The Old Testament Part 1

Imagine the earth is a grand stage here a great drama is being played out, but this drama is real long ago mankind sinned, separating us from our Creator God was not content letting his finest creation die without hope. So he set in motion a plan to redeem those that believe in the value of a great sacrifice, that of Jesus on the cross today.

The drama begins from Chicago. This is The Moody Church.

Our weekly service of worship and teaching with pastor Erwin Blitzer. Today we begin a four-part overview of the entire Bible in this series will trace the drama of redemption later in our broadcast Erwin Blitzer will begin at the beginning as he speaks on the Old Testament part one pastor Blitzer comes now to open today's service were glad that you have joined us today and in the moment were going to be singing together hymn number 23, number 23 the God of Abraham praise our Scripture reading today is by Earl Bowers, Earl and his wife Joanne have been involved here in The Moody Church for many years and we thank you for their involvement for their prayers and Earl will be reading to us today. Let's join together and then we shall stand to sing father as we stand here, we know that we cannot predict the future. We thank you that no matter what happens you will be there. Grant us father both your favor and your grace create within us the determination that we should have just serve you acceptably all the days of our life, no matter how many days you give us. Thank you for all who have come. Thank you for those who are watching today by way of Internet we ask your blessing upon them as well.

In Jesus name, amen. Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations before the mountains were brought forth ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God you return man to the dust and say return children of man for a thousand years in your site are as yesterday when it is passed or as a lot in the night. We are brought to an end by your anger by your wrath.

We are dismayed you have set our iniquities before you are secret sins in the light of your presence. For all our days pass away, and under your wrath. We bring our years to an end like a sigh, the years of our life are 70 or even by reason of strength 80. Yet their span is with toil and trouble. They are soon gone and we fly away so teach us to number our days, that we may get a heart of wisdom satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days. Let your work be shown to your servants and your glorious power to their children. Let the favor of the Lord our God be upon us and establish the work of our hands upon us.

Yes, establish the work of our hands. The Bible is a very remarkable, on the one hand it's rather simple.

I mean we know all of the promises and the favorite passages of Scripture that we have been we go back to those again and again. On the other hand, the Bible is very complicated, especially the Old Testament because neither the Old Testament nor the New Testament. The books of the Bible are not in chronological order.

So if you begin to read it.

It becomes a formidable task to put it all together is something like a puzzle and you have all of the pieces but if you don't have the big picture on the box. You don't know where they get. You might benefit from it, but how much better if you can see the whole picture. The whole drama of redemption. There are many reasons why most Christians have never read through the Bible. One is they began and often times this is done at the beginning of the year, though it doesn't have to start at that time and that they say to themselves, I'm going to read the Bible through, and they get through Genesis they get through Exodus Exodus is very difficult because all of those chapters about the priests in the temple and become so difficult and then they get to Leviticus and in Leviticus and many well-intentioned Christian decided to stop never going to happen again after this message, I assure you, you'll never stop in Leviticus again and so they don't go on. Another reason is because if they miss once they say to themselves, or they get behind and they're not reading the Bible for a week. They say well you know I have to wait until next year to start again. Don't do that, pick up where you left off. And if you do that you even if you take two or three years to go through the Bible go through it, read it all and the best way to do it is to read five chapters a day and if you read five chapters a day. On some days when you have to skip or you forget our it doesn't work out, you're not going to be far behind because actually four chapters a day would get you through it perfectly fine.

Now the Bible is such a remarkable transforming book. I don't have this, but you want to take notes right now. Grab your pen because I'm going to give you three questions you should always ask as you sit down to read the Bible because when you're finished reading it. You should take something from it something that you can think about all day and now that you have your pen handy. Let me give you the three questions. Question number one is does this teach me anything about God. What does it teach me about God. Number two is there a promise that I must believe and number three is is there a command that I must obey.

What does it teach me about God. Is there a promise I must believe.

Is there a command I must obey you want to be able to answer at least one of those questions. Hopefully all three. After you've had your morning reading the Bible is going to change you some of you one day I was struggling with my thought life and I said, Lord, why do I struggle so much and just like that the verse of Scripture came to me from John 15 now you are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you, wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way by taking heed thereto according to thy word and it dawned on me. I wasn't in the word because the word cleanses the word keeps us the word guides us. This is what the Bible says about itself and how true it is the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul.

The testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart the commandment of the Lord is pure and righteous altogether more to be desired than gold, yea, then much fine gold even at $1100 an ounce more. Are they to be desired than gold haven much fine gold sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. Moreover by them is thy servant warned and in keeping them there is great reward.

You are going to be changed, you're going to be transformed because everybody unless you're a child, everybody, let's just all agree that we're going to read our Bibles from cover to cover.

How many of you say yes we are agreed that I see your hands place all right in the rest of you. May you not sleep well until until you agree that what I'm going to do in the next two messages is to cover the entire Old Testament today were going to look at more than a thousand years of interesting history, not boring history, but interesting history and in order for us to do it and in order for us to have all the books of the Bible put together for us. You have a chart today in your bulletin and I want you to take it out. At this time this chart was lovingly prepared by the pastoral staff is a very special chart. It has been worked on for hours and this chart will enable you in your reading to know where the various books fit. Please don't leave it in your bulletin put it in your Bible and bring it for the next three Sundays after this Sunday because were going to spend two on the Old Testament two on the new.

The last one in the new is in 30 minutes I'm going to take you through entirely the book of Revelation in 30 minutes were going to dissected put it in its context, and you will be blessed so today we begin the Old Testament, we begin with the book of Genesis.

Many of you may not realize that the book of Job is one of the oldest books of the Bible and that's why on your chart you'll notice it is concurrent with the Genesis. The way in which to read this chart is to understand that there are books that carry the Bible's storyline forward. And then there are lots of supporting books. They support the story line and it's all worked out for you on this chart. So let's begin with the book of Genesis. Genesis 11 in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth in those 10 words, the whole basis of science is evident in the beginning time, God personality created is force the heavens referred to space, the earth matter. Everything is there and what does it tell us about God. It tells us that he is self existent. It tells us that he is sovereign. He created out of nothing. It also tells us that everything is created by God and is going to be for his glory and were going to see that we are part of the Bible story. The bigger story of the glory of God and his purposes. The other day someone asked me who created the devil.

The answer is God. Now he was in the devil.

When God created him. He was an angel. But he fell and became the devil.

But there is nothing that exists that doesn't exist under God's sovereign control and it's not about you and it's not about me it's about him, but thankfully because of his grace, we fit into the pick. So first of all you have creation, then you have the fall in Genesis chapter 3, and what a tragedy that is if you don't understand the fall of man into sin you're going to be off base.

As you read the rest of the Bible God takes sin seriously, and because it is against him.

He has been grievously offended. Steve Mason, one of our pastors uses this illustration. If you throw a snowball at your brother, you probably won't be arrested.

But if you know of throw a snowball at the President of the United States, you're in trouble. The sin of the garden of Eden where Adam and Eve opted for independence.

That sin is grievous and as a result, it was as if they hit a string of dominoes and you think of all of the things that happened because they decided self-determination and you see the rest of this story of history and of psychology is basically mankind finding some way to minimize and manage the grievous notice of his sin, and sin is going to be the issue that God is going to deal with in the rest of the Bible so that we can be reconciled to a holy God, what a story it is.

That's why I'm so glad you're listening now I am going to ask you to turn to one verse of Scripture only one and that is in Genesis chapter 3 verse 15 I won't refer to it.

That is to say I won't turn to it because I think I do know it by memory. But in Genesis chapter 3 verse 15 God says this to the serpent. Remember, Satan came to Adam and Eve in the guise of the serpent God says I will put enmity between thee and the woman between thy seed and her seed and he shall crush you on the head and you shall nip his heel. When Jesus is saying there what God is saying is that every Diemer is going to come through this seed of a woman who's going to crush the serpent's head and it was going to be the means of our reconciliation, and now the rest of the Bible story line is going to be the outworking of how all that is going to happen in history. So what we have now is creation.

We have the fall which is huge. And then comes the flood because God said I will not endlessly strive with man in his wickedness man left to himself will perform every imaginable kind of evil. And that's what the Bible says happened there in the book of Genesis and God decided to drown everyone except Noah and Noah and his family is there in the ark, and that arc really becomes already a picture of redemption.

The Scripture says in Genesis 614 that when Noah built the ark. He he had pitch put on a pitch is to hire and what he did as he tired all of the boards so that it would leak and the word pitch in Hebrew has the very same route it means to cover.

It is the very same route as the word atonement because you see it is the pitch that prevented the judgment of God, namely the water from coming into the ark and drowning them as well and it is the atonement that God is going to provide that is going to keep us from his judgment so that we will not fall into the condemnation but can be reconciled to a holy God. And so you have the flood. After that, as you look in the book of Genesis and now we're in chapter 12, you have the call of Abraham.

Abraham is in Ur of the Chaldees and did being a nerd. He comes to the land that we call the land of Israel.

This land is going to be the one that is going to be the place for the whole drama of redemption is going to be acted out. It's the most important piece of real estate in the whole world and still is, because here eventually the Redeemer is going to be born, and salvation is going to come. Now God said to Abraham that Abraham I'm going to make of you a great nation, and he says also through you all the families of the earth will be blessed so the seed of the woman is now being clarified that it's going to come through the lineage of Abraham by God's sovereign choice. So you have Abraham and Deb. He's in the land you have Abraham you have Isaac and then you have Jacob, and Jacob has a number of sons and one of them by the name of Joseph goes into the land of Egypt, and eventually as Joseph goes into the land of Egypt, and I assume you know the story.

Joseph now becomes the means that God will use to get the whole family. The whole family of Jacob into the land of Egypt, and there are over a period of 400 years they will become an nation and they are going to experience hardship and the Pharaoh is going to work against them.

But God is developing them, and God is leading them so that leads us now to the end of the book of Genesis, Exodus, is the next book in Exodus, God raises up a deliverer by the name of Moses and Moses comes and in the book of Exodus, there are two marvelous examples of redemption that God has the first example of redemption is of course the Passover as they come out of Egypt. The Passover is going to become now the type of God's spiritual deliverance and so they leave Egypt and they come into the promised land though takes them a while to get there and that Passover is going to become critical in the life of the nation, and centuries later, Jesus is going to have the Passover with the disciples and then healed invested with new meaning and say this cup is the cup of the new covenant in my blood. This drink in remembrance of me and he will take the symbolism of the Passover and he will explain it in a new way because he is the fulfillment of it.

And then, in addition to the Passover. You have the tabernacle. Now the tabernacle during the day. They were led by a cloud at night. They were led by a pillar of fire and as you see what happens. As all of the tents were around this tabernacle explained in the book of Exodus and the tabernacle had in it the ark because God was going to be localized in the ark, and if you get hung up in the book of Exodus, then it's important for you to realize that God is saying. Number one sin is serious and you can't handle it, but sin is serious.

I will provide the way by which you can access knee people say what you know I don't like this idea that there's only one way to God, I'm sorry, but God has not consulted with you as to what your view is all that we can do is to say that this is the way in which God worked it out and thankfully Jesus becomes the fulfillment of the whole thing and so we have the book of Exodus. Now we get to the famous book of Leviticus, the place where people diligently read and then they come across offerings and sacrifices priestly requirements and high gene ideas and commands and they come to a certain kind of cloth you know don't mix different fabrics together and they're saying what is this assignment help you with Leviticus right now. First of all, always remember never open the Bible to read it unless you have first of all, prayed Psalm 119 always pray that before you open the Bible you prayer Lord, open thou mine eyes, that I might behold a wondrous thing out of thy law and there's no time when you need that more than when you enter the book of Leviticus now I need to tell you that it is okay it is okay for you to speed read some sections in the Bible. Now, for years I was bound.

I was thinking what you know this is God's word. I have to read every chapter and every line when you get to books like the book of Leviticus. It is okay to read it quickly and get the gist of it without pausing to try to understand it all. I have seen Washington DC on the ground. My wife and I've been there and we looked at the different buildings.

As we walked through most of Washington DC. But I've also seen Washington DC from an airplane and when you see it from an airplane. It is not disrespectful to say I'm not stopping to look at all of the buildings.

I'm not trying to figure out all of the things in the symbolism of what the buildings mean I'm just getting the general plan and when you come to the book of Leviticus. What you want is the general plan and you say that there were sacrifices and there were requirements and so forth. Always remember the bottom line the bottom line is this God is giving rituals in Exodus and Leviticus, he is giving rituals that enable him to dwell with his people without being contaminated with their sin, and without compromising his holiness and justice. That's the whole point and then when you read it.

Thank God for Jesus because he fulfills it all and that's why we no longer practice these rituals. These were intended to be a picture of the real thing you know there's a big difference between having a picture of someone and then the real person showing up on the stage. God's is in the Old Testament. I'm going to show you how holy I am the word holiness occurs 87 times in Leviticus.

The word sin occurs even more times than that. You have to understand that I am holy and your sinful and I'm giving you a way by which you and I can exist together without me being contaminated by your sin or compromising my holiness and that's the way you need to do it now. I'm going to. I wish I had all of you slow readers in a room for 10 minutes. If I had all the slow readers in a room for 10 minutes. I could help you but you know what I'm going to take out two or three minutes to just help you if you're a slow reader.

Listen, if you're a slow reader, you don't. That means you read one sentence and then you have to read it again because you forget what you just read is not true slow readers. I'm going to deliver you from that right now I'm going to give you two or three minutes. No extra offering taken it's all free today here it is your slow reader. I'm glad that 35 years ago.

Somebody explain this to me what you do is you take a book, not the Bible but another, but maybe want to use one that I've written and speed rated okay right now. Here's what you do is you read very quickly and you don't read line by line use zigzag all the way through grasping as many ideas as you can.

What you're after. His ideas turn the page.

Maybe your reading 100 words a minute.

Now your reading 500 words a minute and you just keep reading 500 words a minute. Page after page, get the main I hear and read.

Now you do that for 10 or 15 minutes a day for three weeks then if you are reading 100 and now your reading 500.

What you do is you go back to 250 words a minute, which is more than double what you are doing and you'll find out that you are picking up all the ideas your eyes can handle it. Mind can handle it and you'll have doubled your reading speed just that fast. You can do it in three weeks break that habit of being a slow reader and understand that there is some passages in the Bible that you can scan and get the main gist of it. Also, when you get to the prophet. Sometimes chapter after chapter.

There, hammering against idolatry. But at cheap reading all right so much. Now for the book of Leviticus. It is a manual for the priests. That's what it was and notice according to your chart. Leviticus does not advance the Bible story line why it supports it numbers they're getting ready to go back into the land.

Deuteronomy is a recap it's a recap of what happened and it's Moses farewell speech so that doesn't really advance the story line either so notice in your chart. It occurs at the bottom now under Joshua in the book of Joshua. They reenter the same land they did in the wilderness for 40 years now though over the Jordan River. They enter into the land and the land is conquered and it is divided up under Joshua Bott. But remember this, there are still pockets of resistance.

Some of the Canaanites are still left in the land by design.

God says I'm leaving them there so that so that they can test you.

God always leave some enemies for Christians. That's why he doesn't exterminate the devil and the devil exists for the glory and the happiness and the victory of God's saints same reason why the Canaanites existed in Canaan now after they are there. The period of the judges you see the judges are Israel trying to find leaders that will help them in their fight against the Canaanites, because these warring tribes continue to become very strong when you get to first Samuel first Samuel is basically the story of Israel's first king, namely Saul, and Saul turns out to be a great disappointment.

But the people wanted a king, and so God says I'm giving you Saul and David begins to enter into the picture, though his story is most prominently displayed in the second Samuel second Samuel is the story of David and when you get to David God gives another covenant to David and God's is David I'm going to through your seed to give you a son who is going to rule forever and it turns out to be Jesus.

That's why you see the Angel comes to Mary centuries later and says he shall be great, he shall be the son of the most tired.

The Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David, there you have the fulfillment of the Davidic promise. The beginning of the fulfillment of so David gets a special revelation from God. And then what you have is his famous son Solomon, and that opens first king Solomon turns out to be a great builder and he builds a temple in Jerusalem and it was extravagant.

If you have gone inside of it. You have seen all the gold that Solomon had their because he loved to do things in a big way. He sacrificed thousands of animal and Solomon also is one of the wisest people in the world. He is such a he's a psychologist dream to analyze because he is so wise he writes books such as Proverbs, most of them were by him at your Ecclesiastes song of Solomon. All of those books relate to Solomon and the Temple. Now if you go to Jerusalem and you have a guide. The guide will always talk about the first Temple. The first Temple. The first Temple period is the period of Solomon and let's suppose that he builds it in approximately 930 BC and now because word BC were going. The numbers are going down as we get to the time of Christ, 586 BC that Temple is taken apart by the Babylonians. As you'll understand in a moment. And so that's a 350 year.

Roughly that's Israel's first Temple. Oh wait until next week. Don't even think about not being here next week because I'm going to explain Israel's second temple. And all of the intrigue that is involved there so that is Solomon and after Solomon dies, he designates a son by the name of Ricoh bone and says Rehoboam you become king. Now catch this. Okay, real bone is appointed by Solomon to be king. The people come to him and say you know your dad really taxed us. I mean, how else to build the temple and his hand was so oppressive in terms of taxation would you please reverse his policies and and take this oppressive taxation away Rehoboam's as well. Give me time to figure this out. I'll tell you in three days he goes to the old man and the old man say absolutely the taxes are too high. Cut them. He goes to the young man and the young man said hey you know what you tell him your dad. My dad text you but you ain't seen nothing yet. It's going to get worse and so he goes to the people and takes the young man's advice and says under me.

Things are going to be worse. All my you are under my father's thumb, but you're going to be under my hand.

10 of the tribes.

10 of the tribes of the tea party and say absolutely not, were revolting and were going to establish our own capital and this is the period of what we call the divided kingdom, what you have now is Samaria and Samaria is both a city as well as in the region and were going to establish a capital in Samaria and were going to have our own kings and were going to have her own means of worship go to Jerusalem, absolutely not working to build our own temple on Mount Zürich mounds huff and I know the word so well. Mount Garrison, that's the word sometimes the computer finds it difficult to spit all the stuff out to have our own thing on Mount Garrison going to Jerusalem.

So from now on, you have Judah in the south and some of the tribe of Benjamin and you have the 10 tribes to the north under an entirely different king and in the book of first and second Kings. Would you have missed two different lines of kings you've kings were ruling over Israel. It always says, and you have kings were ruling from Judah, namely from Jerusalem when you go to Israel. As I studied there in 1968 I the privilege I don't think torus can do that today to actually go to Samaria the town of Samaria. We were at Jacob's well and that there in Samaria, you still have the ruins of the palace and and who lived in that palace. Well, Ahab with his infamous wife Jezebel. So you see, you had kings like that ruling you had prophets like Elijah and Elisha going to a has an Ahab, but rather, and telling him to repent and so forth and so you've got that whole history. Now you have another line of kings. Beginning in Judah and you've got that whole history and the kingdoms are divided and it's during the time of the divided kingdom. You have all of the profits arising because idolatry is everywhere. People are our building shrines on every single hill and they are sacrificing to the pagan gods in their doing it with a great deal of gusto in the profits or saying judgment is coming judgment is coming and then you have false prophets. That's why Jeremiah gives chapter after chapter about false prophets or saying good times ahead. Nothing but prosperity in the fall's profits are preaching that the true prophets or saying judgment, judgment, judgment, judgment you take for example, Isaiah one example he is in the southern kingdom he's going to be these going to be exercising his ministry to the kings of the South in Jerusalem and it says the vision of Isaiah the son of Amos, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of whose I/O Joe Pham, Ahaz and Hezekiah of Judah. So there you are. He had such a long ministry it to stand for five different king. Now, what happens is this, by the way, look at your chart. All this today for you. You notice that first and second Chronicles don't advance the story because they are the same history as first and second Kings, except that they give a different perspective. When you watch football, you notice that often times they have two people there's one who calls the plays and then there's another guy in the booth to these adding color commentary. He's adding things that the other left out. Listen, I was reading some chapters in Chronicles the other day.

They are so full and so rich I'm going to be receiving phone calls and all kinds of things thanking me that you got beyond Leviticus and you are now in Chronicles because you are going to be blessed.

Everybody's going to be blessed.

Now what happens and look at this. This is in your chart to I just can't believe this, you'll notice that Israel is the north of Jude is the South look at the bottom of your chart you see that diagram. Notice what happens in 722 BC to Israel the 10 tribes of Syria comes down Syria says were going to conquer you.

Syria takes 27,000 Jewish people. That was a lot of people in those days, and they take them to a Syria and what happens to them.

They are lost there. The 10 lost tribes. They were integrated into the other nations and and that's it. Years ago there was a group called the British Israelites, the British Israelites were those who says that the people of Britain are the 10 lost tribes, but there's no evidence for that they are totally obliterated in the sense that their identity has been lost and what the Assyrians did is they brought other people that they had conquered to settle there in the land of Samaria centuries pass what we read in the New Testament, the Jews have nothing to do with the Samaritans.

Why because they were a mixed race. They were Assyrians.

There were some Jews you know who still stayed in the land they intermarried. They lost their identity. They had pagan worship on Mount Garrison and that's the end, Jesus comes in. He has to go through Samaria. The Bible's and there is a Samaritan woman who knows what her race was and he sits with her and he explains the gospel and she says our fathers worshiped in this mountain. I remember being at Jacob's well you can't go there today.

Unfortunately, but sitting there in 1968. There is Mount terrorism where they found the temple that they built their the shrine and GNU.

She says our fathers worshiped in this mountain, but you folks you Jews.

You say that in Jerusalem is the place Jesus said eight neither in Jerusalem nor here. Those who worship the father must worship him in spirit and in truth. Wow, what a powerful message so 722 they go off then what happens is you have the southern kingdom. This kingdom of Judah that lasts about another hundred. Remember, that's what Solomon's Temple was built or talk about Jerusalem now and it is there that finally in 586 BC, after the prophets just crying their hearts out) to repent, repent, judgment is coming, but people say no, no, no, we like our paganism better. 586 BC through three separate campaign babbling comes and what you have is Solomon's beautiful Temple destroyed so completely that we don't have any artifacts of it anymore.

The first Temple period is over the 350 years that it lasted are gone.

First Temple. Finished so what happens is now everybody has to go to babbling the South, the Jews who gets caught up who get swept up in this judgment, but people like Daniel, remember this when you have a nation under judgment.

If God judges America economically as well. He might Christians get caught up in this to work part of the judgment, so Daniel ends up in and he's in Shushan. The palace theremin is telling us what's happening in babbling. By the way, excellent book to study not only because of its prophecy, but he gives an example of how we have to live differently when were surrounded by pagans who do not care about our rituals.

Nobody in Babel, and was keeping the Passover, nobody in Babel, and was concerned about the temple and so here you have Daniel and his friends, and other righteous Jews living there for 70 years until God brings them back now. What was the temple.

By the way the temple was simply taking this tabernacle, which initially was a building that could be moved. It was like a tent giving it a permanent home and Solomon had done that, gloriously, sometimes people say we shouldn't get money toward a building wide.

Let's give it to people.

Well, you know, Solomon built that wonderful Temple and God apparently was pleased because after the sacrifices. Remember the glory of the Lord came upon it. But now it's totally destroyed. 70 years now there going to be in babbling and then there going to be brought back. This remnant then God is going to pick up the story and let me say this next week I will pick up that story to where does this leave us. What is the bottom line the bottom line is what God is trying to convey through all those books of the Old Testament is that sin is terrible human beings left to themselves will leave the true God and all worship idols and Bill enjoyed doing. Let me ask you a question.

All throughout the northern kingdom, and the southern kingdom. The big issue was idolatry, they would have the shrines on the hills and they worshiped the different pagan gods some damn good preaching entire message on this, but what was the great attraction of idolatry. Why were they constantly going back to idols. Couple of things.

First of all, it was some financial benefit, but all describe at some later time.

Perhaps if God wills. Secondly, this was a very highly sexualized kind of paganism and you will find people doing all that they possibly can to try to convince themselves that God is not upset with sexual immorality. Whether it is homosexual marriages or whether it is infidelity within marriage. People will do everything to try to justify it and to say that God approves paganism is waiting for people and paganism says yes you can live this way in this sexualized culture and you can still worship the true God to bought the lie of course the major message is God's grace God's grace you see in our culture today politically correct and I know that what I've said today is not politically correct exactly, but in our culture today. People always ask this question. Why doesn't God just save every body. The Bible nowhere answers that question. It answers an entirely different question. Namely, how can God save anybody. That's the issue, because God is so holy. We are such sinners.

The $64 question that is answered in the Bible is again how does a holy God connect with and how can his presence be among his people when they are sinners. That's the big issue and by the way, the presence of God is always the distinguishing mark of God's people always Old Testament, New Testament, when people walk into Moody Church what they should see and hear. And as we sing, they should say. Surely God is in that place.

It's always the presence of God and what God is saying is that sin is terrible and you can't come bumbling into his presence with your sin unless you have some way, but that sin can be forgiven and cleansed and that's where Jesus comes in Jesus is going to be born. Centuries later and he's going to fulfill these Old Testament rituals and he is going to say to you that if you believe on me, you will be reconciled to God. But if you don't the wrath of God abides on you, no matter how content you are with your sinfulness, the wrath of God abides on you. The bottom line always has to do with how do we manage our sin. That is the issue and with that today.

I close would you join me as we pray together. Father, we thank you today that you found a way by which you could dwell with your people without compromising your holiness or being contaminated by us. Thank you for Jesus the one mediator between God and man. And we asked today that in his grace that those who listen to this message would never trusted him as their Savior may do so right now even during this prayer may they say Jesus save me and for those of us who know him, may we love him more because of all that he did for us as sinners. Thank you that the seed of the woman crushed the head of the serpent and we walked today in his victory. Thank you.

In Jesus name, amen on today's media church over Pastor lutes or spoke on the Old Testament part one the first of four messages in a series on the drama of redemption next week.

Our trip through the entire Bible continues as we complete our look at the Old Testament, the drama of redemption series helps us make sense of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. We'd like to put this four-part series in your hands on either CD or DVD is our way of saying thanks your gift of any amount to The Moody Church. Our just call us at 1-800-215-5001. Ask about the drama of redemption. When you call 1-800-215-5081 or you can write to us at Moody Church media 1635 N. LaSalle Boulevard Chicago, IL 60614 also you can go online moodyoffer.com that's Moody offer all one word.com join us next week for another Moody Church. Our with pastor Erwin Blitzer and the congregation of historic Moody Church in Chicago. This broadcast is a ministry of The Moody Church