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Illus: My first visit to a charismatic church.
When we tackle our distinctives as a church, which are those things in which Christians will disagree while still being Christians, we will find there are some very distinct differences.
Lutherans, Presbyterians, Anglicans, Baptists, and Methodists are going to disagree with where we land on communion and Baptism and such, and we disagree with where they land on this.
Yet we're brothers and sisters in Christ who love one another, are going to spend a lot of time in heaven with one another celebrating the same Savior.
But know this.
We're just unwavering Bible folk.
That's going to make the world think we're a little weird.
It's going to challenge us personally as the Word of God bears its weight on us.
So what do we do when we start talking about the gifts of the Holy Spirit and how they interact in our lives?
How do we respond to the tough ones?
What do we do with stuff like prophecy?
To talk about the sign gifts of the Holy Spirit, I want to go to Hebrews, chapter 4, verse 12 and 13.
Don't freak out if you’re more charismatic.
I can here you now, "Wrong text, bro.
No, no, no.
You need 1 Corinthians 12 through 14.
You need to get in the book of Acts, Pastor.
You will not captivate our imagination with Hebrews 4."
Yet I'll tell you if Hebrews 4 stands in opposition to the sign gifts of the Holy Spirit, then the sign gifts of the Holy Spirit have no place in the church.
The Word of God interprets the Word of God.
So, we're not afraid of any text ever on any subject, right?
I'd better get an amen on that, or I'm preaching a different sermon okay?
Now here we go.
We are going to look at the text now and allow the HS to do what He does best.
He will work it out in us.
Read: Hebrews 4:12-13
Now it's important to note kind of where this very well-known passage among Christians is situated in the book of Hebrews.
Namely, this passage is found amidst a ton of warning about the people of God and how the people of God relate to and interact with their King.
This is not just kind of a random text about the Bible in the Bible.
It's found within the context of warning about how the people of God interact with God.
It continues our movement from last week.
It is rooted in Psalm 95.
It is rooted back into Exodus.
We'll talk more about that here in a moment, but I think what I want to do at the beginning here is define.
So, this is what's happening when we read here, "For the word of God is living and active…" I would say the Word of God in Hebrews, chapter 4, is talking about Jesus.
When we read this text, we can read it as saying, Jesus is living and active.
Jesus is sharper than any two-edged sword.
The point is when you read the Word of God as living and active, you're to think about the Son of God revealed by the written Word of God.
Are you with me?
That's what's being had here.
What we see is the Word of God is a serious matter.
It is not to be taken lightly.
Now for time's sake, I had to cut some things.
But if we had time and could go read Hebrews 3:12 through 4:11, where you're going to find nothing but the warning of God on his people for how they hear his Word and don't do it.
Later this week, I want you to read all of this, but here's what's said in those verses.
He says to them, "Hey, take care.
Be careful."
He is going to say, "Do not harden your hearts."
He is going to say early in chapter 4 that the message they heard did not benefit them.
He is going to say, "Did not their bodies fall in the wilderness, and did they not enter his rest?"
See, the book of Hebrews up until this point is just a blanket warning that the people of God have a tendency to hear the Word of God and not submit to it, to hear the Word of God but reject it.
That's what he is saying.
"Hey, be careful.
Don't do that."
The refrain up until this point is, "Today if you hear his voice, don't harden your heart.
Today if you hear his voice…"
Now that's all a quote from Psalm 95 where King David is referencing Exodus where the people of God heard the Word of God and rejected it.
He is saying this is what the people of God do.
Now look.
Here's what we'll do.
What we'll do is we'll kind of look at this kind of like we look at the Pharisees when we hear about the Pharisees.
We're just like, "Had I been there, Jesus, in the first century, I would have been your guy, King Jesus.
I would not be like those weak vessels who ran, who turned their back, who denied."
Yet what about your life is leading you to believe that?
What revisionist history we must have?
What self-aggrandizing tendencies must exist in our hearts?
No, he is saying, "Since the beginning, my people have heard my Word, gotten energized by it, and then fallen away from it."
In the middle of this idea of warning, take care.
Be careful.
Don't harden your heart.
Today, today, today, today, today, today.
If you hear his voice, he then ties it to the solution to this problem.
"For the word of God is living and active…" Let's just talk about this text.
The Word of God is alive.
I love this.
This is what the Bible is teaching about.
This book is not just a book of history, although it has history in it.
It's not just a book of laws, although there are laws in it.
It's just not a book of stories, although there are stories in it.
This book is alive.
It's living.
It produces.
It does stuff.
This is not the only text where the Bible is talked about in these ways.
This is Acts, chapter 7.
This is Stephen, who is not an apostle.
He doesn't work at the church.
He is just a layman.
Stephen basically ran the potluck for widows at the church in Jerusalem.
This is a lay guy.
I don't know what his regular job was but, man, his theological chops are breathtaking.
I want to encourage you.
Just because you don't work for a church and haven't been through seminary doesn't mean you can't know theology and the story of God you find yourself in.
As Stephen is preaching this sermon that starts with creation and ends with the resurrection of Jesus, he says this in Acts 7 referencing Moses on Mount Sinai.
"This is the one who was in the congregation in the wilderness with the angel who spoke to him at Mount Sinai, and with our fathers.
He received…" What? "…living oracles to give to us."
Do you hear it?
The Ten Commandments, the things God gave to Moses to give to the people of God was given as living oracles.
They weren't static.
They were meant to accomplish something.
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