Let Us ... Do Church

Hebrews 10:19-25 | Let Us ... Do Church Good morning. We are back in Hebrews this morning in a series we've called, Greater Than. In this series, we are reminded that Jesus is greater than anything or anyone. We're in chapter 10 this morning and will cover verses 19-25. I think it is safe to say that overall church attendance has decreased over time, even by those who claim to be committed Christians. I personally love church and hate to miss it. While sometimes it's unavoidable and there are good reasons for missing, other times it isn't, and we make excuses for why we missed it. So, thoughtfully, our friends at the Babylon Bee have provided 12 more excuses and a bonus one from me, just in case you've run out: 1) The worship leader keeps singing in keys that are way too high for normal humans to sing in: How are you supposed to worship God in a too-high key? UGH! 2) You just, like, don't feel like you've been getting anything out of the sermons lately and stuff: This is entirely the pastor's fault. 3) The band is playing "Oceans" again this week: Please, make it stop! 4) You need to find socks and shoes for ALL your kids to wear: An impossible task before 9 AM. 5) There's a sermon series on sin and you don't need that kind of negativity in your life: You're probably not that much of a sinner anyway... probably. 6) Greeters: You're an introvert, yet the church still posts greeters at the door. This is abuse. 7) Those stale cut-in-half [bagels] are too tempting: Today isn't the day to ruin your 7-day keto streak. 8) COVID: That's still a thing, right? Yeah, COVID. 9) You got in a big argument with your spouse this morning and you're still mad: It may be too hard to fake a convincing smile to the greeters. 10) Your church started offering gluten-free communion options: And you're not into all that "woke" [stuff]. Don't worry, we've stopped doing that. 11) Some weird visitor was sitting in your [seat] last week: You just can't deal with that awkwardness again. 12) You listened to some worship music this morning and that pretty much counts as church: Church isn't a building, after all, right? 13) I went to church last week: I mean, God is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow, right? Obviously, that was all in fun, but the reality is, many professing Christians no longer regularly attend church and have lost the value that church attendance really brings to the Christian. Hopefully this morning, in our passage, we will see why we go to church, and what that is supposed to look like. Follow along as I read our passage this morning: 19 THEREFORE, BROTHERS, SINCE WE HAVE CONFIDENCE TO ENTER THE HOLY PLACES BY THE BLOOD OF JESUS, 20 BY THE NEW AND LIVING WAY THAT HE OPENED FOR US THROUGH THE CURTAIN, THAT IS, THROUGH HIS FLESH, 21 AND SINCE WE HAVE A GREAT 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 WITH PURE WATER. 23 LET US HOLD FAST THE CONFESSION OF OUR HOPE WITHOUT WAVERING, FOR HE WHO PROMISED IS FAITHFUL. 24 AND LET US CONSIDER HOW TO STIR UP ONE ANOTHER TO LOVE AND GOOD WORKS, 25 NOT NEGLECTING TO MEET TOGETHER, AS IS THE HABIT OF SOME, BUT ENCOURAGING ONE ANOTHER, AND ALL THE MORE AS YOU SEE THE DAY DRAWING NEAR. Here is the main idea from our passage this morning: Because of Jesus, we can confidently meet together in God's presence. I am going to ask for a little audience participation here. There are three exhortations in this passage. An exhortation, by the way, is an urgent plea, or an emphatic urging to someone to do something. I want you to help identify these exhortations. I am going to give you a hint: "lettuce" Say the word out loud and slowly. That's right: "Let Us" The writer here, is saying, "look, we've spent the better part of this letter speaking about Jesus replacing the old way of doing things, so because of this, "let us" ... draw near; hold fast; and consider how to stir up one another. Once again, the writer, as a way to begin a new section, summarizes what we've learned so far. One pastor in my studies this week identified two primary Old Testament passages that summarize what we've learned: Psalm 110:4 and Jeremiah 31:31-34. Psalm 110:4 of course identifies Jesus as the Hight Priest, and Jeremiah's passage, which we looked at last week and a few weeks ago, is all about the New Covenant, where we see through Jesus' sacrifice, the Old Covenant was made obsolete. So, the writer here is telling us the "now what," or the action needed from us with this new understanding. While I want to spend most of our time this morning on the "three heads of lettuce" as one pastor almost titled his sermon on this passage, I do want touch on the "therefore" section first, answering the question of ... WHY WE CAN BE CONFIDENT First, this word confidence speaks to a boldness in speech. It is to say, now ... * We can boldly approach God in prayer. o Think about it. Under the old system, only the High Priest, once per year, had access to the Most Holy place. When Jesus died, as we saw in Matthew 27:51, the veil was torn, which now the writer is saying that Christ's death removed that veil that once separated us from God o Jesus, as the High Priest, now sitting at the right hand of God, in a way invites us into the Most Holy place because His blood has cleansed us from sin * Jesus' death is the new and living way o Verse 20 reveals this phrase to us. o Greek scholar Kenneth Wuest paraphrases it this way: "He [Jesus] inaugurated for us, a road freshly slain and living" * So, this idea of "new" relates directly to the death of Christ, that final sacrifice, which via the resurrection, leads to life o Once again, removing all barriers, removing all unholiness before a Holy God Once again, the writer of Hebrews is reiterating what we've learned already, and allowing us to now know what: OUR RESPONSE TO BEING MADE CLEAN Here is where we get back to the "lettuce" passages: * We draw near to God. o If this sounds somewhat familiar to you, you have a remarkable memory, as we did see a very similar exhortation back in Hebrews 4 which Pastor Pat covered last September. * There, we learned that; the verb "draw near" is a compound word that literally means "to come facing forward". And we are exhorted to do that "with confidence". That phrase literally means "all speech," which ties us back to what we saw moments ago, as we now have confidence through prayer. * Noteworthy, this exhortation, just as the next two, are all present tense verbs, which means we are to keep on doing this. o Imagine getting a new car. But since you are so afraid to get it dirty, or for the value to diminish, or you're afraid to wreck it, you just leave it in the garage to look at every once and awhile. * That would be quite silly * Instead, you should enjoy that car o If we are followers of Jesus, we cannot simply sit back and enjoy the view, we are to be active participants. o Notice too what the writer does here. * The writer draws us back to verse 19 and that confidence that we now have: * Because he is addressing Christians here, he says that we draw near with a TRUE HEART. * What we'll this week and next is that there are really two possible responses to those who have heard the truth and have understood the truth. o First, what we are seeing today, the marks of committed and deliberate believer o Second, what we will see next week, those who have possibly drifted away, or are in danger of doing so, which we saw way back in Hebrews chapter 2. o We will see this more clearly next week, but the writer here is setting up one of these warning passages in the epistle, again introduced to us back in chapter 2. * In speaking to those with a TRUE HEART, he is also speaking to those who have full assurance. o Full assurance is directly tied to the phrase "SPRINKLED CLEAN FROM AN EVIL CONSCIENCE AND OUR BODIES WASHED WITH PURE WATER" * Many people take this verse to speak of baptism. * However, if you look at the context of Hebrews as a whole, the writer is contrasting the ritualistic cleansing with the finality of us being cleansed in Christ alone. * I believe that is what is being spoken about here. An internal purification, and the external expression of that purification, which we see here with these exhortations. o Therefore, we can have FULL ASSURANCE of our faith because Jesus has already declared it to be so. o The next exhortation is to: * Hold fast the confession of our hope. o Holding fast, once again is something we saw back in September while looking at the final verses of chapter 4. o We learned then that, the verb "hold fast" means "to cling to something tenaciously, with all one's strength," and that the word "confession" is used here in Hebrews in the sense of our "profession" of our faith in Jesus. o The troubling part of this verse (verse 23) is the idea of "WITHOUT WAVERING." * This is huge. Think about it. The wavering that the Hebrews were facing at the time was their uncertainty of Christ's final work and going back to Judaism under the old system * Unfortunately, churches waver on cultural issues regularly * This month is June, and everywhere you turn, we see this idea of "pride." Of course, this directly ties to the LGBTQ+ community. * Just last week, five players from the professional baseball team, the Tampa Bay Rays, decided that on their teams' "pride night" they would not wear the rainbow patch on their sleeves, or the rainbow themed logo on their caps. o Of course, these five players received a lot of push back from the media and even some players outside their organization. o One player from another team called their reasoning - which was their faith - "a joke" o Another player said their actions were "sad and embarrassing" o An online publication bashed Christianity as a whole, and titled their article "A Ray of Darkness" * Now, I use this example to illustrate the pressures from the culture - even on churches and denominations - on this sin issue of homosexuality. I want to be very clear; this is not the only issue that churches waver on, but this is a relevant example considering it is "Pride Month" o Recently, the United Methodist Church split because many churches had a different view on the issues of gay marriage and LGBTQ+ rights. * The reason churches waver on topics like this, or female preachers, or other controversial topics, is because they are afraid to offend people. * The writer of Hebrews is trying to remind us that if we confess Christ as Lord, that means we have agreed to renounce the things of the world. * This means we must know what we believe and know how to defend what we believe. * In part, this is why Peter says in 1 Peter 3:15: BUT IN YOUR HEARTS HONOR CHRIST THE LORD AS HOLY, ALWAYS BEING PREPARED TO MAKE A DEFENSE TO ANYONE WHO ASKS YOU FOR A REASON FOR THE HOPE THAT IS IN YOU; YET DO IT WITH GENTLENESS AND RESPECT, o We are able to hold fast to what we believe because He is faithful. * One of my favorite prayers is to thank God for His faithfulness, because He will always be more faithful than I can ever be * In fact, if we ended up doing our night of worship last night, the theme would have been around the faithfulness of God. * The writer is reminding us here that God is faithful. So, we can hold fast to our faith even when the world around us hates it. o Our final exhortation is to: * Consider how to stir up one another. o In these final two verses of our passage, the words "ONE ANOTHER" is found twice. o And - each of these exhortations are plural - "US" o The writer here is focusing in on the community aspect of our faith. * First, by encouraging us to STIR UP ONE ANOTHER TO LOVE AND GOOD WORKS. * Stir up is a term that can have negative effects or positive effects. o Obviously, the writer here is using it for a positive effect. * The term means to agitate, or to provoke someone to do something. * The writer here is reminding the church, that we need to be together, ministering to one another, encouraging one another to love and do good works. Consistently and always. * It is no coincidence that we share every week how we can connect with one another. * It is no coincidence that when you open our website, you will see the words: "you're not just a face in the crowd, you're part of the family" * This is why we have refreshments and coffee and a lounge area, so we can gather * This is why we are trying to make a point of doing more events for our church family, so we can gather and be together o The writer says that the Hebrew believers neglected to meet together. * Its unfortunate, but many people neglect to meet together, even today. * Many people have not returned to church after they were forced to do online worship during the early stages of the pandemic. o The writer further states that we gather to encourage one another and how important this is while we wait for the Lord's return * We spoke about faith that is unwavering earlier. * In a culture that is full of hatred and evil, why would you want to be anywhere else outside of the presence of God and His people? o I always look forward to Sundays. I always look forward to Monday mornings. I always look forward to our monthly men's breakfasts. Why? Because no matter how stressful my week has been, gathering with the saints almost always makes me feel better. I can put all that behind me. Every time I gather with the saints, I'm encouraged. * So, think about the impact you can make in someone's life, just by being present. * Facebook can be one of those gift or curse type of things. * One of my favorite features of Facebook has to be the memories. * Last week, a memory popped up from just over 7 years ago. This is when my youngest had her feeding tube surgery. This was a difficult and nerve-racking time for us. Natalie and I were back in the prep room with Gabrielle, and when they rolled her back for surgery, we went back out in the waiting room. The comfort we felt going out there and seeing Pat and Mary, Carol, and other brothers and sisters was priceless. Their presence alone, not only reminded us that we were loved by them, but they also reminded us that we were all part of the family of God. Pam and Derek also bought us dinner that night. This is what family does. Loves and encourages one another. This is what we want to be as a church. Hopefully, through the exhortations of the writer of Hebrews, we've seen that: Because of Jesus, we can confidently meet together in God's presence. I've shared this before, but there was a period of my walk with Jesus that I separated myself from Him. I guess you can say I drifted away. While I professed my faith, I was living for me. I wasn't praying, I wasn't reading, I wasn't meeting together with other believers. And it showed. And, as any good Christian parent would, my parents prayed and prayed, and they had many others praying for me as well. You see, when we are connected, we can intercede for one another, encourage one another, and stir up one another to love and good works. Don't be disconnected from the body of Christ. Pastor Chuck Smith reminded me this week (not personally, of course) that every member of the body is valuable and useful. Imagine a hand that is completely removed from the body. It just sits there. There is no value in a hand that is completely removed from its body. But, when that hand is attached to the body, it can contribute significantly. I know that even as we close and have made such an emphasis on being together and connecting with one another, there will be some of you who will leave right away. Others who are online and are able to be here in person, may likely log back in next week, instead of being here in person. I want to urge you to reconsider. Stick around. Get to know someone else. Come and join us next week in person. Connect with us on Faithlife or social media. The Triune God said, it is not good for man to be alone. So, let's meet together, let's do church together. Let's pray. 2