HEBREWS-JESUS IS BETTER: "and so turn back"

 “and so turn back” Hebrews 1:8-14 Does what we believe about God and of God matter? We can live our lives with Christian ideas that may or may not come from the Bible, working to make things better. Better for people, better for ourselves. Maybe we’ll be a social justice warrior, maybe we’ll be a politician and try to make better laws. As a society we tend to bounce from atrocity to atrocity, outrage to outreach presenting flattened arguments that easily fix complex issues with sweeping law. We can become caught up in that. And we can argue that. And sweeping law, or social justice mission becomes our everything. It’s all that matters, it’s our every conversation - we’ll do anything to be right, we’ll do anything to get our way - and then pretend we push on that, for 50 years, maybe we’ll make a dent in that problem. Have you ever been wrong about something? I know I have. I was recently at house sessions in Maryland and had the opportunity to meet a senator or two and watch some of the government in action and I was thinking, this is crazy. This is what these people do day in, and day out, sit and try to solve and navigate problems and broker deals through consensus, but what about when the majority is wrong? Church imagine this - if we can together come to wrong conclusions how much MORE careful do we need to be with what we know and understand about God? I read this about crime and convictions: “Researchers found that 149 people were cleared in 2015 for crimes they didn’t commit — more than any other year in history, according to a report published Wednesday by the National Registry of Exonerations, a project of the University of Michigan Law School. By comparison, 139 people were exonerated in 2014. The number has risen most years since 2005, when 61 people were cleared of crimes they didn’t commit.  “Historically, this is a very large number for a type of event that we’d like to think almost never happens or just doesn’t happen,” Samuel Gross, a University of Michigan law professor who helped write the report, told The Huffington Post. The men and women who were cleared last year had, on average, served 14.5 years in prison. Some had been on death row. Others were younger than 18 when they were convicted or had intellectual disabilities. All had been swept into a justice system that’s supposed to be based on the presumption of innocence, but failed.” Church imagine this - if we can together come to wrong conclusions how much MORE careful do we need to be with what we know and understand about God? We should as Christians study this Word of God: • In prayer. • In unison • And with purpose. It’s been said that the average Jehovah’s Witness can turn the average Christian into a doctrinal pretzel within 10- minutes. I mean from the *knock knock knock* moment to: • Did you know that Jesus is actually the arch angle Michael and that Jesus is created? • Or that the soul sleeps after death until resurrection? • That we can pray for the dead because they’re resurrected in God’s memory for judgment? Church, most of us have zero idea what we believe about these things. And we don’t care. We just want to know what came on TV last week, or who won survivor amanawahoo, or the Super Bowl. Yet this book of Hebrews comes to a people who are drifting away from the truth in Jesus and within two verses, is elbow deep in theology. That is how God seeks to bring back a wayward people, through the renewal of their minds in knowing Him and His plan more deeply. Last week in verses 4-7 through logical conundrum, through impossible problem, through stacking scripture on scripture and creating a difficult issue we became assured that scripture cannot be broken, because Scripture is from God who cannot lie, and so scripture is without error. When we see scripture showing passages that command worship of ONLY God, then having passages that command worship of Jesus and use Old Testament passages about God applied to Jesus then either - we’re seeing something about who God is or scripture is broken… Because scripture is revelation from God who cannot lie, then it’s painting a clearer picture of who God is through these passages. We’re seeing more clearly who Jesus is and understanding His statements like: If you’ve seen me you’ve seen the father. Or as John talks about in our Sunday school class in Acts, that Jesus’ miracles were of the type and quality ascribed to God - and so His apostles building the base of His church were too enabled to continue His ministry for the justification and establishment of His church. Now that Hebrews has established that Jesus is God, it will continue to outline His positional authority: Hebrews 1:8–14 (ESV) 8 But of the Son he says, “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever, the scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom. 9 You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness; therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your companions.” Here in these verses we’ve transitioned from the argument that Jesus is God to Jesus authority because He’s considered by God more highly than even the angels. And maybe you’re like the Angels - ok, big deal. But consider scripture. The angels who 2 Samuel 24:15-17 killed 70,000 due to David’s sin. Or who took out 185,00 soldiers in a night in Isaiah 37:36 or who killed Herod Agrippa Acts 12:3-23, or that guard us Matthew 18:10…. Higher than the angels is a significant portion what would be higher than celestial beings, over earthly beings - Jesus God’s co-eternal son Jesus. And so as this church of Hebrews is turning back to ceremony and law they’re reminded you’re turning away from Jesus who is God Himself who is over EVEN the angles - and so turn back. Verses 8/9 here draw from Psalm 45:6-7 celebrating a wedding where the king is addressed as God - it uses the phrase “God is your throne” showing the timelessness of God which is now ascribed to Jesus in this section - that Jesus is co-eternal with God is important, he isn’t created, he isn’t the arch angel Michael, his Oil of gladness is his return over death and rightful return to glory with gladness beyond his companions - the many sons and daughters of God who’ll turn to Him. Church let’s turn to Him. Not to our own understanding, which can be wrong - which can lead us a stray, lets lean on God. 10 And, “You, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning, and the heavens are the work of your hands; 11 they will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment, 12 like a robe you will roll them up, like a garment they will be changed. But you are the same, and your years will have no end.” Again, the author is still talking about Jesus - and using now Psalm 110:25-27 a prayer from the afflicted to the Lord God. This is another time the quoted Scripture is describing God and here by the author of Hebrews being ascribed to Jesus - Hughes noted that the Christians after Jesus death “without hesitation” ascribed. To Jesus what the OT said of God. To the Jews Jesus’ position over the angles was to carry them through their trials - because the Jews as we’ve pointed to over and over had been lead and comforted by God - freed from slavery lead by fire and smoke - now by Christ and freedom in His grace. They needed to turn back to Him but to turn back, God wooed them with right understanding - we too should be interested in understanding God rightly. We as lazy Americans want to be spoon-fed, God. So we’re vulnerable to error. We need to not simply come to the table with a fork and a dream, hoping to be fed, rather we need to seek out our meals our knowledge of God - it’s here in these 66 books - we need to engage them. Aren’t you fed well - are you in the room at 9:30, learning together with others and studying? Now we publish, weekly, John’s notes so that each of us can continue to dig at the text(s) through the week – 13 And to which of the angels has he ever said, “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet”? This is one of my favorite literary devices here - it’s the rhetorical question. Do you know why the rhetorical question is my favorite… So what’s the answer - to which if the angles have God said that? The answer is none - because Jesus isn’t an angel, not even Michael. He wasn’t created He is co-eternal, he shares all the aspects of God, He is God. Anything less of Jesus is blasphemy and blasphemy is sin. God would not walk us so compellingly into sin - Hebrews would be an unfair trap - rather the Hebrew Christians are called back to Jesus over law and ceremony, directly by God, in the book of Hebrews - by showing that Jesus is enough. This quote is from Psalm 110 the most cited OT passage in the entire NT. It’s what Jesus used to show the Pharisees who he was in Matthew 22:40-45 14 Are they not all ministering spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation? Why is the knock at the door so important to me? Aren’t we to simply love God and love others? Yes and No. How will you love others when you cannot even tell them why you believe what you believe? Will you tell them to listen to me, or listen to someone else? What if I go insane, or what if I’m wrong - only scripture can be the clear answer. We live in a world where politicians work for consensus, with lobbyists and for the interested of big government and where policy falls prey to the highest bidder with funding for the next election campaign - where apparently 149 people in 2014 alone were wrongly convicted of crimes and sentenced to prison for years … Where in 2017 there were approximately 8.23 million Jehovah’s Witness (nearly 2 times the population of the state of South Carolina), Church - do we worship God? Is Jesus Lord of our lives and do we seek after His Lordship over our lives daily - or is Jesus a 1 in 7 days a week consideration? Do we come to the God of grace for salvation only - or for our daily lives? Do we abide daily, do we study daily, do we seek after the renewing of our minds presented in Romans - do we believe lies? How would we know if we believe lies, do we go to the truth from the 66 books or look from consensus in others, from the radio, or from books? Church there isn’t necessarily anything wrong with social justice - but does it occupy more of our minds than Christ? There is nothing wrong with policy and law, but do we think it can resolve issues more than God? In 2014 a man with a knife killed 33 and injured 130 in China - is that a problem to fix with a law? This past week a young man with a gun killed children in a school - Christian what will we believe of that? What does our theology teach us about that? Do we have a theology? Do we have a theology through which to filter this world - or do we simply react to it emotionally? What about the knock on the door and the claim of soul sleep, Jesus as a created being and Jesus as Michael the archangel or prayer for the dead - will we have an answer? Ephesians 4:14 reads, so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Acts 20:29-30 reads: 29 I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; 30 and from among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things, to draw away the disciples after them. Church - these are warnings to a people in the real world. Where tension runs high, where sin is worshiped, and where God is mocked. Where evil is called good and good called evil (Think Isaiah 5:20). Where the truth about God is twisted and the people are confused. Where what seems so clear like a conviction or a new law - yet in the end becomes the wrong thing, Church we need to be a people of the Word of God. We must study it and know it - if you’re a Christian it’s not an option, it’s a necessity. And so, I pray we’ll turn back. Back to our first love God - and learn more from His revelation to us about this life and about Himself - the Bible. Lets study in prayer. Lets study in unison And lets study with purpose. And lets turn to, or turn back to God - we need Him to be our focus and aim in this world. HEBREWS-JESUS IS BETTER “and so turn back” Pastor John Weathersby Transcend Church 5 of 5 Sunday1/18/2018