Well, I'm sure you are aware that there are many different ideas about how we are to worship God.
And many of them are based upon emotions and upon misunderstandings rather than upon the written Word of God. You remember that Jesus told the woman at the well, the woman of Samaria, that God is seeking those to worship Him. He said that those who worship God must worship Him in spirit and in truth. We need to have an understanding of what that is and that God is seeking such to worship Him. And so God is the one who we are worshiping if we call ourselves Christians and are endeavoring to please God. And God, therefore, is the one who tells us how to worship Him.
That little detail seems to escape a lot of people for some reason. That we should worship God, nearly every Christian would agree to. How we should worship God to many people is just up to, well, I prefer this or I prefer that. I like this.
I like that. Without any thought or reference to what does God say about the subject? Who are you worshiping, yourself or God? Who are you worshiping? Are you worshiping God externally, worshiping God supposedly? But really what you're doing is worshiping yourself, trying to gain something for yourself without much reference to God at all.
That's what we have to be guarding against. We do not choose how we want to worship Him. We learn from Him how we ought to worship Him. And not all the details are given to us in the Bible. He doesn't give us an order of service.
He doesn't tell us which songs to sing and so forth. There are a lot of things that are left unsaid. But the things that are said, we better pay attention to and make sure that we are incorporating them into our understanding of how to worship God. And so we are coming to a new section in the book of Hebrews today that deals with that very subject. Hebrews, like many of the epistles in the New Testament, is divided into two general categories, two general parts.
The first part doctrinal, the second part we sometimes call practical. And Hebrews is exactly the same way. From the beginning of the book in chapter 1 until we have finished chapter 10 verse 18, we have been in a doctrinal treatise, a doctrinal section, a time of teaching, of information, of talking to us about how Christ is superior to the angels, how Christ is superior to Moses, how Christ is superior to Joshua and to Aaron, what Christ did upon the cross, how old covenant worship operated and what was inferior about it, how new covenant worship operates and what is superior about it. All these are facts and pieces of information which are very, very important, but there's scarcely a word of exhortation in there anywhere until we get to chapter 10 verse 19. And now the writer of Hebrews will really take the rest of the book to say, because of these doctrines, you should do this. Because of these doctrines, you should do that. Because of these doctrines, here's what God expects of you.
And that's where we are today. Nothing is more applicable than the first exhortation of verses 19 through 22 guidelines on how to worship God. Nineteen, therefore brethren, having boldness to enter the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which he consecrated for us through the veil that is his flesh, and having a high priest over the house of God, here comes the first exhortation. Let us draw near with a true heart and full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. It goes on to a second exhortation of verse 23.
Let us hold fast the confession of our hope. A third one of verse 24, let us consider one another. So there are three exhortations right there. We could structure a sermon around those three exhortations. Let us, let us, let us, let us draw near, let us hold fast, let us consider one another. However, this section is so packed that I couldn't take all three exhortations today.
Just one, the first one, let us draw near with a true heart. We're learning in this section how to worship God. God given instructions for how he is to be worshiped. And it's very simple, but still a lot of people miss it.
So pay close attention. But in verses 19 through 22, we have what I call the foundation for worship. In verse, that's through verse 21. Verse 22, the invitation to worship, and in the first part of verse 22, and the remainder of verse 22, the requirements for worship. So first of all, the foundation for worship, and here the writer of Hebrews, though he has in a sense concluded the doctrinal section, reaches back as it were to pull a few things out of that previous section as a foundation for worship.
What we need to know, what we need to understand in order to properly worship God, and it has to do with what God has done to enable sinful human beings to be able to worship him. We can't worship him. We can't draw near. The exhortation is let us draw near.
But we can't draw near until first God has done something to enable us to draw near. And so we must first understand the foundation of worship if we're going to enter into worship in a proper way. And the foundation of worship we can state in four phrases. Number one, the forgiveness of sins. Number two, the blood of Jesus. Number three, the inauguration of the new covenant. And number four, the high priestly work of Christ. That's the foundation.
Let's look at them one by one. First of all, the forgiveness of sins, back to verse 19. Therefore, brethren, and whenever you see a therefore, you have to what?
Look back to see what it's there for. It's reaching back into the previous context. And what he's emphasizing is the forgiveness of sins. Verse 18, now where there is remission of these, forgiveness of sins, there's no longer an offering for sin. Therefore, brethren, because of this, because of the forgiveness of sins, let us enter boldly into the holiest by the blood of Jesus. So what he's reminding us is that the old covenant did not provide forgiveness of sins. If there's any question about that when you're studying the Old Testament, the New Testament, the inspired commentary on the Old Testament makes that crystal clear.
Back to verse 11. Every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can what? Are offered in order to take away sins?
No. Which can never take away sins. But this man, verse 12, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God. Well, if all of those thousands of animal sacrifices could not take away sins, then what were they for? They were to remind us that we need forgiveness from sins. They were to remind us that the forgiveness of sins requires the death of a substitute, the shedding of blood, but it also tells us that these animals can never perform that requirement, that only the death of Jesus, the sinless Son of God, the sinless infinite Son of God, only his blood is able to secure forgiveness of sins. And so this fact that the old covenant cannot forgive sins, and even quotes a bit again in the preceding verses, part of the therefore that we're looking at now, he even quotes again that passage in Jeremiah 31 that he dealt with extensively, you recall, in chapter 8, but he brings it up again, this prophecy by Jeremiah in the Old Testament about the inauguration of a new covenant.
Jeremiah didn't tell his readers when that would be inaugurated, but he said, it's coming. God said, I'm going to make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with them when I brought their fathers out of the land of Egypt, which covenant they broke, says the Lord. But I'm making a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, and he goes on to describe the terms of that new covenant, and part of that is the complete forgiveness of sins. Their sins I will remember no more.
Remember that? Look back at verse 16. This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, says the Lord. I will put my law into their hearts and in their minds I will write them a description of regeneration, a description of the new birth, a description of the new life that God gives under the new covenant because of the inauguration by Jesus Christ on the cross of Calvary, that God now will put his word into the hearts of new covenant members, unlike the way that he did not put, unlike the way he did, how do I say this now, different from the way he didn't put his law in the hearts of old covenant worshipers, at least under the terms of the old covenant.
It's very important to understand the distinction here. Someone will say, well, wait a minute, there were regenerated people in the Old Testament, people who obviously knew God, people who'd clearly been born again, people who had God's spirit within them, people who clearly had God's word within them. Why, look at David, look at others in the Old Testament.
They clearly were regenerated. Yes, yes, yes, but not because of the old covenant. The fact of the matter is there were thousands, perhaps in the course of time, even millions of people who were all God qualified, God appointed members of the old covenant, having been circumcised and brought into the old covenant who were never regenerated, of whom it could not be said that God put his law in their hearts and in their minds and of whom it could not be said their sins and their lawless deeds.
I will remember no more because the Bible is clear that many of those Israelites who were members of the old covenant community by the requirements, by the instructions that God gave for people to be admitted into the old covenant community, many of them went to hell. Their sins were not forgiven. The old covenant did not forgive sins. So again, remind me how did people in the Old Testament have their sins forgiven and how were they born again, people like David and myriads of others, by the terms of the new covenant, not yet inaugurated, but still applied to those who by faith trusted the promises of God. On the basis of the new covenant, God regenerated them. They were born again. But those who were only members of the old covenant and did not by faith come in under the terms of the new covenant, they were not regenerated. Their sins were not forgiven.
The old covenant didn't do that. So what is the foundation of true heartfelt worship and understanding of the forgiveness of sins by the blood of Jesus Christ? And that brings us to the second one, the blood of Jesus. We understand the forgiveness of sins is necessary to worship God aright.
But how are our sins forgiven? And we're told in verse 19 by the blood of Jesus, having boldness to enter the holiest by the blood of Jesus. That explains how the forgiveness of sins takes place because forgiveness requires a sacrifice. The old covenant pointed to that. Forgiveness requires a blood sacrifice.
The old covenant pointed to that. Shedding of blood, shedding of blood, shedding of blood, shedding of blood. Without the shedding of blood, there is no remission. There's no forgiveness of sins. But the forgiveness of sins requires the blood of a perfect sacrifice, the blood of an infinitely valuable sacrifice. It requires the blood of the God-man, Jesus Christ.
He's the only one whose death could serve as a substitutionary sacrifice that truly is acceptable to God to pay for the sins of sinners. It took the blood of Christ. What can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. And so we must have that in mind as we draw near to God in worship.
The inauguration of the new covenant, which I've already dealt with, but that's also part of this in verse 20. We enter to the holiness by the blood of Jesus by what? By a new and living way, which he consecrated for us through the veil that is his flesh. This is a new way.
This is a living way. The old covenant was well old. That's why we call it the old covenant. The new covenant is new. That's why we call it the new covenant. The old covenant, however, more to the point, was not a living way. It did not impart life. But the new covenant does.
This is so critical to proper understanding. People who were bona fide, qualified, genuine, God-approved members of the old covenant were not necessarily born again. They did not have new life.
They had not come through a living way. But under the new covenant, every member of the new covenant community is in that community because of what? Because of new life. Because they've been born again.
Because of the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit. That's what brings people into the new covenant. What brought people into the old covenant? Circumcision. Family relationship to Abraham. But what brings people into the new covenant? The new birth. That's why it's not appropriate to take old covenant circumcision and say, well, that ought to be applied to new covenant baptism. Because even though there's not one single instruction, not one single example of baptizing infants in the New Testament, but nevertheless, that's the rationale for doing it.
But it's a misunderstanding. This passage in Jeremiah points out the contrasts. Here's why the new covenant is better than the old.
Why? Because it imparts life to every member. The old covenant didn't do that. This is a new and a living way. It provides for the impartation of life, which was inaugurated by Christ.
We're told here very clearly. He consecrated this for us through the veil that is his flesh. So we have boldness to enter into the holiness by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which he consecrated. It's over. It's done. It's consecrated.
It's finished. He did that when he died on the cross. He consecrated the new covenant, brought it into existence, and thereafter, based upon his sacrificial death upon the cross, the Holy Spirit has been searching out and finding those who God is seeking to worship him and bringing them into union with Jesus Christ under the terms of the new covenant, bringing them to life and bringing them in to the new covenant. And finally, we read that the barrier has been removed, the veil. He was consecrated this new way, verse 20, through the veil that is his flesh.
Now, that's a rather perplexing thought at first. We've never run into that before, where the body of Jesus, his flesh is called the veil, the veil in the temple between the holy and the holiest of holies. But we do know that when Jesus died on the cross, we could say when his flesh was rent, terribly rent in that crucifixion, that what happened at the same time in the temple, the veil in the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. There is a connection here between the flesh of Jesus, rent upon the cross of Calvary, and the veil of the temple being rent from top to bottom.
And what did that indicate? That indicated that now on the basis of Christ's death upon the cross, those who are in him have unhindered access right into the holy of holies, unhindered access right into the presence of God as no old covenant worshiper did. Old covenant worshippers only had limited access to God through a series of mediators. They bring their sacrifice to the temple and the priest would take it and burn it upon the altar. And then that priest would go into the holy place, not the holy of holies. And there he would offer incense upon the altar of incense, his prayers sending to God, representing those who had brought their sacrifices to the altar in the courtyard. But even that priest couldn't go into the very presence of God only, as you know, the high priest one time a year went in there briefly to sprinkle blood upon the mercy seat and then to come out again and not to do it again for another year.
And he represented everybody else who was part of that old covenant. This is as close as you'll get to God through the barriers. If you are not a priest, you can't come past the altar in the courtyard. If you are just a priest, you can't come past the holy place where the table of showbread and the golden candlestick and the altar of incense are. You can't go any farther than that. You can't come any closer to God than that.
If you are the high priest, you can only go in once a year for a few minutes and then you have to wait for another year to come into the presence of God. But when Jesus died upon the cross, that temple veil, which I'm told in that Herod's temple, though it was fabric, it was about a foot thick. Can you imagine how many layers had been sewn together to make that? Can you imagine what it would take to tear that? No human hands could do that.
No human machinery could do that. But when Jesus Christ died on the cross, rip, it went ripped, came apart. And now, walk in. Come into the presence of God. Come into the holy of holies, all you who are in Jesus Christ. The way has been prepared. It's ready. Christ inaugurated it through the veil of his flesh.
Rent for you. Come, come, come into the throne room of Almighty God. That's the point here. But finally, there's still one more part and that's the high priestly work of Christ. We're talking about the foundation of worship. Verse 21 says, in having a high priest over the house of God. New covenant believers have a high priest. It's not Levi, not Aaron, not one of their descendants. But it is a high priest who is, as we're told here, over the house of God.
Question. Do you want to belong to the house of God? Do you want to be one of the members of God's family? If the answer is yes, then you need to come under the one whom God has placed over this house. That's Jesus Christ. That's the way you become a member of his household.
By submitting yourself to the one who has been placed over this household. And he accomplished the true mediation between God and men. First Timothy 2, 5 tells us there's one God, one mediator between God and man, God and man, the man Christ Jesus. He's the high priest who is the one true mediator between God and man. And new covenant believers have a high priest who is over the house that is the household of God.
Over that house of God which constitutes all true believers in Jesus Christ. But he not only became the high priest and offered himself upon the cross of Calvary. And presented the merits of his offering before the throne of God all having something having been done. But he's still representing us as his high priest. He continues to represent his people. Hebrews 7, 25 says, therefore he is able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through him. Since he lives, since he always lives rather, to make intercession for them. Jesus Christ is in heaven now representing his people. Jesus Christ is in heaven now praying for you and for me. Interceding for his people.
That's an astonishing truth isn't it? And when you know that, I think you've got the foundation to worship God, right? You understand the forgiveness of sins. You understand the necessity of the blood atonement. You understand the inauguration of the new covenant. You understand the high priestly work of Christ.
Alright, now when all that is in place, come, come, come. Having a high priest over the house of God, verse 22, let us draw near. Here's the exhortation.
Here's the invitation. Draw near with a true heart and full assurance of faith. Having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. The invitation to come. Let us draw near. The first of the three exhortations in this passage. And what does it mean to draw near to God? And generally the first thing we would think about when we hear this invitation, draw near to God, probably the first thing we would think about is to draw near to God in prayer.
And that's part of it, a very important part of it. We have unhindered access into the very throne room of the almighty ruler of this universe. We can walk right up to his throne and say respectfully, Daddy, I have a need.
We have been invited. Let us draw near. Prayer is the means by which we obtain the promised blessings of God. God has promised many blessings to his believing people, but he's also ordained the means by which they will be granted. How many things that we could otherwise have we forfeit because we fail to pray?
Isn't there a hymn that talks about that? Things we forfeit. O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear. Thank you. O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear. All because we do not carry everything to him, to God in prayer. Yes, let us draw near. Thank you, brother, musician.
Thank you. Prayer is the means by which we obtain promised blessings from God. But it'll help you in your prayer life if you will remember that prayer is first and foremost an act of worship.
This will help. Sometimes we have trouble praying because we don't really conceive of it correctly. It's an act of worship. And let me tell you ways in which it is an act of worship. In prayer, we acknowledge our needs, but his supply. That's worshiping him. In prayer, we acknowledge our weakness, but we affirm his strength. That's worshiping him in prayer. In prayer, we acknowledge our sins, but we claim his forgiveness. That's honoring him, worshiping him in prayer. In prayer, we acknowledge that we are undeserving, but that he is merciful.
And we do not come to him because of what we deserve. We come to him because he is a merciful God. That is honoring him in worship. In prayer, we thank him for his grace. We praise him for his goodness. And we praise him for his attributes, for who he is.
We acknowledge his unrivaled glory, his majesty, his honor, his right, his greatness. All these things we do in prayer, if we're praying aright, and therefore prayer is worship. We pray because it is an act of worship. It may be the most essential act of worship that we can engage ourselves in. And so on the basis of all of these things that we have learned, let us draw near in prayer. But secondly, we could say let us draw near in worship because prayer is not the only activity of worship.
It's an essential one, but it's not the only one. We must draw near in worship, private worship. We must not neglect that. But public worship, corporate worship, we must not neglect that.
Let me show you how coming to what we call a worship service and involving yourself in a worship service is a God-honoring act of worship. We acknowledge that we are one component of the living body, one member of that great body, which is the body of Christ. But we come together with the body. We don't exist independently. We don't live apart from the rest of the body. Members of the human body that aren't attached to the rest of the body are dead.
They have to function in concert with the rest of the human body. And likewise, Christians who are one members of the body of Christ must function in active engagement with the rest of the body. We come together as a testimony of our true identity. When we come together in corporate worship, we are testifying to those around us in the gathering of the saints, as well as those who may observe us doing this, that we are Christians. We belong to Christ. That's not something that we can do readily in our private worship, for that is largely unseen.
But that is something that we can powerfully do in our corporate worship. Don't you think your neighbors know that you are a professing Christian when every Sunday your car rolls out of your driveway and they know you're headed to church? And isn't it a testimony of the opposite when, if you are home to see it, I hope you're not, but if you're home to see it when your neighbors roll out the lawnmower and mow the yard when you are in church, that's saying, I'm not a Christian. Whereas when you go to church, you're saying, I identify as a Christian.
That's very important, isn't it? Your public worship of God. Not only a testimony of our true identity, but it's an affirmation of Christian unity. Yes, we are saved individually. We aren't saved because anybody else is saved. We're not saved because our parents were saved. We're not saved because we were born into a Christian home or because we were reared up in a Christian church. We must be saved individually. We must recognize our need.
We must feel the weight of our sins. We must personally believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. But beyond that, it's not strictly an individual matter. It's both and not either or. Both individual and corporate.
Not either individual or corporate. And so we come together as an affirmation of Christian unity. All one body we. One in hope and doctrine.
One in charity. Onward, Christian soldiers. We come together to join our voices in praise. We are lifting a chorus of praise to God.
You can't do that alone. We come together to join our hearts in prayer. Somebody leads us in prayer, but our hearts join in to those petitions and those affirmations of the greatness and goodness of God. And we join in that in heart affirmation. We join our hearts in prayer, in corporate worship. We join our minds in truth, in corporate worship. As the word is being proclaimed and we receive it, we are all agreeing together. Yes, I believe that.
This is so. And we have done that together in corporate worship. We join our resources for kingdom work. I give my offering.
You give your offering. It's brought together and it funds some part of the Lord's work. That's part of our corporate worship. We come together to affirm and to confirm, but to affirm our acknowledgement of truth.
That's why at the end of many services I say before we close, and all God's people said, that's your affirmation that what you heard you agree with. That's our corporate worship. Corporate worship is a privilege. And corporate worship is a fulfillment of what we were created to do before Adam fell in the garden, and what has been spoiled by sin and what is being restored by the Lord Jesus Christ and by the work of the Spirit of God in the new birth. We are enabled to worship God as we could not in our sinful condition. We are enabled to worship God as Adam did before he sinned against his creator in the garden. We are able to fulfill the primary purpose for which we exist, for the purpose for which we have been created. It is to worship, honor, glorify, and serve our creator.
That's why we're here. And we can do that when we are saved and we engage in the worship of God. So let us draw near in prayer. Let us draw near in worship. But finally, what are the requirements of worship in verse 22, the last part of the verse? As we come near, how do we come?
And it's all spelled out here. Let us draw near with a true heart and full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Here's how we come. We're coming, we're drawing near to God in worship.
How do we come? Number one, with a sincere heart. Number two, with a genuine faith. Number three, with a clear conscience.
And number four, with an obedient disposition. We come with a sincere heart. Let us draw near with a true heart or a sincere heart or an honest heart that is being honest and open before God.
A genuine heart, a committed heart without deceit, without ulterior motives. You know as well as I do that not everybody who comes to a corporate worship service comes with a clean heart. Not everybody comes with the right motives. Some people are coming to impress others. That's not coming with a true heart.
Some people are coming to make themselves feel good. But that's not really coming with a true heart. That's self-centered, not God-centered. We come with a heart that understands that we are sinners deserving of eternal condemnation, but God has saved us by His grace. And so we come with a sincere heart to worship Him. We come with a sincere heart to hear from Him.
We come with a true heart, a sincere heart. That's what it means to worship God in spirit. Our spirit in tune with the Holy Spirit who indwells us. We worship Him in the power of the Holy Spirit. We worship Him in the God-given empowerment of our own spirit, our own inner man. We worship Him in spirit, but also in truth. We come with a genuine faith, full assurance of faith. We read in verse 22. And what is faith?
Our Bible conference speaker made reference to this, I think, in at least two sermons. That faith, by definition, is believing the Word of God, believing the revelation of God. That's what faith is. Faith is not just believing whatever I think I'd like to believe and say I believe that very sincerely. Faith is believing the revelation of God. In other words, believing what God has said. Faith in God's Word. And because of our faith in God's Word and what we have already covered in the foundation of worship, we come to God with a genuine faith, a full assurance of faith.
That means full confidence of our acceptance in Christ. Well, how can I approach the throne of a thrice-holy God? I'm not worthy of that. Of course not. But are you in Christ? Then you're just as accepted as He is.
Whoa! That's what the Bible teaches. You can come that way, can't you? Is Christ accepted in the presence of the Father? Are you in Christ? Then you can come with a full assurance of your acceptance in Christ before God. Full confidence of our acceptance in Christ.
I read one commentator who put it this way. Doubt insults. Faith exalts. Again, we so often turn inward.
Well, poor little me, I had this thing happen to me, this difficulty, this misfortune. I just don't know if I can go on. I just don't know if I can believe. Stop it.
Nonsense. Your faith is in the Word of God. It is in the God of the Word. And your faith honors Him. Your faith exalts Him. Doubt insults Him. When you act like you don't believe Him, you're insulting Him. You are saying, I can't believe the living God. There's something about Him that makes it impossible for me to believe that His promises are true. I can't believe that all things work together for good to those who love God and are called according to His purpose.
What's that? That's doubt. That's the absence of faith.
Doubt insults. But faith exalts. I believe God. I honor Him by believing. I'm exalting Him by believing even when I don't understand. We're talking about requirements of worship.
How do you truly worship God? Number one, with a sincere heart. Number two, with a genuine faith.
Number three, with a clear conscience. Having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience. This, of course, is also drawing upon Old Testament typology. There was a lot of sprinkling of blood in the Old Covenant system.
There was a lot of washing with water, as we'll get to in a moment in the Old Covenant system. And it all spoke of cleansing. Guilt removed. And for New Covenant believers, that is a truth that we could say is true objectively before God.
God looks upon those who are trusting in His Son and sees the righteousness of His Son and says, sends God. Perfect righteousness. Guilt removed. But sometimes the objective truth has some difficulty lodging in our subjective feelings. Oftentimes the way we feel about things lags behind the way things truly are.
We look at it, we say objectively, I know that's true, but I just don't feel that way. Well, as long as you are feeling unforgiven, as long as you still have a sense of guilt, a guilty conscience for what you have done, even though you have trusted Christ, even though you've committed to Christ, even though you have acknowledged your sin and claimed His forgiveness, and yet you still can't seem to let go, you still have a guilty conscience, you're going to have something hindering you in the true worship of God. You can't really worship God with a true heart of faith assurance if you are holding on to something that God says is gone. Who are you going to believe? Me or God? Who am I going to believe? The way I feel, I just don't feel that way. Or God who said it, who declared it, the eternal God who proclaimed it and declared it to be true.
Now who are you going to believe? I expect about 90% of Christians are living more by their emotions than by the truth of God's word. We've got to turn that around. It's not that there's no place in true Christianity for feelings and emotions. They're there, but they need to take a distant second to the objective truth of God's word.
That's what we depend upon. My heart is leaning on my feelings, the wavering feelings that change from day to day. No, my heart is leaning on the Word, the written Word of God. That's what we need to say and remind ourselves regularly so that our subjective feelings line up with the objective truth. We come into the presence of God with a clear conscience. Not because we're free from sin. Not because we haven't sinned. We have. We are.
Dr. Orrick dealt with that a little bit this week. I hate to correct the learned doctor in any way, but he made a big point of saying Christians aren't worms. Well, when we look within ourselves, we are. There's nothing wrong with seeing yourself as a worm as long as you don't dwell on the worm, but you move on from that to who you are in Christ. It's good. It's humbling. It's proper to see how guilty, vile, and helpless are we and then look to the spotless Lamb of God.
Was he? Yes, I am a worm in myself, but who am I in Christ? I am a prince. I am a king. I am a son of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
That doesn't... I'm a child of the King. We come with a clear conscience. We have assurance that our sins are gone. Gone, gone, gone, gone.
Yes, my sins are gone. And finally, we come with a disobedient disposition. And I think that's the best way to understand that last phrase.
Our bodies washed with pure water. That's a rather challenging phrase. What does that mean exactly? Some say that refers to baptism.
I don't think so. I think it has to do with the outward cleansing. We've talked about the inward cleansing, the clear conscience, our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, but now there has to be, because of what's happened inwardly, there's now a cleaning up of our life, isn't there? And now in the past we served ourselves in sin and Satan and now we have a disposition to serve God. And it's with that disposition we come to worship God.
We don't come and say, look at what good works I've done. That gives me standing with you. That gives me merit to come to you. That qualifies me to come to you.
This is what saves me or this is what gives me a good standing with you. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Not at all.
Not in the slightest way. But yes, in coming to Christ I have placed myself under the authority of the one that God has placed over the household of God. And now it is my desire and disposition to do His will. And I am ashamed of myself in those areas where I fail to do that fully, as I do fail to do that fully. But because I am a true child of God, when I fail I acknowledge it as sin, I confess it and ask for His help, and I go back at it again.
I always have this disposition. I want to live a life that pleases God. I want to live a life that's obedient to Him.
I want to do what He commands me to do. And when we have that ingredient in our approach to God, if we're coming to Him with a sincere heart, a genuine faith, and a clear conscience, and an obedient disposition, we are there in the right frame to worship the living God. True worship is not merely a feeling, though it may involve that. True worship is based upon objective truth, the ten and a half chapters that have gone before us here. True worship is based upon objective truth embraced by a believing heart and manifested in obedient action that also is contrite and confessing when obedience has been imperfect as it will be. We worship God in order to please Him.
We benefit when we worship God, but that's a byproduct of serving Him. It's similar to this formula that I haven't said anything to you about for a long time, but I have it sometime in the past, about how to have happiness, how to be happy. How do you achieve happiness in your life? And I heard a wise old preacher along with the Lord, died in about 1968, but a wise old preacher who said this, happiness is not achieved by seeking happiness.
Happiness is something we stumble over on the road to duty. People who are always trying to figure out, what makes me happy? What makes me happy? Will this make me happy? Will that make me happy? I'm just seeking happiness, and some parents say, the only thing I want for my children is that they be happy.
Whatever makes you happy, son, whatever makes you happy, you're setting them up for a life of unhappiness. Serve God. Do what He commands. Trust in Him. Live a life of obedience to Him.
And guess what? Along the way, you're going to stumble over a good measure of happiness. In this fallen world, there's no such thing as perfect happiness.
There won't be until we get to heaven. But whatever happiness is possible for fallen sons and daughters of Adam in a fallen world is only available to those who pursue a life of service to God. And happiness just sort of tackles you along the way on that path to obedience.
Same thing with worship. You don't worship God for, what will it benefit me? How will it benefit me?
What will it do for me? I worship God because of who He is, and He deserves to be worshiped. But as I do, hey, this does help me greatly, but don't ever make that the goal. True worship is experienced as we desire to please God and actively believe what He says. Let's pray. Father, seal these truths to our hearts today, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.
