Tuesday night study

This is from last night's Bible study at the church: According to the art of the Apothecary; the Perfumer

We are talking about the Holy Perfume or the Holy Incense that God commanded Moses to make to be used on the altar of Incense and it was to be offered ON IT day and night. The Altar of Incense as you know was located just outside the Veil in the Holy Place where the priests ministered before the Lord. It was a place of intercession and the grounds and effectiveness of the prayers made at this Altar were based upon the blood that was shed upon the Brazen Altar which was located in the outer court. Just so, the intercession of our Lord Jesus is based upon His shed blood at Calvary, the Brazen Altar being a type of Calvary.
Let’s look at some scripture here in Exodus. Firstly let’s read again Ex. 30:1-10. Sweet incense was offered on this Altar every morning and every night; it was lit by a coal from the Brazen Altar which had it’s fire started by God. Unless the fire has been started by God it is to no avail. It is a false fire; not fire at all. So the incense was burned by the fire of God. Are you seeing something here? If real revival is to come, if the real worship has begun it comes
With the Fire from Heaven. It’s the Holy Ghost and Fire!
Notice it was a perpetual offering, this burning of the sweet incense. There would
Have been a sweet aroma in that place all the time. And when you came into the Tabernacle there would be this sweet aroma hanging in the breeze and you would have known that God was in the place. When we come together in worship and that sweet aroma of praise and worship is ascending toward heaven, don’t you realize that God is in our midst? When you are driving alone sometimes and the anointing comes upon you and you begin to lift your voice in praise and you are worshipping Him, don’t you feel His sweet presence? Have you ever done that? Can’t you tell that God is in the place? Hallelujah! Sometimes my old pickup truck becomes a cathedral, a place of worship. Do you know what I am talking about? Maybe for some of you it is your kitchen that becomes your place of praise. Or your bedroom or wherever it may be…it is a perpetual sacrifice of praise that becomes a sweet aroma in God’s nostrils! Come let us offer the sacrifice of praise. Let us offer unto Him thanksgiving and the praise due to His name. There’s no place for complaint…no place for gimme prayers, only a place of prayer that edifies and lifts up and offers hope and finds mercy in a time of trouble and help in the time of need. This is a sweet aroma , a sweet incense unto our Lord. Look at Psalm 141:2. The Psalmist says here, the Psalmist in this case being David, “Let my prayer be set before thee as incense; and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.” It was a perpetual sacrifice! Hallelujah! And we should see that there is always an incense burning in the altar of our hearts. Amen? It was like the anointing oil, a holy incense. Our worship must be pure and holy unto the Lord!
Turn with me to Ex. 30:34-38, And the LORD said unto Moses, Take unto thee sweet spices, stacte, and onycha and galbanum; these sweet spices with pure frankincense: of each shall there be a like weight: And thou shalt make it a perfume, after the art of the apothecary, tempered together, pure and holy: and thou shalt beat some of it very small, and put of it before the testimony in the tabernacle of the congregation, where I will meet with thee.
Let’s first of all look at the ingredients and as we do we need to consider that most of these sweet spices were also quite bitter. It was an unusual mysterious mixture and carefully protected so that it would not be duplicated or used for any other purpose. It was not to be used to put on one’s body. It was beaten small..I think it speaks of travailing in prayer in times when we don’t have the answer to life’s problems. Times when our back is against the wall, so to speak and there is strong tears and even crying…travailing in prayer. Yet in the greater sense, Jesus was crushed and beaten and that offering was a sweet smell unto His Father.The incense was made of equal proportions of stacte, onycha, galbanum and frankincense. They appear to be a gum like spruce gum and the plant gave it’s life to produce this gum. Pure and holy, separated unto God.”Stacte or the Hebrew word for it “nataf” means “to drop” From the words of Job ch.36:27, “For He maketh small the drops of water; they pour down like rain to the vapour therof” Then in ch. 29 vs.22,23: After my words they spake not again; and my speech dropped upon them. And they waited for me as for the rain; and they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain.”Here in these verses is a picture of the dropping of words…the graciousness and seriousness of words and of course we know in the conversation of our Lord’s words how gracious and serious His words were. Luke 4:22 “And all bare Him witness, and wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of His mouth. And they said, Is not this Joseph’s son?” His words were carefully chosen, they were like a refreshing new morning dew that refreshes the ground, like a fresh new snow in the country side. We may not like winter, but isn’t a fresh snow a thing of beauty. His words were like that. Multitudes listened to His words and hung on to every word that dropped as it were from His lips. His words came from a sanctified mind; sometimes it was mercy to the poor; forgiveness to the woman taken in adultery, or it could be a rebuke to the Pharisaical hypocrite. I think Jesus laughed and could see the funny side of things, but He never engaged in jokes, that is foolish jesting. Look at Matt. 5:37 and also James 5:12. God has given us the ability to speak…it is a God given privilege that’s why these Godless nations do not allow free speech. God speaks; He spoke and the worlds were made…we shall SEE That when we get into Hebrews 11.If we are to be like Jesus, we need to be careful in our speech….open mouth insert foot? Jesus never did that…He uttered words of forgiveness…the only time He said “My God” was when He was talking to His Father.
The next ingredient is “onycha”…it could be translated a herb or it is also used in reference to a shell-fish found only in the Red Sea which when ground up produced a special fragrance. If the shell fish was the true ingredient, then it would be a constant reminder of their deliverance from Egypt and the miracle of the Red Sea crossing. The onycha was a sweet fragrance unto the LORD because it typified the suffering of the LORD upon the cross as He was crushed and beaten.The third ingredient was “galbanum”, it too has been difficult to pin down to translate. The only place it is used is here…seems like it was used is here and it is surrounded in secrecy. It was also known to be, by itself a bitter, disagreeable odor that drove away pests and vermin, destructive insects,etc. However even though these ingredients were disagreeable though these ingredients were disagreeable in smell all by themselves, yet when mixed together they are a sweet smelling savour to the nostrils of God. Isn’t that a picture of the church? Alone many of us are not too desirable or attractive, I’m referring to myself here, but as a whole if we allow the grinding process and the bleeding, the discipline referred to in Hebrews 12:6-10, our lives can be partakers in His holiness and we will produce that peaceable fruit of righteousness that verse 11 refers to. It is when we are operating on our own outside the body and we do not allow the chastening process that we are bitter. Look at verse 15. Many can be defiled through one life that does not allow the mixing of the ingredients. One commentator put it this way, “constant prayer and intercession by our LORD drives away every demon and imp from successfully gathering and developing among the body of Christ Determined, yes, even bitter prolonged prayer, with fasting repentance, drives away all spiritual vermin that eat away at our spiritual lives. Every ingredient found in this incense is necessary to typify the many facets of prayer.
And then the Frankincense…we’ve talked about it before This was the incense that was applied upon the loaves of the showbread and eaten by the priests. We saw, I think that it was a bitter white substance that was taken from piercing a tree which grew in the cracks of marble rock . It required very little moisture and any fluid taken from it was at a great price. And by the way, it was also a medicine and an antidote against poison, True worship is an antidote against the poison of sin and a medicine to our bodies, is it not? What a privilege it is to the church in Saint John to have this wonderful heritage of worship that has been handed down to us. I remember also the great churches in the State of Maine and how we would gather at Bridgewater camp in Maine and the great times of worship there. Truly the lifting up of our hands in worship is as the evening sacrifice.
These ingredients were equal amounts in this mixture which the LORD God said was not to be ever copied. We see the bush or tree and the shellfish having to be broken and ground into a fine powder pointing once again to the cross of Calvary
Where Jesus truly was crushed and broken and it was a message also to the tribes of Israel that they too must look ahead to the cross, to their redemption and that is what the 11th. Chapter of Hebrews is all about, not the kind of faith preached about by the prosperity doctors but rather the faith in the finished work of Christ on Calvary. It is a summation to the message given by this book of Hebrews that without faith(in the finished work), any other faith is not faith at all; faith if you will in good works and the keeping of the law, which does not save anyone but rather puts them in bondage. And we will go there to Hebrews 11 next week. So remember when you are reading this coming week in preparation for next week that it is to be taken in it’s context of the larger picture.