Lessons from the Laying on of Hands

[Music] turn to hebrews in chapter six we have this interesting passage where where paul is talking to the recipients of the letter to the hebrews and he's he's wanting to be able to move on with them but recognizes he can't to some degree because certain fundamentals uh were sort of lacking or shaking when they shouldn't have been he wants them to be able to move on toward perfection but there was this foundation there right that that we all have to have and it's an interesting passage in hebrews 6 for those of you familiar it's right here at the beginning of hebrews 6 where he talks about this foundation some foundational ideas of the church when you think of a foundation i mean right now we're standing on a carpet and it's not just the cold bare foundation between us and that foundation there's a few different layers there's there's stuff underneath the carpet to make it cushier of course there's all the microbes and bacteria of every disgusting carpet in every hotel in the world but regardless there's things under our feet until you get to this thing that is essentially holding up the whole building right i mean we do talk about i really loved the sermonette by the way and the idea of a second second grader picking up a car i don't know about you but i imagine the second grade me picking up that car but anyway you know you imagine something like that and how much strength it would take well imagine what it takes to hold up this entire building right we're all counting on the fact this building isn't just gonna sink into the earth or even just the stresses of its massive weight isn't going to cause it to crack or buckle why does it not because there's this well-laid foundation underneath and you think of all the weight the mass of this building on that foundation has to be able to uphold it foundations are critical they're important and so in hebrews chapter 6 we have through paul god about to inspire him to talk about elements of our foundation as believers in god and as members of the church of god and as those who attain to the resurrection so clearly it should have our attention and you've perhaps gone over this list before we won't be going over the whole list today in hebrews chapter 6 and verse 1 he's talking to them and says therefore leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of christ let us go on to perfection not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward god of the doctrine of baptism of laying on of hands of resurrection of the dead and of eternal judgment and this will do if god permits that is will build on this the things that need to be built i always found it you know quite a remarkable list and some of it really does make sense especially when you're interacting with people in the world who come to you like for instance the foundation of repentance from dead works is so fundamental often for instance when we find baptisms that have gone wrong quote unquote when someone needs to be re-baptized which is a pretty rare phenomenon at least in my experience often it's an understanding of repentance that you know sort of was the element not that they had perfectly repented many people questioned their baptism from time to time because they were busy they they still had sin before they were baptized well duh i mean really that's why that's why you're being baptized you know because you you're overcoming all of this and you want to you want to move on right but you do find i've known in cases where the person said i got to be honest i really didn't even know what repentance was i wasn't repenting before i was baptized i didn't repent after i was baptized especially as as as the worldwide church of god began to crumble i know there were some cases like that was essentially just getting people in the church and it was just like the old uh the old sort of a protestant evangelical evangelistic effort where you just kind of get someone to decide and that's it so there's these kind of foundational elements they really are fundamental that the idea that if you think of a foundation these things that are super important that without these things the entire edifice crumbles and you have this in vital list and god inspires paul to include the laying on of hands as one of the key foundational principles in the church now maybe that doesn't seem strange to you well good on you fine come back for the afternoon you know whatever for me i know it really did it has struck me interestingly in that way for for quite some time and as i studied it myself i know i could see why i could see why and that's what i'd like to talk about today is the things that god teaches us by having instituted the laying on of hands as a foundational doctrine of the church of god and so that's the title for the sermon today lessons from the laying on of hands i'm just kidding if you think you already know please stay it's nice to it's nice to have you here lessons from the laying on of hands now for those perhaps really new if you're if you've ever just come into the church and you haven't been here for long and haven't been baptized yet you may not even know what that is and if you do look it up in the bible it's interesting because not all the examples of laying on of hands are what we're talking about there are it's often associated with violence to a certain extent uh such as when nehemiah is telling those camping outside of the walls to come in and help israel corrupt the sabbath and he says get out of here i'm paraphrasing get out of here you bums you know if you don't i'll lay hands on you oh he's gonna make him deacons and everything no he's not he's gonna lay hands on them and he's gonna he's gonna rough and tumble and they're they're gonna be gone so there's several places where laying on of hands is actually something violent it's actually something negative and there's a reason the wording is the same because it is a very physical act you know laying on of hands is a matter of actually laying your hands on someone very often the head not necessarily in all in all cases you know but there is this physical sense to it so when you look it up you got to make sure you distinguish between those two things but what i hope that we'll see is a few different things and actually organizing this this sermon was a bit of a challenge so later on if you want to tell me my organization was terrible i will do my best to humbly listen to you because it was it really was a challenge and it's every good spokesman should be willing to to take critique but in terms of how i organized this there are a lot of things i wanted to communicate for instance laying on of hands has been a part of of what god does to these people since going back just about as far as biblical recorded history will let us see it's not just the new testament church it goes back you know all the way back into genesis it's not a new testament practice as the examples show us it's a people of god practice it has been a part of what we do since there has been a we who do things it goes back very far i know you start to see that and realize well maybe there is some kind of foundational element to this maybe there's a reason it's fundamental uh to to god and how he does things i also thought about organizing it and i've actually done this before and realized i didn't think this was a good way to organize it which is organize it just by the examples kind of going through the bible and seeing the examples and i found that i think the things i want to emphasize help us get out of that aren't don't come out in quite the same way so consider that a speech i failed in the past and this is my redo and i hope it goes hope it goes better rather i would like to organize it based on the lessons themselves the things that laying on of hands has to teach us and i'm not going to pretend this is an exhaustive list nor am i actually going to pretend these points are really distinct that's part of the challenge god is so amazing with the things he structures part of when i view what god tells us to do in the bible like the holy days like various practices and baptism and laying on of hands and different things is i think of it with my old high school teacher glasses on you know back when i was a high school teacher i taught math everybody's favorite subject and you'd organize the day right you'd have to consider what are the what are the lesson objectives what are the things you want the students to learn that day they're in your classroom and then you pick the examples you try to find these math examples in my case that would really illustrate all those things it would take them through the steps to understand and sometimes the principles you want them to learn they're distinct but they're also rather intertwined and so it's sometimes hard to find examples that will only highlight this one particular element they're all sort of woven together so so understand when i when i break these out into these into these bullet points i don't mean to imply that these are truly distinct from each other so you might think of them as uh as changes in emphasis where i'm wanting to emphasize a particular facet of the lesson as opposed to some sort of distinct lesson from the rest i i overuse this analogy and i apologize if i've used it a lot here to the point that that our ears grow tired of it that that happens sometimes but when it comes to the truth so many elements of the truth they remind me of a a jewel or a gem that's been shaped to bring out its brilliance that's what they do with diamonds for instance right the goal is you want to a diamond in the rough you can't see its potential right it's there but you just can't see it and you need this master worksman to be able to to shape it in such a way that the final result its brilliance just shines through and you're able to see what a an amazing stone it is and so when it comes to examining the truth often we just can't take in the whole right we have to look facet by facet and so one person is looking at one facet and they're appreciating what that facet delivers to them from the jewel but then someone else looking at the other side might see a completely different shaped facet it's longer it's not wider it's got different number of points perhaps maybe it dives into the stone instead of being a flat surface but that said it's still the same stone they're still appreciating the same truth but a different facet that's often how i explain paul quote unquote versus james people in the world will pit the apostle paul versus james as if they're contradicting each other when they're not they're looking when you look at it with god's eyes as we know we're blessed to know in the church they're speaking of the same wonderful truth concerning faith and works and how they interact they're just focusing on a specific facet for their particular audience and so this is is going to like that as a result certain things blend together the the brilliance of a diamond that shines through one facet you know also impacts how it shines through another so i don't mean for these to be distinct but hopefully they'll work together to give us a broader picture of the lessons that god gives us in the laying on of hands and what a blessing that command and that ordinance really is in the family of god in the church of god so what are those let's start with the first one i want to highlight one of the lessons that comes to us from the fact that the laying on of hands exists in the church and is a fundamental idea to the church of god is that there are many things we need that we do not find within ourselves that we are not self-sufficient we must go outside of ourselves for those things what god needs of us we can't do by ourselves how many families suffer because a husband won't submit himself and take himself to a minister or someone and say i need help in our marriage in our family because it's hard to admit as a man at least that we need something outside of ourselves it's it's difficult to accept things like that and laying out of hands reminds us we're insufficient in of ourselves we in and of ourselves we need to find sources of things beyond just us we say that in many of the examples of laying out of hands in the bible like a blessing for instance turn to genesis chapter 48 he'll go way back in time genesis 48 genesis 48 and we have joseph bringing his children to jacob uh called i uh israel in this passage because his name was changed so they could receive the blessings and this is the famous passage if you haven't read it before you really should take time with it where he brings ephraim and manasseh manasseh manassas the older ephraim is the younger and even though he was old and couldn't necessarily see you have israel or jacob being inspired to cross his hands so the right hand that should have gone to the older son manasseh is actually placed on the head of ephraim and the left hand is placed on the head of manasseh so in genesis 14 verse 2 says joseph brought them the two boys from beside his knees he bowed down with his face to the earth and joseph took them both ephraim with his right hand toward israel's left hand and manasseh with his left hand toward his right hand and brought them near him then israel stretched out his right hand and laid it on ephraim's head who was on the who was the younger and his left hand on manasseh's head guiding his hands knowingly for manasseh was the firstborn and he blessed joseph and he goes through some of the blessing here i'm not going to to read the details of the blessing but we see in verse 17 now when joseph saw that his father laid his right hand on the head of ephraim it displeased him it bothered him because that's not that's not what's supposed to happen so he took hold he literally grabbed his father's hand to remove it from ephraim's head to manassas head and joseph said to his father not so my father for this one is the firstborn put your right hand on his head he thought he was correcting a mistake oh silly dad he didn't realize i'm smart enough to put the kids in the right place you know and so you know hey dad you know you're always misunder underestimating me dad i figured that out but no he has to tell him no i i i did this this is what god wants you know the younger is actually going to be greater which also as americans is hard to swallow but that's also a fact uh that that's the case now there's so many things packed into this in terms of seeing we're going back all the way to genesis this is literally you know about just almost as patriarchy as patriarch can be right going back this far and these are this is one of those fellows who when we praise god and we look forward to the reign of christ we talk about serving the god of abraham isaac and jacob right you're going all the way back and part of what's fascinating to me is not just the act of what's going on but the implication this is not a new thing this is expected that actually joseph expected that a blessing is going to be passed on and this is how blessings are passed on to the point that when his dad crossed hands joseph knew you're not you're not doing it right dad how many of us hear that from our kids right sometimes they're right but you know you're not doing it right dad in other words this laying on of hands to convey a blessing was already a part of the culture of the people of god to the point that this is not a surprise this is this is how things are done in the church this is a foundational thing that really does go back incredibly far but notice it wasn't just a matter of joseph being right with god and joseph did have a relationship with god and he had his children and surely he prayed for his children right if he's any kind of father he's praying for his children but yet the blessing from god he had to go elsewhere it wasn't sufficient for him to call upon that blessing he had to go elsewhere we see in mark chapter 10 something similar in the new testament mark chapter 10 in this beautiful thing that we get to do at the feast every year whenever there's kiddos in the blessing of little children and we read in mark chapter 10 and verse 13 how all the people there in judea many of them following jesus and listening to him it says in verse 13 of mark chapter 10 then they brought little children to him that is to jesus that he might touch them but the disciples rebuked those who brought them but when jesus saw it he was greatly displeased and said to them and he he said you know what are you doing this is what we're here for right in fact these kids are an example i want you to follow and then jump to verse 16. it says he took them up in his arms laid his hands on them and blessed them so again here we have thousands of years later this is still how blessings are conveyed and these parents recognize they needed to go to someone now again i hope we're praying for our kids i hope we're praying and ask for god's blessings to be on them but the laying on of hands reminds us that we are not enough that we there are things apart from us that we need to go out and seek we are not sufficient in and of ourselves there's things out there there's things away from us and we need to be willing to seek those things and humble ourselves yeah it's it really is interesting you know the if you've ever been there with a bunch of kids at the feast of tabernacles it can be a little bit of a circus because the one element of that the one actor in the play if you will that didn't get a script is usually the baby right and the baby has well i'm sorry this is my fussy time right you know whatever goes on and so you know we we negotiate a lot of things while we're up there we do our best to do it just like verse 16 where the minister's whole that's why we try to say you know don't bring your 16 year old even if you're new in the church and you've got this 16 year old you know on your shoulder that would be awkward for everyone we do our best to do this so usually the minister or one of the ministers often more than one tries to hold the baby and then we all lay hands on the baby which is probably pretty creepy for the baby but still all of us you know we do our best in some way you know like a little two fingers on a shoulder on a head and try to convey god's blessing that's been requested by the parents just like this model but we do have to negotiate sometimes it makes sense you know mom and dad hear especially when the kid's punching you and the rest and you you're about to say the prayer and he sticks a fist you know right in your mouth hey you know sometimes mom and dad end up holding the baby but the one thing we don't really compromise on because it is the mechanism is the laying on of hands we do our best even if kids squirming around and you feel like you're you know you're chasing them you know we do our best because that's how blessings are conveyed this family has come seeking something that god tells them i need to go outside of myself and i want this for my children so the blessing is is a good example another example is ordination turn to mark chapter sorry acts chapter 6. acts chapter 6. and i'm mainly just getting this in because i want these examples to be there to show how i don't say omnipresent i'm not trying to say a characteristic of god but just how extremely present laying out of hands is in the culture of the church because god himself has placed it there in acts chapter 6 we have the case where there were certain members in the congregation that were being missed in the service provided to the congregation in terms of the daily allotments concerning food and or money and things like that and and there was discontent there was concern so what do they do well they didn't go off and just fix things themselves they went to the leadership of the church and let the leadership of the church figure that out and weigh that and try to come up with a solution because that's how god does things consistently and so as they did they they end up creating uh deacons this whole this whole job inside the church inside the body of christ clearly moved by god in these circumstances to do this and now creating an office in the church and so they ask the people to recommend people to them who have the sort of capability that have god's spirit clearly in them and can do this sort of job of a deacon the sort of physical care for the church but whenever they came what does it say in verse 6 it says that the people set them before the apostles and when they had prayed that is the apostles they laid hands on them if you've ever seen an ordination it's done by the laying on of hands where someone is given an audience and i don't know exactly how god records such things in heaven but in my imagination there's a register in heaven where these names are written maybe it's an org chart maybe he's got microsoft word which is a terrible place for doing our charts just so you know but regardless of how it's done in heaven that that is that's registered there as we'll see later these people doing this are acting on god's behalf because it's god who's acting in it and we'll get to that point but the hands are laid that's how that's done if you were blessed to be able to see the stream where we saw mr hernandez ordained as an evangelist that's how that's done you saw those men there laying hands on on mr hernandez so acts of ordination mark chapter 5 and verse 21. we have jesus christ in the middle of his ministry here in judea mark 5 and verse 21 now when jesus had crossed over again by boat to the other side a great multitude gathered to him and he was by the sea and behold one of the rulers of the synagogue came jerius by name and when he saw him he fell at his feet and begged him earnestly saying my little daughter lies at the point of death come and lay your hands on her that she will be healed uh that she may be healed and she will live now and we can look a little bit more about this uh some other examples but i want to highlight that this was the expectation this is what you wanted christ to come and do you wanted him to lay hands there was no expectation that just now we'll get to an example later where there is this understanding that there doesn't always have to be laying on of hands that god has certain kind of flexibility when it comes to healing and we should be grateful that he does but still this is the expectation this is the norm this is how it's done he expected christ to come and lay hands on the individual but if you then go to say mark chapter 6 we have a case where christ actually couldn't do very much mark chapter 6 we have christ in nazareth and he's not able to do much there because some people are so busy seeing the human side of things they can't see god moving in the background and they knew jesus so well from his time when he was younger isn't this the son of a carpenter right i mean we knew this guy he he played with my kids my kid isn't going around healing people and doing this and it was difficult for them to see past the human they saw to see god who's moving behind it all and so jesus actually wasn't able to do much there you know so much of what god does is able to do is contingent upon us because he's not really just here to heal us he's not really just here to to to make our lives better he's trying to create children in us he's working a larger plan than just making sure we're healthy and none of that was present in these people there was no real faith that was needed that the healing would work with to serve a larger purpose and so it literally says in verse 5 he could do no mighty work there except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them so again it is a part of healing this idea that i want healing but it's necessary to go outside of myself to achieve that and some people they were not healed because they didn't have that ability to reach out to the source of that that was not that was not in them now i will highlight that again definitely god has a prerogative to use other means of healing in fact in luke chapter 7 i want to go to this particular example because there are still important similarities and and connections to laying on of hands and things that must be there in terms of this particular point luke chapter 7 in verse 1. we read now he concluded all his sayings in the hearing of the people he entered capernaum and a certain centurion servant a centurion is going to be a roman at least in part of the roman government centurion's servant who was dear to him was sick and ready to die so when he heard about jesus he sent elders of the jews to him pleading with him to come and heal his servant and when they came to jesus they begged him earnestly saying that the one for whom he should do this was deserving that is yes he's a gentile he's not he's not a part of our people but he is so deserving he served us as someone who loves god's people he says in verse 5 for he loves our nation has built us a synagogue and so verse 6 jesus went with them and when he was already not far from the house of the centurion sent friends to him saying to him lord do not trouble yourself for i am not worthy that you should enter under my roof therefore i did not even think myself worthy to come to you but say the word and my servant will be healed such an astonishing act of faith even in luke uh sorry in verse nine jesus christ says flat out i haven't seen faith like this anywhere in israel he says this is this is astonishing but it's important to see verse eight for i also am a man placed under authority having soldiers under me and i say to one go and he goes into another comet he comes until my servant do this and he does it essentially he talks about how i'm a person i'm a man placed under authority but what does that mean that means when he tells people to go they go it's it's subtle and it's easy to miss but notice he doesn't say i am a man with authority and i tell people to go and they go because if i just said hey look i'm a guy that tells people to go and they go you would think i'm talking about my authority but he's saying no i'm a person under authority why else would they go because i have nothing in myself i recognize that there's someone above me with authority and that when i speak i recognize i am representing a higher power than myself something outside of me and when i send them to go they go it's just a remarkable example but notice some important things there and we'll actually see them reflected in the other lessons of laying on of hands this recognition he did not have it within himself to accomplish what he needed that however whatever his relationship with god was which might have been mighty at the time for what it could have been as a gentile was not something he should rely upon to ask that god that there was that he needed to reach out beyond himself to someone in something else and we'll see another example where it's not laying on of hands that's used for healing but we see so many of those elements present that are taught to us through the laying on of hands let's move to the second point and it's it's very similar to the first the first one was that there are things we truly need but we don't find them within ourselves that we have to go outside of ourselves for those things the second point i want to talk about in terms of what laying on of hands teaches us is that we have to go to another human being we have to go to another human being and i don't know about you and maybe as far as you're concerned this might as well be the same as the first point but that makes a difference for me because if you're going to tell me something i got to go on a great quest right like the the tales of hercules go and find the 18-headed lion that spews fire and bring me its tail to swing around your head something like that you know where you've got to go you got to find the flower of healing on the mount of despair beyond the river of doom or all this kind of stuff well now there's something outside of you but to me it's not nearly as humbling to say no you've got to go to another person you got to go to another human being it's like well why is that person any better than me right why is what's what's what's up with that you know i can't can i just do something else you have to go to another person for laying on of hands and to me that's an element of humility it is the opposite of the do it yourself christianity that we see in the world and that sometimes infects some of us in the church this idea that it's god and me and that's it now don't get me wrong there are times when we stand and we have to stand opposing difficult forces and there's no one around us it's only god with us that's true i'm not trying to knock that right i'm not trying to knock that when shadrach meshach and abednego had to face down nebuchadnezzar they couldn't look around and say all right you're with us boys there was nobody with them right but it's so easy to get caught up in that and assume that somehow that spirit even that that is supposed to communicate to a spirit of independence when god has explicitly crafted in his church a remarkable interdependence that is supposed to be what helps us in those times right anyone who stands there facing down a government has generally been able to do so because of the support they've had whether they've been reared in the church they've had a chance to be taught they've had those who love them and work with them and then they find themselves in this circumstance we have this spirit in the world of this do-it-yourself relationship with god the diy church of god you know if you will i'm sorry god condemns that in so many places that under no uncertain terms at all and the laying on of hands being part of that foundation reminds us no you've actually got to go to another human being i have to go to another human being paul wrestled with this with the corinthians for instance turn to first corinthians chapter four corinth was caught up in a lot the spirit of a lot of different things they definitely had some some attitude going on and they were some were dismissive of paul dismissive of apollos and the rest and they were in many ways doing a bit of diy christianity and if you really read carefully a little bit between the lines but sometimes explicitly what it says a lot of them felt what they were doing was rooted in the bible right after all i got a bible why do i need anybody else and you get the sense they were using biblical statements to justify their personal decisions about how things ought to be and had lost sight that god actually creates a body in which we're dependent not just on things outside of ourselves after all the bible is outside of ourselves right but on actually on other human beings and so in first corinthians chapter four for instance whereas talk about how puffed up they are in verse seven he asked them for who makes you differ from another and what do you have that you did not receive now if you did indeed receive it why do you boast as if you had not received it and then he goes full sarcasm because paul does that sometimes oh you're already full oh you're already rich you've reigned as kings without us he goes you know indeed i i could wish you did rain that we also might reign with you know if you were reigning that'd be fantastic because the rest of us would be he said but you know what you're not he says paul paul could be really biting sometimes you know it's very difficult he was like a father to them to a certain extent there's times he's happy and praising at times he's like oh you're killing me you're killing me corinth you're killing me so in this he's reminding them what do you have that you didn't receive that wasn't preached to you by apollos that i didn't preach to you he says and you're caught up as if you didn't get these things from other people i've seen apostates out there in the world i saw one in particular uh he's no longer living but he was one that really wanted to follow her after himself and he completely reinterpreted the holy days in many ways but it's fascinating when you look at his interpretations which i don't recommend i had to in a sense he was writing me and it was just a mess there was someone caught in his clutches and i was trying to counsel that person but you look that he wouldn't have actually known enough to reinterpret the holy days if he hadn't had previously been taught the meaning of the holy days have been keeping them under herbert w armstrong it's like he has no idea it's like well he's grown based on this foundation so he decides well you know what i guess i gotta demolish this foundation and do something for there's nothing he had he didn't receive from others and yet he came across like he was some sort of great source if you will in fact let's go to james chapter five talking about going to another human being james chapter five and verse 14. when we're sick what should we do maybe not just a sniffle or something but regardless our default should be we see in james chapter 5 and verse 14. we read here is anyone among you sick let him pray for you don't need nobody else what oh that's that's not what it says if your bible says that it's you have my permission to burn that one because it's a really really bad bible uh it says in james chapter 5 and verse 14 is anyone among you sick let him call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him anointing him with oil in the name of the lord it's interesting even the anointing with oil is a physical act there's actually a physical touch with that there's this physical you know kind of sense to it we'll talk about that just a little bit later but notice it says is anyone among you sick let him call for the elders you need to reach out to another human being that's what he says and and and the laying on of hands reminds us of that that we have to go to other people in our lives uh in fact we won't turn there for the sake of time but many of you are familiar with the example in the book of acts about handkerchiefs or clothes or aprons being brought from paul to other people and then being healed that's actually the basis of the anointed cloth practice that we do is that and it's interesting that even in that there is this kind of physical connection right you know when i know when i'm anointing a cloth i don't know how other ministers do it it's been a long time so i've seen somebody else do it but i lay hands on it kind of squish it you know i don't really crush it but still i've got the oil on it and i kind of lay hands on it and i i i pray as if i were in the presence of the person talking to god about you know that he would use this uh and then what do they do when they get it well what do you do you put it on yourself there's this interesting you know kind of connection but it reminds us we don't have anointed cloth vending machines right for you to just go and put a quarter in and it pops out you've got to talk to another human being and this laying on of hands as a fundamental idea reminds us of that that we have to humble ourselves and be willing to go to another person and talk about you know whatever this is a third point the laying on of hands teaches us not that we should have to go outside of ourselves there's things we need outside of ourselves but also we have to go to other human beings but this third point not just any human being will do not just any human being will do if you turn to acts chapter eight i think i commented too much on this passage a few months ago and uh so sometimes you get distracted from your main sermon and you get caught up in another i call those side quests if you will so uh you know i had a little side quest i think on this one it's actually more more relevant here in acts chapter 8 and we have philip and philip is amazing philip is a deacon we actually saw him becoming a as best we understand maybe there's things that we don't see here and there but i think the evidence supports that he was still a deacon he was deaconified if you will just earlier as a part of the original original group of guys but here he is in samaria and miracles are happening at the hands i mean what the church was doing back then was absolutely astonishing you had uh unclean spirits being cast out you had paralyzed people right suddenly being able to move uh you you had these amazing things that were being done and god was connecting those things to to philip these signs that god was moving in the world and then we have uh it says in verse 12 when they believed philip this is in samaria verse 12 when they believed philip as he preached the things concerning the kingdom of god in the name of jesus christ both men and women were baptized now understand at this point they were just dunked in water as we'll see later they did not have hands laid on them and they were not given god's spirit yet but they were dunked in water and it says in verse 14 and now when the apostles who were at jerusalem heard that samaria had received the word of god they sent peter and john to them who when they had come down prayed for them these people these baptized people that they might receive the holy spirit for as yet he it's actually just the spirit it's an it had fallen upon none of them they'd only been baptized that is submerged in water in the name of the lord jesus then they laid hands on them and they received the holy spirit and then simon simon magus he's often called saw that through the laying on of the apostles hands the holy spirit was given he tries to buy this say man i would love to do that here's 50 bucks you know go buy whatever you want i don't care what you spend it on just give me the power to lay on hands and give people god's spirit and they say verse 20 your money perished with you you're a big jerk they didn't say a big jerk but they might have maybe an aramaic or something regardless they were not they were not pleased and they did not do that but here i want to highlight notice philip miracles are happening around philip and yet when it comes to laying hands on someone and give god's spirit no matter what god is showing in philip philip clearly understood that he was not a human who had the authority to lay hands and give god's spirit how impressive is philip in that regard honestly i you know if you brought me a bunch of paralytics and all of a sudden you know they're all walking around and stuff you know because of my preaching or whatever it'd be easy to get your head pretty big man god is using me i you know i know so-and-so i haven't seen him heal any paralytics or anything like that but but philip understands he had not been appointed to have that kind of authority and he took it seriously and if you think about it it would have been an offense to god for philip to have taken on authority to himself that he did not have now event god does use him as an evangelist and we see later in the book of acts he's called philip the evangelist so he was raised in rank he was made a minister personally my personal theory speculation anyone remember inspector gadget right i used to think that anytime i speculate i wish i could do like inspector gadget and have like some siren come out of my head and warren because this is this is me right this is me but i i wonder if this was the moment because what do we do when we ordain someone is we look for god's fruit in them we look we we we notice that someone god seems to be showing the fruit of an elder or showing the fruit of a deacon and so we want to ordain them because it seems to be god's desire and and we want god through that to empower them to do that job more fully and to me it's very possible that the apostles came and they saw what god was doing in philip and recognize god is calling this man to be a spreader of the gospel which is what evangelist essentially means and maybe he was ordained after that i i don't know we'll get to ask him one day and they might say smith your ideas are dumb thank you for saying it was speculation because that's totally not what happened but i do wonder the point is it makes a difference who the people are it makes a difference to god now maybe it doesn't make a difference to us it's irrelevant it makes a difference to god that's the important thing in fact let's go to the old testament number is chapter 16. it's so easy to write off the korah and the leaders of israel who rebel as just a bunch of rebellious weirdos of some sort who's the fellow that portrayed him in the ten commandments i can't recall i was it was that korra i know it's dathan right wasn't dathan the character and ten commandments it's like ah moses expecting to see you know a cigar in his hand ah moses yeah i got plans moses you're not a part of them you know whatever you know this kind of conniving sort of a fella but that is not who these people were not as best as we can tell korah the people that rebelled with him were men of renown in the congregation they were incredibly respected in the congregation as leaders in the congregation which would have included some kind of appointment verse 1 we read now this is a number 16 verse 1. now korah son of ishar the son of gohan the son of levi with dathan and abyram the sons of eliab on uh and on the son of peleth sons of reuben took men and they rose up before moses with some of the children of israel 250 leaders of the congregation representatives of the congregation men of renown these are men who were respected who would have dealt with moses and such on a regular basis these were leaders among leaders not caricatures which would have made the temptation to say what they say all the greater number 16 and verse 3 they gathered together against moses and aaron and said to them you take too much upon yourselves for all the congregation is holy every one of them and the eternal is among them why then do you exalt yourselves above the assembly of the lord you know if all you saw was just the flesh if you lack the faith to see god working in the events it's exactly what you could conclude and it's true the congregation is holy right like all of us are holy we're sanctified we're set apart the fact is god had not appointed them to that place and as a result the earth eats them like pac-man because god isn't going to have that it makes a difference who the people are and laying on of hands reminds us of that you know if i'm if my hip is really hurting it does i'm you know yeah once you get past 50 really you know the warranties start to run out pretty fast you know so my hip is really hurting you know maybe i've mistreated it you know i need to repent and you know i can't just go hey you know david hey you busy could you could you come lay hands on me you know and everything better sure dad that's what you deserve go to a minister right uh we have people to go to and it makes a difference who those people are god's appointment means something uh let's look at one last example deuteronomy chapter 17 and by the way not all of these examples are straight-up examples of laying on of hands as you just said rather laying on of hands teaches us the principle and i'm trying to emphasize how important that principle is and what a service the laying on of hands service does for us by reminding us of these fundamental ideas deuteronomy 17 we're restarting in verse eight and this has been read a whole lot because of the difficult decisions the church has had to has had to face verse eight if a matter arises which is too hard for you to judge between degrees of guilt for bloodshed between one judgment or another between one punishment or another matters of controversy within your gates then you shall arise and go up to the place which the eternal your god chooses you shall come to the priests the levites and to the judge there in those days and inquire of them and they shall pronounce upon you the sentence of judgment you don't just go to anybody you go to people whom god clearly says he has set them apart for judgment he has set them apart to make those decisions so that his people are unified like we heard in the sermon verse 10 you shall go do according to the sentence which they pronounce upon you in that place which the eternal chooses and you shall be careful to do according to all that they order you according to the sentence of the law in which they instruct you according to the judgment which they tell you you shall do you shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left from the sentence which they pronounce upon you now the man who acts presumptuously and will not heed the priest who stands to minister there before the eternal your god or the judge that man shall die so you shall put away the evil from israel god considers not regarding the person and a circumstance of evil and something to be shunned from the congregation so i'm gonna be put out of the congregation because it's a dangerous thing anytime you see the death sentence involved anytime you see this kind of thing or putting someone out it's very often if you really take a look at study at those kinds of decisions in the old testament it's often to ensure something doesn't corrupt the congregation it says in verse 13 and all the people shall hear and fear and no longer act presumptuously god does not take lightly presumption he takes it very seriously and the laying on of hands reminds us about that we don't just go to anybody like we read earlier in james chapter five when you're sick go to the elders and have them anoint you have them pray for you the laying on of hands reminds us that god's appointment means something that it means something in heaven that if someone is is is trying to fill a role and if you go up to god's roll call in heaven and you don't see that god himself has appointed that person to that then there's something to be condemned there there's something we don't want to be a part of and it's something that cora clearly didn't understand all right let's look at another point another lesson taught to us by the laying on of hands because it will this point this is kind of a transition that what we just talked about leads to this god uses laying on of hands to picture and to reinforce his government god uses laying on of hands to picture and to reinforce his government actually i skipped one let's see i don't think i'll be all right all right let's go to numbers chapter 27. numbers 27. you know i debated about numbering these and now i'm glad i i didn't they're just bullet points so the order is different but hopefully the lessons are still will still work in numbers chapter 27 and verse 12. we'll start there now the eternal said to moses go up into this mount abarim and see the land which i have given to the children of israel and when you have seen it you also shall be gathered to your people as aaron was your brother was gathered he was kind of saying once you've seen it you're going to die which moses you think is like well i don't know if i want to look you know i mean do i want to look at the same time give what he had to deal with over all these you might say you know what god i am pooped that sounds that sounds pretty good i think i think i'm ready so he says in verse 14 he says for in the wilderness of zinn during the strife of the congregation you rebelled against my command to hollow me at the waters before their eyes these are the waters of mariby kadish in the wilderness of zen now it's interesting this was the one thing right moses messed up one time right there's the one thing but we have to remember if you're a teacher you are held to a stricter judgment i am astonished at how many people on facebook without declaring themselves officially teachers choose to spread knowledge into the world from whatever source they happen to find credible because it's like they forget the fact that god says everyone who believes what you say and acts on it i'm holding you accountable for that i'm holding you accountable for that because of your example it's a terrifying thing not to be set aside as a person of any kind of authority or to take on yourself the role of teaching other people if you're not rightfully spooked by the idea we should be we should be i think two-thirds of the volume of facebook would disappear if people properly understood the responsibility that that entails but that said so moses messed up once right he messed up once god says look it was difficult because he had invested this and moses and moses in the end actually failed to honor god by what he did the people were aware of of what that represented so anyway the point is he was not going into the land so verse 15 it says moses spoke to the eternal saying well let the eternal the god of all the spirits of all flesh set a man over the congregation who may go out before them and in before them who may lead them out and bring them in that the congregation of the eternal may not be like sheep which have no shepherd moses recognize god's people need shepherds that's how it all works god's people need shepherds we all need shepherds i need a shepherd and moses recognized that that we don't want chaos god's government must exist please god appoint someone to fill that role so in verse 18 god picks the next person now is that who moses was rooting for is this who moses was praying about you know come on god you know there's a great guy we don't really know but we do know that god picked him because that's how appointments happen it says in the eternal said to moses take joshua the son of nun with you a man in whom is the spirit and lay your hand on him set him before eleazar the priest and before all the congregation and inaugurate him in their sight notice i went over pretty quickly in verse 18 but how does this happen by moses laying his hand on him verse 20 you shall give him you shall give some of your authority to him that all the congregation of the children of israel may be obedient and so we look later it says in verse 22 moses did as the eternal commanded him he took joshua and said him before elias are the priests and for all the congregation and he laid his hands on him and inaugurated him just as the eternal commanded by the hand of moses there was a laying on of hands notice the emphasis it represents this continuity right there was a passing of the torch and it is in front of all the people and joshua submitted to moses for that laying on of hands is a picture of submission we'll touch on that a little closer to the end uh it represented that god had invested moses with authority that god was now investing authority in joshua it backs up god's government it reinforces that in fact we'll we'll come back to numbers chapter 27 a couple of verses later so if you want to put a marker there uh feel free but i want to turn to exodus chapter 19 because the fact that it was done on the side of the people is actually interesting because this is part of god's modus operandi god wants us to understand how he reigns in the church and it wasn't just for joshua's sake that he did this he wanted it done in the sight of the people so the people would understand so in exodus chapter 19 this is something that it's easy to forget uh one of my uh favorite elements about this in exodus 19 we have the set up for the ten commandments being given and i get all caught up in the special effects aspect of it you know the thunder and the lightning and the flames and the smoke and the mountain shaking and and all the people in israel just completely freaking out you know it's an amazing scene where it was probably the closest thing that any of them could ever even imagine what it was like to have divinity sort of touch the earth and not hold back from its power an amazing scene and god tells moses that he's going to do this and we see the beginning of well not the beginning but kind of the transition where you have all these things going on you have the mountain shaking you had the smoke you have the people terrified then it says in exodus 19 and verse 19 when the blast of the trumpet the word is actually so far there when the blast of the trumpet sounded long and became louder and louder moses spoke and god answered him by voice exodus 19 and verse 9 and the eternal said to moses before all this eternal said to moses behold i come to you in the thick cloud that the people may hear when i speak with you and believe you forever that the people may hear when i speak with you i want them to hear it even though i'm talking to you moses i want all of them to hear it so they'll believe you forever they will understand who you are and where i've put you to do these things and they will respect the things you say because you're my servant in this it wasn't just god wanted them to be impressed with the ten commandments part of the reason for the show was so they would listen to the leader god appointed god uses laying on of hands to picture and reinforce his government we don't just go again to anybody we go to ministers we go to people that god has set aside the laying on of hands teaches us that we don't just go to anyone we have to go to someone god has authorized and it reinforces his government next point we should know that it is god who is acting in the laying on of hands yes it is a person it's a human being it's our physical hands but it's god who's present in the moment it's a god who's crafted that environment and it's god who is taking action at that time in fact let's go back to i said two but i'm gonna change the order of these go to numbers chapter 27 again numbers 27. and we saw for instance that in verse 18 why was joshua at the laying on of hands because god decided it would be joshua because god made the decision why was moses going to be laying hands on him because god told him you go lay hands on him again let's read that in verse 18. it says the eternal said to moses take joshua again there's a command you take joshua the son of none with you you know it's really amazing also to think here's joshua clearly an orphan who's risen to this thing because he's the son of of none yeah that was awful you should feel bad for laughing for that uh here we have joshua he's not an orphan he's actually the son of someone named none uh so you do this a man is a spirit and then you lay your hand on him god is commanding all these things he's the one who's acting why is joshua going to be in charge because god picked him why is moses laying hands because god told him to why is he being inaugurated as the leader why is any authority at all passing to him because god is passing that authority when it comes to laying on of hands when it's healing it's not the minister who's healing right we're asking you hear us pray when we lay hands that god heals that christ's sacrifice including his broken body is is is reflected on by god at that time and that a healing comes to the stripes of jesus christ when you're baptized the minister does it lay hands then slip his hands and pull out a syringe full of holy spirit you know and jab it in you and and stick it then you got it what do we do we ask god to place that spirit in the other person when there's a marriage marriage is a setting apart right we do laying on of hands in that usually familiar we clasp hands all together but it is a laying on of hands and it's god who's joining them as man and wife just as it says in the gospels what what god has joined together let no man put asunder the minister doesn't do that with the authority of the state it's a god who creates that family in that sense it's god who is the actor in fact there's a fascinating passage related to that if you will in john chapter 3 and this is actually not necessarily a laying on of hands and yet i've learned so much from it and the lesson is related to this john chapter 3 verse 22 says after these things is john 3 22 jesus and his disciples came into the land of judea and there he remained with them and baptized so what do we read here jesus baptized just keep that in mind so as we move through we read about the discussion with john's disciples it has that fantastic fantastic line in verse 30 that even though it's not relevant to my point i can't pass it and not read it where john the baptist says he must increase but i must decrease just one of the most astonishing uh statements of humility in the bible uh that humans just don't seem to be able to master without his help uh but earlier than that we saw i actually kind of skipped right over it verse 26 when they were talking in verse 26 the disciples of john the baptist to him it says they came to john and said to him rabbi he who was with you beyond the jordan to whom you've testified behold he is baptizing and all are coming to him so who's baptizing again we read jesus is baptizing let's actually move all the way to the beginning of the next chapter chapter four and verse one word has come to the pharisees that now here's this guy who's baptizing even more people than john did and john was an irritant to them so this is just more irritation john chapter 4 and verse 1 therefore when the lord knew that the pharisees had heard that jesus made and baptized more disciples than john parentheses though jesus himself did not baptize but his disciples that is his disciples were doing the baptizing if it's in there it's in there for a reason verse two yeah it's got parentheses around it but if you ever get any of my emails you know it's always got more parentheses than emails are supposed to have however it's in there for a reason right that is god inspired john to make sure we knew that for all of these people being baptized even more that john the baptist john the baptist was baptizing and even though the bible says jesus was baptizing he was baptizing jesus baptized more disciples were then told jesus himself that is the person the man jesus didn't do the baptizing he had his disciples doing the baptizing you might think well why is why would you go to jesus and so you know i thank you for all this i want to go closer to god i want to repent this was just a baptism of repentance the holy spirit had not been given yet but still i i want to repent and so jesus then says that's this wonderful child peter come here peter baptize her he's right there right he's right there you know why wouldn't it just because he was busy and such well it is interesting to me and i feel like i've learned so much from it because in a sense there's so many things jesus does as an example that pictures larger things like when jesus went to john the baptist himself to be baptized and john the baptist says whoa you know i mean are you kidding you know i should be baptized by you and you're here because jesus had no sin there was nothing to repent of why was he baptized and jesus says you know permitted to be so for now for righteousness sake he set a picture for us he was picturing larger realities throughout his ministry and to me it's fascinating here to understand that when someone is baptized when they're brought into the family of god in embryo here whenever we are healed whenever we're ordained who is truly doing all of that it's god who's doing it but he's doing it through his chosen representatives it may be the people he has set aside and as we saw earlier it's not just anybody you have to go to particular people but that doesn't change the fact that he's doing it you know we have the church has been around long enough there's people that have been baptized by ministers that a decade or two passes and somehow the next time you see that ministry i was talking about a similar example earlier next time you get them is a christmas card from them you know while they're busy eating a ham sandwich smoking a cigar and wishing you a happy halloween right and it's like oh well great you know that's the minister that baptized me 40 years ago so what happened to my baptism right well as long as that person truly was in that he was the person there he was ordained he was authorized by god to do that then remember it's god who brought you into the family right and god hasn't moved god's still god jesus is still jesus it's god who acts in these things but all the more then we want to go to one of his representatives notice it said it was his disciples that did the baptizing it wasn't just random joes it was people that he had appointed to do that the last points i'll make here because i'm running out of time i want to wrap up is that what is our role in a baptism if we're receiving sorry not baptism i'm laying on of hands when we receive the laying on of hands it's a role of humble submission humble submission as we've read looking at the points we have to submit our pride to a certain extent recognizing that we're not content in our so we're not sufficient in ourselves that we have to go to someone else it's a submission to god it's doing things the way he wants us to do them even physically with heads bowed because there's a prayer going on it's a picture of submission to god it's a submission to god's government that we don't just pick anyone that we go to the people that he has designated for such things and it reminds me of the accolade for those you know what an accolade is we think of accolades as just praise like oh the singers you receive great accolades but accolade actually is a french word and it harkens all the way back at least to the uh to the middle ages with knights and kings and the rest which is part of why i like it because i dig swords and all that kind of stuff that sounds i'm not a weirdo or anything you know i just as a kid like the idea of chivalry and having this code that a man should live up to and and the whole idea of nights just fascinated me and when when a man is knighted by the king what does he do he goes before the king and he kneels and the traditions vary but often there's a sword involved and the king taps the person on each shoulder not just once but usually a few times while you sit and yield and do nothing and then you stand and there's great honors you know that you're accepted and you're you're a part of that and that's man's way of doing you know rituals of submission if you will but laying on of hands is god's way really even the minister who's bowing with his head is submitting to god god we're doing things your way this person is picturing his in his physical form even now his submission to you his submission to your government please work in this and accomplish your purposes for this person and what he needs and the last thing i'll say as i wrap up the last point is that in the laying on of hands one of the lessons we learn is that it means something to be set apart by god laying on of hands is a setting apart in a very particular way when you lay hands on one person you're not laying hands on all the other people you're not laying hands on it's kind of a physical picture of setting apart but it was also the means by which things are set apart you see many examples in the old testament before an animal is sacrificed often there's a laying on of hands in some kind of way you know picturing a specifying of that particular animal in the marriage ceremony we say the following before we lay hands we read in as much as the scriptural example in all cases of ordination or setting apart is by the laying on of hands in prayer please now join hands and we will ask the eternal god to unite you as husband and wife it is a setting apart and the fact that laying on of hands exists in the church reminds us that we are set apart people and that comes with obligations it's not just a name badge it's not something just a glory and there's an expectation of the one set apart the animal that has had hands laid on it is about to serve in a way all the other animals don't it's about to be sacrificed in that case in a marriage where hands is laid that becomes sacred ground there's an obligation on those people if you ask god to heal you and hands are laid on you and you're set apart in that way for divine healing there's an obligation to do the things that come with that and to seek divine principles of health and to seek to align yourselves with those things when it comes to ordination when hands are laid on you there's an obligation to fulfill the charge you've been set apart for and that's what laying on hands of hands should remind all of us that we've been set apart for something and we need to act accordingly you know as i wrap up here in the conclusion i'll just say one thing it's a i should have asked her for details but isabelle de simone once showed me something she has which is this tell me later if i get it wrong this collection this is sort of a family tree if you will of uh music teachers right of who has taught her and who taught them and who taught them and she goes back like all the way to adam and eve no she doesn't go back that far but she goes back to like some big names i can't remember if it's mozart or brahms or whoever but regardless oh sorry you can ask her later you know who they are it is it's this interesting connection right and if you think about it we have passover coming up and i never i can't say i never but almost every passover this strikes me and it's moving when i think about it you know if you have god's spirit in you then hands were laid upon you by someone set aside by god who also had god's spirit to make you a part of the family but you know that person only has god's spirit because someone laid hands on that person and that person has god's spirit because someone had hands laid on that person and you trace this back and you go all the way to jesus christ founding of the church and in a sense if we could see with the eyes of god if we had the ability to put these sort of timeless pictures together but we could see every single one of those moments where god's spirit is given at one time it'd be this beautiful physically connected picture of a people that are the people of god that he has set apart in the world for something remarkable and astonishing it'd be a picture of the body of christ picturing christ's own submission to his father but also picturing the love of the family of god as they serve and as they lead and as they bless and as they set apart it'd be this beautiful picture and i'm reminded of it everyone again almost every passover when we're all together and seeing just one the latest frame if you will in the collection of all of those pictures i hope all of us will remember that and understand there's a reason god put the laying on of hands in hebrews 6. it is so fundamental to everything we are and everything we are to do and everything god wants us to be and there's a reason why it's one of our fundamental concepts in the church [Music] you

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Published: Fri Jun 04 2021