Tonight, I invite you to turn to the second book of the Bible, the book of Exodus, as we are reading together chapter 27. Actually, we'll be reading together the first 19 verses tonight. This is Exodus chapter 27. This is the word of the Lord. You shall make the altar of acacia wood five cubits long and five cubits broad. The altar shall be square, and its height shall be three cubits. You shall make horns for it on its four corners. Its horns shall be of one piece with it, and you shall overlay it with bronze. You shall make pots for it to receive its ashes, and shovels, and basins, and forks, and firepans. You shall make all its utensils of bronze. You shall also make for it a grating, a network of bronze. And on the net you shall make four bronze rings at its four corners. And you shall set it under the ledge of the altar so that the net extends halfway down the altar. You shall make poles for the altar, poles of acacia wood, and overlay them with bronze. And the poles shall be put through the ring so that the poles are on the two sides of the altar when it is carried. You shall make it hollow with boards. As it has been shown you on the mountain, so shall it be made. You shall make the court of the tabernacle. On the south side of the court shall have hangings of fine twine linen, a hundred cubits long for one side. Its twenty pillars and their twenty bases shall be of bronze, but the hooks of the pillars and their fillets shall be of silver. And likewise, for its length on the north side, there shall be hangings a hundred cubits long, its pillars twenty and their bases twenty of bronze, but the hooks of the pillars and their fillets shall be of silver. And for the breadth of the court on the west side, there shall be hangings for 50 cubits with 10 pillars and 10 bases. The breadth of the court on the front to the east shall be 50 cubits. The hangings for the one side of the gate shall be 15 cubits with their three pillars and three bases. On the other side, the hanging shall be 15 cubits with their three pillars and three bases. For the gate of the court shall be a screen, 20 cubits long of blue and purple and scarlet yarns and fine twine linen embroidered with needlework. It shall have four pillars and with them four bases. All the pillars around the court shall be filleted with silver. Their hooks shall be of silver and their bases of bronze. The length of the court shall be 100 cubits, the breadth 50, the height 5 cubits, with hangings of fine twine linen and bases of bronze. all the utensils of the tabernacle for every use and all its pegs and all the pegs of the court shall be of bronze may the lord bless the hearing of his word tonight well imagine having to put that together that would be quite a project wouldn't it tonight we are looking at the courtyard of the tabernacle and we've been studying this now for some time looking at this structure that the lord had commanded them to put up in the wilderness but what did they understand by it? I suppose that's an important question so far in our study. What did they understand when they looked over to the tabernacle? And I think sometimes we look at the Old Testament and we say, well, this must have been just burdensome and cumbersome, right? All of these sacrifices, all of these rules, all of these regulations. And yet we come to a psalm like this and it says, well, what a blessing it is to be in your courts. We want to be in your courts. what is all of this how do we understand all of this what did it mean to them i mean people are trying to uh to recreate this i think it's over in timna today that there is a life-size replica of the biblical tabernacle i think the mennonites did this over in uh lancaster pennsylvania they have put up a tabernacle that people go and they visit and they check it out and it's it's kind of life-size thing where people get a sense of what it was. And like I may have told you before, I've preached through some of this and I remember up north I bought for the kids a tabernacle and I constructed it in my house, a little small. It was easy. You could buy it pre and then pop the things in so it wasn't very hard to do. But I built this for the kids so that they could see this after church and i just didn't bring it from linden so i should order it but it's an it's important to think through all of these things tonight why did they do this why did the lord command this and i suppose it's important to say up front that there's a danger in studying all this and doing all of this and looking at all the pictures and trying to understand this of missing that the earthly symbol here pointed to a greater reality. That was always Israel's problem with the tabernacle and later the temple. We saw some of that this morning, didn't we? They ended up, the prophet Jeremiah would say, that they ended up trusting in the temple. They ran around saying, the temple, the temple, the temple. They were putting their trust in these things. And that's what you never want to do in, I suppose, studying all of this and understanding all of this, we study this to understand the greater fulfillment, to know what we're a part of now. What does it look like that we're a part of the greater tabernacle made not with hands? We study this because it was God's way of teaching Israel that he had come among them, that God had come to them, and he was declaring certain things in the details, wasn't he? That's really important. So tonight we come to the outer court, the outer court of the tabernacle. And there we find this courtyard structure that we read about, which spoke in such an important way to Israel's need because one article of furniture, if you will, stood right in front of the holy place. And this was communicating something very important about how people were able to have access before God. And that was this burnt altar. You'll notice that there. This sacrifice had to be made so that sins could be forgiven and that there could be reconciliation. This was all teaching the gospel message as we understand it today. So that's what we're looking at tonight. How wonderful God has been to supply everything we need so that when I'm able to read in Hebrews that we now are blessed to come in the most holy place. You have an appreciation of that. That's where it says you are right now. That's how the New Testament views your worship right now. You're not kept far, you're there. That's the beauty of this. Even though you can't see that with your eyes, he wants us to live by faith. But all of this is foreshadowed in what the tabernacle spoke about and declared to Israel. So that's what we're looking at tonight in chapter 27. Let's begin with this courtyard. He says in verse 9, I'd like to come back to the bronze altar. He says in verse 9 that you shall make this court of the tabernacle. And then he goes on to give all the dimensions of the court. I want to think with you again for a minute of the whole structure of the tabernacle that was conveyed to the Israelite. You can only imagine the children asking the priests, what does that mean? What's going on in there? What are you doing in there? What are you seeing in there? What is it like in there? All the questions that then the parents were supposed to train their children and teach them what these things meant. By the way, when the generations, this was big in the Old Testament, when the generations did not train well their children, this is why the children did not stay. was very important. This is how children were preserved, that the parents would really take a time and train their children in the home in these truths. This is why we constantly saw the problem in the Old Testament of the next generations defecting. They weren't taught these, and it went farther and farther down the road where they didn't even know the faith. Well, this was important that they understood the tabernacle structure, and it conveyed certain things. It taught certain things well moses had had been instructed to go up onto the mountain into the cloud and receive the building plans remember and it was a sort of visual that moses had gone up into heaven and got them and brought them back down that was the sort of visual for israel because he descended ascended and then descended with these plans and that's why you keep reading in this i want you to continue you to construct this exactly as the pattern was given to Moses on the mountain, as I inspired the building plans. There was a heavenly pattern on the mountain there that was given to him. Well, what did it all convey? Notice so far what we've learned. You had two rooms. You had the most holy place where we started, and then you had the holy place. And we've looked at that many have noticed it's sort of a mini replica of the universe, if you will. God had come down to them. His throne had been brought to them. Essentially, you had levels described here, didn't you? I seek for a better word than that, but I think it most clearly helps you to understand it. Think about the structure for a minute. In the inner room was the most holy place and there in the most holy place was the ark of the covenant the law the testimony was placed in the ark and there um the mercy seat where the cherubim had their arms stretched out it was the throne it was a throne room and and and then remember in that most holy place all the curtains all around had cherubim woven into the walls cherubim images of angels everywhere on the sides and on the on the up on the ceiling beautiful artistic design of cherubim woven into the tabernacle curtains the tent uh the ceiling of the tent of meeting and then that that remember what separated it was a four to six inch curtain uh separating the holy place from the from the the most holy place of where we just were we then went into the holy place that big curtain, separated it, and on that veil was beautiful colors and purple colors, and woven on that particular veil were cherubim again. All on that big veil, cherubim. We've looked at the cherubim. They guarded the way to the tree of life in the Garden of Eden, remember? The cherubim surrounded the throne when Isaiah saw. All of it's symbolic of God's throne, that he symbolically dwelt there. And this firewall around the throne of God's glory shielding with the wings up as Isaiah saw so that the glory didn't escape and consume. That was how they understood it. Then in the next room, you had the cherubim woven again into the walls, the ceilings and the walls of the tent. That room had a massive veil sealing off the people from entering. This is the second room now the holy place most holy place holy place and then we're going to come to the court in the second level if you will there were signs of god's immediate presence to israel remember what we studied the lamp stand that the table of showbread we're going to look uh soon at the altar of incense everything in the the the holy place was pure gold radiating from the glory outside the second level was of the of the tabernacle was the court the court everything in the court you'll notice was made in bronze so you almost have three levels presented here god in the most holy place symbolically dwelling on the throne and putting this together the inner room corresponds to where God dwells in His holiness, distinct from the second level, which is the outer room corresponding. And many have picked this up, and I think it's somewhat compelling, that you have a sort of structure, as we understand things, of the visible heavens. Think of Genesis 1. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Speaking about the invisible realm that we don't have access to. We know angels were created at some point. The cherubim were created at some point. You don't have the details to that, but he created the heavens and the earth. And then, of course, once the earth was created, there became the heaven that's visible to us, which we look up and see. And what do you see when you look up? You see moon, you see a sun, you see clouds you see blue beautiful blue you see colors well that corresponds to what we look up and see on the entrance to the door to the holy place if you ever look at what they communicated before they entered into the when they entered the courtyard they looked toward the structure there on the door were images of the moon the sun the stars you look at this and how they're depicted on these curtains as the jews used to to convey this and you'll see this the clouds i think it's interesting to note and it's been received that many in the jewish tradition have pointed out and i think you can make that case from the text that these two rooms didn't even touch the earth you'll notice that the tabernacle was raised up in the last chapter on all these sockets and bases and and it held up the entire tabernacle so that none of it touched the earth the whole design was teaching us something and israel something of god's holiness that he is the creator and his separateness and yet it was teaching he desired to come and dwell with them and be with them think of the language of the psalms when david would cry out He bowed the heavens and came down to me. Ezekiel describes this in chapter 1. When in chapter 1 of Ezekiel, the throne is present on the earth and the wheels are moving. It's a moving throne with rims. These were great looking rims, let me tell you. Presence is what Exodus is communicating to us. now from these rooms we move to the courtyard verse 18 tells us the dimension of the courtyard um it would be hard for us to grasp it it says it's 100 cubits breadth 50 height five cubits and the hangings of fine twine linen and bases of bronze probably around 75 feet by 150 feet And it's been estimated, to get an idea, at around 10,000 feet, the whole structure, meaning that it's roughly the size of four tennis courts. Four tennis courts. Around it, he instructed them to make beautiful white linen fence around the courtyard. It goes on to describe in some detail the north side. You caught all this in the reading, I'm sure. The west and the east, a total of 60 pillars into 60 bases, all giant joined by these 60 bands and hooks holding up the white linen curtains. The fence was about eight feet tall. So if you stood maybe far away, you could see the hustle and bustle going on in the courtyard. You can get an idea of what was happening. In verse 16 and 17, you have the door described. Another screen, very similar to the veil hanging from the holy place. And this is the detail then given for this court of the tabernacle. Well, let's somewhat put this together tonight in a way that I hope helps you to understand and see fulfillment in this. You had basically boundaries and places where worshipers could go and limits. This has been very important for understanding the holiness of God, hasn't it? We've been studying this. It was a danger zone. You had cherubim who would strike you down if you came into the worship sloppily and did what you wanted to do. It was a danger zone in worship. Everyone understood that. As a matter of fact, just so you have an understanding of this, in Psalm 50, and you could go to even Ecclesiastes 5, but I'll just read this. Mark this then, you who forget God, lest I tear you apart, and there be none to deliver. The one who offers thanksgiving as his sacrifice glorifies me. To the one who orders his way rightly, I will show salvation. It was David Fetis in the Christian Reformed Church years ago, lamenting what had happened about worship in Reformed churches, who wrote on this passage and says, Do we realize that worship's a danger zone? Danger zone. How you come is very important. That pastor, David Fettis, wrote a helpful article on that and I've never forgotten that based on Psalm 50. Ecclesiastes 5 says the same thing and it emphasizes something about the worship of the Lord and even a sort of call to worship in considering the worship. Guard your steps when you go to the house of the Lord. Draw near to listen. To listen is better than to offer the sacrifice of fools. For they don't know that they're doing evil. Be not rash with your mouth. Control yourself. Nor let your heart be hasty to utter a word before God. For God is in heaven and you are on earth. Therefore, let your words be few. And he goes on. You can read that. Ecclesiastes 5. They understood this about worship. They got this. And the New Testament was no different when in Hebrews it says, careful when you come. God's a consuming fire. Now, this all communicated that, that there were boundaries to the worship of the Lord, but when they came trusting in the sacrifice, looking to Christ, this was one of the most joyful things you could do. And so notice here then, you had these boundaries. Only the high priest could enter the most holy place. And he would go in there once a year and on the throne he would take blood and he would sprinkle it on the throne symbolic of the one who would come and pay for our sins the priest would be about the holy place serving in there ministering to the needs of the people from the source of life bread light life i'll come back to the altar of incense but in the courtyard israel could enter And this has a lot of meaning for what the Lord was teaching Israel. The message was clear. Outside the tabernacle, outside the court, were the Gentiles. No Gentiles came into Israel, this court. The common Israelite could. So the first meaning here, and what God wanted Israel to understand was, God had set apart his people from the world. Really important point. This is what he says in chapter 29 of verse 43. You'll look at that. Exodus chapter 29 verse 43. If you flipped over there, you'd see this. Look at what God's intention is here. There I will meet with the people of Israel and it shall be sanctified by my glory. I will consecrate the tent of meeting and the altar Aaron also and his sons I will consecrate to serve me as priest. I will dwell among the people of Israel and be their God. And they shall know that I am the Lord their God who brought them out of the land of Egypt, that I might dwell among them. I am the Lord their God. This is telling us the intention of Him coming down. I'm going to dwell among them. How does a holy God dwell among His people without consuming Him? That's the question of the Exodus that we're going to answer. But I think for now it's important to to remember that the New Testament takes this principle of separateness from what is worldly and applies it to the church. Listen to this. This is 2 Corinthians 6. What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said, I will dwell in them and walk among them. I will be their God and they shall be my people he's quoting this they therefore come out from among them be separate from the world this is what he's saying don't touch what is unclean and i'll receive you i'll be a father to you and you shall be my sons and daughters says the lord almighty god was commuting this communicating this to israel that he chose them to be his people calling them to be a holy nation separating them in the courtyard taught this this is where worship was happening this was the worship this is where they gathered and they would gather before the courts and they wanted to be in the courts this went all the way through to later the temple in solomon's temple the jews in that day had actually constructed a four court system superimposed to sort of keep people farther away so in christ's day you had the most holy place you had the holy place and then you had the innermost court for the priests and then you had the court of men and then you had the court of women and then you had the court of gentiles where jesus was this morning flipping stuff over so you can kind of get an idea and then right at before that where the the gentiles were there was a sign, a massive sign that said, any foreigner that goes beyond this point is under the pain of death. It's right there. That was the court system in Jesus' day. Now, the basic point is, is Israel understood if they had come in faith, this is what Jesus was after, They had understood what all this pointed to. It was the greatest blessing to be there. You find it all over the Psalms. One of my favorites we'll sing after the sermon tonight. My soul longs, yes, it even faints for the courts of the Lord. My heart and flesh cry out for the living God. For a day in your courts is better than a thousand. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of wickedness. This is the spirit of true worship, the attitude. Iniquities prevail against me, Psalm 65. As for our transgressions, you'll provide atonement. Blessed is the man you choose and cause to approach you, that he may dwell in your courts. We shall be satisfied with the goodness of your house, of your holy temple. One thing I've desired, that of the Lord I will seek, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life to behold the beauty of the Lord and inquire in his temple. These are all over the place. What made this possible? What was this? When you walked in the courtyard, you looked up and right before the door, right before the door to the holy place, you know what was there? A big altar. in the middle of the courtyard, he says, I want you to put it right there. Right in the center so everyone sees it. Right in the path. You make an altar of acacia wood. Square. I want horns on the altar. You'll know later that had quite a history of people grabbing onto horns. Right in the middle to the way of the tent of meeting, Seven feet wide, seven feet long, four feet high, four horns on the end, sat this bronze altar. The amazing thing is it never stopped burning, ever. Before you entered, you would have been exposed to in the courtyard a mess. I mean, we're all on our Sunday best, right? I can tell you, you stunk when you left. smoke, ash, blood is everywhere blood is everywhere listen to Leviticus 6 and the fire on the altar shall be kept burning on it it shall not be put out and the priest shall burn wood on it every morning and lay the burnt offering and order on it he shall burn it on the fat of the peace offerings a fire shall always be burning on the altar It shall never go out. And then Leviticus says there were five offerings that would typically go on it. You had the burn offering where the whole animal was burned as an offering for sin, speaking of their consecration to God that was going on every morning and evening. And then you had the grain offering, the harvest presented to God as a thanksgiving offering for His provision. You had the fellowship offering in which part of an animal was sacrificed and part eaten by the worshiper which symbolized reconciliation and communion between God and man. And he had the sin offering which taught the need of atonement. What was the point of this? Blood. Lots of it. Thousands of years this thing burned. Always burning. Always burning. Never stopped burning. You can't help but to begin putting this together to think of the Garden of Eden when after Adam and Eve's sin that the Lord shed an animal to cover them. He performed the first sacrifice. And then you realize that it had always been taught throughout history that without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sin. God required this. Don't you see him proclaiming the gospel right there? Always. There was no other way to come. Smoke went up. Smoke went up constantly. They would just see from this structure, smoke constantly in the air. Well, if you look at the tabernacle as a structure of the heavens, think about what just happened then. You haven't studied one piece of furniture yet. In the holy place, there was something that sat right in front of the door to the most holy place. You know what it was? The altar of incense. Well, what was that declaring? As smoke from the bronze altar went up into the holy place, it was a sweet-smelling aroma to God as it went into the most holy place. The New Testament picks all this up. Atonement's being made. This is what God required. Now we know the blood of bulls and goats didn't forgive sins. And I want you to turn one place with me tonight. And I want you to turn to Hebrews 13. And we'll close with this. Think of the Christian Gospels. You read this. God would provide the sacrifice of atonement. It would be His Son. God did not spare His own Son, Romans 3. As the sacrifice of atonement, the propitiation through faith in His blood, sacrifice after sacrifice after sacrifice, day after day after day, then comes the sacrifice who is Jesus. Listen to Hebrews 13. Verse 9. Do not be carried about with various and strange doctrines. I notice I put my translation here in this one. Let me get there so I am reading the same thing that you're reading. It says, Hebrews 13, beginning at verse 9. Do not be led away by diverse and strange teachings, for it's good for the heart to be strengthened by grace, not by foods which have not benefited those devoted to them. We have an altar from which those who serve the tent have no right to eat. For the bodies of those animals whose blood is brought into the holy places by the high priest as a sacrifice for sin are burned outside the camp. So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through His own blood. Therefore, let us go to Him outside the camp and bear the reproach He endured. For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come. through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to god no more blood that is the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name you want service there it is the sacrifice of praise with lips that acknowledges his name in worship do not neglect to do good and to share what you have for such sacrifices are pleasing to God. Wow. Sacrifice of praise. Isn't it amazing? Because the one blood sacrifice of His body has been offered up for us. Now our whole life is a sacrifice of praise. That's how the Lord presents it. By one sacrifice of the perfect Lamb, you're there. The veil is split from top to bottom. Remember when Jesus said it's finished, the veil was split. You enter the most holy place by His blood. Therefore, brethren, having confidence by the blood of Jesus to enter the most holy place. Not with the blood of bulls and calves, but, says Hebrews, by His own blood, He entered the most holy place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. That's Hebrews 9. By that, we will have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Hebrews 10.10. How do you see why I put so much emphasis on worship? I close with this thought. Haven't I made the case that coming to worship is coming into the most holy place now? What if we really believed that when we came here? You're not going to run around and be goofy. You're going to say, we're there. You're going to show reverence and awe. there's two ways you can go create an idol it's not worth coming back to if you refuse him you're not even going to want to be here you'll never be able to relate to the psalms that say it is so wonderful to be and now you can say in the most holy place that's fulfillment you're not going to relate to that but the value of worship demonstrates an understanding in our hearts of the marvelous sacrifice that was performed on your behalf. That's what drives your worship. That you are now able to be there in spirit and in truth. Because He did that for you. And Revelation says that if you understand that and you appreciate that, you understand you've been brought into the gates. Well, this is the destiny. This is the picture of the destiny of all. You're either going this way or that way. So Revelation concludes it. Blessed are those who do his commandments. They may have the right to eat of the tree of life and may enter through the gates into the city, but outside are dogs, sorcerers, sexually immoral, murderers, and idolaters, whoever loves and practices a lie. You see, it's always been that. You're either heading in or you're heading out. Worship is heading to Him. Worship is saying, I've been brought there by the blood of Jesus and I'd rather dwell there any day than out there in the courts of wickedness, tents of wickedness. Christ has brought you there. So then that should change your whole perspective of worship that you do come with joy, lasting joy, real joy, reverent joy because of what it costs. Now, I'll just close with these verses. Blessed is the man whom you choose to dwell in your courts. He'll still be praising you. The righteous man, Psalm 92, the only, by the way, psalm for the Sabbath that has a morning and evening connection that shows this is what the worshipers did on the Sabbath. It was a rhythm. The righteous man will flourish like a palm tree. He will grow like a cedar in Lebanon planted in the house of the Lord. They will flourish in the courts of our God. Don't you want to be there? Let's pray. Heavenly Father, it takes faith because we still struggle with wanting to live by sight and wanting worldly amusement. special message that You've given to us. And what a special Savior. Jesus, meaning Savior, who saves us from all of our sins. And has brought us right before Your face so that we're not consumed. We give You glory tonight, reverencing Your name, bowing with holy awe in Your presence, understanding the great sacrifice once for all that was made so that we can be here with joy. Help us to recover a right view of worship and treasure the privilege of being before your courts and into the most holy place. We pray that this would be so for all Christians around the world. They would understand the great treasure they have. That God Himself is with us. Let us now adore Him and with awe appear before Him. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.