Sermon Tone Analysis

:1 Thank you ______________________________

             It is 2 o’clock in the morning, and you can’t sleep, being 1,000 miles from home on a business trip.

You hate staying in hotels, because the combination of loneliness, a TV set, and a remote control always combine to compromise what you believe as a Christian.

You think, “I love Jesus, but how in the world can He love me with the things I do?”

You resist for a while, but as it happens way too often, you power up the TV, and start taking your eyes in places you know they shouldn’t go.

The next morning, with red eyes and a guilty conscience, you wonder, “How come I keep doing this stuff?

How can God love me when I know He hates this?  Am I really saved?”

But you’ve been taught “once saved always saved,” although you don’t understand how God works that out.

Just the same, you push your guilty conscience down further and further, and try and get on with your day, somehow putting it behind you.

:2 This year we are learning how to keep the Cross in Christmas, and this morning I am going to take that cross, shape it into an anchor, and help you see how holding on to Jesus is our only security.

Keeping the cross in Christmas means resting securely, not in what we have or have not done, but in what God has done.

When we have that, it will be the foundation for holiness in your life, especially in the area of sexual purity.

:3 Over the past few weeks, we have looked at symbols to remind us how to keep the cross in Christmas.

I started two weeks ago looking at the cross itself as a reminder how God always takes the initiative in our lives.

Last week Michael Connor looked at the manger and the message of the cross, which is salvation in Jesus Christ.

I’m looking at the anchor this week, which speaks to the security of our relationship with God, and next week Michael will return to talk about the star.

:4 I was struck with a Scripture Michael read last week.

It’s in Luke 2:30, where Simeon sees the baby Jesus in the Temple and says, “my eyes have seen Your salvation.”

I was struck with two things.

First of all that salvation is not work that God does, it’s a person that God provides.

Secondly, from God’s point of view, salvation is not a process, it’s a done deal.

Simeon looked at Jesus, at the very beginning of His earthly ministry, and saw a completed work.

Ephesians 1:3 says that God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world.

Technically speaking, our salvation occurred, not only in our historical past, or even Jesus’ historical past, but before there was a you and me.

Before there was an Incarnation, before was a world - before there was even sin – God chose to save us in His foreknowledge of all that.

From God’s point of view, my salvation has always been a “done deal.”

:5 Now here is my problem:  I am “in between.”

Although I want to assure you, I’m not the guy in the hotel room, I tell you this, I could be.

And if it’s not that sin, it’s something else.

It’s one thing for you, a different thing for me, but haven’t you ever felt like, “although it is a done deal for God, why doesn’t seem that way to me?”

That’s because I am somewhere in between my */second birth and my last breath/*.

My life seems like a series of fits and starts, failures and successes, victory and sometimes despair.

So how do I hold on to what God has already accomplished, while living in the midst of constant temptation, which is everywhere I turn?

How do I move from failure to victory? 

            :6 Our text for this morning is in *Hebrews chapter 6*, verses 9 – 20.

That’s page 171 in the New Testament portion of your pew Bibles.

Now this is not a very “Christmassy” passage, I’ll give you that, but if we are going to keep the cross in Christmas, I think it is an essential one.

I really believe that, if you latch on to what I am about to say, you’ll not only keep the cross in Christmas, you will keep the cross in the other 364 days too.

While you are turning there, I want to give you some background for the book of Hebrews.

In this letter, which really reads like a sermon, the author is speaking to a primarily Jewish audience who apparently is undergoing persecution.

Some are tempted to abandon Christianity as just too hard, or “it doesn’t work.”

Some want to return to their Jewish roots.

They have done some great things for God, but the storms of life are so severe now, that it seems impossible to hold on.

And the way of the world is looking pretty good to them right now.

Understand this:  the goal of the enemy is to separate us from God.  Whether it’s persecution, or failure in our thought life, it’s all the same.

The devil wants to get us away from God, get us away from His Word, get us away from His people, and the battle is won.

I know a professional business woman, I’ll call her “Kathy.”

Kathy is single, successful, attractive, smart – but she would also add -  lonely.

She wants a husband.

But the guys she has dated, Christian guys no less, want sex outside of marriage, and that’s not for Kathy.

On the other hand, she thinks, sometimes any relationship, even an immoral one,  seems better than coming home to “frozen food and an old grey cat.”

The pull for Kathy give in – it’s strong.

It’s strong because the devil wants us on the outside.

God wants us near.

Let’s begin with verse 9:  9But, beloved, we are convinced of better things concerning you, and things that accompany salvation, though we are speaking in this way.

If you are familiar with Hebrews, you know that throughout this book, the author repeatedly warns them not to give in, that what they have in Christ is better than anything they would have under their Jewish traditions, and I’ll add better than anything this world has to offer.

Jesus is better than the prophets, He’s better than the angels, and He’s better than Moses.

The whole point of the book is that Jesus is better.

Period.

Of course, we all agree with that, don’t we?

But when faced with the choice to depend on the tangible stuff of this world, the things in my control, and the intangible promises of God, which am I going to choose? 

            :7 Verse 10:  10For God is not unjust so as to forget your work and the love which you have shown toward His name, in having ministered and in still ministering to the saints.

11And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence so as to realize the full assurance of hope until the end, 12 so that you will not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.

Now, as we read through these verses, I want you to see that the author of Hebrews is not talking about what they DO so much as how they think – how they regard Jesus Christ and the quality of His work.

What he is saying in verse 11 is this:  “You are diligent in doing good works.

Now, show that same diligence to how you regard what God has done for you.

Make */that/* your hope.

Hold on to */that/*.

Don’t abandon */that/* for what the world offers.”

Don’t be “sluggish,” in your thinking.

You see, this is where the world has an advantage.

For these Jewish Christians, the things of the Law were tangible, easy to understand, and believe in.

You could see them, smell and taste the offerings, and sense that God was there.

But Christianity, it’s hard on our brain.

It takes faith.

It believes in something we can’t see, and offers a reward that is largely beyond this world.

For Kathy, it is easy for her to understand how a warm body will satisfy her.

It is hard for Kathy to accept that abstinence is better in the long run.

And so we lean toward the world, because we can understand it, while trying to obey God, because that’s the right thing to do -  and guess who wins?

We try and fail, and try and fail, feeling more and more separated from God with each failure.

This is where the wheels fall off the cart, when it comes to our understanding this whole concept of eternal security.

We go around saying “once saved, always saved,” because that’s what the church teaches, but don’t really understand how God would do that with a bad bargain like me.

It seems logical, now that God has saved me, to try and live up to His expectations.

The problem is you can’t produce holiness out of the reservoir of good intentions.

They weren’t good enough to save me in the first place, and they are not good enough to maintain a right relationship with God.

It takes something more than that.

Now God wants good behavior.

He wants holy living and holy thinking, but that comes only when we take hold of God’s promises by faith with both hands.

When we do that, it keeps us close to God, which then changes our attitude toward the world.

:8 He gives Abraham as an example in Verse 13:  13For when God made the promise to Abraham, since He could swear by no one greater, He swore by Himself, 14saying, “I will surely bless you and I will surely multiply you.”

15And so, having patiently waited, he obtained the promise.

Typical of God, He always takes the initiative.

I want you also to see that */God/* is the one who is concerned that Abraham get this.

He’s so concerned that He doubles the promise with an oath.

And when Abraham took hold of that promise, it was enough.

It was enough to move him from Mesopotamia to Canaan.

It was enough to give him a son.

It was enough to sustain him from */his second birth to his final breath/*, living as though all the promises were a done deal.

Now look in the next verse.

It is no different for us.