Maryland Men of Faith Conference 2024: Bold Unto the Throne

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Maryland Men of Faith

Bold unto the Throne Seminars

Jonathan Walter

Building a Sanctuary Inspired Marriage

This seminar is entitled Building a Sanctuary-Inspired Marriage Sacred Spaces How many of you are married?

How many of you have been married for more than 5 years?

We'll be relying on your collective wisdom today as we're going to take a journey through the sanctuary and try to see what God can teach us from the sanctuary for our marriages.

The sanctuary as you we've already kind of looked at in our presentation this morning as you know is God's redemptive operational blueprint for his activities to tell us and explain to us what he is doing, why he is doing it and how we can get of course salvation and experience his transformational power.

Understanding, welcome brothers, come in, take a seat and join our session here.

Understanding the sanctuary is itself like a blueprint.

It's like putting on glasses that help us see clearer.

I had a friend who said the sanctuary is the best hermeneutical lens to understanding the Bible, meaning it's the best way to look at the Bible through the sanctuary, helps you see things clearer, making sense of things in the Bible.

And so I want to encourage all of you who are interested in the sanctuary to really dive into it.

And probably most of you are already well familiar with it.

But it will enlighten you, it will give you a clearer insight into what God is doing for us.

And so, but this afternoon we're going to be looking at how some of the things, the furniture and some of the things in the sanctuary, how they relate to marriage in terms of the principles that we can derive from God's activities, His redemptive activities.

They directly also impact how our marriages can be improved or be blessed.

So before we do that, let's have a word of prayer and then we'll dive right in.

Heavenly Father, I want to Thank you for Maryland men of faith.

Thank you for the opportunity we have to study the Bible together, to pray together at this conference and now as we look at the sanctuary Lord and the beautiful principles behind each of your redemptive activities, help us to understand what that means for our lives, for our marriages.

Lord, we believe that you have given us marriage as a blessing and we want to do our part in that partnership to bring that blessing forth and just have fruitful and flourishing marriages.

So Lord, bless our time now together and also all the other seminars that are going on at this time.

The sanctuary is holy, marriage is holy, as you know marriage and the Sabbath are the only thing remaining from the Garden of Eden.

Marriage is instituted before sin inside the first sanctuary which was the Garden of Eden.

That was the first place where humanity met God and it was a holy place.

And even when you look at it geographically, it's actually even designed similar to the sanctuary in terms of the spaces that existed.

And so as we look at this divine institution, we shouldn't be surprised that it's under attack the Sabbath is under attack, so is marriage because the devil knows these 2 things are the last 2 things remaining from the beginning of earth's history As we look at the different pieces of furniture in the sanctuary today, we're going to have a moment of group participation as we're going to reflect on a couple of questions for each 1 of them.

In the big audience when I was doing a seminar this morning, we were splitting up in small groups.

We can do that here or we can just kind of talk together as a group if you're willing to participate, that would be great.

Then maybe we'll just do that and that way we can also save a little time and we're all pressed for time and we don't want to go over.

As we go into the sanctuary, the first stop that we have when we enter the sanctuary is the altar of burnt offering.

When you enter the sanctuary this is where the sacrifices took place.

This is the place where there was a continual fire, a continual burnt offering going up, signifying God's continual offer of salvation.

This of course signified the sacrificial death of Jesus for your and my sins and it's the key that unlocked redemption and all other aspects of the sanctuary.

Everything that Jesus is doing for us, He can do for us because of His sacrifice.

Without the sacrifice of Jesus we would have never had any of the other blessings.

There is no sanctification without it, there is no glorification, there is no redemption without the sacrifice of Jesus.

And so the altar burnt offering signifies this.

Ellen White says in Adventist Home page 95, Marriage is a union for life, is a symbol of the union between Christ and His Church.

The spirit that Christ manifests toward His Church is the spirit that husband and wife are to manifest toward each other.

If they love God supremely, they will love each other in the Lord, ever treating each other courteously, drawing in even courts, in their mutual self-denial and self-sacrifice, they will be a blessing to each other.

Now, of course, Spirit of Prophecy is giving us these ideals.

So if you're not living up to this, I'm not here to condemn you, I'm not living up to this, but I want to.

My wife and I, of course, it's a partnership and we're striving to live the ideals that God has given us through His grace and through Him working in our lives.

Now we're going to take some time for each of the pieces of the sanctuary furniture and see what principles we can derive from it for our marriages.

And so As we're going to go to the altar of burnt offering, there are 3 questions that we want to look at and that's where you come in.

I want you guys to share with me your collective wisdom and not just with me but with the whole group of how we can derive some things for our marriages here.

So our first question is in what ways is sacrificial love, which we see represented in the altar of burnt offering, in what way is sacrificial love demonstrated in a healthy marriage?

If you can, name some practical ways to sacrifice for your wife in daily life.

In what ways is sacrificial love demonstrated in a healthy marriage?

Just raise your hand if you want to share some thoughts.

So putting the other person first, even in the moment of an argument or a challenging situation, saying are you like make sure she's okay first and then sacrificing, you know, having my point heard or my point understood for later times.

We're not saying sacrifice and then just ignore your issue.

We want to make sure we have good communication.

So sacrificing your right, so to say, to be right in that very moment, but lifting the other 1 up and then working through it.

So you can ask your wife, do you want me to listen or do you want the solution?

You're probably going to hear the L word more often, the listening part.

There's a great video, I wish I would have had it here, if you look it up, I don't know if you can find it on YouTube probably, and it's called, it's not about the nail.

So basically, it's a love language you're learning, right?

And it's not what you would want for yourself, but you're listening to what she wants, and so you're willing to sacrifice what you want, so to say.

Right, keeping your money, and doing something that makes her happy.

In the long term, that will actually make you both, because it's a joy to make her happy, right?

And then also, I've noticed, for my wife, she loves to go to Target, all right?

I remember when we first got married, and she's like, Target, I'm like, what's up with Target?

And she, it's not even about buying things.

Daniel Royo

Sanctuary in Relation to Mission

Thank you John, glad to be here this morning, delighted to be able to share with you on this Sabbath morning, this time of study, the opportunity we have to look at, particularly the Sanctuary and Missions.

My name is Daniel Royal, and like this brochure points out, I currently serve as the pastor of the Burnt Mills Church in Silver Spring, Maryland.

And again, I'd like to welcome each 1 of you here to the seminar this morning.

Before we dive into our study, I'd like to invite you to bow your heads with me as we approach the Lord in prayer.

Thank you that we can meet together, that we can consider this important topic, not only the topic of the sanctuary as it is revealed in Scripture, but also the appeal and the call that you give us to engage in mission as we share your message here in this world.

Lord, as we embark on this journey, I pray that your Spirit might guide us.

May you not only help us to understand the things we see, but most importantly to put them into practice as we follow you.

Like I mentioned in the introduction shared just a few moments ago, oftentimes studies on the sanctuary look at the details and those are obviously important.

But today I want to take just a little bit of a broader view of the overall picture that the Bible gives us of the sanctuary and, most importantly, the purpose for which God even set up a sanctuary to begin with.

God came to Moses and gave him directions and much of the book of Exodus, in fact it's the second half of the book of Exodus, goes through all the details of how to build the sanctuary and all of the pieces that would be a part of it.

But, tucked away in there, we find several important clues that define for us why the sanctuary existed to begin with.

But before we dive into the sanctuary itself, I want to just set the stage a little bit and look at some definitions of what it is that we mean when we are talking about specifically missions, because if we are defining how the sanctuary informs us with regard to missions, we need to look at these terms.

So we're going to start with the term missionary.

I found this particular definition to be helpful And so R.P.

A missionary is 1 who is sent on a Christian ministry usually focused on the task of evangelism, church planting, or ministry to the poor or indigent.

So that gives us kind of a picture, a parameter of what it is that when we use the term mission, more specifically someone who is engaged in mission, a missionary, there's someone who is usually focusing on the task of evangelism, church planting, or ministry to the poor or indigent.

So that kind of gives us that parameter, but we also use another term somewhat interchangeably, but I think it's helpful in these terms, and that is evangelism.

Like we mentioned, A missionary is someone who is engaged in evangelism in part.

And we have the call, the perhaps most well-known call that the Bible gives us to evangelism, and that's the Great Commission.

In Matthew 28, verses 19 and 20, Jesus tells his disciples, go therefore and make disciples of all the nations baptizing them teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you So there we have the instruction Jesus parting words to his disciples in the book of Matthew telling them go Go tell everybody about me and invite them to be followers of mine.

And so there is the call to evangelism, but looking at the definition again, as this is what we're looking at, William Temple defines it this way, to evangelize is so to present Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit that individuals shall come to put their trust in God through him, to accept him as their Savior and serve him as their King in the fellowship of his Church." So this again is defining what the appeal to evangelism is, the call to invite others to be followers of Jesus and to do so through the power of the Holy Spirit as He is working in our hearts and in the hearts of those to whom we reach out to make the choice to follow God.

And I want to argue, you'll see where I'm going with this in just a moment, that in its origins and the reason for which God created the sanctuary in the beginning was God was the original missionary.

When we go to Exodus chapter 25 and verse 8, there God gives Moses the reason or the purpose for which he had him build a sanctuary.

God tells Moses, let them make me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them." Sin, and the problem that it created in the very beginning as defined there in Genesis, was that it separated God from his people.

And God, having been separated from humanity, no longer had that direct personal interaction.

The book of Genesis chapter 3 describes God coming in the cool of the day and spending time with Adam and Eve, and it was in that setting in which He has that interaction with them and tells them they've sinned and they have to now face the consequences.

But since that time there has not been a place particularly on earth where God would specifically come to meet with his people.

And so in Exodus 25 verse 8 God tells Moses the reason he wants a sanctuary built is for him to be with his people But it's not just to be with his people In a broader sense it's so that God has a location on earth That is dedicated to him and more specifically dedicated to learning about him.

In fact, notice what it is that Ellen White has to say.

This is in Patriarchs and Prophets, page 358.

She writes the following, in the ministration of the tabernacle and of the temple that afterward took its place, the people were taught each day the great truths relative to Christ's death and ministration, and once each year their minds were carried forward to the closing events of the great controversy between Christ and Satan, the final purification of the universe from sin and sinners.

So besides God just having an office, if you will, on earth, the idea of being just there dwelling with his people, the purpose for the sanctuary was also to teach about what it is that Jesus was going to do someday and how this problem of sin was going to end.

Well that to me sounds like that definition of evangelism we just read.

The definition of evangelism is to go and share the message of Jesus, to make others aware of who He is and what His coming will be.

That was what the original purpose was, God dwelling with His people and informing them about Jesus and what he was going to do.

So at its heart, the very purpose for the sanctuary and the reason that God had Moses build it was mission-oriented.

It was a sanctuary but also a mission outpost.

We then fast forward, and the sanctuary in its entirety, the various pieces, the various components, and the overall sanctuary itself, anticipated the 1 who would be the fulfillment of it.

After all, what name is it that Matthew says is applied to Jesus?

In Matthew 1, verse 20, Matthew quotes the prophecy from Isaiah and says, "...the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel, which means God with us." Well, if Exodus 25, verse 8 said the purpose for the sanctuary was for God to dwell with his people, in Jesus, God does come to dwell with his people.

And so, When then Jesus faces the question at the close of his life, John chapter 14 and verses 8 and 9, there he has a conversation with Philip.

Philip says to Jesus, Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us.

Jesus said to him, Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known me Philip he who has seen me has seen the father how can you say show us the father so you have again the revelation of who God is through Jesus and Jesus is the embodiment of the sanctuary He not only fulfills the various individual components – so He's the sacrifice, He's the high priest, He's the 1 engaged in intercession, He's the 1 who is going to ultimately fulfill all as the final events play out with the day of atonement all of those pieces are fulfilled in Jesus but even the entirety of the sanctuary the very structure itself pointed to Jesus dwelling with his people revealing who God is and thus evangelizing the world Bringing the world to an understanding of how God is dealing with the problem of sin, how He's going to solve it through Jesus' death, and how He's going to solve it through Jesus' coming, to take everyone home to be with Him.

So the sanctuary, again, becomes in its entirety a focus on Jesus and who He was and what He did.

So let's then look at the plan of salvation, specifically in the daily sanctuary ministry.

I put some of the texts on the screen but I wanted us to look up some of them too.

I think it's important for it not just simply to be read off the screen up here.

So if you have your Bible, I invite you to join me there for this next particular portion because we're going to look at 3 ministries that took place in the sanctuary and specifically they happened on a daily basis.

So the first 1 we're going to look at was a morning and evening lamp trimming.

This is from Exodus 27 and verses 20 and 21.

Exodus 27 verses 20 and 21 and here Moses records he says you shall command the people of Israel that they bring to you pure beaten olive oil for the light that a lamp may regularly be set to burn, in the tent of meeting outside the veil that is before the testimony, Aaron and his sons shall tend it from evening to morning before the Lord.

It shall be a statute forever to be observed throughout their generations by the people of Israel." So inside the sanctuary, in the geography of the furniture that was in there every day evening and morning they were to go in and make sure that there was enough oil in the 7 branch candlestick that was there and that the wicks were trimmed such that they might be able to burn well and this was a regular activity that took place every day as a part of the sanctuary service.

Then the other activity that the priests were to engage in every day was also the incense that was offered.

So this is Exodus chapter 30 and we're looking at verses 7 to 10.

Exodus chapter 30 verses 7 to 10 Where again Moses writes, and Aaron shall burn fragrant incense on it every morning when he dresses the lamps Notice it's connected there Every morning when he dresses the lamps he shall burn it and when Aaron sets up the lamps at twilight He shall burn it a regular incense offering before the Lord throughout your generations, and then we have restrictions.

Verse 9, you shall not offer unauthorized incense on it, or a burnt offering, or a grain offering, and you shall not pour a drink offering on it.

Aaron shall make atonement on its horns once a year with the blood of the sin offering of the atonement, he shall make atonement for it once in the year throughout your generations, it is most holy to the Lord." So just in the same way that every morning and evening the lamps were trimmed, also every morning and evening there was incense that was offered on the golden altar that was inside the sanctuary, and this was with the intent that it would always be available.

In other words, the light would always be burning, there would always be incense that would be wafting and ascending and filling the interior of the sanctuary that was there.

There was 1 more activity that the priests were supposed to engage in every morning and evening, and this is from the previous chapter, Exodus chapter 29, verses 38-42.

It says, Now this is what you shall offer on the altar, 2 lambs a year old, day by day regularly.

1 Lamb you shall offer in the morning, and the other Lamb you shall offer at twilight.

And with the first Lamb a tenth measure of fine flour mingled with a fourth of a hin of beaten oil and a fourth of a hin of wine for a drink offering.

Verse 41 The other Lamb you shall offer at twilight, and shall offer with it a grain offering and its drink offering, and in the morning for a pleasing aroma a food offering to the Lord.

It shall be a regular burnt offering throughout your generations at the entrance of the tent of meeting before the Lord, where I will meet with you to speak to you there." So every day, this was the activity.

The priest had 3 primary responsibilities to start the day, and 3 primary responsibilities to close the day.

Trimming the lamps, offering incense, offering a sacrifice.

And the idea was, all of these would always be available.

There was always incense that was ascending.

There was always a sacrifice that was burning on the altar.

Now, people could come and bring their individual sacrifices, and they would have the morning or evening sacrifice that would be pushed off to the side that was still there on the altar, and then they had other space that would be used for that sacrifice that was brought but the idea was it was always there.

In fact if you make a study of it there are several different references through the Bible book of first Kings, book of Daniel, book of Ezra.

This was such a regular activity that people in Israel set their clocks by it.

In fact, Daniel makes reference when he is praying, he prays about the time of the evening sacrifice in Daniel chapter 9.

That's how ingrained it was in his mind to go, I know what time of day it is, it's time for the sacrifice.

Another interesting side note, this was done so regularly that if you are a student of Adventist history you know that in the 1800s there was a discussion that took place within Adventism about the nature of the daily that appears in Daniel chapter 8.

There there is a particular word in Hebrew, the word is tamid, which means daily or continual or regular, and the reason that it's a discussion is because it appears there in Daniel chapter 8, but the primary use that it has is in this context.

In the sanctuary services, in these settings, the word in Hebrew to describe the continual or regular practice of these services that took place in the sanctuary was tamim, or continual.

When we look at the significance that comes there, If we make our way to Zechariah chapter 4, there we find Zechariah gives us the insight to discern what it is that the 7 branch candlestick ministry meant.

Why is it that they were active in what was taking place there?

Zechariah chapter 4 verse 2, here there is an angel that is speaking with Zechariah, Zechariah says, he said to me, what do you see?

I said, I see and behold a lampstand all of gold with a bowl on top of it and 7 lamps on it, with 7 lips on each of the lamps that are on top of it." So after this interaction takes place, notice then how it is that the angel interprets this candlestick.

Verse 6, Then he said to me, This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel not by might nor by power but by my spirit says the Lord of hosts so this Continual burning candlestick was pointing to the work of the Holy Spirit and his availability to us Both to intercede in our prayers to bring to our hearts conviction and to transform our lives And there's never a point at which we don't need the Holy Spirit.

It is not as if we can kind of take a break and say, well, I'll take the Holy Spirit right now, but I won't need Him in a little bit.

We are always in need of the Holy Spirit and our entire Christian walk is informed by the Holy Spirit.

Zeno Charles-Marcel

Mental Health in Relation to Addiction

Of our Father in Heaven, we thank you for giving us the opportunity to meet and to discuss an important topic, something that sometimes we let slide or just pass over.

We're very thankful that you saw fit to inspire the Maryland men of faith to to talk about some of these issues that we sometimes overlook, the sins that so easily beset us.

And so we pray now Lord that your Holy Spirit will guide us even though I prepared things on slides.

You take over please so that what is said, what is understood, what is done from here on, would be to your name's honor and glory.

Okay I gave a scenario that I'd like to repeat.

Now I'm not talking about anybody here, all right?

So there's this guy, alright, a regular guy, married, everything is going relatively good, has his accomplishments, has his challenges, like everybody else, right?

2 kids, things are going well in school, he's feeling okay.

This particular day, He had a hard time in the office and he was hoping that when he gets home, he'll have a nice relaxing evening and spend some time with his wife.

But maybe, maybe, as they say in the vernacular, maybe he'll get lucky.

So he's hoping and desiring but there's an issue.

His wife has a headache and the kids, well she has to put them, take care of things and she has some stuff that she needs to do for tomorrow and he's feeling a little bit frustrated so he sits down to his computer okay, so far so good so He looks at the news and he gets on YouTube and there's news on YouTube.

But it's all political news and he's getting tired of all the politics and whatnot.

Now anybody here can relate to what I'm saying?

So he's doing this and he sees this thing on bloopers.

And in the midst of looking at the sports bloopers and having a good time watching this, right, they show you a couple of uniform fails.

And it's not men's uniform fails, it's women's uniform fails.

The leotards break or something and reveal something.

What he doesn't know is that the computer is actually keeping a record of how much time he spends on each part of the screen.

Because the next set of suggestions that come are all related to what he spent time looking at before.

The next thing you know it's 04:00 in the morning and he's still watching stuff on the internet.

Let's just explore that for a little while.

04:00 in the morning, he's still watching there, His wife is in bed snoring.

So, he is now, he was medicating himself, right, But now the medicine isn't working.

And next week the same thing happens again.

And he says I'll never do this again Until tomorrow.

Do you guys believe that this thing happens to people?

So with that in mind, we're going to talk about addictive behavior in men.

So if we let's see here okay this is not Okay, this is not...

So here's a guy in the dark doing something on his computer.

Beyond substances, many times when we talk about addiction, people think drug addiction, right?

Today we have other kinds of addictions that we know about.

1 of the common ones, of course, is pornography addiction, right?

But as a general rule, I'm not going to talk, you know, about pornography per se.

I want to talk about the whole issue of all of these things that so easily beset us.

They have to do some with media, some with not, some outside.

So it's really A disorder in the medical field is called non-substance abuse disorder.

It's characterized by compulsive engagement in behaviors despite negative consequences, despite late for work, despite arguments with your wife, despite not being able to take out the garbage.

All of these things are happening, But you still do it.

The key concept is compulsivity, excessiveness of whatever that action is or whatever that thing is, and inappropriateness.

It also, of course, includes when you try to stop it, you have withdrawal.

In this book, The Gifts of Imperfection, the author who is a researcher in this particular area, she says, She describes addiction as chronically and compulsively numbing and taking the edge off feelings.

We have something, the things in life that are on us and men carry a special burden in this society.

We have things that we carry, and we try to numb ourselves so that we don't have to deal with all of the stuff that's going on.

So we can numb not only with things like alcohol and drugs and smoking, we can do some other things.

Binge watching shows, doom scrolling on social media, you just go and go and go and go and go.

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Series

Bold unto the Throne Seminars

Sanctuary in Relation to Mission

Transcript

Parent Series

Parent Conference

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Recorded

Parts

Building a Sanctuary Inspired Marriage

40m

Sanctuary in Relation to Mission

57m

Mental Health in Relation to Addiction

1h 7m

Holiness & Presence: The Effects of Media on your Relationships

52m

Sound Doctrine