Serving in His Sanctuary

Screams echoed through the camp. It was about to be one of the most terrifying days of the wilderness journey. Forty percent of Israel's priests were charred to a crisp. Nadab, son of Aaron and nephew of Moses, was dead. So was his brother Abihu. Less than a year earlier, Israel had been tasked to be a priest-nation to the world, and within it, some would serve as priests to the priest-nation. Aaron and his two oldest sons Nadab and Abihu were among the select few who, standing on the untouchable mountain, glimpsed God with their eyes and feasted with him. After the golden calf, Israel was deprived of having the firstborn head of each family act as its priest. Instead, the immense honor of priesthood was confined to Aaron and his sons Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar, with their entire tribe of Levi dedicated to holy service, trading a share in the land for a share in the Lord. This same Lord had given the Levites and the ordained priests strict regulations about how to approach him. But instead of taking holy fire from the altar, Nadab and Abihu got theirs elsewhere. Was it convenience? Pride? Too much to drink? Whatever the cause, they burned incense with strange fire, claiming the right to do worship their way. To which God shouted no, in flame and fury and fatality (Leviticus 10:1-3).

Time passed – was it months, or was it years? But one day, a grumbling spread through Israel. Some Levites stood up, led by Moses' cousin Korah, and other Israelites, led by the Reubenites Dathan and Abiram. And they insisted on the priesthood of all Israelites – wasn't the whole congregation holy? Then how come Aaron and his family got these special privileges? So hundreds challenged the authority of Moses, and they dared to demand the priesthood from Aaron. So Moses set a contest: they were free to approach and burn incense, and see how it turned out. Korah and his cohorts seized a place not their own in Israel's worship. For their crime, those who weren't Levites were swallowed up by the earth, while the rebellious Levites suffered the fate of Nadab and Abihu – fire came out from the Lord's presence and consumed them. For complaining about it the next day, Israel was afflicted with a sudden disease outbreak, which only Aaron's ministry could stop (Numbers 16).

To hear those two stories is to realize that God is not 'laid back' when it comes to our worship. He takes it very, very seriously. If he weren't, Nadab and Abihu and Korah and a whole lot of others would have lived out many more years than they did. No, God considers the sanctity of his worship to be a matter of life and death. And therefore he handed down to Israel a significant number of rules and regulations to guard and guide their life of worship in structured and ordered ways. Much later, ancient Jews saw that the Ten Commandments were like the chiseled bedrock of the entire Law, and so everything the Law said about the way that Israel should worship was filed under this First Commandment.¹ What was that to look like?

First, Israel was commanded to make the tabernacle, or tent of meeting – “a sanctuary, that [God] may dwell in their midst” (Exodus 25:8). It had to be built to the exact specifications that Moses saw on the mountaintop (Exodus 25:9), because the tabernacle was “a copy and shadow of the heavenly things” (Hebrews 8:5). It was a replica of heaven itself. So exact instructions were given for its curtains and clasps and frames and bars and veil and entry screen, and for its inner furnishings like the ark of the covenant and the table for sacred bread and the golden lampstand, and for its outer furnishings like the perimeter of its court and a bronze altar and a bronze basin and an incense altar (Exodus 25-30).

To serve the needs of that tabernacle, the tribe of Levi was appointed, with some among them – Aaron and his sons – alone chosen to be priests to the priestly nation. And those priests had very definite responsibilities. For one thing, they were responsible for teaching Israel theology and ethics – who God is and how to serve him. “They shall teach Jacob your rules and Israel your law” (Deuteronomy 33:10), “for the lips of a priest should guard knowledge, and people should seek instruction from his mouth, for he is the messenger of the LORD of hosts” (Malachi 2:7). Second, in the course of their duties, the priests would hear people's sins, so as to know what kinds of offerings should be given. Third, they were called on to inspect people's bodies and buildings, to act as judges of what things were clean and what things were unclean, with authority to quarantine (Leviticus 13-14). Fourth, priests were called on to sit in judgment of lawsuits: “The priests, the sons of Levi, shall come forward, for the LORD your God has chosen them to minister to him and to bless in the name of the LORD, and by their word, every dispute and every assault shall be settled” (Deuteronomy 21:5).

Fifth, maybe most importantly, it was their job to offer Israel's five kinds of sacrifice, which were essential to living in proximity to God. One type of sacrifice was the 'sin-offering,' which was meant to purge away the stain of moral wrong or ritual uncleanness (Leviticus 4:1—5:13; 6:25-30). Another type was the 'guilt-offering,' which was meant to repay God for having trespassed certain boundaries (Leviticus 5:14—6:7; 7:1-10). Still another type, which our Bibles translate as a 'grain offering,' is literally called a 'tribute-offering,' returned to God as a token of blessings and reminder of covenant loyalty (Leviticus 2:1-16; 6:14-18). Another type of sacrifice was the 'peace-offering,' meant to express peace and fellowship with God. It was a response to God's saving grace, and even the everyday people were allowed to have a bite (Leviticus 3:1-17; 7:11-18). Of that type, there was even a sub-type our Bibles might call a 'thank-offering,' a sacrifice of grateful acknowledgment, but the Greek Old Testament calls it “sacrifice of praise” (Leviticus 7:12-15). And the fifth type of sacrifice, which our Bibles call a 'burnt offering' or a 'whole burnt offering,' is actually an 'ascension-offering,' because it gets turned entirely into delicious-smelling smoke that ascends up to heaven – it signifies complete letting go and giving over to God (Leviticus 1:1-17; 6:9-13).

So the priests were the only ones who could offer these sacrifices. “Every priest stands daily at his service” (Hebrews 10:11), “appointed to act on behalf of humans in relation to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices” (Hebrews 5:1). And beyond that, Israel's priests oversaw other aspects of Israel's worship. They tended the fire of the altar, made sure the lampstand had enough oil to burn, replaced bread laid out on the holy table. They sounded the trumpets on holy days. And just as the story of Korah confirmed that priests were set apart even from other Levites, so the story of Nadab and Abihu confirmed that these priests had to follow a very specific method. But in return for all their work, they and the sanctuary received financial support from the people. Not only did they have exclusive right to eat portions of certain sacrifices, but they were supported by Israel's firstfruits and tithes. “The first of all the firstfruits of all kinds, and every offering of all kinds from all your offerings, shall belong to the priests” (Ezekiel 44:30). “To the Levites have I given every tithe in Israel for an inheritance, in return for the service they do” (Numbers 18:21).

So Israel had all these regulations laid out for their worship. But, we might ask, what does that have to do with now? The prophets saw a definite future for all these things. Through Jeremiah, God declared, “The levitical priests shall never lack a man in my presence to offer ascension-offerings, to burn tribute-offerings, and to make sacrifices forever” (Jeremiah 33:18). Through Malachi, God said that when the Lord finally came to his temple – in other words, the coming of Christ – “he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the LORD” (Malachi 3:3). Through Isaiah, God pledged that when he gathered the Gentile nations in, “some of them also will I take for priests and for Levites” (Isaiah 66:21), and so “the foreigners who join themselves to the LORD... to be his servants..., these I will bring to my holy mountain and make them joyful in my house of prayer; their ascension-offerings and their sacrifices will be accepted on my altar” (Isaiah 56:6-7). But through Malachi, God said: “From the east to the west, my name is great among the nations, and in every place incense is offered to my name, and a pure offering” (Malachi 1:11). Even some Jewish rabbis acknowledged that, when the Messiah came, he'd fulfill all sacrifices, but one would remain: the 'sacrifice of praise' would forever be offered.² How are these things fulfilled in our worship?

In Jesus Christ, of course! For “we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens: Jesus the Son of God” (Hebrews 4:14). Jesus was “designated by God a high priest” in a higher order than Aaron could have dreamed of (Hebrews 5:10). Jesus ministers now as “a high priest holy, innocent, unstained, separated from sinners, and exalted above the heavens” (Hebrews 7:26). And in Jesus Christ, the entire Church inherits the promises given to Israel. Israel was called to be “a kingdom of priests” to the world (Exodus 19:6), and so the Church is now the “royal priesthood” to the world (1 Peter 2:9), being also built up as God's new temple, “a holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 2:5). We all, together, have a priestly calling toward the world around us, just like Israel was to have.

But the early church also came to believe that, just like Israel's priesthood toward the world foreshadowed the Church's priesthood toward the world, so the priestly order within Israel foreshadowed a priestly order within the Church – those who minister in the Church, through whom Jesus continues to do for the Church all those things that the priests and Levites did for ancient Israel. The priesthood of the Church is no substitute for the priesthood in the Church – otherwise, Korah's only problem was being a visionary ahead of his time. And so, already in the Bible, we see the apostles given authority to do the sorts of things priests used to do. Just so, Paul described himself as Jesus' “minister... in the priestly service of God's gospel” (Romans 15:16). Paul even defends the right of gospel ministers to financial support from the church by identifying them with Israel's priests who had a right to be supported through Israel's firstfruits, tithes, and sacrifices (1 Corinthians 9:13-14).

Already in the first-century church, bishops or prophets were labeled “your high priests” and entitled to receive the firstfruits that used to go to the Temple in Jerusalem (Didache 13.3-7). Already in the first-century church, leaders trained by the apostles themselves identified the structured hierarchy of Israel's priesthood with the structures of ministry in the Church: just as Israel had proper orders and places for the high priest, the priests, the Levites, and the Israelites, so Christians were called to “strive to please God with a good conscience and with reverence, not transgressing the fixed rule of each one's own ministry.”³ By the end of the second century, the bishop was explicitly called the “high priest” for the church in any given local place,⁴ and the Church was explicitly said to have “priesthoods” (sacerdotia).⁵ (This was the same time the word 'Trinity' was coined.) By just two centuries after the cross, each bishop was ordained with a prayer that he'd “serve before [God] as high priest..., ceaselessly propitiating your countenance and offering the gifts of your holy church; and let him have the power of high priesthood, to forgive sins according to your command, to assign duties according to your command..., to please you in gentleness and with a pure heart, offering you the scent of sweetness.”⁶

As for Israel's sacrifices, Paul explains that Jesus offered himself as the final sin-offering (2 Corinthians 5:21). Jesus “appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself” (Hebrews 9:26), offering “for all time a single sacrifice for sins” (Hebrews 10:12). Isaiah had also prophesied that the death of the Messiah would be a guilt-offering – the final guilt-offering ever needed (Isaiah 53:10). Paul also describes Jesus' death in the language appropriate for an ascension-offering: “Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, an offering and sacrifice to God into an aroma of fragrance” (Ephesians 5:2). Christ fulfills it!

But the ancient church also believed that there were sacrifices the Church was called to offer, just as Israel had its sacrifices to offer. Paul compares the table of the Lord's Supper to the altar of Israel (1 Corinthians 10:18-21). The author to the Hebrews insists that “we have an altar from which those who serve the tent have no right to eat” (Hebrews 13:10) – but we do eat from an altar. Having had “our bodies washed with pure water” in baptism, believing with “full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience,” we enter holy places through Jesus' flesh and blood (Hebrews 10:19-22). And so, just as ancient Israel celebrated their own 'sacrifice of praise' – an actual sacrifice, surrounded by hymns and blessings – we, when we celebrate at our altar, “continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God” (Hebrews 13:15). People trained by the apostles all agreed that the Eucharist – we usually call it 'Communion' – was the sacrifice that fulfills the prophecies of Malachi and must be kept strictly pure (Didache 14.1-3). They described the work of bishops, and later other pastors, as “offering the gifts,” that is, sacrificing.⁷ Just as Israelites connected to worship at the altar by cooperating with the ministry of the priests, so early Christians said they connected to worship at the altar by cooperating with the ministry of the clergy.⁸ They explained how a church has “one sacrificial altar” on which is celebrated “one eucharist, for there is one flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ and one cup of unity in his blood.”⁹

This is the sacrifice of praise, the peace-offering, and the tribute-offering of the Church, which brings us back to the one sin-offering and guilt-offering. Through it were offered up to God the acts of charity and good deeds carried out by each Christian: “Don't neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God” (Hebrews 13:16). Christians lay down their whole lives by presenting their “bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is [our] spiritual worship” (Romans 12:1). And indeed, in the early church, the logical extension of that living sacrifice was a sacrifice that could end in the death of the body: martyrdom. Ignatius of Antioch, who became a martyr, said he hoped that martyrdom would make him “a sacrifice for God,”¹⁰ and Polycarp of Smyrna, disciple of John, “was bound like a ram marked for sacrifice out of a great flock, a whole-burnt offering,” praying that Jesus Christ, the “eternal and heavenly high priest,” would receive his life and death “as a rich and acceptable sacrifice.”¹¹

For Israel, keeping the First Commandment involved receiving and maintaining the sons of Aaron as priests who, with help from the Levites, would teach truth, treat sins, help to govern, judge between clean and unclean, offer sacrifice, lead worship, and maintain and care for holy things and holy places. For us today, we fulfill the First Commandment as we cherish Jesus who does all these things as our heavenly High Priest, and in him we receive and maintain the ministers of the new covenant as priests who serve as Aaron served; whereas rejecting those ministries would not keep the First Commandment.

For Israel, keeping the First Commandment involved the assorted sacrifices that Israel's priests offered, first at the tabernacle and then at the temple. For us today, we fulfill the First Commandment as the Church offers up the new covenant's sacrifice of praise, the Eucharist, as surrounded by hymns, gathering up our charity and good works to God, bringing us in contact with the sin-offering and guilt-offering of Jesus on the cross, and preparing us to lay down our lives to rise to heaven as ascension-offerings in martyrdom, if God blesses us with it. But if we neglect to offer and eat the Church's sacrifice of praise, or if we carry out no charity or good works to be gathered up with it, or if we neglect to look to Jesus for our sin and our guilt, or if we shy away from presenting our bodies sacrificially to God, then to that extent, we fall short of the First Commandment.

For Israel, keeping the First Commandment involved supporting the ministries of the tabernacle, and the calling of the priests and Levites, with firstfruits, tithes, and offerings. For us today, we fulfill the First Commandment as we support the church with our firstfruits – not just our leftover greenback here or there, but with the best of what we have, before we take our own cut. As uncomfortable as it is to talk about giving and tithing, since we Americans are notoriously sensitive about money, we have to teach the whole counsel of God here. Malachi warns that refusing our firstfruits, our tithes, our offerings, is robbing God (Malachi 3:8). When we refuse or neglect the support of the church and her ministers and ministries, we fall short of the First Commandment.

For Israel, keeping the First Commandment involved honoring the solemnity of its worship and its holy space in the tabernacle and temple. For us today, we fulfill the First Commandment as we honor the solemnity of our worship and the sanctified space in which we carry it out. But too easily, we're tempted to treat our time here in worship casually. We might meander in and out. We might get sidetracked into joking around. We might get caught up in chitchat. We might forget that we stand and sit on holy ground for holy purposes in the presence of a holy God who is still very much a Consuming Fire. And to the extent of our neglect, we fall short of the First Commandment.

And for Israel, keeping the First Commandment involved maintaining the proper order and character of their worship as prescribed by God – and not taking it upon themselves to tune it to their whims. It didn't matter if Abihu didn't like one of the prescribed psalms, or if he thought that a different one would go better. It didn't matter if Nadab thought the sacrificial liturgy was too elaborate. It didn't matter if Korah didn't like the priest's instructions. It wasn't about them. It was about God. And just as the worship life of ancient Israel was no free-for-all up for revision, neither is the worship life of Christ's Church. Because it isn't about us either! It's about the God of Israel revealed perfectly in Jesus Christ, guiding the whole Church in its properly ordered worship. Let our whims and wishes all be denied, but let God be glorified. Thanks be to the God of all holiness and all salvation! Amen.

Worshipping the One

I wonder if you've ever heard somebody say something like this: “Well, I don't think you have to believe in God to be a good person.” Have you heard somebody say that? I know I have. Talk with an atheist, an agnostic, or most other stripes of non-believer in God, and you're likely to hear it. Ever since high school, I enjoyed talking about these sorts of things with the few serious-minded non-believers I could find. And it's something that will crop up on a regular basis: they insist that you don't have to believe in God in order to lead a good moral life. Is there anything to what they're saying?

Well, in one sense, sure. Thanks to the impact of Christianity on the development of our moral culture, there live among us atheists and other non-believers who, by secular standards of human morality, do lead lives of decency and charity. “They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness,” so that sometimes they “by nature do what the law requires” (Romans 2:14-15). There are thus non-believers who stand on principle, whose consciences lead them to treat others well, and whose lives, in many ways, may not look that different from yours or mine some of the time. I've had atheist friends I'd trust with my life to do the right thing toward their neighbors in a given situation. In that sense, there are people who don't believe in God and yet are decent people who strive to treat their neighbors with justice and kindness – and that is being good, in at least that one sense.

But yet... it's the “fool” who has “said in his heart, 'There is no God'” (Psalm 14:1). And the word the psalmist uses there, 'fool,' has as much the sense of moral bankruptcy as of intellectual bankruptcy. There is, ultimately, a tension between disbelief in God, on the one hand, and moral wellness, on the other. So there is a sense, or maybe more than one sense, in which you do have to believe in God to be a good person. As we begin with a look at the Ten Commandments, we're reminded of something that I don't think many of my atheist friends ever considered. If a major area of morality involves moral duty, moral responsibility – then our first area of duty and responsibility is our duties and responsibilities to God. Our duties to God are part and parcel of morality – in fact, they are the core of morality. A person who treats every creature here on earth with utmost kindness and who yet ignores the Creator – that person is not, in fact, yet 'good.' We cannot be good, fully and really, unless we start a life of justice by doing justice to God. And that means treating God in the way he deserves.

The first commandment declares God in his own words. It expresses his character and his conduct. It demands that, so far as each one of us is concerned, he be the first one to whom we do justice and the first one to whom we do honor. It demands that God be the one we treat as God, because he has a rightful claim on our allegiance and a rightful claim on our devotion. Our responsibility in this commandment begins with a positive obligation: to give the true God his rightful due, everything he has a proper claim to. Those who fail to do this, St. Paul classifies as “the impious” or “the ungodly” (1 Timothy 1:9). And so another first-century Jew, writing for a Gentile audience, explaining the Ten Commandments, sums this one up by saying: “The first commandment teaches us that there is only one God, and that we ought to worship him only.”¹

And that's exactly the gist of it. There is just one God, in the full sense of that word. There are no more, there are no fewer. And toward him, we must do justice, must give him his due. And that means we must worship him. God deserves our worship, our different ways of acknowledging and expressing God's worth. We'll say more next Sunday, but there are some things we can say already even now that God deserves from each person.

And the first of these is our faith. For as it's written, “without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him” (Hebrews 11:6). One way we acknowledge and express the value that, say, our spouse has to us, starts by receiving and believing the truth about who he or she is: a human being of such-and-such a character, a person who loves, who has needs and wants and desires and a will of his or her own, and so on. And equally, one way we acknowledge and express the value or worth that God has in himself, starts by receiving and believing the truth about God and his greatness. God is the Founder and Maker of the universe, and of each thing in it. God is the summit of all life and light, of all wisdom and knowledge. God is the possessor of all power and every perfection. He is merciful and compassionate, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love down through thousands of generations. God is “the giver of every good and perfect gift” (James 1:17), who shines the sunlight and pours forth the rain (cf. Matthew 5:45), who grants us “fruitful seasons, satisfying [our] hearts with food and gladness” (Acts 14:17). He is the author of human love and kindness; he is the orchestrator of the rhythms of his creation. In every tiny split-second moment, he is the One who sustains all things in being. And he is the One who plans in wisdom to bring all willing things to an immeasurably beautiful destiny beyond our comprehension. Every heartbeat is his gift, every breath in our lungs is his gift. He nourishes us in sheer kindness as our Creator.

More than that, for ancient Israel, he was the Lord who liberates from slavery. There's a reason the Ten Words, the Ten Commandments, open with the declaration, “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery” (Exodus 20:2). Once, they were not free. Once, they were not a people. Once, they had their dignity stolen in a land they couldn't truly call their own. And their oppressor, the Pharaoh, treated them so ill because he broke this first commandment: “Who is the LORD, that I should obey his voice and let Israel go? I don't know the LORD; and moreover, I won't let Israel go!” (Exodus 5:2). And so the LORD, the Power above all powers, intervened for Israel to redeem them and ransom them, pouring down judgments on Egypt and its false gods, setting this people free from the prison that held them fast. They are not in the house of slavery anymore. As they stand and hear these words, they hear their liberty. And after seeing this God's salvation and this God's light, other gods standing anywhere in his presence should be a laughable thought, a ludicrous joke. To Israel, there ought never more be any such thing (Exodus 20:3).

For the New Israel which is the Church, we still confess him as the Lord who liberates – but not merely from a slavery on earth. No, he liberates from the slavery of sin, he liberates from the slavery of a bad character, he liberates even from the slavery of sorrow and of despair and of death. For we have beheld his mightier work in Christ, and the announcement of a greater exodus from darkness to light. And after having seen this far brighter light of salvation, turning our gaze away from this Lord our God would be nothing but madness. And we confess this when we believe, for instance, the things we say in the Apostles' Creed. We've spent so much time this year learning the Apostles' Creed, as the simpler statement of our faith, because – as we seriously believe it and seriously say it – we are committing an action that upholds this commandment.

You see, what we believe – and what we're willing to admit we believe – is, in fact, a moral activity. There are truths of beauty and dignity that it is morally good to believe, or seek to believe. And there are also twisted thoughts of ugliness and debasement that it is morally bad to believe, or seek to believe. The Apostles' Creed reminds us of truths of such beauty and such dignity that it is morally good to believe them (or seek to believe them), and morally not-so-good to refuse assent to them with our minds and our hearts.

And so my atheist and agnostic friends, in breaking this commandment, have sometimes failed their moral duty. Because we have a moral duty to believe that there is a God, or at least to seek to believe that there is a God. But atheists, by definition, do not believe that there is a God, and many are not even seeking. And as we live in God's universe, sustained moment by moment by his care which shines through in all things, even our damaged minds and corrupted hearts are “without excuse,” for God's “eternal power and divine nature have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made” (Romans 1:20).

But if atheism is one way of breaking this commandment, so are all ways of trying to construct life or society on a God-denying or God-neglecting basis. And so are all ways of holding aloof from Jesus Christ. And so are all ways of misrepresenting Christ in our minds and hearts, crafting a caricature of him that's untrue, distorting his reality. Every denial of some part of the faith, as it's summed up in the Apostles' Creed or the other great creeds, is ultimately, objectively, a morally bad act – a violation of the first commandment we're given.

The first commandment also calls us to a disposition of trust – trust toward God, trust toward Jesus, trust toward their Holy Spirit. Because trust is also an indispensable part of what it means to have faith. The faith that God deserves from us isn't merely admitting that he exists. It isn't just describing him correctly. Both of those are essential, but God deserves our trust. And when we live our lives in ways that hold back that trust, that refuse that trust, we are in fact falling short of giving God his due. We are not adequately expressing his worth when we act as though he isn't trustworthy. Trusting him means, of course, believing the things he's told us in his word of revelation. But it means more than that. It means leaning on him in day-to-day living. It means we'll live consciously in dependence on him – because, as he's the Giver of all good gifts we get, we are dependent. As one second-century Christian named Aristides said, “Christians... know and trust in God, the Creator of heaven and earth, in whom and from whom are all things, to whom there is no other god as companion...”²

Second, we acknowledge and express God's worth by treating him with reverence. God deserves to be honored as God. God deserves to be held in the highest esteem and value. And that entails respect. It entails careful conduct toward God. We should be as careful with the things of God as if we were handling priceless artwork or radioactive materials. We should exercise appropriate caution. So often, we tend to overstate the themes in the New Testament of friendship with God, and think that it means being chummy, all buddy-buddy, paling around as if God is no more than just 'one of the guys.' But the intimacy with God to which we're invited is a miracle precisely because it's set in a background of God's infinite holiness. God deserves to be regarded by us with a sense of awe, dignity, and solemnity. And that sense of awe, of dignity, of solemnity – the biblical term for that is “the fear of the LORD.” As in, “the LORD commanded us... to fear the LORD our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive” (Deuteronomy 6:24): “the fear of the LORD is Zion's treasure” (Isaiah 33:6). When we refuse to treat encounters with God as occasions for awe and dignity and solemnity, when we lack “the fear of the LORD,” we aren't living up to this first commandment. God deserves our reverence.

Third, we acknowledge and express God's worth by coming to him in prayer. For how do we treat God as great, as worthwhile, if we don't consider him worth talking to or worth seeking our good from? God is, we've said, the Giver of every good and every perfect gift. He invites us to engage relationally with him, to speak to him as well as listen. God is worth our time. God is worth our attention. God is worth our words. And so we honor him when we call on him. We honor him when we invoke him. We honor him when we cry out to him. We honor him when we take him up on this open-door policy of his. As Aristides said, “As people who know God, [Christians] ask from him petitions which are fitting for him to grant and for them to receive; and thus they employ their whole lifetime.”³ When we spend our days prayerlessly, when we caricature God as uninterested or else decide that we're too busy for him to have any of our time, we aren't living up to this first commandment – we're not giving God his due, we're not doing justice to God as God. God deserves our prayers.

Fourth, we acknowledge and express God's worth by putting our hope in him. We treat God as great, we treat him as worthwhile, when we listen to his promises and expect him to make good on them, and when we look forward to them, and when we think about them, when we let them shape our vision of our future. Particularly, we treat God as great and as worthwhile when we surrender our imagination to his promises – that is, when his promises so captivate our imaginations more than any other picture of the future, knowing that one day these dreams will be fact. And we treat him as great and as worthwhile when we rely, not on our attempts to control the future, not on our efforts to penetrate the future, but on God as the One in whose hands the future rests. That's why the Church has always considered this first commandment to be broken when people go to fortune-tellers, even if it's meant for fun – because the forbidden act of fortune-telling is at odds with placing our hope in God as the unveiler of the future. This commandment is also broken when we despair of God's promises. Maybe one of my favorite lines from the whole Bible is the declaration that “all the promises of God find their 'Yes!' in [Jesus Christ]” (2 Corinthians 1:20). They already have their yes! “Hope does not put us to shame” (Romans 5:5)! So “if we hope for what we do not [yet] see, we wait for it with patience” (Romans 8:25). Like Aristides said: “Christians know... God..., from whom they received commandments which they engraved upon their minds and which they observe in hope and expectation of the world which is to come.”⁴

Fifth, we acknowledge and express God's worth by giving him our praise and adoration. “Praise God... for his mighty deeds, praise him according to his excellent greatness!” (Psalm 150:1-2). “Shout for joy to God, all the earth! Sing the glory of his name; give to him glorious praise! Say to God, 'How awesome are your deeds! … All the earth worships you and sings praises to you...” (Psalm 66:1-4). God, in and of himself, is deserving of praise, just for being who he is. All things are intrinsically defined in relation to his greatness. He is the peak of the mountain of goodness. He is the standard of all excellence. Any true thing said about him is a praise. He deserves to be the focus of our attention and the celebration of our mind and speech. But too often, we become ungrateful to God. As if he stopped giving us gifts! As if we had received no new favor since our last heartbeat! As if he weren't keeping the very atoms in our body from breaking apart! As if the warmth of the sun weren't from him, as if the flavor of food or the refreshment of water weren't from him, as if the color of each and every flower weren't called forth by him! Yet we're ungrateful sometimes. Or we become indifferent – we spend an hour, we spend a day, we spend even longer, just ignoring God, just acting as if he weren't there, still actively supplying our most basic needs. In those times when we refuse to care, when we refuse to thank, when we refuse to praise and adore – we are not living as this first commandment calls us.

But we fulfill the commandment each time we do proclaim God's worth, each time we celebrate him, each time we proclaim his greatness out loud, both to others and to God, by returning thanks. It's not, as some unbelievers will assume, because God has an ego that just needs scratched, and that's why he tells us to praise. No! No, it's because it is right and just to praise him! Withholding praise from someone or something who deserves it, is an act of injustice, it is negligence and wrongdoing. Refusing to thank someone for a gift or favor – that isn't just a social faux-pas, it's an act of injustice, it's failing to return what the gift or favor deserves. It is right and just to praise God, and particularly, to praise God with higher praises than we give to anyone or anything else, with more excitement and effusiveness to anything else. That's why we sing! That's why we sing with meaning, with feeling, with gusto – because, as best as we can, we know we ought to praise God, and we want to!

Sixth, we acknowledge and express God's worth by obeying him, by serving him. “It is the LORD your God you shall fear: him you shall serve” (Deuteronomy 6:13). “Return to the LORD your God and obey his voice” (Deuteronomy 4:30). “Why do you call me 'Lord, Lord,' and not do what I tell you?” (Luke 6:46). God merits our obedience. God merits our service. God is God, and we are not. In our actions, we should act for the sake of God. We should act in ways where God is centrally relevant in our motives and in our drives. God deserves to be relevant to why we choose what we choose, and why we do what we do. His will should be the beginning and end of our actions. “Whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him” (Colossians 3:17).

Seventh, we acknowledge and express God's worth by imitating him. “Be imitators of God, as dear children,” we're told (Ephesians 5:1). We imitate him by learning his wisdom. We imitate him by sharing his mercy. We imitate him by seeking to be holy as he is holy (Leviticus 11:44-45), and to be complete lovers as he is perfect love (Matthew 5:48). When we consider God's character worth imitating in all these ways, we are worshipping him – we are seeking to give him his due by expressing his worth with our lives.

All this is commanded us because worshipping the true God is good for us. Because God is truth, and God is beauty, and God is goodness. God is light, and God is life, and God is love. And what we worship, whatever we think most worthy and most worthwhile, we open ourselves up to, we become more and more conformed to, step by step. In worshipping God, we open ourselves up to a beautiful life that floods ours, and so we allow ourselves to be “transformed... from one degree of glory into another” (2 Corinthians 3:18).

And we have a perfect example in Jesus. Jesus, when he descended to earth and took on our human nature, took on also the Law, and he perfectly lived out its commands – including this first commandment. As Jesus himself said, “I honor my Father” (John 8:49). Jesus kept the first commandment perfectly, and he fulfilled it. In every moment, Jesus was about God his Father, Jesus was open to God his Father, Jesus was imitating God his Father, and Jesus served God his Father all the way to the cross. Let us follow Jesus, imitating him as he imitated his Father, worshipping him as God and worshipping God his Father alongside him as he leads us. Let us give God his due, with and like Jesus. And in this way, we will begin the adventure that is truly good human living. Amen.

Blessings on the Mountain: Sermon on Matthew 5:1-20

Have you ever seen a news segment where a reporter goes out and interviews people in the street about things everyone assumes they should know? The footage they get is seldom encouraging. I've seen people flustered about what causes a rainbow; people uncertain who fought in World War II; people unable to point to any country on a map and name it. “Education these days!” Right? Well, sad to say, but this isn't new. In January 1889, reporters spread out through St. Louis, Missouri, to quiz the population of the city as to whether they could recite the Ten Commandments. Most people believed they knew how – after all, this was when the Ten Commandments were learned in school. And some actually could. But most were wrong.

One man they interviewed, a certain M. Klute, refused to try, offering the excuse that, for all he knew, the Ten Commandments had changed since his school days. (I want to know how old that guy was!) The local street commissioner, George Burnett, said the Ten Commandments had been crowded out of his head by learning math. A young doctor named Henry Jacobson, son of German Jewish immigrants, said he didn't know the Ten Commandments but would be happy to recite definitions out of the medical dictionary. Philip Lanham, a popular though elderly judge known as an auctioneer and hunter, would only say that his way of keeping the sabbath meant going fishing. A stockbroker in his early thirties, Joe Davidson, said that there was only one commandment he observed: “Thou shalt not buy wheat unless thou hast it already sold.” Six years later, Joe got drunk, accosted a friend at his house one night, and put a gun to the man's head, demanding payment of a $50 debt. He eventually lost a fortune in the stock market and froze in the street one winter's night in early 1903.

Local lead dealer Richard Everett, when asked, was convinced that one of the Ten Commandments was “Lead me not into temptation.” Another local broker, 45-year-old George Henry Small, said there was only one commandment he cared to remember – and that one was, “Mind your own business.” A month after saying that, he'd be appointed to the Board of Police Commissioners, and eventually would become an Assistant United States Treasurer. Still another fellow, 48-year-old Col. Henry W. Chandler – local merchant, Civil War veteran, and a committed believer in his own ability to read minds – was asked to recite the Ten Commandments, and began by saying: “Now I lay me down to sleep...” Col. Chandler later became president of the electric company but was sued by his former friend, president of the silk company, who caught Chandler in bed with his wife. And finally, 34-year-old William Hobbs, the city recorder of deeds and a reporter himself, said that when he wanted to know anything about the Ten Commandments, he just asked his wife, because, he said, “it's easier than keeping all of them continually stored up in my brain.”

On the whole, 90% of residents of St. Louis in 1889 were unable to say what the Ten Commandments were. As the newspaper reported on the results of dozens of street interviews, they ran their findings under the line: “Isn't this awful?”¹ A good thing to remember any time we get too despairing about our generation today, or the next – our ancestors weren't exactly the swiftest either, sometimes.

Still, I suspect that what was true in St. Louis 140 years ago would not have been true in Jerusalem or Nazareth 2000 years ago. Jesus would not have been caught off-guard by the question or flubbed it, and neither would Joseph or Mary, or likely any of their neighbors. See, growing up, Jesus would have been taken by Joseph and Mary several times each year to Jerusalem, to attend all the pilgrimage feasts for which Jews were ideally meant to go to the holy city. And during these multiple yearly visits to Jerusalem, the young Jesus would, like so many others, have been exposed first-hand to the liturgies of worship in the temple. Each and every morning and each and every evening, Israel had been commanded to sacrifice: “One lamb you shall offer in the morning, and the other lamb you shall offer at twilight. And with the first lamb, a tenth measure of fine flour mingled with a fourth of a hin of beaten oil, and a fourth of a hin of wine for a drink offering” (Exodus 29:39-40). And so each morning, at the Temple in Jerusalem, the priests on duty held four lotteries in the Chamber of Hewn Stone to decide things like who'd clear away the ashes from last night, who'd actually butcher the meat, who'd carry the parts to the altar, who'd burn the incense, and so on. Once the eastern sky had been lit up by the dawn, a priest would unlock the large gate, allowing people access to the temple courts; and a loud voice would call priests to their service, Levites to their platform, and all Israel to their watch. And so the people would gather.² Every time Joseph and Mary took young Jesus to Jerusalem, each day they were there, they'd listen for that call after dawn and come to see and hear. And then, after the lamb was slain, nine priests would gather into the Chamber of Hewn Stone, which was accessible also to the people. And they would recite the opening prayers of the day, as a blessing. And the first words that these nine priests would recite every day? The Ten Commandments.³  Each and every morning, the people who went to the Temple to attend the morning sacrifice would hear the Ten Commandments spoken over them, all over again.

Of course, most of the time, young Jesus wasn't in Jerusalem. He was at home in Nazareth, as was his family. There, instead of the Temple, there was the synagogue, where everyone in town would come to gather each and every Sabbath. And each and every Sabbath, someone in the synagogue would read first a passage out of the Law, the five books of Moses, and then a passage from one of the prophets (cf. Acts 15:21). Over the course of every three years, Jesus and everybody else would've heard the whole Law read. That meant that, every three years at minimum, the Sabbath reading would have included the Ten Commandments, making them familiar.

But as if that weren't enough, each and every morning, committed believers among the Jews had prayers that they'd pause to recite several times a day, at fixed times: morning, noon, and night. Jesus would later go on to criticize some of the Pharisees for timing their errands so as to make sure that the call to prayer would catch them at an intersection so more people would see how devout they were and be impressed (Matthew 6:5). But Jesus does assume that the people hearing his Sermon on the Mount are already observing these fixed times of prayer. Joseph and Mary would have taught young Jesus the prayers to recite each morning in Nazareth at the same time the priests were reciting their blessings in Jerusalem – and we have evidence that tells us that devout Jews living far from Jerusalem were adopting the same prayers.⁴ In Nazareth, Jesus would have begun each and every day of his earthly life by reciting the Ten Commandments first of all. So even from a purely human point of view, the Ten Commandments cannot have helped but leave an indelible mark on the way Jesus lived and the way Jesus thought during his time on earth.

But, of course, we do not see Jesus only from a human point of view. Because Jesus is not only human. Jesus Christ is both fully man and fully God. He is the Eternal Word made flesh. And when Moses gathered the people at the foot of Mount Sinai that fateful day we heard about last week, and when the storm and flame came down on the mountaintop – Jesus was there. The Old Testament never uses the phrase “Ten Commandments” – what it actually calls them are the “Ten Words,” the Ten Words of God, which he spoke in fire from the summit of the mountain. But every word that God speaks is, at its heart, the Word of God which is indivisible, who can be expressed only partially through the medium of frail human language.

In other words, God has been continually speaking his one unique Word, the Word that became flesh; and all the times we find God speaking, he's speaking Jesus – only expressed, in different partial ways, in human language. In some way, each of these “Ten Words,” these Ten Commandments, is Christ himself, the self-revealing Word of God. When God opens his mouth on the mountain, so to speak, what comes out is Christ. Each of these commandments, each of these declarations, just is Jesus, but seen through a pinhole, heard in slow motion. In being the Word of God made flesh, you could say that Jesus is therefore the Ten Commandments made flesh. And that makes sense of why St. Irenaeus, our friend and mentor from the second century, referred to “the Ten Commandments, which, if anyone does not observe, he has no salvation.”⁵

So, as the Ten Commandments made flesh, who grew up reciting the Ten Commandments each morning, Jesus clearly values and cherishes the Ten Commandments. Later in his ministry, when a rich young man came to this rabbi and wanted to know how to live well, Jesus told him, “If you want to enter life, keep the commandments” (Matthew 19:17). And when the rich young man asked which ones, Jesus started rattling off many out of the ten (Matthew 19:18-19). But quite some time before that, Jesus sat down on a hilltop in Galilee, turning it into the new Mount Sinai. Those gathered below him, seated in the fields, probably had little idea that they were in the same position as their distant ancestors who'd stood at the foot of the desert mountain and heard the words of God proclaimed in fire and fury. But when Jesus comes to the mountain, with the crowds down at the foot and his disciples approaching him, these apostles are like Moses and Aaron and the elders of Israel, approaching on the mountain the God who is Jesus. Jesus, for his part, is both the Prophet Like Moses (Deuteronomy 18:18) and the fresh face of God to the world – all these things rolled into one. And so, in a new way, he's come to teach the Law all over again – which is exactly what he does, in his Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:1).

If we understand the posture Jesus is taking here, then we can understand why some people might have thought that Jesus had come to replace the Law with something different – that he was smashing the tablets all over again, so that he could write in their dust. And we can also understand why Jesus makes very clear that that isn't what he's doing. He hasn't come to cancel out the commandments, hasn't come to demolish the Law. “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets! I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them” (Matthew 5:17). Jesus says that not even one single letter will fall out of the Law until everything has happened (Matthew 5:18). Jesus says that loosening even one of the minor commandments, or teaching other people to ignore it, will forfeit honor in the kingdom of God; but living out the commandments and teaching others how to do the same – that's the path toward honor and greatness (Matthew 5:19). And in that way, Jesus announces, our righteousness – our faithfulness to these commandments and to their Giver – should go beyond the way they were performed by even the most committed Law-abiding people of the day. It's a mighty tall order: “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:20). Because to do that, isn't just about the Ten Commandments. By the time Jesus was speaking, many had come to understand the Ten Commandments as something like a table of contents for the whole Law. Each one was broader than what it literally said, and covered many different kinds of circumstances. And so, as we begin exploring the Ten Commandments for ourselves, we're going to take that into consideration.

Jesus is emphasizing the importance of the Law. He didn't come to do away with it, or to teach anybody not to keep these commandments. Rather, what he wants to do is to crack them each open for us, so that we can see how he's written all over it, and how each commandment can write Jesus on our lives, as we meet him there and hear his loving voice. And by meeting Jesus in the commandments, we can be shaped into a people of blessing. Because we love the commandments, we will refuse to fight our way through life with the tools of sin – and that refusal is a blessing, because the spiritual poor who cry out to God will be citizens of God's kingdom (Matthew 5:3). Because we love the commandments, we'll take more and more notice of the gap between our world and God's vision for the world. And that gap, that gulf between the two, will sadden us. It'll make us lament, and it will make us mourn. And that sorrow is a blessing, because Jesus promises to comfort such mourners who grieve that gap (Matthew 5:4).

Because we love the commandments, we'll learn the value of restraint – having power to do certain things, but gently choosing not to. And that's a blessing, because the meek, those who gently restrain their power, are destined to inherit not just the land from river to river but the whole of the earth (Matthew 5:5). Because we love the commandments, we'll hunger and thirst for justice to be done on that earth – and that's a blessing, since Jesus promises to satisfy that hunger, to quench that thirst (Matthew 5:6). Because we love the commandments, we'll lean into their challenge for us. And as we understand how readily we ourselves fall short, we'll know that we're gravely in need of grace and mercy. We'll understand that the same obstacles we ourselves face are faced also by others. And in that understanding, we'll show mercy to them. That's a blessing, because Jesus promises to show mercy to the merciful (Matthew 5:7).

Because we love the commandments, we'll use them to examine our conscience. And these commandments will become God's scalpel to perform surgery in our hearts, scraping out the roots of sin that stain. And that surgery, that scalpel, is a blessing, because it will make us pure in heart, and Jesus promises that those purified in heart will finally be able to see God (Matthew 5:8). Because we love the commandments, we'll encourage others to love them too, so that they can have great peace – for as the psalmist says, “Great peace have those who love your Law” (Psalm 119:165). And that's a blessing, because Jesus promises that peacemakers will be counted as God's very own children (Matthew 5:9). And finally, because we love the commandments, we'll be dreadfully unpopular by the standards of a rebellious and lawless world. And that's a massive blessing, because Jesus tells us that those who are persecuted for the sake of this justice and this righteousness will have the kingdom of God and that those who are slandered for clinging to Jesus have an unthinkable reward in store (Matthew 5:10-12).

We want all of those things! We want each and every one of those blessings! And that life of blessing begins by learning the commandments, learning Christ in the commandments, and living Christ in the commandments. God's word, God's commandments, are a lamp for our feet and a light for our path (Psalm 119:105). And as we lean into God's commandments and keep them in Christ, then that light will radiate throughout our lives. Our whole lives will shine with that light, which no basket or bushel can be allowed to hide (Matthew 5:14), and no part of the house of this world will be able to hold onto its darkness (Matthew 5:15). As people see our “good works,” our lives that fulfill everything these commandments mean and everything the Law was trying to accomplish, our lives that hew closely to God's will, then observers will “give glory to [our] Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16).

So to do that better, we're going to spend most of the rest of this year on a journey through the Ten Words which God spoke at Sinai – which are really just his one Word, who is Christ. But under the forms then given and the history that followed, we're going to learn the Ten Commandments and apply the Ten Commandments to our lives today, to shine that light on them. We don't want to be like those people in the St. Louis streets who didn't know them. We're going to know them. By the end of this year, I dare say each one of us, if asked the Ten Commandments, will have no problem scoring 10/10.

But even more importantly, we're going to see how to live them – or, rather, how we can yield place for Christ and his Holy Spirit to fulfill them in us by his love. For these commandments were spoken by Jesus no less than any other words you'll find in the Gospels or anywhere in the Bible. “Everyone who hears these words of mine and doesn't do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand,” but “everyone, then, who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock” (Matthew 7:26, 24). These tablets of stone – they're a rock worth building our house on – and our hope on. Amen.

Fire on the Mountain: Sermon on Exodus 19

What do you think it was like to be there? Put yourself in their sandals this morning. You're one of the Hebrew men or women who grew up in the house of bondage – in Egypt, where you or your husband spent the day making bricks for the Egyptian government or building their cities for them. All your life, you knew you were second-class. But then Moses came – one like you, sent by the God of your ancestors, the God you'd nearly forgotten, sent with power to confront and confute the gods of Egypt. In judgment after judgment, devastation fell on the land for your sake, until finally, for the tenth plague, you sacrificed a lamb, you coated the lintels of your house with blood, brushing it over the etching of your name, and you ate a meal inside, while that night, death came to the land (Exodus 12:1-30). Your house was spared. Your freedom was granted. It was time to run, with all the treasure your neighbors could give you as a bribe to just go away (Exodus 12:33-36). You traveled for days toward the edge of the sea (Exodus 13:17—14:2) Then came the pursuit (Exodus 14:5-9). Your back was to the sea. You were terrified, cornered (Exodus 14:9-12). Then the sea split for you, and you ran across with your family and your goods (Exodus 14:21-31). On the other side, you sang and danced for joy (Exodus 15:1-21). On a day in early April, this God saved you! You're a slave no more, you'd been redeemed – how you loved to proclaim it!

Then continued your journey into the desert. Uprooted from your settled lifestyle in your old house, now you and everyone with you was a nomad, pitching tents at campsite after campsite. In the nights and days you'd move, you'd march fifteen, twenty miles at a time. From the night when death passed over your house until you reached where you were headed, it'd be six weeks. It was a three-day march south into the desert of Shur along a ridge to the place you called Marah, 'bitter.' You relied on finding water, but here it was tainted with magnesium sulfate – a bitter mineral. Thirsty, you complained, and then Moses threw in some wood and, by a miracle, purged the minerals from the water, making it good to drink (Exodus 15:22-25). Praise God! Soon enough, moving on from there, you came to an oasis with twelve springs and seventy palm trees, Elim (Exodus 15:27; Numbers 33:9). What a relaxing place, so good to be at. You were sad to eventually move on. But you did, and reached the next desert a month after the night you set out. Initially, camping by the seashore, you could dig holes and wait for them to fill with fresh water (Numbers 33:10). But then you all turned east through a dry riverbed (Exodus 16:1; Numbers 33:11). You got hungry and complained (Exodus 16:2). You started to long for the way you were fed and kept in your slave days (Exodus 16:3). So through the night, God began to send something flaky – you weren't totally sure what it was – to coat the ground by morning; and as evening fell each night, flocks of confused quail, pausing to rest on a long journey, became easy prey for meat (Exodus 16:4-36). Finally fed, you passed through the turquoise-mining district of Dophkah (Numbers 33:12) – it was the off-season, it was safe, and you picked up some nice supplies – and then began to turn through a few more dry riverbeds like Alush (Numbers 33:12). At one riverbed called Rephidim, there was an oasis – but you couldn't go there. A strong tribe, the sons of Amalek, were jealously hoarding access, and you could not drink. You were so thirsty, and began to complain (Exodus 17:1-7). Then Moses tapped his staff on a rock, and water began to gush forth. You drank with gladness. So jealous were the Amalekites that they attacked, but you fought through all the day as Moses lifted up his staff in both hands, blessing you with power and victory, until at last you drove them out (Exodus 17:8-16). You stayed at Rephidim for a while, long enough for Jethro to come and bring Moses back his wife Zipporah and sons Gershom and Eliezer (Exodus 18).

After some stay there, you finally came out onto the plain from which you could at last see the mountain more clearly – the mountain you'd glimpsed in the distance. You pitched your tent by the light of a new moon (Exodus 19:1). It was about the middle of May. You suspected you'd be here for a while, and it felt like a relief for this leg of your trip to be over and done with. All this way, this God of your ancestors had rescued you and was feeding you and watering you and fighting for you. You were here to worship him. Not only that, but to find him – to find his presence. In the land of Egypt, dotted with temples, your old neighbors had no trouble finding the presence of their failed little gods. You'd never had that. But this mountain, Moses had said, would be the temple soon. Here, this plain, this would be the outer court; the mountain slope would be the holy place inside the temple; and at the summit, the holiest place of all – once God would come to be there.

And why had you come? You'd come to cut a covenant with God (cf. Exodus 19:5). You had some awareness that, all through the world, small nations and big nations made treaties, defining the duties of little kings to great kings. At this mountain, you and each of your friends and family would be the little kings, signing on to the treaty this great king called God was about to put in front of you. It would be for you, for your children, for your grandchildren, for all who'd come after you. And just like there'd been ten plagues with which God had judged your captors, so there would be ten words spoken, ten basic principles as the basic stipulations of the treaty – ten, so that even your littlest children could learn them by heart on their fingers as you raised them in responsibility and dignity. That was what you were ready for. That was why you'd come. Moses explained to you and the crowd that God had brought you all to himself here for this purpose. You felt ready. You joined the general cheer, telling Moses, “All that the LORD has spoken, we will do” (Exodus 19:8).

Moses, going back and forth from the mountain to the camp, relayed the words of instruction. That very day of the new moon, the day you'd arrived on the plain, he said a fence needed to be put up, a boundary marker between the plain and the mountain. You helped carefully to put in the stakes. Beyond that limit, you could not go, your animals could not go, nothing must go – if it does, you must kill it from afar (Exodus 19:12-13). Before ever a law was given, a zone of special purity was said to be off-limits, just like that tree in the garden in the old stories. You were safe in your tent, safe on the plain, but the mountain – that was dangerous. You had to be very clear on that. And before you could approach even the border of the danger, you'd have to prepare yourself. Moses consecrated you – a first day, a second, into a third, he said. For it was the third day when you'd have the encounter (Exodus 19:11). Until then, you would wait. You would wash your garments in the water supply of the area, restoring them to the condition they had before you sweated six weeks in them and got them crusted with desert sand (Exodus 19:10). You'd take a bath. You and your spouse would have to abstain for a few days, resisting temptation to live out your married life as normal in your tent (Exodus 19:15). Ritual purity was demanded of you. Consecrate yourself. Because this God, you're finding, is not simple to approach. This purpose and mission, of being bound to him by a treaty, of becoming his covenant partner – it isn't easy to take on. This was serious business. You could not approach this casually or lightly. That's why you were being assigned several whole days of just waiting, time to reflect very thoughtfully on the immense ramifications of what you were about to see and hear and say. Think very carefully about this high calling.

You wake up on the third morning. You rise on the third day. It hadn't been easy to sleep – your mind raced as you thought about what the day might bring. You had scarcely any idea what things would look like. Yawning, you get dressed and wandered out of your tent at daybreak. Moses is waiting. It's not a sunny morning, when the dawn comes. It's actually rather gloomy. The sky is dark. You're still not too far from your tent as the sky begins to darken. Clouds, thick and black, begin to gather over the mountain. A violent storm, but you feel no rain. But you hear the low rumble of thunder. You see the flashes of lightning. And then you hear what no storm had ever brought: a sound like the blast of a trumpet in the sky. And it's so loud, much louder than the thunder had been, and it catches you off your guard, it frays your nerves, it makes you quake in your sandals. You wonder if maybe you made a mistake – if you're meddling with powers you can't bear, if perhaps even a drop of this God is a flood you'll drown in (Exodus 19:16; cf. Hebrews 12:18-19).

Moses leads you and the thousands of trembling others outside the camp, in the direction of this fierce storm. You leave your tent behind. You leave your property behind. You leave your animals behind. Your family alone is with you, and your friends. You're all dressed in your clean clothes. You've consecrated yourself. You've gone through the preparations. But you wonder how anyone could be prepared to withstand this. You'd come to worship. And now is the time. This is the day of the assembly (cf. Deuteronomy 9:10). It's the first time you've ever gotten to gather with others for an organized encounter with God, and you won't return to your tent – if you somehow live to – until you've met him. You've hungered for this, thirsted for this. All the travels and travails of the past six weeks have been to get you here, that you might gather in the outer court, and worship God in his storm. So now you stand, at the foot of the mountain (Exodus 19:17). And in the storm, you see something burning. From the heights of the sky, fire pours down in the heart of darkness, and smoke pours forth like an oven, cascading down the slope and rising to the heights of heaven (Exodus 19:18; Deuteronomy 4:11, 36). The mountain visibly shakes. The earth shakes. You feel the ground move beneath your feet, vibrating, trembling as if terrified. You can relate. You wince as the sound of the trumpet is growing louder and louder and louder, and your ears hurt, and the glow of the fire glows through the darkness, and you're so close to the action, it almost feels as though if you reach out your hand, the smoke will swallow you up. You can smell the burning. You can taste it on your tongue, like scorched incense, sweet and bitter.

Just when the trumpet seems loudest, Moses stands in front of you, leaning against the barricade, and shouts up to the mountain. You can barely hear what he says. But evidently God can hear him just fine. For God shouts back in a piercing crack of thunder that cuts off the trumpet (Exodus 19:19), and when this thunder roars in its sevenfold depth, the ground under your feet winces and shakes – the whole earth does (Hebrews 12:26). But as the echo of the thunder fades, you realize that everything is quiet. No birds sing. No donkeys bray back in the camp. You don't hear the wind. You don't even hear the crackle of the fire. All creation has paused. God, the Lord God, the Omnipotent Maker of all things, has invaded his creation, has come into her midst, has seated himself in fire on the mountain, wrapping himself in darkness and smoke for the world's protection. He is about to speak. Creation is listening.

And so, for the first time, you hear with your own ears the voice of God – and see it, somehow, with your very own eyes. Later legend, as it tells the story, will have it that the words were traced out in flame that poured forth from God, that each was accompanied by torches, that word by word, this speech flew over your head, hovered over you, circling around before returning to God. Those legends will also have it that each utterance, as you heard it spoken, translated itself into all the languages spoken by humans. And some legends will even imagine that, as you listened to the languages and saw the words etched in fire, angels came down and crowned you with glory. (And if those stories sound at all like how Luke writes the story of Pentecost, good catch!¹)

That morning, confronted with the God you came to worship, you receive those ten words. Hearing them, you realize that perhaps you aren't cut out yet to hear God directly, which is why you'll soon be begging Moses to be the intermediary who listens to God's voice and relays it to you. Patient as he's been, you trust him not to distort the message. He'll relay it faithfully, and in hearing him, you'll know what God wants to tell you. But you feel the need for some distance, to retreat back from the edge, to insulate yourself a bit more from this God.

And yet the reason why you're here, the reason why your tribe is here, the reason why all the associated tribes and their members are here – it's because God made you an offer, which you accepted. God has a marvelous plan and purpose for your people. Moses told you a few days ago – these are the words you've been meditating on while you consecrated yourself. God said through Moses that you'd seen what he'd done to the Egyptians for your sake, and how God in his care had carried you to the edge of his presence, to meet you as face-to-face as you can handle (Exodus 19:4). He is the owner of everything in the earth, all of it is his. But, that said, if you'll obey his voice, if you'll uphold this covenant he's making with you, then out of all the peoples on the earth, you'll be special. You will be his secret treasure, gained and gathered through his effort and reserved exclusively to his personal purposes. Your whole nation will be this God's special servant. Your nation will be separated from all other nations by this unique way of life – it will set you apart, it will purify you, it will make you holy, an earthly mirror of your God. Each and every one of you will be to all other nations what priests are within a nation. Each of you will, to the world, communicate God's will; each of you will, to the world, show what it means to be sacred; each of you will, to the world, intercede and minister and guide. “If you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” (Exodus 19:5-6).

Step forward over 3200 years, and land in a pew here. What does all this mean for us? You, no less than they, have passed through the sea. For in those days, “all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea” (1 Corinthians 10:2), but we now have been “baptized into Christ Jesus” (Romans 6:3). They camped where the wood purified the water; we camp where the wood of the cross purifies all things. They camped at the oasis of twelve springs and seventy palm trees; we camp in the nourishment of twelve disciples and seventy apostles. They, reaching a new desert, were fed manna and quail – they “all ate the same spiritual food” (1 Corinthians 10:3). But we feed on the Greater Manna: the flesh and blood of Jesus, “the Living Bread who came down from heaven” (John 6:51). At Rephidim, they back then “all drank the same spiritual drink, for the drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ” (1 Corinthians 10:4) – and so do we. The gift put them in conflict with the envy of the Amalekites, and the gift puts us in conflict with the powers of darkness; but as long as the cross is lifted high, Christ on heaven's throne will give us the victory. After the new moon, they then gathered for the day of assembly. And so do we, for that word 'assembly' that Moses applied to them, Jesus gives to us – it's 'church.' You aren't so different from those who stood beneath the mountain.

And in Christ, we are now his treasured possession, gained by the purchase of his blood and valued highly as his special treasure. We are now his holy nation, set apart from all the peoples of the earth, set apart even from the United States of America – and our responsibility here is to live differently than the American norm. So too, we are his kingdom of priests, called to pray for and teach and guide the entire creation to what we've found already in him. And how do we know this is true? Christ tells us by Peter: “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9).

So let us go to the foot of the mountain. “Let us go to him outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured” (Hebrews 13:13). For we have come to this place to worship. And we are preparing to hear the words of the covenant that the Lord our God will speak in our midst. In coming weeks, we will begin to hear and understand the voice of God who spoke in thunders. “Keep listening to the thunder of his voice and the rumbling that comes from his mouth” (Job 37:2). For ours is a high and holy calling, to live these ways and to teach the entire universe to live these ways through our example and guidance. But it is for no less a dignity and no less a duty that we have been chosen in Christ.

Therefore, over these next few weeks, let's consecrate ourselves all over again, washing the garments of our faith white in the blood of the Lamb (Revelation 7:14). Let's bathe ourselves by returning with tears of repentance and joy to our first love. Let us keep back the beasts of our vices from the mountain to which we are summoned. And let us abstain from setting our minds on mere earthly things, that we might meditate instead on our heavenly calling. “Seek the things that are above, where Christ is … Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth” (Colossians 3:1-2). “You who share a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession, who was faithful to him who appointed him, just as Moses was faithful in all his house” (Hebrews 3:1-2). He leads us from the darkness and the gloom into the blazing light of glory – hallelujah! Amen.

Eating the Proof: An Easter Homily from Luke 24

It had been a long few days, no doubt thought Cleopas, as he and his friend hit that first mile outside the city limits of Jerusalem. Certainly it had been an odd morning. For the Teacher they'd followed, the one they'd held out hope for as the Messiah promised to Israel, had a few days ago been hanged on a tree, cursed by God. They still believed, somehow, he was a prophet. But their hopes were dashed, and not all the curiosities of the morning – reports by hysterical women that they'd had a vision of angels, and the words of that hot-headed Simon and that impressionable kid John that they'd found his grave unsealed and vacated – not even those could restore joy. They only created a confusing fog of unproven half-hints. Cleopas would need time to sort it out.

Cleopas and his friend journeyed on – until they stopped. A stranger fell in with them, somehow ignorant of all that had happened. Cleopas filled him in on the death of the prophet, on his betrayal by the priesthood and his condemnation by the Gentile overlord and his shameful crucifixion that obliterated their hopes. Cleopas was astonished as the stranger rebuked them for their lack of faith, and began to walk with them the remaining miles toward the village Emmaus. The stranger insisted that the Law and the Prophets were filled with patterns and promises making it utterly clear that the true Messiah would indeed suffer shame and death and bear the curse – that not only did these things not serve as grounds for giving up hope, but that they were grounds for clinging to hope, because the Messiah would indeed be glorified, would indeed live and flourish.

For hours this stranger, whose name they never managed to get out of him, walked them not only down the road but through the ancient testimonies of prophets and saints and sages. And as he did, Cleopas' heart yearned with red-hot longing tinged with hope, that little light once extinguished and hardest to revive. For the first time since the darkness fell, hope seemed so plausible, as this stranger wove his pretty words and fit the pieces all in alignment. But could they bring themselves to take the leap and believe? If only there were a conclusive proof!

Cleopas and his friend reached the village of Emmaus, and the prospect of parting from this peculiar stranger, who had a further journey to walk into the night, pained them. “Stay with us,” they insisted, “spend the night – it isn't safe on that road after nightfall. Come on, get a nice meal and some warmth.” And this stranger agreed. He came in. Made himself comfortable. Reclined at the table. And just as the homeowner prepared to bless and break the bread, this audacious stranger stretched out his hand. Cleopas was intrigued, perplexed. But the stranger took over, as if it were his house. He began to rip the bread. And as the bread parted, behind it they saw his face as if for the first time, as if waking from a deep sleep – and it was the familiar face of Jesus, with the marks of the thorny crown glistening in splendor! Their eyes were opened – the proof was staring them in the face! And as they took the bread he handed to them and placed it on their tongues, as they bit down and chewed, in an instant Jesus could no longer be seen. Wowed with wonder, Cleopas and company grabbed their dinner to go, racing through the waning sunlight the miles back to Jerusalem as fast as their weary legs, fueled by adrenaline and awe, could carry them. They now believed to the full. For they'd eaten the proof.

In the sustenance they received from the hands of a stranger who revealed himself to be Christ, Cleopas and his fellow-disciple found proof they could eat. The evidence fell on their own lips. The testimony was uncovered in their mouths and maws. And so might it be with us, when we come to this feast. For all this year so far, if you've been with us, we've learned the explanation of our faith in the ancient words of the Apostles' Creed, words we've begun this morning the practice of reciting together – the summary and substance of our faith.

We confess one God, the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth. And the proof is here fed to us. When we prepare for this meal, grain that did not make itself is ground by the effort of hands that did not make themselves, and becomes “bread from the creation.” And grapes that did not make themselves are pressed and fermented by the effort of hands that did not make themselves, and poured into “the cup from the creation.” At this meal, none of these things could exist – not the bread, not the wine, not the table, not us – unless there were a Creator of them, who is Almighty God. So even in these bare elements, we taste proof of the faith we confess.

We confess that the Son of God, the eternal Word of God, is our Lord Jesus Christ. And the proof is fed to us. We have come to a royal banquet, and the host today is not me but the Son of the Great King. The Great King is God, and his Son Jesus hosts us. For it is his meal we come to eat – it is the Lord's Table and the Lord's Supper. And when we eat it, we receive food from Jesus, and his lordly hands place it in ours. When we come to this royal banquet, then, we find proof to taste of the faith we confess.

We confess that this Word of God became flesh, this Son of God became a Son of Man, when he was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit, incarnate in the womb of the Virgin Mary. And the proof is fed to us. For if the Word had not been made flesh, then no material thing could mediate his presence to us. He couldn't be touched, couldn't be embraced, couldn't be tasted. But when we sit at this table, the bread we call 'body' is the body of the Word-made-Flesh, and the cup we call 'blood' is the blood of God Incarnate, in all his virgin-born simplicity and purity. When we encounter God through this material meal, we find proof to taste of the faith we confess.

We confess that this Jesus Christ suffered under the rule of Pontius Pilate, and that he was crucified and killed. And the proof is fed to us. For it isn't in an intact loaf of bread that we recognize him – it's when the bread is broken. And it isn't in the bottled wine that we recognize him – it's when the wine is poured. “When you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord,” Paul reminds us (1 Corinthians 11:26). We could not eat this meal of bread ripped as his broken body and wine poured out as his shed blood if Jesus Christ had not suffered, had not been crucified, had not died. “For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed” (1 Corinthians 5:7); “through him, then, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God” (Hebrews 13:15). When we see this broken and poured, we have come to the very cross, and so taste proof of the faith we confess.

But we confess with joy that this same Jesus who was crucified to death was then raised from the dead on the third day, and is alive forevermore! And that is the cornerstone, that is what we're all about! And that is exactly what the Emmaus disciples found in the breaking of the bread from Jesus' hands. So do we, whenever this feast is truly tasted. In the breaking of the bread, we – like them – recognize our living Lord. In the cup we drink, we discover our risen Redeemer – now. For he lives in victory! And we taste the proof of the faith we confess.

We confess also that Jesus thereafter ascended into heaven where he has become seated at God's right hand, and the proof of this is fed to us here. Because the hands that hand you the bread and the cup this morning will not bear the marks of the nails. The nail-pierced hands of Jesus will be working through the unscarred hands of a man of his appointing. And the reason for that is that the nail-pierced hands are not on earth. He left the earth so as to extend his presence on the earth, by forming for himself a Body out of many. So when we receive this food, the very way it is brought into our midst, and the authority by which this grace takes place, are edible proof that Jesus is indeed on heaven's throne.

We confess that Jesus will one day return again as judge of the living and the dead, and proof is fed to us today. That Jesus is the Judge, this meal proves, for “anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body,” says St. Paul, “eats and drinks judgment on himself: that is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died..., judged by the Lord” (1 Corinthians 11:29-32). This meal has the potential to be the judgment seat. But we eat it and drink it “until he comes” (1 Corinthians 11:26), when he will eat and drink new with us in the kingdom of his Father (Matthew 26:29). He has promised to come again, and is already active to judge – we taste the proof.

We confess also our faith in the Holy Spirit, and proof is fed to us today. For, since time immemorial, it is the Holy Spirit who has been invoked, called down upon these gifts, to change them from ordinary bread and wine into something altogether uncommon: the very presence of the living God. We receive this food, not as symbol to be toyed with, but as a holy thing and a spiritual reality, made so as only the Holy Spirit of the Lord can do. Hearing the word with ears of faith, seeing the altar with eyes of faith, receiving them with the tastebuds of faith, we know that it's true: the impact made on our souls is the activity of the Holy Spirit in this feast. And we taste the proof of the faith we confess.

We confess also our faith in the Holy Church, and proof is fed to us today. For Paul reminds us that this meal is eaten precisely “when you come together as a church” (1 Corinthians 11:18), and to mistreat this meal would be to “despise the church of God” (1 Corinthians 11:22). When we eat this meal, we eat in the Church, and we eat from the Church, for it is the Church who “feeds with the eucharist” her children. This is the new Passover sacrifice, and just as the old one was to be eaten by the family in one house without being taken outside, so it has long been seen that “the flesh of Christ and the holy things of the Lord cannot be carried outside, and there is no other house for believers except the one Church.” We would not take this meal if we did not trust the Church, for we cannot make it on our own. And so we find proof to taste of the faith we confess.

We confess, moreover, the prospect of forgiveness of sins, and proof is fed to us today. Didn't Jesus himself announce the cup as his “blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Matthew 26:28)? And so when we worthily receive this sacrificial gift, the power of sin actually is shattered, the guilt of sin is freshly obliterated, forgiveness becomes a present fact in our hearts, and we taste the proof of the new covenant, we taste the proof that we are forgiven.

And we finally confess our hope in resurrection and eternal life. Today we are fed the proof. “Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood,” Jesus said, “has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day” (John 6:54). “If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever” (John 6:51). When we eat this feast, we know from experience the promise of the resurrection and the eternal life of Jesus dwelling in our very bodies – a life which a puny thing like death could not possibly conquer. In this meal, we taste proof of our hope for the future.

So what are we waiting for? I invite you, this beautiful Easter morning, in a few minutes, to eat and declare that Jesus, once crucified, is the Christ risen indeed! Let us all eat the proof of our faith, and taste and see that the Lord is good, for the Lord lives! Thanks be to God! Amen.