Reject Not He Who Speaks

Hebrews 12:25-29

As Californians we get used to this idea of shaking don’t we? We moved here from Alabama when I was 6 years old, I knew it was my fate to die in an earthquake because that’s how everyone out here died. We all knew it in fact. 30 years later we will still sometimes get messages from family in Alabama after a 4.0 earthquake hits San Diego wondering if we are alright.

I wasn’t here in 1989 for Loma Prieta. Some of you were. Probably the biggest shake you’ve ever felt. Well our text is speaking of a much bigger shaking than that one.

This is actually the 5th and final warning passage in Hebrews, and it takes us back to the first verse of the book and even farther back to the message of judgment from the Old Testament. But remember these warning passages are for believers, meant in some sense to shake us and wake us up to remember who we are in Christ. This warning can be summed up in this way: What are you holding onto? Are you in love with things that are eternally unbreakable, or have you settled for the things that are passing away?

Continue to Listen to God’s Word

Turn back to the beginning of Hebrews and let me show you quickly this theme of God speaking throughout this book.

Hebrews 1:1–2 “1 Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, 2 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 Word. You ever wonder why John uses the word “Word” for Jesus? It is because throughout the Old Testament God’s Word was synonymous with his revelation. We know who he is by what he says. People are healed by his word, people are judged by his word, people are saved by his word. John says, that Word came and dwelt among us. He is personal. Jesus is the full revelation of the Father come to dwell among us.

So this book begins by saying that this full final revelation of God is in the person of Jesus… who of course we are told in every way possible that he is better. Better King, better priest, better prophet. And this Word of God speaks, has called all people to himself.

Hebrews 3:7–11 “7 Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, “Today, if you hear his voice, 8 do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness, 9 where your fathers put me to the test and saw my works for forty years. 10 Therefore I was provoked with that generation, and said, ‘They always go astray in their heart; they have not known my ways.’ 11 As I swore in my wrath, ‘They shall not enter my rest.’ ””

He explains that there have been people who have heard his voice and rejected him. Of course throughout 3 and 4 he uses the example of Israelites in the wilderness rejecting God’s Word.

Then Hebrews 8:8-12, which I believer I read last week, he says that God spoke again, but this time his word promised the New Covenant where God would dwell in his people and write his law on human hearts. We saw in 12:15-24 that there is a difference between the law and the gospel, these two different realms that people live in. Some are under the terrifying tyranny of Mt Sinai. God’s word going forth and condemning, showing his perfect standard and people falling short. And Mt Zion, where the victorious conquering Jesus reigns and where we are invited in as his justified people. The same God and the same Law, but fulfilled in Christ our head, our king.

So notice in 12:25 he’s calling us back to the generation in the wilderness who heard God’s voice and rejected it. Before Christ, God spoke, people disobeyed, and they didn’t escape. That means they died, they couldn’t wiggle out of it.

He says how much greater is the danger when God sends his Son and we reject him? Jesus says in Luke 6:46 “46 “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I tell you?”

Believer, continue to listen and obey this savior. It is the great news of the gospel that he empowers us by his Spirit for holy living.

Hold on to the unbreakable

He makes this comparison about the shaking that took place at the mountain and the shaking that will come one day when God judges all things.

Believer you have nothing to fear in Christ. I’m speaking of Christian assurance here. Many Christians struggle with the question, “will I survive this shaking?” Maybe its worded differently in your head, but that’s the question.

I have found so much encouragement in Martin Luther and John Calvin as they wrote on this topic of assurance.

In July of 1530, Martin Luther wrote to his friend, Jerome Weller. Weller struggled withe depression, and in a very difficult season began to doubt the reality of his salvation, and as a result, he became overwhelmed by the prospect of hell. Reassuring Weller of his saving faith, Luther wrote, “When the devil throws our sins up to us and declares we deserve death and hell, we ought to speak thus: ‘I admit  I deserve death and hell. What of it? Does this mean I shall be sentenced to eternal damnation? By no means. For I know One who suffered and made satisfaction in my behalf. His name is Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Where he is, there I shall be also.’”

Calvin wrote, “For nothing so moves us to repose our assurance and certainty of mind in the Lord as distrust of ourselves, and the anxiety occasioned by the awareness of our ruin” (3.2.23). And again later: “For faith totters if it pays attention to works, since no one, even of the most holy, will find there anything on which to rely” (3.11.11).

See this is the wrong move I believe Christians make. We are told to look at our lives and see how the Spirit is growing us. That is a good thing to do, but it is not the end of what we should do.

See because believers are acutely aware of God’s holiness, and looking inwardly, maybe even if and when we see growth, we also see our sinfulness don’t we? Do you see it? Oh its overwhelming isn’t it!

And Satan loves to point us to our sinfulness as evidence of our condemnation. We look at our sinfulness, we look at the works we should be doing, we look at how our works don’t measure up. That’s exactly the purpose of the law. But we dwell on those, and instead of them driving us to the cross, they drive us to fear of condemnation.

If our examination of ourselves only results in fear of condemnation, we have forgotten the core of the gospel. This is where Luther is so helpful applying the gospel to his friends distress. “I admit  I deserve death and hell. What of it? Does this mean I shall be sentenced to eternal damnation? By no means. For I know One who suffered and made satisfaction in my behalf. His name is Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Where he is, there I shall be also.”

We often find ourselves holding onto the things that will be destroyed in the judgment. Instead the gospel says, know even your sinfulness and imperfect works and even your imperfect love for Christ will be shaken and destroyed. The only thing that will remain is Christ in his perfection.

Believer you are in him. You say, “I don’t trust him perfectly!” No one trusts him perfectly, but Christ holds his people perfectly.

Live in grateful lives

And so what should our response be? As sinful, imperfect people we have still received and unshakable kingdom, because it is Christ’s. He’s the unshakable king, and you are united by faith to him. The faith you are united to him with has been given to you. It is his that he holds you with.

And so, we are to be grateful. That looks like this, “yes I deserve death and hell, but I know the one who suffered and made satisfaction on my behalf His name is Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Where he is, there I shall be also.”

It is through this gratefulness to Jesus that we offer acceptable worship with reverence and awe.

This is how fear of death is transformed into the fear of the Lord. Our God is a consuming fire who judges and condemns the lost and will remove our evil deeds as a fire burns away the dross of impure metal. But also the God who’s just condemnation fell on his Son.

We fall on our faces in gratitude to him in awe that his Son would unite us to himself and receive our worship as pure and holy.