Hebrews: Greater than Moses
Notes
Transcript
We are Going through the Book of Hebrews
Which is all about how Jesus fills the roles set forth in the Old Testament
Last week we looked at Jesus’s Position in regards to the Angels, that as the Son of God he is above the angels, and as the Son of Man he brings those who trust in him into relationship with God as brothers and sisters.
This week we compare Jesus to Moses.
Therefore, holy brothers, you who share in a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession, who was faithful to him who appointed him, just as Moses also was faithful in all God’s house. For Jesus has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses—as much more glory as the builder of a house has more honor than the house itself.
Jesus is faithful to God Like Moses was, but Jesus is of more Glory than Moses.
Now Moses was the Law Giver - God’s Friend and Servant, perhaps the person closest to God in all of the Old Testament.
Look at how the Bible Describes Moses’s relationship with God:
And the Lord came down in a pillar of cloud and stood at the entrance of the tent and called Aaron and Miriam, and they both came forward. And he said, “Hear my words: If there is a prophet among you, I the Lord make myself known to him in a vision; I speak with him in a dream. Not so with my servant Moses. He is faithful in all my house. With him I speak mouth to mouth, clearly, and not in riddles, and he beholds the form of the Lord. Why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?”
And there has not arisen a prophet since in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face,
So Moses was the Prophet of Prophets who God speaks to face to face, rather than in visions or dreams or by Angels.
Moses compiled the first five books of the Bible,
We only have a Bible because of Moses
There was no one like Moses in all of human history until we get to Jesus, and Jesus goes further.
Now Moses was faithful in all God’s house as a servant, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later, but Christ is faithful over God’s house as a son. And we are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.
Moses was God’s Servant, Jesus is God’s Son.
God always Called Moses - “My Servant Moses”
But God calls Jesus “This is my son”
And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became radiant, intensely white, as no one on earth could bleach them. And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses, and they were talking with Jesus. And Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good that we are here. Let us make three tents, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah.” For he did not know what to say, for they were terrified. And a cloud overshadowed them, and a voice came out of the cloud, “This is my beloved Son; listen to him.”
When Jesus takes his three closest Disciples up the Mountain they Meet Moses - The Giver of the Law, and Elijah - the Prophet who was taken to heaven in a Chariot of Fire.
And Peter is all about this, and says lets makes tents for Moses and Elijah to join us - and then God speaks and says of Jesus “This is my Son.”
Moses and Elijah were servants, Jesus is the Son.
So, what does that mean for us as Followers of Christ?
Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your fathers put me to the test and saw my works for forty years. Therefore I was provoked with that generation, and said, ‘They always go astray in their heart; they have not known my ways.’ As I swore in my wrath, ‘They shall not enter my rest.’ ” Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end. As it is said, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.” For who were those who heard and yet rebelled? Was it not all those who left Egypt led by Moses? And with whom was he provoked for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? And to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest, but to those who were disobedient? So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief.
The Author of Hebrews quotes a psalm and dives into it’s interpretation, pointing out that the Israelites after being freed from Egypt , hardened their hearts against God and against Moses. And because of this, that entire generation was not allowed to enter the Promised land, and wandered for 40 years in the desert.
He then warns us not to fall into a similar trap, and to focus on building each other up.
And Notes that if Jesus tells us to do something, we should not harden our hearts to it.
What does it mean to harden our hearts? - the word harden in Hebrew in which this psalm was originally written, literally means to make strong, to strengthen our hearts, which is what the ancient Israelites thought that emotion and thought came from.
To strengthen our will against what God has commanded. to put our will and desires and thoughts before God’s commandments and will for our lives.
Lets look at the specific rebellion that God is talking about:
They are on the border to the promised land, they sent spies in to look at the land and see where the cities are,
And the Spies bring back a report:
At the end of forty days they returned from spying out the land. And they came to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation of the people of Israel in the wilderness of Paran, at Kadesh. They brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. And they told him, “We came to the land to which you sent us. It flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. However, the people who dwell in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large. And besides, we saw the descendants of Anak there. The Amalekites dwell in the land of the Negeb. The Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the hill country. And the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and along the Jordan.”
The land is good, it is fertile, there is fruit that grows so big we can hardly carry it,
but the people are strong there are giants in the land
But Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, “Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.” Then the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are.” So they brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied out, saying, “The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people that we saw in it are of great height. And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.”
Caleb believes in God, God promised them this land, and so he says we can take it, it doesn’t matter if there are giants, our God is bigger than them
But the rest of the people are afraid.
Then all the congregation raised a loud cry, and the people wept that night. And all the people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron. The whole congregation said to them, “Would that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or would that we had died in this wilderness! Why is the Lord bringing us into this land, to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will become a prey. Would it not be better for us to go back to Egypt?” And they said to one another, “Let us choose a leader and go back to Egypt.”
The people refuse to trust in the power of God, the goodness of God, the promises of God, they rebel against Moses, and elect a new leader to go back to Egypt, which God had nearly destroyed in order to free the Israelites.
They let their own fears harden their hears against God’s voice.
And God Punished them by making them wander in the wilderness for 40 years, until that entire generation had died.
Only Caleb and Joshua get to enter the promised land.
Church, if the people who rebelled against Moses, God’s Servant, missed out Entering the Promised land, How much more will those who rebel against Christ, God’s Son, miss out on all God has for them?
So it all comes down to this, do you trust God’s word over your own thoughts, fears, and will?
Therefore, while the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it. For good news came to us just as to them, but the message they heard did not benefit them, because they were not united by faith with those who listened. For we who have believed enter that rest, as he has said, “As I swore in my wrath, ‘They shall not enter my rest,’ ” although his works were finished from the foundation of the world. For he has somewhere spoken of the seventh day in this way: “And God rested on the seventh day from all his works.” And again in this passage he said, “They shall not enter my rest.” Since therefore it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly received the good news failed to enter because of disobedience, again he appoints a certain day, “Today,” saying through David so long afterward, in the words already quoted, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.”
Now Just because that generation could not enter the promised land, God still offers his rest to Us, through Jesus, and he says if you hear his voice, then follow it - today or at once.
do not put it off for tomorrow.
But notice - David was the psalmist who wrote these words,
David lived 500 years after they entered the promised land, and they still have not found the promised Sabbath Rest.
What does that mean? is there no promised rest? on the contrary -
For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken of another day later on. So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God’s rest has also rested from his works as God did from his. Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience.
Joshua led the people into the promised land, but they didn’t enter God’s rest, instead as you read the rest of the Old Testament it is clear that they continue to rebel against Him.
But for everyone who trust is God, who put’s God’s will above their own, they can enter into God’s rest - God’s sabbath - today.
Now that doesn’t mean that things will automatically get easier, or that there is no more work to be done,
but rather that by trusting In Jesus TODAY, we secure and eternal rest in Heaven. so TODAY we are called to Strive to enter that rest, and to do so together as a church.
The Author of Hebrews ends this section with a warning:
For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.
We sometime quote this as a sort of victorious statement about the Bible
It is living and active and can speak directly to your heart,
But it also acts as a judge and witness against you.
If you hear his voice - Today do not harden your hearts
Church We have His Word - We have his voice - it is right here, in the Bible.
So when the Bible tells you something you got to choose to put it above your own thoughts or desires.
When the Bible Says that certain behaviors and lifestyles are sinful - it doesn’t matter what you think about those behaviors and lifestyles.
When the Bible Says we ought to help our neighbor, and the strangers living among us, or to feed the poor and help the homeless- we don’t get to debate about what that means.
Because if we put our will above God’s will then we are in rebellion, and we will not enter His rest.
When Jesus prayed in the garden of Gethsemane he let God know what he wanted, but he submitted to God’s will.
And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.”
And when Jesus taught his disciples to pray He began with them Seeking God’s Will
Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Church Christ led the way for us, by putting God’s will above his own, and he taught us to seek the same things.
Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
What do we need to do?
Listen to God’s voice - that is to say, read the Bible.
From the beginning to the end, from the books of Moses, to the Stories of Jesus.
For how can we know what God has commanded unless we look to his words.
Once you hear God’s word - obey it,
Put His will above your own. Because God’s will for your life is much better than anything you can come up with.
Because if you hear God’s voice - if you read his word, and then choose your own will above his, you are in rebellion.
In obeying God, Enter into His sabbath rest.
God’s perfect peace is available to us all Today,
And Only Jesus provides the way.
