Thru the Bible

Guest (Male): Welcome to Through the Bible. Our five-year journey through the whole word of God continues, and today we're going to finish up the historical book of Exodus. Now, Dr. McGee says that preparing for Exodus was one of the most rewarding experiences in his life, and that's saying something. And I hope that you'll feel the same way about studying it. So, as you open your Bible, Greg and I have some time to share some exciting letters highlighting the growth and success of our home groups, particularly in India, which was the birthplace of our home groups. Wasn't it, Greg?

Dr. J. Vernon McGee: That is correct. Yeah, more than a decade ago now, George Philip was working with a partner ministry. Now, he's actually on our team. He retired and then started working with TTB. But he always had a heart for TTB. He's the Malayalam speaker. He says if you cut me, I bleed Dr. McGee. And he created this idea. And you were talking earlier about

Guest (Male): Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. J. Vernon McGee: how how the medium has changed in India.

Guest (Male): Yeah, India originally when I started in the '90s being the host, I was just so impressed with the volume of letters from terrestrial radio. I mean, we had like the numbers were like 15,000 a month plus. And the languages were much smaller. But guess what? The world changed, and slowly that count started diminishing. And George seeing that happening went through a whole process and came up with the home group movement. And it really has become a movement in India. And today we are seeing so much fruit. But I just think it it speaks to you know, if you're listening and you're wondering, oh, how is Through the Bible changing?

Because you know, their speakers, that same guy, Dr. McGee, and it's we're on our 12th cycle. Well,

Dr. J. Vernon McGee: Yeah, it was huge. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Guest (Male): good Bible teaching systematic throughout the entire all 66 books taking 5 years to go through it is a great way to go. And we're going to continue to do that, but we may change the delivery methods. And the home groups are a way to start doing that. And the benefit of that is we get to go into people's heart languages, which we've talked many times about where that person, the person we're going to be listening about Tripura, but they probably speak India Hindi, and they also probably speak English to some extent. But their heart language is something different.

And it's those smaller languages that really seem to have the greater impact on people's souls. And that's the end game for us anyway.

Dr. J. Vernon McGee: Yes. Yeah. Mhm. Yes, probably. Yeah, and I and I think if you're hearing this, what we want you to know is we work very hard. We don't just set things on autopilot. We are constantly monitoring everything we do around the world in 250 languages. And that's one reason we've been staffing up is we have people watching over all these projects. But let's get to the to the response. You want to read this first one?

Guest (Male): Yeah. Yes. As previously mentioned, this is a listener in Tripura. I'm not going to go into the background of the area, but here's the here's the testimony. Listening to the word of God together with the radio home group has changed both my lifestyle and my spiritual life. Earlier, I never studied the word of God or spent personal time with him. I would only go to church on Sundays and return without understanding the importance of what was spoken. However, after listening to the audio Bible study every week, I realized how important God's word truly is. Not only is it important to know the word, but also we need to read it, and the Holy Spirit needs to speak it into our lives.

I then began to study the word regularly, and the Holy Spirit spoke to me and corrected me in many areas of my life. Because of this, my life has changed greatly.

Dr. J. Vernon McGee: Wow, and that is actually in a language called Chin Falam, which is spoken, believe it or not, in Myanmar. But there are a couple tens of thousands of people in the Tripura region of India that speak this. So, it's powerful.

Guest (Male): Yeah. Yeah. And And this is probably the only solid content in that language.

Dr. J. Vernon McGee: Oh, I think you'd be very on very solid ground to say that. So, here's another short but powerful response from a listener who said, I grew up Hindu worshiping millions of gods. I used to follow the same religion as my parents. Not long ago, I was invited to a home group, and God's word changed me. I have accepted Jesus Christ as my personal savior and want to lead a group of my own. Please pray for me.

Guest (Male): Yeah. Amen. And let's Let's do that right now. Heavenly Father, we do pray for this listener who has come to love your word and wants to be a part of a home group and lead that. I pray that you would give them the opportunity for that. I pray that you would bless that home group and the many hundreds of thousands that are out there in India and in South Asia and throughout the world. Bless our study now in Exodus, Lord, as we look at Exodus 39 and 40 in Jesus' name. Amen. Here's Dr. J. Vernon McGee with our study of Exodus 39 and 40 on Through the Bible.

Dr. J. Vernon McGee: Now, friends, as we come to the 39th chapter of the book of Exodus, and if you have your Bible, we'll turn there, and I trust you have our notes and outlines. And we will now offer the notes on the Gospel of Mark. And I'm sure many of you have those because that'll be the next book that we'll go to. And this is our last study in Exodus. This has been for me one of the most rewarding studies that I've had. You see that a great many people say, well, you don't seem to have any opportunity to hear others preach.

And I only have when I go to conferences where there are other speakers. And it's always a blessing to my heart to hear them, but I hear so little of it. And someone says, well then, how are you blessed? Well, you know when you put warm water through a spigot, the spigot will warm up. And if you put cold water through a spigot, the spigot will get cool. Well, when you put the word of God through a preacher or a teacher, it'll have some effect on him. And I find that just studying the word of God this way, sitting down with the Bible and teaching each day has been for me one of the most rewarding experiences.

And the book of Exodus has blessed my own heart in a new way and has given me uh greater understanding and appreciation of our wonderful Lord. I hope it's had the same value for you also. Now, as we come to this 39th chapter, which is actually not the last chapter, we have chapters 39 and 40 today. Now, I have before me the chart of the tabernacle as usual, but we will just look at it in a casual sort of way today because chapter 39 deals with the garments of the high priest. That is the garments that he wore.

And these garments, by the way, all speak of the person of Christ. And I will begin reading here, and then we're not going to attempt to read this section because we've had the blueprint before. I should say of garments. It 's not a blueprint, but I think you ladies call it a pattern. And we've had the pattern, and now they have been made. And Aaron will be clothed with these garments. And notice what is said concerning them. I'm reading now chapter 39 verse 1. And of the blue and purple and scarlet, they made cloths of service to do service in the holy place and made the holy garments for Aaron as the Lord commanded Moses.

Notice their call here, holy garments. And we read here, and he made the effort of gold, blue and purple and scarlet, fine twined linen. And then we go into details concerning that. And then there was the curious girdle of his effort. And curious means simply this, curious is something we generally apply to a human being or even to an animal, but not to an inanimate thing. But it's curious in the sense that it was an unusual way in which it was woven. It was not just a simple one. It helped not only the robe of the effort, but it helped all the garments that the high priest wore held them in order and in place.

Then it talks about the breastplate here. And now these are called in this chapter garments of glory and beauty. And a great emphasis is put upon the miter which Aaron wore on his head. And it had on it in verse 30 we're told holiness to the Lord. All of these things now have to do with this. And we're told they brought the tabernacle unto Moses and all his furniture and all this and the covering of the ram skin and all of that. So that now when it's all completed, it's all brought to Moses so that the last thing actually that's mentioned are the garments of the high priest.

Now, I want us to take a look at these garments of the high priest because it's very important as the high priest speaks of Christ. That is something you couldn't miss because we're told that very definitely that the garments speak of the high priest and of Christ as our high priest, by the way. And now we have given here these instructions. Now, basically, Aaron wore what all the other priests wore. And that was a linen garment. All of them were clothed in that fine twined white byssus Egyptian linen. They had on this linen garment, and it had on it sort of a pants that it wore because their nakedness was not to be revealed.

Although they didn't serve barefooted apparently in the tabernacle. And Aaron as the high priest was dressed like the others basically. And on the great day of atonement, when he took the blood and went into the Holy of Holies, he laid aside all the garments of beauty and glory, the outward garments, and just wore this. Now, the linen, the white linen that the priests wore speaks of righteousness. You remember the scripture says that those that bear the vessels of the Lord are to be clean. God still says that. I do not believe that God uses a sinful preacher or teacher or a sinful layman today.

God's not using them. And I don't care how prominent they are, and I don't care about their talent and how many people they influence. They're doing nothing for God. He doesn't accept it. And it'll be nothing but wood, hay, and stubble. But we must be clothed with the righteousness of Christ. And then there must be a life to back that up. That is certainly taught in these basic garments. Now, the thing that interests me are these garments of glory and beauty that are laid aside by Aaron when he went in to the Holy of Holies, when he offered the sacrifice for the sin of the people.

That great day of Yom Kippur, the great day that was the beginning actually of days for these people. What an important thing it was. And he took that basin of blood within. Well, now the Lord Jesus came to this earth. He did not lay aside his deity, but he did lay aside the garments of glory and beauty. What's that? He laid aside his prerogatives of God. He laid aside the Shekinah glory. And he came just as a human being. He was born a baby. There was George McDonald that said he came a little baby thing that made a woman cry.

And they were looking for a king to lift them high. But he came just a little baby thing that made a woman cry. That's the way he came into the world. The garments of glory and beauty were laid aside. There should have been instead of just that few paltry number of shepherds there and the wise men that came later. The whole world should have been there. But he laid that aside, friends. He was God manifest in the flesh. What a picture you have here. And when he offered himself, you see he died in his humanity.

I don't quite buy that idea that God died on the cross. It's only what you mean by death. He was separated from God. That is true. That was a rift in the Godhead to be sure when he was made sin for us who knew no sin. But even at that moment, God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself. There's a mystery there, friends, that I can't penetrate. And I've read after a few of the theologians, and you want to know something, they haven't penetrated it either. Now, these garments of beauty and glory really were lovely.

The high priest, my, he was gaudy and colorful. And all of these things speak of the person of Christ. And we'll not go over this because most of you follow this study, but some of you may not have followed it. He had on this robe of the effort. And it had these two stones, one on each shoulder, and six of the names of the tribes of Israel on each one of the shoulders. Speaks of his strength and ability. That is speaks of the strength and ability of our great savior who when one sheep got lost, he went out and found it, put it on his shoulder.

Thank God we have a savior, friends, that can go out and put us on his shoulder and bring us back. And he's able to save to the uttermost those who come unto God through him. Then you have that breastplate like a vest. And it had 12 stones on it. Oh, was it a thing of beauty. And apparently it had in it a sort of a pocket where the Urim and Thummim were placed. And it had something to do with prediction. I do not know how it worked at all. But these beautiful stones right on this breastplate.

Now, this speaks of the fact that Christ carries us on his heart today. He loved us. God so loved the world, and he loved the church, and he gave himself for it. There are the stones there that depict that. And there were stones of beauty. And this was part of it. Now, down there on the robe of the effort, there were golden bells and pomegranates. And so when the high priest, you see, was serving, you could hear those bells ringing. When he went in the holy place, he was in there serving, you know. You could hear the bells outside ringing.

And the pomegranate, that speaks of fruit, the fruitful life. And the bell speaks of the testimony of the life. They could hear him. And they could say, well, you know he is there serving for us. We know he is there. And that's what worship ought to mean to us. It ought to draw us to the person of Christ. We don't hear the bell ringing, friends, on Sunday morning, there's something wrong. I used to have an elder that was a very wonderful man of God. He was great encouragement to me as a young preacher. And he would come out on Sunday morning, and he'd always say to me, well, you rang the bell today.

Well, if you want to know the truth, I didn't. I was a young preacher then, and I had some lousy sermons that I preached in those days. I still have those sermons, by the way. But nevertheless, his point was because he was a Bible student. The important part of the service is that we'll be able to come into the presence of Christ. And I told you about the fellow. He was a country boy down there in Georgia. And he came to me one Sunday morning. I never shall forget. And he waited till everybody left, and he took my hand and held it, and tears were coming down his eyes.

And he said, you know, I never knew Jesus was so wonderful before. And he wouldn't say something else, but he couldn't say it. He just released my hand, turned, walked out of the little country church, out across the cotton patch that was there because we were right in the corner of a cotton patch. I watched him walk across, and then tears came in my eyes as I said, oh God, I hope I can preach that everybody will be able to say, at least somebody will be able to say, I didn't know how wonderful Jesus was.

Well, may I say, we ought to be able to hear his bells on Sunday morning and not hear all this protest or running up the American flag and all of these things that are used today as gimmicks in our churches and in so-called Christian work today. Friends, if any Christian work doesn't let you hear the bells every now and then, maybe you ought to get in another Christian work. Or maybe you think you're hearing bells when you're not hearing them. And that's about the worst thing you can have happen to you is to think you hear them when you don't.

But you see these bells were ringing on the inside. What a glorious wonderful picture this is of the high priest. And these were the garments that he wore. And I had this miter on it, and that said holiness unto the Lord. And that meant holiness, oh, it does have to do with the inner life. But the important thing is it means this man is totally given to the work of the ministry. Holy means anything that is set aside for the use of God. And I'd like to say this to some of you today. And I've been a preacher a long time, but you know there are great many people that want a preacher to do everything under the sun.

I think many of those people would rather for him to be doing all these other things, socializing, backslapping around, holding somebody's hand, and nursemaid, as one preacher said to me, the poor fellow had a nervous breakdown in his church. They told me, he says, you know, said I find I'm a wet nurse for a lot of little babes in Christ. And he says, I just go around burping them all the time. Well, that's the unfortunate thing. Preacher today who stands in the pulpit ought to be able to wear the miter holiness unto the Lord. That is that he has time to prepare a message.

He has time to spend before God. I'm amazed today the number of people that invite a preacher out on Saturday night. You ought not to invite your preacher out Saturday night. You ought to let him have that day and that evening for meditation and study. I had an elder say to me one time, in fact my first minister, I want to go around visit everybody, and I was around visiting day and night. And the first church I served in Nashville in this elder said to me now Vernon, he said, I appreciate you coming to see me.

But he said, I'll tell you what I'd like for you to do. I'd like you to spend the time that you'd come to see me spend it in preparation of a message. He said, business is difficult, and I get very weary and discouraged in the world today. And this was a very successful businessman. He said, but when I come to church Sunday morning and Sunday night, I want to hear something that comes from God. I want help there. And he says, I hope you'll spend time so I'll be able to hear from heaven on Sunday morning and Sunday night.

Well, I think he had a right to say that. My friend, we need to recognize today that there ought to be that miter. And there are many of us laity that need to if we say we're dedicated to the Lord, we ought to mean it. Now, I have left very little time for this 40th chapter. What you have here is the setting up of the tabernacle. And I only wanted to left out one thing because we have dealt with every article of furniture, every part of the tabernacle. And when Moses set it up in the camp of Israel, this is what happened.

Verse 34 of chapter 40 now. Then a cloud covered the tent of the congregation, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. And Moses was not able to enter into the tent of the congregation because the cloud abode thereon, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. And when the cloud was taken up from over the tabernacle, the children of Israel went onward in all their journeys. But if the cloud were not taken up, then they journeyed not till the day that it was taken up. For the cloud of the Lord was upon the tabernacle by day, and fire was on it by night in the sight of all the house of Israel throughout all their journeys.

When Paul attempts to identify these people over in the ninth chapter of Romans, he says, who are Israelites? And of the things he enumerates, that one is they had the glory. They are the only people that ever had the visible glory of God, the visible presence of God. And that was what led them. That cloud would lift in the morning if they were to journey. And if it didn't lift, the children of Israel stayed in the camp. They didn't attempt to move that day. They didn't move by their own wisdom or their own judgment. And they didn't vote on it.

And Moses didn't make the decision, the cloud did. Now, we sometimes say this, and I think in our conservative churches it's pretty meaningless today. We say Christ is the head of the church. How about your church? Is he the head of the church? Are we following the cloud today, or do we put a man on the board because we say, well, you know he's a successful businessman. My friend, that's not the reason to put him on the board. That ought not to exclude him. Don't misunderstand, but that ought not to be the reason. And you hear people say today, well, I want to talk to my preacher about whether I should do this or not.

A lot of people consult me on things I'm no expert at telling them what to do. I can't solve their marital problems. And by the way, the psychologists can't either. May I say to you, there's the pillar cloud today, but you don't see it. You know, it's the Holy Spirit of God. And he ought to be the one to lead us and to guide us and let us know that we're in the will of God. Oh, how this is neglected today. We're always appealing to something human and something outside. We need a church. We need preachers.

We need teachers. We need laymen. We need church members that are filled with the Holy Spirit of God. There are too many of them that are just spouting off, talking. And they're talking without any unction at all coming from heaven. Pay no attention to the word of God. I have been to church board meetings and listened to officers just spout off. No reference at all to what the word of God says or what might be God's will. Just this constant wanting to put forward our own way. My friend, there's no visible cloud over the church today, but the Holy Spirit of God wants to lead us and guide us.

And this book that we just now concluded is a very wonderful book. Did you notice? Again, it opened in gloom in the brickyards of Egypt, and it closes in glory. The presence of the Lord is there in the tabernacle now and leading these people through the wilderness. God today wants to deliver you from the gloom of the slavery of sin and bring you into the glory of his presence and in the very center of his will that he might lead you and guide you. What a wonderful book, Exodus. He leads you out that he might lead you into a good land.

Until next time, may God richly bless you, my beloved.

Guest (Male): Now, next time we're going to begin our study of the Gospel of Mark. It's a completely different study from Exodus. Mark is a fast-paced book of action. You're going to love it. To download notes and outlines for our study, just get our app if you want or visit ttb.org or call 1-800-65 Bible if we can help you find them. Until next time, God bless you as you walk with him.

Guest (Male): Our story on the Bible Bus today is just one step in a five-year journey through the entire word of God. Come along for the ride, and you'll study both the Old Testament and New Testament discovering God's great redemption story. Is this your story, too?