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Bible Reading
Today we are looking back in order to look forwards.
Last week we finished the book of Acts and we thought about how the church is built and spread throughout the early new testament times.
So it is appropriate for us to take a Pause here today, and think about Just where we are in our journey from Garden to Garden city.
Because we are in fact nearing the end of the series.
We have only a few letters to go before we hit Revelation and finish the story.
But to get there we have to look back and sum up what we have said so far.
And actually the new testament gives us a book to help us do exactly that - the book of Hebrews.
So today we are going to be looking back via the lens of Hebrews in order that we can look forward to Revelation.
Now what the book of Hebrews allows us to do is to see exactly how Jesus is superior to all of the ways in which God guided and sanctified his people throughout the old testament.
Now Hebrews is kind of like a sermon manuscript from ancient times.
And it is like a 4 point sermon with a large bit of application to the hearer at the end.
And so today we are going to be following the same structure as we look at the book of Hebrews together...
The theme of Hebrews is JEsus is superior to everything, therefore live for him.
Now firstly we must understand that the way Hebrews is structured is that it in each of it’s sections it has a claim about JEsus’s superiority, and then an application and warning as a result.
Now the first claim is that Jesus is the superior message
And the first thing the author of Hebrews wants us to see is that Jesus is the superior message and superior messenger (both angels and prophets).
Jesus is the superior message (chapter 1-2)
The first thing the author hebrews needs his hearers to understand is that Jesus is the superior message.
What was the message God has been speaking all throuhtout the history of earth?
His message is himself.
He has been revealing himself throughout all of history to the world.
Now this as we saw was neccessary because in the fall of sin, the knowledge of God was obscured.
Was broken and corrrupted.
And so all throughout history God has been revealing himself to the world.
So how did God speak before JEsus?
He revealed himself htrough his special people, ISrael to the world, and to ISrael through the prophets, angels and priestly system.
But now the problem is that that message is incomplete, is corrupt too.
Because israel wasnt the revelation of God to the nations they were supposed to be.
They ended up rejecting God, rejecting his ways, and they did not communicate God’s character to the world.
And so if you wanted special revelation you would go to prophets or look for special miracles or angel messengers.
but that era has passed.
As an aside, where are you looking for your revelation?
And so things change when JEsus comes.
If you wanted to know who God was, look at Christ.
He is the exact expression of God’s glory, the one who sustains all things through his word, the radiance of God’s glory.
Jesus is the superior message.
And when this message comes, when Jesus comes, what is the message he actually ends up communicating?
And what is the message the Jesus brings as the fulfillment of all the previous ways God spoke?
Repent and believe.
Believe in your heart, and confess with your mouth and you will be saved.
In essence Jesus brings the message humanity has been aching for ever since Adam and Eve sinned in the garden.
How do you get a restored relationship with God, how do you fill that God shaped hole in your heart?
You need to repent and believe and accept hte free gift of salvation offered through Jesus.
That is how the problem of sin is fixed, through Christ, who brings the true and better message from God.
But then the author of hebrews makes gives us the first warning:
If Jesus is the superior message, and the superior messenger, then
If Jesus is brings the superior message - listen to him!
you israel didnt listen to his previous messengers.
Jesus said even if someone rose from the dead they wouldnt believe.
but we are in a different era.
so we need to listen to the superior message from the superior messenger.
repent and believe.
Otherwise you will not escape the just vengence of God on judgement day.
Repent and believe and you will be saved.
Jesus is the superior message.
But also,
Jesus is the superior leader (chapter 2b-4)
Having established that Jesus is the greater message, and greater messenger, the author now wants us to understand that Jesus is the superior leader.
And he picks on Israel’s two great establishing leaders: Moses and Joshua.
Now all throuhgout Israel’s history, Moses is considered to be the leader par excellance.
He is the one who brought ISrael out of Egypt, he is the one who got the laws to govern Israel, he is the one who led ISrael thrugh the desert and established them as a nation.
Joshua was the great leader who led Israel into Canaan and conquered the land so that the ISraelites could find their rest and peace in the promised land.
But in these chapters Hebrews makes the point that yes Moses and Joshua led the people through to the promised land, yes they got to enter the land of rest.
But the rest was temporary because of their disobedience.
Because Israel rejected God, he promises that they will never enter his eternal rest as a nation.
So the promised land was really just a forshadowing of the eternal rest, the eternal shalom we will have with Christ in eterntity.
But how do we get this rest?
Well listen to the message - repent and believe, and you will be saved.
And don’t reject the salvation offered in Christ.
And so having established that Jesus is the superior leader offering a superior rest, the author of hebrews gives us his second warning:
So Warning 2: Don’t be like ISrael - dont get locked out of rest because of a hardened heart.
Don’t reject the rest offered.
Since we have a better leader, a better Moses, who promises a better and eternal rest, hold on to obedience in faith, lest we get thrown out.
What does it look like to hold on to the obedience in faith?
You listen to and obey Scripture:
Jesus is the superior message, listen to him, Jesus is the superior leader, so obey him as he reveals himself through his word.
But also, Jesus is the superior mediator.
Jesus is superior mediator (ch 5 - 8ish)
Here the auhtor of Hebrews wants his reader to now compare JEsus to Aaron the high priest.
And he makes the point that yes,
Aaron was the first high priest, but he was sinful himself.
As were all the high priests who came after him.
And this is a problem, because high priests therefore can’t be perfect mediators between God’s people and God because of their own sin.
And so whenever the high priest in Israel wanted to atone for the sins of hte people, he first had to make sacrifices for his own sins.
He had to be cleansed himself.
And so the sacrifices he offered and the nature of his atonement is by definition limited.
The sins had to be washed away again and again.
Because the high priest was flawed his work was essentially incomplete.
But Jesus Hebrews tells us, is not like the high priests of the past.
He is a wholly different kind of high priest.
Listen to what he says about Jesus.
Jesus is a different kind of high priest.
He is a high priest in the order of Melchizedek.
And again because we all know our bibles so very well, we know all about Mechizedek don’t we?
No?
Well the last time we saw melchizedek was way back in Genesis 14
Now this is way back in the days of Abraham and Lot.
And what happens is that lot gets captures, and Abraham goes and saves him from the people who captured lot.
And as he takes the plunder back home, Abraham comes across this strange figure, the king of Salem, whose name is Melchizadek, who Gen 14 makes clear was a priest of God.
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