Sermon Tone Analysis
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It is as always, a privilege to bring the Word of God to this congregation.
We have had a wonderful day of worship thus far.
It is always excellent to have the children involved in the worship service.
Thank you to those who coordinated that.
We are in series entitled “Better” where we are walking through the first few chapters of the book of Hebrews.
We will be coming back to that momentarily, but we should first draw our attention to today.
Today is Palm Sunday.
This day marks the Sunday Prior to the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
It may be even marked on your calendars.
I’ve seen that some people celebrate Palm Sunday with a feast.
We did not prepare a church-wide potluck today, but if any of you are having your own feasts at home following the service today, my wife and I are up for an invitation!
But what exactly is Palm Sunday?
It is the celebration of Jesus’ Triumphal entrance into Jerusalem.
When I was in youth choir growing up, we had a song that said, “A King is coming to town!” Well, that is what was happening on this Sunday some 2000 years ago.
It was the culmination of prophecy.
The Jewish people were told there king would come in Zechariah:
So hundreds of years later, Jesus Christ is finally here.
He had spent the last 3 years in ministry.
He went around from place to place preaching the gospel of repentance.
He casted out demons, healed the sick, He even rose the dead.
The Jews in Jerusalem had heard about all the things He had done and now it was time for Him to enter into the city.
Let me tell you, they were fired up to see the Messiah come into town.
Check out the scene as recorded in the book of Matthew.
Jesus comes riding into town on a young donkey, the colt, and to put into modern terms, the crowd goes wild.
There is cheering and rejoicing!
It was a sign of honor to lay down their cloaks on the road.
They were saying this is Jesus the King!
A great crowd amasses all around and shouts out Hosanna! Hosanna is praise to God that is saying “Save us” “Please Deliver Us” “I Beg You to Save Us!”
These people were crying out for salvation and recognizing that it comes from Jesus.
Those who didn’t know about Jesus were stirred up by all of the commotion going on.
They say, “Who is this?”
And those in the know are like How do you not know!
This is Jesus!
Now to tie this is in with what we have been looking at as we walked through the first chapter of Hebrews the last couple of weeks, the message is in some ways very similar.
The people laying down the palm branches and their own cloaks for Jesus to ride over on the colt, are professing the Majesty of Jesus.
In the first chapter of Hebrews we are told of the great authority and power of Jesus.
We are shown that He is the divine heir of creation.
The hand of creation.
He is better than the angels.
It is they that worship Him.
Honestly, we should be as stirred up as the city was here in Matthew when we read about the excellencies of Jesus Christ in Hebrews!
But as we find ourselves beginning to look at the second chapter of Hebrews, we are presented with a problem that is in line with an unsaid problem happening during the original Palm Sunday.
You see the people crying Hosanna, had knowledge of who Jesus was and what Jesus had done.
They even celebrated His existence and His entrance to the city.
But the problem was that they praised Jesus, not for who He really was, but who they wanted Him to be.
You see this crowd was cheering because they wanted Jesus to bring them political and national salvation.
The Jewish people had some freedom at times during the Roman empire, but they still paid taxes to Caesar, their nationalistic identity was under the Roman umbrella.
They wanted to be their own nation.
They thought that is what would happen when the prophecy of Zechariah was fulfilled.
“Our King is here.
He will make us a mighty nation!”
But you see, the crowds crying out “Hosanna” on Sunday were made of the some of the same people crying out “Crucify Him!” the following Friday.
They were interested in political and national salvation.
Because of their fleshy desires for temporal, earthly power, they were uninterested in the eternal, spiritual salvation Jesus came to give.
But y’all, we have to understand that the real, true salvation Jesus actually brings is better!
It is better than any earthly liberation we could dream up.
It is better than political, national, or cultural salvation.
This world will pass, but the soul will last forever.
The salvation Jesus brings emboldens us to shout
The Jews on that palm Sunday wanted political victory, but Christ came to bring eternal victory.
We take peace in hope in knowing that the Salvation from Jesus Christ truly is better and best beyond all measure.
Today, as we look at chapter 2 of Hebrews, we are given a warning.
The Holy Spirit, working through the writer of this letter, is warning us of the necessity of believing in the true message of the gospel.
We don’t read and learn about Jesus to twist Him into whatever we Him to be.
Jesus is who God’s Word has revealed Him to be.
And who Jesus is and the salvation He brings is better than anything we could come up with on our own.
Jesus came preaching the message of repentance, to seek and save the lost, and in so reconciles the believer to God the Father, and that repentant believer will enjoy eternity in the presence of the Lord, paradise.
We cannot get that message twisted.
A pastor told a story:
A lady came into his office and told him she was a prostitute.
She said she was desperate and in need of help.
So the pastor walked her through what Christ had done.
After presenting her with Christ’s message of repentance and belief, he asked the lady id you would like to confess Jesus as Savior and Lord.
She said that she would she said she had enough of the things going on in her life.
The pastor was elated and so they prayed together.
Then he told her there was one thing he wanted her to do.
He asked her if she had a book of all of her contacts she used for her sinful business.
She said she did.
He said “Let’s take a match and burn that book right now.”
She was surprised!
She said, “What do you mean?”
The pastor responded, “If you really met Jesus Christ as your Lord, if you really accepted His forgiveness and are going to live for Him, let’s burn that book and celebrate your new birth right now and just praise the Lord.”
She said, “But it’s worth a lot of money… a lot of money.”
The pastor said, “I’m sure it is.”
The lady the took the book and put it back in her purse.
Looking at the pastor square in the eye she said “I don’t want to burn my book.
I guess I really don’t want Jesus, do I?”
And she walked out of the room.
(MacArthur)
That woman knew everything there was to know about the person and the work of Jesus.
But she was unwilling to repent from the sin her life.
She wanted deliverance from her circumstances, but did not desire the holiness of God.
She did not truly grasp the cost of her sin and in turn the immeasurable grace of Christ’s death on the cross.
That pastor never saw her again.
He can only hope that a seed was planted that day and that woman would eventually repent.
The reality is that there are many people who have an intellectual knowledge of who Christ is but have there eyes set on a lesser salvation than the one He brings.
Please open your Bibles to Hebrews 2 if you haven’t already.
The purpose of the section we are looking at today is to show the hearer the necessity of not only knowing about Jesus, but truly submitting to Him as the Wonderful Savior He is.
Read with me verse 1.
Let’s just break this down in parts.
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