As we consider God's word this morning, we want to turn to Exodus chapter 28. Will you please turn with me to Exodus chapter 28. We're going to begin reading at verse 15 and read through verse 30. 15 through 30 in Exodus chapter 28. This passage is found in the context of God giving commandments to Moses and Aaron as to how the tabernacle ought to be built and how the priests ought to function there. And even in this particular part of Exodus 28, pieces of the clothing that the high priests were to wear. And so we pick up then at verse 15, fashion a breast piece for making decisions, the work of a skilled craftsman. Make it like the ephod of gold and of blue, purple and scarlet yarn and a finely twisted linen. It is to be square, a span long and a span wide and folded double. Then mount four rows of precious stones on it. In the first row, there shall be a ruby, topaz, and a burial. In the second row, a turquoise, a sapphire, and an emerald. In the third row, a jacinth, and an agate, and an amethyst. In the fourth row, a chrysolite, an onyx and a jasper. Mount them in gold filigree settings. There are to be twelve stones, one for each of the names of the sons of Israel, each engraved like a seal with the name of one of the twelve tribes. For the breastpiece, make braided chains of pure gold like a rope. Make two gold rings for it and fasten them to the two corners of the breast piece. Fasten the two gold chains to the rings at the corners of the breast piece and the other ends of the chains to the two settings attaching them to the shoulder pieces of the ephod at the front. Make two gold rings and attach them to the other two corners of the breast piece on the inside edge next to the ephod. Make two more gold rings and attach them to the bottom of the shoulder pieces on the front of the ephod close to the seam just above the waistband of the ephod. The rings of the breast piece are to be tied to the rings of the ephod with blue cord, connecting it to the waistband so that the breast piece will not swing out from the ephod. And then these two verses really are our particular text. Whenever Aaron enters the holy place, he will bear the names of the sons of Israel over his heart on the breastpiece of decision as a continual memorial, continuing memorial before the Lord. Also put the Urim and the Thummim in the breastpiece so that they may be over Aaron's heart whenever he enters the presence of the Lord. And thus, Aaron will always bear the means of making decisions for the Israelites over his heart before the Lord. So far in the reading of God's word here in Exodus chapter 28, may he also bless it to our hearts and minds. You know, sometimes, people of God, when we are struggling with fear and sorrow and the issues of life, trouble and pain, we sometimes forget that God knows everything. But we need to be reminded today that the God who we serve, that is the God of the scriptures, that is the triune God, the only true God that there is, is a God who is omniscient. That is, God knows all things. And this fact about God, this truth about God, that God knows all things is certainly very troublesome to the unbeliever. Because you see, an unbeliever does not want God to know his thoughts. He does not want God to know all of his deeds. He would rather live in secret. He would rather live apart from God. But there's nothing hidden from the eyes of God. That's an amazing truth. We know so very little in comparison to God, but God knows everything. There is nothing hidden from his all-seeing eyes. Every thought God knows. That's troublesome for unbelievers. But for us, who are the children of God, this affords to us great comfort. And we know that God not only knows everything, but the precious thing about this truth is that he understands us. He knows us with a heart of compassion. He knows us in all of our needs. He understands. He does not forget us. There is nothing that can ever separate us from the knowledge of God. He knows us intimately. He knows us personally. He sympathizes with us in our fears and in our pain and in our troubles. Jesus Christ, as you know, lived here on the face of this earth. And therefore, he truly understands what it is to live in a world of sin, though he was without sin. He knows about death. My wife's brother passed away just recently at the age of 59. Unexpected. Face down, dead in the snow. That's how quick death comes. But he understands the sorrow. He understands the pain of aged parents having to say goodbye to a 59-year-old son. You see, Jesus lived here in this world of sin and sorrow. He understands our fears. But because Jesus Christ was victorious in overcoming sin and all of its consequences, he therefore gives us also the grace and the strength to live for him in the midst of all of this sinful mess in this world. And that's the comfort I hold out before you today. You and I live in a very technological and a very computerized world, do we not? And in such a world, we can become very much like a number. In the military, you are a name and a number. When you go to be a patient in a hospital, you might be 21-52-B. I drive down the highway and I am 6-STV-635. The government and the tax people know me by my social security number. But by God, we are not a number. Before God, he knows us intimately. He knows us personally. He forgets not his own, we sing together. And we rejoice in the marvelous blood of Jesus Christ that makes us not a number, but one of the very dear children of God who he knows by name. We look at the Bible, we see that it speaks to us on a number of occasions about God's intimacy, God's care, God's remembering his people. For example, in the early chapters of the book of Exodus, in Exodus chapter 2, the Bible tells us that the Israelites groaned in their slavery in Egypt and that they cried out, and their cry for help because of their slavery went up to God. And then this is what we read about God's gracious response. God, four active verbs now. God heard their groaning. God remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God looked on the Israelites, and he was concerned about them, says the NIV. Really, it is a word that means he knew them, and he knew them with compassion. That's the kind of God that we serve. And here in the passage that we have before us this morning, God also demonstrates that marvelous care and love for his people in a very interesting way, and we want to be reminded of that marvelous truth and care of God By looking at just one piece of the clothing that the high priests wore in the presence of God. I've entitled the message this morning, Christ Bearing Our Names. I want you to see the promised Christ, the suffering Christ, and then finally the victorious Christ. As we read this passage this morning, maybe you as boys and girls said, what is this passage? It's all about how things are to go in the tabernacle, these pieces of the high priest's clothes. Does this make any sense to us? When we read this part of the book of Exodus about tabernacle, about sacrifices and altars, the table of showbread and the laver and the candlestick, you and I might be confused. Why is it even in the Bible? Is it just a lot of ceremony going on here? Why is it there? What meaning does that have to do with us anyway? Why did these Old Testament saints have to go through all of these ceremonies anyway? And we need to be reminded that it wasn't just empty ceremony. We need to be reminded this morning that every part of what God instituted in his worship was something that pointed the people of God to the coming of Christ. So we might ask this morning ourselves the question, how were the Old Testament people saved? Were they saved by obedience to the law? Were they saved by just going through these ceremonies that God had instituted? Were the people in the Old Testament saved because they brought sacrifices to God? Absolutely not. They were saved in the same way that you and I are saved. By the grace of Jesus Christ through faith. The only difference was that the people of God in the Old Testament looked forward to the coming of Christ. They saw all of these pictures in the Old Testament of the coming work of Christ. And they laid hold in faith by the grace of Christ on that work of Christ still to come. And you and I are redeemed by laying our faith upon Christ Jesus' work that has been finished after Calvary. So you see, in a very real sense, when we look at the tabernacle and we look at all of these sacrifices and practices, They are fulfilled in Jesus Christ. You take the Ark of the Covenant, for example. You'll remember something, of course, about that rather smallish gold overlaid box. That little box, really, where two seraphim, two angels, cherubim, I'm sorry, had their wings outspread towards each other to cover the top of that box. And you will remember that the Ark of the Covenant had to be kept in the Holy of Holies, that place which represented the very presence of God, the very throne of God. And we remember from the Gospel of John, chapter 1, about Jesus' words. He said that he had come to dwell among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory of the only begotten Son of God. Well, it was on the top of that box that the high priest had to put some blood. Why did he have to put blood there? Well, he had to put blood there because of his own sins and because he wanted to teach the people about their sins being forgiven through the blood of the Lamb in the presence of Almighty and the Holy God so that that blood would atone for their sins, that they were looking forward to the Lord Jesus Christ. That's why the top of that ark was called the mercy seat. Now remember, boys and girls, that that ark was behind the curtain, that beautiful fabric woven curtain in the Holy of Holies, and nobody could go in there. You couldn't go into the Holy of Holies. Nobody could get in there apart from blood. Nobody could go in there lest you be struck down by the holiness of God. Nobody could come into the presence of God except the divinely appointed mediator, that is the high priest. And then he could only go in there with the blood for his sins, the blood for the people's sins, and only once a year. And always he had to come reminded that only by the grace of Christ who was coming could he even enter the presence of Almighty God. You see, all of these things in the Old Testament pointed forward to the work and the ministry of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Well, the same thing is true about the high priest's clothes. He couldn't just wear any clothes. The high priest had to wear clothes specifically mandated by God himself. He had to wear a special robe. He had to wear a special ephod. We're going to discover in a minute what an ephod is. We don't run around with ephods anymore, do we? He had to wear a very special breast piece, a wonderful turban on his head, a sash. But today we're going to particularly look at this breast piece, or as some of the older translations put it, a breast plate. This breast piece had a very special meaning to the people of God. God commanded Moses to make for Aaron, the high priest, a very beautiful breast piece. And only the high priest could ever wear that breast piece because he alone was the mediator between God and the people and the people and God. That breast piece fit right over his breast, his chest, his heart. And it fit over the top of the ephod. Now the ephod was worn over the robe. First of all, the priest had a robe on. Then over the top of it, an ephod, and that ephod was very beautiful. It was made of linen. It was made of blue and purple and scarlet thread with gold worked into it. And it reached down from the shoulders down to about where the hips are, fastened together here at the shoulders. We might say that an ephod was rather like a long vest worn over top of the robe. And up here at the shoulders, where the front and back came together, there were two large onyx stones. And on those onyx stones, on one were written six names of the children of Israel, and on the other, the other six names of the twelve tribes. And the breast piece fit right over that ephod. The breast piece was also made of gold and blue and purple and scarlet and finely twisted linen. In other words, it was a piece of cloth with gold settings on the front side for the placing of precious stones. It was about nine inches by nine inches a square. And the next time that you ladies do some baking, remember when you take out your nine by nine baking pan, That's the size of the ephod to fit right here. So every time you do baking now, you can remember the work of Christ. It was a square that fit right here over the heart. And the Bible says that it was folded double. It was folded over, apparently nine inches of cloth on the back, nine inches of cloth on the front. in order to form a sack, in order to form a bit of a pouch. And in that pouch were kept the urim and the thummim. We don't know exactly what the urim and the thummim were, but perhaps they were two stones that indicated a yes and a no. What we do know, of course, is that the urim and the thummim were used to make important decisions for the people of Israel. And so when Joshua, for example, wanted to determine the will of God, he consulted about the urim and the thummim. But there's still one other feature of this breast piece that I want to tell you about. On the front of the breast piece, set in gold, were four horizontal rows containing three precious stones each. And when I read from the NIV this morning, some of you who are following in a different translation said, man, he's really messing up the names of these gems. But the difficulty is in the Hebrew to be able to translate these particular gems. We don't know exactly what they were. But what we do know is that they were very, very precious stones set in three and by four. That is twelve, you see. One of those stones each for the twelve tribes of Israel. And on those stones were engraved the names of the twelve tribes of Israel. The Bible says that Aaron would bear the names of the sons of Israel over his heart whenever he went into the sanctuary as a continual memorial before the Lord. You see, the people couldn't go in before the Lord. The people couldn't get into the Holy of Holies. But Aaron could. Only the high priest could get into the Holy of Holies. But every time he went in there before God, every time he went before the mercy seat, every time he atoned for the sins of the people, every time he put blood on the mercy seat, the people went with Aaron by way of those stones. Because those stones, with the names of Israel on them, We're born into the very presence of God. So that we might say Aaron vicariously brings the people of God before the presence of God to present the people before the Lord. It's not as if God needed to be reminded of his people. Remember, he never forgets. He never forgets. He knows all things. But what a tremendous consolation for the people of Israel as they watched Aaron go into the tabernacle, knowing that he was going into the Holy of Holies, carrying their names before Almighty God. Their names were etched in stone. They would never be lost. They could never be erased. Those names were very, very precious in the sight of God. God would remember his people. And I'm reminded of those beautiful words in Isaiah chapter 49 where the people ask a question. Hasn't the Lord forgotten us? The Lord has forsaken us. The Lord has forsaken us. Now, what does God reply? Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has born? Though she may forget, God says, I will not forget you. See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands. Beautiful. So that no matter how small, no matter how large the tribe each was represented before God. And I want you to catch hold, really, of the significance of this morning. I want you to catch hold of something of the beauty of what's taking place here today, people of God. the high priest carried the people over his heart. The breast or the heart is the center of one's deepest emotions. It is the place of closeness. It is the place of the most tender of affections. Remember what God said in Isaiah chapter 40 when he speaks of the Lord who tends his flock like a shepherd. He gathers the lambs in his arms and he carries them close to his heart. Or as the older translations put it, he carries them in his bosom. Well, you see, Aaron was carrying the names of the people, the people. He was carrying them over his heart. A very precious object is something you carry over your heart. You have a boyfriend, you have a girlfriend maybe. And maybe you have a chain with a ring on that chain. And you carry that ring close to your heart. God carries us close to his heart. An official position is recognized on the shoulders. It's recognized on the arms. But a tender affection is carried on the heart. Well, what do you see here? You see, Aaron expressed both the official care and responsibility of God's people. There he had the names on those onyx stones on his shoulders. But he also carried them before the Lord over his heart. The high priest didn't just remember them in his mind. He held the sheep of God in his bosom as he brought them before the Lord. They were God's people. God knew them. The high priest knew them. The high priest knew their sin. The high priest shared in their sin. He knew their needs and so the high priest stood in deepest sympathy for those for whom he interceded. He brought them into the very presence of God to appear before God. And he brought the people of God that they might receive from him his illumination. For the people could always know the will of God, you see. What a marvelous picture this is of the work of Christ. The high priest carried the names of the people of God into his very presence. All of this in promise of the coming Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ. That's why when you come to think of it, and you come to think of Aaron the high priest, and all of those other priests, you begin to understand how inadequate they were. Because all of those priests were sinful, just like you and me. They had to take blood along with them for their own sins. For their own forgiveness, they were most inadequate. They had to be covered by the blood of the lamb. But you see, in that lamb, the people were being pointed forward to Jesus Christ, the high priest who suffered, who was killed, whose blood was shed for our redemption. You see, Jesus didn't come and just take the blood of another animal. Jesus became the priest and the sacrifice all at once. And when he hangs on the tree of the cross, suffering there as that lamb, he brings the people before Almighty God. He brings the unholy in themselves into the presence of the holy God so that as Hebrews 4 puts it he sympathizes with us bearing our names into the very presence of God he dies for his people he dies for his sheep he dies for his church and he knows us all by name I want to point out this morning that Jesus doesn't just die for a nameless blob of humanity He dies for people. He dies for particular people. He dies for particular people with a name. He dies for you and me, who are intimately known by him before the foundations of the world. And so what Jesus does in his death and resurrection is to bring the new Israel into God's presence so that the Lord might accept you and me on account of his blood. In his suffering, he bears our names before Almighty God. You see, we are united to him. We're united to him in his death so that when Christ dies, we die to sin. When he arose from the dead, we arose spiritually, victoriously. This spells victory for us. That's what the people saw in the breastpiece. But of course, Jesus did not stay dead, did he, boys and girls? He did not stay dead. Oh, we give thanks to God for that. He arose as the victorious one. And now our high priest, what's he doing? He has carried our names into the very presence of God in heaven. He entered heaven itself to appear before God on our behalf. We're the people of his choice. He's not forgotten us. Constantly, he brings our names and he brings our needs before the Heavenly Father. People of God, don't ever doubt that. And don't ever forget that. In the deepest woes of life, he has not only engraven you on the palms of his hands. He has engraven your name on his heart. He carries you in all of his sympathy, in all of his power, in all of his grace before the Heavenly Father. Oh, to be sure, we are also warned here because the names of unbelievers will be blotted out before God. Their names will not be found in the Lamb's book of life. What did Jesus say? Whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven. So that this morning, if you do not have this assurance, if you do not trust in Jesus Christ, then I call upon you in the name of Christ to repent. To stand before God in all of His holiness and to confess your unholiness. To cry out to this Christ for forgiveness and mercy. Because otherwise, your name will not appear before the Lord in His book of life. But Jesus not only said, whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven. Jesus also said, whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven. Listen, in another place he tells us this. For those of us who believe, I will never erase his name from the book of life, but will acknowledge his name before my Father and his angels. What a marvelous comfort this is for us. Interestingly enough, God even gives us his name. We read in the book of Revelation, I will write on him the name of my God and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which is coming down out of heaven from God, and I will write on him my new name. You see, even the new Jerusalem has names on it. The names of the tribes, 12 tribes of Israel are on its gates. The names of the 12 apostles are on the foundation. You and I are that new Jerusalem. And if you are so precious to him as that, That he puts his name upon you, his claim upon you, his mercy and his love upon you. If you are that precious to God, then remember and believe that he will be with you in the midst of every trial, every test, every sorrow that can possibly come your way. Because nothing will be able to separate us who are in Christ Jesus from the love of God. He bears your names into the very presence of the Heavenly Father. Do you know that comfort this morning? I pray that you do. And that someday you will experience it in all of its fullness. Amen. Oh, Father in heaven, what a merciful and mighty God you are. what a blessing to be able, Father, to know in this painting that you have made in the Old Testament of the work of Christ that we can understand, that we can comprehend something of the beauty of the work of Christ. Oh, we bless you from the bottom of our hearts for your work in Jesus Christ. Father, may we not only comprehend the joy and the blessing of your grace, but may we, O Lord, in gratitude, live out the implications of that glorious salvation that we have in Jesus, living for your glory, understanding anew the depths of your compassion and grace and mercy. Thank you for bearing our names, dear Savior, into our Father's presence. Thank you for your comfort and for the joy, for the assurance that is ours as a result of Jesus' work. We pray it in his name. Amen.