Preparation for service

Perhaps we could turn to a passage that has been referred to already in the book of Numbers chapter 8. Numbers chapter 8 is about the service of the Levite, his commission, his consecration. So we'll start reading in verse number 1. Numbers 8 and verse 1. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto Aaron, and say unto him, When thou lightest the lamps, the seven lamps, or the lampstands, shall give light over against the lampstand. And Aaron did so.

He lighted the lamps therefore over against the lampstand, as the Lord commanded Moses. And this work of the lampstand was of beaten gold unto the shaft thereof. Unto the flowers thereof was beaten work, according unto the pattern which the Lord had showed Moses.

So he made the lampstand. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Take the Levites from among the children of Israel, and cleanse them. And thus shalt thou do unto them, to cleanse them, sprinkle water of purifying upon them, and let them shave all their flesh, and let them wash their clothes, and so make them clean.

And let them take a young bullock with his meat offering, even fine flour mingled with oil, and another young bullock shalt thou take for a sin offering. Just for sake of time, verse 10. And thou shalt bring the Levites before the Lord, and the children of Israel shalt put their hands upon the Levites.

And Aaron shalt offer the Levites before the Lord for an offering of the children of Israel, that they may execute the service of the Lord. And the Levites shall lay their hands upon the heads of the bullocks, and thou shalt offer the one for a sin offering, and the other for a burnt offering. Verse 13.

And thou shalt set the Levites before Aaron and before his sons, and offer them for an offering unto the Lord. And thou shalt separate the Levites from among the children of Israel, and the Levites shall be mine. Verse 17.

For all the firstborn of the children of Israel are mine, both man and beast. In the day that I smote every firstborn in the land of Egypt, I sanctified them for myself. Now I have taken the Levites for all the firstborn of the children of Israel.

Now I have given the Levites as a gift to Aaron and to his sons from among the children of Israel, to do the service of the children of Israel in the tabernacle of the congregation, and to make an atonement for the children of Israel, that there be no plague among the children of Israel. Verse 23. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, This is that that belongeth unto the Levites.

From twenty and five years old and upward they shall go in to wait upon the service of the tabernacle of the congregation. And from the age of fifty years they shall cease waiting upon the service thereof, and shall serve no more, but shall minister with their brethren in the tabernacle of the congregation, to keep the charge, and shall do no service. Thus shalt thou do unto the Levites, touching their charge.

Now we know that God always blesses the reading of his precious word. Now you might have noticed, and I used to wonder about this, why we have these first verses of the chapter, and a chapter that deals with the consecration of the Levites. We have verses about the lampstand, it's called the candlestick, but we know it's really the lampstand.

And maybe this little last word in ministry corresponds a little bit with the first one we had on Saturday, where it talked about the vine, and bearing fruit for God. That's what service is. We're not told to really be fruitful, are we, to bear fruit, but we're told to abide in the vine.

That's the important thing, if we're abiding in the vine, we're going to bear fruit. So before it speaks about the service of the Levites, it gives us what I'm going to call in these first four verses, the motivation for service. What is the motivation for service? Well, the motivation for service is the Lord.

He's the light of the world. He's the lampstand. And it tells us about the purpose of the lampstand.

It was to give light over against itself. So all service isn't to promote the person that serves. That would be foolish to think that, wouldn't it? All the service is so that Christ might be seen.

And it tells us something about that lampstand. It says it is of beaten gold, and it speaks about the flowers that are off. When I think of the word beaten, I think of Calvary.

And I think of the sufferings of the Lord Jesus. That should be my motivation for serving Him. He's the one that suffered.

He's the one that came to serve. He came to serve us. And that service took Him to Calvary.

And the least that we could do in response would be to serve Him. All because of Calvary. He suffered for us.

We should be willing to suffer for Him in our service. And then, when it speaks of the gold, that would speak of the deity of Christ. And to think of the one that served as the one who is deity.

Came into this world and came as a servant. That He might serve His people, that He might serve us. And then we read, the flowers are off.

That would be the beauties of Christ. And if we are occupied with the sufferings of Christ, with Calvary, and the gold that speaks of His deity and His glory, and the beauties of Christ, I'll tell you, it shouldn't be too difficult for us to leave this place after hearing what we have heard at this conference, to go out and serve the Lord. Now, there are other things that have been mentioned already, but the next thing, we have purification for service.

If we're going to serve the Lord, we have to be clean. The Lord was pure in every aspect of His life. We have heard a little bit about Him serving there, and He girded Himself with a towel.

You know, Mr. Darby's translation of my memory is any good at all. He suggests, it's a linen towel, and it speaks of the priestly garments, and it speaks of purity. His service was absolutely pure.

You'll remember this because you have John 15, and you go back to Jeremiah chapter 15, you have another girdle, and there was a girdle that was hidden in a little hole by the river Euphrates. And then Jeremiah was told to go and get the girdle, and when he got it, the girdle was marred. The service of Israel was marred.

And our service can be marred if we're not pure. God's looking for pure, pure, and if we're not pure in our lives, whatever we say for God and whatever we do, it's not going to really have any weight before God. It doesn't take very much to mar our service.

And we're all prone to just do the wrong thing or maybe say the wrong thing, some little thing. Remember in the Song of Songs, it's the little foxes that spoil the vines. So we have to be absolutely pure in our service.

And he said, put water of purifying upon them. I suppose you could link that with the labor, but we know this, it speaks of the water of the word. How do I know if I'm impure? By the word of God, not by what I think.

We must go and we lay emphasis on the word of God. That's the main purpose, I think, of a conference isn't just to try and tell God's people what to do, but it's to try and interest God's people in the word. And especially younger believers, to get them into the word of God.

Our brethren have gleaned some wonderful things. You wonder how some of these men can get what they get out of the word of God. And when I see it, it doesn't make me envious of them.

It makes me glad I'm with them and I'm able to learn from them. But it gives me a desire to get farther into the word of God. I have heard men minister from very simple little things.

And it's touched my heart. And you know what I think? I think, what have I been doing all my Christian life? How did I never see these simple little things in the word of God? So it gives me a desire to get into the word of God. So he said they must be pure and they were to shave all their flesh.

Now of course you know what that means. It means that there's nothing of the flesh in our service. It's not to be seen, it's not to get your name in the magazine or anything else like that.

That's not the idea of service at all, is it? Just to serve quietly. A man told me, he said, he said, Bill, you know what advice your father gave me many years ago? There's a man that's full time in the Lord's work. And I said, no, but I'm interested.

He said, get through life as quietly as you can. We just don't need to be promoting self. Just try to be a help wherever you are.

We're all different. I can't be like some of my other brethren and I'm sure they wouldn't want to be like me. But we all have our own little part in this great work, don't we? And in order to be a part of this work we need to be clean.

And we need to have nothing of the flesh, nothing that exudes from the flesh should be in our service. And then it says, they had to wash their clothes. What does it mean to wash your clothes? Well, I think in this instant here, our clothes would speak of our testimony.

There's other places where our clothing would speak of our standing before God. But it also speaks, it's what people see, isn't it? When you look at me, you see my clothes. Maybe you won't remember much about them.

Sometimes you go to a conference with your wife, you know, and she goes in the dining room and you say, where is she? And they say, what was she wearing? And you know, they think you didn't even live in the same house. I'm not really sure what she's wearing. Well, we don't pay attention to it like we should in that way.

But you know, our testimony is so important. What do people see when they look? Do they see a little reflection from the lampstand? Is that what they see in your service or my service? They see something of Christ. The Lord Jesus, He went to the Northern Kingdom, wasn't it? In Matthew chapter 4. And what did He do? It says, to them that sat in the region of the shadow of death was a great light sent.

He brought some of the light of heaven into this dark world. Is that not what you and I should be all about in this life? To bring something of the light of heaven into this dark world. We're luminaries, we're not the light, but we reflect the light.

We're lights in this world. Well, something else we need, not only purification for service, but we need to have an appreciation of the sacrifice. I think that's what really touches our hearts too, isn't it? And they said, let them take a young bullock with his male offering and fine flour mingled with oil.

And I'm not going to go into all the details of the offerings, but that's a wonderful study, isn't it? I like to look at the offerings. There are a lot of commentaries on the offerings. Some of them are a little different from the other ones, but I like to get into the offerings.

And, you know, we talk about the silent years in the life of the Lord. They're not as silent as we think. You go back to the offerings and you find things about his life and hear the evenness of his character and so on, even in those years that we call hidden years.

And they take another young bullock that says, for a sin offering. And they bring them before the tabernacle of the congregation. And thou shalt gather the whole assembly of the children of Israel together.

Bring the Levites before the Lord and the children of Israel shall put their hands upon the Levites. What does that tell me? That all my service is in communion with the local assembly, with my brethren. We're not freelance servants of the Lord.

None of us. All the men assigned my letter of commendation have been gone dead a long time, but that doesn't mean I'm a freelancer. I'm still responsible to my brethren.

I'm responsible to the Lord, but some could say, well, I'm only responsible to the Lord. That's not right. I am responsible to the Lord, but I'm responsible to the assembly that commended me, I feel, and the assembly of which I'm a part.

So it's not a freelance service. We do it in communion with our brethren and the assembly. And there's reasons for that.

They can help us and they can certainly pray for us and whatever we're occupied. And they can guide us in the things. Some of us weren't long saved and we were occupied and trying to reach out to others.

Well, we didn't just go out and do it. We talked to the brethren and they gave us their okay and their blessing rather, not just their okay, but their blessing to go out. So that's what putting their hands, that's identification.

They're identified with the assembly, the children of Israel. But as well as that, the sacrifices were offered and they put their hands upon the bullocks, the one for a sin offering and the one for a burnt offering. And you know what that means.

Identification. And it means that the sin offering is as though the sins of the offerer are transferred to the sacrifice. So when I serve the Lord, there's no more consciousness or conscience of sins.

The sins have been dealt with. And that doesn't bother me in my service for Him. And then when it comes to the burnt offering, it's the acceptability of the sacrifice being transferred to the offerer, the hands on the head.

So we're accepted. We're accepted in the beloved one. So those are things that really we're enjoying our salvation.

Our sins are gone and we can serve Him and we're accepted of Him and we serve in fellowship with our brethren. And then, not only do we have identification brought out before us with the sacrifice and with our brethren, but there's a presentation to the Lord. That's what we have heard already.

That you present your bodies, a living sacrifice, wholly acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. You ever wondered what sacrifice that is? Some say, well, maybe it's a burnt offering. And I'll tell you what I think.

I like to link it at least with the meal offering. That's a living sacrifice. That's the life of the Lord.

So our service should be patterned in His life. And how shall we do that? Without going into it fully, you look it up. In the meal offering in Leviticus chapter 2, it could be offered in an oven, first of all.

Baked in an oven. It was unseen. And I would liken that to the life of the Lord in those years that are more or less silent.

Unseen. Living before God. Unseen.

And then it could be in a flat plate. Couldn't it? And that would be His more public service of the Lord. In front of the disciples and so on.

And there as He went about in the land. And then you have the cauldron. The boiling pot.

That would be in the trials and so on. The sufferings of the Lord right up to the cross. And maybe even on the cross.

Not the vicarious sufferings, but what He suffered at the hands of men and so on. You say, well how does that affect us? You present your bodies. That's in the unseen place.

We don't do it to be seen. This is something between ourselves and God. We do it in a quietness.

And we present our bodies for whatever the Lord has for us to do. We don't tell Him what we're presenting our bodies to go to the mission field or to go here or go there. What's the most important thing for me? Where's the most important place for me to be? Where God has put me.

And maybe it's in your little assembly wherever it is. Far off fields look green. Well they say the grass still has to be cut.

So it might look good. But God hasn't put you there. God has put us where we are.

And I would like to be where God has put me or led me to be and doing what God wants me to do. You could be at a conference on a conference platform speaking to 1,200 or 1,300 people. Is that more important than teaching a Sunday school class? Not if that's where God has put you.

That's the way. We might look at it in a different way but I'll tell you that. I think that's the way God looks at it.

Just to be where we are doing what He has for us to do. And whether it's in the local assembly or among our enemies. If your enemy hunger, feed him.

If he thirst, give him drink and so on. And we take a perfect example from the Lord Himself. Now there's a separation involved.

Verse 14, Thou shalt separate the Levites from among the children of Israel. Oh, you say, that's strange. You know, we're separate from the world, aren't we? But how could we be separated from God's people? Well, I'll tell you.

All of God's people don't have a desire to really present their body to God and to serve Him. But no matter what others are doing. Don't always be looking at others or what shall this man do? Although I think Peter had a genuine concern for John.

But we shouldn't be occupied so much about what others are doing. And we can be critical of others. Criticism isn't a gift, you know? When the Lord said it's more blessed to give than to receive, He wasn't talking about criticism.

But we can look at others in their service and complain about the way they're doing it. Well, maybe we should be doing it. And there's others maybe that aren't associated with us.

And they're doing things and we could judge them for what they're doing. And maybe they're doing far more than we are. None of us can boast too much, I don't think.

I can't do anything anyway about my service. But here they are. Separated.

It doesn't matter what even others of the Lord's people are doing. You go in for serving Him. That's why He saved you.

Stay in communion with Him. That's what service is about. And we've been reminded of producing fruit.

Well, what is fruit? Everything that the Lord did was fruit for God. Everything that He thought. Everything that He said.

And I would take it that everything I do like Him would be fruit for God. Now, we'll just go on. We're going to close soon.

Separation from Israel unto the Lord. And then there's a representation. They represented all the people of God.

All the firstborn are mine. I think we've been reminded at this conference of the role of the firstborn. We heard about Elijah and Elisha.

You see me taken up. And so on. He said, I want a double portion.

The Lord has been taken up. We have been given a double portion so that we can serve Him. And what happened? The cloak fell upon Him.

And when people saw Elisha with that cloak, probably at least from a distance they would have said, man, that's Elijah. He looked like his master that was taken up. And that should be true of us.

There should be a likeness on us to the one that's taken up. And we have a double portion so that we might represent Him in a worthy manner in His absence until He comes. So then, I didn't maybe read some of the verse, but it doesn't matter.

It tells you all what happened. They were purified. They washed their clothes.

An atonement made to cleanse them. After that, after that, don't take service lightly. It was only when these things were true that they really were in a condition to serve the Lord.

Are we in a condition to serve Him? Well, He says, so did they unto them. And when we read in the last part of the chapter, from 25 years old and upward they shall go in to wait upon the service of the tabernacle. Chapter 4 in verse 3, from 30 years and chapter 2 in verse 15 from one month and it was even a little different in the days of Solomon's temple.

Well, what does it mean? Well, I think it means from well, it means it was a period where they served an apprenticeship. When older men taught the younger. When they got to be 50 years, you say that were they all washed up at 50? If they were, I've been washed up a long time.

And I'm not talking about the washing in here. I'm talking about your service would be over. So I hope it's not meaning that.

I know it's not. But it means when they got to be 50 years, they weren't taken up with the heavy lifting and so on of the furniture of the tabernacle. But they were training others that were coming along.

And I'm glad for older men that trained me. I can get training from younger men as well. I'm glad for anyone.

But I'm glad when I was first saved there were older men that had a real interest in me. If we didn't take part in the breaking of bread and worship, we had an old French man, Mr. Hannet, and he said, don't become a silent brother. He called us brothers for some reason.

But he was encouraging us. You know, you get away from it. You can stop taking part in it.

It's hard to get back again for some anyhow. Just keep at it. That's the important thing.

Keep on keeping on for God. And there's a potential for everyone. From one month, soon as we're born into God's family, there's a potential for service for everyone.

We're all servants. Don't just talk about some people like myself, the Lord's servant. We're all the Lord's servants.

And we're all occupied in this great work. But I just want to impress upon us as we leave the conference in this part, last part of the ministry session, that we don't take our service lightly. God has given us a very important place in his program.

And he's equipped us for it. He's given us everything we need in this book. May the Lord help us to get into it and to reflect some of that light of the lampstand.

Calvary. Deity of the Lord is glory. Think that this is the one we're associated with.

Think of the flowers, the beauties of the Lord. And the Lord, in his mercy, has called on you and he's called on me that we might serve him. May we be willing servants.

And may we be worthy servants and remember even the least little thing. Can mar our service for him. Keep thyself pure.