Sunday’s Sermons

Text: Hebrews 13:7-16                                                   4/20/08 p.m.

Thesis: God uses people and Christ particularly for our sanctification.

 

Intro: 1 Thessalonians 4:3 says, “for this is the will of God, your sanctification.”

God’s great purpose for your life is to make you look more like Jesus at the end of the day than you did at the beginning of the day.

I have to remind myself that a successful day is not a day when I get to check everything off the to-do list.

A successful day is when I end up more like Jesus than when I began. And a successful day is when I am used to help others look more like Jesus when they began.

Since this is what we are after and since this is what God is after we can assume there will be some difficulty along the way.

Our flesh, this world, and the Devil will battle against us so we better have a game plan for sanctification.

Hebrews 13:7-16 gives us that game plan. In Hebrews 13 we are told by God how to be sanctified.

 

Read Hebrews 13:7-16

 

I) God uses dead people for our sanctification

a)      If we’re going to grow we need to get to know people who know the Lord.

i)        Read verse 7

ii)      Every one of us no matter our age needs someone to look up to but e must be selective in choosing our heroes.

iii)    Long dead people make good heroes because there has been time for all the skeletons to come out. And history has time to shift through their contribution and decide if it’s worth or not.

iv)    A worthy contribution is speaking the word of God to you. You can find any number of people who will teach you how to cook meth and make bags of money.

v)      But everything that can be taught is not worth learning. Be selective in what you are learning. God will use Word-saturated people greatly in your lives.

vi)    Seek these people out and listen to them.

vii)  But notice as well that it’s not enough just to get the bible right. We must also consider the outcome of their way of life.

viii)            How did their kids turn out? How did their marriage turn out? Did they make a positive impact on the church? Did they serve and share the gospel with their neighbors?

ix)    Were they growing in Christ up to the point of death?

x)      Don’t waste your time holding up people who did one thing well like go to church every Sunday but their families are a wreck.

xi)    Find someone who was word-saturated and by that I mean the gospel was brought to bear on every circumstance of life.

xii)  Find that person and imitate their faith. Don’t do what they did. Don’t try to be a copy or clone of that person. God doesn’t want that.

xiii)            Believe what they believed about Jesus because it’s what they believed about Jesus that caused them to live the life they lived and have the outcome they had.

xiv)            The way we do things will always change but Jesus will never change.

xv)  Verse 8 says Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

xvi)            This verse teaches the immutability of Jesus Christ; the unchanging eternal quality of God the Son.

xvii)          Remember, God’s will is your sanctification and God uses dead people who lived for Jesus to make us more like Jesus.

II) God uses Christ-bought grace for our sanctification

a)      If we are going to grow we need to avoid fillers

i)        Read verse 9

ii)      There apparently was this strange teaching floating around this Hebrew church in regards to the spiritual benefits of foods.

iii)    All things considered it’s not all that strange when you think about the Old Testament Passover meal. A person could very easily begin to think that there was some spiritual benefit to be gained simply by eating that meat.

iv)    In the church today there are even entire denominations that teach there is spiritual benefit to be had by simply eating the bread and drinking the wine of the Lord’s Supper.

v)      But according to the Bible it is grace and not food that benefits us.

vi)    It is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace. It is good for the guilty heart to feed on grace.

vii)  It is good for the discouraged heart to feed on grace. It is good for the frustrated or wounded heart to feed on grace.

viii)            We want to be devoted to a Passover meal, the Lord’s Supper, an all natural diet, or even an all blue bell diet but those give no benefit.

ix)    The Jew, the catholic, the vegan, the food-addict, and the anorexic all devote themselves to some aspect of food but they gain no heart-benefit.

x)      The heart is strengthened by grace and this is a good thing. So seek grace and avoid fillers.

b)      If we’re going to grow we need to understand Christ

i)        There is so much to Christ. I’ve been a Christian for 21 years now and I’ve only begun to scratch the surface of what Christ is all about.

ii)      The further up and the further in we go the more we will grow. Let’s go further up and further in.

iii)    Read verses 10 &11

iv)    This is an allusion to the sacrifice on the Day of Atonement. Remember, once a year the high priest would sacrifice a bull for his own sins and a perfect lamb for the sins of the people.

v)      The blood would be collected, taken into the holy of holies, and sprinkled on the mercy seat which was pretty much the cover of the ark of the covenant.

vi)    There were many sacrifices commanded in the Old Testament and the priests would be survive because God would allow them to eat all or a portion of the sacrifices the people brought.

vii)  Do you remember the wicked sons of Eli? They were going around and instead of using a hook to pull out the priests’ portion of the sacrificed meat they were demanding the best cuts (1 Sam 2:1-14).

viii)            Some sacrifices could be eaten but others, particularly the sin sacrifices on the Day of Atonement, could not be eaten. The blood was collected and the bodies of the bull and lamb were taken outside of the city and burned.

ix)    In relation to the altar in the temple and tabernacle some sacrificial food could be eaten and some could not.

x)      Hebrews 13:10 says we have an altar from which those who serve the tent have no right to eat.

xi)    The church has an altar where even the high priest isn’t invited to bring a fork and come eat.

xii)  It doesn’t matter how many laws you keep, it doesn’t matter how ritually clean you are, it doesn’t matter what your lineage is, if it’s outside the camp and you’re inside the camp you don’t get to eat it.

xiii)            We must understand that Christ is outside the camp.

xiv)            Read verse12

xv)  The day of Jesus’ death is THE Day of Atonement.

xvi)            The ultimate price for the forgiveness of sins was paid by Jesus outside the gate.

xvii)          You don’t get to have your Old Testament sacrifices and Jesus too.  You don’t get to bat both ways.

xviii)        You’re all in or it’s nothing at all.

xix)            If you’re all in than Jesus’ sufferings are for you. The sufferings of his righteous life are for the purpose of securing our righteousness.

xx)  The sufferings of Christ to pay for sins are not for the purpose of paying some vague amount of some unknown people’s sins.

xxi)            Jesus suffered under God’s righteous demands because of your sins and because of mine.

xxii)          Christ’s blood was poured out on Calvary in order to fulfill God’s will: our sanctification.

xxiii)        How serious is God about His church looking like His Son? God is dead serious about us growing up to look like Jesus.

xxiv)        To sanctify something is to make it holy; it is to make it useful for God.

xxv)          Jesus died for your sanctification that means it is a sure thing. If you are a Christian you will be sanctified.

xxvi)        And we now understand that the cross is not just about buying forgiveness. The cross is also about securing our sanctification.

xxvii)      The Day of Atonement has found it’s fulfillment and completion in the atoning work of Christ.

c)      The benefit of Christ’s work for sanctification is experienced when we go out to him

i)        Read verses 13 &14

ii)      Salvation and sanctification are not entirely beautiful things. There is a great deal of humiliation involved in salvation and sanctification.

iii)    There is first the humiliation or reproach of Christ and then there is the call on every Christian to go out and join in the humiliation.

iv)    The cross is a scandal.  Look at the cross. Our sin is so bad this is what it demands.

v)      Look at the cross. God’s wrath toward sin is real and it is consuming.

vi)    The world does not want to bear that kind of reproach. The world does not want to bear the humiliation of repentance for sins.

vii)  Tell them God loves them. Tell them God has a great plan for their lives but do not tell them to go outside of the camp and join themselves to Christ.

viii)            Tell them everything except how to be saved.

ix)    Verses 13 and 14, sanctification and salvation call for an abandonment of all other means of gaining favor with God.

x)      After the Exodus and the golden calf incident God told Moses to move the tent of meeting outside of the camp.

xi)    Remember, the tent of meeting was the forerunner for the tabernacle which was the forerunner for the temple.

xii)  God would come down in a pillar of smoke and speak to Moses in the Tent of Meeting.

xiii)            The Tent of Meeting started out inside the camp. Inside camp was pure. Outside camp was unholy.

xiv)            After the people turned their hearts from God in the golden calf incident the Tent of Meeting went outside of camp. If you wanted to meet with God you had to leave camp.

xv)  Jesus was crucified outside of the city. Wouldn’t it have been more impressive for someone during the trial of Jesus in the temple to have shot him with an arrow or stabbed him and then he bleed out on the very altar where the sacrificial lamb bled out?

xvi)            God could have done something and that would have been a great event sealing the connection between the Old and New covenants.

xvii)          That didn’t happen because God is not interested in smoothing out the differences in the Old and New Covenants.

xviii)        There is a clear break between the two. It’s not about that altar. It’s not about that temple. It’s not even about Jerusalem. We have no lasting city here.

xix)            We’re seeking Christ and the His city that is to come.

xx)  So, we too must go out after Him. We must leave behind our empty traditions. We must leave behind the tatter rags of the way things used to be.

xxi)            Our commitment is not to tradition. Our commitment is not to an idea called Mambrino Baptist Church. Our commitment is to Christ and our sanctification depends on us leaving this city behind and going hard after Christ.

xxii)          But that also does not mean we do not have a sacrifice to give.

III) God calls us to give our lives as living sacrifices.

Read verses 15 &16

a)      We will grow in Christ as we strive to praise God

i)        The sacrificial worship that pleases God is worship that is offered to God through Christ.

ii)      Christians must be intentional not just to think nice thoughts and say nice things to God.

iii)    We must work to remind ourselves that nice thoughts about God and saying nice things to God is possible only because of the work of Jesus.

iv)    We must give him the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name.  We’re talking about the product of hearts that bow to the sovereign Lord.

v)      We’re talking about the overflow of hearts that see Christ as primary and everything else as secondary.

vi)    Let me tell you if you are not intentional to continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God throughout the week, when you come in here on a Sunday you’re going to stink it up.

vii)  If our lips don’t acknowledge him Monday through Saturday how can we expect just to show up and our hearts and lips go to work for Christ on Sunday?

viii)            Faithful worship on Sunday that pleases God is a product of faithful worship Monday through Saturday that pleases God.

ix)    Put the work in to praise God throughout the week and I guarantee it will bring great blessings on Sundays.

x)      But this is a mega-gospel we’re talking about isn’t it? It’s not just a matter of singing it’s a matter of living.

xi)    Verse 16 says, “do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.”

xii)  A heart that is gives throughout the week is a heart that will be ready to give on a Sunday.

xiii)            If you are working to give love to your neighbors, to your spouse, to your kids, and to your coworkers through the week then it will make it so much easier to give love to God when the church gathers.

xiv)            Every one of us has something to share. I love it when the pears start showing up in the foyer.

xv)  The sacrifice to pick those pears, bring them up here, and share them is pleasing to God.

xvi)            Every one of us has been given a gift to share. It could be pears or it could be preaching.

xvii)          It could be a small thing or it could be a big thing. It could be humiliating to share or humiliation to tell the church you have a need.

xviii)        It pleases God when the church makes it’s needs known to each other and then responds to meet those needs.

xix)            I want to give you an opportunity to make your needs known to the church tonight. It may be sanctification or it may be a pair of socks. What do you need and how can we help? Would you tell us?