12) Hebrews - Nothing Is Hidden
Notes
Transcript
“Be Reconciled to God” Root of Fruit Sin addressed “Unbelief, Pride, Selfishness”
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Call to Worship
Saving Faith
3. This faith may exist in varying degrees so that it may be either weak or strong.11 Yet even in its weakest form, it is different in kind or nature (like all other saving graces) from the faith and common grace of temporary believers.12 Therefore, faith may often be attacked and weakened, but it gains the victory.13 It matures in many to the point that they attain full assurance through Christ,14 who is both the founder and perfecter of our faith.15
Corporate Prayer -
Worship through Song
Scripture Reading
7 The instruction of the Lord is perfect, renewing one’s life; the testimony of the Lord is trustworthy, making the inexperienced wise. 8 The precepts of the Lord are right, making the heart glad; the command of the Lord is radiant, making the eyes light up. 9 The fear of the Lord is pure, enduring forever; the ordinances of the Lord are reliable and altogether righteous. 10 They are more desirable than gold— than an abundance of pure gold; and sweeter than honey dripping from a honeycomb. 11 In addition, your servant is warned by them, and in keeping them there is an abundant reward. 12 Who perceives his unintentional sins? Cleanse me from my hidden faults. 13 Moreover, keep your servant from willful sins; do not let them rule me. Then I will be blameless and cleansed from blatant rebellion. 14 May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, Lord, my rock and my Redeemer.
Worship through Song
Worship through Song
Sermon
Prayer
Introduction
Introduction
The author has come the the end of his first main topic. His focus last week was on the promise to enter God’s rest. Let us read our passage from last week.
1 Therefore, since the promise to enter his rest remains, let us beware that none of you be found to have fallen short. 2 For we also have received the good news just as they did. But the message they heard did not benefit them, since they were not united with those who heard it in faith. 3 For we who have believed enter the rest, in keeping with what he has said, So I swore in my anger, “They will not enter my rest,” even though his works have been finished since the foundation of the world. 4 For somewhere he has spoken about the seventh day in this way: And on the seventh day God rested from all his works. 5 Again, in that passage he says, They will never enter my rest. 6 Therefore, since it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly received the good news did not enter because of disobedience, 7 he again specifies a certain day—today. He specified this speaking through David after such a long time: Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts. 8 For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken later about another day. 9 Therefore, a Sabbath rest remains for God’s people. 10 For the person who has entered his rest has rested from his own works, just as God did from his.
The promise of rest that was given to the Israelites after they left Egypt still remains. As they had left Egypt and worked their way to the promised land they has seen God do many amazing things. He promised them that he would go out in front of them and conquer the land of the Canaanites. But when they arrived they scouted the land and 10 of the 12 scouts came back and convinced Isreal that the promised land was not possible to be conquered, that even though is was a land of great plenty, the people in the land were too big and they did not stand a chance of winning.
They had come to a test of faith, a test of their belief. Do we trust in what God promised or do we look out with our own eyes and trust what we believe we can do. Isreal chose to trust in their own power and they refused to enter the promised land of God and in doing so they rebelled against God and the result was that they did not enter God’s rest. The men and women over a certain age would never enter into the promised land.
He said that even though later on Isreal would go into the promised land after their punishment of wondering in the wilderness for 40 years was over, the promised rest still remains to the church today.
The rest of God is still available and can only be entered in one way and that is to believe and trust in God and more specifically the believe and trust in the finished work of Jesus that messiah, Jesus the savior of the lost, Jesus the redeemer of sinful men, Jesus the high priest and mediator of God’s people.
This where we pick things up today.
11 Let us, then, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall into the same pattern of disobedience. 12 For the word of God is living and effective and sharper than any double-edged sword, penetrating as far as the separation of soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. 13 No creature is hidden from him, but all things are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give an account.
He brings the church into one call to action let us then make every effort to enter the rest that is promised, so that no one will fall into the same pattern of disobedience.
Make Every Effort
Make Every Effort
Let us make every effort to enter the rest. What image pops into your mind as you hear make every effort? Does a list of tasks come to the front of you mind? Do you start to think of all of the things that a christian is commanded to do?
The word that is translated into make every effort means
To be eager or to have a keen interest, intense desire, or impatient expectancy
Let us be eager to enter the rest. To be eager I think of children and how they can ave this abundant almost consuming eagerness to chase after things. To have a keen interest, not a passing fondness of a fleeting notice but a keen, focused interest. An intense desire, to long for it, and to be impatiently and expectantly looking toward it.
To enter the rest is not to cross a boarder or enter a room. It isn’t something you move in or out of.It means to enter a state of rest. Be in a state of rest not at rest. It isn’t a place to get to, it is not a destination. It is a state of being.
It is the rest of God that comes through belief in Jesus that a person enters into the state of rest.
Let us labour, strive, make every effort to enter this rest. This is the labor of faith not the labor of works. Spurgeon wrote “let us labor to not labor”.
The natural man works for what he wants. Even if that means nothing. Each and every person will expound massive amounts of energy to get what they want. Look at athletes, of scholars, or business people, or stay at home moms, or anything else.
We are willing to spend time, money, and energy to get what we want. This does not have to be taught. Who here has offered a child a sweet treat to produce a certain behavior. The parent and the child are working for what they want.
We are not to run around busily working and tallying up every work to make sure we enter into into this rest. it is actually the opposite. The labor is not doing all of the work but eagerly seeking with a keen interest the rest of God the promises of our Lord and savior. Let us labor not to labor.
The Jews were great at laboring with works. Look at the Pharisees and religious leaders. They prided themselves on being inline with the law. To deny must to be conformed to the image of the law but they were not in God’s rest.
There were Jews in the church community that were tempted to fall back into Judaism. TO go back to the rule following. To stand on the door step of the promise of God and to reject it. To fail to believe in the promise and to walk away from it. Isreal stood on the edge of the promised land and the Jews stood on the boarder of the Gospel, on the boarder of the Good news of Jesus.
They were tempted to fall, to suffer defeat and fail to enter the rest.
How would they fail to enter, by following the pattern of the disobedient. Isreal is used as a sample of what not to do. It is not the pattern of the disobedient that we are to follow but the example of Jesus.
12 When Jesus had washed their feet and put on his outer clothing, he reclined again and said to them, “Do you know what I have done for you? 13 You call me Teacher and Lord—and you are speaking rightly, since that is what I am. 14 So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. 15 For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done for you. 16 “Truly I tell you, a servant is not greater than his master, and a messenger is not greater than the one who sent him. 17 If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them. 18 “I’m not speaking about all of you; I know those I have chosen. But the Scripture must be fulfilled: The one who eats my bread has raised his heel against me. 19 I am telling you now before it happens, so that when it does happen you will believe that I am he. 20 Truly I tell you, whoever receives anyone I send receives me, and the one who receives me receives him who sent me.”
The author does not want anyone to be in a state of disobedience. And the state of disobedience comes from the state of unbelief. He says be focused on the rest on Jesus keep your effort towards him so that no one will fall by following the pattern. What is the pattern? To come to the promises of God and when they require faith a person turns away to what they know and they demonstrate that their trust is not in God but in themselves.
The Word
The Word
12 For the word of God is living and effective and sharper than any double-edged sword, penetrating as far as the separation of soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
Why must the people of the church live this way? Because of This HOLD UP THE BIBLE
Because of the word of God. Jesus is the word of God but all through Hebrews that author refers to Jesus and the Son. Here the word Logos is the message of God. His words. God speaks through the Son, he speak through Jesus and the word of God cannot be separated from Jesus in anyway but here he is speaking of the written words of God.
For it is living and active. This is not a bunch of translated literature from some people who wrote a long time ago. It is active, powerful, energetic. It is effective.
It brings spiritual life.
22 Since you have purified yourselves by your obedience to the truth, so that you show sincere brotherly love for each other, from a pure heart love one another constantly, 23 because you have been born again—not of perishable seed but of imperishable—through the living and enduring word of God.
The word is living and powerful and it is the person who has been born again that will see that truth revealed. The is no understanding without new life. Yes there can be compliance like any self help book but the author is speaking of the words of God on a different level. Other books bay be inspirational, they may even be culture changing, or best sellers but they do not live and they are not effective at the level of the bible.
For it is sharper than a two-edged sword. There are different types of swords referred to in the bible this is the same sword mentioned in Ephesians
17 Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit—which is the word of God.
The image that the author is bringing forth is a very sharp sword or dagger that would be used in close combat fighting or in cutting up animals for food and sacrifice. He is pulling the readers to the most effective cutting blade that there was at the time.
He says that it is even sharper than that blade. it is unparalleled in cutting sharpness.
Hebrews Exposition
The Word of God is so sharp a thing, so full of cutting power, that you may be bleeding under its wounds before you have seriously suspected the possibility of such a thing. You cannot come near the gospel without its having a measure of influence over you; and, God blessing you, it may cut down and kill your sins when you have no idea that such a work is being done. Yes, when Christ comes, He comes not to send peace on the earth, but a sword; and that sword begins at home, in our own souls, killing, cutting, hacking, breaking in pieces. Blessed is that man who knows the Word of the Lord by its exceeding sharpness, for it kills nothing but that which ought to be killed. It quickens and gives new life to all that is of God; but the old depraved life, which ought to die,
Hebrews 4:12 (CSB)
… penetrating as far as the separation of soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
Not only is it described as having a sharpness far beyond a sword, It has the ability to penetrate, to pass through into something that resists. And it dives deep to the place where soul and spirit are.
The author is not speaking of separating soul and spirit but to the place of that separation. the word soul come from the greek word that we get the word psyche. It speaks of the heart, mind, and conscience.
30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.
The word spirit refers to the immaterial part of a person. That part that will be after the physical body has passed. The point he is making is that the word penetrates to the innermost part of a man. To a depth that at the absolute end of a person. That nothing is out of its reach. He then adds a physical metaphor to reinforce this idea using the image of joints and marrow. Once again, not separating them because the are not even in contact with each other. the joints separate the body and the marrow is inside the bone. The hardest substance to get to in the body. The deepest parts of the material body is used as an image for the spiritual part of a man.
This is is reinforced with the next line
Hebrews 4:12 (CSB)
... It is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
It penetrates so deep that it judges the thoughts and intentions of the heart. Think about that for a minute. Have you sat down and asked why you do what you do. Why you want what you want. Have you ever been confused by your own actions and thoughts. There are people who have studied the minds of humanity in an attempt to quantify and explain the human mind and psyche. But the word of God is the only thing that has the power to do just that.
The word judge means to discern to evaluate and label what a though or action truly is.
The word of God separates truth and fiction, Holy and profane, righteous and evil, Godly and ungodly, things that give life and things that give death.
The bible and the word of the bible must be read and recieved with humility and belief otherwise they will be rejected. Only a regenerate person will eagerly pursue the hard truths in this book. Knowing and trusting in the goodness of God.
The reprobate, unregenerate, lost person who hears the special revelation of scripture will be drawn to it or repulsed by it. It is by the holy spirit and the work of God in a person to be open to the truth of God’s word. To find it to give life. Others will reject it and along with that they will reject God’s rest.
Because no mater how a person interacts with scripture in their mortal life there is a time that all will be revealed.
No Hiding Place
No Hiding Place
13 No creature is hidden from him, but all things are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give an account.
No person created by God can hide from God. It is actually ridiculous to claim God created each and every person. To defend that God knitted you together in your mothers womb and then to live as if he cannot see what you are doing. because there will be a day when every person will come to a point where all is exposed. And every intention and thought will be revealed.
The words translated as naked and exposed may be translated as open and laid bare. These word are a little hard for us to see the picture that the author was painting in the minds of the readers. These words were used in at least three different ways that the audience would have been familiar with.
It was used to describe when a wrestler had a hold on his opponents neck. Such as choke hold. In collage I trained with a friend who did Brazilian jujitsu. The absolute worst place to be in was to have a person get behind you and put you in a choke hold. The head was drawn back and the opponent was helpless.
The second possible is there was a method of binding criminals and securing a knife under their chin to keep them from looking away from the judge.
The third is very foreign to us as a society but in those times and before the act of animal and human sacrifices were common and without going into detail the neck of the sacrifice would be exposed.
It is impossible to know the exact image that the author was thinking of the idea is that when this time comes. When each an every person gives there account for their life they will be helpless and exposed. And it will be the word of God that separates each and every thought and intention of the heart and mind.
Hebrews Chapter 4
And what solemn feelings should all have who remember that all is naked and open before God! Were we transparent so that the world could see all we are, who would dare go abroad? Who would wish the world to read all his thoughts and feelings for a single day? Who would wish his best friends to look in upon his naked soul as we can look into a room through a window? O what blushes and confusion; what a hanging down of the head, and what an effort to escape from the gaze of men would there be, if every one knew that all his secret feelings were seen by every person whom he met! Social enjoyment would end; and the now gay and blithe multitudes in the streets would become processions of down-cast and blushing convicts. And yet all these are known to God. He reads every thought; sees every feeling; looks through the whole soul. How careful should we be to keep our hearts pure; how anxious that there should be nothing in the soul that we are not willing to have known!
I want to point out that it says the thoughts and intentions of a person are what the word judges. It is not the actions. It is not the works that are judged. It is what is in the heart of a person that is to be revealed.
Conclusion
Conclusion
As we read these final words of of this first section of Hebrews we should come to have some tension. As we live with our human nature if we are not careful to walk according to the calling that we have. as we continue to see the temptations of this world and we submit to them rather than to God’s word we know that there are things that can and will be revealed. And for the person who never enters God’s rest
by believing in the saving grace of God, by believing in the saving work of Jesus, the second person of the Trinity, who took on a second nature a nature of humanity, and by believing that he died for our sins, that he paid for our transgressions and sins, and by living a perfect life that he conquered the penalty of sin, he conquered death.
The person that rejects these truths they will stand helpless before God as the word sifts through the thoughts and intentions of their life and they see that they have nothing that is not burned up.
But for the believer they will stand with the righteousness of Jesus before them. Thought there are sins that must be dealt with in life, Jesus paid for the penalty that we deserved. In the end there is no hiding so let us make every effort to enter into his rest.
Let us pray.
Prayer
Communion
Warning
Children, Lost, Sin
19 And he took bread, gave thanks, broke it, gave it to them, and said, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” 20 In the same way he also took the cup after supper and said, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.
Prayer
Song
Closing
Blessing/Benediction
20 Now may the God of peace, who brought up from the dead our Lord Jesus—the great Shepherd of the sheep—through the blood of the everlasting covenant, 21 equip you with everything good to do his will, working in us what is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.