're worried about the consequences and the effects of how it will be received today. How's it going to go? It's all too extreme. It's all too judgmental. We're taking this way too seriously. Way too seriously. And this casual Christianity that we have today takes over and causes immense problems in dealing with sin and dealing with idolatry and dealing with conviction so that ultimately it has the goal of suppressing conviction. It's exactly the attitude of Aaron here. When Moses comes down off the mountain and he says to Aaron, what in the world got into you? The first thing Aaron says is don't let the anger of my Lord get hot. Calm down, Moses. I've taken this all way too seriously. I've learned a lot about how serious God takes sin. That's what this is all about. And if there's anything that has to be recovered in the church today, it's the understanding that God is holy. That we're in a battle. That sin enters the camp. That all kinds of things are constantly trying to take us away from standing on the truth, and we'll see today standing with God. And when that's forgotten and the people are unrestrained when they come to worship and unrestrained in their behavior and unrestrained in their attitude and actions, idolatry is constantly the result. And the passage this morning teaches us that God doesn't set aside His justice to exercise mercy. That's what we've got to grapple with. That's what we've got to think about this morning. One of you came up to me after the last sermon in Exodus and said, you know, I'm having, Pastor, a hard time seeing grace in this passage. And I really appreciated that comment. I thought, you know, I believe that person's really sensing the struggle that's going on here. Because we're being pressed with that struggle. We're being pressed with, how is mercy even possible? That's the question that the text is really pushing us to, to ask. It's important because the golden calf event has really presented to us a great dilemma in the relationship of Israel with the Lord God. The text is presenting to us a tension of how can God exercise mercy in light of His attribute of justice? How does He do it? They've sinned. Notice Moses said, this is a big sin. This is a great sin. Don't use that line, all sins equal. It's not even true. It's not the same as stealing a cracker. This is a great sin. Moses wants us to wrestle with this as he did. And you see that captured here in the text where you have him, Moses himself struggling to understand how do we get to mercy? How do we get to gospel? Is there grace? How can God exercise it? If sin is so bad before a holy God and you can't explain it away. We're going to all have to give an account. How does mercy show? And when you've made grace so cheap today, so easy, so expected, that God just forgives, God just lets it all go, one of the best things to do is to again realize the weight of justice. How expensive and costly grace is. How it's even possible for sinners to receive it. Those things have to be revisited. Because the weight of this, the severity of the problem is not being realized or felt or confessed today. Well that's this morning and that becomes ordination day in Israel, you notice. This was ordination day for the Levites. This became the day that God has set and establishes leadership to take seriously the problem of sin. That's essentially what we see here in Exodus chapter 32. God taking men, setting apart to take very seriously the problem of sin. And we see that today in the midst of this great golden calf, failure on Sinai. We see here three things that demonstrate that. We hear a call to come, a command to kill, and an attempt to atone. A call to come, a command to kill, and an attempt to atone. All of this, of course, is leading us to God's answer that He does give us in the Bible, and He has answered us. Well, Israel has been intoxicated with themselves and with this golden calf, drinking and having a wild worship service down at the foot of the mountain with great music. a calf is in front of them they are worshiping they are praising joshua can't even distinguish the music it's so powerful from the noise of roar and war remember all the devotion all of the energy all of the thunderous music they were holding up a calf and saying wow this is the best worship we've ever had it's like egypt this is your god oh israel who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. Look at him. We can see him. Finally. Contra second commandment. We can see him. Moses comes down the mountain with two tablets of stone with the finger of God written with the ten words. We're not even moved on from Sinai yet. And he takes these things and he smashes them in anger at the foot of the mountain. Anger justified. And he takes their idol and he pulverizes it right in front of them, smashes it up into bits and makes them drink it, tasting its bitterness. He burns the calf in the fire and grinds it into powder, scattering it on the water. That's often something that they did with idolatry. You'll notice later in Israel's history, they would scatter it over the brook Kidron. It was a symbolic act. These idols are nothing. Then he confronts Aaron in an awful scene of denial And we left off last time with Moses confronting Aaron when Moses says, what in the world did these people do to you? And then the blame game started, remember? Just like Adam after the fall. Moses, don't let your anger get hot. It's their fault. These people are always pushing me. They're always pressuring me. They're always pushing for this stuff. They never let it go. They're never happy. They're always murmuring. They're always grumbling. And so I threw this thing in the fire and it popped out. so you forgot your chiseling tool my friend total denial is what we get so that's where we left off that's that sets the scene that sets the stage for ordination day look at verse 25 now when moses saw that the people had broken loose for aaron had let them break loose break obviously break loose from who well it's evident god they had broken loose verse 25 to the derision of their enemies it's a very important point always in the history of why god had to implement discipline because enemies were now given all this opportunity to mock then moses stood in the gate of the camp and said whoever is on the lord's side come to me not restrained no one has been held accountable for this we thought it was over remember Moses had said a prayer and God relented from the disaster we thought it was over but here we are again who's taking responsibility for the sin nobody Moses outwardly pulverized the idol Moses removed tried to purge the sin from the camp but nobody's taken any responsibility. So we see Moses here as a leader really grappling with how do I deal with this? How do I address sin in the life of this congregation? What do you do when idolatry has completely overtaken a congregation? The very thing that Jesus warned about to the churches in the New Testament in Revelation that this very problem still happens. What do you do? Well, he ground the idol to bits. He made them drink it. But the whole camp is polluted. This contaminating effect of sin is everywhere in the camp. And I'm trying to imagine when Moses then starts to deal with this, what was the attitude toward Moses in the camp? Well, we know seeds of rebellion were already beginning. Korah and his rebellion, they were ready to dump Moses. They were done with this guy. He's too much. Not leading us anywhere, taking this all too seriously. We're going to get rid of Moses. And they tried, remember? calm down moses in our debt you're too legalistic well this is where we are and um before moses is an entire leadership failure going on in the camp leadership holding nobody accountable idolatry running wild in the congregation enemies have mocked the whole thing's a joke the world looks at it and says things a joke What a goofy group of people. Silliness. Nobody's taking God seriously. Nobody knows what it even means to reverence a holy God. It's just gone. There's none of it. So what's the first thing Moses does? What does he do? Then he stood at the entrance of the camp. Wouldn't even go into the camp. Right at the entrance. Throws up his arms, and what does he say? Whoever is on the Lord's side, come. Come to me right now. Moses sees the idolatry, confronts the leadership, but the first thing he does here, he gives a call. Come. Come. Does that sound familiar? Well, it's all over the Bible. It's the call gospel preachers are supposed to give in line of what's been done since great Moses and what Jesus did throughout his entire ministry. When he began his ministry, the heart of his ministry was standing up to the multitudes and what was he constantly saying? Come to me. Come this day. Repent and believe the kingdom of God is at hand. Come. it's all it's just all over come to me my yoke is easy and my burden is light come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden come come if you come i won't cast you out if you come you'll be saved well that that is um essentially the first step in god's chastening of people we do this in worship I always feel to some degree guilty if there's not a call to come because that's such a prominent call throughout the scriptures that the pastor is to give it comes in this form when you're preaching through books and then you come to a passage like this that has the emphasis on this then it really functions as the call to come because in the course of regular preaching you've come to it now God in his providence especially calling this congregation to come. And that's remarkable. And on the day of ordination. I didn't set it up. I mean, you should really see the Lord working in this church right now. I did not put this together. I wasn't going to preach this. Who would say, oh, it's ordination day. The Levites are going to take out the swords. Ah, let's ordain them. Who would do that? It's our office, isn't it? Come. turn. You know how hard that is when people are sinning, don't you? You know what we do. You know what your children do. But these calls in the course of preaching come as a real moment, a special moment, to make a decision. And today functions just like that. Whoever is, there's always a difference between struggling with sin, we all do, to living in sin. and in a congregation of this size, there may be some today who've chosen to live in it. No repentance. No turning. And the Lord says to you today, it's decision time. It should be chilling. It should be. You should really feel it. Especially if you know what you're out doing and not turning to the Lord. Are you living in denial? There comes these moments that Jesus so graciously stands. Come, come. Whose side are you on? You've been playing fast and loose with him. Your idols have been ruling to you. Look what you run to. Look what you do. Whose side are you on? It's just time to decide. Whose side are you on? Stop playing fast and loose. It's Elijah on Mount Carmel. Elijah. If the Lord is God, follow him. You're faltering between two opinions here and there's no middle ground. If the Lord's God, follow him. If Baal's God, follow him. You're either for him or against him. Can't serve God and mammon. Well, Moses does this. Guess what happened? Picture this. He stands at the entrance of the camp calling out at the top of his voice to a million people, Come! Now! Guess what happened? Nothing. Nothing. No one from Israel except the Levites came. We're not looking at the world. We're in the holy camp. They didn't take them seriously. You read in verse 26 that the sons of Levi gathered themselves to him. So they came, but that's it. I can't get over that the whole of the people didn't take it seriously. they just probably scowled and rolled their eyes old traditional Moses you can't do that for very long you've got to stop you're not going to get away with it this is what earned Israel the title of being stiff necked right here it would be used throughout history you have an entire nation deciding against the Lord and there was no stand there was no stand they heard the call they just sat there they just stood there They didn't come. They refused him who speaks, says Hebrews. So the tension's building. We've got a problem here. Moses is given the call. They have sinned a great sin. God is just. He's given them the opportunity to repent. None. No repentance. What do you do at that point? What do you do at that point? What should God do at that point? Well, He already made the proposal. Let's just wipe them out and start over. Moses says, no. So what do you do? Are people taking it seriously? You ever feel that today? Do people take this seriously? Well, we know what happens when people do take it seriously. You have a hunger for the Word and you have a real broken and contrite heart that then follows, like David, I've sinned against the Lord and I know what I'm doing is wrong. Lord, purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean. Wash me and I shall be white as snow. God, be merciful to me, a sinner. It's all over the Scripture. You get that. Then you know they've come. That's coming. That's coming. What happens when people don't come? What did you get from Aaron? Denial. From the leader and maker of the idol himself, calm down, Moses, the sin thing's not that bad. It's all to everyone else's fault. I can just hear it all today. It's just, you see that God inspired us. Nobody would ever write this stuff down to try to expose themselves like this in history. We always, history is written by winners, right? History is always written by the winners and a positive presentation of the great displays of people are put down in the books for you, not this. So you know it's from the Lord. I can hear the mentality. Too much. Or maybe they did our mentality of American Christianity. Oh, God's forgiving. God's not going to judge. Maybe that's what they did. God's full of grace. God won't punish. What do you do? What's needed? Well, when we experience this, what does God call us to do? I'll tell you what happened in Israel that day. Look at verse 29. Today, you have been ordained for service to the Lord, each one at the cost of his son and of his brother, so that he might bestow a blessing upon you this day. Huh? It's ordination day. You're standing with God. So what was the command? Tough verse. Put your sword on your side, verse 28, 27. Put your sword on your side, each of you, and go to and fro from gate to gate throughout the camp. Each of you kill his brother and his companion and his neighbor. Today, you're ordained at the cost of your sons. What if that were your son? feeling this go kill even your family God had specifically charged the Levites to go on a purging of a certain number of people who probably were the ringleaders of this idolatry who had been nothing but thorns in the camp probably tares the Lord knows who were infecting everyone else same sort of thing happened with Achan remember that the sin that had contaminated the camp and the Lord was was bothered with the whole camp because Achan was in the camp what we have in here in this passage is a severe uh old testament passage of discipline that's why I read first Corinthians 10 today because you can't just say well that's the old testament that's what people love to do when they don't want to have to deal with reality. Do you think Israel finally started taking seriously sin when they saw the Levites, these armed warriors, coming through the camp with swords? I think so. What conclusion did they draw finally? We're wrong. We're wrong. What was the alternative? Well, the alternative was to say, I don't agree with any of this discipline stuff to do what Aaron did no big deal let it all go unrestrained they were there were serious consequences down the road for this I don't you know I think it's helpful to remember that Aaron's two sons were Nadab and Abihu and when they had their worship service and they had been taught by dad not to take any of this seriously when they abused the worship of God fire from God fell on them and consumed them you read that Aaron got hot first time Aaron gets hot Moses says, Aaron, you never listened. Aaron, this is what the Lord spoke. By those who come near me, I must be regarded as holy. And before all the people, I must be glorified. God told you that at Sinai, Aaron. You've never listened to it. You've just done your thing. I was reading Psalm 78 this week. I was really moved by Psalm 78. He decreed statues for Jacob. And establish the law in Israel, which he commanded our ancestors to teach their children. So the next generation would know them, even the children yet to be born. And they would turn, and they in turn would tell their children. Then they would put their trust in God and would not forget his deeds and would keep his commands. They would not be like their ancestors, a stubborn and rebellious generation. this generation rose up incredibly stubborn whose hearts were not loyal to God whose spirits were not faithful to Him they didn't keep God's covenant and they refused to live by His law you come to this and you see when you answer as a pastor to the Lord did you preach my word I can say in good conscience I believe I've hit the intention of this text to say have we taken sin seriously I've seen all kinds of parents justify and refuse to stand with God when it comes to their children and family. There was the terrible problem that family always got first place before the Lord so that when a child refused and fell into sin, the father refused even to address it. You understand what the Levites are being called to here. Be willing in your ordination to oppose your family with the sword. I believe this was the effect Jesus had when he said, don't think I came to bring peace on the earth. I've not come to bring peace but sword, for I've come to set a man against his father and a father and a daughter against her mother and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law and a person's enemies will be those of their own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me and whoever loves son or daughter is not worthy. Jesus was constantly running up of people who stood with family over him. So what's God doing here? Discipline. Discipline. People don't understand church discipline. I struggled to understand it a long time. They think it's unloving. They think it's mean. They think it's cruel. The amazing thing about the New Covenant you know is that when I hear people who say I have a problem with church discipline, we're not even wielding the sword. There's no blood being shed. It's spiritual discipline and they don't have a problem even with that. We don't use guns against our people. It's not what these men are called to do. You heard the song we sang. But when discipline happens, there is a real goal of protecting the family, the spiritual family, and protecting the body of Christ to bring a godly fear in the life of the body that protects the body instead of doing nothing which opens it up to this stuff. I was reading in the forum for excommunication and it would be interesting how many times we've ever even heard it in the course of our lives. But there was a prayer in there and I want you to listen to this prayer. O righteous God, merciful Father, before your high majesty, We blame ourselves for our sins and acknowledge we have justly deserved the sorrow and pain caused by the excommunication of this, our late fellow member. If you entered into judgment with us as a scripture, we all deserve to be excluded and banished from your presence on account of our great transgression. But O Lord, be gracious to us for Christ's sake, forgive our trespass, for we heartily repent of them and work in our hearts an increasing measure of sorrow for them that fearing your judgments which thou bring upon stiff neck the stiff neck we may endeavor to please you you don't do anything that in fact never happens in the life of the church um and that's what the lord is is is here uh doing in the life of the congregation you say well, 3,000 people were killed. And I'd say, well, that was one half of 1% of adults, Israel's adult population. One half of 1% to stop this. Remember when the Lord gave the call, nobody came. What do you do? What do you do? They're not listening. Moses understood that a church body that does nothing when sin is openly practiced tramples God's holiness to the ground, exalts a false God in the place, and then the world looks at us and never takes us seriously. You remember that was the effect with Ananias and Sapphira in the New Testament, when the Holy Spirit exercised church discipline in Acts and struck them down for holding back. It said, great fear came on who? All the people out there. Whoa, this group is to be taken seriously. But let them get in there and rock out and do whatever they want. It's just the world. There's nothing there. Nothing there. People who don't take seriously discipline are exposing they don't take sin seriously. People who don't take serious discipline are exposing they don't take God seriously. And the reason God commands parents even to discipline because he says if you spare your rod, you hate your son. I told you it would be a tough sermon. And this is where the text takes us. You have to feel this. We never feel this. The greatest issue that we will never escape, whether you like this or not, whether you say, I can't even hear this or not, the greatest issue you're going to have to deal with in the course of your life is if we have sinned, how can the wrath of a holy God be propitiated? Satisfied. Moses is so concerned about this issue. He's pulverized the idol. He's done discipline. But what had to happen? The greatest thing had to happen. God had to be appeased. He's still up there in wrath. He told Moses, I will visit and punish sin to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me by no means clearing the guilty. We never want to hear that. Moses is really concerned about this. So he begins to start thinking. Something's got to satisfy him. Listen, Israel, I'll try it, I'll do it for you. Boy, mean Moses, legalistic Moses, angry Moses, just showed the greatest pastor's heart in the entire Bible, besides Jesus. I'll go try for you. So Moses goes up, verse 31. He returned to the Lord. Alas, this people has sinned a great sin, Lord. They've made for themselves gods of gold. Notice how direct he is. He's not doing what Aaron did. Don't let the anger of your Lord get hot. Never do that. Don't be so hard on them, God. This is the first way of approaching the Lord. Lord, what we've done is bad. it's a great sin yet I know verse 32 if you will forgive their sin but if not please blot me out of the book that you have written Lord just if you'll just let it go but if you can't just let it go by the way he can't just let it go that would trample his justice he doesn't just let it go if you can't just forgive it blot me out of the book you've written it's not the intention here to start asking whether salvation can be lost. That's not what's going on. Lord, here's the intention. I see how bad this is. Will you let me step in for him? I'll take it. Will you let me take the blow for him? That's the heart of a servant. Paul said the same thing about Israel. I would gladly step in their place for my countrymen if I could. Boys and girls, you see why you learned the Heidelberg Catechism? This is a really important question in the Heidelberg Catechism that goes like this. Can any creature, any at all, pay this debt for us? Well, no. To begin with, God will not punish another creature for man's guilt. Besides, no mere creature can bear the weight of God's anger against sin and release others from it. So what did God answer to Moses? The Lord says, whoever's sinned, I'm dealing with him. I'll blot him out. In other words, no. Your proposal's rejected. I won't accept another offer for atonement from you. And the Lord will go on to say, I will visit the punishment for their sin so the Lord plagued the people because of the calf which Aaron made. You're shocked because none of this fits the American religion of Christianity. It just doesn't fit. You'll notice how uncomfortable this all makes us feel. We've never heard God say no. We can't handle him saying no. Think about it. Well, this is why Paul called the ministry in the Old Covenant a ministry of death. It didn't have a mediator who could deliver. Anyone who remained under it, cursed is everyone who does not continue to do all things written in the book of the law to do them. They broke this covenant. That's Jeremiah 31. My covenant which they broke. God wants us to understand the awful predicament we are in if we're left to maintain the standard of God's holiness that he demands. And here, you say, well, where's hope? That's where I'm getting tonight. Can I give a really, not a whipping, but a pastoral plea to come back tonight? Because it's a doubleheader. Does that work? I'm going to really show you the answer God gives and answer the question of the sermon, is God against us? If you don't care, you don't have to be here, right? But I trust you care. He speaks of grace in the next section and then begins to proclaim the name of the Lord. Listen to this. Yahweh. Then Yahweh passed by Moses and proclaims the Lord, the Lord God merciful and gracious, long-suffering and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sins. Moses, you can't do it, but I'll do it for you. How wonderful. I'll come down and do it. And then you look at the Son of God who comes here as the true pastor. They've committed great sins, Lord. Can you hear his prayer? I'll go down for them and I'll come back up for them. I'll love them. I'll forgive their sins. I'll make the payment. Blot me out of the book. Let the curse fall on me. That's what it says. Let them fall so that I might bless them and put them in my Lamb's book of life with no deeds mentioned in the Lamb's book of life. The Father says, This is my son, whom I'm well pleased. You listen to him. You hear him. You give yourselves to listen to him. And Moses tonight goes out and he sets up an alternate tabernacle. He sets up another tabernacle and Moses goes and shows them how to come to Jesus. Today is ordination day. Servants set apart to minister not judgment to you, but hope. Peace. Forgiveness. grace, love. There's going to be tests in this body. There's going to be tests over loyalties to your children. There's going to be tests over family loyalties. In fact, the Lord may bring that because we idolize those things. And when idolatry gets in in our families, terrible things happen. But the Lord wants you to know He's setting apart men who care about you, who love you, who are going to help you and call you to repentance. And that's an act of mercy. And the leaders today are charged to take that seriously. I'm charged to take that seriously. I'll be the first to say this morning that I have failed in being serious enough about sin in my own life and as a pastor. But His mercies are great. And He loves His flock. and I pray that everyone in this building and today has heard this. Come to me. All you who labor and are weary, come to Jesus and I will give you rest for your souls. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me. I'm not pulling out the sword on you. I'm gentle and I'm lowly in heart and i've set apart these men to show you that love let's pray precious lord bless the men who are set apart to serve you and to serve your people and bless this congregation you've you've given us a challenging message this morning probably the most difficult i would say i've had to preach one of them and yet i believe it's your word of good to us we need it sometimes the medicine that we need most doesn't taste the best but it's the best for our souls we ask that there would be demonstrated in all of our lives humble sincere repentance and that we all this day would come to Jesus and believe and trust your word and flee from idolatry in Jesus name we pray amen