Lean In, Move Beyond, not Away
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Need to Change
Need to Change
There are always projects around the house. Things break and need t/b fixed.
We discovered a small leak in the toilet tank in a bathroom. Rubber gaskets break down, lose their seal.
I thought it would be a quick fix, maybe take it apart one day, go buy parts another b/c I wanted to watch the football games. Playoffs. It’s halftime. How hard can this be?
It’s a tight space, but I’m a small guy. Flashlight, look around, feel around and figure out what’s wrong. It’s either the gasket between the tank and the bowl or the gaskets on the bolts that hold the tank onto the bowl.
Turns out, it’s one of the bolts. And it had been doing it long enough that it rusted the bottom of the bold.
I had to figure out what tools I needed, which was no small feat for me. The only thing smaller than my collection of tools is my knowledge of how to use them,
The size of the nut, to get the right sized wrench. Screwdriver. The bolt had the slot on top. But, b/c the bold was rusted, the nut wouldn’t unscrew, I couldn’t hold it tight w/ the screwdriver so the bold just turned. That nut was not coming off.
What originally looked like a pretty quick fix, quickly was becoming a bigger project.
I’m busting my knuckles as the wrench slips off, stripping the slot on top of the bolt. Now, I have to figure out how to get that bolt out.
BTW, I’m missing the football game. 3rd quarter started.
I know, hacksaw. I’ve got one of those. No idea how old the blade is. It’s just a small bolt. But the hacksaw won’t fit between the toilet and the wall. What now?
I remember, I have a little one that is w/ my PVC irrigation tools. I haven’t seen those since LR, 7 years ago. But, it’s in my garage somewhere. Found it!
Back up the bathroom. The 4th quarter had started.
I get to work w/ the hacksaw. Rapid, back and forth. Again, busting my knuckles. No idea if I’m making any progress. I can’t get my head down to see it. flashlight, contacts, it’s all a blur under there.
Half the time it’s too smooth. Like the saw is just rubbing against the tank.
I’m thinking, what if it doesn’t work. I’m messing the bolt up so there’s no way it will come out.
I’m getting frustrated. My hand hurts. I can’t tell if it’s working. Something needs to change. What?
Quit, call a plumber. Pay for the fix?
Different tool? I have sledgehammer. I’ll get that tank off.
We could sell the house and buy one where the toilets don’t leak.
Or, just put towels down forever to sop up the water that leaks out. Quit and pretend.
I evaluate my options and figure my best option is to keep on w/ the hacksaw, catch the end of the game, go buy parts tomorrow.
I”m psyched up. Working that saw. Sara comes in. I think she’s come just to check my progress. Encourage me. Come on, just a little more. You can do this.
No. She tells me she was taking a shower upstairs and the shower head broke.
So, one problem, I thought would be a quick fix, became a bigger problem. And, while I’m wrestling w/ toilet, I’ve got it in a headlock, I find out I’ve got another problem.
I missed the end of that game, Tampa Bay & the Rams. You know how it ended, FG, the last play of the game.
You get this. You know how problems like this always seem t/b much bigger problems when you tear into them. Then, more problems. And, something you really want to do, you can’t b/c the problems need to be fixed.
Frustration. Anger. Don’t know what to do. Missed opportunities that will never come back.
It’s really not a big deal if it’s a little plumbing leak. Life’s bigger deals can follow the same pattern.
When we’re young, we think we’re going to live forever. Then, we’re not young anymore and we hear our doctor tell us something we never expected.
When we’re first married, we mean, “Till death do us part.” Until we don’t. Our spouse doesn’t.
In our careers, we’re going to set the world on fire. Do it differently. Do it right, like nobody before us. Get rich. Be philanthropic. Retire young. Travel.
Until we realize there’s a reason why everybody who did this before us did it this way. And, we’re pretty average at what we do.
Our kids are going to be perfect. Grow up, be responsible adults. Mature, wise decisions. Love the Lord like we do. All b/c we were perfect parents.
Until we realize we aren’t perfect parents and our kids have the audacity to think for themselves. And, there decisions are really no better than ours were when we were that age.
Something needs to change. My situation needs to change. Everyone around me needs to change.
Maybe I need to quit. Maybe I need a sledgehammer. Maybe I need a different wife, a different career, different kids, different religion, Lord, belief system.
Or, maybe, I need to change. I need to change my attitude. I need to change my perspective. I need to change what I am doing.
Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result.
The preacher of Hebrews wrote to people whose lives were not going as they expected. It was hard. They were busting their knuckles, their heads, and their hearts trying to fix what was broken.
When they first became Xians, it was exciting, powerful, life-changing, and easy. But then, the problems got harder, and piled up. And, they were considering a change.
Quit. Go back to the old way. Try something new.
When life goes sideways, and it always does w/ unexpected problems that end up harder than we thought that pile up, we have to choose what to do. Something needs to change.
Either everyone else needs to change. Or, where we are needs to change. Or, who we are needs to change. The first 2 options are much easier than the 3rd. But, the 3rd leads to lasting fixes.
The way to change ourselves in a way that works and lasts, is to lean into Jesus, not walk away.
When life gets harder than we expect, and the problems pile up, lean in, get closer to Jesus and He will help you fix what’s broke and manage what’s hard.
The them of Hebrews is Christ Above All. All 13 chapters make the case that we have lots of options, but none a effective nor as good as what Jesus can do for us when life goes sideways.
This is going to be a review of the book we just studied.
I’m going to remind you of most of the best verses found in the book. If you want to try memorizing a verse or 2, pick the ones this morning that speak to you and where you are in your life and memorize them.
This is not intended to go deep. I explained it all when we were there before. This is to give the broad review of where we’ve been. Still, I think it will speak to you in significant ways.
But first, the preacher’s benediction.
Benediction
Benediction
Now may the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
What’s peace of mind worth to you? What is a good night’s sleep worth? We stress over the situations in our life that are too hard for us to fix.
Why not try letting the God of peace, the Prince of Peace, give you His peace, not the peace the world offers?
But to get what we want, we have to do things His way. His will, not ours. Not what I want, but what He wants for me.
Just as Jesus prayed in the garden of Gethsemane, Not my will by yours.
He has equipped us w/ everything we need to manage our lives. We may think we want something else. But what He offers is what’s best.
And, notice, the prayer is that he work in us in way that please Him, not us. When we get what He wants for us, it always goes better for us.
How did we get to this benediction? It’s been a few months and lots of Sundays to cover 13 chapters.
Jesus is better than any other options. Here’s his case.
Christ Above All
Christ Above All
The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.
Jesus is God. Exact representation of God. There is no other person like Him, except God. So, if you want to know God and be known by Him, then know Jesus.
Not only did He speak and create everything, He sustains everything by speaking. How powerful and wise He is.
There is nobody more powerful nor wise than He and He makes himself available to us in way that we can relate to.
Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil—
He became human to save humanity. A giraffe couldn’t do it. He had to be human, die a human, be raised as a human, to make the way for the rest of us humans t/b able to be raised, too.
In the process, we could relate to Him, God, know Him, and be known by Him.
He experienced everything we do. He had to eat. He had to sleep. If you cut Him, He bled. He was betrayed by a close friend.
The physical, mental, and emotional pain we feel, He felt
For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin.
He did have something we don’t, though. We have 2 human parents. He only had 1. The other is God.
So He stood up to the temptations we face and fail. But, since He was successful, He can help us navigate these minefields as the landmines blow up in our faces.
When I fix a problem, do a project, I can be nearly 90% of perfect. That toilet still drips once in a while. So I put one of those plastic disposable containers under the valve to catch the drips.
Jesus doesn’t need to rig anything. When He fixes something, it’s a perfect fix.
Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them.
He saves us perfectly, and completely. The biggest problem we have is death and He fixed it.
After death, what else could be harder? Nobody else fixes death. And who fixes everything else perfectly?
President? Congress? Supreme Ct.? Military?
Some are the best and the brightest. Others, not so much. But none of them can do what Jesus does.
When Jesus heals you, it’s immediate and complete. When your doctor heals you, you still have to P.T. and regain what you lost.
The same Jesus who spoke everything into existence, raised Lazarus from the dead, healed my wife’s thyroid cancer.
He’s always been the same and easy to find in the same place.
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.
We change. We evolve. Sometimes for the better. Sometimes for the worse. One of challenges in a marriage. I’m not the same person I was 38 years ago when Sara and I got engaged. She’s changed, too. So have you.
As married couples, friends, we have to adapt to the changes of ea other.
Jesus never changes. He was the same Savior that saved my great grandfather, Lewis Baker. And He’ll be the same Savior that hopefully saves my yet to be conceived great grandchildren.
Easy to find. Easy to relate to as a human. Can fix our biggest problem; and everything short of it.
There is no one else who ever did this nor ever will. If you’re looking for your best option, Jesus both God and Man, is it.
So, if something needs to change, it’s not Jesus.
Maybe our knowledge and understanding of Him needs to change. Or, our expectations, attitudes, and perspectives do.
Where do we go to get the help making these changes to ourselves?
The Word of God
The Word of God
In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways,
God is alive and He speaks. Do you know His voice? Can you hear Him?
What a wasted opportunity if we can’t.
He spoke thru the prophets and they wrote it down. Their writings are collected in the OT.
He spoke thru Jesus. John said, Jesus is the Word, His life speaks to us, His messages and miracles speak to us.
He sent the HS to live is us and counsel us.
So much of this is in black and white in your bible. If you want to get to know Him, what to expect of Him, what He expects of us, then study and get to know what He thought was so important that it should be written down for us to have in the c.21.
It’s as much about Him as it is about us. Remember, He doesn’t need to change. We do.
For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.
Not only is Jesus alive, the Word is alive. it is so much more than letters, sentences, and paragraphs on a page.
It speaks life into what’s dead and dying w/in us.
It corrects our wrong expectations. We take our thoughts and ideas to the bible and let it amend them so we will be less disappointed b/c we will have more accurate expectations.
It gets deep into our attitudes and perspectives on the things we are facing. The problems that need fixing may not even be our fault but God has something good for us in them.
There is always a pearl among the sand in the problem. Find it.
The pearls produce changes in us, growth.
We have much to say about this, but it is hard to make it clear to you because you no longer try to understand. In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.
Thru trial and error, the application of what we learn in the bible we gain a better understanding of what is good for us to do.
Thru its constant use we train ourselves to know these things. Not occasional use, not weekly use, not just on Sundays when the pastor spoon feeds us use.
We approach the bible and babies. I was 17 years old, but an infant in my faith. I needed formula b/c my spiritual teeth had not come in yet.
Maybe some of us have worn our teeth out, lost them, need dentures. Still we chew to food to get nourished so we can grow and stay healthy.
It’s important to know elementary things like how to be saved. But we’ve got to move on to wrestle w/ tougher passages like can we lose our salvation.
What’s the point of studying that? Growth. Maturity. Learn and experience more of God’s grace and know Jesus better. More faithful. More obedient. More capable of better choices.
So, let’s move on to tougher passages to learn how Jesus can fix our tougher problems
Therefore let us move beyond the elementary teachings about Christ and be taken forward to maturity, not laying again the foundation of repentance from acts that lead to death, and of faith in God,
Don’t move away. It could be your spiritual education has not covered the solution to situation you’re facing yet.
Don’t walk away from Jesus or His Word. There is no better option.
Walk closer. Move in and move beyond what you already know to gain the maturity that gives you the ability to manage your life.
There’s a reason why 9 year olds can’t get a driver’s license. They don’t have the maturity to process the situations they will face in traffic and they can get hurt or hurt someone else.
We need maturity to be able to process and manage the problems we will face as they pile up and get bigger.
So, what should be our response to Jesus and His Word?
Our Response
Our Response
Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
Approach. Get nearer. Get closer. Don’t walk away.
Confident that we will get what we need.
One of the things that keeps us away from Jesus is that we don’t have what we need for the problem we’re facing.
He didn’t give it to us. Maybe he won’t. Maybe he can’t.
Or, maybe, b/c we haven’t been here before, or we’re stubborn, we haven’t asked, yet. If we will humbly, confidently approach Jesus on the throne, we will get whatever we need that will help us fix the problem we have.
Approach the throne, that’s in heaven. We’re here. What can we do here and now that will help us get what we need?
And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.
Don’t quit church and hanging out w/ the ppl who can help you.
People may blame the preacher, the preaching, the music, the temp in the room as the reason why they quit the church.
They knew they needed a change, so they found something else to do on Sunday mornings.
Mature ppl can get beyond these things.
Gandhi said he liked Jesus. He just wasn’t fond of His followers.
We get that. But we’re not called to follow His followers. We join ea other as we all follow Jesus together.
fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Focus you eyes on Jesus. He is in Heaven right now. So He is beyond your problems
When Peter focused on the waves, he sank. When he focused on Jesus, he stayed above the problem he faced.
Jesus was the first to have faith and he plied it perfectly. Maybe the change we need is what or who we are focusing on.
Don’t focus on the ppl around you that you think are the cause of all your problems. Focus on Christ who can help you change your perspective so you can find that pearl in there.
Then, w/ the ppl you are struggling w/.
Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.
The ppl are not your biggest problem. They may be a problem. Maybe you need to change your boundary in regards to some ppl.
This may be exactly where you need to put the work in. Forgive. Let go. Move on. Don’t gossip to or about anyone.
Do all that you can to live at peace w/ everyone.
If your eyes are on Christ then you’re not focused on the imperfections of others and it’s easier to get past them.
Don’t expect anything of anyone you don’t expect of yourself, first.
Then, the most important response we can have to Jesus is to believe. Have faith.
Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.
Choose to believe. No matter how big the problem nor how many, choose to believe that God is at work in good ways you can’t see in the midst of them.
Hope always sees a positive future. Maybe not tomorrow, but next week or next month or next year.
W/ our eyes on Jesus, the future always looks bright. And we can be certain that we can’t see everything that’s going on.
There is no better place to put your faith than in the One who is alive and speaks to us, save completely, has felt everything we feel, fully God and fully human, the same today as He was yesterday and will be tomorrow, pioneer and perfecter of our faith, that we can approach confidently.
When life gets harder, don’t strike out on your own looking for another. Lean into Who you know but you may not know enough about, yet.
There are no better options. Christ above all.
Applications
Applications
Memorize
Memorize
Memorize a verse or 3. Of these I have reminded you of, which spoke to you in a special way today.
The book of Hebrews may have more memorable verses than any other book in your bible.
Commit some of them to memory.
Change
Change
Maybe it’s time to stop trying to change everybody else.
It takes some security and self-esteem to face the reality the I might be the biggest problem I have.
When you come to Christ, you give Him your old, flawed ID, and He gives you a new one that can handle facing the necessary changes you need to make.
Let the Word change you. What changes do you need to make in your own attitude, perspective, or actions?
Faith
Faith
Everything good begins by choosing to have faith in Jesus. Believe in all that He is and all that He came to do for you.
Another verse, it is impossible to please God w/out faith. No good work accomplishes any good in God’s eyes if it’s not accompanied by faith.
Start here. Maybe for the first time. Maybe you need a booster shot. You’ve had all the vaccinations you can get now you just need a booster of faith.
Choose to believe more, stronger, deeper, that your situation is not hopeless, God has not forgotten you, hasn’t stopped speaking to you, and hasn’t stopped working in you and for you.
Confident in your hope.
Assured that God is at work in good ways you can’t see.
When life goes sideways, and it always does w/ unexpected problems that end up harder than we thought that pile up, we have to choose what to do. Something needs to change.
When life gets harder than we expect, and the problems pile up, lean in, get closer to Jesus and He will help you fix what’s broke and manage what’s hard.