The Book of Hebrews 4:8-16 "Let Us Draw Near"

Good morning. We're going to continue our study through the passage that Courtney just read for us, Hebrews 4, 8 through 16. And in this passage, there's, I think, three sections. I want to just point out as a broader statement of Hebrews, Hebrews is like a fine tapestry. It is a fascinating and actually very unique book The whole book of Hebrews is like a tapestry that has themes woven throughout all of it. They surface at different durations and with some unique undertones. So it's interesting as we go through that, we've seen some of it already. Let me point out one of the things I'm looking at here.

Jesus is the Son for most of chapters 1 through 10. He is the high priest for most of chapters 2 through 9, as we'll see in today's passage here. Angels, and it's interesting, angels plural, are brought out in chapters 1 and 2, and then not again until 12 and 13. So first two chapters, last two chapters, is where we find angels resting only in chapters 3 and 4. So there is a pattern of bringing up themes for some duration, sometimes shorter, sometimes longer. This is the last passage we're going to see on resting, and as we see, it doesn't even continue through the whole passage.

Still a very important theme in the book. Seeing Christ and looking unto Jesus are in chapters 2 and chapter 12. So again, as we go through Hebrews, we'll see that the themes will come up, they'll be sustained for some period of time, and then drop off for another theme to show up.

One of them that comes up, and we mentioned before, is the book of Hebrews has a number of nautical, by that we mean shipping terms, and athletic terms scattered throughout the book. I discovered another one of the shipping terms just this last week, and so I added that as a fourth page to your handout in order to include that one. That's to update what we had previously as a supplement. So at any rate, these terms keep cropping up through the book, and this is what I would call an undertone, because while shipping is not a theme in the book of Hebrews, the use of shipping terms certainly is.

Athletics is not a theme, per se, in the book of Hebrews, and yet reference to athletic terms through the book is fairly frequent. So as we start into today's passage, three main topics. And I won't have all these funny hands with six fingers or anything like that, but just three main topics here. Verses 8 through 11, the first section here, are the last verses that are addressing directly, in any way, resting in the book of Hebrews. We've seen it start in chapter 3 early, continue on into these verses here. So these are the last ones.

Verses 12 and 13 speak of the piercing depth of the Word of God and the penetrating insight of God. Verse 12 has the piercing depth of the Word of God. Verse 13 has the penetrating insight of God. Now, verse 12 is so important, we're actually going to set most of that aside to look at next Sunday and focus on that specific verse this next Sunday.

I think it's got enough richness to it, we don't want to miss it. So we'll kind of set that aside for the most part until next Sunday. The third section is verses 4 through 16 are about Christ as our Great High Priest. and the practical and gracious difference that it makes. See, Christ isn't the high priest, and that's just hypothetical and spiritually nice. It's practical, as we'll soon see here.

So those are the three parts to this passage, and they break rather evenly and cleanly in those three parts. So we'll take a look here at this first one, verses 8 through 11. Now, for the last time here, we have this resting theme, began in chapter 3 fairly early, It will be completed in these verses.

What's interesting is the author of Hebrews goes through the subject of resting. There is a repetition. He keeps quoting today, today, today. And he also keeps talking about, they shall not enter my rest. That's God speaking in the Old Testament. So there's a repetition.

But here in these verses, what we're going to find is that there are some things that are unique to this specific passage. We'll look at what's essential in the difference between Israel's resting and ours, and it's very important we understand the difference. But with the completion of resting theme here, we're provided some fresh insights in these last and final verses on the theme of resting. Some very important insights we'll want to be sure to point out.

One of the things from last week we pointed out, important to just kind of reinforce and keep clear in our minds, the Israelites were all baptized into Moses. You know, we have baptism and we tend to do it one at a time. The Israelites, they get all baptized at once, right? Here we go through the sea and under the cloud and they do it all at once. Great big giant event, they're baptized into Moses. They were supposed to enter the land of Israel and take it. God said, I'll be with you. I'll fight the battles for you. You can do it. You ought to do it. It's land that I've already picked out for you. And they refused. So they wandered in the desert for 40 years, and it wasn't a great place. And so they ate manna, and they got so tired of it, they died. No, that's not really what happened. But anyway, they did get tired of eating manna, I'm sure.

Now, we in the church, who have all been baptized into Christ, that's not just getting wet in the water, but we've been spiritually placed into, immersed into Christ so as to be permanently changed by that baptism, we are called to rest in, not go to the land of Israel and drive out the Canaanites. You get in real trouble if you try to go do that. I don't recommend it.

But we are to rest in dependence upon who we are in Christ and who Christ is in us. Dependence upon who we are in Christ and who Christ is in us, and to encourage that among each other. That's what we're called to. So now there's resting, Israelite resting, and then there's church resting.

So the Israelites were discouraged from entering the land by the ten spies who came back and said, oh boy, this is a great land, but boy, those people are ominous and big and we just felt like grasshoppers. And so there was no rest for them who disbelieved and died during that 40-year period of time. We in the church are encouraged to enter God's rest diligently and daily. diligently and daily, depending upon who we are in Christ and who He is in us by the Spirit's three Es, enabling, energizing, and empowering to live life. Now, Joshua, Jericho, and all the rest were not the end of the rest. And that's a pun. Okay, all right. I bring in these groaners and nobody laughs. Okay, all right.

After the Israelites wandered in the wilderness for 40 years, all of the faithless generation died off. They got so tired of the manna that they died. Joshua led the Israelites in conquering most of the land of Canaan. They didn't conquer it all, by the way. They didn't conquer it all.

When King David wrote a few centuries later, As the author of the book of Hebrews pointed out in verses 6 and 7, just previous to this passage we looked at here, the opportunity to rest remained and David wrote about it. David recognized we still have the opportunity to rest. It remains. The opportunity is still there. So David wrote about it and verses 6 and 7 of chapter 4 make note of that fact.

Now, Israel's best rest is yet to come. God's not done with Israel, and Israel's best rest is yet to come. It will come when Christ returns, and we will return with Him. He will rule as the King of Israel over the land and people of Israel. and he will rule as king of kings and lord of lords over the gentiles by the way that title king of kings and lord of lords is over the gentiles that's not just some sort of general title it is over the gentile nations here is a map of if we take genesis 15 18-21 and Ezekiel 48 we have a description of what the land will be like in the millennial kingdom and what we have is a band for each of the tribes that runs across Israel, but it includes about eight nations in whole or in part. Imagine Israel going all the way to the River Euphrates, and all the way down to the northern end of the Sinai Peninsula, and all the way up into Lebanon. So it truly includes a large area And that, if we take scripture as it says, that could happen as soon as seven years from now. If you could imagine that. Now, Christ the King of Kings and Lord of Lords is over the Gentiles, over all the Gentile nations.

This is, he'll be the King of Israel. He was born the King of Israel. Remember, that's what the three wise men, or the wise men, or the Magi, as the story comes, That's what they were asking. Where is he who was born King of the Jews? He will be the King of the Jews, King of Israel over this millennial nation. He will be King of Kings and Lord of Lords over all the Gentile nations over all the earth. That will be his title over all those Gentile nations.

Israel's best rest is yet to come. This will all be done, and it will be God's accomplishment through Christ, Israel's Messiah, to whom we, in the Church, the body of Christ, are now betrothed. I use the word betrothed. Our word engaged is rather informal. There's no formal and legal significance to our being engaged, per se. There was, however, in Israel, a formality of being betrothed And actually, if you broke it off, you had to get a legal divorce, even though you weren't married yet.

We are now betrothed to Christ to be ultimately the bride of Christ. He, our bridegroom on into eternity. One of the things I was sharing with the Revelation Intensive group yesterday is that one of the things that causes me great excitement in my marriage to Nancy is to think of, we're not just married and that's a cool thing and God just instituted marriage at the beginning, yes that's cool, but we get to live out day by day the eternal romance of Christ in the church. So our marriage is the analogy, Christ and the church as the bride and the bridegroom is the reality.

We will be there when Israel's best rest is in force and in action and taking place, as soon as seven years from now. We will be there with Christ as his bride, as he is our bridegroom, but the King of Israel and the King of Kings and Lord of Lords over the Gentile nations.

Here you have a kind of a chart, timeline, that I think gives the perspective. And let's step through it one point at a time. You also have it on page one of your handout if you want to track through there. So the first coming is recorded for us in the four Gospels, right? This is what the New Testament is in great part addressing, is Christ's first coming. It's not the only thing it addresses, of course, but substantially addressing that. The four Gospels record his first coming.

We have after that what we are in now from Acts 2, the church age, and then the rapture, the taking up of the church. And by the way, have you ever heard anybody say the word rapture is not in the Bible? Well, if you look it up in the concordance, it isn't. The Greek word is harpazo.

It's in 1 Thessalonians 4.17. And it means to be caught up or taken up. Rapture is simply the Latinized form of that Greek word harpazo, to be caught up. So it is a biblical term. It's simply our English term, rapture, is taken from the Greek through the Latin into the English. So the church age goes from Acts 2 until the time we're taken out to be with the Lord. I hope it's today.

Now, the next is a seven-year tribulation period. As we've been discussing in our Revelation Intensive, even the Orthodox Jews understand that there is coming a time of seven-year great tribulation upon the earth. It will be the worst time the earth has ever seen, at the end of which the Messiah will come. At the end of which the Messiah will come. That is what we call the Second Coming. The Orthodox Jews, in fact, a rabbi was joking with me about a decade back. He was saying, when the Messiah comes, we'll be asking, is this your first or your second time? So, we call it the Second Coming.

That begins the Millennial Kingdom. We say millennial because that means a thousand years. Revelation chapter 20 has six times, says it's a thousand year period. So that's what the Millennial Kingdom refers to, Christ reigning on the earth as the King of Israel, the King of the Jews, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords over the Gentile nations, and He, while we are with Him, there as our Bridegroom forever.

And then finally, eternity, okay? Eternity with a new heavens and new earth. Anyway, that's the broad outline. And so when I say Israel's best years are yet to come, that's this millennial kingdom right after the second coming, okay? Okay. So now, verses 9 and 10.

What? A Christian Sabbath? Burns has been talking for a hundred lessons on law and grace and saying, not one law, right? And then what am I doing talking about a Christian Sabbath? Uh-oh. Have we got a problem here? Let's take a look. As the author of Hebrews pointed out in Hebrews 4, 4 and 5, God rested on the seventh day. Alright, I'm okay with that.

Not because He was exhausted from six days of creation. Not because He was exhausted after making woman. But because His work was complete. His work was complete. Very important that we understand that. Our resting is a ceasing from our own works. Got that? Our resting is a ceasing from our own works because we are complete in Christ. We rest because we're complete. God rested because His work was complete. We rest because we have been completed in Christ. We are relying upon who we are in Christ and who Christ is in us as we enter the rest that God intended. See that? As we enter the rest God intended, we are relying upon the completion of God's work in us.

Now, I have to tell you, God will not be pleased if We work really, really hard at trying to live out the life of a Christian. Ever feel like you need to do that or talk to somebody? I try so hard to be a good Christian. You know, God doesn't like that. That's not what God has in mind.

As a matter of fact, if we redouble our efforts and make promises to do all the right things and none of the wrong things anymore, If we have others hold us accountable and press us to try all the harder to live the Christian life, God will not be pleased with us because we didn't rest in the completed works of God and His life through us. That's what it means to be diligent to enter God's rest. Diligence Godly diligence is not trying really hard to be a good Christian. Godly diligence is being diligent to enter God's rest.

Huge difference. Huge difference. Hebrews 4.11, in our eternal position we are forever We are always in a state of spiritual rest. I am made in my position to be resting. That's how God made me to be as a believer. Not as an unbeliever, but as a believer. If we haven't entered God's rest in our daily condition, notice the difference?

Eternal position, daily condition, then we're not there yet. Ever have kids in the car, you know, are we there yet? Are we there yet? Five seconds later, are we there yet? Well, guess what? If we haven't entered God's rest right now, we're not there yet. We're not there yet.

Verse 11 tells us that resting is not an accident. I don't go, whoops, I just rested. I wonder how this happened. It's not an accident. It's not incidental. It'd be kind of nice if I rested, but it doesn't matter. No, that's not the way it works either. It doesn't arrive by surprise. It doesn't arrive by surprise. Entering God's rest calls for diligent dependence on our part. That's what verse 11 tells us. Entering God's rest calls for diligent dependence on our part.

You ever have a to-do list? Here's the things I've got to do today. I'm not saying you put this on your list, but frequently if we do everything that's on the to-do list, but forget to rest, we've wasted our time. Productive rest is what God has in mind. It's all the things on the to-do list done out of resting. That's what He's thinking. That's what He's talking about. Productive resting. Not resting like, boy, I'm resting and I've been resting here for days and days and days and pretty soon I just got atrophy. It's productive resting. Resting with all the things that we have to do. I've got so many things to do. I really need to rest through it all. I've got so much to get done. My to-do list is really long. Then I really need to rest.

Productive resting. If we don't rest, we don't get anything done at all. It won't matter if we don't get anything done, or if we get anything done if we don't rest. Productive resting is what God has in mind. Are we there yet? If we're resting, we are. So, if I try hard to be a good Christian, while we are to be diligent to enter God's rest, we're not called to try really hard to live the Christian life. We aren't. Trying really hard to live the Christian life will be disobedience. Got that? Trying really hard to live the Christian life is disobedience. Let me repeat that. Trying really hard to live the Christian life is disobedience. Got that?

Now, you may have heard people say something like, I tried Christianity and it didn't work for me. And what they're thinking is that Christianity comes in some kind of a trial size. No, it doesn't work that way. You know? What's trial size is usually something really, really small. You ever notice that? There's some things that they just don't put in trial size. Ever try on trial size underwear? Oh! You know? Ouch! You know, that's going to hurt.

Some things don't come in trial size and Christianity doesn't either. Christianity was never designed for you to try it. If they haven't known Christ and haven't known resting, they have not tried Christianity. I don't care what size they tried. If they haven't known Christ, and they haven't known resting, then they haven't tried Christianity. Period. There is no trial size. Don't try putting on those little dinky underwear. It won't work. Okay? Any more than there's a trial size for Christianity.

Now, next section here. We're in verses 12 and 13, and again, we're going to revisit verse 12. because there's so much good stuff in there that we don't want to miss it. So we'll revisit that and focus on that next week. This paraverse is about the piercing depths of the Word of God, part 1, verse 12, and the penetrating inside of God. So verse 12 speaks of the active, living, and powerful impact of the written Word of God, and that the Word of God, like a sword, has the ability to penetrate to the depths of our spiritual being.

Nothing, as we'll look at next week, nothing goes that deep. Nothing goes that deep. Next, verse 13 speaks of the penetrating insight that God has into our hearts. So there's a piercing depth of the written word of God and there's now a penetrating insight that God has into our hearts. No secrets. Nothing can be hidden from God. What people deny, ignore, neglect doesn't limit God's insight.

You see, people sometimes do this kind of thing. They say, you can't see me! You ever see a little kid do that? They cover their eyes. You can't see me! We can't do that with God. We just can't do that with God. God's going to see what's going on. There is no place to hide, way to hide. It's just not happening. Not happening. God does not play games with us. We cannot play games with God. You just can't do it.

God knows what's happening. He knows what's going to happen. God knows the end from the beginning. He knows the depths that we can't even see. We cannot play games with God. Not even rock, paper, and scissors. And what this verse tells us is God has, to use a kind of a figure of speech here, spiritual x-ray vision. God's knowledge of our hearts is total. There is no part of us that God is kind of wondering about. He knows everything about us.

There are no hidden places, no obscure features, there are no mysteries, there isn't something around the corner that God doesn't quite get. He sees it all. At the end, from the beginning, motivations, thoughts, possibilities, everything. He sees it all.

What this tells us also is that God cares about our hearts. It is possible that God would have the capacity to look at our hearts but say, you know, I'm just not interested. Is He interested? Yes. Because He does in fact care about our hearts. This verse tells us God does care about us. Otherwise, because He has the capacity to look at our hearts, if He didn't care, He would just say, why bother? In fact, He does care about us. He cares about all of us. God cares and He knows what we all need, even before He said, let there be light. Before He created anything, and started this world into existence, He cared about us.

We've been going through this Revelation intensive, and one of the verses that stands out in the next section here, Revelation 13.8, He was slain from before the foundation of the world. Slain for you and slain for me from before the foundation of the world. So it isn't like God came and said, Hey, I think I'll make people. And then all of a sudden Adam goes and blows it and he goes, oh no, now what are we going to do? Right? That's not how it happened, did it? Before God said, let there be light. He said, we know what's going to happen and we're going to deal with it with immense grace and amazing love. That's the way God works.

He knows our hearts and our needs on into the days and years to come for as many days as you have on this planet He knows all our needs. He cares about our hearts up to the day that He calls us home. He knows about what our heart will be today and tomorrow and the next day and years to come up to the day He calls us home. God has spiritual x-ray vision that comes from a heart of great love for us. Psalm 13-15 reads like this, The Lord looks from heaven, He sees all the sons of men. From His dwelling place He looks out on all the inhabitants of the earth. He who fashions the hearts of them all, He who understands all their works." People do things, and a lot of people say, well, I don't know, I'm not sure why I did that. Ever have that experience? I'm not sure why I did that or why I said that. God understands it all.

In Romans 8.27, as we studied that, the Father searches the hearts.

He who searches the hearts, Romans 8.27, and Christ is speaking in Revelation 2.23, I am He who searches the minds and hearts. So both the Father and the Son search our hearts. Why? Because He cares. Because He cares. Now the last verses, 14 through 16. So we'll take a look at that set of verses here.

In verses 14 through 16, it begins again with this theme, Christ is our high priest. Verse 14 is about Christ, our high priest in the heavenlies. He's the high priest not in Jerusalem, but in the heavenlies. That's his role now. Verse 15 is about Christ, our high priest, while he was here on earth. And verse 16 is about the access we have to the throne of grace because of our high priest who was on earth and now is there in the heavenlies for our benefit. You realize when Christ was here, it was for our benefit. When Christ went and was in the heavenlies and now serves as our high priest, that's for our benefit too. Both of them are for our benefit.

In the Jewish system, the high priests rotated, believe it or not, among the Sadducees. And they're the ones who didn't believe in a resurrection, in great part didn't believe in miracles or angels. They didn't believe in anything after the first five books of Moses in the Old Testament. They didn't believe much, is part of what you could say. These Sadducees rotated among themselves to perform the service of high priests. They didn't believe they were going to heaven or any other place after they died.

Jesus is not just a high priest, but he's a great high priest the author of Hebrews says he has been here But is there in the heavenlies ministering for us always? What what is Christ doing in the heavenlies? Quite a few things, but one of them and Hebrews points it out again again. He is ministering for you and me always always He is not only the high priest, He has been the sacrifice as well.

In view of these truths, we are called to, and this is taking advantage of the insight from the nautical term here that's in verse 14, to guide our ship carefully. To guide our ship carefully. It's in a lot of translations, hold fast. through the teachings that we hold to. Guide our ship carefully through the teachings that we hold to. What we teach matters.

Nancy was talking to a very nice Christian lady who was a neighbor about a year ago. Maybe that's a couple years ago. Anyway, but she was saying to Nancy, well, you know, you've got to stay away from doctrine. That just doesn't work. But what this says is, no, you need to know the doctrine so you guide your ship carefully according to and knowledgeable about what the Bible teaches. It's important.

Now, we have a high priest who has been there. But notice, I'm going to stop there and let's explain why. Christ didn't serve as high priest in the heavenlies until he first came to earth and was exposed in a human body to the temptations that are common to all of us. He went through temptations of all sorts and all kinds. Temptations that you and I would say, yep, yep, been there, yep. We have a high priest who is able to sympathize with us in those ways.

But we human beings, we've got a saying, ever hear, you know, been there, done that? Christ can say, been there, but not done that. See the difference? He's been there, but not done that, because he didn't sin. Been there, but not done that, because he didn't sin. And so we have, as verse 16 points out, we have confident access. Confident access.

The Jews, as the law was being given to Moses up on the top of Mount Sinai, were told, you stay away from this mountain. And of course, with all the lightning and thunder that was coming off of it, they were glad to stay away from the mountain. Now, us, here in the body of Christ, have a very different call. It's not stay away, it's draw near.

In ancient times, you didn't just come up to the king and walk into the throne room and say, hey, oh, kingy old buddy, oh boy. Because what's going to happen? You're going to get run through with a spear or sliced in half or something worse. You're not going to be allowed to do that. You can't just come into the throne room and approach the king.

But we, we have been introduced to the Father by Christ the Son. We have an official royal introduction. We can with confidence approach the throne of grace, even calling God Papa, Abba, as it says in the New Testament, Papa. We are not only told that we can approach the throne of grace, but we're called to do exactly that. We are called to approach the throne of grace. Do approach the throne of grace. That's exactly what God has in mind. Go in there knowing we have confident access. Because Christ has been our introducer. He's already cleared the way. We're good to go. So we're called to the throne of grace.

And then finally, this verse has here, receive mercy and find grace. Why? Why receive mercy? Why find grace? Because you're going to need it. You're going to need it. That's what this verse is telling us. We go to the throne of grace because we're going to need it. Now, a distinguishing point between grace and mercy. Some people think, well, they're just the same thing. No, not quite. Mercy is withholding judgment deserved. Grace is giving us beyond what we deserve see the difference there.

I could give an example I've given it before but just to make sure it gets home Let's suppose that Verne is driving down right in front of the street here at 65 miles an hour in front of Holly Hills Okay, now, you know as well as I that's way beyond illegal. Okay, and Probably at that point in time.

I'm gonna be in big trouble, right? It's probably I'm gonna hand over my keys at that speed but So let's say that the cop comes up to me, and he says, Vern, do you realize how fast you were going? I say, yeah. He says, I tell you what, I'm just going to let you off with a warning here. For 65 miles an hour? Yeah, I'm going to let you off with a warning. I'm going to trust you not to do that again.

I'm going to withhold a judgment from you. Grace acts differently. Grace, the cop, comes up and he writes out a ticket and he gives me the ticket and I show up there in the courtroom and the judge says, you know, you're guilty. That's a big, big ticket. You have to write out a big check for that one. And in grace, the cop comes up and pays the ticket and says, what are you doing for dinner? That's the difference between mercy and grace. Mercy is withholding a judgment that I deserve. Grace is going beyond what I deserve to bless me.

So we have mercy and grace and we're going to need it. We really are. Let's thank the Lord for His amazing grace. Lord, as we look at this passage, we do thank you for your grace that is amazing, your mercy that's amazing. Though completely undeserved, we have this tremendous privilege of drawing before the throne of grace. We have this tremendous privilege of resting. What a wonderful set of truths you've revealed for us here in this passage. We pray that you would teach it to our hearts. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.