Bertha Smith emphasizes the significance of dedication to God through the sacrificial system, illustrating how the priests had to offer perfect sacrifices, such as a bullock and sheep, to atone for their sins and represent their complete dedication to the Lord. She explains that true dedication can only come from those who have been cleansed and have died to their sinful nature, allowing them to fully commit themselves to God. The sermon highlights the importance of understanding the cost of sin and the necessity of Christ's sacrifice for true forgiveness and relationship with God. Smith urges believers to recognize their role as priests, standing between God and the world, and to live in a way that reflects God's holiness. Ultimately, she calls for a deeper understanding of God's holiness and the seriousness of sin in the lives of believers.

...became sinful human beings, and they had to be put to death. And because it, uh, their, their position was so much higher as leaders than the common person, they had, they couldn't offer a goat, they had to offer a sin offering of the very, uh, most expensive animal that was suitable. And that was the bullock. A year old, a perfect specimen of a bullock. And, and these, uh, Mo, I'm not taking up Aaron, he represents the Lord Jesus Christ, and we do not have time for him and these priests. And the priest represented us, so I'm taking this, representing us. But the, and Aaron and his five sons came and put their hands on the head of that bullock. And the Jewish tradition tells us it was not a case of lightly laying their hands up there, they pressed down. They entered into that bullock, and that's the way it, that it meant in God's sight. They were transferring themselves to that bullock. I guess that's a better term than they're entering into. Transferred themselves to that bullock. And then Moses cut the jugular vein of this bullock, caught its blood in a basin, not a drop of that blood could touch the ground, it represented the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. And then he cut out of this bullock the kidneys, and that pure leaf lard that has no fat in it, no, not even any fat flesh in it, no, no, no flesh in it at all. And there's a net of pure leaf lard that surrounds the kidneys, and there's some in the rump. And that was cut out, and the kidneys and that pure leaf lard was put on this fire here. When this was finished and dedicated and God's fire came down, the fire came over here and licked up, licked up that offering that they had there of a lamb. And then, and then the priests kept that fire alive. And they put it in, in, in hot charcoal containers when they moved and carried it from place. And they never let that fire from heaven go out. And then that was the fire that God could accept, the fire that came from God, not natural fire. Well, why the kidneys? Well, all I've ever been able to find is that it's an ancient time. Instead of saying, I love you with all my heart, an ancient would say, I love you with all my kidneys. The seed of affection was the kidneys. And someone reminded me, it was sent from somewhere, and I gave this, that the kidneys purify the blood. I don't know what that had to do with it. But anyway, they cut out the kidneys and, and, and that pure leaf lard. Now this whole bullock, minus its kidneys and that pure leaf lard and its blood, was carried out by men specially chosen to a clean place outside of the city walls and burned. Now that Moses put some of that blood on the altar, some on the horns of the altar, and, and he kept the lamb burning here all the time. Well, this, that came later, of course. And there was a regular trough made at the base of this altar to contain the remainder of the blood. And the, the heat of the fire and the sun would gradually dry up that blood and make room for more. But now the, the, the sin problem of these men was solved. They'd been put to death in that bullock representing our Lord Jesus Christ. Well, now they, they could come and dedicate themselves to the Lord. Our friends, you can't ever dedicate sin to the Lord. Shall I repeat this? You can never dedicate sin to holy God. And I see people in churches. I go down and rededicate and rededicate and rededicate. And I ask them why they went. Well, I'm just so conscious of sin. Just so conscious of sin in my life. And I talk to a lot of young people, and sometimes they'll say, oh, they'll just come and tell me how wicked they are, and I'm going to say, oh, Miss Bertha. Oh, I'm just so full of sin. I'm just, I'm just going to give my whole self to the Lord. Why I have to say, well, he won't have you, he won't have you. You can't dedicate sin to holy God. What can you dedicate to holy God? Well, now this sheep, they were told to bring a sheep. And they were going to dedicate themselves to holy God in this sheep. Now these five men come, and they put their hands on the head of this sheep. Now, what kind of personalities come and enter into this sheep? Or what kind of personalities are transferred to this sheep? Dead, cleansed personalities. Dead, cleansed personalities. Only a person who has died in Christ and taken Christ's death for themselves, and God the Father has charged the death of his son to that person, can dedicate. No wonder you look at me like that. You can't dedicate sin to holy God. You can only dedicate a dead, cleansed personality. Well, and now, what do they do with this? Well, Moses cut this jugular vein and saved his blood, and put some on the altar, and some around the altar, and pours the remainder here. Cuts off the head of that sheep. Now five men have entered into that sheep. Cuts off the head of that sheep and puts it on the altar. Cuts this sheep into four quarters, and there's enough blood on him, he washes it off, and puts these four quarters over here, and burns them up. And then he washes all those inner organs clean, and puts them over on that altar, and every lock of wood and every hook of that sheep is burned up. Now that's dedication, friends. That's dedication. Nothing short of that is dedication. You're holy to the Lord, and everything you have is the Lord. And you can't ever give the Lord anything anymore. It's already here. It's already here. Now this sheep is finished. And they bring another sheep just like that. Perfect specimen of a male sheep, a year old. And Moses catches the blood of this sheep, and puts some of it on the altar, and sets some aside in a basin. And the five men come, of course, before he killed him. Going too fast. The five men come and put their hands on the head of this sheep, and enter into that sheep, or transfer themselves to that sheep. And that sheep represents Christ, too. Well, when you're wholly dedicated to the Lord, what next can you do? You enter into Christ to dwell in him. To dwell in him. And to share him, and to feast on him. Feast on the written word and the living word. So these five men come first, before Moses killed his sheep, put their hands on his head, and they enter into that sheep, representing Christ, enter into Christ to dwell in him. And then Moses kills the sheep, and as I said, leaves some of the blood in a basin. And then Aaron, of Moses, cuts off a right shoulder, and puts it in the hands of Aaron. And Aaron waves that sheep before the Lord. He's giving back to the Lord a token of what the Lord has given him, which means that everything we have belongs to you. Now, you know, that's why we give a tithe to begin with. The tithe is the flag representing that we are the Lord, and all that we have belongs to him. And we leave, we're left with some of it, to support ourselves, and to support children, and bring them into the world. And we have some duties to society, to the Red Cross, and we live with other people, and we have different drives for different things that we won't have to share in. But friends, we don't have the privilege of spending one dime of that nine-tenths that's left, in a way that wouldn't glorify the Lord, because that nine-tenths is his too. That flag is just a token that it's all ours, and you put that in the Lord's treasure, take that to church, and then we take all the other we can. And we talk about tithes and offerings. And I used to just save and save, and the woman that lived with me in China, we'd live just as frugal as we possibly could to save everything we could. We loved to give the Lord some of our money. Well, you hadn't given him anything when he paid the tithe. But we loved to give him as much as we could, and oh, just so many needs. We didn't get enough money from the Foreign Mission Board to buy the tracks that he and I gave out, and I wasn't but one of the missionaries. And we always needed so much more money to help some boy or girl to come to school. They couldn't even pay $2.50 for their food. And if you ate food like they ate food, you could get along on $2.50 too. And they live and do well. And know the day came when the Lord showed me I never could give the Lord anything, that that nine-tenths was his, just as much as the one-tenths. But I was the Lord, and I was to take care of myself and the people that I... I wasn't responsible for anyone, but most people are. And you've got other people to support. But you're doing it in the field of the Lord and in a way that would please him. You have no right to put anything in your mouth just because it tasted going down that red lane. You've got to eat what's good for the Lord's people. Well, uh, Moses waved that right shoulder signifying that all that we have is in Christ and we're giving back to Christ a portion of what he is to us. And then they cut off that delicious breast meat and gave it to Moses to eat. That's sharing Christ. And then, you know, after these priests would get through with their dedication, they would cook and eat the rest of this sheep, and they would feast on that sheep. And they couldn't share it with their families. They had to burn up what was left. Only those who are dead, cleansed and dead and thoroughly dedicated can feast on Christ and share Christ. Now, that don't mean quit coming and visiting. You visit here on Tuesday evening or Thursday evening. Monday, you visit Monday evening. Well, you keep on coming and visiting Monday evening. And if you can't do anything but go boost the church, go boost the church, because that's all you can do. And boost the pastors. That's the best you can do. Keep on going. But, oh, wouldn't it be lovely and good for those people if you were so feasting on Christ and so cleansed and so living in him that you could go share Christ with them. Get them on their knees and bring them to the cross of Christ. And get on your knees and pray through with them for their burdens and the burdens of their children. Well, that's sharing Christ. Well, now this Jesus thing. Well, then Moses takes some of that blood and puts it on the air of these five men. Now, blood, blood signifies death. They could only live in that holy place and be chosen of God and have to stand between the people outside and holy God in that tabernacle by being put to death. They could only hear his voice by being put to death. They could only obey him by being put to death. And then they put some blood on the hand. Evidently, the hand represented their service to God. They could only serve God by being put to death. And then they put some blood on the floor. What do the feet represent? Well, evidently, their daily lives, their daily walk. They could only be chosen of God to dwell in that holy place and serve him, standing between holy God in the form of fire and these people out there in their tents by being put to death. And then Moses took some of that blood. My Chinese Bible says he sumpt it. My Shakespearean English, which I still like better than any other, so I like to have the others as a reference. I'm getting a Bible lesson. I like to have a half a dozen translations open on my desk just to see what this one says and that one says. But if I'm going to memorize something, I come back to Shakespearean English. That's when Shakespeare reached its Venus and glory. English reached its Venus and glory during Shakespeare's time. And my Shakespearean English says the blood was sprinkled on those garments. Well, how could they sprinkle it on there if something happened? Well, anyway, that blood was sumped and sprinkled all over those beautiful white linen garments. It just ruined them, didn't it? Did it ruin them? No, it made them fit for God's presence. Some time ago, a young woman who'd been supported by Cooperative Board money, working with college students in a student center, told me about a certain person she'd invited to come and lead a few days evangelistic meeting for the students who attended that center. And she said to me, Now, I want that man to come down here and talk about the love of God. I don't want him coming down here talking about an angry God that requires blood. Now, didn't she deserve her salary from the Cooperative Board? She ought to have been out teaching everyday school somewhere, making her a living. Whose blood did Jesus require? His own. His own. And through his marvelous love, the blood of his son could be said that the whole human family might not have to spend an eternity in hell. Well, you know, after Moses put that blood on those dommies, making them fit for God's presence, showing they'd been put to death, he put on a very fragrant oil that must have represented the Holy Spirit. And he put this on top of the blood, the blood first. And he couldn't put it on the flesh. He put it on those beautiful garments. Now, Aaron represented the Lord Jesus Christ. And the Bible says that the oil was poured on Aaron's head. See, Jesus was filled with the Spirit from his birth. And the oil was poured on Aaron's head, evidently from a pitiful, without measure. And it ran down all over his garments, down to the fringe of his garments, the psalmist said. But these people still had their sinful natures. And that blood representing the Holy Spirit could not be put on the flesh. It could be put on those white linen garments representing Christ. They were dwelling in Christ. And they could do that because of the blood they'd been put to death, been put to death. Well, now these priests were dedicated priests. You know they couldn't do one single thing because they, even though their dedication was complete, they couldn't do one thing. So what were they supposed to do? Now these priests had two duties and two privileges. The two duties were, one duty was that they were to teach God's Word. And the women had to go and stand over by themselves and stand for the hour and be taught God's law that he gave it sign after the nation. And the men stood in another place and were taught by other priests. They not only didn't have a bench with a cushion on it, they didn't have a bench. They stood and listened to God's Word. That was their first duty. The second duty was that they were to take the offerings that people brought. After people had offered their sin offerings, you remember, they could make an offering to God. And they brought offerings to the priests. The people bought loaves without leaven for the priests to eat, to be put in the tabernacle. And they brought their tithes to the priests. So they took the offerings of the people, received the offerings, and put those over here on the altar to burn, the offerings that were supposed to be burned, to God, directly to God. Well, the two privileges were that they were permitted to take turns going into that holy place and standing between the holy God over there behind that curtain and pray to the people, pray and worship to the people. And the way they prayed, there was a prayer altar. It's called the Infants' Altar in the Bible. It was an altar of prayer. It was made of wood, overlaid with pure gold. Whom did it represent? Well, evidently the God man. It had an iron rack in it to hold the hot burning coals or some kind of metal. And it had a crown, made with a crown, a gold crown around it. And the priest took coal from here where the lamb was burning, the charcoal, and put it on this rack. And then they burned on that a very highly perfumed substance called incense. It had in it something that made a heavy smoke. And as soon as that incense reached those hot coals, the smoke just oozed up. And that worshiper, now even though he'd been put to death and all those animals, and even though he stood there with the blood representing that he died in Christ, and that oil on him, he still could not go into that place and stand there and worship God unless he were enveloped in smoke. God trying to teach those people something of his own holiness and how sinful man is separated from holy God. And that place just filled up with smoke. And he stood there in that smoke putting on this incense. And that lit up to God that perfume as worship and prayer for himself and the people outside. That was his first privilege. Now the next privilege was that he could go over to this side of this first room called the Holy Place where there was a table, wood, overlaid with pure gold. Whom did it represent? It had a crown around it too. The God man, God becoming man in order to die. A man's sin. And on that table were laid every Sabbath day 12 loaves of bread made of water and flour. Don't you know that is insipid to eat? They couldn't put any leaven in it, anything to make it rise, because it represented the Lord Jesus Christ. And our Lord used leaven at least three times, as I remember, to represent sin. Leaven doesn't grow in wheat. God didn't put leaven in wheat. It's an outside substance that's brought in and put in into that sponge, into that dough. And it contaminates everything it touches. So it's a good illustration of sin. And they couldn't put any leaven in this because Jesus himself said he was that Passover bread, he was that grain of wheat that fell into the ground and died. And he had to go through suffering here in the world and the strain had to be beaten out to get it out of his chest, separated from his chest. And then it had to be put between stones and be crushed. And then this bread had to be baked in an oven. Now all the rich people in the old land have ovens. And they bake bread and they steam bread on top of the stove. And they can cook several things and have racks in a pot. And they can cook several things over one burner. And they may have to go to a restaurant to get anything cooked in an oven. But this had to be cooked in an oven. Why? It represented the unseen fires of suffering that our Lord had to go through in order to be that heaven and manna for you and me, in order to be bread for us. And if we ate that bread, we'd never die. Well, these priests could stand there and eat that bread. And now, there was no window in this tabernacle. Why no window? A window would give in natural light. People do not worship God by their natural ability. That's why some of the greatest men and some of the greatest teachers having strings of degrees after their names are so stupid in spiritual things. Spiritual truth must always be revealed to the heart by the Holy Spirit. It is not understood by the human mind. The only light was over here at this side, which was the first floor lamp that was ever made. I have to hold it upside down because the branches fall down when I turn it up. But it had three branches on each side with a cup in each branch and a cup in the original stem. And that fragrant oil, evidently representing the Holy Spirit, was poured in. And that was the light. That oil burned. And that was the only light. Now, there was no wood in this. It did not represent the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, I don't know. He was light. He was light before he ever took a human body. But anyway, it must have represented, could have represented just pure gold. It could have represented God the Father or the Holy Spirit is. But the oil certainly must have represented the Holy Spirit. Now, if one of these men had gone in here just because he was a priest to burn that incense and eat that bread, that represented feasting on Christ, feasting on Christ. He would have been smitten dead. Or just because he was a dedicated priest, he would have come here and offered a sacrifice to someone. He would have been smitten dead. I wish you'd bring a pencil and paper and write down the Bible passages I used. What I'm giving you about this is, I've gone way down from the good portion of Exodus in review. But this dedication of the priest, what I'm making on, is described in the 8th chapter of Leviticus. 8th chapter of Leviticus. And just now I'm reading the 30th chapter of Exodus. Exodus chapter 30, verse 17. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Thou shalt also make a labor of brass. A labor of brass. Where's the labor this morning? Well, I found it last night. The labor. Where's the labor? Have to have the labor. Oh, here it is. Here we are. Now, the labor was made of the mirrors. It was a washbasin with a basin at the top to wash the hands and a basin at the bottom to wash the feet. Now, they didn't wear shoes. Now, in the Orian, the servant never wears shoes in the presence of his master. When he removes his shoes, that means I'm your servant. And when God's messengers appeared to saints in the Old Testament, if the saint didn't take off his shoes, the messengers from God told him to, to take off his shoes. Now, they didn't wear shoes. And their feet represented their daily walk, their daily lives. And the hands represented their service. And there was a basin of water at the top to wash their hands and one at the bottom to wash their feet. And if these men didn't pass by here and wash their hands and their feet, they would be slitting dead. Slitting dead. God is no old Santa Claus. Take him anywhere and tell him you're sorry and he'll forgive you. He'll do nothing of the kind. The wages of sin is death. God, holy God, in all of his wholeness must put us to death for our sin. Man's not what God made. He's separated from God by sin. And friends, people are just teaching heresy to these children in Sunday school when they're telling them, when you do wrong, just get on your knees and ask God to forgive you and He will. He'll do nothing of the kind if that's all they know. But oh, praise the Lord. He paid a price. He paid a price to forgive that child's son. He had to send his son into the world to take that child's sin in his own body and have his life's blood pushed out of him. And we ought to teach these children what it costs God to have to forgive sin and only on one condition. And that is that they take his son as the Lord of their lives, that they have any part in holy God's forgiveness. And God never forgives sin because He loves us, just because He loves us. He forgives sin because He's already put His Son to death and the people in the Old Testament times looked forward to the coming of His death when they offered those lambs and transferred themselves to those sheep. They looked forward to His coming and dying. And God saw the Savior coming and dying for Adam and Eve and for Abel 4,000 years later. Praise the Lord. We live on this side with all the record. We live on this side of the cross. We've got good news that these youngsters can understand. Jesus is already coming down. But it cost them every drop of His blood for the tiniest sin you ever committed. Their sins could be big and little. And of course they are. Some sins are more heinous than others in the sight of God. But the mildest sinful thoughts you ever had to be forgiven, Jesus Christ had to die. And it would take an every drop of His blood if you'd have been the only person in the world for Him to die for. The way that God is holy friends. And He can never excuse anything that comes from the devil. He never forgives anything that comes from the devil in the sense of excusing it. His forgiveness is charging that sin of ours to His Son. And that's the only kind of forgiveness holy God has. He sees your sins on you until you have placed them on Jesus Christ and then He sees your sins on His Son. And then that child can receive a living Lord in their hearts only when they've identified with Christ in His death and transferred their sons to the Lord Jesus Christ. And when they do, the Holy Spirit baptizes them. I wish I could remember to say this at every service. The Holy Spirit baptizes them into Jesus Christ. He places that person into Jesus Christ. When they've been put to death in Christ and they've taken Christ's death, God looks at it as if they're dead and they're buried dead people. And baptize means to bury, transfer, submerge them. And that person is placed into Christ and he stands before God in His Son. And then and not before can that child receive a living Savior into his heart, a living Lord into his heart. Because he's been put to the death of Jesus Christ, he's been charged to Him and he stands before God in all the perfections of His Son. And his sin's been punished in Christ and that's the way God sees it. Oh, how much of the gospel we've left out in getting people into our churches and deceiving these precious children. No child can be saved. I've said it once to Christ yesterday. Hope to say it the rest of the time, every day. We've got to take Christ's death. God is holy and He can't excuse anything that comes from the devil. And our very nature has the devil in it. Every descendant of Adam and Eve has the devil in them. I don't mean that's demon possession. We're warped. We've got that inclination for sin that we've got from the devil. Our nature's changed when Adam and Eve lost God's glory and God's life when they sinned. And we've got to be recreated or we go on to hell. We've got to be made over. We've got to be reborn as Jesus It's got to be born of the Spirit. And it can't be born of the Spirit until we know we'll condemn sinners inside of God because we can't understand Jesus' death until we know we're sinners. And when we can understand that Jesus Christ died and why He died, we can claim that death for ourselves and not before. And when we claim Him for ourselves, we don't feel anything about that, His placing us into His Son. I had to learn that from the Bible. I didn't know that. I knew I came and took Christ's death for myself after six long years of weeping over my sins and nobody telling me how to be saved. Nobody told anybody to receive Jesus' sin. I'm sure glad they didn't. They told us to repent of our sins. And when we repented of our sins, the Lord would forgive us and He would come into our hearts when we took His death for ourselves and that's surely what He did for me. But it took me six long years to get to the cross and I didn't know that when I got to the cross the Lord placed me into His Son. The Holy Spirit placed me into His Son and I was baptized into Christ and I was counted righteous. The righteousness of Christ is ours to me because it stood before God and His Son. Therefore, I was not that sinner anymore. I could receive a living Lord and a person of the Holy Spirit into my heart. And then I would say, He doesn't come into this devil nature for instance when something's done about it. And oh, the grown people that are lost in our churches and have been lost. I never heard of anybody, I was grown before I ever heard anybody invite people to come down the aisle and receive Jesus into their hearts. And that was after too many of our young preachers had gone up north to the seminary. They used to call sinners to repent and they came down and all your front seats were vacated and people took their handbooks from these seats and stood in the aisle and had continued singing their invitation hymns. And the lost and the backsliders came down here and got on their knees and the backsliders came back to the fellowship of God and repented of their sins and the lost people came to the cross of Christ. Took his death and the whole and we learned from the Bible that when they identified with him in his death and claimed his death for themselves and you can't do that without handing everything over to him. He never comes to anybody's heart until he gets all there is to him. He's got to be the Lord of their lives before he comes in their hearts to live. The common reason would teach you that you have to do that. Apart from what the Bible teaches you. The Bible certainly teaches it. And then we can receive him in our hearts. After this devil nature has been dealt with and put to death, put him in a position of death. Well, now, where were we here? I'll read what it says about putting these men to death. They didn't wash their hands. They didn't wash their hands and feet. Their daily lives had to be cleansed before they were put to They didn't wash their hands and feet. They didn't wash and feet. and their hands and their feet, that they die not. It was death penalty to go into this holy place. To worship God with your daily, your daily walks, not We're living in the devil's territory, we're coming in contact with people all the time that belong to the devil, expressing the devil, or unfaithful people all the time. The devil is always after us. And we accidentally do and say a lot of things sometimes we're not even conscious of. Maybe not even realize we've said something that didn't please the Lord, that we get on our knees at night. If we're living close enough to the Lord, He can point it out to us and bring it to us. If we're not close enough to Him, we may just go on and pack up and pack up and pack up again. But their daily sins, their daily walk had to be cleansed. They had to come in and wash their hands. And if they didn't, what was the penalty? Death. God would smite anybody dead who came to worship Him with unclean hands and unclean feet if their service to God was not holy. Friends, if you travel around as much as I do, and associated with church leaders as much as I do, you would be astounded at the amount of Christian work that's done in pride. Oh, we've got to have more churches. Our church has got to add them faster than anybody else. We've got, our group's got to have the balance. Oh, our Sunday school classes had more baptized Christies than any of them. Oh, it just shows up in every way. So many ways it shows up. Human pride in our Christian work. And then what about our daily lives? The daily lives. Every human being is a priest in the New Testament. Every human being is a priest standing between people outside who do not know the Lord and the Lord Himself. The Lord's made us priests and kings. What does a king do? A king reigns. A king has authority. He reigns over his situation. He has power. But as a priest, he stands between holy God and the people outside, telling them about God. He stands to pray between people outside and holy God. And every saved person is a priest today. And, dear Lord, we're just continually amazed when we read Your Word and we get reminded all over afresh of the holiness of God and the exceeding sinfulness of human beings who are not the human beings that You created and You intended us to be. But, Lord, we do pray to You that when our foreparents failed in sin and lost their God-glory and their God-likeness and their God-power right that very day You promised to send a Savior, it took You a long time because people wouldn't obey You. And You had to wait until You had a people and a place who would receive Your Son into the world and accept His death for themselves and write it up in the New Testament. Lord, we thank You that we live this side of the cross and all of our lives have been taught about Your death on the cross. And the day came when the Holy Spirit revealed it to our hearts and we knew that it was for us. Lord, speak to every person here today. Give us a new sense of Your holiness. Rebuke church members who laugh and make fun of sin too often. Rebuke anybody in this church who is habitual of sinning. Lord, give us a new sense of God's holiness. And our being personalities for the light of the Creator of the universe and the person of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit living inside of us. Make us afraid of God. Make us afraid to sin against Him. Oh, just make us so afraid we just don't dare sin against Him. We'd rather die than sin against Him. Since it breathes the Holy Spirit in a corner and it can't get to us other people until that sin is made right. Lord, do something new in teaching us more of Your holiness and man's sin these days. We pray in Jesus' name and for His sake. Amen.