How to Demolish the Barrier Between You and God

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- Written at the base of Mount Sinai,

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Leviticus is set in between

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the Israelites' rescue from slavery

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and their deliverance into the Promised Land

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God set for them.

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They were literally camping between stops

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on their journey.

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On the surface, Leviticus might look like

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a collection of laws that no longer apply,

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but it's really a story of God pursuing

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His most beloved creation, us.

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Since the beginning, God has always wanted

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a relationship with his people,

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but they consistently turn their backs on Him,

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just like us.

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To make matters worse, their beliefs

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about God's character were being hijacked

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by the popular culture surrounding them,

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just like us.

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Today, like the Israelites, everyone is moving

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from something and towards something else.

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It's easy to look at the strictness

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of the Old Testament, the rules, wars,

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and the brutality and think

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that God is different than the one we worship.

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Leviticus actually proves the opposite.

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If God is anything,

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He's consistent in His pursuit of his people.

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Leviticus helps bring the Old Testament

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and New Testament together as it holds some of

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the deepest revelations about God's character

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and His intense pursuit of us.

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Well, hey, good morning. My name is Kyle,

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one of our teaching pastors here at Crossroads.

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And we are talking about Leviticus,

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like you just saw in that video.

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And as we've been talking about it,

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we've got some major prop game, haven't we?

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We had the swinging smoke thing on the first week.

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Smoke on a rope is what I call that.

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And then we had two goats, not one, two goats on stage.

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That was pretty cool.

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And then we had smoked meat for you out in the atrium

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and pretty cool props.

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I think today, though, is going to take the cake

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because today we have something incredible.

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We have a really big curtain.

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Yeah, yeah, that's from the Bible

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and we're going to talk about it a lot.

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So there you go.

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I know. I know what you're thinking.

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You're like, "Man, Kyle, when I went through

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all the effort to get ready for church,

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you know, because it takes some effort, right?

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It takes some effort.

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I had to get dressed. I had to eat breakfast.

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I fed most of my kids, I think, brought them all here.

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And then I was just hoping all that effort

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would pay off and church would be about

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something awesome like angels or the Apocalypse,

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you know, something exciting.

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But a really big curtain, man, what a friggin treat.

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So excited. So excited."

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Yeah, well, this is what we're talking about.

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This comes from the Bible,

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from the book of Leviticus.

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And it's actually a curtain that God made for a reason,

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so He'd be separated from us.

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He made it as a barrier, which typically

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at Crossroads we're not really about that.

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We say this all the time:

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No matter who you are, no matter what you believe,

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we're just really glad you're here.

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We're very welcoming. We're also very honest.

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And so let me just be honest.

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There are a few types of people who,

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if you're here, I'm actually not glad that you're here,

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and I would love there to be a barrier

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like this between us.

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In fact, no one's glad you're here.

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For instance, if you're the kind of person

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who calls after I text you,

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I am not glad you're here.

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I'm just not.

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I don't know why this doesn't carry

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a jail sentence at this point.

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Like, if you're a normal person,

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you don't want to talk to anybody

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on the phone ever under any circumstances. Right?

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Some people call you back.

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Those kind of people you don't want to be around you.

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Also, the kind of people

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who if you're at a group dinner,

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you know, there's friends hanging around.

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There's 8 or 10 of you or whatever at the table.

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And the waiter comes, if you're the kind of person

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who tells the waiter to just split the check evenly

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to make it easy.

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I don't want to be around you

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because 100 times out of 100,

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you're the only one who ordered the steak

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and the rest of us got a salad or a cheeseburger.

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I wasn't really looking to donate to your dinner tonight.

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That wasn't in my plan.

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I don't want to be around you.

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And lastly, maybe most importantly,

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if you're the kind of person

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who poops at other people's houses,

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don't want to be around you. Thank you.

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The rest of us don't do that.

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Do you know why? We're good planners.

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Maybe you could try that.

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You got that one, buddy, right?

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The one that comes over to your house

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and he's immediately just like,

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'"ey, man, do you mind if I take

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a quick business meeting in your bathroom?"

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You know, and like, 25 minutes later,

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he comes strutting out like he won a war.

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"You're out of toilet paper."

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Don't want to be around you.

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This is a barrier.

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God did make it because

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He didn't want to be around us, seemingly.

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He had to put a barrier in place.

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In fact, Leviticus is a book all about barriers.

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Each week of this series, we've zoomed in

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to look at one of the offerings or sacrifices

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that's listed in Leviticus.

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We covered four so far:

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the burnt offering, that was that was the smoke;

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the guilt offering, that was the goats;

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the peace offering,

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that's when we learned we could have parties;

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and then the grain offering,

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that's when Chuck and Justin Mosteller last week

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made us all cry with their story.

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That's -- we've looked at all those.

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And today we're going to cover a fifth,

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the sin offering

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and this curtain that's directly tied to it.

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Now, Leviticus is a tough read.

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I'm not -- going to be very honest with you.

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It is a very, very tough read.

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We're looking at it, though, because

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if you don't understand Leviticus,

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you cannot understand Jesus.

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It's that simple. It's that simple.

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It's directly tied to who He is.

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Now, the language in it, if you were to read it,

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it's very impersonal, but it actually deals

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with an incredibly personal topic.

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It's the idea of why do we feel

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separation between us and God?

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And this is what I find most people, most of us,

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whether this is your first Sunday in church

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or whether you've been coming to church for decades,

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most of us live with some ongoing constant

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level of feeling of disconnection or barrier

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or separation between us and God.

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Maybe you experienced it earlier this morning.

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The music started and the person in front of you

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raised their hands, you know, and you just

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had this moment where you went like,

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"I've never felt that close to God

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the way that she feels."

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Or maybe you're the kind of person

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who raises your hand in worship on Sunday morning,

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but you go home and on Monday morning,

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God just feels further away from you.

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Like somehow He moved

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or somehow He went behind the curtain.

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And there's this, there's this gap between you.

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What happens for most of us is we follow God

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over years that turn into decades

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is at some point we just decide

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that's how it's supposed to be.

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That's just kind of how it is,

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there's always going to be this gap.

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Most of us feel separated from God.

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My question is why? Why do we feel that way?

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Now, Crossroads has been accused

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of being church lite in the past.

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You know what I mean by that, like Bud Light.

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You know, like, full church flavor,

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but half the carbs, that's Crossroads.

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You know?

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I don't think we've ever been that,

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certainly not in this series and certainly not today.

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It's a 401 level day because

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to answer this simple question

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of why do we feel separated from God,

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we have to wade into some fairly deep theological waters.

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But please hang with me because my hope is

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at the end of this experience,

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it's going to turn very personal,

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very simple and very clear for you.

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See, the idea today is very simple:

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God removed every barrier to be close to you,

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and now it's your turn.

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Would you pray with me?

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God, thank you for today.

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Thank you for the effort that it did take to be here,

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the effort that it does take to watch.

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I pray that you'd reward us.

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Reward us for being here, God,

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reward us for leaning in and listening with more of you,

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with more closeness to you.

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Knock down every barrier standing in the way. Amen.

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So Leviticus is the third book of the Bible.

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It comes right after Exodus.

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Exodus is the story where God frees His nation,

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Israel, from slavery in Egypt.

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And God's plan is then to live with them

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symbolically in a place called the Tabernacle.

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Tabernacle is a tent.

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It basically can travel with them

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as they make their journey from Egypt

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to the Promised Land.

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And that's His plan, the tabernacle.

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Now, we haven't talked about the tabernacle

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explicitly in this series, but it's where

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all of the sacrifices we've learned so far

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have taken place.

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So here's a picture, an artist's recreation

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of the outside of it.

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And you'll see right there in the middle it says Altar.

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That's where all the sacrifices took place

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in the courtyard, which was part of

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this structure called the Tabernacle.

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Now, the tabernacle was not designed by people.

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It wasn't a thing that Moses dreamt up or anybody else.

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God specifically designed it

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and He designed it for a reason.

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He wanted it to be reminiscent of the Garden of Eden.

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Why?

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Because in the Garden of Eden,

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there were no barriers between us and God.

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None at all.

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Like, to the point where Adam and Eve walked around naked.

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That's how much there was no barriers.

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And maybe you're in here and you're, like,

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"I think Adam and Eve are allegorical

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or they're a fairy tale."

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That's fine.

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That's totally okay for the point I'm trying to make.

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The vision, though, is that there was

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once this relationship of no barriers

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and it had changed.

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And so God designed the temple or the tabernacle

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to be reminiscent of the time

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when there were no barriers because

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that's how He wanted it to always be.

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I don't know if you know that about God.

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Do you know God doesn't want there to be

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any barriers between you and Him?

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Do you know that He wants to be close to you?

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Not distant.

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Not like some some faraway God who you have to

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posture in order to approach

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or say some prayer exactly perfect for Him to hear you.

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That's not the relationship He wants with you.

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He wants closeness, utter and complete closeness.

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The one time Jesus prayed for you in the Bible,

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you can look it up yourself after this, John 17.

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Do you know what His prayer was?

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It was that you would be one with God,

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no gaps between you.

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But this gap had been created.

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And so God makes the Tabernacle, designs it like Eden

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to say, "Hey, I want to go back to the way it was."

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Some similarities between the two.

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Eden faced east, the garden.

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The tabernacle, no matter where it was set up,

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no matter where they were traveling,

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was specifically always to be set up facing east.

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The Garden of Eden was guarded by Cherubim.

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Cherubim are like God's guardians of His Holiness.

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And the Tabernacle Cherubim show up in two places,

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one, on this curtain.

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This is a replica of the curtain

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that divided the rest of the tabernacle

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from the most holy place.

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God said design two Cherubim on it.

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That's these winged figures that you see up here

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to guard My Holiness.

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And then they also showed up

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on the lid of the Ark of the Covenant,

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which was behind this curtain,

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inside the Holy of Holies.

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Eden had the Tree of Life in it.

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The tabernacle had the lampstand

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designed to look like a tree.

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You know it as a menorah.

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It looks like the Tree of Life.

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The Garden of Eden had

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the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil,

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which God specifically said, "Don't touch it.

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Don't touch it because you'll die."

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Do you know inside the Tabernacle

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was the written word of God, the law of God,

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which was the knowledge of good and evil,

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literally the Ten Commandments carved on stone,

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which were inside the Ark of the Covenant,

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which God said specifically,

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"Don't touch it or you'll die."

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The point is God was saying something

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to humanity at this at this moment.

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He was saying, "I'm designing this tabernacle

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to make a declaration, to declare to you

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that I am building a way back to how it was in Eden

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when there were no barriers between us."

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The inside of the tabernacle was also very intentional.

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This is a kind of a cutaway section

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of what it looked like on the inside.

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You can see this curtain shows up.

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Now, interestingly, as you move through the tabernacle,

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moving from east to west, things got more holy,

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more west, more holy.

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The materials changed.

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When you were outside it was wood,

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and then it became bronze,

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and then it became silver,

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and then finally it became gold

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when you got around the most holy place.

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But the real eye catcher, the stunner,

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if you were to walk inside, was this gigantic curtain,

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which God had them hang up to create separation

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between Himself and the people.

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Here's the instructions God gave for its creation

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in the book of Exodus, Exodus 26.

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And you shall make a veil of blue and purple

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and scarlet yarns and fine twined linen.

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It shall be made with cherubims skillfully worked into it,

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and the veil shall separate for you the Holy Place

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from the Most Holy.

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The veil is the barrier that allowed God to be close,

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but not too close because that was His plan.

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I just want to be close to you, but immediately

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it just all goes to crap because

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the Israelites mess up in this massive way,

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so much so that God can't even be around them at all.

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Like, they can't even enter into the tabernacle.

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This is how Exodus ends and where Leviticus picks up.

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I'll read it to you. Leviticus one.

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Now the Lord called to Moses

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and spoke to him from the tabernacle of meeting.

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It means that God was in it and Moses was outside.

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He spoke to him from the tabernacle of meeting.

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And the spoiler that I need to give you

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is Leviticus is the chapter where God

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starts to create the way back to closeness,

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back to there being no barriers.

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That's the sacrificial system.

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Every single one of them was meant to be

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a temporary solution that someday

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Jesus would permanently solve.

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And we see how this plays out.

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If you look at the first verse

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of the book after Leviticus,

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we see that it worked to a degree.

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Numbers 1:1:

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And so Moses goes from the outside of the tent

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to able to enter into the tent

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because of this sacrificial system.

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That's the idea behind the entire thing.

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Now, there's a question, though, we have to ask,

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critical question, which is

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why would God need to be separated from us at all?

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Why would this curtain need to exist in the first place?

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You know?

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As a kid I heard this explained

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and I don't know the exact words people used.

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This is just my impression, my takeaway

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going to Sunday school in different churches

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and stuff like that.

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What was described to me was kind of this

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two parter situation that I was sinful

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and because I was sinful,

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God did not want to be around me because He was Holy.

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And so He would stay back here

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and create distance between me.

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Because I was sinful, He couldn't be around me.

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That would be, like, on one Sunday,

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and then the next Sunday I'd come back

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and they would tell me about

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what a great father God was.

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And I was like, "That doesn't make sense,

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actually, if you think about it."

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Because I wasn't always good at home growing up.

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Sometimes I sinned.

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I had a little brother,

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sometimes I would punch him or take his things

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because that's what you're supposed to do

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when you're the older brother. Right?

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But you know what my dad never did?

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He never hung a giant curtain in our house

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and said, "Kyle, you stay over here.

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I'm going back here.

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I don't want to be around you.

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That's way better. Whoo."

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My dad never did that. Right?

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That'd be weird.

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You guys wouldn't be, like,

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"He should be Dad of the Year if he did."

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It's weird.

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So, why can't God just be around us?

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Well, it does have to do with God's Holiness

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and our sinfulness.

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Those are the important components.

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But it's not about God doesn't want to be around us,

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it's that God can't be around us.

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You see the holiness of God

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and the sinfulness of humanity do not, cannot,

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will not mix. It's a conflict.

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Let me explain it to you.

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The holiness of God.

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Holiness means unique.

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It just means different,

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and not different in a worse way,

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but different in a better way.

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Like, so incredibly different,

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it's just on a different plane, different category.

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That's what holiness means.

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And so God is holy in that He is uniquely loving,

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He is uniquely compassionate,

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He is uniquely comparing, He's uniquely forgiving.

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All those things are true.

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But God is also uniquely just,

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not commonly just like we are, uniquely just.

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Common justice is what we do.

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It's where we excuse injustices.

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It's where we take inconvenient truths

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and we just kind of kick them under the rug

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so we don't have to deal with them.

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That's not who God is.

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And if God were to do that,

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if God were to be commonly just,

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He would cease to be unique,

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which means He'd cease to be holy.

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And that's not an option.

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He would in doing so cease to be God to a degree, right?

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Second thing is our sinfulness.

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It used to be back in the day,

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the most radical Christian beliefs were things,

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like, I believe in the virgin birth

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or I believe in the resurrection

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or the divinity of Jesus. You know?

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Enlightened secular thinkers would look at you

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and call you an idiot, because

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those are superstitions and fairy tales, you know.

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And and I miss those days. I miss them.

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Those were the good old days. You know?

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This is not the case anymore.

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Now, we live in this age of enlightened

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general spiritualism where you can believe in

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whatever you want to

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and have mystical spiritual experiences.

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It's totally fine.

00:18:08

Anything, everything spiritual and weird,

00:18:10

it is in and okay.

00:18:13

Now the single most radical Christian belief is sin.

00:18:19

And there's not a close second.

00:18:21

Not at all. Not at all.

00:18:23

See, today, enlightened secular thinkers

00:18:28

increasingly deny that humanity is inherently sinful.

00:18:35

This is the big idea behind things

00:18:37

like self actualization or manifesting

00:18:41

or the ever popular pop psychology line

00:18:43

of everything you have is just inside of you.

00:18:47

No, it's not, according to the Bible.

00:18:50

See, the Bible says that every one of us is born sinful

00:18:53

and completely and utterly unable

00:18:55

to meet God's moral standard, completely.

00:18:59

But just believing that God has

00:19:01

an absolute moral standard

00:19:03

and that He actually holds us to it

00:19:06

will make you not just an outsider in culture,

00:19:08

but increasingly an enemy.

00:19:11

One of my favorite modern theologians

00:19:13

is a guy named John Mark Comer,

00:19:15

who wrote a book called Live No Lies.

00:19:17

He talked about it this way:

00:19:37

That alternative vision he references

00:19:40

is the basic idea that if we humans can just be freed

00:19:45

from the oppressive religious idea of moral absolutes,

00:19:50

we will be able to evolve upward

00:19:53

into a harmonious utopia.

00:19:57

You've heard the phrase

00:19:58

"be on the right side of history."

00:20:00

Well, friends, let's talk about history.

00:20:02

Do you know that whenever humanity

00:20:04

has been freed from moral absolutes,

00:20:06

we do not evolve upwards into a harmonious utopia,

00:20:10

but we devolve into a violent mob.

00:20:13

That's what happens.

00:20:14

Think about this.

00:20:15

The one time God showed up on Earth

00:20:17

in the person of Jesus, do you know what we did to Him?

00:20:19

We killed him. That's what we did.

00:20:22

See, our sin makes us a danger to God.

00:20:25

We can't be together.

00:20:27

The two things do not mix.

00:20:31

Think about it for a minute.

00:20:32

In order for us to be together, one of two things,

00:20:35

and only two things would have to change.

00:20:37

Either God would have to cease to be holy,

00:20:39

we've talked about why that can't happen,

00:20:41

or we would have to cease to be sinful,

00:20:43

something we are completely and utterly

00:20:45

unable to do on our own, which is why

00:20:49

the sin offering was instituted in the first place

00:20:51

to temporarily deal with the problem.

00:20:54

Now, there's lots of different sin offerings

00:20:56

in the Bible.

00:20:57

If you want, like a really thrilling read,

00:20:59

read Leviticus four and five for yourselves.

00:21:02

And when I say really thrilling, I mean

00:21:04

have a coffee next to you the whole time

00:21:07

and maybe a Red Bull on the other hand,

00:21:09

because it's a lot. Okay.

00:21:11

It's a lot.

00:21:12

And I'm not going to read you everything from it.

00:21:14

I'm not going to read you all the nuances

00:21:16

and different types of sin offerings.

00:21:17

I just want you to see the big picture idea.

00:21:20

Common across all of them something happens,

00:21:23

a sin is committed which results in guilt.

00:21:25

And the response is a blood sacrifice

00:21:28

must be offered which results in atonement.

00:21:31

That means payment for the sin

00:21:33

and then subsequently forgiveness.

00:21:35

And very specifically, it's the blood of the animal

00:21:39

that's the most important thing.

00:21:40

And many of these sin offerings,

00:21:43

the good part of the animal, the meat,

00:21:45

is actually taken outside the camp,

00:21:47

put on an ash heap and burned.

00:21:48

It's the blood that's scattered around the altar,

00:21:51

and even before this very veil.

00:21:53

Here's what it says in Leviticus 4:

00:22:09

It's a blood sacrifice that deals temporarily with the sin.

00:22:13

Now, if you fast forward a few years,

00:22:16

a few hundred years, that traveling tabernacle

00:22:18

becomes a fixed permanent stone structure

00:22:21

in Jerusalem called the temple.

00:22:23

The setup is the same as the tabernacle.

00:22:25

Same idea, same process, same Most Holy Place,

00:22:29

same curtain hanging up still to block us from God,

00:22:32

it just becomes permanent.

00:22:34

If you fast forward a few thousand more years to,

00:22:37

like, today, though, you might have noticed something.

00:22:40

There is no more giant curtain usually on stage.

00:22:44

And we don't really sacrifice animals in church anymore.

00:22:47

Have you noticed that?

00:22:48

Haven't killed a single animal this whole time.

00:22:51

Some of us are excited about that.

00:22:53

Brian Tome, not sure he's excited.

00:22:54

I think he'd like to hunt a deer on stage, honestly

00:22:56

Maybe we could make that happen for him.

00:22:58

I don't know if we can or not.

00:22:59

Just saying, most of us are excited and it's gone.

00:23:04

Why?

00:23:05

Well, because, as you've heard me say

00:23:07

a couple of times through this message,

00:23:08

and I think you've probably heard

00:23:10

every week of this series,

00:23:11

the sacrifices, the offerings were temporary solutions,

00:23:15

that Jesus brought the permanent,

00:23:17

everlasting once and for all solution to.

00:23:20

That implies the sin offering as well.

00:23:22

See, God flips the script with Jesus.

00:23:25

Every offering was I bring what I have to God.

00:23:29

I offer something to Him as payment.

00:23:33

But God flips the script with Jesus.

00:23:35

Instead, He takes Jesus and offers Him to us,

00:23:39

if we'll just take Him and we'll just receive Him,

00:23:42

if we just take His blood as payment for our sin

00:23:45

and will cleanse us forever.

00:23:46

That's the gospel.

00:23:49

Maybe you've seen John 3:16 on a sign at a football game.

00:23:51

It's because it's really clear, makes it really clear.

00:23:54

Let me read it to you, John 3:16,

00:24:13

Jesus didn't come to tell you what you've done wrong.

00:24:15

Jesus didn't come to hide behind the curtain

00:24:18

and shout at you how bad you are.

00:24:20

He didn't come to condemn the world, but to save the world,

00:24:24

To cleanse us from all of our sins,

00:24:26

using the one thing that could do that, His own blood.

00:24:31

We've been also looking at Hebrews in this series.

00:24:33

It's kind of like the answer key in a way to Leviticus.

00:24:35

If you've been in the Crossroads app in the morning,

00:24:38

you've seen readings from Hebrews

00:24:39

and that's kind of why, it pairs with it.

00:24:41

I read you what Hebrews 9 says:

00:24:58

See Jesus atoned for our sin.

00:25:00

The once and for all sin offering

00:25:02

was taking place which wiped out our sin.

00:25:04

The Bible says it removes our sin

00:25:06

as far as the East is from the West.

00:25:08

So we've been cleansed as white as snow.

00:25:10

And friends, that means this curtain is no longer needed.

00:25:13

The barrier gets to go away.

00:25:14

In fact, if you've been around for an Easter service,

00:25:16

you've probably heard this passage read

00:25:18

where right after Jesus dies on the Cross,

00:25:20

the curtain is ripped in two.

00:25:22

Matthew 27:51 says: [FX storm]

00:25:24

And behold, the curtain of the temple

00:25:26

was torn in two from top to bottom.

00:25:28

And the earth shook, and the rocks were split.

00:25:32

And it falls.

00:25:33

And it's amazing, friends. It's amazing.

00:25:36

No more curtain. Yes. [Hallalujah Chorus]

00:25:45

Yes.

00:25:47

Yes, I still have a question.

00:25:51

That happened 2000 years ago.

00:25:54

Why do you and I, 2000 years later,

00:25:56

still feel like there's a barrier between us and God?

00:26:01

And I believe that did happen.

00:26:03

Well, the answer is because there's two veils.

00:26:06

There's the one that God made

00:26:08

and there's the one that you've made.

00:26:10

There's the one that God tore down

00:26:12

and there's the one that you and I are still holding up.

00:26:17

Do you see God did everything

00:26:19

to remove every barrier between Him and you.

00:26:22

If you feel distance,

00:26:24

it's because you're making the barrier.

00:26:27

There's a second veil.

00:26:28

This is my favorite picture of my wife, Sarah,

00:26:31

probably ever.

00:26:32

It's from our wedding day 16 years ago.

00:26:35

Just love it.

00:26:36

And I love it because of the veil.

00:26:38

The veil is kind of half covering her face,

00:26:40

half on, half off.

00:26:42

And this is the moment of marriage.

00:26:43

It's the moment of movement

00:26:45

from one state of being to another

00:26:47

where there's a barrier, there's a distance between you

00:26:50

to where there's no barrier.

00:26:51

The Bible actually says that

00:26:52

when you're married you become one, no barriers.

00:26:58

Now, this is a picture I took of Sarah just recently.

00:27:01

This is another picture.

00:27:02

And I want you to look very carefully

00:27:05

and see what's missing.

00:27:09

There's no veil.

00:27:11

You notice that?

00:27:13

I know, I know.

00:27:14

And you're like, "But what's the thing on her --

00:27:17

What's the black thing on her head?

00:27:18

Is that a veil?"

00:27:21

Nope. That's a visor.

00:27:23

That's a visor, very close to a veil,

00:27:24

but it's actually a hat just to keep sweat out of her eyes.

00:27:27

So completely different.

00:27:28

This might shock you.

00:27:30

Since our wedding day 16 years ago,

00:27:32

Sarah hasn't worn a veil a single time.

00:27:36

Just hasn't -- just hasn't done it.

00:27:41

Imagine for a minute that a couple got married, right?

00:27:44

And the bride comes up the aisle with her veil on

00:27:48

and at the altar, there's the moment

00:27:50

of they get married, they exchange vows.

00:27:53

And she just decides to keep it on.

00:27:55

She just decides, "This is, you know what?

00:27:57

I kind of like this.

00:27:59

This is kind of I'm just going to keep it here.

00:28:02

This is kind of cool."

00:28:04

And she goes through her life with the veil on.

00:28:06

She goes back down the aisle.

00:28:08

The reception she's got the veil on.

00:28:10

Honeymoon the veil is on.

00:28:12

She goes through their first year of marriage,

00:28:14

veil's on; first baby, veils on

00:28:16

even at the hospital, it's crazy.

00:28:18

Day after day, month after month, week after week,

00:28:20

year after year the veil stays in place.

00:28:24

Would that be a sign

00:28:26

that something was off in the relationship?

00:28:29

Would it be a sign?

00:28:31

Friends, do you know that if you believe in Jesus,

00:28:33

you're part of the Bride of Christ?

00:28:36

And the question is, are you living with a veil?

00:28:39

If you experience any sense of distance

00:28:41

between you and God, the answer is yes.

00:28:45

See, most of us still live behind a barrier.

00:28:50

Interestingly, back in the Garden of Eden,

00:28:52

when Adam and Eve sin,

00:28:53

the very first thing they did is create a barrier.

00:28:56

The Bible says they took fig leaves

00:28:58

and they wove clothes together.

00:28:59

They needed some kind of separation

00:29:01

between who they are and God seeing them.

00:29:03

And they made a barrier and then they hid.

00:29:07

They hid.

00:29:08

This is another picture.

00:29:10

This is my dad, Joe, Joe Ranson right there.

00:29:14

He caught a fish. That's my son Ben with him.

00:29:16

I love my dad.

00:29:17

Him and I are very different, though,

00:29:19

very, very different, like exact opposites.

00:29:21

He's an introvert. I'm an extrovert.

00:29:24

He was a chemical engineer.

00:29:25

I'm a designer.

00:29:27

He was really great at math.

00:29:29

I liked art, you know, very different.

00:29:33

There's just always been naturally barriers between us.

00:29:37

But he has worked hard my whole life

00:29:39

to bridge every one of those barriers,

00:29:41

even when I'd slam the door in his face.

00:29:43

He's always worked hard to bridge them.

00:29:45

About 18 months ago, he called me up.

00:29:48

And he said, "Hey, I'd love to go on a trip together.

00:29:50

Just just me and you, just to spend time together.

00:29:53

I'd love to go on a trip.

00:29:55

In fact, I'll remove every barrier.

00:29:56

I'll take care of everything.

00:29:58

I'll pay for everything.

00:29:59

And we can go wherever you want to.

00:30:01

I was thinking maybe like Red's Spring training.

00:30:03

You know, catch some ball games,

00:30:05

play some great golf out in Phoenix.

00:30:07

Something, something like that.

00:30:08

And I'll take care of all.

00:30:10

I'll pay for plane tickets, hotel, car rental,

00:30:14

greens fee, everything.

00:30:15

I'll remove every barrier.

00:30:16

I just want to be around you.

00:30:18

I just want to hang out with you."

00:30:19

And I was like, "Dad, that is awesome.

00:30:21

That is so great.

00:30:22

Let me check my calendar and I'll get back to you."

00:30:27

And then a month went by and my dad called me.

00:30:30

He said, "Hey, son, have you had a chance

00:30:31

to find some dates that work?"

00:30:34

"Oh, Dad, no, man, that's busy.

00:30:36

The kid's got a lot going on.

00:30:38

I haven't had a chance to look at the calendar,

00:30:41

but I will.

00:30:42

I'm going to look at the calendar this week,

00:30:44

talk to Sarah, and I'll get back to you."

00:30:46

Two months go by.

00:30:48

He texts me, "Hey, you got those dates figured out yet?"

00:30:51

"Oh, Dad, no.

00:30:53

I mean, things are busy at Crossroads.

00:30:54

It's a busy season.

00:30:56

You know, it's a busy -- never not been a busy season,

00:30:58

but it's a busy season.

00:31:00

And I just haven't.

00:31:01

I just haven't had a chance."

00:31:03

Then a year went by, a year, and the clock hit 2023

00:31:09

and it hit me like a two by four between my eyes.

00:31:13

My dad had removed every barrier,

00:31:16

every barrier on his end,

00:31:19

every barrier that he could possibly remove.

00:31:21

He had removed all of it just to spend time with me.

00:31:25

But there was still a gap there.

00:31:27

It still wasn't happening.

00:31:28

We still weren't having that close trip, that relationship.

00:31:30

And there was only one reason, it was me

00:31:34

because I was making a barrier called time,

00:31:37

being too busy.

00:31:41

And that's the same barrier

00:31:42

I tend to make between me and God.

00:31:44

Same excuse I tend to use with Him,

00:31:45

"I'm too busy, I don't have time

00:31:46

to do a full, quiet time with You this morning,

00:31:48

really spend time with You.

00:31:49

I just got to kind of fly through things.

00:31:51

It was a late night last night.

00:31:52

I'm going to sleep in a little bit.

00:31:54

I'm going to kind of move around, God.

00:31:55

I don't have time to pause and pray

00:31:57

before the big things in my day.

00:31:58

I don't have time to actually spend time with my kids

00:32:00

and teach them about You.

00:32:01

I'm just kind of I'm moving quick.

00:32:02

God, I'm doing I'm doing ministry work. Right?

00:32:04

It's all good. It's all good."

00:32:05

I put the same barrier in place,

00:32:07

the barrier called time.

00:32:11

I wonder about you.

00:32:12

What's the barrier you're creating between you and God?

00:32:15

And if you sense any bit of distance

00:32:18

between you and Him, it's not on His end, it's on yours.

00:32:22

I want you to get out this card,

00:32:24

your little replica of the curtain

00:32:27

that we passed out to you.

00:32:29

Get out this card.

00:32:30

You just put it on your knee if you want to.

00:32:32

I want you to think about what that barrier is.

00:32:35

And yes, this is going to require

00:32:37

a little bit of work on your part.

00:32:39

God's done a lot of work on His.

00:32:41

You'll be okay, a little bit of work.

00:32:46

I want you to think about what that barrier is.

00:32:48

And when you have it in your mind,

00:32:50

I want you to draw a symbol that represents it.

00:32:52

On the curtain God made God drew cherubim wings, why?

00:32:56

To symbolize His Holiness.

00:32:57

That was the barrier on His end

00:32:59

and our sinfulness that was creating the division.

00:33:02

So try to think about what your symbol is.

00:33:04

If I was drawing this,

00:33:06

I would probably just draw a clock to represent time.

00:33:11

This is my barrier.

00:33:12

You can just draw it on the back when you think of it.

00:33:15

I don't know what it is.

00:33:16

Maybe it's like mine, maybe it's time.

00:33:19

Maybe it's your calendar.

00:33:20

Maybe you've heard us talk for weeks and weeks

00:33:22

about camps, and you were, "That sounds great.

00:33:25

Spend time with God."

00:33:27

Back we had the past four weeks before this one

00:33:28

we had tents and stuff out in the atrium.

00:33:30

Maybe you walked by that and you're, like,

00:33:32

"That sounds like a good idea."

00:33:33

You got that catalog.

00:33:34

"That sounds like a good idea.

00:33:37

I just don't know how the calendar is going to play out,

00:33:39

though, you know? Better not, better not sign up."

00:33:43

If that's you draw a calendar or draw a clock.

00:33:47

Maybe for you it's not time.

00:33:48

Maybe it's your career.

00:33:51

You know, like, if your boss

00:33:52

were to call you tonight during dinner,

00:33:54

you would pick up the phone, wouldn't you?

00:33:56

Or, in fact, if your boss were to call you right now,

00:33:59

you would kind of sneak out the aisle

00:34:01

and you'd go back there and you'd take the call,

00:34:03

wouldn't you? Why?

00:34:04

Because you've got to climb that ladder.

00:34:06

If you miss that call,

00:34:07

you might miss the next promotion. Right?

00:34:09

If that's you draw a ladder,

00:34:12

the ladder you're trying to climb.

00:34:13

Maybe for you, it's your drinking habit.

00:34:15

Started out as as a beer a week or a glass of wine a week.

00:34:19

And then it became a glass every night.

00:34:20

And then it became two.

00:34:21

And now it's become three.

00:34:23

And you know it's coming between you and God.

00:34:25

If that's the case, draw a glass.

00:34:27

Maybe it's your need to control everything.

00:34:30

It's the things that you're still holding on to tightly

00:34:33

and you won't give over control.

00:34:34

Maybe it's your finances.

00:34:35

You haven't given God control of your money.

00:34:38

If that's the case, draw a dollar bill

00:34:39

or draw a money symbol.

00:34:42

Maybe it's what happens in your bedroom.

00:34:44

You know, it's not what God wants.

00:34:46

Just keep doing it anyway.

00:34:47

If that's true, draw a bed.

00:34:50

Or maybe it's your inability to forget your past,

00:34:54

a past mistake that God's saying

00:34:56

He's forgiven you from, but you haven't.

00:34:59

If that's true, you can just write the word unforgiven.

00:35:03

See friends, this is a repentance exercise

00:35:05

is what this is.

00:35:07

And the Bible says very clearly in Romans 2

00:35:09

that it's God's kindness that leads us to repentance.

00:35:14

See, God hasn't just cleared away the barrier

00:35:17

just to be around you, just to hang out with you.

00:35:20

He wants to bless you extravagantly,

00:35:23

if you'll remove your barrier.

00:35:26

I'm going to give you a minute to think of this.

00:35:28

I want everyone to write something or draw something

00:35:30

if you want to have this moment with us.

00:35:32

So I'll give you a minute.

00:35:33

We'll play some music to not make it awkward.

00:35:35

Here you go.

00:36:48

We're going to keep this moment going.

00:36:49

So if you need more time, you've got it.

00:36:51

It's okay. You can keep thinking.

00:36:55

I want to read you a verse that we read earlier

00:36:57

and highlight a phrase you might have missed.

00:37:00

Matthew 27:51 says:

00:37:11

Why would God take the time to record how the curtain tore?

00:37:14

Isn't it enough to say it's gone?

00:37:17

It's to communicate something.

00:37:19

He's saying I did everything on my end,

00:37:21

starting with me, everything I could control

00:37:24

to come down to you.

00:37:25

I tore the curtain down.

00:37:29

Will you tear yours up?

00:37:32

That's the invitation of God.

00:37:34

And I know.

00:37:35

I know some of us are hesitant to do that, right?

00:37:40

We're hesitant to do that because we hear

00:37:43

messages like this one about the gospel

00:37:45

and how much God loves us

00:37:46

and He tore down the curtain and John 3:16

00:37:48

and all these things.

00:37:49

And we think, "That must apply to everybody else,

00:37:52

but not to me.

00:37:55

God doesn't want to be around me."

00:37:57

See the common thing that tends to underlie

00:37:59

every single barrier you and I have is shame.

00:38:05

That's what drove Adam and Eve to create their barrier.

00:38:08

It says they were ashamed of their nakedness,

00:38:10

so they hid, covered themselves up.

00:38:12

They made a barrier.

00:38:14

We tend to do the same thing.

00:38:17

I have good news for you, if you'll believe it.

00:38:20

Do you know that Jesus is not ashamed of you?

00:38:23

He's not.

00:38:25

Hebrews, 2:11 says:

00:38:35

He's not ashamed of you.

00:38:37

He doesn't see you walk up and go,

00:38:39

"No, no, no, no. Everybody else not."

00:38:41

That's not at all what He does.

00:38:43

He says, "You're my brother. You're my sister.

00:38:45

Come in here. I've got a place prepared for you.

00:38:48

I took care of everything.

00:38:50

I paid for everything for you just to be with you

00:38:53

so I can bless you extravagantly."

00:38:57

Here's another one. Colossians 1:21:

00:39:24

That's how God sees you.

00:39:27

And when you walk up to somebody

00:39:28

who you believe loves you more than anybody else

00:39:31

in the universe, you take off your veil,

00:39:35

you tear down every barrier just to be close,

00:39:38

just to stand face to face.

00:39:41

2 Corinthians 3:

00:39:59

God wants to transform you. He does.

00:40:02

And it'll happen if you get close to Him.

00:40:04

But to get close to Him,

00:40:05

you have to tear up your barrier.

00:40:07

You have to tear it up completely.

00:40:10

And if you want to with other people

00:40:13

who want the same thing in life that you want,

00:40:15

other believers who are seeking more of God,

00:40:18

more closeness, maybe, maybe you believe in Jesus fully,

00:40:20

maybe you don't yet. It doesn't matter.

00:40:22

If you want more closeness with God,

00:40:23

I want us to rip this up on the count of three.

00:40:26

Start at the bottom as a way of saying,

00:40:28

"God, this is my intention to tear it up."

00:40:31

One, two, three. [ripping]

00:40:40

I think there may be no more beautiful sound

00:40:42

to God this morning than that.

00:40:45

Nothing more beautiful to Him.

00:40:47

God sees your intention. He sees your heart.

00:40:51

And I just believe it makes Him glad.

00:40:53

But I want to tell you something about intentions,

00:40:56

they have a very short shelf life.

00:40:58

They spoil fast.

00:41:01

Those intentions need to turn into follow through.

00:41:04

Tomorrow morning,

00:41:05

I'm flying to Phoenix to hang out with my dad.

00:41:07

[cheers & applause]

00:41:14

I figured we'd watched some Reds games

00:41:15

and play some golf. Why?

00:41:18

Because my intentions were nice,

00:41:21

but the follow through is what matters.

00:41:25

So follow through today. Follow through.

00:41:28

Maybe it's signing up for camp, just doing it.

00:41:30

"Hey, I know how the calendar is going to play out.

00:41:33

I'm going to camp because nothing's more important to me

00:41:35

than spending time with my Father."

00:41:37

Maybe it's setting aside time to pray as a family tonight.

00:41:42

Maybe it's dumping out your liquor cabinet,

00:41:44

telling a friend you need help.

00:41:46

I don't know what it is, but take action today.

00:41:49

You'll be so glad you did.

00:41:51

The God of the universe has removed

00:41:53

every single barrier just to bless you

00:41:57

and He wants to be around you.

00:41:58

Let me pray for you.

00:41:59

God, thank you for this time.

00:42:02

Thank you for the truths found in your Scripture.

00:42:04

Thank you for how they weave together

00:42:06

into a picture we can see, into an action we can take.

00:42:09

And you give us the courage, the boldness,

00:42:13

the energy to take the step of following through

00:42:16

to be closer to you. Amen.

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