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FELLOWSHIP OF GOD SERIES
THE
SACRIFICE OF WORSHIP
Tonight I want to talk about something that touches the heart of God. Something that is most precious to Him. I want to talk about what we must do in order to enter into the heavenly veil. We know that what Moses had in his revelation of the tabernacle was only a picture or pattern of what is real up there in heaven. We know that in the Old Testament the animals and blood sacrifices point to Jesus. And we know that Jesus had opened the veil for us to go through, so that we can come boldly to the throne of grace that we may find help in grace and mercy as we need from God.
No matter how much we have tasted of the
presence of God. No matter how sometimes comfortable we feel at ease because we
know He loves us and that we could come into His bosom and just love Him and let
Him love us, I never lose that awesome holy fear of His presence. No matter how
many times you have tasted His presence; no matter how many times you have
entered into the most holy place, that freshness and that holiness and
awesomeness of His fear is tremendous. The holy fear of His presence always
remains. And it is in the heart of God. We could title this message in many
ways. How to touch the heart of God. Or The secret place of God's
heart. There is something that touches God very much. And I want to talk
about the main thing that touches God's heart.
In the book of Leviticus 16 we see how the
high priest on the Day of Atonement, which takes place once a year, is to enter
into the
Lev. 16:3-15 Thus shall Aaron come into the holy place; with a young bull for a sin
offering and a ram for a burnt offering? He shall put on the holy linen coat,
and shall have the linen breeches on his body, be girded with the linen girdle,
and wear the linen turban; these are the holy garments. He shall bathe his body
in water and then put them on. And he shall take from the congregation of the
people of
Take note of verse 12 and 13. How Aaron
has to take a censer full of burning coal before the altar. And this is talking
about the altar of incense. There are 6 pieces of furniture and there 3 parts
to the tabernacle; the outer court where there is a brazen altar and the lever;
then the second place called the holy place where you have the candle stick,
the altar of incense and the table of show bread; then you have the veil. And
once a year the high priest enters into the veil where you have the Ark of the
Covenant. God gives instruction to sprinkle the blood on the mercy seat. The
blood is important and it points to the Blood of the Lamb.
But another thing is important too. And that is the incense. He cannot just enter
with the blood. He must enter with something else that God prepared at the
altar of incense. And that is Aaron must take coals of fire and put incense
there. And as he puts the coal of fire and the incense immediately the incense
will come forth like a smoke and an aroma that surrounds that place. And as he
hold the incense stick on one hand and holds the blood on the other, under the
covering of the cloud he must quickly go in. See there is only a certain amount
of time that the incense will remain.
In verse 13 the cloud of incense may
cover the mercy seat. The high priest only had a glimpse of the mercy seat.
He had to look at the mercy seat through the cloud of incense. And that is only
the earthly pattern. And as the cloud of incense fill the place, he must go
under the cloud. If he goes before the cloud he will die. That is why when God
made the high priest garments all along the edge of his skirt are little bells
and pomegranates. So when the high priest walks you can hear the tinkling sound
of the bells. According to some Jewish writings, they had to tie one rope to
the high priest's leg. When the high
priest enters into the most holy place, the other priests would be waiting
outside. And they would be all very concerned. As long as the rope is moving
they look at one another and say it is all right. But if anytime they hear a
fall, they would have to slowly pull the rope out with a dead priest. It's a
dangerous assignment. I wonder how he felt emotionally. It must be very
exciting in a sense that is once a year affair. But he knows that if he makes
one mistake, that's the end of him. And if the priest was too slow and if
before he could put the blood the incense cloud disappears he would die. Then
he must not be clumsy. He must be very precise and time it nicely: put the
blood there under the covering of the cloud and then quickly come out. He must
quickly leave the place before the cloud disappears. If the cloud disappears
and he hangs around and have a tour of the most holy place he will die.
That cloud has meaning in the New
Testament. What is the meaning of that incense cloud? The Lord began to speak
to me something special about that incense. I said, "Lord there must be
something that pleases You." I know in the bible says faith pleases God.
There is a time in your life as you walk with God you always has a desire to
please Him. If you really love your wife sometimes you want to think of some
ways you could show your love. That is the way we have in God. I want to know
what moves God.
Do you know that if God can get angry God
can also be touched? And there are some things that touch God more than others.
Tonight I want to share with you the secret of touching the heart of Father
God. Something that pleases Him so much, you could almost feel His pleasure. Do
you know that in heaven if God smiles there is some power that flows from Him
to our lives. And that incense is the secret of touching His heart. That
incense in the New Testament has to do with the sacrifice of worship. The Lord
began to talk to me about the sacrifice of worship that costs you something and
how much it meant to Him. I know that in Heb. 11:6 it says that without faith
it is impossible to please God. But then God began to speak to me and said,
"Did you have a look at what that kind of faith it is that pleases
God?" That faith involves a sacrifice of worship.
Heb.11: 6 Without faith it is impossible to please God. Then he lists the
many people who live by faith. Verse 7 Noah, verse 8 Abraham and Sarah, Isaac,
Jacob, Enoch and all these other people. And if you look down the list you
notice one thing common. Each one of them paid a price to love God. It was not
just by saying I believe, I confess and that's all. There was a price they paid
to walk with God and to love God. Abraham by faith left his homeland to go to a
strange new land. That was a sacrifice. Noah had to prepare and give up
everything and spend the rest of his days building the ark. That was a
sacrifice. What about Cain and Abel? Abel's sacrifice pleased God. Now Cain
also sacrificed. But the sacrifice was
different. Abel's sacrifice cost him something. Cain's sacrifice didn't cost
him anything. The bible tells us that Able gave the firstlings. What Cain
should have done was to give first fruits with the blood sacrifice. There is
something that is meaningful when it costs us something. And you give it to God
as worship. It is something that costs you something. When Abraham offered
Isaac it meant everything to him. You could feel the feelings of what a holy
sacrifice is. To give all that you love, all that is dear and precious to you
and pour it before God as an incense of worship. I want to make it very clear
that is not just sacrifice alone. It has to be a sacrifice based on a heart of
love and worship.
In Matt. 9 and Matt. 12 where Jesus was
talking to the Pharisees and he says I desire mercy and not sacrifice. Now He
is talking about the attitudes. The Pharisees were having a form of religion
and doing something but it was not costing them anything. They didn’t
understand mercy and the deeper things of God. You can love God and your love
for God will cost you to surrender many things because of love. You can't love
without giving. Because when you love you want to give. But you can give
without loving. And that's what some of the people in the bible did. For
example in Isa. 1, Jer. 6 God told the people and said I am tired of your
sacrifices. I am tired of your incense because you don’t obey My Word. You
don’t follow My Word. And to you all these sacrifices of Moses are just
nothing. So take it in the context when God was against those sacrifices. It is
not that He is against all sacrifices. He is just against the sacrifices that
don’t cost us anything. And it is just a pattern or a form of religious thing
that we do day in and day out.
God also rebuked Saul in the book of I
Samuel in chapter 15 through Samuel. When God commanded him to go and slay
Amalekites, he didn’t obey God's word and he kept the best of the flock. I
don’t think he really had God in mind. He probably was thinking of something
for himself or for the people. When God rebuked him he just said that it was
for God. When Samuel says to him what is this sound of the animals and then
Saul excused himself in verse 21 it says But
the people took of the spoil, sheep and oxen, the best of the things devoted to
destruction, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal. The way he said
the Lord your God instead of the Lord my God shows that there is a lot of
differences.
In verse 22-23 And
Samuel said, "Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and
sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than
sacrifice, and to hearken the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of
divination, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have
rejected the word of the Lord, he has
also rejected you from being king."
Now take it in the context that here Saul
didn’t really love the Lord. And what he is saying is more like a form of a
religion, something that we just do because we have to do. Those things don’t
please God. And that's what God means when He says that those sacrifices don’t
please Him.
However, there is an area of sacrifice
that touched the core of the heart of God. And that is when our worship cost us
something. And that was the way David who was known as a man after God's heart.
You know why God loved him. He knew how to touch God's heart. He knew how to
give his best to God. When David made a mistake by numbering the Israelites,
God brought judgment on
As he prayed in repentance to God in I
Chron. 21:16 And David lifted his eyes
and saw the angel of the Lord standing between earth and heaven, and in his
hand a drawn sword stretched out over Jerusalem. Then David and the elders,
clothed in sackcloth, fell upon their faces. It must have been awesome. And
look how he acknowledges his sin. He was even willing to take the price on
himself. He said Lord don’t punish the people punish me.
Look at his prayer in verse 17. And David said to God, "Was it not I
who gave command to number the people? It is I who have sinned and done very
wickedly. But these sheep, what have they done? Let thy hand, I pray thee, O
Lord my God, be against me and against my father's house, but let not the
plagues be upon the people." He
knew he made a mistake. And he was willing to pay the price for his own
mistake. He said, "God don’t punish the people. If you have to punish,
then punish me O Lord."
Verse 18-19 Then the angel of the Lord commanded Gad to say to David that David
should go up and rear an altar to the Lord on the threshing floor of Ornan the
Jebusite. So David went up at Gad's word, which he had spoken in the name of
the Lord. And now David has come to bring a sacrifice to God. And as he
came to see Ornan in verse 21 As David
came to Ornan, Ornan looked and saw David and went forth from the threshing
floor, and did obeisance to David with his face to the ground. And David said
to Ornan, "Give me the site of the threshing floor that I may build on it
an altar to the Lord - give it to me at its full price- that the plague may
be averted from the people." Then
Ornan said to David, "Take it; and let my lord the king do what seems good
to him; see, I give the oxen for burnt offerings, and the threshing sledges for
the wood, and the wheat for a cereal offering. I give it all.
Any other ordinary man would have accepted
that. Many pastors would say thank you.
And then they share their testimony how God provided. But David was
different. All of us have a public life and a private life. Our private life
must be consistent with our public life. There is something in the heart of
David that is different from other people. I want you to know that there are
millions of people all over the earth worshiping God. If you know how to touch
the heart of God you will make a difference. There is something about the
sacrifice of worship that God bypass the millions of people and come to you.
Jesus said to the woman in the well at the gospel of John chapter 4 and says
that the Father seeks those who worship Him in spirit and in truth. Those who
really know to worship God, God will bypass the millions of people and come to
you.
I
want to share with you the secret of David's worship in God. There was
something different about David's life. There was something different in his
heart. David doesn't take his relationship with God lightly. When he did
anything for God he doesn’t do it the same way that he will do it for anybody
else. You can see David rejoicing when the ark was coming in. David had many
happy moments. David didn’t rejoice when he conquered
Now this David said to Ornan and said I
appreciate all that you have done. But Ornan this is for God. In verse 24 But King David said to Ornan, "No, but
I will buy it for the full price; I will not take for the Lord what is yours,
nor offer burnt offerings which cost me nothing. I don’t even want a discount. I want to
make sure that it costs me something to worship God. When I worship God I want
God to know that this is how much I love Him. I don’t want a discounted
worship. I want God to know that when it comes to Him I am willing to pay a
full price. It must cost me something to worship God. He knew the secret of
touching the heart of God.
Turn over to the New Testament and I will
show you some areas, which bring great incense and worship to God. Philip.
4:15-19 And you Philippians yourselves
know that in the beginning of the gospel, when I left Macedonia, no church
entered into partnership with me in giving and receiving except you only; for
even in Thessalonica you sent me help once and again. Not that I seek the gift;
but I seek the fruit which increases to your credit. I have received full
payment, and more; I am filled, having received from Epaphroditus the gifts you
sent me, a fragrant offering a sacrifice acceptable and pleasing to God.
God began to show me what it means by Hebrews 11:6 He says that
kind of faith that they exercise cost them something. Faith that doesn’t cost
you anything doesn’t require faith. It costs them some sacrifice and worship
and love for God. When we look at this offering of the Philippians we don’t get
the full picture yet. We see the aroma and the things that please God.
Let me give you another picture, another
angle of the same group of people called the Philippians. And why there is such
powerful incense that goes to God. Turn to II Cor. 8. Remember that the
Macedonians are the same group of people as the Philippians. II Cor. 8:1-2 We want you to know, brethren, about the
grace of God which has been shown in the churches of Macedonia, for in a severe
test of affliction, their abundance of joy and their extreme poverty. Do
you know that for the Philippians to give it hurts? They don’t have much. They
were not a very rich people. And of all people they were the people who
constantly gave to the apostle Paul. And Paul says it was a sweet incense to
God. You know why? It was a sacrifice of love in worship to God.
Cho Yonggi who has a congregation of
800,000, was sharing how he built his large church building. The church went
into some difficulties. They didn’t have enough finances and everything was so
tight. They have given their house and they have moved into the uncompleted
apartment next to the church. Then something happened in his church as he held
on persistently to God. One Sunday after the service one very poor woman went
to the front and she said, "Pastor I know what is in your heart to do
something for God." And she gave her little bowl and a chopstick as an
offering to God. Cho Yonggi knows she was a very poor woman. He said, "What
are you going to eat with?" And the lady said, "I can eat out of
cardboard." Then one businessman who was sitting there saw it. He said,
"I give five hundred dollars (or five thousand, I can't remember the exact
amount,) for that bowl. Because of that one incident all the church people
began to start giving sacrificially to the Lord. That one little woman brought
a breakthrough to the church. I am sure that woman is going to receive a very
great reward in heaven. No matter how small you are if you learn how to sacrifice
a sacrifice of worship you can do something great in God.
I was once talking with a pastor about his
building plan. As we were talking about sacrifice of praise and worship, I said
some of the greatest givers are not very rich people. Then I remembered 2 times
in my life when I cried when I was given an offering. One was when I first
started in the ministry and that was in 1981. We were just starting off and we
didn’t have much. And there was a lady whom I know she was not too well off.
And she came one day to one of our little home fellowships and she gave an
envelope. And she said the Lord told me to give this. I opened it and inside I
found one thousand dollars. At that time I have never received an offering as
big as that. I knew she didn’t have much. She didn’t know it but that night I
went to the Lord and I cried. I said God there are so many people in the world
that you could use. Why of all people you choose a little woman who loves you
and gives so sacrificially. Even when I was shared that incident with another
pastor I still cried.
Just a few weeks ago something like that
happened again. I was standing at the back and I was shaking hands with people.
One of the sisters came to me and said, "Pastor I want you to know how
much you have changed my life and I ask God what can I do and God told me to do
this." And she handed me a little envelope. And I know she didn’t have
much. When I went back I opened the envelope and I found a thousand dollars. I
said, "Lord I know this sister to a certain extend although I don’t know
her that well. I know her income she don’t have much. For her to save a
thousand dollars takes some time. I knew what a sacrifice that was to
her." You can feel how touching it is when people sacrifice because of
their love. The Lord spoke to me and said, "Son do you know what it means
to Me when those who love Me sacrifice because they love Me."
In the gospel of Luke 7:36-38 One of the Pharisees asked Him to eat with
him, and He went into the Pharisee's house, and sat at table. And behold, a
woman of the city, who was a sinner, when she learned that He was sitting at
table in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster flask of ointment, and
standing behind Him at His feet, weeping, she began to wet His feet with her
tears, and wiped them with the hair of her head, and kissed His feet, and
anointed them with the ointment.
This woman loved Jesus so much. When you
see some people worship the Lord because they loved Him don’t judge because you
don’t understand what is going on in their heart,. Sometimes you see somebody
else worshipping in their own way in their own heart. They are doing what they
know best to worship God and it is from their heart, don’t judge. As long as it
is love for Jesus and it is not something unscriptural leave them alone. It may
be touching to God.
Verse 39-46 The Pharisee who had invited Him saw this he spoke to himself saying
this man if He were as prophet would know who and what manner of woman this is
who is touching Him for she is a sinner. And Jesus answered and said to him,
"Simon, I have something to say to you." And he answered, "What
is it Teacher?" "A certain creditor had two debtors; one owed five
hundred denari, and the other fifty. When they could not pay, he forgave them
both. Now which of them will love him more?" Simon answered, "The
one, I suppose, to whom he forgave more." And he said to him, "You
have judged rightly." Then turning toward the woman he said to Simon,
"Do you see this woman? I entered your house, you gave me no water for My
feet, but she has wet My feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You
gave Me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not ceased to kiss My
feet. You did not anoint My head with
oil, but she has anointed My feet with ointment.
No ordinary person would do that. But
something was going on in the heart of this woman. She knew that Jesus had
forgiven her sins. Jesus touched her and she wants to tell Jesus that she loved
Him. I don’t think that she could have been a rich woman. She may have taken
all her savings and bought one bottle of perfume. People don’t understand but
that was her way of loving the Lord. When she saw Jesus she loved Him so much,
she kept kissing His feet and kept on crying. Washing His feet with her tears,
using her hair. Do you know the people around Jesus were disgusted? But this
woman loved Him. It was a sacrifice. We must be careful when we tread on
somebody else's love relationship with Jesus.
In my church there is a man who love to
dance and worship before God. One day the Lord began to speak to me and said,
"Son I wish you could do that like him." I said, "Lord it is not
my character. I am not jumpy like him." That Sunday I went back and God
continued to talk to me and said, "You know my servant David did that
too." I said, "Lord I will do it but let me first tell my
congregation so that they understand." I told my congregation and said
when you see that happening that is not my personality. However since God deals
with my life, I as a pastor am willing to yield. I am willing to give up my
self-consciousness I am willing to give up my dignity I am willing to give up
what people think of me and just let go. Just 3 weeks and the Lord began to do
something that He has never done before. The Lord began to show a new presence
that I never felt before in my private life. And the Lord said, "Son I
want you to know that I love you for loving me that much." And something
changed on my inside I could feel it. It is good to worship God in whatever way
that cost you something. It is something precious to God.
Turn to the book of Numbers 16. Moses knew
that the incense was precious to God. And one day trouble happened in the
wilderness and the plague started among the people. People started dying like
flies. Verse 41-45 But on the morrow all
the congregation of the people of
And
God's judgment started falling. Do you know that all prophecies of judgment can
be conditional although the conditions may not be mentioned? When Jonah was
told
Here judgement was coming but Moses knew
how to touch God's heart. God didn’t tell him to do this. This was something
not initiated by God. This was something that Moses understood the meaning and
he applied it to the situation he was facing. He knew how special the incense
is to God. And Moses of his own initiative when he saw the plague he knew
everybody would die if he don’t do anything. And Moses said to Aaron take a
censer put fire in it from the altar and put incense on it. Take it quickly to
the congregation and make atonement for them. The wrath has gone out from the
Lord the plague has begun. Then Aaron took it as Moses had commanded. He ran
into their midst. He has to run as quickly as possible because every second people
are dying. When God saw the incense He was touched.
Look at what happened in verse 48 he stood between the dead and the living. Everybody
in front of him died but everybody behind who were covered behind the incense
lived. That incense was special. I want you to know that the sacrifice of
worship is special to God. And I know that as God deals in my life God will do
in your life in different ways. I ask you a few questions tonight. When was the
last time that it cost you something to show your love for God? I pray that it
is not too far away. May we be sensitive in the times that we are living in
that God is seeking for worshippers of God. And there may be different ways
that we show our love for God. May I ask you tonight what does it cost you to
love Jesus? Do you know that it cost Jesus His entire life in order to love us?
Eph. 5:1-2 Therefore be imitators of God,
as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave Himself up
for fragrant offering, a sacrifice and us to God. Many times Jesus gives
all out of love for God - it was a sacrifice of love. Many times God said,
"This is my Son in whom I am well pleased." Can God say that of your
life?
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