 All right, welcome once again. Thanks for joining in for the worship ministry session. Let's pray and we'll get started. Father, we thank you for this opportunity that we have, the privilege that we have to learn from your word. Lord, I pray that you will continue to pour out your wisdom and your knowledge over us, Lord. Holy Spirit, the word says you are the spirit of revelation. I pray that you would open up our hearts, our eyes to see the wonder of who you are. I thank you, Lord, in Jesus' name, amen. Amen, okay. All right, so last week was a holiday due to a public government holiday here in India. We were celebrating our Independence Day, but the class of the session before that, we started off the worship ministry course with learning about Abraham and how he was known as the man of altars, right? So we kind of, we saw, just to do a very quick recap of what we covered in the last session, we learned about altars, basically. And we looked at the life of Abraham, his journey, his journey of faith, you know, from where God called him out of the land that he was in. He comes from a polytheistic world view, so to say, then he was being called to monotheism. That means there's only one God and he had to leave his family, his father, everything it takes, it brings his wife along and his nephew. Just goes, because God told him to go and didn't really know where. And along the way we see the progression of his life and his life of intimacy, his walk of faith, go deeper, you know, with God. And along the way, we happened to see that he builds altars. And altars, as we learned, is a place where death happens. It was a place of sacrifice. It was a place where bloodshed would be there. And it is a place, an altar, where two worlds collide. The two worlds, there's a collision of, you know, the kingdom of God and our kingdom here. And there's one world invading. It's, you know, that's where humanity meets with the divinity. There's a divine exchange that is happening at the altar. And altars, it's a beautiful, beautiful thing. You know, one of the things that we see, you know, when Adam and Eve sinned, right? They covered themselves with the leaves, the Bible says. They didn't know that the leaves would dry and wither off. And then it goes on to say that God covered them with the skin of an animal. That means in the process, the blood was shed. It doesn't go into great detail, but you could imagine that you can see that God's showing that the wages of sin is death. That's what's supposed to happen. But he performed for himself the first sacrifice. And somewhere along the way, he must have built an altar that Adam would have seen, okay. And looking at that, I mean, so Bible doesn't go into great detail, right? About all of these things. It just says Adam, you sinned and then goes on to say that God covered them with the skin of the animal and whatnot, but you can imagine, right? All of those for sacrifice to happen, there must have been an altar that is built and Adam must be seeing all of these things. And hence imparted that later or taught that later to Cain and Abel. And hence Abel also goes on to build an altar and offered up sacrifices, isn't it? And so altars are a beautiful, beautiful thing. We can talk about it for a long time, but we saw that Abraham was known among the many things that he was known as the man of altars. And then towards the end of that session, we saw that God is not only expecting us to build altars where we come to a place of sacrifice, but he is, and we saw that in conclusion in Romans 12 one, that he is also asking us to be on the altar, right? Don't just build an altar for yourself and expect something magical to happen, but he's saying, you know, as Paul cries out, I beseech, therefore I beseech you, brethren, offer yourself as a living sacrifice, okay? In the Old Testament, you know, there is the offering that you give and the person that is giving will be known as the Offerer, isn't it? So if you put an offering in your church, whatever, you know, you take the money and you put it, okay? So that is the offering, but you are the Offerer. But towards the conclusion of that, from the last session, we see that God is not just asking you to be the Offerer, but he's also asking you to be the Offering, right? So that was just a very quick recap of everything that we could learn and we could build much more deeper and just study about the altars of Abraham a little bit more deeper, but then the gist is enough, a brief understanding of that is enough. What I'd like to do today is just to share how worship service would have happened in the Old Testament, right? Now, the Old Testament is huge from Genesis to Malachi. A lot of things happen, the timeline is huge, the years between Genesis and all the way to Malachi is a lot, isn't it? And but the Old Testament does not give us an exact blueprint, right? Of how the worship of ancient Israel happened, but however we see that people built altars, right? In Genesis, we see the altars were built and then we come to Exodus and then we see that God gives Moses the blueprint. We'll study about the tabernacle of Moses in a later section, just a little bit. And we will also study about the tabernacle of David, a little bit later. So there was the tabernacle of Moses, tabernacle of David, the altars were there and then after David came the Temple of Solomon, that was. So that's what I'd like to look at a little bit for now is just to go through a few scriptures and see how worship or the service in general happened in the Old Testament. Because the Temple that Solomon built, let me just see if I can share. This is just an image. This is a design that was made by a person, I forget. This is from the 1800s and it is in a museum in the UK somewhere. So then I found this image and there are multiple images of the person who designed this particular model of the Temple of Solomon. But it's just such a small scale but you can just look at it, the grandeur of it. You can kind of imagine, right? And we can go through the book of Chronicles and everything and you can read about the materials that Solomon got to build this Temple from different regions and parts of the world. It's just amazing, it's just wonderful. But so the Temple that Solomon built was a place of corporate worship. It was the place for the people of Israel. I was glad when they said to me, come let us go to the house of the Lord. It was, they were excited to meet there. That was one place that would go to worship, to honor God, to offer up sacrifices. It was just a wondrous, wondrous thing. Right? So just stop sharing this. There was just to give us an idea of what the Temple kind of would have looked like. But here's the thing. So in your notes, if you follow along, I think I'm in page nine. Yeah, I think you're in page nine. Just let's just look at some of the scriptures. You know, let's look at from second Samuel chapter six verse five. We are again going to just go back and read a few scriptures from the life of David and how he began to organize it. And we learn about it in detail much later, but then just to give us a context of from the tabernacle of David and the transitioning into the Temple. So second Samuel six, five says that the Ark of the Covenant was being brought to Jerusalem. David and all the house of Israel were celebrating before the Lord with all kinds of instruments made of fur wood and with liars, harps, tambourines, castanets and symbols. So it begins to give us an idea that, okay, during the service, there was a lot of instruments that was being used. Most of it I have not seen or experienced playing it. Has anybody seen a liar? Are perhaps seen, but yeah. Okay, David and all the house of Israel, in other words, another translation says the entire, the nation of Israel were celebrating before the Lord, celebrating before the Lord. Now, if you remember from the first year, the Hebrew word for praise and celebration is what? To rave, to boast. What's the Hebrew word? Sorry? What was it, Shabbak? Shabbak, yeah, but with more phlegm. Shabbak. Yeah, we'll be help. Right, so there was, they were boasting, they were raving, they were, you know, what they were doing is Shabbak, right, before the Lord. So you see their audience was very clear. Sam 95 is so clear about it. Is it come? Let us sing to the Lord. Right, it doesn't say, let us sing to the worship leader or whoever, or any other individual. It's very clear that their audience was very clear. Let us sing to the Lord. They were celebrating before the Lord with all kinds of instruments. Okay, I'm sure there were more to it, but let's go on, okay. The first chronicles 16 was four to six. It says, David, he appointed some of the Levites as ministers before the Ark of the Lord, even to celebrate again, Shabbak, and to thank and praise the Lord God of Israel. Right, Asaph the chief, and the second to him, Zechariah, then Jiel, Shamiramoth, Jiel, Metatiah, Eliab, Benaniah, Obed Edom, and Jiel with musical instruments, harps, liars. Also Asaph played loud sounding symbols, and Benaniah and Jehazel, the priests, blew trumpets continually before the Ark of the covenant of God. Now, what I wanna do is, I just don't want us to read a bunch of scriptures. Because you can do that at home as well. And you already do that. But I want us to just dig a little deeper and think about the scriptures that we are reading. So in the scriptures that we just read, what kind of stands out to you? Pastor, but my name is not there in the verse. Why should I read it? Now that I've mentioned that, most of us are rereading the verse. So I know what's happening guys, behind the veil, although I cannot see. What's some of the thing that's kind of standing out? Okay, Jafina here is saying all kinds of instruments. Okay, go on, please feel free to unmute and speak. What kind of stands out? Neon, Rosalind, Lea, Anita, that's a little bit. What's happening guys? What kind of stands out in that verse for you? Chippy, anything? Worship leaders in the order that God has set. All right, thank you. Yeah, so I think this, yeah worship leaders as in from the levitical priesthood. Okay, so the gist of immediately what we begin to see is that there was order as you mentioned. I think that's a very key word as we, so this course we begin to learn a little bit of the theology of the worship ministry, worship at the initial stages and then we shift our focus towards the most administrative part of worship ministry. Okay, and administrative in other words is simply is bringing some order, a system in place, right? And so we see that David beginning to do this. So he appointed some of the Levites as ministers before the Lord. Why? Because he must have done his homework. He learned the hard way. And you know that the Levites are the priesthood tribe and a lot of the responsibilities were given to them, right? To minister before the Lord and whatnot. So he begins to bring an order, a system. You know, he begins to administer. Okay, this is your responsibility. This is your responsibility. This is your responsibility. It's not like, okay, let's all come together and do something without any order or system. So that kind of stands out. Okay, let's go go on. First Chronicles 25 verse one. It says, moreover, David and the commander of the armies set apart for the service from the sons, some of the sons of ASAP and of He-Man and Jeriton who were to prophesy with liars, harps and symbols. Again, we see that continuing. Now, first Chronicles chapter 25, we'll again look into at least the half of the chapter in the latest session. But the first Chronicles chapter 25 is like a more of fully, the tabernacle of David is in its final form. Okay, the system is everything is in place, is everything is running smoothly. But can someone read Second Chronicles 5, 12 to 14? What is mentioned there in your notes? Second Chronicles chapter five was 12 to 14. Someone please unmute and read that verse. All the Levitical Singers, ASAP, He-Man, Jeriton and their sons of Kinsmen, clothed in fine linen with symbols, harps and liars, standing east of the altar and with them 120 priests blowing trumpets in unison with the trumpeters and singers, but to make themselves heard with one voice to praise and to glorify the Lord. And when they lifted up their voice accompanied by trumpets and symbols and instruments of music and when they praise the Lord saying, He indeed is good for His loving kindness, He's everlasting, then the house of the Lord was filled with a cloud so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of God. Amen. Thank you, JP. Okay, guys, now, yeah, please share some of the things that stands out in that verse for you. One voice is to be able to stand in one accord, yeah. Yeah, one voice, the unity, one accord, okay. Thank you. Subashish Rosalind. We see that during the worship, the house of the Lord was filled with a cloud so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of God. So during the worship, we see the presence of God in it sometimes. Awesome, yeah, thank you. JP, were you saying something? We were saying 120 priests blowing trumpets in unison. Priests blowing in unison is another, if I be a picture of unity. And also praising the Lord, not talking about the circumstance, praising the Lord saying, he is good for his loving kindness, he's everlasting. Yeah. I mean, that seemed like a very famous song in the Old Testament, no? Songs did not go more than three lines, two lines, yeah. What else, guys? Someone else, anybody else? I think God was so pleased that he decided to come in his fullness with his glory. Right, yeah. Yeah, I mean, this is so much, we see now, we've shifted to second chronicles, chapter 25 from first chronicles, and then they've moved to the temple. So then it goes on to say, I want to read that again, Levitical Singers, Asaphim and Gerethan, and their sons and kinsmen. Look at the detail. It goes on to say, clothed in fine linen. That means they didn't come in wearing whatever they felt like wearing, right? Even that mattered to them with instruments. Standing east of the altar. You know, all of this, we don't have time to dwell into, but anytime a specific direction or information is given, a good way to study the Bible is ask yourself, why? Why is that mentioned? Why is standing east of the altar mentioned? Why not north, south or west? Okay, so I'll leave that to you to discover. Okay, it says they wore fine linen with instruments. They were standing east of the altar. And with them, 120 priests blowing, trumpets in unison. Okay, now, has anybody seen an orchestra? I mean, like a 140 piece orchestra or 120 with all the violins and, you know, the timpani's and the drums, and have you guys seen at least an image or in TV? Yes, an orchestra. Okay, let me see if I can find some image, which image worthy of sharing? No, sorry, guys, just give me one moment, okay? I'm seeing if there's any image that's worthy of sharing, but what is happening? Okay, found something. Just to give you an idea, okay? Because so this is at least 120 piece orchestra as you see it, okay? Now, in the front to the left of, okay, the person standing here with that baton or, you know, it's called, he's the conductor to his left, right in the front, we have the first violence and at the back, you'll have the second violence. And as they come, you know, behind them will be the violas, an instrument that is bigger than the violins that usually plays the alto parts. And then there's the cello that will usually, and the contra bass that will play the bass parts of the music. So there you have the strings instrument, a string section in itself, you know, there are at least, there itself on 40 people are there. And then to his right, to the conductor's right, you see the woodwinds, like the flute and the clarinet and the oboes, the contra bass. And so to the right, you'll find the woodwinds. Now you see the saxophone also, they'll make, you know, they're covered in like a brass or whatever they're considered to be woodwinds because they have a piece of wood, they blow into it, it's called the reed, okay? So, and then right in front of the conductor, you have the percussion section, the timpani's, the drums, the marimbas, the kalimbas, the vibrophone and all the drums section and the cymbals and whatnot. Now, and then way at the back, you see the brass section, you see the, like at least three, two bars, four, two bars and you can't see everybody, but there'll be a French horn. French horn is the one that looks small, kind of curled up in it, that's called a French horn. Trombone is, you've seen people push this thing in the front, that's a trombone and whatnot. So why I wanna show this picture is the brass section of an orchestra is the loudest section of the orchestra. They can easily overpower just four trumpets, okay? So the conductor most of the time will always keep the volume in check, okay? When the brass section have to play an instrument, a piece of music, they'll say, okay, control because they can easily overpower the entire orchestra. Just four to five trumpets can out sound the entire orchestra. I'm talking about the string section, the woodwinds, the drums, the percussion section, everything. Now, when you look at the verse, it talks about 120 priests playing trumpets in unison. Talk about mind being blown, everything being blown, right? Blowing the trumpet in unison, that must have been like quite a scene just to witness that, just to be there. It would have been loud. That's an understatement, you know? And then imagine, so trumpets are being blowing in unison when the trumpet is in, and singers were to make themselves heard. So the singers had to sing on top of this 120 priests blasting the trumpets. Now, it doesn't really tell us how many singers were there, but they had to make themselves heard with one voice to praise and to glorify the Lord. I mean, we need to imagine, isn't it? What a party it must have been. You know, what an event, what a joy it must have been for people to just come together and to worship this one God, right? And they sang, he indeed is good for his loving kindness is everlasting. Well, I think there's so much of power in unity, and that is an understatement, right? Everybody's heart set, fixed on the Lord. You know, it's just what I've been a beautiful, beautiful say, okay? Is there anything else you wanna add or share that kind of stands out in that verse for you? Nothing, okay, let's move on. So at the bottom, there's another verse, 2 Chronicles, chapter 29, verse 25 to 30. 2 Chronicles, chapter 29, verse 25 to 30. Can someone read that, please? Speaks of the worship to God, instigated by Hezekiah. He then stations the Levites in the house of the Lord with symbols, with herbs with layers according to the command of David and of God the king's seer, and of Nathan the prophet. But the command was from the Lord through his prophets. The Levites stood with the musical instrument of David and the priests with trumpets, and Hezekiah gave the order to offer the burnt offering on the altar. When the burnt offering began, the song to the Lord also began with the trumpets, accompanied by the instruments of David, King of Israel. While the whole assembly worshiped, the singers also sang and the trumpet sounded. All this continued until the burnt offering was finished. Now at the completion of the burnt offerings, the king and all who were present within bowed down and worshiped. Moral book, King Hezekiah and the officials ordered the Levites to sing praises to the Lord with the words of David and Hussab the seer. So they sang praises with joy and bowed down and worshiped. Amen. Thank you, Super Shish. Okay. Yeah. So you know the drill now. You know the drill. Anita, I'm going to start picking out names. Okay. And by the way, if you don't know, this is later going to be uploaded on YouTube and e-learning platform and all of them will be waiting for you to unmute and speak. What kind of stands out in the verse that we've just read? For you, what stands out for you? Yes, Lovika, please. Go ahead. According to my simple modular oberingata, it looks like for true worship, there must be, it is time bound. It has when to stop what follows and when to end. You don't just go on and on and on and on that you're driven by the Spirit. Thank you, sir. Thank you. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you for sharing. Who else? Rosalind? Would you like to? I just want... Okay. The thing which stood out to me was that here also I see order and everything was so organized and also, you know, they revised the same praises to God with words of, you know, like with joy. There's so much of joy and the way the same praises to God. I can picture it and when just I'm having this mental picture and it was such a great awesome scene. That's what I'm getting in here. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. Yes. That's order, yeah. Order is still the key element in worship. Yeah. Responsibilities are also shared accordingly Absolutely. Yes. Anmit. We see. Okay. So I just liked how it says they started according to the command of David. Like, there is some reasoning, even they're looking up to someone to start it. That's one of the things that stood out to me and also how it says, when the burnt offering began, they started everything. And then until the burnt offering was completed, they just did it. And just imagining itself. It's like, I mean, I used to listen to this choir songs during Christmas and it just gives us a goosebumps singing all of them together. And just imagining how it will be like when everyone just sings together. And when it's all over, we all go down together. I could just feel that happiness just by reading it. But yeah, that's one of the things. Great. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. Subash, you had something to share. We see that in verse somewhere, actually while the whole assembly worship, the singers also sang and the trumpet sounded. Though this may be now we can say the worship team through this started. They sing songs, maybe the trumpet sounded. But we see that maybe sometimes they stopped and during that time, maybe the whole assembly there worshiping. And maybe I see that the singer also sang. That means many times, I choose to sing. I choose to sing. I choose to sing. I choose to sing. I choose to sing. I choose to sing. The singer also sang. That means many times actually nowadays, what I think many times as singers or the people they lead the time of worship, they think we are leading people. But I think here we see that they are sometimes they are quite and the whole assembly they are worshiping. And the singers also sang and trumpet sounded. That means actually we have to believe it's not the singers, they are leading people to Christ, but it is all about God's presence. So though they are quite sometimes, but these people, they are worshiping continuously. And these leaders, maybe these singers, they are also singing and they are maybe using trumpets or maybe some other instruments. So we have to believe it's not all about we, but it's all about God, who is leading people. Yeah. Thanks, Shabashish. Okay. Let's just look at the verse again. Okay. So by now we need to understand that David is dead and gone. All right. Second Chronicles 29. So a lot has happened. So Solomon beyond Solomon and now Hezekiah is in charge. And so he, Hezekiah, then stationed the Levites in the house of the Lord with symbols, with harps and with lies. Now, why is this important so far is now, even after David is kind of passed on, dead and gone, the order is still in place. Why I say that is it says that he then stationed the Levites in the house of the Lord. Now he's learned from David. That's how he set it up with harps and with liars, according to the command of David. Right. And of Gad, the king's seer and of Nathan, the prophet for the command was from the Lord through his prophets. Okay. This was the Lord's command and David followed that and he's instilled that into his team members. And so the next leader, generation after generation will follow what was instilled by the Lord, what was commanded by the Lord. Right. So the order and the system is still going on. The Levites stood with the musical instruments of David. And that goes on to say that David invented musical instruments. He built new instruments that was not heard of. Right. Imagine. Does anybody know who invented or designed and built the first piano? Okay. So, you know, if you study music history, it shows me, right? If I remember my history, right? It's Bartholomew Christopher. Is the person who first designed and built the piano in, I think, the 17th century because the 16th century is what we know as the Baroque era. It was where the hapsichord was a very famous instrument. And in the 17th century, the classical is an era of the classical music that's where the piano was built in the 18th century is known as the romantic era where the piano became a better instrument. It could add more dynamics to it and whatnot. So, what I'm saying that is inventing one instrument or designing and building one instrument which the world has never seen is a big deal. Here it goes on to say that with the instruments, that means they would build multiple instruments, you know, just to worship God. And we don't know of all the instruments that he's done. But it's such a great deal, isn't it? And the priests with the trumpets goes on there. So, now that everybody is in place now that the worship team is standing where they're supposed to stand, now that the singers are placed where they're supposed to be placed and everything is in place and whatnot, then the senior pastor gives the order to offer the burnt offering on the altar. When the burnt offering began, the song to the Lord also began. The song to the Lord also began with the trumpets accompanied with the instruments of David, King of Israel. Now, while the whole assembly worshiped, the singers also sang and the trumpets sounded. Now, again, with the previous verse, where we say the one accord, unison, everybody with just one focus, you know, singing to the audience of one. So, while the whole assembly worshiped, the singers also sang, the trumpet sounded. All this continued until the burnt offering was finished. Now, we don't know how long it was burning for. It doesn't say that. It doesn't say 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hours, 3 years. We don't know. Could have taken longer, right? We just don't know. But it must have been longer. Otherwise, it wouldn't have been mentioned over here. All this continued until the burnt offering was finished and they didn't stop. That means everybody were excited. There were Shabakh, Yada, Toda, everything was happening. Zamar, you know, all of that is happening until the burnt offering was finished. Now, at the completion of the burnt offerings, you think that the service is done. You say, bye now. Have a good day. Have a good Sunday. Enjoy your Sunday with your families and a good nap. You think that the service is done after the burnt offering was finished. Now, at the completion of the burnt offerings, the king and all who were present with him bowed down and worshiped. They didn't want to stop. But then again, another point there that kind of stands out for me is the king was still there. The head, the leader was still there. It was important that the king, the leader was there, leading by example. Talk about that, isn't it? The king and all who were present with him bowed down and worshiped. Moreover, the service is not done yet. King Hezekiah and the officials ordered the Levites to sing praises to the Lord with the words of David and Asaph the Seer. All right, they were singing a song. All of this is done. Let's sing some songs of David and Asaph. And so they sang praises with joy and bowed down and worshiped. So what I want to leave us with this session is worship in the Old Testament at least in the first Temple of Solomon but it began with the Tabernacle of David and everything was just a place of celebration. It was just a place of joy. Again, I say this and what John Paul shared that they sang that he is good and his loving kindness endures forever was not based on their circumstances of what they were going through. So coming back to Psalm 95 it says sing through the Lord sing through the Lord a new song and shout for joy. So shouting think about shouting. Shouting does not have a vocabulary. Isn't it? It's just shouting, screaming and what not but then they're doing that with joy. You know joy for most of the time we mistake and we think that joy means happiness. Happiness is temporary but joy is the Biblical definition or understanding of joy is an expression of faith or one of the expressions of faith is regardless of what my situation or circumstances I'm going to shout for joy because I think it's and I'm not please correct me if I'm wrong it's either Hebrews 11 or 12 I think it's 12 was 1 and 2 it says for the joy that was set before him talking about Jesus he endured the cross for the joy that was set before him this act of worship in the Old Testament when they were coming together as a corporate it was a place of joy it was a place where everyone was filled with faith and everyone was expressing their faith and worshiping God it would have been an awesome sight to behold Does anybody have any thoughts that you want to share before we end the session? Okay, so we'll pause here and we'll come back after the break okay, thank you