Gooding, David: 6 - The Table of Shewbread

Last night, ladies and gentlemen, in our lecture, we, in our imagination, entered into the holy place in the ancient Mosaic tabernacle. Here on the screen for you is a cutout of the tabernacle, so that you may locate yourself tonight just exactly where we're meant to be. The Holy Place is the first division. In the building, there were two divisions. The first is called the Holy Place, and the second, after the second veil, is called the holiest of all, or the most holy place. And last night we went into the Holy Place, and there considered at some length the lampstand, which you see now pointed out to you, stood on the left hand side as you entered the Holy Place. As we studied it, we found that the lampstand itself, as distinct from the lamps that were put upon it, the lampstand itself was in the form of a tree, with its base representing the roots of the tree, the central stand, the trunk of the tree, and then six branches, three from out each side. A tree, therefore, a symbolic tree, of course, and an almond tree in addition. It had in it, both in the central trunk and in the branches, emblematic knobs and flowers and almond-shaped things representing the three stages of life, its potential, its beauty, and its mature fruit. And therefore, as we looked at it, we thought reminiscently of that tree of life which was in the original paradise in the Garden of Eden. There were two trees there, you may remember, the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Mankind were, mankind was forbidden. They were not to touch the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Of the tree of life, they might eat as often as they cared. Man disobeyed God, put forth his hand and took of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, whence began the catalog of humanity's woes that have broken like an endless waves upon the shore of our planet. And so man was driven out of the garden, we read, lest he should put forth his hand and eat of the tree of life and live forever. Man driven out until he should return to the dust, for of the dust he was taken, and to the dust he would return. When, however, we come to the last book of the Bible, it is altogether a more cheery tone that greets us. For in the Revelation chapter three, chapter, uh, three, our Lord speaks to one of his Christian churches, and at the end of his letter he says, to him that overcometh, I will give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God. Paradise is the Greek translation of the original Hebrew Garden of Eden. And so, in the work of our blessed Lord, and in the salvation that he provides, we see the undoing of the results of Adam's sin, and not only undoing it, but salvation returns us not simply to the original Garden of Eden and its innocence. Salvation will one day take us to the very paradise of God in his eternal heaven, there to partake everlastingly of the tree of eternal life. Now I must answer a question, so I'm told, that arose in the minds of many of you last evening. Those of you who particularly were looking with one eye at the screen and one eye on my model. Because, as you see on the screen aloft there, the lampstand is pictured as a tree, and the branches do not all come up even at the top. The artist did it deliberately in order to get across the notion that sometimes misses some observers, that the lampstand was a tree, meant to be the tree of life. So the artist drew it as a tree. In the actual tabernacle, it is quite possible that the lampstand was a formalized tree, with the six branches coming up of equal height to the central trunk. The evidence that it was so is to be found on the triumphal arch that Titus, the Roman general, built in Jerusalem to celebrate his capture of Jerusalem and his destruction of the temple. And when in the AD seventy he destroyed the temple, he took the vessels from the temple and carted them to Rome, and some stonemason at his command, uh, chiseled on the triumphal arch representations of the various pieces of furniture from the temple. And the lampstand on his arch is of this form, with the branches all coming up, uh, uh, equal with the trunk, you'll see. And such has been the tradition ever since. In the state of Israel, standing outside the Knesset, the parliament building, is the large, uh, lampstand, the menorah, as it is called in Hebrew, given them by the government of the United Kingdom upon the establishment of the Knesset in Jerusalem. It likewise, of course, has the branches coming up equal at the top. You must forgive my inconsistency. That is not the only inconsistency I have, but you must forgive that, you see. But there was didactic purpose behind it. So then the lampstand carried on the central trunk and on the six branches lamps from which emanated the light. And when we studied it last night, of course, we saw in that lampstand, which was the light bearer, a foreshadowing of our blessed Lord Jesus, of whom it is said in the gospel by John chapter one, in him was life, and that life was the light of men. In the context, John is talking about creation, how all things were made by the word of God, and without him was not anything made that was made. And if you ask where all the life ca- came from to make the ten billion trillion pieces of life that are upon the earth, the answer is to be found in those simples w- simple words, in him was life. Our blessed Lord is the source of life, of every kind and conceivable sort of life. He said elsewhere, as the Father has life in himself, so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself. Jesus Christ, our Lord, is the source of life, of all created life, wherever it is found. But now tonight we are to cross the floor of the house, so to speak, and go across the holy place to the other side. Let's look at it in a cutout, so, uh, look at in the cutout once more, in the cutout, please, once more, and we shall see the positioning of it again. There is the lampstand, as you see, on the left hand side as you go in. Opposite it, on the other side, is the table, called in the old English translations the table of showbread. In Hebrew, the word is the bread of faces, that is the bread of presence. On that table were loaves of bread put once every week on the Sabbath day, twelve of them. The text says they are to be in two rows, though the experts disagree among themselves whether you should translate it two rows with the bread out in two long rows on the table, or whether you should translate it in two piles with one piece of bread on top of the other. And it makes no difference for our purpose this evening, and we may, uh, proceed to forget that detail. What we have to get hold of is that there was bread on that table. And the Christians among us, doubtless, will jump to a conclusion at once. Let's say this is obvious, what this is a foreshadowing of. This is a foreshadowing of our blessed Lord, who declared himself to be the bread of life. For if in gospel, the Gospel of John in chapter eight he says, I am the light of the world, in chapter six he says, I am the bread of life. And your, your conclusion is perfectly good, of course. Our Lord is not only the source of life, as we are reminded by the lampstand. He is also the means of life. And that should be an important, uh, observation for us, do you see? Someone might ask, what is the difference between the source of life and the means of life? Well, let's descend to ordinary everyday things. Uh, let me ask you, how did you get your physical life? Did you get it by any chance by eating bread and butter? No, you say, of course I didn't. Oh, you didn't then. Well, how did you get it then? Well, you say I got it from my parents, you see, as a gift of life handed me, uh, by my parents. They were the source, the immediate source, of course, the original source was God. Oh, I see, that's where, that's the source you got it from. Ah. So once you had got that, uh, life from that source, you never did need to eat bread and butter ever after because you had the life, didn't you? Oh no, you say, you're going crazy now, because of course we had to eat bread and butter and beef steaks if we could get hold of them, because receiving life from its source is one thing, and maintaining that life is another thing. So do we need our Lord in that dual capacity. He is the source of life, to whom we may come in simple faith, and receiving him, receive from him eternal life as a gift there and then, as spiritually we are born from above of water and of the spirit. But having received eternal life from him as the source, we shall now need our Lord as the bread of life to be the means of life, to maintain that life permanently and eternally. So these two vessels in the tabernacle, so to speak, are twins, the one opposite the other, lampstand and table. The table now reminding us of our blessed Lord as the bread of life. But now, yes, it does represent our Lord. But let us notice that the twelve loaves on that table were always, in the first instance, put there for God. Let me read you the actual text that talks about these things. I read from the book of Leviticus, the third book in the Old Testament, book of Leviticus, chapter twenty four and verse twenty five. Verse, I'm sorry, verse five. Twenty four and verse five. And thou shalt take fine flour and bake twelve cakes thereof. Two tenths parts of an ephah shall be in one cake, and thou shalt set them in two rows, six on a row, upon the pure table before the Lord. And thou shalt put pure frankincense upon each row, that it may be to the bread for a memorial, even an offering made by fire unto the Lord. Every Sabbath day he shall set it in order before the Lord continually. It is on the behalf of the children of Israel, an ever lasting covenant. And it shall be for Aaron and his sons, and they shall eat it in a holy place, for it is most holy unto him of the offerings of the Lord, made by fire, by a perpetual statute. The bread served two ends, therefore. It was placed there every Sabbath, and placed there before the Lord for his pleasure. And then at the end of the week, the priest could come and take the old bread from the table, put new bread in its place, and then to them was given the privilege of eating that bread from the Lord's table. They had to eat it in a hallowed place, that is, in the court of the tabernacle. Their eating it was part of the symbolic ceremony. And once we grasp that, we see what a gigantic significance that table had. It wasn't similarly su- sim- simply some spiritual benefactor dealing out bread to the poor and hungry. This was God Almighty, maker of the universe, inviting men to come to his table and eat the very bread of God. A table whereat God and man could have fellowship. Let that, uh, concept sink down into our hearts. For if it is true, what a magnificent and awesome thing this is. That God and I should, so to speak, enjoy the same table. What that means in New Testament terms, we can now find out if we look at one John, the Apostle John's first letter, and chapter one. And here, what we are looking for is the New Testament to tell us what it means to have fellowship with God in this particular context. First John chapter one reads as follows, beginning at verse one: That which was from the beginning, that which we have heard, that which we have seen with our eyes, that which we beheld and our hands handled concerning the word of life. And then John adds a parenthesis. And the life was manifested, and we have seen and bear witness and declare unto you that life, that eternal life, which was with the Father and was manifested unto us. That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you also, that you may have a fellowship with us. Yea, and our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. And these things we write that our joy may be fulfilled. What then does it mean to have fellowship in this sense with God? Sometimes when we talk of fellowship with God, we use another word in English, we have communion, we say, with the Lord. And we mean that in our hearts we talk to the Lord, and the Lord talks to us, and we're having fellowship together. And that's a very blessed and a real thing. I'm not saying it's not true. But here, where John uses this Greek word for fellowship, he has in mind an extended idea for, you, you could use, if you please, the verb to share. It's in the noun form a verb for partners that share something in common. So in this passage, we're not thinking of one and another having fellowship together like that merely. We're thinking of one here and another here, and something in between that they share in common. They have fellowship because they are both partaking, sharing, enjoying the same thing. And to have fellowship with God in this context means this, that God and we share the same thing. And what thing is that, you say? Well, John has just told us, you can sense the awe as he writes, that which was from the beginning, that which we have heard, that which we have seen with our eyes, that which we beheld and our hands handled, concerning the word of life. He's talking here, presumably, of the beginning of our Lord's ministry on earth, which he, as an apostle, was privileged to see, for he accompanied with the Lord Jesus from the very beginning. Watch the verbs he uses. That which was from the beginning, which we have heard. We heard him. We've seen him with our eyes. And wonderful to relate, we beheld, and as we contemplated him, our hands handled. Imagine handling the Lord Jesus, and then presently, a month or two later, maybe a year and a half later, waking up to the fact that the man you handled was none other than God incarnate. And when they had seen and handled him sufficiently, he then put the question to them, whom do men say that I am? And they replied with various inadequate suggestions. He added then, and who do you say I am? Who do you say? And Peter, answering for the rest, says, thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. Just imagine what it is to row in a row bo- boat, with God incarnate in your boat, to sit at a table. Oh, I shall like to ask Mary and Martha, when I get home to glory, tell me on the side, what did it feel like to entertain the Lord Jesus at your table in your cottage, now that you know exactly who he is. He's marvelous, isn't he? And then John explains this one whom they witnessed. He says, the life was manifest, the word of life. And we have seen and bear witness and declare unto you the eternal life which was with the Father. And now John is taking us right back to a much more remote beginning, of which he talks in the first verse of his gospel. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, in that divine fellowship that is the blessed and holy triunity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And there, in the eternal joys of the Godhead, was the Son with the Father and the Father with the Son, and their mutual, uh, love and affection for each other, uh, by the Holy Spirit. And then I pause to think, that all-sufficient God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Blessed tri- triunity, in need of nothing. Why did he choose to make the likes of you and me? What extra pleasure could he possibly get? And tell me this more problematical thing. When we departed from him and rebelled against him and chose the gifts rather than the giver, what induced him to send his son that we might share the son with the divine father. That eternal life that was with the Father and was manifest to us. Extraordinary, isn't it? You can almost feel the excitement dribbling off the pen of the apostle as he writes it. Imagine every day of life, some happy, some moderate, some gloomy. But having this gigantic privilege to eat at the same table as God, so to speak. To have in common with God, his dear son. That is what having eternal life means, you know. Eternal life is not, to put it crudely, simply a ticket to heaven, guaranteeing a s- a a a a seat in the pits, if not in the gallery. Eternal life is sharing with God in the very life of God. It is a relationship of sharing. That's why it turns on this. He that hath the Son, or he that receives the Son, or he that believes on the Son, has everlasting life. Eternal life is not something that we hope to get one day after we've died and left this planet and gone off elsewhere into eternity, and we hope we'll get eternal life. Not so. Scripture seems to suggest it will be too late to think about it then. If we are to enjoy eternal life, it's now that the thing is offered to us. And I write this to you, says John, as we have learned to share in the Son of God, and partake of his life. We write it to you that you may have fellowship with us apostles, who actually saw him and lived with him. Surely our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son. Oh, the wonder of that bread. Will you allow me five minutes just to talk on that bread? How wonderfully sustaining that bread is. It's not called eternal life for nothing. In John chapter six. our Lord fed the crowds with loaves and fishes, and next day they came, as they thought, to have another, uh, stomach full of loaves and fishes. This was good going, they reckoned, uh, such a meal once a day, free and for nothing. But the second time they turned up, our Lord said, no, gentlemen, you seek me since- simply because you saw a miracle and were filled, and all you're interested in is another meal for free. But that's no use, gentlemen. You didn't see the sign, did you? You'd have thought that any man or woman in the, in their senses, having seen that miracle performed and have been satisfied with the bread and the fish, would then have said to themselves, and whose hands must they be? Who took the bread and the fish and multiplied them like that? Who must he be? They were so engrossed with the little things of daily life, miracle though it was. They weren't at that moment interested in the giver. So then our Lord said, labor not for the meat that perishes, the food that perishes. He's not telling us don't go to work, of course not. This is a Hebrew way of talking when it comes to life's emphasis and major interest. Yes, we have to work for our bread from the Ormo bakery or wherever, but that's of less importance. The greater importance, labor for, work for the meat that endureth. It won't come just dropping into your mouth, you know, according to our Lord. Do you want this bread? You must set yourself to get it. Work for it, said Christ. Not that you will ever earn it. But if you were going to be hungry, if you're hungry physically, you have to work, don't you? And if you're spiritually hungry and, and... and would like this bread of life, you must let nothing stand in your way. You must make it your priority. If you haven't yet got it, you should make sure you get it this very night, so to speak. Labor for the meat that endureth. Hm, they said. What sign do you show? Well, crap, some, some people be. You've already done a miracle. What sign do you show, they said? Our fathers ate manna in the wilderness, you know. God rained it down from heaven. Ah, yes, I know, says Christ. Yes, it was God that gave you that bread, not Moses. But it's now God that is offering you the bread of life. Well, they said, that's nice. Uh, give us this bread. No, says Christ, I am the bread. And that startled them. Christ is the bread. Therefore, if we would have this eternal life, we must receive and take to ourselves the Lord Jesus. How sustaining is this bread? Why, just like the manna came down from heaven, said our Lord. I came down from heaven to do my Father's will. And this is the will of him that sent me, that all who see the Son and believe on him shall have everlasting life. None shall perish. I will raise them up at the last day. Marvelous. Then he said another startling thing. He said, you see, he that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood has eternal life. He didn't mean it literally. He later on said, the flesh profits nothing. It is the spirit that gives life. But when he used that vivid metaphor, he that eats my flesh and drink my blood, he was forcing on their minds, startling their minds open to see that it's not enough to know about the Lord Jesus. We have to take him and receive him, to use our Lord's term, eat and drink him, that he might enter in, into our very lives. And I can imagine a thought arising in the minds of the Israelites, and I'm glad, uh, it is, uh, there because our Lord twice over answered it. When God brought Israel out of the wi- out of Egypt and took them along the wilderness, it was true, as the men said, that God rained down manna out of heaven to see. Men did eat angels' food. But as our Lord pointed out, in spite of that, they died. Well, they sinned, of course, and they died in spite of the manna and never got into their inheritance some of them. And when I think about that, I have a question in my mind. But wait a minute, what about me? Yes, the Lord Jesus is the bread of God come down from heaven. I have received him. I'm not perfect. Can I actually be sure that I shall get in and not come to disaster because of any particular sin? Twice over, our Lord answered that question. Not as your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness and died. Not like that. He that eateth this bread shall never die. He shall live forever. Or do it in a subdued tone, but do shout hallelujah in your heart. Wouldn't have you disturb anybody. B- but the glory of it, to have it on the repeated authoritative statement of the blessed Lord Jesus. But what do you say are the conditions? Let's think about them a little bit more. If I'm going to have fellowship with God like this, in this eternal life, which is the life of God, to share with God, so to speak, the blessed Son of God, w- and a- and come to God's table, if you like, to use the metaphor. What is the basic condition? Well, first let me read it to you from this, uh, first epistle by John, and then illustrate it from the model. Says John, verse five, and this is the message which we have heard from him and announce unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him and walk in the darkness, we lie and do not the truth. Well, let's look at the, uh, thing again. Let's now have the, have the another view of the table. Yeah. And you see the table, don't you? On the right hand side. And you see, uh, the lampstand on the left hand side. So that the table, where was it? Well, you say it was bang opposite the lampstand, that's where it was. I see. So in evening time, of course, the, uh, the, uh, table would be in full light of the lampstand means that anybody who wanted to come and take the bread off that table, any priest came of an evening time to take of that bread, he had to come and walk in full, uh, in the full light of that lampstand, yes? Mm. There, in that sense, to have fellowship with God by sharing the bread from God's own table. So if any, uh, uh, priest said to you, uh, to you, look, I have, uh, fellowship with God, I am, uh, eating the showbread, and you find him walking in the dark. You say, wait a minute, old boy. How can you be eating of the bread of that table if you're walking in the dark? The very, the very practical, down to earth, actual condition is that you should come and walk in the light. So, says John, if we say we have fellowship with him and walk in darkness, we lie. The two things are utterly incompatible. But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus his son cleanses us from all sin. But here is a knotty theological problem, so we shall have to spend a little time on it. What does it mean to have fellowship with God? Some dear Christians interpret this verse as follows, that if you want to keep up a healthy daily fellowship with God in communion and feel that your prayers are being heard and answered, you must be careful to be living a holy life, do you see? If you have grown careless at your, of your life and are living, uh, brainworthily, you will find that your enjoyment of communion with the Lord is lessened to the point of almost being extinct. Now, that is absolutely true. I'm not denying it at all. But I'm about to suggest to you that John is meaning something more fundamental than this. What is the initial condition for have receiving and having eternal light, eternal life? What is it? Well, of course, you first must come to the light. If ever you're going to receive eternal life. And not merely come, ladies and gentlemen, but coming, stay in it. For now it is a question not so much as how we walk. You noticed that, didn't you? It is a question of where we walk. Are we walking in the light or in the darkness? I repeat, it's a question of where we walk. Not so much here of how we walk. Yes, John is later going to talk to us about how we walk. That is also important. And he says, of course, in chapter two, you'll see that he, he that's, uh, he abide, know we that we are in him. He that says he abides in him ought himself also to walk even as he walked. Yes, how we walk is very important, and John is going to talk to us about that in a moment. But before he talks to us about how we walk, he talks about where we walk. And the basic condition for having eternal life at all is that we must come and walk in the light, not just come to it. In John's Gospel, chapter eight, where our Lord proclaimed himself the light of this world, there were some who, when they heard him, they believed on him. Oh, that sounded very good. They believed on him. So our Lord said to those that believed on him, if you continue in my word, then are you really my disciples, and you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. Their brows knotted up. They said, did we hear you correctly? Free? Did you say free? Yes. Free from what? Well, free from sin, he said. For everybody that goes on sinning as a practice is a slave of sin, and the slave will not abide in the Father's house forever. If the Son shall make you free, you shall be free indeed. And when they heard it, you know, these Jews that had believed on him, so John says, and when they heard that, they turned huffy and they got angry and they said, who asked you to come here? We're not being used to talk to being talked to like that, daring to come here and insult us by calling us sinners. We'll have you know that we're Abram's seed. I said, Christ, if you were Abram's seed, you wouldn't try to kill me, would you? They said, we're not born of fornication, we have one father, even God. Really, said Christ, and if God were your father, you would love me, wouldn't you? So how will you judge these people? They had come to the light. They had professed to believe, but when the light began to shine on them and show them what they really were, they weren't prepared to stay in it. And presently they picked up stones to stone him and put the light out. What is conversion? Well, it's not just coming. They came to the light, but when it exposed them, they rejected it. If we would have this eternal life that is sharing the very life of God, we must come to the light and be prepared to walk in it. You say, if I come and walk in that light, it will expose me too. Yes, my dear friend, it will. It will that certainly. I- I- and that can be uncomfortable. I remember a good lady, I heard of her yet, she's still alive, very elderly now. When I first knew her, she had been to some evangelistic campaign and professed faith in the Lord Jesus. That was lovely. When I met her, she said to me, you know, David, uh, since I've been saved, as I'm worse I was when before I was saved. Therefore, I think I'm not saved at all. It was funny logic. Since I was saved, I think I've been worse than I was before I was saved, so I'm not saved. It took a long while to let her see what was really happening. What had happened? Well, before she got saved, she was highly religious, highly religious, but without the Savior, didn't know salvation nor personal fellowship with Christ. When she got saved, she began to walk in the light. And of course, the light began to expose the dear lady. That was a good sign, wasn't it? That's what the light does, you know. And when we come to the Savior and receive from him the gift of eternal life and we walk in his light, this is surely going to happen. It will expose us. You say, well, that's serious, isn't it? Which if it exposes us, we shall have to run away. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. If we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and what about our comings short and our sins? And the blood of Jesus Christ, his son, cleanses us from all sin. Oh, thank God for the blood of Christ. If it weren't for that blood of Christ, you and I could not endure to walk in the light five minutes at a time. But because of that blood, we can come and walk in the light, and when it exposes us, we don't need to run away. We can, as John now puts it, confess our sins, and he's faithful and just to forgive our sins. We don't have to hide anything up. If we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. I imagine to myself one junior priest, and this particular Sabbath, it was his job to come and take the bread off the table and put the new bread in the place, you see, and then he could start eating with his colleagues the, uh, last week's bread, you see. And I imagine him coming, and it's the first time he did it, and he had his long robes on, and he was all fingers and thumbs with excitement and, uh, and trembly, you see, and just as he was going near to the table to get it, he caught his big toe in the hem of his garment and went flat on his face. Yes, fallen, hadn't he? But then it would be a question to ask, where had he fallen? Fallen in the light. Well, that exposed his clumliness, cu- his clumsiness. Ah, but he was in the light still. Dear old Peter. When he denied the Lord, it was dark indeed. Ah, but he came to the light, didn't he? And let it expose him. Confessed his sin and was forgiven. You say, oh, but does that mean then it doesn't matter if we sin? Oh no, you've got it wrong there. John says, these things I write unto you that you sin not. But if anyone sin, what then? We have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and he is the propitiation for our sins. Pray, look at that, uh, uh, film again here, and you will see that in the holy place there were in fact three vessels and not just two, making a holy triad once more. Do you see? And now the priest is walking in the light, as he is in the light. What happens if we are walking in the light and we sin? The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin. We're not encouraged to go on sinning, of course not. The aim is that we shall not sin. But if any man sin, look at that altar. Altar of intercession. We have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and he is the propitiation for our sins. The blood of the atonement was put on the horns of that. You know, I get the impression that God has thought of everything. His salvation is realistic. Condition of having a a eternal life, then, is not just coming to the light, it is walking in the light. That is living life with Christ and in his light. Now John puts the other side. If I have eternal life, how shall I know it? And he says this, verse three of chapter two: um And hereby know we that we know him if we keep his commandments. He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoso keepeth him his word, in him verily has the love of God been perfected. Hereby know we that we are in him. He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also to walk even as he walked. Oh, it's easy enough for me to say I know the Lord, is it not? But how do we, how do I know I know? If that doesn't sound a bit funny. I say I know the Lord, but how do I know I know? What evidence is there? And I shall have to trouble you with making a legal distinction or a logical distinction. The distinction between condition of having life and the evidence of having life. Let's illustrate it by a simple thing. When a little child is born, so they tell me, but I'm no expert in the matter, uh, the midwife takes the, the, the child, takes it by the ankle, so I'm told, holds it upside down and delivers a hard smack on that part of the anatomy built for that purpose. And at that moment, the child lets out a marvelous yell, and everybody is delighted to hear the babe cry. Why is that? Well, the babe's cry is the evidence it is alive. If it didn't cry, we would begin to fear it was stillborn or something. The crying didn't get the child life. He got life as a gift, but the crying was the evidence of the life, yes? We get eternal life as a gift. It's free and for nothing. Ah, but if we got it, there ought to be some evidence. Hereby know we that we know God. If we keep his commandments. He who says, I know him, and makes no attempt at all to keep his commandments is a liar, of course. The truth is not in him. But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily has the love of God, that is our love for God, been perfected. If God shows us his commandments, then it's natural for the child of God to love him them. If I know God, and I know what his commandments are, and I love his commandments, I shall do them. Hm. If you come to me and say to me, Gooding, what is your favorite country where you like to go on holidays? Well, I say Switzerland is the land I go to. I think there's nowhere on earth like Switzerland. You say, I see. You must love mountains. No, no, no, I don't like mountains. I hate mountains. I never go anywhere near mountains. And yet you love Switzerland. Be odd, wouldn't it? I say I love God. But I don't intend keeping his commandments. If I say, if I say I really know God, and I don't love his commandments, the thing is a contradiction in terms. We distinguish, therefore, rightly, don't we, the difference between receiving life. That is a free gift. And showing the evidence that we have life, that is our bound and duty to walk as he walked. And now we come to one other passage, finally. It is to be found in one Corinthians chapter ten, for those of you who like to take the reference. For this is a passage also that talks in terms now directly to us Christians about what is described as the Lord's table. It is one Corinthians chapter ten, and the verse in question, of course, is verse, uh, twenty one. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons. Or do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than he? Once more, the idea of a table. It's the table that the Lord has provided. He invites us to come to that table. Look how its contents are described. Verse sixteen: the cup of blessing which we bless, it is, is it not a communion, fellowship of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not a communion of the body of Christ? Seeing that we who are many are one bread, one body, for we all partake of the one bread. This passage is going twice over to teach us the basic principle that there is no fellowship in the sense of partaking of the Lord's table without the inevitable involvement. When we talk of the Lord's table, you may think of the Lord's table, as you call it, of a Sunday morning with the emblems of blood and wine upon it, and your mind goes to Calvary. And perhaps you say to me in your hearts at this moment, but now the man has wandered more than usually from the point, and instead of talking about the table of showbread, he's gone off and he's talking about the big altar of sacrifice. That shows he doesn't really know his stuff. Well, in part so, maybe. But you see, we should notice another little thing, that when the showbread was put on that table of a Sabbath, they had to put frankincense on it. And when the bread was removed, the frankincense was burned on the altar. It was one of the most holy offerings of the Lord made by fire. There was a connection, therefore, between that altar and the table of showbread. The connection being the frankin- the incense, the, the, the, uh, s- uh, herbs and myrrh and so forth, the anointing oil and whatnot on that table, the in- uh, incense of frankincense that had to be burned on that altar as an offering made by fire, showing a connection. Here the bread was a provision. It was on the basis of the sacrifice, of course. And when in Malachi, God, through the prophet Malachi, says that the priests have treated the table of the Lord, uh, with contempt, there the word table of the Lord refers to the big altar. So sometimes that altar is called a table, because at that altar, certain of the sacrifices were divided, part given to God, part given to priest, so that the priest ate from that altar as he could eat the bread from that table. When we think of the table of the Lord in one Corinthians ten, we think of the immense blessings brought to us through our blessed Lord Jesus Christ. And we take the bread at the Lord's Supper and we drink the cup. We eat and we drink. It's only a symbol. But we do it in memory of him, and the fact that we have received that Savior and all the benefits that come to us through him. But there is no partaking of the table of the Lord without the inevitable involvement. We all drink of the same cup, we all drink of one bread. We are therefore one bread, one body. Yet should lose as an illustration of the principle involved the ceremony at the Lord's Supper. There's the bread on the table. At the appropriate moment after the giving of thanks, the bread is broken and circulated amongst the believers, and each believers take a part of the bread. And when the last believer has taken her or his part of the bread, suppose now the whole bread is gone. Nothing left on the plate. If I said to you at that moment, where is the bread? You would say, the whole congregation is the bread. That's where the bread is. For all have taken part of that one bread, one loaf. And all who have rightly partaken of the Lord Jesus and received him, the bread of God, have, in the words of John six, eaten his flesh and drunk his blood and have eternal life. They are, by that very token, formed one in the body of Christ. That is what led the great Saint James Dick to write that lovely hymn, Lord, we remember we are one with everyone that loves thy name. But it has also the serious side. At Corinth, some of the believers were so puffed up by their supposed knowledge that they thought there was no harm whatsoever in going to the restaurant in the pagan temple in Corinth, into the restaurant that was part of the te- temple complex, and there, as the meat from the sacrifices, those pagan sacrifices, often on those pagan altars, as the meat now was brought around, it was served in the restaurant, part of the ceremony of the temple. And some believers thought that there was no harm in that whatsoever, going along to the restaurant and eating of the flesh of those pagan sacrifices, still quivering from the knife of the sacrificer. Paul rebukes them severely. You cannot do that, my brethren. The things that the pagans offer, they offer to demons. You cannot and must not be seen to be in that temple having a meal, which is a fellowship meal according to the rules with the temple and with their sacrifices. You cannot do it. For that is idolatry. And idolatry is sin number one. Thou shalt have no other gods but me. Sin number one. To compromise our loyalty to God by partaking of the table of demons. You can't do it, he says. Well, if you do, you'll find out this, that God is stronger than we are. And if we are believers and are disloyal to God, then he will discipline us. And he's stronger than we. Partaking in the eternal life, the very life of God. Sitting at the table, so to speak, that metaphorical table, furnished with all the blessings that we have through Christ. And then to be disloyal. Will God save us from such dis- disloyalty? We must be religiously loyal. And my dear young friends, we must be intellectually loyal as well, and not hold views in our colleges and universities that would be disloyal, intellectually disloyal to the truth claims of Christ. So may God help us. But one last thing, for you have a question, I think. No, I think you've forgotten it. But I will be honest, and I'll give the answer. I said at the beginning that the bread was put on the table first and foremost for God, and left there for a week. It's called the bread of faces, the bread of presence, put there for God. You say, but God didn't eat it, did he? No, of course not. But it was an emblem. It was a symbol. It was an enacted metaphor. And the New Testament has the same kind of metaphor, doesn't it? Let's transfer it to our Lord for a moment, and the book of the Revelation once more. And it says, Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in, and I will dine with him, and he with me. The blessed Lord, who could multiply bread and fish enough to feed five thousand, deigned to come into Martha's and Mary's house and sit at their table and let them entertain him. You wonder what they talked about? What would you talk about if the Lord came, my dear brother, my dear sister, to your house and invited you to put on a meal for him, and you put the meal on and sat at table? Now, what would you say? What would you talk about? Ah, let me think. A nice day today, wasn't it, Lord? Yes, beautiful. Yes. Uh, wasn't last week we had rain? Ah, yes, yes, that's good. Um, uh, well, uh, did you have a good holiday this year? Oh, ba- oops. Perhaps you don't go on holiday. I well, um, um. What would you talk about? It's bad enough having a preacher sometimes, isn't it? What would you talk about if the Lord came? And what's he looking for? I will dine with him, with her. Not now literally, for now he's in glory. But he knocks on our heart's door and asks us to feed him. With our heart's devotion and love and spiritual and any other kind of conversation that is suitable, that he might enjoy us. And that is for what we were made. The Epistle to the Ephesians says that before God even founded the earth, he had a something in his mind, which is why he created the earth as a stepping stone by which to reach the goal. And the goal was this, that we, his redeemed, should be before him in love, as that loaves, those loaves on the table were before him, for his gratification, so the bread is on that, uh, spiritual table for God's gratification. Why, in the first place, the bread is his dear son, isn't it? That we saw at the beginning. He was not only with the Father before the worlds were, but when he was incarnate, there came times when God could no longer restrain his delight and call from heaven, this Peter is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased. Yes. The wonder is that in Christ, we are meant by God to be a something that shall satisfy God's heart, and that for all eternity. Is it not so? Don't ask me how it can be. It said of our Lord, he shall see of the travail of his soul and shall be. And all for the day when God who designed it shall bring the believers home to glory, all conformed to the image of his son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. That the purpose for which we're made. The purpose for which the earth was made, that God might put us upon it, and there enact the whole story of creation and then redemption. But oh, for the day that's coming, as Jude himself tells us. And as I listen to Jude, I think of that table. Just as the lampstand held up the lamps that they might shine before the Lord, so the table, that beautiful table made of wood and gold and a crown around it, so the table was provided to hold up the bread before God. Now, says James to Jude unto him that is able to keep you from falling and to present you before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy. To him be glory forever. Amen. Oh, what a day the day of presentation shall be. Can you imagine it? When the victorious Redeemer, having saved his people, brought them through, gently disciplined them and guided them and perfected them, shall take the company of the redeemed, the bread of faces, and present them before the Father, before the throne of his glory, with exceeding joy. The Lord keep our hearts fixed upon that glorious day, so that now we might learn consistently to walk in the light and to walk as he walked. Shall we pray? Our Father, these things are so glorious that without thy grace and strength now, they will pass from us as though they were unreal dreams. Therefore, we ask the grace and power of thy Holy Spirit to grant us that illumination and knowledge in the knowledge of thee. That we might say, find ourselves saying, these are the true sayings of God. And that they may grip our hearts and provoke our praise and strengthen our wobbly legs to walk in the light and to walk even as he walked, until the great day shall come, and he shall present us faultless before the presence of thy glory with exceeding joy, for his name's sake. Amen.