Sermon Tone Analysis

Intro

Open your Bibles, we’re going to read the first 16 verses of .

I think when I’m done reading that I probably won’t need to say anything else.

It’ll just be evident how to apply that and how to walk in the fruit of that in your day-to-day life.

This week, we’re going to look at chapter 37; next week, chapters 38-39; and the week after that, chapter 40, which will be our last weekend in Exodus.

Distinct People

Before I read this, I want you to remember that where we are and where we’ve been for the last four months is that God is making his people a distinct people among the nations.

He is forming them and shaping them and creating a people that are going to reveal to the rest of the nations, the rest of the world, his wisdom, his power, his might, and his beauty.

Before I read this, I want you to remember that where we are and where we’ve been for the last four months is that God is making his people a distinct people among the nations.

He is forming them and shaping them and creating a people that are going to reveal to the rest of the nations, the rest of the world, his wisdom, his power, his might, and his beauty.

God has not just saved us out of slavery from nothing.

He has freed us from our bondage to sin and death and now is making us a distinct people for our joy and his glory.

God has not just saved us out of slavery from nothing.

He has freed us from our bondage to sin and death and now is making us a distinct people for our joy and his glory.

That’s God’s big plan: your joy, his glory.

All God is after in working in our lives is about our joy and his glory so that the nations might see that he is good, that he is God, and that salvation is found in him and him alone.

So that’s where we’ve been.

Presence and Power of God

We talked about the fact that that revolves around the presence and power of God in our lives.

One of the things that makes us distinct is that the presence and power of God is active in our lives in a way that’s not true for those who have not put their faith in Jesus Christ.

We said that plays itself out in a lot of different ways.

One of the ways is that we believe and embrace that some of the more significant things God is going to accomplish in our lives he’s going to accomplish over a long period of time in everyday faithfulness.

We just believe that.

We just believe that.

We don’t need fireworks all the time.

We know that when we faithfully live the way God has asked us to live that God is accomplishing something in us and through us for our joy and his glory.

We believe that, but we’re also people who have embraced and believed that the Holy Spirit of God will oftentimes break through the ordinary and do spectacular things.

I was confronted yet again with this 90-year-old woman who had faithfully, in the highs and lows of her life, tried to follow the Lord, and I looked at the legacy of faith behind her and saw children and grandchildren in ministry, saw great-grandchildren being raised in a fear of the Lord, and that wasn’t a lot of fireworks.

That was everyday faithfulness through some really difficult things and some really beautiful things.

He will heal.

We believe that, but we’re also people who have embraced and believed that the Holy Spirit of God will oftentimes break through the ordinary and do spectacular things.

He will heal.

He will deliver a word.

He will do these things that are outside of maybe even our own comfort zones, and there’s what’s called breakthrough.

What I want to try to shape here, as the people of God at The Village Church, is not a group that tries to pick one of those.

“All there is is the ordinary.

All there is is the supernatural.”

No, no, no.

He will deliver a word.

He will do these things that are outside of maybe even our own comfort zones, and there’s what’s called breakthrough.

Generosity

Ordinary faithfulness day in, day out.

No fireworks.

I’m just going to get up.

I’m going to get in the Word.

I’m going to pray.

I’m going to live faithfully, love my spouse, raise my kids, watch my money, work hard at work, and I’m going to do that decade after decade after decade.

Then I’m going to pray and plead with God over and over and over again for supernatural breakthrough all across my life.

We want to be a people that embraces both of those.

We talked about not only are we walking in the presence and power of God working itself out in ordinary means and supernatural means, but we’re also a people marked by generosity, motivated by God’s generosity to us.

No fireworks.

That’s what makes us distinct.

I’m just going to get up.

I’m going to get in the Word.

I’m going to pray.

Then I’m going to pray and plead with God over and over and over again for supernatural breakthrough all across my life.

We want to be a people that embraces both of those.

We talked about not only are we walking in the presence and power of God working itself out in ordinary means and supernatural means, but we’re also a people marked by generosity, motivated by God’s generosity to us.

That’s what makes us distinct.

You don’t need to be a Christian to be generous.

It’s not just Christians who are generous, but the motive behind our generosity is not that we’re trying to make ourselves feel better about something.

You don’t need to be a Christian to be generous.

It’s not just Christians who are generous, but the motive behind our generosity is not that we’re trying to make ourselves feel better about something.

In being such recipients of God’s grace, we extend generosity as we have received generosity.

Can you imagine a congregation or youth group unleashed to meet every need they saw in the community?

You want to talk about a distinct movement of the Holy Spirit.

You let loose just the churches in Sanger, people on a community who are just going, “Where’s a need I can meet?

Where’s something I can give to?

Where’s something I can help with?

Who can I come alongside of?

How can I encourage?”

Just think about what that alone would do.

That brings me to , starting in verse 1.

“Bezalel made the ark of acacia wood.

Two cubits and a half was its length, a cubit and a half its breadth, and a cubit and a half its height.

And he overlaid it with pure gold inside and outside, and made a molding of gold around it.

And he cast for it four rings of gold for its four feet, two rings on its one side and two rings on its other side.

And he made poles of acacia wood and overlaid them with gold and put the poles into the rings on the sides of the ark to carry the ark.

And he made a mercy seat of pure gold.

Two cubits and a half was its length, and a cubit and a half its breadth.

And he made two cherubim of gold.

He made them of hammered work on the two ends of the mercy seat, one cherub on the one end, and one cherub on the other end.

Of one piece with the mercy seat he made the cherubim on its two ends.

The cherubim spread out their wings above, overshadowing the mercy seat with their wings, with their faces one to another; toward the mercy seat were the faces of the cherubim.

He also made the table of acacia wood.

Two cubits was its length, a cubit its breadth, and a cubit and a half its height.

And he overlaid it with pure gold, and made a molding of gold around it.

And he made a rim around it a handbreadth wide, and made a molding of gold around the rim.

He cast for it four rings of gold and fastened the rings to the four corners at its four legs.

From there we get into the making of the lampstand, the making of the altar of incense, the making of the altar of burnt offering, the making of the bronze basin, the making of the court, and then finally the materials for the tabernacle.

Close to the frame were the rings, as holders for the poles to carry the table.

He made the poles of acacia wood to carry the table, and overlaid them with gold.

And he made the vessels of pure gold that were to be on the table, its plates and dishes for incense, and its bowls and flagons with which to pour drink offerings.”

From there we get into the making of the lampstand, the making of the altar of incense, the making of the altar of burnt offering, the making of the bronze basin, the making of the court, and then finally the materials for the tabernacle.

Like I said, I could just pray right now and dismiss.

You could apply that in your life, and your world would be transformed.

Preaching Through Exodus

Let me talk about Exodus and decisions that have to be made if you’re going to preach through the book of Exodus.

What we just read in is nearly identical to what we’ve already read in .

When you decide to preach through the book of Exodus and you’re kind of outlining how you want to approach it, you have to figure out how you want to teach , because are almost identical .