Jesus: A Great Help to Hold Fast

Introduction

Story

When I was growing up, I had a big fascination with tornadoes. I remember going to the library as a kid and checking out books on tornadoes to learn how they worked and what kind of weather was needed to make one. I had always hoped I would get to see one, as scary as that sounds, because they seemed so cool to me. Maybe it was the great power they have, or the way they are unpredictable that drew me to be so fascinated. But I know one thing for sure drove the fascination: I saw the movie Twister.

This movie came out the year I was born, and I remember we had it on VHS. I couldn’t tell you at what age I saw it, but when I did I was hooked. It became one of my favorite movies. If you’re unaware, it’s a story of a group of people, called storm chasers, trying to get close to a tornado so they could send up sensors into it and gather scientific data from the inside.

In the climax of the movie, a massive F5 tornado is ripping through the countryside and the two main characters are driving in a truck with the sensors in the back chasing behind the tornado. They plow through a cornfield, set the cruise control, and jump out of the truck as it runs right into the tornado, successfully sending the sensors up into it and achieving their goal. But then the team that’s monitoring the data from safety sees that the sensors indicate that the tornado is shifting directions. And sure enough, it’s heading straight for the two main characters. So they turn and they run as fast as they can.

They first try to seek shelter in barn, but this thing is filled with dangerously sharp farm equipment that’s surely going to get them killed, so they quickly escape the barn just as the tornado rips it to shreds. So they run into another little shack. In the shack they see water pipes going into the ground, and finding some leather straps, they tie themselves to the pipes. The twister comes through and rips apart this shack, and the powerful winds end up lifting both of the characters up into the air as it tries to suck them up into the center. But the leather straps hold strong. They remain safely anchored to the ground until the tornado passes through and dissipates.

It’s been a while since I’ve watched the movie, but that scene kept playing in my mind as I thought about this passage.

If you have a Bible, I invite you to turn with me to Hebrews 4:14-16 this morning. We’re continuing our study of the Book of Hebrews in a series we’ve labeled “Jesus is Better”

FCF

All throughout the book of Hebrews the readers are warned to stay anchored to Christ and hold firmly to the faith. They’re facing persecution and pressure to leave behind their faith and revert back to their old ways, the old Jewish rituals.

We too, face pressures, persecutions, and temptations that are trying to pull us away from the safety of being anchored to Jesus.

But this passage rightly tells us that while we are commanded to hold firmly to Jesus, we cannot hold firmly on our own. The pull of temptations and persecutions is strong. We need Christ to help us.

In that climactic scene from Twister, if the characters were trying to hold on to the pipes with their own strength, they would have surely been sucked up into the tornado and met their end. But they weren’t holding on by themselves. Those leather straps anchored them beyond their ability to hold on. It’s even more true of Christ and our need of his help to hold fast.

Sermon Passage

Let’s read this passage together.

Hebrews 4:14–16 ESV

Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Outline

In this passage we are given a foundational truth and then three implications of that truth.

The Foundational Truth is that Jesus is our Great High Priest

The first implication is the command to hold fast our confession. Some of your translations might say to “hold firmly to the faith we profess”.

The second implication is that we can be comforted with the knowledge that Christ knows our weaknesses in carrying out this command.

The third implication is that we are to have confidence as we approach him for help.

Transition: First let’s explore the foundational truth

Foundational Truth: Jesus is Our Great High Priest

These verses in Hebrews are the start of a much longer discussion of the High Priesthood of Jesus. So a little bit of background may be helpful.

Under the Mosiac Law, the Tabernacle (or later, the Temple) was the place where God dwelled with his people. Inside was called the Holy Place, and even deeper into the tabernacle, behind a veil was called the Most Holy Place. The high priest was appointed to go in to the Most Holy Place only once per year on the Day of Atonement. Inside the Most Holy Place was the Ark of the Covenant, with the Mercy Seat covering it. It was above the Mercy Seat that God’s presence would dwell. The High Priest was instructed to first make sacrifices to atone for his own sin and his households sin. Then he would make sacrifices to atone for the sins of the whole nation. This happened once per year, every year to remind the people of their need for forgiveness from their sins.

But Jesus is now called our great high priest.

Hebrews 4:14 ESV

Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.

As we continue to progress through the book of Hebrews, we’ll get to go into even more detail about why Jesus is a great high priest, greater than any earthly one. But a few quick points to whet your appetite:

Verse 14 says that he has passed through the heavens, or passed through the sky and outer space, meaning that he has ascended into the presence of God. Under the Mosaic Law the high priest had to go into to a physical place that was a picture of this heavenly place where Jesus nows sits.

And the author of Hebrews is quick to point out both the humanity of our high priest, using his given name on earth “Jesus,” as well as the divinity of our high priest as the Son of God. Every high priest beforehand was merely human. But ours is both God and man.

While the high priest had to make atonement for himself, Jesus is without sin and doesn’t need to make atonement for himself.

The high priest had to make atonement for the people year after year, offering the blood of bulls and goats to atone for sins. Jesus offered his own blood, a much better offering that is sufficient as a sacrifice once and for all.

Jesus isn’t just a high priest, he is The Great High Priest.

Transition: And because we have Jesus as our great high priest, we are given a command.

Command: Hold Fast to our Confession

The confession is everything we profess to be true about who Jesus is and what he’s done for us. We proclaim this together, that Jesus is our savior. Jesus is the Word made flesh. God incarnate. The fullest revelation of God to us (Hebrews 1:1-3) We are saved by his sacrifice for us. And salvation can only be found in him and him alone.

Why the Command?

We must ask ourselves why this exhortation to hold fast is necessary in the first place. For the original audience of this letter, we can deduce that they were suffering persecutions, facing temptation to sin, and wrestling with the pressure to forsake Jesus and turn back to the old Jewish religious system.

I know most of you don’t have a background in Judaism so you may not be tempted to turn to back to Judaism like the original audience was. But Satan is hard at work in other ways, trying to pull you away.

What does that temptation look like for you?

Sin

It could be a particular sin that you wrestle with, where it may at times feel much easier to give in and let that sin be a part of your life than do battle with it each and every day.

Persecution

It could be a temptation to avoid uncomfortable situations by keeping your faith a secret, personal practice. You may not be facing persecution right now, and you’d very much like to keep it that way. So you may be tempted to hide your true beliefs, hide even your moral convictions on a particular issue out of fear that it may cause others to look at you differently.

Drift

It could be the simple temptation to coast or to drift. And I think this is one temptation we ought to pay close attention to.

It’s easy to drift. For those of you who have gone swimming in the ocean, you know that drift doesn’t take any effort at all. In fact, drift is what happens when you are carried along by something else, like an underwater current. If you are not consciously resisting the pull of the current, it will carry you along. You may be swimming out in the ocean, only to look back at the shore after a few minutes and realize that you are further from it than you intended to be, or that you had drifted down the beach away from where you started. And it took no effort at all. Actually, all it took was letting your guard down.

The same is true of our spiritual lives.

One of my professors told us repeatedly in class, “You must always be on guard against drift. You never, ever drift anywhere good.”

We never drift into deeper relationship with Jesus. The waters all around us pull in the opposite direction.

Be On Guard

The temptation could also be something else. It could be to respond poorly to a situation, or to reject God because of some hardship it your life.

Two weeks ago Pastor John outlined 10 types of Wilderness Tests that we may face. I encourage you, go back and listen to that sermon again and take note of which ones you may be facing.

The command to hold fast to the confession of our faith is more than just a mental battle. It is a physical battle as well as an emotional battle.

We just not merely be on guard against lies that are opposed to the truth of Christ. We must also cling tightly to the life of holiness he has called us to. Holding fast happens in the heart and with the hands as much it does in the head.

The world tempts us with much. So we are commanded to hold fast to the faith in Christ. He is shore which we must be anchored to.

A Difficult Task

But this is no easy task. Sometimes, as we feel pulled by the various temptations, we feel our strength start to dry up. We feel our fingers grow weak and our grip begin to slip.

We might be ashamed of this. We might feel as though we ought to be strong enough to hold fast. And when we come to recognize that on our own, we are not strong enough to resist the forces of temptation, we may be tempted to hide our faces from God in shame, as if we didn’t measure up and therefore don’t deserve to be in his presence.

But that’s not how God sees things. He gives us this comfort in verse 15. Hebrews 4:15

Hebrews 4:15 ESV

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

Transition: The comfort we’re given here is that Jesus knows our struggles firsthand.

Comfort: Jesus Knows Our Struggles Firsthand

Jesus can sympathize with us, because he knows what it is to be human.

Jesus may be in heaven now, but he is still fully God and fully man. And he has not forgotten what he went through when he was here on earth. Therefore He knows what it is like to face the attacks of the devil.

One of the strongest temptations Satan threw at him was the temptation to avoid the cross altogether. In Matthew 4:8-9 he tempted Jesus in this way.

Matthew 4:8–9 ESV

Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.”

This was the temptation to take the easy road. Jesus could sidestep the suffering of the cross and have the kingdoms of the world given to him if he would just abandon the Father’s will.

So Jesus knows firsthand what it means to be tempted to forsake the Father’s will. He knows how strong the pull of the devil is, how much strength it takes to resist his schemes. And he knows exactly how much because he resisted the devils strongest attack. Satan threw everything he could possibly throw at Jesus to thwart the Father’s plan.

That means that you will not face a temptation stronger than what Jesus has faced. There’s comfort in that.

That kind of solidarity is powerful. In her book Trauma and Recovery, Dr. Judith Herman explains that support groups where victims of abuse can connect with other victims plays a critical role in the recovery process. She writes:

“The solidarity of a group provides the strongest protection against terror and despair, and the strongest antidote to traumatic experience. Trauma isolate; the group re-creates a sense of belonging. Trauma shames and stigmatizes; the group bears witness and affirms. Trauma degrades the victim; the group exalts her. Trauma dehumanizes the victim; the group restores her humanity.” - Dr. Judith Herman, Trauma and Recovery, p. 214

If this is even remotely true of support groups, then how much more true is it of our savior? Jesus is so much better than a support group, because not only can he sympathize better, but he loves better! His love is a sympathetic, selfless love that knows exactly what we are going through and calls us to run into his warm embrace for help.

A better help, the King with Power

And unlike a support group or even a friend who’s familiar with your struggle, Jesus is able to give you grace to help in your time of need.

Not only is Jesus our great high priest, but he is also the King. As the king He sits on the throne and has the power, the authority, and the ability to give us whatever we need.

As you cling tightly to the faith, but feel your strength beginning to dwindle, a friend can only give you tips from afar. They may tell you how you may be able to adjust your grip, or give you pointers on which muscle groups to use for the best endurance. These are useful things, but nothing compares to what Jesus can do. He can give you strength. Remember that His Spirit dwells inside of us.

Knowing this we are called to draw near to his throne confidently. Hebrews 4:16

Hebrews 4:16 ESV

Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Notice here that it is called the throne of grace. This is not a throne of judgment for us. We are not being summoned before a king where he will ask us why we are so weak, why we can’t do it on our own. We don’t have to plead our case before the throne and try to persuade God to be merciful to us. He’s already established his throne as a throne of grace for us who are in Christ.

And there we can receive mercy. The word used here could also be translated as “compassion,” because it means “a kindness shown to someone in need”. Jesus stands ready to show you immense kindness in your weaknesses.

Transition: And so our confidence is that we can freely approach his throne for help whenever the need arises.

Confidence: We Can Approach The Throne For Help

Paul gives us an example of this in 2 Corinthians 12:7-9

2 Corinthians 12:7–9 ESV

So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

We don’t know what this thorn in the flesh was, but Paul knew he had the freedom to ask Jesus for help. First, he asked for Jesus to take away the thorn. But rather than taking away the thorn, Jesus said that his power and his grace is sufficient to sustain Paul through this battle.

We should not be surprised when this is his response to us. As we face trails and temptations we may very well approach the throne of grace in prayer and ask him to take away the threat, and he may choose not to take it away, but to give us grace to get through it.

This is good news! That’s why Paul says he will boast gladly of his weaknesses. There’s a strengthening of our bond with Christ that comes from us walking through the storm hand in hand, rather than avoiding it altogether.

What makes this even better news is that there is no limit to how often we can approach his throne. For any of you grammar nerds out there, the command to draw near in the Greek has an imperfective aspect to it. Meaning that we don’t have a completed action in view, but a continual one.

So we’re not just drawing near once, or occasionally, but every time we have a need.

Each and every time we approach for help, we can do so with confidence, not sheepishly as if we’re ashamed of our need for help again. Remember, Jesus sympathizes with your weaknesses.

And Jesus has done a great work on our behalf to pave the way for us. I love this quote that I read while studying:

“Rather than one who stands between God and humanity, Jesus takes us to God, ripping away the moral and ritualistic obstacles that prevented our free entrance into his presence.” - George H. Guthrie, Hebrews, NAC, p. 178

Closing

Because Jesus is our Great High Priest, (who has done all of the necessary work on our behalf to give us free access to God), we can boldly approach his throne when we feel the world trying to pull us away from the faith.

He will give us the strength we need to hold fast. And he will do it with sympathetic love.