“So Aaron shall bear the names of the sons of Israel on the breastplate of judgement over his heart, when he goes into the holy place, as a memorial before the Lord continually.” Exodus 28:29
Have you ever tried to read through the Bible from start to finish, perhaps with the aid of a reading plan or perhaps just jumping right in at Genesis 1:1?
How did you get on? For many (if not all) of us, reading the Bible through just isn’t as easy as we perhaps feel it ought to be.
Take the chapters upon chapters of Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers that deal with the building of the tabernacle (with the lists of dimensions and materials and so on); or that deal with the priestly clothing (again, with the lists of dimensions and materials and so on); or that list the various censuses (with the numbers upon numbers upon numbers)…
Now, I’m sure that there are people will enjoy reading those parts – architects, engineers, mathematicians perhaps, who have an interest in such things; or who will have a great understanding of such things;
But some of you may be like me and the words seem just to all blur together and, to be honest, I generally get very little out of these sections of the Bible by just reading through them by myself, without the help of experts explaining the importance and relevance of what I am reading.
However, in my experience of reading through these portions of the Bible I find that every so often, in the midst of all this blurriness, something will just shine out, like a bit of metal suddenly catching the sunlight…
And Exodus 28:29 is an example of exactly that.
Now, we know that in the design of temple, the design of the sacrifices, and even in the design of the priestly clothing God is teaching us something about salvation; and as the priestly clothing applies specifically to the priest, so this teaching applies specifically to the Person of Jesus Christ – who is, of course, our Great High Priest –
So when we find ourselves reading about the names of the people of God being placed especially over the priest’s heart we do not necessarily need so great a theological mind to understand the meaning.
We know what it means for someone to be ‘upon our heart’. We might have found ourselves saying to someone, “I just want you to know that you’re very much upon my heart”. It means to love, to care and even to cherish.
We know what that means. It means we are loved. And so, we can know immediately from this verse that we are loved by Jesus – our names (the names of ‘the people of God’) are written upon His heart!
There are a few hymns that reference this Bible text, but there was one that jumped out immediately as I was considering the text:
Before the throne of God above, I have a strong, a perfect, plea
A Great High Priest whose Name is Love, Who ever lives and pleads for me.
My name is graven on His hands, my name is written on His heart…
This is a beautiful picture that tells us Jesus loves us – but it also teaches us some things about how Jesus loves us too, three of which are as follows:
1. Firstly, this breastplate is called the ‘breastplate of judgement’ (v.15).
What a strange way of showing us that He loves us, with a breastplate of judgement!! We have to understand, though, that this isn’t talking about end-time type judgements here. It is judgements more along the lines of decision making. When God makes judgements (or decisions) concerning His people He makes those judgements with love.
If we think about what this means for us then we can see that this is a wonderful thing for us to always remember and hold on to. As God plans out our lives for us, He does so with every judgement being made with love toward us.
This is especially precious during those times that we find it difficult to understand God’s plan for us – to know that it has been made with love toward us, nonetheless.
2. Secondly, the High Priest was commanded to wear this breastplate every time he goes into the holy place (v.29).
Now the priest would go into the holy place only for a very specific reason – to offer sacrifices. This simply highlights the fact that when Jesus offered up the sacrifice of Himself, He did it because He loved us; He did it with our names upon His heart. That’s another wonderful thing to remember.
Through the pain that we can see etched across Jesus’ face upon Calvary’s cross we can see the depths of His love toward us. Hallelujah, what a Saviour.
3. Thirdly, the priestly role was a role of intercession. The hymn we quoted (‘Before the throne of God above’) recognises this link:
“A Great High Priest whose Name is Love, who ever lives and pleads for me”. Hebrews 7:25 says, “Therefore, He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them”.
Do you ever feel alone? That no one cares? That there is no one in the entire world that is praying for you?
Maybe that’s true! I’m sure its not (especially if you have a loving church), but even if it was true – there is always someone praying for you… always! Someone in heaven is praying for you… and He is praying for you because you are upon His heart!
Isn’t that a wonderful thought, also? In fact, the more that we come to see, and understand, about God’s love, the more we are also able to see why the Apostle John says quite simply, “God is love” (1 John 4:8 – italics mine).
So, there are three things we can learn about Jesus’ love for us in this ‘breastplate of judgement’:
1. When God makes judgements concerning us, He does so with our names upon His heart.
2. Jesus offered up the sacrifice of Himself with our names upon His heart.
3. Jesus is always praying for us, with our names upon His heart.
Because He loves us! Because He loves us, this is what Jesus’ love does for us!
But let me also close by asking you a question:
If we say that we love Jesus, what does our love do for Him? If we see what Jesus does because we are upon His heart, what do we do because Jesus is upon our hearts?