Sermon Tone Analysis

II} CHRIST:-

HOPE OF OUR FAITH {ENDURANCE}

Heb 12:2

a.Looking.

—More precisely “looking off,” “looking away.”

It implies “the concentration of the wandering gaze in a single direction.”

b.

Author.—ἀρχηγόν:

see Heb 2:10.

Leader, Imitator, Captain, Prince, Bringer-on.

He who introduced the new religion.

c.

Finisher.—τελειωτήν.

The one who has Himself reached the goal for which we are striving.

There is a guarantee in His having completed the race (1Pe 1:9).

Looking off unto Jesus.—

In the old Grecian games it was necessary to keep the eye of the runner fixed on the goal.

So we must turn our attention from everything else and fix it on Christ, if we would run well the Christian race.

I.

Under what apprehensions of Him are we to look to Christ?—

1.

As Saviour.

Illustrate by the figures, “Alpha and Omega”; ransom; opened prison; slave given his freedom.

The look should be one of gratitude.

2. As Master.

Illustrate by figures, captain leading army; king; Joshua seeing “Captain of host”; St. Paul receiving orders from the glorified Jesus.

The look should be one of obedience.

3. Example:

Jesus is the model of a man dwelt in by the Spirit of God.

Imitation needs the presence of a model.

II.

In what scenes are we to look to Jesus?—

1. Common duty.

Christ’s image can be reflected in a little pool even better than in a great lake.

2. Times of temptation.

3. Times of difficulty.

Imagine Moses anxiously looking every morning, the first thing, to see whether the pillar-cloud had moved.

4. Means of grace.

What is ever brought to mind by the church steeples pointing upwards.

III.

What sort of looks should they be?—

1. Trustful.

A man on a height looks up, not down.

2. Obedient.

The proper spirit of servants.

3. Loving, as to our mother or our dearest friend.

We shall look to Christ the better, the better we come to know Him.

Know Him worthily, and we shall look off to Him altogether.

Looking unto Jesus:

The expression before us is one of the pithy golden sayings which stand out here and there on the face of the New Testament, and demand special attention.

It is like “to me to live is Christ,” “Christ is all and in all,” “Christ who is our life,” “He is our peace,” “I live by the faith of the Son of God.”

To each and all of these sayings one common remark applies.

They contain far more than a careless eye can see on the surface.

But the grand question which rises out of the text is this:

What is that we are to look at in Jesus?

I. First and foremost, if we would look rightly to Jesus, we must look daily at His DEATH, as the only source of inward peace.

We all need peace.

Now there is only one source of peace revealed in Scripture, and that is the sacrifice of the death of Christ, and the atonement which He has made for sin by that vicarious death on the Cross.

To obtain a portion in that great peace, we have only to look by faith to Jesus, as our substitute and Redeemer.

II.

In the second place, if we would look rightly to Jesus, we must look daily to His LIFE OF INTERCESSION, in heaven, as our principal provision of strength and help.

While we are fighting Amalek in the valley below, one greater than Moses is holding up His hands for us in heaven, and through His intercession we shall prevail.

III.

In the third place, if we would look rightly to Jesus, we must look at His EXAMPLE as our chief standard of holy living.

We must all feel, I suspect, and often feel, how hard it is to regulate our daily lives by mere rules and regulations.

But surely it would cut many a knot and solve many a problem if we could cultivate the habit of studying the daily behaviour of our Lord as recorded in the four Gospels, and striving to shape our own behaviour by its pattern.

We may well be humbled when we think how unlike the best of us are to our example, and what poor blurred copies of His character we show to mankind.

Like careless children at school we are content to copy those around us with all their faults, and do not look constantly at the only faultless copy, the One perfect man in whom even Satan could find nothing.

But one thing at any rate we must all admit.

If Christians during the last nineteen plus centuries had been more like Christ, the Church would certainly have been far more beautiful, and probably have done far more good to the world.

IV.

Fourthly, and lastly, if we would look to Jesus rightly, we must look forward to His SECOND ADVENT, AS THE TRUEST FOUNTAIN OF HOPE AND CONSOLATION.

That the early Christians were always looking forward to a second coming of their risen Master, is a fact beyond all controversy.

In all their trials and persecutions, under Roman Emperors and heathen rulers, they cheered one another with the thought that their own King would soon come again, and plead their cause.

It ought to be the consolation of Christians in these latter days as much as it was in primitive times.

(Bishop Ryle.)

III] CROSS:-

HISTORY OF FAITH

Completely engulfed in the person of christ

a. Totally ENGULFED in the Person of Christ.

b.

Total ENDURANCE of the CROSS and the CONTRADICTION of Sinners.

Word Contradiction :- means Strife, the Conflict, The Disobedience of Sinners , keep this thought in the Mind for now.

Endured the Cross

The Cross carried, and the shame despised by Jesus

I. WHAT WAS THE CROSS WHICH JESUS CHRIST ENDURED?

Was not the whole life of Jesus cross-bearing from the beginning to the end?

But there were three things which may emphatically be called the Cross of Christ.

1.

His being made sin for us.

God did not make Jesus sinful; but God treated Jesus Christ as though He were a sinner.

Herein was a Cross.

2. Jesus was wounded by God for transgression, and bruised for iniquity.

3. Jesus Christ’s dying as a notorious malefactor, and thus dying for the ungodly was another part of His Cross.

II.

WHAT WAS THE SHAME WHICH HE DESPISED?

This was disgrace, reproach, with the passions and emotions which they are supposed to awaken, and which in all purity and power they did awaken in the human nature of your Saviour.

III.

BUT WHAT WAS THE MANNER AND SPIRIT OF HIS ENDURANCE AND OF HIS CONTEMPT?

For this chiefly is the point.

Observe, He endured the Cross.

He felt the Cross to be a Cross.