Hebrews 4:9-16, "Anticipate Mercy"

Ken MacLeod

Prayer • Sermon • Submitted 7 months ago • Presented 6 months ago

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Have you ever had a stay at a hospital, or been with someone during their stay? Any time I have been with someone in that situation, there’s one phrase that makes me smile every time I hear it. A doctor or nurse will tell the patient as they leave the room, “Get some rest.” And I smile because I know that in ten or fifteen minutes, another nurse or physical therapist or CNA or doctor or environmental specialist or…will come in and disturb the patient’s rest. Not only that, but if you know you’re having surgery in an hour or in the morning, how much rest are you really able to achieve?

Our passage today is an invitation to pray anticipating God’s word to do surgery in our hearts, but also anticipating mercy, and we will find rest for our souls.

Augustine of Hippo said, “You have made us for Yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in You.” Your soul was made to rest in God. How does that happen? It starts with listening to God’s word.

The letter to the Hebrews is an appeal to listen to God. Ever since God created human beings in His image He has been speaking to us, but most of us aren’t listening. As a result we are all enslaved to sin through the fear of death. God has spoken in the past through many prophets. But now He is speaking through His Son, Jesus the Messiah. Jesus is our last chance.

This is how the letter opens,

Hebrews 1:1–2 (ESV)

Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world.

Jesus is the one who said,

Matthew 11:28–30 (ESV)

“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

Generation after generation of human beings have tried to fix the world their own way and appease God with their religion and none of it works. And all along, God has been inviting us to listen to Him. If we will just do what He says, we will have eternal life and rest for our souls. But He asks us to do things we don’t want to do. So we don’t, and that’s sin. That way ends in death.

But here’s the good news, God sent His Son. He lived as a human, but as no one else, He lived as a human should. He was totally obedient to God the Father. Obedient even to die on a cross for the sins of everyone who was disobedient. In that act of obedience, Jesus was acting our High Priest, offering a perfect sacrifice for our sins. The Bible tells us His sacrifice was so complete, it opened the way for us to draw near to God on His throne, in all His holiness.

Can you envision what it would be like to approach the throne of God in heaven? Some people already have. What they tell us is astonishing. He is surrounded by 24 thrones for the elders representing all of us, every one clothed in white with golden crowns. Lightning and thunder come from God’s throne. There are seven torches of fire, which is the seven-fold Spirit of God. Before Him is a sea of crystal glass. He is surrounded by four creatures representing all living creatures on earth, each of them with six wings and full of eyes all around and within, and day and night they never cease to say, “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!”

And the elders join in the worship by laying their crowns at His feet, saying,

“Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.”

I don’t know about you, but there are one or two things there that would make me pretty shy about approaching God’s throne. But here’s the gospel.

Jesus says, you don’t have to appease God, you don’t have to fix the world, or even yourself. All you need to do is come to Jesus, “yoke yourself to me”, “trust in me, unite yourself with me by faith, learn from my gentle and lowly heart and you can rest in my grace. I will forgive your sins and enable you to do obey God’s word so you receive eternal life and have peace with God.” And you can approach the throne of God with confidence.

For the person who believes in Jesus as our Messiah, our Savior, life is transformed. Hebrews tells us about all these transformations: we hear from God, we no longer fear death, we are not enslaved to sins, we grow in faith, we have the community of faith to help us, we have an unshakable hope, and even an ability to love even complete strangers. But here in chapter 4, the life transformation the writer highlights for the one who believes the gospel of Jesus is rest.

Hebrews 4:9–10 (ESV)

So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God’s rest has also rested from his works as God did from his.

You can stop striving to please God. You can stop trying fix everything. You can rest from your striving to overcome the fear of death that leads to enslavement to sin and self-centered living.

So, if we put this in the context of prayer, as we have been learning, Jesus taught us to pray to God as our Father in heaven. We can come to God any time we need our Dad.

Matthew 6:9–11 (ESV)

“Our Father in heaven,

hallowed be your name.

Your kingdom come,

your will be done,

on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread,

And sometimes, we come knowing we need forgiveness for some sin. So, Jesus goes on in the prayer He taught us,

Matthew 6:12 (ESV)

and forgive us our debts,

as we also have forgiven our debtors.

We rest in the fact that we can be forgiven anything because Jesus has paid the debt of our sins. So, the writer of Hebrews says, to really believe in the gospel is to go to God as our Father, trusting that Jesus has done everything necessary for us to rest in God’s love.

Hebrews 4:11 (ESV)

Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience.

That took a turn. Disobedience to what? To the word of God that is calling us to rest in Christ. Then, the writer of Hebrews says that word that invites us to rest is the same word that will perform surgery.

Hebrews 4:12–13 (ESV)

For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

So, here’s the process. We come to God as our heavenly Father, and we bring Him our praise, our surrender to His will, our requests for what we need, and our confession. And in that moment, if we are listening, our Father will speak to us. We pray with our Bibles open. Our Father might have something to say, and the Bible is God’s word to us. It is not a static, ancient manuscript. It is the record of God’s word to people for thousands of years. And all of it points to Jesus Christ. He fulfills it in such a way, that He is the living embodiment of God’s word. He is the living word, personally connected to the written word. And He has the ability, through His Spirit in a believer, to use the Bible to speak to our minds and hearts in very personal and pointed ways.

When I come seeking forgiveness from God, He will start exposing things in my life. He starts doing surgery. You perform surgery on someone who has something corrupt or broken on the inside. And just because someone becomes a believer in Jesus and finds rest in God doesn’t mean all the corruption and brokenness in our souls goes away instantly.

I cannot tell you how many times I have come to God seeking a time of worship or communion, or in need, or even asking forgiveness, and He surprised me by exposing something in my heart or mind that laid me bare. There was a thought or intention I had not even seen, or hadn’t been paying attention to. But He used His word to show me the corruption and brokenness that was in there.

For example,

In that moment, when we have come to rest, and find our Father wanting to do surgery, and we feel naked and exposed and in pain, we need to know it’s going to be okay. We need a priest. That’s when Jesus shows Himself so gentle and lowly. He meets us in that moment as our priest. He sympathizes with us, and He uses His word to remind us that He has paid for every sin. He has experienced all our pain, and it has produced eternal glory, so hold on. If the Father wants to cut out some corruption or reset some brokenness in it, though it may hurt in the moment, Jesus will hold us through it, and it will produce good fruit later.

But He doesn’t just give sympathy. Look at this next passage,

Hebrews 4:14–15 (ESV)

Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

He is victorious in every way we have failed. He is strong in every way we are weak. He overcame the weakness of human nature. He was tempted in every way we are, but He never sinned. When He could have turned back from the cross, He surrendered to the will of the Father. He is our strong helper.

Hebrews 12:2 (ESV)

[We look] to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Hebrews 12:3 (ESV)

Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.

He lifts our drooping hands and strengthens our weak knees. When we are exposed in all our weakness and failure. When God lays bare all the times we gave in to temptation, Jesus is there to remind us that He has paid the debt of all our sin, and we get grace. We can draw near the throne of the King of the universe and anticipate mercy.

Hebrews 4:16 (ESV)

Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

The strength of our faith in the gospel is not our ability to live life perfectly. The strength of our faith is in Jesus, who shows up in our weakness and gives us mercy and grace to help us in our time of need. Sometimes that time will come before we have given in to the temptation and we will feel His strength to overcome. Sometimes the help comes when we have been overwhelmed by the temptation and given in and we need mercy one more time. The writer of Hebrews says, if you really believe the gospel, if you take God at His word, you’ll come to God’s throne with confidence. It is a throne of grace. We pray, “Father, forgive me my debt,” because we know we owe more than we can ever repay.

Anticipate mercy. It may be a severe mercy. But if God is exposing your corruption and brokenness, it is for your healing. You’ll be stronger for the next time.

I’m thankful for people that have demonstrated this grace and mercy to me. I had a seminary professor named Bill Jones. Dr. Jones taught personal evangelism and church planting. I took personal evangelism my first semester and I was overwhelmed, between my classes, and work, and being newly married. I failed personal evangelism. So when I took his church planting class, we all introduced ourselves and told why we were taking the class. I jokingly said, “I failed Dr. Jones’ other class and I want to redeem myself.” After the class, Dr. Jones followed me out into the hallway and said, “Don’t ever bring up that failure again. That’s all over. You’re going to do well in this class and I’m going to help you.” I couldn’t redeem myself, but I didn’t need to. I needed to receive mercy and grace.

Questions for Discussion

Have you ever had surgery or stayed in the hospital? What was the experience like? If not, was there ever a time when you really wanted rest but couldn’t? What was that like?

What does this passage teach us about God? What does it teach us about the person and work of Jesus Christ?

What does the passage teach us about ourselves?

How does the imagery Hebrews 4:12-13 uses to describe God’s word help us understand what it means to rest in the finished work of Christ? Or, put another way, how do verses 12-13 connect with their context in verses 9-16?

What is the gospel communicated in these verses? How would you explain it to someone else?