Ex 29:4. Then you shall bring Aaron and his sons to the doorway of the tent of meeting, and wash them with water. 
This morning’s reading gives us a picture of all the steps that were necessary for the ordination of the Levitical priests to minister unto the Lord. There were many things that were needed in preparation to be the priests that would be enabled to come into the very presence of God in order to fulfill their services for the sake of the people. It went far beyond the perfection of the clothing that they were to wear, into the very heart of their being cleansed and anointed in order to bring before God the required sacrifices for the sins and the omissions and the offerings of the people. So many elements had to be perfectly accomplished in order for these men to be in the presence of God and not be struck down and annihilated. 
We want to look at just one aspect of this preparation of the priests in order to see how it has become the same preparation that we have received in Jesus Christ. The truth is that every element that we read today typifies some detail that has been fully dealt with by Our Lord and Savior. The most evident are the many sacrifices that were required and the many animals that were offered, whose blood was insufficient in quantity and perfection in comparison to the perfect sacrifice of the Only Begotten Son of God. What He has done once and forever in the giving of His very lifeblood truly has no parallel in the power and the awesome results that He set before the judgment seat of the Most Holy Heavenly Father. 
We will see, even in the washing required of the priests, that Jesus has washed us clean in His action as our High Priest and Perfect Lamb of God. What the cleansing of the water signified in the preparation of the priestly order was the washing away of their sins in order to bring before God the blood of the sacrifices that would serve to wash away the sins of the people for the time period between those sacrifices. What they had to do time after time after time, Jesus has done once for all of eternity, and so washed you and me from our sins and trespasses.
In Ex 30:17-21, we have the further detailing of the washing required of the priests, all the priests in their service each time they entered into the presence of God. Please turn to it and read along with me. Ex 30:17-21, And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, "You shall also make a laver of bronze, with its base of bronze, for washing; and you shall put it between the tent of meeting and the altar, and you shall put water in it. And Aaron and his sons shall wash their hands and their feet from it; when they enter the tent of meeting, they shall wash with water, that they may not die; or when they approach the altar to minister, by offering up in smoke a fire sacrifice to the Lord. So they shall wash their hands and their feet, that they may not die; and it shall be a perpetual statute for them, for Aaron and his descendants throughout their generations." 
	Notice that they were to wash their hands and their feet every time they entered into the tent of meeting and before the altar so that they would not die. They were to do so in order to show, in a very literal manner, that they were washing away the sins of their hands and their connection with the realm of this earth. The washing of the hands signified that what they had done in their dealings with others was no longer to be part of them as they came before the Lord God Almighty. They washed themselves of their activities and the touches of their indiscretion and the abuses of others as symbolizing that they were sorry for their own sins and did not want to have any more to do with sin as they came into the presence of God.
	As for their feet, they were cleansing themselves of the earth touch which has no place in the presence of God. They were signifying that they were not bringing before God the dirt and filth and soil of this realm, putting into place the reality that they were now dealing with the spiritual realm in coming into the presence of the Most Holy Lord God Almighty. Anything of this earth would be consumed by His Righteousness and His Holiness. All that earthly touch had to be washed away and left outside the tene of meeting and not be brought before His Holy Altar.
	A little side step might be in order at this point. This caution to not bring before God any element of this world is something that we need to take to heart in our own lives as we come into the presence of God in our times of prayer and worship. Too often, in our slovenness of preparation, we are found to be guilty of bringing earthliness into the spiritual realm. We enter, besmirched with the filth of this age, with anger, with frustration, with unforgiveness, with jealousy, or with any other variety of refuse and grime that should have been washed away in prayerful washing of our hearts and minds. 
As but one aspect to consider, when we pray and spend time together in corporate communion with God, bringing unto Him those people and circumstances that urgently need His divine ruling and overruling, we may find ourselves actually derailing His work. We do so when we bring those spiritual battles down to earth by talking about them outside the sanctuary of prayer, by gossiping and spreading the details when everything is to be shut up before the holy altar for the Sovereignty and the Omniscience of God to do what He chooses to do in each life. Whenever we pull those spiritual issues into the domain of human interaction and give them the earth touch, God will remove His hand. He will have nothing to do with that which we so brazenly and most defiantly defile. Our attitude of judging others or of seeking gossip and juicy tidbits to broadcast against others needs to be washed away from us at the door of our entering into prayer and worship.
	This is a measure that we can personally take before the Lord. If we are not finding our prayers going any further than the ceiling and our hearts not being elevated in our time of worship, it may well be because we have hands and feet that have not been washed from the dirt and the filth and the muck of this realm. Obviously, this is not in the literal sense, but in the reality of where our hearts and minds and actions and attitudes are anchored. If we cannot wash our hands and our feet, so to speak, of the dust and the connection of this realm, we will never find ourselves able to come into that holy and glorious spiritual reality of the presence and the power and the awesomeness of Our Lord God Almighty. 
	Returning to the preparation required of the priests, the Lord stipulated their washing again, in Ex 40:12+13. Ex 40:12+13, Then you shall bring Aaron and his sons to the doorway of the tent of meeting and wash them with water. And you shall put the holy garments on Aaron and anoint him and consecrate him, that he may minister as a priest to Me. This is obliviously vital in the service requirements of the Lord as it is charged three times in the space of these chapters that the priests needed to wash themselves before they entered into the presence of the Lord and before they would be enabled to minister as priests before God. 
	And please note this was not some private washing, done in secret away from the people for whom these priests were to be interceding with God. As they were being readied for their priestly ordination, in Lev 8:5+6, Moses brought the whole congregation together to witness that these men were, in fact, being cleansed for their sake in order to perform their spiritual service as defined and ordained by God. Lev 8:5+6, Moses said to the congregation, "This is the thing which the Lord has commanded to do." Then Moses had Aaron and his sons come near, and washed them with water. It was important for the congregation to witness the action of the priests in this symbolically being washed from their sins in order to be holy unto the Lord. There is a full recognition put into place, in this representative washing, that betokens the removal of the filth in order to minister unto the purity and the sanctity and the consecration and the devoutness of their service before God. 
	Again, this detailed and laborious sanctifying preparation is recounted for us in Lev 16:3+4. Lev 16:3+4, Aaron shall enter the holy place with this: with a bull for a sin offering and a ram for a burnt offering. He shall put on the holy linen tunic, and the linen undergarments shall be next to his body, and he shall be girded with the linen sash, and attired with the linen turban (these are holy garments). Then he shall bathe his body in water and put them on. He was to bathe before his service unto God as well as before his offering of the sacrifices for the people. There was the need for his personal cleansing in order to physically present himself before the altar of the Lord as well as the cleansing on behalf of the nation in the bringing of the offered sacrifices for atonement and forgiveness of sins.
	This is emphasized again in verses 23+24 of this 16th Chapter of Leviticus. Lev 16:23+24, "Then Aaron shall come into the tent of meeting, and take off the linen garments which he put on when he went into the holy place, and shall leave them there. And he shall bathe his body with water in a holy place and put on his clothes, and come forth and offer his burnt offering and the burnt offering of the people, and make atonement for himself and for the people. 
	It was the priest’s utmost responsibility to be properly prepared to do this service unto the Lord for the sake of the people. There were dire consequences in the happenstance that the priest was not fully cleansed and prepared for offering the sacrifices and the priestly duties as so specified. The priest going into the very presence of God had bells on his garment, as so stipulated in our readings. He also had a rope tied to his ankle for the very simple reason that if he was struck down by the holiness of God, the bells would stop ringing and the other priests would pull out the lifeless corpse without themselves suffering the fiery death before the Lord. This was a life or death commitment they were making as they were dealing with the life and death of the suppliants whom they were representing in their actions and activities before the altar of The Most Holy and Righteous Lord God Almighty. 
	It was no small thing to come before the Lord God Jehovah, and make supplication for sin and trespasses of His Law. These were very serious and perilous elements of the honoring of the Lord as God and Sovereign over all the affairs of both the individual suppliant and the nation as a whole. He was to be treated with utmost reverence and fear and trembling at the awesome weight of duty and responsibility that it held. Sadly, the nation and the people would soon turn their backs on the reality of to Whom they were offering sacrifices. Even many of those who did not turn directly to the idol worship of the surrounding nations saw the duties and the responsibilities of this spiritual service as merely custom and ritual, losing sight of the just and holy requirements that were demanded.   	
	 That is why we hear the Lord, through the Prophet Ezekiel, in Ezek 36:23-29, declaring that what God would do in the cleansing of His people and the giving to them a new heart of flesh would not be because of their actions or their deserving it. It would be for the sake of showing all the world that He is the One True Living God Who deserves all praise and adoration and reverence since He, Alone, is Holy. 
	Please open to Ezek 36:23-29, as our final passage of this morning. Ezek 36:23-29, "And I will vindicate the holiness of My great name which has been profaned among the nations, which you have profaned in their midst. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord," declares the Lord God, "when I prove Myself holy among you in their sight. "For I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands, and bring you into your own land. "Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. "Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. "And I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances. "And you will live in the land that I gave to your forefathers; so you will be My people, and I will be your God. "Moreover, I will save you from all your uncleanness; and I will call for the grain and multiply it, and I will not bring a famine on you. 
	To this point, it was the efforts and the physical groundwork and diligence of the priests that had manifested the lack of ability to maintain that which was required by God. Some would be more efficient and more dedicated than others, but nothing of humanity, lost in sin and death, could work to the full and absolute cleansing that was required. Everything showed that abject failure of mankind to do that which would always and forever be satisfying to God’s holiness and righteousness. The very best of the Levitical priestly order was utterly insufficient to be the true and perpetual ministers unto God and from God unto the people. 
	As this passage indicates, it has to be God Who does the cleansing and the washing to prepare hearts of flesh to eternally be in His presence. He is the only One Who can make our stony hearts alive through His Own Holy Spirit indwelling us. We will follow through on this, next week, Lord willing, as we consider just how God does exactly this through His Only Begotten Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, as we trace this washing away of our sinful nature in the Good News declared throughout the New Testament. So be it.
Then you shall bring Aaron and his sons to the doorway of the tent of meeting, and wash them with water. Amen.

This morning’s benediction is Ps 105:1-3. Oh give thanks to the Lord, call upon His name; Make known His deeds among the peoples. Sing to Him, sing praises to Him; Speak of all His wonders. Glory in His holy name; Let the heart of those who seek the Lord be glad. Amen.