Requirements for Every Christian

Introduction

If there were ever a Sunday to physically be at church to hear a message in person, this would be that Sunday!

In life, sometimes, there are things that we have to do. In some settings, these things are called requirements. Think about someone interviewing for a job. They go into the interview and are asked many questions about their past experience and education. Following this time they are told what the requirements for the job are. For a doctor, a requirement for the job is to help patients who are sick or who are in need of a surgery. For a truck driver, a requirement could be to be able to drive long hours. For a teacher, a requirement is to teach. These are things that are expected and come along with the specific job. The question that we will look at today is this, “Are there requirements for us as Christians?”

Some people answer this question and say that the answer is no - we are free to do whatever we want! This is like the American way of thinking - we have all the freedom, don’t you dare touch my freedom because I’ll do whatever I want to do. What does the Bible say, though?

Romans 6:1–2 ESV

1 What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? 2 By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?

We are not supposed to continue living in sin as Christians. We are to live differently. The entire chapter of Romans 6 talks about this reality. There are things that we can and can’t do as Christians and as Americans that might grind our gears a little bit but we have to get over it. We are a new creation and there are requirements for us. What are some requirements for Christians? Some of them are obvious: We are supposed to read Scripture, pray and be Christlike with how we live our lives. These are not easy things, but we recognize that we should do them. What about persevering in hard times? That’s a requirement of being a Christian. What about encouraging others and praying for our enemies? Those are requirements of being a Christian as well even though they’re not necessarily fun to do. What about attending church? That’s a requirement for Christians too. What is “church”, though? The Biblical definition (ekklesia - called out ones) doesn’t always align with our Western definition. We’ll examine all of these requirements and questions as we find ourselves in Hebrews 10 yet again.

Hebrews 10:19–25 CSB

19 Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have boldness to enter the sanctuary through the blood of Jesus— 20 he has inaugurated for us a new and living way through the curtain (that is, through his flesh)— 21 and since we have a great high priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed in pure water. 23 Let us hold on to the confession of our hope without wavering, since he who promised is faithful. 24 And let us consider one another in order to provoke love and good works, 25 not neglecting to gather together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging each other, and all the more as you see the day approaching.

Live Differently (19-20)

The first 2 verses of this passage of Scripture tell us that we are called to a new and living way. What does this imply? If there is something new and alive it means that there was once something that was old and dead. The Bible shares with us that before Christ, we were dead in sins and trespasses! We were not just neutral or bad, we were dead. Yet, now we are alive! This is great news - what does this mean we are supposed to do, though? It means that we are supposed to live differently because we are a completely new creation!

This third and final section of the book of Hebrews brings about some practical instructions for us. Because Jesus is greater, because Jesus took our place on the cross, therefore - we must enter in with confidence and live for Him. Where is your confidence?

I’ll never forget reading this quote by Stephen Hawking, the British Physicist who was many times smarter than I ever will be, say this, “Before we understand science, it is natural to believe that God created the universe. But now science offers a more convincing explanation.” For Stephen Hawking, he had so much confidence in science and in his intellect. The man was a genius and I’ve heard many Christians call him all sorts of bad names because of his denial of Christ, but the man was brilliant. Smarter than just about every Christian I’ve ever met, but he rejected God. He placed his faith in himself. Sadly, many atheists do this very thing on a regular basis. There is a denial of the supernatural - everything has to “make sense” and if something doesn’t make sense then there must be a logical explanation without involving God or anything supernatural. So, some people place their confidence in their brain.

Other people, including many churchgoers, place their confidence in their works and their value as a person. 40% of Evangelicals polled by LifeWay research recently said that most people are pretty good. If most people are pretty good then we certainly can have confidence in our works. If I’m a good person who does good works, why shouldn’t I have confidence and boast in my works? The issue, again, is with what the Bible says. The Bible shares that there is none righteous, not even one. There is no one who is “mostly good” or even “pretty good” according to the Bible. We can’t have confidence in our works because Isaiah 64:6 tells us that

Isaiah 64:6 NIV

6 All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away.

This is not good news, friends! So if we can’t have confidence in our emotions, knowledge or in our works, what can we have full and total confidence in? We can have total confidence in Jesus Christ. We enter in through Jesus Christ. We have faith in Jesus Christ. Paul talks about this in Ephesians 2

Ephesians 2:8–9 NASB95

8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; 9 not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.

It’s all because of Jesus - therefore, how are we to live and act? There is a new and living way available to us through Jesus Christ. We live for Him. This requires us to not just look internally at ourselves and what feels right for us, this requires us to look at others and think about what the Bible says rather than what our heart says. We live differently! In our world, though, there is almost a fear of living differently. Whenever you’ve lived in the Bible belt your whole life maybe you don’t really understand how different it is to be a Christian, but if you’ve ever looked at other countries and seen how Christians operate and worship you see that they live differently. They don’t have the freedom to practice their religion. They are persecuted for their faith yet instead of cowering down, they continue to live for Christ. They might meet underground and away from the public eye, but they continue to worship. We might need to do things differently than in the past, but the question that we must ask is does my life look different than my non-Christian neighbor? Does my life look different today than it did before I met Christ?

Draw Near to God (21-22)

After we evaluate where our confidence is from and if our lives are different, we must realize that we are hopeless without Christ and that we must draw near to Him. As a child there were times in which I would get afraid after watching something on TV, such as a commercial for an upcoming scary movie. As a kid, these commercials continued to play in my mind, especially at night when I would try to sleep. They would terrify me sometimes to the point that I couldn’t sleep unless I would go and tell my parents. Whenever I would go to my parents’ room there was safety and comfort there. I knew that nothing bad would happen to me and that those scary thoughts would disappear if I could talk it through with my parents. I knew that there was safety and assurance with my parents. Maybe you can relate with this as well. Maybe there is a place that is where you run to whenever you need to just escape. Maybe there is a person that you talk with when you need help. We all run to various things in times of trouble - what we see Jesus say is that we should come to Him because He will give us rest!

Because of what Jesus Christ did for us on the cross, we are able to stand before God and draw near to him. We have assurance of this because of our great high priest.

You can have assurance of your salvation right now. Have you ever questioned your salvation? You don’t have to raise your hand, but many Christians have done exactly this several times in the past and maybe this is true of you even right now! We question things and one of the things that we question can be our salvation. Am I really saved? Ask yourself, am I bearing fruit? Generally speaking, non-Christians don’t concern themselves with asking if they really are saved or not. If you’re concerned about that then that’s a good thing! With that in mind, though, don’t be afraid - you can be assured of where you stand because of what Jesus Christ did for you! You’re not assured because of your works but because of Jesus’ work on the cross!

As a result, draw near to God. How often should you draw near to God? There are two extreme positions here - some say that they draw near all the time at home and at work. Others say that they only draw near when they’re at church. Both of these positions are incorrect. We certainly draw near to God when we’re at home and at work, but we are also supposed to do so corporately at church. We do so individually and corporately! We draw near to God and in doing so, as the end of verse 22 tells us, we are cleansed and washed. As you draw near to God you will be changed. You will see things differently. You will bear fruit. You will live differently. Why? Because you have been buried with Christ and your are raised to walk in newness of life. Are you drawing near to God today? As a Christian, you should. Strive to do so more often this coming week and document the changes that it makes in your daily life!

Persevere (23)

Not only are we as Christians supposed to live differently and draw near to God, we are called to persevere in both good and bad times! We are called in verse 23 to hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering because He who promised is faithful! Do you know someone who is reliable? Maybe a parent, friend, co-worker or even a pet? Sadly, pets are some of the most reliable members of the family as they are always happy to see you. We all know reliable people, but people are people. People will always let us down eventually. Have you experienced this? Maybe a good friend let you down when you needed them the most. Maybe a parent forgot something extremely important to you or a game or appointment you had. Maybe someone forgot your birthday or they forgot to tell you good job whenever you do something good!

Our world is one of change. People change. Events change. Circumstances change. We hate change, generally speaking, and if you don’t think so just go to Walmart and listen to all the complaining that goes on. With that in mind, we see in Scripture that our God is not a God who changes but instead is a God who is faithful and does not change! As Christians our hope is placed in the unchanging God who is faithful! This is great news. But what do we do whenever our circumstances change? Whenever life is good and things are going our way it can be easy to worship God and be obedient, but what about when things change and life isn’t going our way? God doesn’t change! He will not abandon His children - He is faithful to His promises!

If you weren’t in Christ there would be all sorts of reasons to be afraid and concerned about things. There would be reasons to be concerned with this virus. There would be reasons to be concerned with the financial outlook of our world and the upcoming election in our country. To these people, they wonder, “How on earth will things work out if this happens?” We ask the same question as Christians but we have hope because God is in control and because God is faithful to finish what He started! Therefore, we persevere regardless of what goes on in the world around us because God is faithful. In the Greek text the verb to hold fast is in the present tense - this means that we continue to hold fast today. Good, bad, ugly - we hold fast because God’s got this and He is faithful.

Encourage One Another (24-25)

The final 2 verses have been some of the most popular ones during the last few months. We see that we are to encourage one another to love and good deeds - we’re good with this part. We should want people to love on others and to do good things. But verse 25 is where there is some debate, especially among the church today. Let’s look at 5 different ways that we can encourage one another as brothers and sisters in Christ!

Strengthen our Faith in God

There are sometimes in life where we are struggling. Perhaps it’s financially, relationally or even spiritually, but we all go through seasons of life when we are struggling. In moments like this, we need others to help strengthen our faith. This doesn’t mean that other people have it all figured out or that they have the answer for what we’re going through, rather it means that whenever we are together we can strengthen one another and build one another up. The summer before my senior year of high school there was a student at Ozark high school who passed away. This was a student who I had 4-5 classes with and knew fairly well. A week or so after he passed, my youth group was set to go on a mission trip to Louisville, Kentucky. This was a season of life where things were difficult and there was a lot of emotion, yet whenever we arrived on campus at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary it was so encouraging to worship with brothers and sisters in Christ. I reflected with several friends who were still grieving and our faith was so strengthened because we were able to come together with other believers and praise God, even though things weren’t easy.

Bear one another’s burdens

Whenever someone is struggling, one of the things that we can do in the church is encourage them by lifting them up in prayer and letting them know that we are there for them. We are not in this alone, there is no lone ranger Christianity, this is a foreign concept to the New Testament! We are in this together - we bear one another’s burdens. One of the most sad and frustrating parts of being in ministry and maybe you’ve experienced this too, is when people don’t tell you what’s going on. We can’t help one another out if we don’t know that there’s a problem. We’re in this together. Whenever someone is struggling with something, we rally behind that person and help them out however we can. We are better together than we could ever be apart.

Stimulate one another to good works

As verse 24 says, we stimulate one another to good works. This simply means that we encourage one another to not just have an intellectual faith but a practical one. A faith that leads to works as we share the Gospel with others and model what this looks like to the younger generation. We don’t just have blind faith that is within our head, we have faith that leads to action. We encourage one another to act whenever we gather to worship!

Prayer

Prayer is powerful as it unites us. It helps us to focus not on our own agendas but rather upon what God is doing and what His plan is for us. Things change whenever God’s people pray. To quote from Billy Graham, "The Christian life is not a constant high. I have my moments of deep discouragement. I have to go to God in prayer with tears in my eyes, and say, 'O God, forgive me,' or 'Help me.'" We do this together during worship as we cry out to God and ask Him to help us, to forgive us and to guide us. We pray not to elicit a response that we want, but we pray that God’s will be done and that we will follow Him wherever He leads. The praying church is a dangerous church!

Meet Together!

This is such a divisive subject right now and there have been prominent pastors such as John MacArthur, John Piper, JD Greear, Mark Dever and others who are godly shepherds who have wildly different takes on Hebrews 10:25 and what it looks like to assemble together. Let’s look at what this verse says and what it doesn’t say and allow there to be grace as we go through this difficult situation.

Hebrews 10:25 says that we need to have corporate worship. We need to have times of prayer and worship and encouragement within the body of Christ. This is the positive aspect of the verse - church is essential, if you will! The context of this verse and the entire book of Hebrews is towards Jewish Christians. In this verse we see that some were tempted to stop associating with Christians as they would gather and instead retreat to their old Jewish custom and way of life. There is a strong warning against not gathering with Christian brothers and sisters.

Now, what does this verse not say. This verse does not say that when there is a global pandemic and you don’t know how deadly a virus might or might not be that you have to keep doing everything the exact same as you’ve done before. You can’t use Hebrews 10:25 as a proof text to say that we have to have baptist potlucks and hugs and all that jazz because it’s what we’ve always done. You can’t use Hebrews 10:25 to say that the church shouldn’t have closed - we never closed! We shifted to an online platform for a temporary amount of time. Closing would entail that nothing happened - that never happened here and that never happened around the country. Many Christians are rallying behind John MacArthur, pastor of Grace Community Church outside of Los Angeles, California, because he is adamant that church is essential and I agree with him. Yet, those same Christians don’t realize that Grace Community Church didn’t meet in person from March-July. You can’t use Hebrews 10:25 when it suits your argument and fail to use it whenever it doesn’t suit your purposes.

To the other side of the argument who doesn’t have an issue with online only services but rather embraces it. There is one word to keep in mind: caution. 39% of Evangelicals believe that an online worship service is a valid replacement for in person corporate worship. There is no such thing as a lone ranger Christian! We need community and we need to gather corporately for church. Can this happen online? Yes. You can gather with family, hear a sermon and sing songs of praise, discuss the message and have church. In fact, if you look at the history of the church you would find that the majority of early Christians didn’t meet in large groups or large buildings but rather as small groups in homes. There were many house churches, if you will! This is a Biblical model - it certainly isn’t the way that we’re accustom to things being, but that is Biblical and can be done and is what happens in countries like China on a regular basis. We can’t say 100 people in person is “better” than 8 in a home because it’s our preference. We must be careful not to confuse what the Bible says with what our preference is!

But there are some who say, “I can do this alone” or “I prefer online because it’s easier to hear” or “I can watch it later in the week” - or “I don’t feel safe coming to church” when we go to Walmart, hangout with family routinely and attend various events in the community… Friends, there are many people who are searching for an excuse - let this not be true of us. I feel totally comfortable in saying this based on science and experience. You are safer attending church than you are going to Walmart, a graduation ceremony, school or a restaurant. Now, if you are the type who hasn’t gone anywhere due to health concerns then that’s a totally different story! But there’s a line, friends, and we’ve gotta be careful here because when you’re at home I pray that you’re getting fed, but there’s no feedback. Maybe there’s a facebook comment but unless you shoot me or someone else a message, I really don’t know if the message resonated or if you even worshiped with us. There’s a corporate aspect to worship and you matter vitally to our worship whether you think so or not!

So, Hebrews 10:25 tells us that church is essential and corporate worship matters. Does this mean that you’re in sin if you are sick and can’t come? No. Does it mean that you’re wrong if you’re concerned about COVID and you’re limiting where you go? No, that’s a personal choice you must make. Does it mean that we must be careful not to get out of the habit of attending church? YES! The devil would love nothing more than for you to think Walmart is more essential than attending church in person.

Why does this matter so much? Because the Day is drawing near. Christ will return, the Bible tells us so! Growing in our faith, encouraging one another and inviting non-Christians to join us is extremely important given the circumstances we find ourselves in today. How are you encouraging others today?

Conclusion

This is a heavy passage of Scripture but it’s also a timely passage of Scripture for us to evaluate and examine internally. How do we match up with these requirements? Are we living differently? Are we drawing near to God? Are we persevering through difficult times? Are we encouraging one another? I pray that the answer to these questions is yes, yes, yes and yes! But I also know myself and I know you. It’s hard to do all of these things consistently and given the division in our world and even in the church today, it can be hard to be hopeful. Let me encourage all of us today to start with yourself. Examine where you stand. It’s always easy to point the finger to the other side and say that they need to do this or that, but seriously examine yourself and think of where you can improve. How can you encourage your brothers and sisters who might disagree with you? That’s a hard question but it’s an important one because there will always be people who disagree with us.

Let’s strive to live differently as members in the Kingdom of God. While the world would love to see us tear one another apart and while Satan would love for us to focus on internal matters rather than the lost people all around us, let’s strive to honor God with our actions and words both inside and outside the walls of the church. Let’s stimulate one another to good deeds and let’s continue to gather, even though it’s different and even though for some of you you might think that we’re doing too much or that we’re not doing nearly enough, let’s encourage one another in this difficult time because Christ is coming! As the 1st century church believed, Christ is coming soon. That was the thought 2000 years ago and sometimes we don’t live with that same mindset. Sometimes we live as though Christ will come back in 2000 more years long after we’re dead and gone. That might be the way that it is, but what if it were tomorrow? There’s far more work to be done. Far less arguing within the church to be waged and far more souls that need to hear the truth of the Gospel that Jesus Christ died to save sinners. Let that be our message and let that be a requirement for every Christian to do this week! Let’s pray.