Does God call us to be “square”? What does the Bible have to say about being “foursquare”?

<p>Does God call us to be “square”? What does the Bible have to say about being “foursquare”?</p>

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Ouachita Hills College

Scott Burgess

Are You Square?

Okay, so here we have it. Are you square? So let me just toss out a question to you right here. And here it is. What does it mean when people square accounts? I heard a response, but I couldn't make it out. What does it mean to square accounts? I heard it go get outta debt. Is that what you said? Right. Make sure that everything's balanced the way that it ought to be. If you're not owing somebody, anything is you're current. Okay. What does it mean if someone eats a square meal? Yeah, it's balanced, right? It doesn't necessarily mean there are four parts to it. It just means that everything is balanced. You're not having 90% of one thing. And just a little bit of another, since we're in school setting, what does it mean when hopefully a good algebra student completes the square? Not so sure on that one. Okay. Is it a good thing to do that? If you have, if you have a quadratic equation and it looks a little bit icky, you complete the square suddenly becomes trivial to solve it, solve it. That's you should learn that. That's a good thing. So now let me give you one more question. What does it mean? If a person is square, You said they're rounded. Well, probably not rounded cuz they're square. Right? I know. What do you mean? If somebody were to come up to you and tell your square, what would you, what would you think? It's a compliment. You'd say it's a compliment. Okay. Who here would say it's a compliment. Okay. Who here would say it's maybe not a compliment. Okay. Yeah, we, yeah. The, the not compliment has it. Well, let's, let's let's make sure we settle this. So we're gonna go to the stores of all wisdom. We're going to go to urban dictionary. Okay. Cause I wanna be sure on this. So, you know, you gotta go to the good sources, right? Okay. So according to urban dictionary, we know they're gonna have it, right. They say they recognize it's a slang term. So understood as slang as a person who is regarded as dull, rigidly, conventional, and out of touch with current trends. Okay. So if somebody, for whatever reason were to say that you're square, that they would have something along these lines of mind. So if this were true, would that be a compliment or not? Not, No. Okay. Not a compliment. Funny thing though, language does have a way of changing over time. It used to be that if somebody were described as square, it was more in harmony with those other three questions. It meant that you were forthright, upright, honest, something's changed. So it's gone from good to, you know, not cool. It's not with it. Right. So I thought, well, rather than relying on the urban dictionary, maybe we got a better story so we can go to what would that be? Okay. Webster. No, no. The Bible. What does the Bible tell us about square of all things you ever thought of studying? I don't know. A little bit of geometry in the Bible. It, it, it talks about these things. So let's just, let's just take a look at a few things here and see what we can call from that. And then maybe come to a better, a biblical understanding of square. Oh, by the way. Yes, you, this, you can probably figure out an expression for this. Right? You've you've heard of people trying to put a square peg in a round hole. Right. It, it doesn't work. And it kind of goes along with this understanding of someone being rather, you know, they're just not with it. They don't conform. They're not, they're not easy to work with. Or another picture like this. Everyone's got their little cubby hole. They're they're working with the group and then there's just one difficult person. That's just, you know, outta the place there. So anyways, that that's the idea. But now let's take a look here. Oh yeah. I forgot I had this too. Okay. So yeah. A square person doesn't conform to accepted norms that could or could not be good. It depends on circumstance. And the implication is that yeah, those kind of people are just difficult. So they call you a square they're they're not complimenting it, but now for the Bible here, we're good Bible students here. What is that a picture of? No, not the, the covenant look again. Okay. No, no, no, not the covenant. No, no. This is the altar of burn. Sacrifice. Okay. Sacrifice, burn offering. That's right. Okay. Now why do I have that up there? Well, it probably has something to do with square. According to Exodus 27, it says that this was to be made and it tells us it's kind of a large object here that it's going to be five qubits long, somewhere in the neighborhood of eight ish feet. And it's also gonna be that broad. Okay. So if the laying thing goes, the breath, it is square. Okay. It's square. The altar shall be four square. Hmm. Okay. Now that's just one item, but it is interesting to note that when you had first walk into the sanctuary, the first thing you would see would be the altar. And it does have a square footprint. Okay. It's not as tall as it is the other two dimensions, but those two dimensions are square. Now let's, let's see if we have a little better success with this. What is that a picture of there? Yeah. That's the breast plate on the high priest's costume, right? By the way, too, just a little note for you, for whatever it's worth, we call it a breast plate, cuz that's just sort of the accepted term. When I heard that, when I think of a plate, I think of something fairly rigid. If you check into modern translations, they actually capture, if you, if you've just studied the Bible it's made out of fabric, it's not a plate. Some modern translations kind of are willing to break outta the mold. And so it's a breast piece. That's actually correct, but that's not our goal for tonight. The point is it had those 12 gemstones in it and it also had the Urim and the thy in it. But the Bible gives us a description of this breast piece. It says that giving the directions to, to Moses there you were to make this breast blade or breast piece of judgment, four square, shall it be one folded, double a span, which is about this length. A span is its length and a span. Its Breath's Four square. Okay. Now may I be thinking, okay, so we got two square. So what? Well let's just wander a little bit further, but not too far. Let's see if we see a trend here. Okay. What's this? Okay. Yeah, we got that. Okay. That was good. We got that one. It's the altar of incense. Okay. By the way, where do you find the altar of incense? Okay. Or, well, okay. Yeah. I was just gonna say the sanctuary, but yes. Okay. In the holy place. That's correct. And guess what? Over here. I thought we'd be quicker than that tonight. Okay. Guess what? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. It it's square. That's right. According to Exodus, chapter 30 right there. It says that a cubit shall be its length. Now you understand a cubit is not big and it's a little over a foot and a half. So eh, about this big and the breath is also going to be a Qubit four square. It shall be. Hmm. Okay. Bible, you said it's in the holy place. Right? But the Bible also tells us that it belongs to the most holy place that may help you to put the pieces together. But we'll come back to that in just a second. All right. What do we have a picture of here on the screen? Yeah, it's it. It's a little dark. I understand. This is a picture of the high priest ministering at the, the arc. Now know the arc is not four square. However, there is something that is four square. The most holy place itself. The Bible tells you in first King's chapter six, when it gives the directions for Solomon's temple, it calls that they're the, the Oracle, the place of speaking. It's the most holy place. And it's 20 cubits. Longs are around 30 feet, a little bit more and 30 cubits wide. So though it doesn't say it's four square. It's pretty obvious. It's four square. Okay. So we've got four things square so far. We've got the altar bird hing. We have the breast piece. We have the altar of incense and we have the most holy place. Good Washington Hills Bible students. What is common to those four things. Well, okay. Yeah. Square. Okay. Something else besides besides the square, what do these square things have in common besides their shape? They're All. Okay. They're all holy. They're all part of the sanctuary. Ah, okay. The, the sanctuary has a lot to do with square. Not every aspect of it, but many aspects. Now let's think about this. The altar of burned offering symbolizes something. It was to point forward to what final truth. Oh, I heard somebody say it. Where was it? The Cru of fiction. Jesus death on the cross. He has a toning sacrifice was represented by a square object. This thing right here. What did we say? This was called the what? The breast piece. And it's called the breast piece of judgment is square. Okay. This Is warm by the high priest, the judgment we, which we're in the judgment hour right now. It's the same as the day of what atonement, which takes place in this apartment. The most holy place, right? Jesus moved out of the holy place into the most holy place. But when he did, he took the sensor with him from let's go back just a couple of pictures here from the altar of incense. It belongs. The Bible says to the most holy place, he's still interceding for us right now. Hmm. The altar of burn offering is where Jesus made the perfect atoning sacrifice. Right now he's in the second great phase of atonement, the judgment making atonement for us, making us at one with him. This is described as being square. When you square accounts, you settle them. You make it right. When you use a carpenter's square, a carpenter's T you kind of need that when you're making a room like this, you think? Yeah. That the level, a few other things, right? But it will help you to get things balanced, right? Otherwise you're gonna have a real crooked room and it's gonna, it's gonna be bad. Everything that's square that fits with atonement. God gets everything into alignment in our character, right? This is a picture right here. I tried to get one that would highlight the squareness of the object. What, what is that supposed to be? It's not one of our standard pictures, but I think you can figure it out. Yeah. That's the new Jerusalem, which is described in the Bible, not just as four square, but also as a cube. It says that that city lies four square. The length is as large as the breadth and it's described in revelation 21, where God, the angel says, I'm gonna show you the bride. I'm gonna show you. After the work of atonement is done. What she looks like. This is where God's people are gonna live. It's gonna list on a perfectly square foundation. Also, if you're just a numbers person, you might be able to know that the length, the breadth and the height are all equal 12,000 a piece. How many edges does a cube have? How many edges? Not corners? No, not eight, Six. It has four on the bottom. Right? We're resting the ground. You would have four on the, shall we say roof, but it also has four. If you're drawing it, four poles going up right. Has 12 what's 12 times, 12,000, the home of 144,000. Do you, do you wanna live in that city? Yep. Hmm. God's got some work for us. He's gotta make a square. The Bible says in first two, Peter, two, five that you also, as lively stones are built of a spiritual house. The temple. Here's some observations about how he puts this together as this temple, from the book Christian experience and teachings. Notice what it says here. His church is to be a temple built after the divine similitude and the angelic architect. I like that phrasing has brought his golden measuring rod from heaven that every stone may be huge. Andd squared by the divine measurement, polished to shine as an emblem of heaven, radiating in all directions, the bright, clear beams of the sun of righteousness. Hmm. So he makes this a temple by squaring us. I don't think that language is accidental. The book earlier writings should be familiar with that one. It tell, it tells us this many were neglecting. We might say many are neglecting the preparation. So needful to fit them, to stand the day of the Lord and to live in a sight. And then the continues the paragraph. It says those who refuse to be hued by the prophets, in words, the scriptures, and fail to purify their souls, obeying the whole truth and who are willing to believe that their condition is far better than it really is, will come up to the time of the falling of the plagues and then see that they need it to be huge and squared for the building. The temple. Last one is this great controversy, just 30 some pages before the book ends, page 6 45. It says before entering the city of God, best savior bestows upon his followers, the emblems of victory and invests them with the insignia of their Royal state. The glittering ranks are drawn up in the form of a hollow square. No wonder they've already been squared. And he says, now I'm gonna put you in your positions. You're ready to be like the foundation of the temple. It's a fascinating thing about their king. And he'll be right there in the center. Like the center peg or something now told you Tod be short. Do you want a spot in the holy city? Yeah. Okay. So you wanna hold spot in the holy city. Are you willing to be squared for his use? You know, polished after this Sumit of a palace, that's really a temple. We know that the squaring process. Okay. Are you willing if, if that's your choice, are you willing to risk being regarded as what urban dictionary told us was dull, rigidly, conventional and out of touch with current trends. Now are the current trends really good? Do you think? No. You might not wanna focus too much on the news, but just, just glance for a few minutes. And tell me if you think any of it's worth sacrificing for heaven. I, I would gladly want to be squared. Maybe we should be a, a square peg that just doesn't fit in all the round hole for being told how to fit in This media was brought to you by audio verse, a website dedicated to spreading God's word through free sermon audio, and much more. 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Are You Square?

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