The laver: wash your hands and feet right there

The purpose of the laver was for the priests to "wash their hands and their feet thereat: (Ex. 30:19). The Christian life is referred to repeatedly as a "walk". Believers are told to "walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called" (Eph. 4:1); "walk as children of light" (5:8); "walk in love" (5:2); and "walk circumspectly" (5:15), to name just a few of the admonitions about their walk. In the book of Acts, the Christian life also is spoken of several times as the "way". In the short distance from the altar to the tabernacle, the priests would get their sandal-shod feet dirty and would need them washed before entering into the holy place to minister. In our walk we sin and get our feet dirty and need them cleansed so we need the laver, which pictures Christ cleansing us from the world's defilement (1 Jn. 1:9)

A wonderful explanation of this principle is in John 13, about foot-washing. When the Lord came to Peter to wash his feet, Peter said, "Thou shalt never wash my feet." Jesus answered, "If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me: (v. 8). The word for "part" has the idea of fellowship or partnership in activity, nothing of relationship. Peter wanted fellowship; he already had a relationship with Jesus. Therefore he said "Not my feet only, but also my hands and my head: (v. 9).  Jesus answered, "He that is washed (or "bathed", as the Greek word louo means) needeth not save to wash (Greek, nipto) his feet, but is clean every whit" (v. 10).

Greek scholars for years have pointed out that the first word for washed is louo, which means "to bathe all over." The second is nipto which means "to wash just a part of the body,: such as the hands and feet.

These words accurately fit the functions of the brazen altar and laver. He that has been bathed from his sins at the altar in salvation does not need to be bathed again, but simply needs to wash his feet at the laver from the defilement of sins before entering the holy place of worship and service.  Jesus was showing Peter that He was going to forgive him for the denial even before he committed the act, as foretold in v. 38. Today we practice foot-washing as we "wash one another's feet" (Jn. 13:14) when we forgive one another.

YOU are loved by God and me ABC Sumner

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JESUS IS COMING. "Prepare to meet thy God" Amos 4:12.

Let the wife make the husband glad to come home, and let him make her sorry to see him leave." - Martin Luther

The Tabernacle: washing at the laver, hands and feet.

When we accept the Lord Jesus Christ as personal Savior, we are "born of God", with His kind of life, eternal life, and we will never perish (Jn. 3:16; 5:24). When we sin after that it breaks our fellowship with the Lord but does not change our relationship. If my son does something wrong, he is still my son. He may not enjoy being my son when I discipline him, but he is still my son by birth, and nothing can change that. So it is with God and His children. We are children of God by birth, a relationship far more permanent than earthly ties. It is everlasting, for "nothing can separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Rom. 8:39 b).If we claim to have been saved a while and then, because of some sin, say we are no longer saved nor have eternal life, then we never were saved to begin with. Christ alone is the Author of "eternal salvation" (Heb. 5:9). But what about that sin committed after we were saved" Christ has already suffered for that sin too, or we would have to suffer for it in hell; nothing else could satisfy God's justice. "The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life" (Rom. 6:23).

 

Usually unbelievers accuse those who believe in eternal security - once saved always saved - of thinking they can be saved and then go out and live like the devil himself and still go to heaven. That is a very foolish and perverted idea of a wonderful truth. A parallel would be to say you can get married and then have the privilege of treating your spouse any way you want; that is, mistreat your spouse, commit adultery, and generally live wildly just because he vowed to be married "until death do us part"! A rather absurd idea, isn't it? No more absurd than the false implications and applications some make of the wonderful truth that, when a person is saved or born again, he will "never perish" (Jn. 10:28)

 

First, someone who "says" he is saved and then lives like the devil himself is just proving he still is the devil's child. God's Word says, "They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us; but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us" (1 Jn. 2:19). This perverted idea also fails to take into account that when one is born again or saved that "He is a new creature; old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new" (2 Cor. 5:17). He has a new nature (2 Pet. 1:4) and won't want to live like the devil! Also, he now loves the Lord Jesus and certainly won't want to mistreat the Lord Jesus any more than he would want to mistreat his spouse!

 

SERIOUSLY, go to our website, www.sumnerwemp.com. and download the series of tapes on witnessing. Over the past 30 years, thousands of these tapes have been sold and used to teach and train people to witness effectively. Use them, they are free to you.

Then enter our free book drawing. Get our newest tract, "Your Ticket to Heaven" Call 1-877-827-2871 to order them in KJV, Spanish or ESV.. ABC Sumner

The Tabernacle-washing at the laver is so important

Washing at the laver
You enter the one door in the fence around the tabernacle to go to the holy of holies and the presence of God. The first thing you see is the huge brazen altar where the animal sacrifices were offered, it is the picture of Calvary where the Lamb of God was offered to pay for our sins. Now you come to the "Laver", the place of washing before you enter the holy place of worship and fellowship with God.

"Laver" is the same word from which we get out word "lavatory". It simply means "a place for washing." The priests were commanded to wash here before entering the holy place (Ex. 30:18-21). It is a picture of the believer being cleansed from the sins he commits after he is saved. While the brazen altar is associated with a person receiving Christ and becoming saved, the laver is associated with cleansing for the sins he commits after salvation.

The instructions for washing at the laver are in Ex. 30:17-21:

"And the Lord spake unto Moses saying, Thou shalt also make a laver of brass, and his foot also of brass, to wash withal: and thou shalt put it between the tabernacle of the congregation and the altar, and thou shalt put water therein. For Aaron and his sons shall wash their hands and their feet thereat: when they go into the tabernacle of the congregation, they shall wash with water, that they die not; or when they come near to the altar to minister, to burn offering made by fire unto the Lord: so they shall wash their hands and their feet, that they die not: and it shall be a statute forever to them, even to him and to his seed throughout their generations."

One of the first things a believer needs to learn is what to do when he sins after be is saved. What are the consequences and the cure? The laver answers these queries. At the brazen altar we see Christ judged for our sins, which brings us into an eternal relationship with eternal life with the Lord through salvation At the brazen laver we judge ourselves for our daily sins, and this restores the fellowship with the Lord, broken by those sins. See 1 Cor. 11:31 read this right now. It is immensely important. Don't miss the follow up and finish of this lesson next Wed. YOU ARE LOVED by God and me, ABC Sumner

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"A bone of contention has no place in the Body of Christ."

Everything is in place for Jesus to come again! "Prepare to meet thy God" Amos 4:12.

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