 Okay. Welcome once again to the worship ministry course. Thank you for joining in. Let's pray and we'll get started. Father, we thank you for today. We thank you for your kindness, your grace and your mercy that is new every morning. We thank you for your faithfulness that sustains us week after week, day after day. We thank you for the air in our lungs. Jesus, we thank you for everything that you do in and through us Lord. We submit this time into your hands. You continue to pour out your wisdom, your knowledge and your understanding over us. I pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Okay. All right. So we've been studying for worship in the Old Testament. We've gone through the life of Moses and the Tabernacle of Moses and the Tabernacle of David. Just hold on a second. Put it off. The Tabernacle of David and we concluded in the last session, the Tabernacle of David and how in the last days, God said that he's rebuilding the Tabernacle of David. That's just to say that, you know, that he will continue to pour out his spirit on all flesh where sons and daughters will see visions and they'll prophesy, et cetera. And then in a just saying that worshipers will rise and they will rebuild the Tabernacle of David. That is the houses of worship where God is honored and worship and adore. Okay. And I want to continue to see and learn from the worship team of David how he organized the importance that he gave. What did he teach? Because for so long when we started studying worship and from the Old Testament, we saw how it was organized in the Solomon's Temple. You know, from the time the sacrifices was started to the, to when it ended, there was clear instruction, clear guidance. There was proper administration and all of that was there. And even hundreds of years later when we see that during the time of Israel and Nehemiah, when they come back from exile, the scripture says that they followed, they did everything that they did according to what was instructed by David. It was hundreds of years before that. And so he did something right. When it comes to setting up the Tabernacle and it comes to administering worship and everything that he did in his life. And so that's what we'd like to, I'd like to look today. Let's go to the 1st Chronicles chapter 25. In your PDF, it should be page number 25. So about the Tabernacle of David, from the times he brings it back and the way he sets it up, it's very clearly mentioned from 1 Chronicles chapter 16. You know, that's where the Bible says that he's set up a Tabernacle, he erects a Tabernacle himself. And then he starts, you know, putting the roster together and getting the Levites to lead worship, be part of the worship team. So that starts in 1 Chronicles chapter 16. And by chapter 25, it seems like there's a clear picture, a direction of what he wants to do. And so this chapter speaks about David's worship team in its full form, so to speak. So it starts off by saying, in 1 Chronicles chapter 25, verse 1, it says, Moreover, David and the captains of the army separated for the service, some of the sons of Asaph, Haman, and Jiruthin, who should prophesy with harps, stringed instruments, and cymbals. And the number of the skilled men performing their services was, we'll stop. Okay, so it starts off by saying, Moreover, David and the captains of the army. Another translation of the NIV will say David and the generals of the army are separated for the service. NIV, you will see the words used set apart. Then other translations might also use it. So the first thing what you see is that they were set apart. They set apart a bunch of people. And we'll read about that a little later. Okay. Okay. So the root word for holy in Hebrew, it means to be set apart. Now if you've done any cooking, if you know your way around in the kitchen, or if you've at least seen someone work in the kitchen, they're cutting the vegetables or whatever. They take a knife, they cut the vegetable, things that they don't need what they do. They cut it and separate it, isn't it? They cut and push it aside. And so that again is the root meaning of it, is to cut, to be cut off, to be set apart. Okay. So David, the first thing what he did was to set apart a bunch of people for the ministry of the Lord. And so we can't understand, we will not understand what it is, how to live a holy life. What does holiness mean unless we look at the one who is holy. Right. And so when we say that God is holy, it simply means again there is no one like him. He is completely set apart. He is not just morally right. Okay. Tell me some of the first thing that comes to your mind when you hear the word holy. What are some of the things that come to your mind when you hear the word holy? Purity. Okay. Some of the words that can come to our minds is say, God hates sin. Yeah. And so that's the thing. So when we say the word or when we think of the word holy, the first thing that comes to our mind is moral purity, moral purity or sinlessness. In other words, righteousness. That means, okay, holy means that I shouldn't smoke, I shouldn't drink alcohol, I shouldn't do this, I shouldn't do that, I shouldn't commit murder, I shouldn't commit adultery, you know, all of those extra 10 commandments, nine commandments at least, you know, that shall not co-ed all of that. So when we say holy or when we think of holiness, what we think most often is moral purity, is sinlessness. But when we say that God is holy, we are not just saying that he is morally pure. Okay. We are not just saying that he is morally pure. It's not that he is sinless. He cannot sin. He doesn't understand, you know, what it is to lie. God says, I am not man that I should lie. When we say that God is holy, yes, he is morally pure, you know, according to, you know, our minds that the thing that we can comprehend, but he is beyond. When we talk about the holiness of God, we are not talking about an attribute or a characteristic of God. We are talking about the person of God himself. He is holy. There is no other attribute or characteristic that's repeated three times by the angels, or that's mentioned in the Bible, isn't it? We don't see God as love, love, love. We don't see he's faithful, faithful, faithful, he's merciful, merciful, merciful, or he's kind, kind, kind. It's, if anything is repeated thrice during the time of the Bible was to emphasize that is the ultimate thing, that is who he is. They didn't understand times, 10 times, 100 times, 1000 back then. To repeat something or to mention something three times was the ultimate. It's saying, okay, there is nothing beyond this. This is it. He, you know, he is the one. And so when the scripture says that God is holy, holy, holy, it simply says that there is no one like this God. Okay, let's very quickly go to Psalm 85. Feel with me? Hold on a second. I think it's Psalm 89. My apologies. Yeah, it's Psalm 89. Okay, I hope you're with me. Psalm 89, it says from verse five, I'll read, and the heavens will praise your wonders, O Lord, your faithfulness also in the assembly of the saints, for who in the heavens can be compared to the Lord? Who among the sons of the mighty can be likened to the Lord? God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of the saints, and to be held in reverence by all those around him. O Lord, God of hosts, who is mighty like you, O Lord, your faithfulness also surrounds you. Okay, so look at that verse six where it says, for who in the heavens can be compared to the Lord? Who among the, again, the NIV version, you'll see who among the heavenly beings, right, is like the Lord? Who among the sons of the mighty simply is referring to the angels, right, can be likened to the Lord? So when you think of the mighty seraphims, seraphim that you read about in Isaiah six, or the cherubim in Ezekiel chapter 1 and chapter 10, and the living creatures in Revelation 4, when you read the way the Bible describes them, seraphim, seraphim is the plural, the singular is seraph, seraphah, the original meaning of that is the burning ones. Seraphim means to burn, that means these angels are literally on fire, with two wings they fly, with two they cover their face, with two they cover their wings, and two they cry out to one another, holy, holy, holy is the Lord, God Almighty, who was an ends and ends to come. And you think of these angels and you wonder, oh, they are amazing, they must be holy, right? But then the Scripture says, who among the heavenly beings is like you? And when we say God is holy and say that there is no one like him, that means if an alien were to ask me a Martian, let's say an alien from the planet Mars comes, invades planet Earth, and asks me, who are you? A gunpoint, who are you? Tell me who you are. I have my point, my finger to one of us and say I am like them, I am a human being, that means there is someone else like me, I am like someone else. But when we see that there is no one like our God, that means God can't point his finger and say that, okay, I am like that angel or I'm like this being in the heavens. No, he is God all by himself, he is holy all by himself. Exodus 15, 11 says, who among the gods is like you, Lord? Who is like you? Majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, working in wonders, right? The Hebrew word for holy is kadosh, that's again, it is from the word we get set apart to be separated or to be cut kadosh. And so it is when we don't understand the holiness of God, we have questions like how can God create a world with evil sorrow, pain? How can God, a good God order the slaughter of women and children in the Bible? How can a good God kill Uzair for stopping the Ark from falling? All these questions are raised when our minds can't really comprehend that he is holy. And it is in his holiness he is gracious, in his holiness he is merciful, in his holiness he is loving, in his holiness he is kind, in his holiness he is compassionate, in his holiness he is omnipresent, in his own holiness he is omniscient, all powerful, ever know, ever present, all knowing and in his holiness he is the great I am, isn't it? And so if we ever have to understand what it is to be holy, we need to look at the one who is holy. And if we ever need lessons on faith, we need to look at the one who is faithful and he is the faithful one. Isn't it? I've mentioned this, you know, any word that ends with full, like faithful, simply means that someone is full of faith. So that if we want to learn anything about faith, look at the one who is full of faith, the one who is faithful. And we say that he is beautiful, that means he is full of beauty. We say that he is wonderful, he is full of wonder beyond what our minds can comprehend. Right? And so when we say God is holy, he is beautiful, he is everything, he is whole, he is absolute. There is no one like our God. And so when we understand that he is holy, and it is in, it is from that place when God commanded the Israelites saying, when you go into the land of the promise, the promised land, the land of the Canaanites, which I'm going to give to you, be cautious of compromising with the Canaanites. Don't get into their ways of life. Don't worship like they worship. Don't worship the gods they worship. As soon as you go into the land, drive them out of the land. That was the command for the Israelites. It was to not give room to the enemy. Not give room to the enemy. Right? Why? Because when you read about the history and the story of the Amalekites, whom God ordered to be slaughtered and killed, and this is the argument which the most of the atheists bring all the time is how can a good God come, you know, declare the women and children to be slaughtered. But if you just take that example of Amalekites, Amalekites from the land of Canaan, they served a God called Molec. Anybody heard of this before? Molec was the name of the God, the Amalekites worship. And this idol was made of metal or or some sort of, I'm not sure if it's aluminum or iron, but then he was made of metal. And there will come a time where to celebrate their God, what they would do is offer up children's sacrifices. They offered up, they did a lot of immoral things. And one of which was children sacrifice, child sacrifice. And so his hands would be something like, you know, like this, the idol of this, this God, God lower codes, lower case G. What they would do is they would heat up his hands with the fire underneath, like it's red hot. And on that hand, they would place the newborn babies. And because the mothers or the parents should not hear the cry of the babies, the drummers of the town would play the drums very loud so that the cry of the innocent babies are drowned in the sound of the drums. This was the injustice and the evil that was being practiced by one of the clans called Amalekites in the land of Kenna. God knew about all of this and said, I'm giving them, I'm giving you the land of the promised beautiful land, but don't compromise to their waste because you are set apart. Exodus 19, God says, among the whole earth, although the whole earth is mine, if you follow and obey my commands, you will be my treasured possession. It's in Exodus chapter 19 verse four, I think. You will be my treasured possession, a holy nation, a nation of priests. God's initial original desire was that the whole nation of Israel would be a nation of priests, not just the tribe of Levites. But a lot of things happened between Exodus 19 and Exodus chapter 20 and 21. So that's a lesson for another day. And God says, don't compromise. Guys, what I want to share very briefly mentioned is because most of you are leaders, pastors in charge leading a ministry or you will be leading a ministry. Let me make this statement and let it stay with you. Compromise will kill your spirit. Compromise will kill your fire for God. What does that look like in this day and age? It's okay. Chalta hai attitude, as you see in Hindi. It's okay. It's just this. It's okay. It's just one drag. It's whatever. If we compromise with the world, we cannot flirt with the world. God is very clear about it. Because holiness is not a result of cosmetics. You can highlight that in your notes and leave it. Holiness is not a result of cosmetics. That is, you don't become holy by not wearing jewelry. You don't become holy by wearing white shirt, white pant. You have a clean shave every day. You don't become holy. Okay. Holiness is not a result of cosmetics, but it is a result of communion, a communion with the Lord. When we come together, coming together in unity, in union, that's what it is, isn't it? When we, you know, Psalm 115, it says to summarize, we become like the one we worship. And so, if you remember from first year, one of the points on what worship is, worship is communion with the Lord. And so when we worship Him, and if worship is communion with the Lord, when we adore Him, we become like Him. Are you with me? Okay. So it is very important that you understand this, the seriousness of this, and that you instill it in your worship team later, when you eventually lead a group of people. That the first thing what David did in his worship team is that he set apart. He said, you are not called for anything else, but only to minister unto the Lord. You are special. In 1 Peter chapter 2, we say that we are royal priesthood now. In the New Covenant, you and me, we are royal priesthood. That means we have the responsibilities of the priests. Same thing as to what the Levites had in the Old Testament in the Tabernacle, is to minister unto the Lord. Okay. I'll let's move on. So that's the first thing set apart. And the second thing we see is that they were set apart for the ministry. Hold on a second. Let me go back to that. It says, they separated some of the sons of Asaph, He-Man, and Juditin. Who should prophesy with harps, stringed instruments, and symbols? It's such a strange combination, isn't it? We should prophesy, but prophesy with instruments. That they were set apart for the ministry of prophecy with instruments. Once again, the root word for ministry is the literal meaning of ministry in Hebrew is to be a pap bearer, to serve, to be a waiter in other words. And we're all called to serve. I know we use that a lot in English. You know, I'm called to serve. I serve here. I serve there. I'm serving in the worship team. I'm serving in so-and-so team. But again, just to push that in a little bit more deeper and so that we don't even come close to the sense of entitlement. Because I'm the senior pastor, because I'm the youth pastor, you know, I don't know. I hope no horns grow. It is a possibility as human beings where a sense of entitlement is built in us. When we missed this picture that we are in this to serve, a literally a cup bearer. Nehemiah was a cup bearer. He was serving the king. And so more the annoying thing, more we will stoop down. In John 13, you know, Jesus stooping down, he took a bucket of water, took a towel, tied it around his waist. He went down washing the feet of his disciples because he loved them. And so love and service is ministry. The combination of love for the people and because you love them, you want to serve them in very simple terms. That is ministry. Okay, so they were set apart. The minister needs to serve to be cup bearers. One of the persons that I know, I will never forget this analogy or the example, not analogy, he said, he said, Russian in ministry, be ready to be used, be ready to be overused and be ready to be abused. When you step into full time ministry, remember, people will treat you like doormat. And you should find a way to be okay with it. As in not to treat you like you don't have any value, that is different. But then ministry can be challenging. If you are a waiter, you're going to have irritating customers, annoying customers as well. But that's what it is. Let's look at the other parts of the scripture from the same chapter. Verse 2, in First Chronicles 25, it says, the sons of Asaph, and the names of them, and it's that verse ends by saying, who prophesied according to the order of the king. And then verse 3, it mentions about the sons of Gerethin. And then it finishes by saying, under the direction of their father, Gerethin, who prophesied with the harp to give thanks to the praise of the Lord. Let's come down to verse 6. All their names are mentioned. Verse 6, it says, all these were under the direction of their father for the music in the house of the Lord with symbol stringed instruments and harps for the service of the house of God. Asaph, Gerethin, and He-Man were under the authority of the king. They were all under the authority of the king. That means they were all submissive. They were under the supervision of the king. And they were all submissive to the king. They all understood and honored and respected who their leader was. So this is very important because you are not always going to be in agreement with your leader whom you are serving. There will be times where you will feel like saying, you know, I don't think this is a good idea. Why is he doing this? You know, I think if we do this, it would be better. If you follow my idea, it would be better. Well, it's okay to disagree with some of the ideas and the ways of the leader that you are serving. But you can disagree and still be respectful. Disagreeing is not disrespectful. Right? And so the first worship leader had serious issue with submission. He had serious issues. He just had to think in his mind, I will ascend above the most high. I will make my throne above the throne of the most high. That's all he had to think. You know, pride entered entitlement. And so another word for submission is humility. Isn't it? Living a life of absolute surrender. And in this day and age in the world that we are living in, humility is portrayed as weakness. Humility is portrayed as weakness. But you have to be strong to be humble. You have to be strong to be the first one to say, I'm sorry even if you are at the right, isn't it? You have to be, let's say that there's a huge wall. In the campus, there's a big wall that separates the other compound and ours. And if one of us were to climb or jump over the wall, we need someone who's strong enough to bend over and give them their back so that the other person can stand on their back and jump over the wall. And so humility and being submissive is not weakness, isn't it? Have you ever seen martial artists, you know, they do this and they bow? I'm hoping you have. You know, it's what they are saying is that this power under control, this is what it means. This symbol simply means I can punch you, but I'm controlling it and I'm honoring you. So, and there's a beauty in submission honoring your leader. Because the leader is at the end of it, he is accountable to what God has called him for. Okay, so let us not judge our leaders. We'll do what we are called to do. We'll be submissive, just like, you know, how Asaf Heman and Jerityn and all their sons, it says that they were under the supervision of the king. They were submissive, isn't it? So they were set apart for the ministry, that means to serve, to be like cup bearers, and they were submissive. And the other characteristic we see in David's worship team is that they were all trained and skilled in music for the Lord. Verse 7, it says, So the number of them with their brethren who were instructed in the songs of the Lord, all who were skillful was 288. Now, it doesn't say that they were all the best musicians, because how would you define best? Is it? At least the Bible does not define what best is. But, you know, it says they were skillful, that means they were really, really good. You know, so we talk again, we talk David, the shepherd boy, isn't it? The one who killed Goliath with the sling, right? Now, historically, the shepherds from the region of Israel, from all the Israelites who were shepherds, from little boys to little girls even, they were very, very skilled with slinging stones. Now, they would do this, you know, say, if a flock is going in the wrong direction, a shepherd from far away would fling a stone 50 meters, 100 meters away, and to hit a rock, and that will change the direction of the flock. Okay, when he hits the stone this side, when they're going the wrong way, he would hit it far away, and then they'll be alarmed and they'll go the other direction. And there is a scripture, I forget with what the scripture is, it says that they could sling a stone, they could split a hair. You know, that's how skilled they were. And to say something, to say that you are skillful, that means you've been doing something every day, and you've been getting better at it every day with whatever your talent or your gift is. And because there is no room, you know, there's always room to grow, that's what I wanted to say. You know, so you can't arrive and say, okay, I've learned enough of guitar, I've learned enough of, you know, whatever, there is always more. I can get better, I can get better, I want to get better. And that is skill is you want to keep getting better and better and better and better. Okay, and the Bible says that they were all trained and skilled. Now that means if they were trained, it means there was someone who was teaching them as well. Isn't it verse eight, look at verse eight, it says they cast lots for their duty, the small as well as the great, the teacher with the student, the small and the great means the young and the old, the young ones and the old ones. So this is a very important point, not because we will talk about it in the next chapter, probably in the next class, about the difference between a band and a worship team. But look at David's worship team, that they were all trained and skilled, right? They're skillfully combined, their talent or the gift of music with the truth with the word, with the word of God, and they sang songs. And their work and his worship team was made of young people and old people, teacher and student. Now again, this point is kind of connected to humility is because you need to be humble enough to go and say and ask someone, teach me, right? Sometimes it can come out as sarcasm, as well as like, hey, how do you do that? Can you teach me also in a way that, okay, I already know this, but then, you know, let me be sarcastic in a way that I ask, hey, teach me how you do this. But there's a place of authenticity and genuineness where you can go to someone and say, please teach me. That means what I'm saying is, you know something I do not and I want to learn from you. That is humility. And humility also comes with teaching. You can only teach another person if you're humble. You will not teach another person if you are arrogant. Like, oh, why should I teach you? You're not worthy of my time. I hope I'm making sense, right? You need to be humble to even teach. Sure, I will impart, you know, I will share with you what I know, you know. And that's how it was. We see in the David's Worship Team that there were teachers and students and all of them worshipped and served together. And so this is how beautifully the David's Worship Team was organized, right? That they were set up, that they understood the seriousness of holiness, that they are called to be set apart of, you know, their priesthood, the holy nation. And they understood that God is holy. And they didn't mind being cupbearers. That means ministering, serving. And the tabernacle of David had gatekeepers, doorkeepers. And sometimes, you know, the scriptures mentioned there were thousands of them. I'm like, how many people do you need to open the door and open the gate and close the door, close the gate? But people were zealous to serve in the house of the Lord. They were zealous. And it all somewhere kind of shows to say that it begins with the leader. And this is not to say that, you know, all this burden on the leader, but I think David was a worshipper. He was an extravagant worshipper. He wanted to, because now he is king and he could afford and he could do whatever he wanted to do, he wanted to just go all out. He's like, yeah, I want thousands of men. Let's go. This is your duty and I will pay for you. It became their vocation. For the first time, we see that musicians, music, even as a vocation being introduced here, and they were all humble, submissive, and they were all trained and skilled, and they were teachers and students. So yeah, I hope there's something that we can take off from David's worship team to instill in our worship teams, you know, in your churches and because it's beautiful. All right. Any thoughts or any questions, anything, any points that you took away from what we learned that you want to share? All right. We'll stop here. We'll take a break and we'll come back and resume at the next session where we go into chapter two. All right. Thank you. I'll see you in a bit.