(This transcript was generated by AI. Apologies for any inacuracies)

If you have your Bible with you today, I'm gonna invite you to open it up to the New Testament.

This is after the ascension of Christ.

He has come, he has lived a perfect life.

He has died on a cross, he has been buried in a grave, he's now resurrected.

And one of the writers here writes after his ascension, he's gone back to heaven, and we believe as a church that he came one time, but he's coming again.

Come on, somebody.

And we're kind of in the gap between the first coming of Christ and the second coming of Christ.

And this letter was written after he's ascended to heaven.

The writer here wants to remind the people there of who they are in Christ Jesus.

And we can simply take from this letter that Peter wrote those followers in that day about who they were and apply it to our life today.

So if you have your Bibles, we're gonna start there in 1 Peter chapter two, and we'll read a couple of verses, verses nine and 10.

Peter says this, you are a chosen people.

Come on, somebody.

Yeah, you're handpicked by God in heaven as a Christ follower.

You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood.

Look at your neighbor and say, you're a priest.

Go ahead and tell them you're a priest.

Look at your other neighbor and say, you don't look like one.

You don't look like one.

You're a royal priesthood.

That's where we're gonna camp out today.

A holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into the wonderful light.

So that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness, come on, priest, into the wonderful light.

Once you were not a people, but now you are a people of God.

Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

Here the writer reminds them that they are a priesthood of believers who have received the mercy of God in their life and their simple purpose was to begin to display him to the world around them.

And today what I wanna do is I wanna look at how to bring up there down here as being a royal priesthood, a priesthood of believers.

And if you have put your faith in who Jesus is, the one who died on a cross, resurrected from a grave, ascended to heaven and is coming back one day.

The Bible simply says, you're a priest and I'm a priest.

We're a priesthood together.

Now I know in culture, we typically think of a priest as someone who wears a robe, who basically intercedes for people and talks to God for people.

But the Bible says that Jesus came to basically open up God's presence to all of us who put our faith in him.

Come on somebody.

And we can go into God's presence anytime, any day, any place and be a priest and seek God and begin to shine God to the world around us.

So the Bible says all of us who are believers and there's many believers here at Valorous Church, this community called Valorous Church.

And it says together we are a priesthood of believers and we have an incredible, incredible opportunity to shine the light of God into a dark world around us.

Come on, we're here to bring up there, down here.

But in order to really begin to grab hold of what the writer is writing here and for us to apply it to our life today, we have to go back and look at what a priest was in the Old Testament and what the functions of a priest was in the Old Testament because it'll begin to help us apply this to our life and begin to live it out on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.

Because the priests were basically a group of people that God had assigned to a task of allowing His presence to come live among the people.

And one of the functions of a priest was simply to set things up.

Everybody say, set things up.

Set things up.

I want you to know today as a priesthood of believers, one of your functions is to set things up.

To set things up for God to show up and do great and mighty things, to show His mercy and His miracles to the world around you.

The Bible says in Numbers 4, verses 46 through 49 that God called the group of Levites to be a priest among the people that had come out of bondage and had cut out slavery out of Egypt and were on their way to the promised land and they were to set up a tent of meeting where God's presence would rest with the people.

And one of the simple tasks of the priest wasn't just to go into that tent of meeting, that tabernacle, but it was simply to create all the furniture in it, all the things around it, and create an environment, come on, for God's presence to rest in and show up among the people.

Numbers 4, verses 46 through 49.

So Moses and Aaron and the leaders of Israel, they listed all the Levites by their clans and families.

All the men between 30 and 50 years of age who were eligible for service in the tabernacle and for its transportation.

This was a moving tent of meeting.

The Bible says this group numbered 8,580 people.

I'm a priest, come on.

Says, when their names were recorded as the Lord had commanded through Moses, each man was assigned, everybody say assigned.

Assigned.

Assigned his task and told what to carry.

If you go back and read the book of Numbers, Numbers chapter four, you'll begin to get a description of God assigned every group of priests a certain task in setting up this tent of meeting.

And God was moving these people from, through the wilderness to the promised land.

And as God moved this nation of people, Israel, these priests, simple task was simply to set up the tent of meeting exactly like God said it was to be set up.

Every detail mattered.

Every measurement mattered.

Every piece of furniture placed in the tabernacle mattered.

How they carried it, how they broke it down, how they set it up, every single piece of it mattered.

And it took 8,530 or 80 men to basically begin to move this tabernacle and set it up for God's presence to rest among the people.

In other words, every one of them's task wasn't the same.

And this is significant for us to understand today as a priesthood of believers.

Your task and my task aren't exactly the same.

But what is the same is God cares about the details of the environment where his people are, how their hearts are, and what they do to his glory.

He cares about every detail.

And we're to pay attention to the details when we set up an environment for God to show up.

He's a holy God.

He's a set apart God.

He's a God that deserves reverence.

He's a God that deserves glory.

And he invites people into his presence.

And these priests were simply human beings that were created to create an environment for up there to come down here and every assignment was significant.

The Bible says in 1 Peter chapter two, verse five, the writer here says, you, you who are believers, you who are this priesthood, you are living stones that God is building into his spiritual temple.

Some people say, does it matter how I live my life?

Does it matter how I pay attention to the details when we're setting up a church environment for people to meet the mercy and grace of God?

Absolutely 100%.

Every detail matters.

How you turn on the light matters.

How you cut on the air conditioner in this environment matters.

How you set up the lobby for people to come in and the hospitality there, it matters.

It matters to God, it matters to us, and it matters to the world around us, and it shines the light of God's glory to the world around us.

It matters.

These priests, their only responsibility wasn't to go into the holy of holies and just pray to God.

They were responsible for setting up the environment for God to rest in.

We are to set ourselves apart.

The Bible says we're a set apart people.

That's what the church is.

We've been caught out of darkness into the wonderful light.

We're a set apart people, and we need to pay attention to every detail.

The book of Ephesians says it this way.

Ephesians chapter two, verses 20 and 22.

Together we are his house.

Look at your neighbor and say, you're God's house.

Go ahead and tell him you're God's house.

That's kind of serious, isn't it?

Build on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets in the cornerstone is Christ Jesus himself.

We are carefully joined together in him, carefully.

Every detail matters.

Joined together in him.

Becoming a holy temple for the Lord.

Through him, you Gentiles, the writer here says, are also being made a part of this dwelling where God lives by his spirit.

The book of Colossians says this in Colossians three, verse 17.

It says, whatever you do or say, do it as a representative of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Giving thanks through him to God the Father.

Every detail matters.

And God calls us to set up things so his glory can shine in us and through us around the world.

It's amazing because as you begin to walk through this tabernacle, this tent of meeting, and see all the details, it is simply remarkable because it created an environment for the priest to basically go into and go through into a place called the Holy of Holies and meet with God, the presence of God, once a year on God's, on people's behalf, for God to be able to come into that group and shine out around that group.

The Bible says that God followed these people in the tent of meeting by a pillar of fire at night and a cloud by day, and these people moved as God was moving and the priest had a responsibility.

And it was simply to set up, make all the furniture to God's details and set every single piece of it up to God's details every single time they tore it down and set it up.

Think about that, you know, because they could have got real lazy, couldn't they?

I mean, like I know it was important the first time, but the reality of it is it was important every time God moved.

They were even to pack it up a certain way.

It wasn't like, they just throw it in the basket and let's move the sheets and the gold and the table of bread and the Ark of the Covenant, let's just move it any kind of way we wanna move it.

No, God says, my presence is holy and the details of what I'm going to do in the world matters and every detail about me matters.

And how you set up this tabernacle, this tent of meeting matters.

And the reason it matters is because it's a shadow and a type of what is still to come.

And that is fulfilled ultimately in Christ Jesus.

But I'm here to tell you, though Christ Jesus has come and made our way in the temple and through the temple, in the tabernacle and through the tabernacle, the reality of it is he still cares about the details and you are the house of God and every detail about how we go about God's business matters.

I think some people have become very casual with God.

And God isn't casual, hey dude.

No, no, no, he's a set apart God and he has a purpose and a plan for your life.

He created you for greatness.

He created you to do great and marvelous things.

He created you not to go in your own way but to live underneath his authority, his rule and his reign and to permeate who he is in the earth.

Be of allegiance to him, submitted to him and know who he is and begin to let him do a work in your life.

My friend, when he calls you out of darkness into the wonderful light, understand something.

It is simply so that you can begin to permeate his presence into the world.

There is always a purpose clause in what God does.

Jesus saves you, male and female, and calls you, the Bible says, to a holy, to a set apart calling.

And the reality of it is we have to walk in that and we have to become this priesthood of believers because this is how the world's gonna change is when we pay attention to the details of what God is speaking through his spirit into us and begin to walk fully in it in the gifts that he gave us.

See, not only did they set things up but they sought after God, the priests sought after God through the tabernacle.

There was one way in the tabernacle.

I think they have a blueprint of the tabernacle they're gonna put on the screen here.

We're gonna kinda walk through how the priests would walk through that.

Yeah, there they have it available there.

But as you notice, they would start on one end where this fuschia line is over here.

On this side, they would all come in on that side.

And the Bible says that they came in and eventually work their way into a holy place and once a year, one of the priests could go into the holy of holies.

The whole reason they were going through this tabernacle is they were seeking after God and we've gotta seek after God too.

The focus of the tabernacle was ultimately to reach the place where man could commune with the presence of God in the holy of holies.

So what the Bible says in Hebrews chapter four, verses 14 and 16.

It says, now since we have a great high priest who has entered heaven, that would be this resurrected and ascended Jesus.

Jesus, the son of God, says now let us hold firmly to what we believe.

The high priest of ours, he understands our weakness for he faced all the same testings we do yet he did not sin.

So let us come boldly, everybody say boldly.

To the throne of our gracious God, there we will receive his mercy.

His mercy and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.

So again, we all need mercy and we all need God's grace, God's unmerited favor in our life to begin to bring up there down here and be who God has called us to be.

But ultimately, the Bible says Jesus is the high priest and he is represented all the way through this tent of meeting, this tabernacle.

And we all can begin to see him in this furnishing and going through the tent and begin to work this into our life and ultimately pray this into our life.

And this is something new I'm working on.

I'm praying through the tabernacle.

And the reason I'm praying through the tabernacle is because it leads me, Christ Jesus leads me through that tabernacle and points to me about some aspects of God and the aspects of me and how I need God to come into my life and put his presence in my life so I can work out the life he called me to live in this world.

I wanna encourage you to consider this, pray through the tabernacle.

And the Bible says that they come in through that fuschia line and not only the priest could come into that outer court, let's call it, but all people could come into that outer court and they could come into that outer court, but they were to come in through the gate, the one gate, with thanksgiving.

Everybody say thanksgiving.

The Bible says in John chapter 14, six, Jesus says, I'm the way, the truth, and the life, and no one can come to the Father except through me.

In another passage, Jesus says, I am the gate, come on.

And so we can come through Christ Jesus, his death, burial, resurrection, his ascension, and his return, we can put our faith, our hope in him, and we can come into the outer courts with thanksgiving, because God has made a way into his presence.

The Bible says in Psalm 100, verse four, enter his gates with thanksgiving, go into his courts with praise, give thanks to him, and praise his name.

So again, this outer gate or this outer door was, it was made up of special materials that represented all the colors, represented parts of who Christ is, but the Bible says that we can all come in to those outer courts, and then the priests were to basically make sacrifices there at what they refer to as the brazing altar.

They were to make blood sacrifices there.

The Bible says Jesus is the final blood sacrifice, and the reality of it is he came into this world to die for humanity's sin, to pay the penalty of the sin of humanity, and we can come to that brazing altar being thankful that Jesus is the sacrifice.

The Bible says in Hebrews 10, 10, God's will for us is to be made holy by the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once and for all.

I encourage you to think about the brazing altar, and as you're praying, come into God's courts at Thanksgiving, but step to the altar and thank God for the blood sacrifice of Jesus that makes you right and holy before his eyes.

And the Bible says there were other offerings made at this altar.

They were free will offerings, and the priests would put them in a fire, and they would burn them, and they would bring these things into this place, and it was the people saying, you know what, we want to provide this as a sacrifice for us.

We want to provide an offering so we can begin to commune with God in a powerful, powerful way, and they would move into the holy of holies.

The Bible says that we're to offer ourself up as a living sacrifice because of what Jesus has done on a cross.

The Bible says that is our true act of worship as a priesthood of believers.

Let me show it to you, Romans 12, verses one and two.

The writer says, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you.

Let them be a living and holy sacrifice, the kind he will find acceptable.

This is truly the way to worship him.

Don't copy, in other words, turn away from some things.

Don't copy the behaviors and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think.

Then you will learn to know God's will for you and this good and pleasing and perfect will.

So they would come in through the only way provided through Christ Jesus.

Christ Jesus is the ultimate sacrifice at the brazen altar.

Then the priests would move, before they'd go into the holy place, they would move to a wash basin.

And as they moved to that wash basin, it was made out of bronze mirrors taken from the ladies, it was special details where it would reflect their image as they looked in that water, it would begin to show them, you know what, a double image from the water and from the mirrors of who they used to be and who they were becoming.

Come on, somebody.

And I want you to know that God's word will begin to wash you in a powerful, powerful way.

God's word, his written word, is given by God.

And the reality of it is his word can wash us and cleanse us and though it may bring us back to a place of who we used to be, it will also reveal to us of who we are becoming.

And so when we come to that place, I wanna encourage you not only to come in with thanksgiving, not only be thankful for the sacrifice of Christ Jesus and the blood, but move to the place of beginning to understand who God says you are becoming over and over and over again.

Begin to pray the word over your life.

Begin to pray the word of God over your life and over others' life.

And again, it's a powerful, powerful thing because now we're moving in to the presence of the living God and then not only would all these people be at the outer courts, now the priests were ready to go into the holy place.

Everybody say the holy place.

And as they enter the holy place, it would have been a dark room with no outside light coming in it.

And what's amazing is there were three pieces of furniture.

There was a gold, basically candle, you know, stick thing.

I think you'd say the Hebrew word Mariah or something, right?

Huh, how you say it?

Yeah, that's how you say it.

But again, not a theologian.

I'm just trying to tell you what we're working through this thing, okay?

But the reality of it is it was something with a lot of details and I read this week that, you know what, the approximate cost of that particular golden candlestick thing that would hold the light.

You know what, the reality of it is the cost in today's dollars would be about $3 1⁄2 million.

It was made out of solid gold.

It was very valuable.

And it was to hold candles that were to stay lit in this holy place continually.

The priests were to go in and trim the wicks on the candle pieces and they were to put oil and new oil in the, and provide new oil over and over again so this light would stay lit inside of this place, which is a clear reminder to us that, you know what, that this whole, this oil is a representation that the Holy Spirit will continue to keep the light of Christ alive in our life if we'll keep it fresh.

The Bible says that we are to stay full of the Holy Spirit.

We are to be filled with the Spirit.

That means there's daily attention that needs to happen to your life.

And you need to let God search your heart.

You need to let the Spirit of God work some things out and work the new things in so the light of Christ will begin to shine on you and shine through you in the world.

And then as you walked in, over to the left would be the candlesticks.

Over to the right would be what they refer to as the showbread, 12 loaves of bread on a table.

It's a special table.

It was built in a special way.

It basically represents Christ Jesus himself.

Jesus said, I am the bread of life.

He says, you know, you need to come to me and let me feed you.

But what was amazing, they had to trade, they had to eat this bread.

The priest had to eat this bread once a week and trade it out once a week.

But they wouldn't just remove the bread and then put some new in.

They would remove the bread and put some new in all at the same time.

There was always bread on this table.

And some of you in here may be more Jewish than me.

My Gentile, I'm coming into understanding these things.

But the reality of it is that this bread had representation of a lot of things, but ultimately it represents as a type and shadow of Christ coming and being the bread of life for people.

And we could come to him always, anytime, anywhere.

He is more than enough over and over again.

And we can come into his presence.

Then the Bible says, before you moved into the Holy of Holies there was an altar of incense and there were special incense put on this altar a couple of times a day.

And the particular fire that lit this incense altar had to come from the brazen altar outside.

It couldn't be just brought in from anywhere.

But it had to be brought in and it kept this fire and this aroma alive and it begins to be, represent our prayers going up to heaven.

It's a place of intercession.

It's a place saying, God, you know what?

I've come in through the sacrifice you've made of Christ Jesus.

I have washed myself in your word.

I'm paying attention to the Holy Spirit and the bread of life in my life.

And now I come before you offering prayers and interceding for myself and those around me, my neighbors, my friends.

And I'm offering this up as a fragrance to heaven so that you will hear the aroma of us coming into your presence.

Or smell the aroma of us coming into your presence.

Simply amazing.

And then, once a year, the high priest could go into the Holy of Holies where we find what the Bible refers to as the mercy seat.

And underneath the mercy seat was the Ark of the Covenant.

And in the Ark of the Covenant, there was the stone tablets and underneath the mercy was the law.

And the stone tablets were in the Ark of the Covenant and there was a rod, a stick, that Aaron had used that basically represented authority and represented leadership.

It abutted among all the other sticks in that particular day above all the other tribes.

And then there was a jar of manna that God fed the people as they went on their journey.

All of that was in the Holy of Holies.

And I do believe that the jar of manna represents God's provision and the stick represents God's authority and leadership over our life.

And the Ten Commandments in the Ark of the Covenant represent God's character and we can come in.

And they had to sprinkle this mercy seat with blood once a year.

And then, because of the mercy, they could come into this holy place and begin to experience the presence of the living God.

The Bible says now Jesus has torn that veil that separated them and we can come into that place any time.

The Bible says we can go into that place and begin to have the mercy of God delivered to our life.

We can begin to have the character and the provision and the authority of God over our life and begin to experience him in a powerful, powerful way.

But are we just approaching God in such a way that we're not thankful for Christ all the way through that tabernacle and we're not truly giving him the honor and the glory as our king and our savior and our Lord all the way through that tabernacle?

And it's all because of Christ Jesus that we can go into God's amazing presence.

But I wanna encourage you today, go into the presence, walk through the tabernacle, be respectful of who God is and let's see what God can do in our life.

Let's seek God's face.

Come on and we'll find him and he'll do amazing, amazing things.

And up there, we'll begin to come down here.

And so this was the priest's responsibility.

But in the New Testament, the Bible says we as a priesthood of believers, we have another responsibility when we leave the holy of holies.

It's to reflect the glory of the Lord that we found in this most holy place.

We'll reflect the mercy, the grace, the provision, the healing, the newness of life that we find in this place.

We're to reflect it into the world.

We're called to be a holy nation.

Remember the passage?

A holy people.

The Bible says in Matthew 5, verses 14 and 16, Jesus said this, he says, you now are the light of the world, like a city on a hilltop that cannot be hidden.

No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a basket.

Instead, a lamp is placed on a stand where it gives light to everyone in the house.

In the same way, he says, let your good deeds shine out for all to see that everyone will praise your heavenly Father.

As a priesthood of believers, we don't only come in to the most holy place where the glory of God is shown to us, but we come out of that glorious place and begin to shine our light to the world around us.

God changes us through Christ Jesus.

Everything he's offered, his sacrifice, his mercy, his grace, his love, his obedience, all of these things are offered to us in Christ Jesus.

We receive it by faith.

We go into that place, but never forget, you're not only supposed to go in and soak it up, but you are to pour it out.

Come on, somebody.

First Corinthians chapter three, verses 16 and 18 says, but whenever someone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away for the Lord is the spirit and wherever the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

So all of us who've had the veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord and the Lord who is the spirit makes us what?

More and more like Him as we are changed into His glorious image.

We have a responsibility as a priesthood of believers and that responsibility is to set things up for God's presence to show up.

Our responsibility is to seek His face and go in to this holy place and get a download of our most high God.

Our responsibility is then to come out and to begin to shine it into the world and how we do that is as a family, as a nation, as a people who've been caught out of darkness into the wonderful light and given various gifts to do certain things well.

My friend, you have a gift if you're a believer in Jesus Christ and your gift is to be put with the other gifts so that the glory of the Lord may fill the earth.

If we go back to the Garden of Eden, God created both male and female in His image, in His likeness to bear His presence in the world, to reflect His image in the world.

Those two were to come together in their differences and become one and represent God in a powerful, powerful way to the world around them.

Understand, you are uniquely created by God, for God, to do something marvelous with God in this world.

And the enemy, the enemy wants to suck the life out of you from who God created you to be.

He's a liar, he's a thief, and he comes to steal, kill, and destroy, but Jesus came to give you life and give it to the full with the riches of heaven.

Come on, somebody.

And if he's lying to you, if he's lying to you, you tell him he's a liar in the name of Jesus, you come in to God's throne room and get a download from God.

And when you get a download from God, you partner with God's people, the church, the priesthood of believers, and together we change the world.

You see, maybe God's waiting on your part to show up and do what God called you to do.

Maybe God's inviting you today.

You've been sitting around church all your life.

And man, I'm glad we do fun stuff as a church, but I'm on a mission.

And it's a mission to shine the light of Christ in the world.

It's the mission to be a city on a hill and bring up there, down here.

It's a mission to pray God into people's life, into their broken life, and believe him as a priesthood of believers, that he can come in and reshape them forever.

He can heal the brokenhearted.

He can bind the wounds of these broken people.

He can help the desolate.

He can help those imprisoned to sin.

And I believe it with all of my heart.

And God's calling us to be interceders on his behalf.

But we're not just crying out to God.

God calls us now to go cry out to people on behalf of God.

Priests go to God on behalf of people.

But now God's called us to be a prophetic voice, to go to people in brokenness in the world through our acts of service and our acts of kindness to bring God to people.

We're a both and.

We live underneath the priesthood of Christ, Christ as a prophet and Christ as a king.

And my friends, God is inviting this church, this congregation to step into all of his glorious riches and be who he's designed us to be.

Don't you hold back.

Don't you pull over to the side.

Don't you quit and become something the enemy's telling you to become.

You come in to the presence of God through Christ Jesus and let's see what God can do.

Come on, church.

Father God, we come into your courts today with thanksgiving for what you're doing in our hearts and our lives.

Jesus, we thank you for the sacrifice that you offered on that cross.

And we're grateful for that sacrifice.

We bring our bodies as living sacrifices to you today, God, and we come into your holy presence.

God, we need your power from your Holy Spirit.

We need the word of life that comes through Christ Jesus.

We need to begin to pray and offer up our offerings and incense to the heavenlies.

God, we need your mercy.

We need your provision.

We need your authority.

We need your leadership.

And God, all because of Christ Jesus, we step boldly into your throne room today and we believe today that, God, we're a priesthood of believers and you're going to change the world through us, not because of who we are, but because of who you are.

God, you're going to provide every piece of provision that is needed.

God, I pray for your authority to come over the life of this church, this people, and every person underneath the sound of my voice.

And God, we begin to bring up there, down here, and expel darkness with the light of Christ.

Jesus, thank you for being a savior.

Thank you for being a king.

Thank you for being our leader.

And God, we want to follow you all the days of our life.

It's in your holy name we pray.

Amen.