Confidence to Enter the Holy Place

(show picture of holidaying)

School is over!

For many of us, this could only mean one thing - holidays!

How many of you are going overseas for your holidays?

Where are you going? Korea, Japan, Thailand, or Vietnam?

But before that, what’s the most important thing to check?

Do you need to renew your passport?

Imagine going to the check-in counter with all your luggage, all ready to fly.

But then you can’t get your boarding pass.

Because your passport is expiring or has expired.

Without a valid passport or the passport itself,

how can you and I have confidence to enter the boarding area?

(show picture of Most Holy Place)

The holy places, or more accurately, the Most Holy Place (NIV), was the place that only the high priest could enter through animal sacrifices.

This was the place where the Ark of the Covenant, a wooden box which symbolises God’s presence, was placed.

A veil separated this Most Holy Place from the priests ministering who normally looked after the Tent of Meeting.

Only the high priest could enter into this Most Holy Place.

And even then, he was only allowed to enter there once a year,

on the Day of Atonement, or Yom Kippur.

Every time the high priest needed to enter the Most Holy Place, as we can see in Lev 16,

he needed to “renew passport” for himself and his family,

and then for the people of Israel through animal sacrifices and burnt offerings.

Without “renewing their passports”, so to speak, the people’s sins will not be atoned, or covered over.

Even then, their passports will only be good for one year.

So we see here that even though God dwelled in the midst of sinful people,

Through the representative ark of the covenant and the tent of meeting,

they could not just take his presence for granted.

There was a separation - layers of curtains separating the holy place and the most holy place from the ordinary.

You couldn’t just waltz into the presence of God, treating the sacred as common.

Imagine going back to your own country, with your own passport, but being rejected at the customs!

(flash Hb 10.19-20)

But our Hebrews passage tells us that we now have a new and living way to enter.

No more animal sacrifices and burnt offerings.

Just one sacrifice is needed - Jesus.

He is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (Jn 1:29).

And at his death, God tore the curtain separating the Most Holy Place from the holy place.

Jesus’s death opened the way for us through the curtain, into God’s holy presence.

We don’t have to keep renewing our “passports” year after year, so to speak.

His one single offering he has perfected us for all time.

Therefore we can have confidence to draw near the most holy place.

This is our first point:

(show point 1)

1) Approach the Holy Place Confidently

It has been a tiring few weeks for me.

Like me, I believe you might been trying to plough through everyone’s mad race to get everything done before the holidays.

Or maybe you’ve been bogged down with studies, waiting to finish the “A”s finally.

Or maybe you’ve been in and out of the hospital, your mind fatigued by the overload of concerns.

And you’re wondering, can I draw near and approach the holy place confidently?

Cos’ I’m not so sure I can still be confident before God when my life seems to be in such a mess.

(show Hb 10.19-20)

The Greek word translated into “confidence” was used to refer to the “boldness of speech,”

which was the right exercised in Greek cities by free citizens.

The author of Hebrews reminds his/her listeners that they, too, have been granted a special privilege to come before God,

not as outsiders, nor slaves, nor irredeemable sinners in front of a vengeful God

But as God’s children, welcome into their Father’s presence.

But as a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, God’s own special people,

Able to enter the place where only the high priest could go,

And not just once a year, but every single day,

having been perfected by the blood of Christ.

With the eventual destruction of the Jerusalem Temple in 70 AD,

as was foretold by Jesus in our Mk 13 passage,

God’s children no longer needed to look and pray towards Jerusalem.

But we can now approach our Father’s presence,

through the curtain of Jesus’s perfected work on the cross,

with confidence and with great joy.

(show Hb 10.11-14)

Through Christ’s one single effective sacrifice for sins for all time,

as contrasted to the Levitical priests’ daily ineffective sacrifices,

Jesus has done the Father’s will and revealed the true form of the good things to come.

Through the blood of Jesus shed on the cross,

Jesus has fulfiled the requirements of the first order, as the Lamb of God, in order to establish the second.

Through his one perfect sacrifice, he has perfected (present perfect) for all time those who are being sanctified.

The present perfect of the verb “perfect” is significant,

because it tells us that it is a completed action in the past that still affects the present.

Because it tells us that Christ’s sacrifice,

even though it happened in the past,

is still real and effective even into our situations right now.

(show BT report)

A recent Business Times report shows that the Singapore passport is now the most powerful in the world,

having the most destinations where we don’t need to apply for a visa to enter.

This is why we can confidently walk through most customs without worrying that we will be turned away.

More powerful than the Singapore passport is the confidence we have, having been perfected through the blood of Christ.

Like the Singapore passport, the pre-condition of having the confidence is that you own it, by virtue of being a citizen.

It happened in the past, but its effect are still felt till today.

Like the passport which identifies a person as a citizen,

so our confidence in being identified as a Christian is tied up to the one perfect sacrifice on the cross.

And especially for the Singaporeans amongst us, the friendly welcome that you will hear as you get home,

As the SIA plane touches down on the Singaporean tarmac,

As you scan your passport at the machine,

“Welcome home, (name)”

(show Hb 10.14)

Christ has perfected you and through his one perfect sacrifice.

But we are not 100% sanctified yet.

Is there a difference?

The difference is that while the single offering has decisively purged and perfected us from our sins, past and present,

it doesn’t mean that at this side of eternity, we will not sin.

The decisive purging is to authorise and qualify us

to be more like Jesus every day,

until we finally hear him say,

welcome home (xxx).

This process of becoming more like Jesus every day is called “sanctification”, or “being made holy”.

On this side of eternity, we are all work in progress,

even if we can confidently wave the passport in the customs officer’s face,

we are still not in our final destination.

And that brings us to the next point.

(show point 2)

2) Abide in the Holy Place Cleanly

(show Hb 10.19-22)

Being perfected in Christ doesn’t mean taking out a life insurance policy that promises guaranteed salvation.

Yes, we have been perfected in Christ, so far.

Yes, the way has been opened to us, so far.

And yes, we have managed to enter the most holy place, so far.

But that doesn’t necessarily mean we will be able to stay in there continually.

We have to draw near with a true heart

in full assurance of faith,

with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience

and our bodies washed with water.

The late Tim Keller wasn’t afraid to call out sin.

In one of his sermons, titled Confession, he said that it’s easy to feel sorry for the kick, the consequences from our sin.

But there is a difference between feeling sorry for the consequences of my sin,

vs feeling sorry about the sinness of my sin.

Feeling sorry for the consequences of my sin is like a mule feeling sorry for wanting to go another direction only after getting kicked a few times.

It recognises that it has done something wrong.

But the reality of the wrongness of what it has done doesn’t sink in.

It is only aware that it has done wrong after it has done the wrong.

So it is very likely the mule will return to doing that which is wrong again.

Because it was only sorry about the consequences of its sin,

Not the sinness of its sin.

Dr Keller gave the example of a couple who went for counselling,

because the wife said that she would leave him.

The husband relented, apologised, and things improved for a while.

Six months later, the husband realised that she wasn’t probably going to leave her.

So reverted to his old ways.

And she threatens to leave him, and they went for counselling, and the cycle keeps repeating.

(show Tim Keller quote)

And here I quote Dr Keller verbatim, because it is so good.

He was sorry he said, but only for the consequence of his sin.

In other words, he was sorry for himself.

He wasn't sorry for the sin.

He didn't see the sin as a grievous thing,

a sin that was hurting the person who loved him.

The, the thing that was hurting the people around him.

He didn't see the sin as something in itself was bad.

He didn't see the sinness of his sin.

He just saw the danger of his sin, the inconvenience of his sin, the impracticality of his sin.

As a result, he didn't change.

He was constantly confessing it whenever it looked like it was gonna get him in trouble.

And he never changed.

And as a result, he wasn't confessing.

He said he was confessing, but he wasn't.

He wasn't repenting. He said he was repenting, but he wasn't.

And that’s our tendency, our humanness, in our process of sanctification.

I want salvation without sanctification.

I want reconciliation without repentance.

I want to believe, but without being baptised.

(show Hb 10.22)

Without a true heart in desiring to abide in the Jesus the Vine and be fruitful,

Christ’s one perfect sacrifice is just merely head knowledge.

I can be so learned in theology, in Hebrew and Greek, in church history.

I can be a even be a cell leader, a BSF leader,

But without a true heart, I will keep getting jumping to things that interest me.

And I will not desire abiding in the holy place,

preferring to join in only on my whims and fancies.

Without a full assurance of faith,

a faith that has reached in its mature vigour.

When persecution come, can I stand?

When challenged, will I retreat?

When pushed into a corner, will I even deny that I ever was a Christian?

Without that robust and strong faith in the faithful God,

My time and tenure abiding in the holy place will be short and brief.

Without the sprinkling of my heart clean from an evil conscience

without the washing my body with pure water,

and without seeing the sinness of my sin,

I will keep on hurting my brother with my careless words and actions,

deleting the WhatsApp messages when I realise the consequences of my sin,

but reverting to my old ways later.

I will say that I am sorry, but I am not really sorry.

I will abide in the holy place as a filthy stain in God’s eyes.

(show Hb 10.15-18)

The good news is that God has already known of our tendencies and weaknesses.

That is why the Father opened the new and living way for us by sacrificing his only begotten Son.

That is why Jesus is sitting at the right hand of the Father, interceding for us.

This is why the Holy Spirit is given to us,

to bear witness to God’s covenant.

And to help us put God’s laws in our hearts and minds.

And the assurance given that God will remember our sins and lawless deeds no more.

When we look at it this way, the whole Trinity of

the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit

are actively and continually helping us to be sanctified and made sacred for God.

(show Hb 10.23)

Let us therefore hold fast, or hold tightly what we believe,

That is, the confession of our hope,

without wavering,

for he who promised is faithful.

And until then, let us help each other to abide in the holy place cleanly.

This brings us to our final point:

(show final point)

3) Abound in the Holy Place Communally.

Christianity is not meant for individuals.

Nor is it meant to be consumed individually, like Netflix or YouTube

But it is meant to be lived in community.

The old sacrificial system and the Temple were not meant for just the individual person or priest

But they were meant for the whole community of Israel

Because when one sins, it isn’t just an individual that is affected,

But its ripple effects affects relationships, families, and the community.

Christ’s sacrifice was an act to reconcile us to God.

This means a relational reconnection back to the God whom we had lost connection to.

But Christ’s sacrifice was also to reconcile us to one another in his body, the Church.

This is why we call each other brothers and sisters in Christ.

(show Heb 10.19-25, highlighting 1P and 2P examples)

Therefore, the author of Hebrews appealed to brothers and sisters under Jesus the great high priest,

to not just be reconciled to God and to one another,

But to abound in love and good works,

to abound in building relationships with one another,

and to abound in preparing for the Day,

that is the return of Jesus.

Some of us have families that are awkward, fractured, and even broken.

So your natural tendency might be to scoff and be critical at the idea of abounding in community.

But what if a community so distinguished themselves that their very existence was recognised even by others?

What if the being sanctified church family you are in truly abounded in the perfected work of Christ?

(flash St John’s Jurong pic)

Have you ever heard of the Hong Kah area in Jurong West?

Have you ever wondered what it means?

It is actually the Romanised form of the dialect form of “奉加”,

Which is a corruption of “奉教”, which means “bestowing religion”.

It was named after the Anglican community of St John’s Church, Jurong planted by Revd William Gomes and Mr Cheok Loy Fatt.

Those in St Andrew’s might have heard of these names before.

The church celebrates its 140th anniversary this year and has since moved to Farrer Road and renamed St John’s Chapel.

And the graves in the old compound in Old Jurong Road will be exhumed next year to make way for the growing Tengah estate.

Yet their legacy as the community that bestows religion remains in our maps.

From just a church plant, to a village, to a place named after them.

Can we catch that vision of Hong Kah Village for St Andrew’s Village?

(flash picture of COA)

We too, as a COA family, have many opportunities to abound communally.

We thank God for the close connection with St Andrew’s School.

Many of her teachers and students, new and old, still attend this church.

We thank God for the wider Potong Pasir community,

where we have been able to serve them through the setting up of the preschools,

not forgetting the flood relief and free clinic,

which by God’s grace, has evolved into the Singapore Anglican Community Services.

And we thank God for the new opportunities, just to say a few:

The cell groups that have grown and stirring one another to love and good works,

The children and youth ministries that are not neglecting to meet together,

but encouraging one another.

And the seniors ministries,

whether to the seniors in church and at home,

or even the seniors in the nursing homes we look after.

Truly God has given us this privilege to abound in his presence communally,

from cradle to grave.

And perhaps one day, the maps will record this housing estate as “St Andrew’s Village”.

(show sermon series poster)

The four Sundays before Advent run from All Saints Day to Christ the King Sunday.

You may have noticed that the frontal and holy communion linen colours have been changed to red.

Red, as Vicar pointed out in his Vicar Writes last week, remembers the saints that are part of the Church Triumphant.

Together with them, we, the Church Militant, have a role to play in abounding and expanding God’s kingdom.

Having confidence to enter the Most Holy Place is not just a privilege we reserve for those who accept Jesus’s one perfect sacrifice.

But it is also our duty and our joy, in all times and in all places,

by sacrificially giving God our thanks and praise,

By sacrificially labouring to grow the population of New Jerusalem,

By sacrificially and lovingly welcoming Zaccheuses into the family,

And by sacrificially and continually helping each other to grow more into the like of Christ our King,

who is coming again.

Maranatha! Come, Lord Jesus!

(show summary)

So, do you have your passport ready?

Does your passport state that you have been perfected, but still being sanctified?

Does your passport give you confidence to approach the holy place?

Will you hold on to and cherish your passport as you abide in holy place cleanly?

And will you pledge to help more people get passports to be on their way to the holy place?

And to the new Jerusalem, where one day we will meet and celebrate with the Church Triumphant?