Three Confrontations of Christ - 11

Well, I'm sure most of us are familiar with the closing verse of 1 Corinthians 13, that well-known chapter on love, and it concludes by saying, and now abide, faith, hope, love, these three, but the greatest of these is love. That trio, faith, hope, love, is found a number of times throughout our New Testament. Not one additional one besides that which is found in our text for today, but in 1 Thessalonians chapter 1, in verse 3, we read these words as soon as I get there. 1 Thessalonians 1, 3, remembering without ceasing your work of faith, labor of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ in the sight of God and the sight of our God. And then we come to our text in Hebrews chapter 10, and we read in verse 22, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith. And in verse 23, let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering. And in verse 24, let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works. Faith, hope, and love. It's no coincidence that these three attributes are found rather frequently throughout the New Testament because clearly there is a great emphasis upon them by the Spirit of God as deposited in the Bible, the Word of God. And so coming now as we move along in Hebrews chapter 10 to these three practical exhortations which introduce the second half or the second section, it's not really a full half, but the second part of the book of Hebrews we find an emphasis on these three attributes, faith, hope, and love, right from the get-go. The first part of the book up through chapter 10 verse 18 is what we call doctrinal because the emphasis there is upon teaching, upon information, upon details about Christ and His work, and the Old Covenant versus the New Covenant, and angels, and Moses, and Joshua, and many things that we've already covered. And all of that is primarily didactic.

It is teaching. It is information for us to know. Before we can do what we ought to do, we have to know what we ought to know. That's the emphasis of the Bible. The idea that we can just go off and do what is right without knowing what is true is a fallacious idea. We have to know what is true before we can possibly do what is right. And that's the way so many of the New Testament books are structured.

And Hebrews is no exception. It is structured the same way. But now having moved past that doctrinal section into what is sometimes called the practical section, we are introduced immediately to three clear exhortations. Let us do this. Let us do that.

Let us do something else. Let us draw near in faith. Let us hold fast in hope and let us consider one another in love. Let us draw near in faith. That's worship. And we spent the whole message last Sunday morning talking about that particular exhortation.

Let us hold fast in hope. That's perseverance. And we're going to be reminded of that again today. And let us consider one another in love. That's fellowship, Christian fellowship. Let us apply that to our lives as well. And so there is faith, hope, love. There is worship, perseverance, and fellowship. And these are three practical exhortations, three practical endeavors to cultivate and maintain a healthy Christian life.

Let's look at them one by one. First of all, let us draw near in faith. Verse 22. Let us draw near with a true heart and full assurance of faith. Faith is the foundation of worship. This first exhortation has to do with drawing near to God in worship. Let us draw near in faith, in the full assurance of faith. Let us draw near to God in prayer.

Let us draw near to God in heartfelt worship. And that is all predicated upon faith in the Word of God. The foundation of worship is faith. And the foundation of faith is truth. And therefore, we have to know what God says if we're going to believe what God says. And when we believe what God says, we are able to draw near to Him in prayer and in corporate worship. You must be born again to truly worship God. You can't worship God in spirit and in truth until the Holy Spirit has made you alive in Christ. And until the Holy Spirit has enabled you to understand God's truth. John MacArthur, in his commentary, says there are three requirements of faith.

And I thought this was worth passing along. To have true heart faith, there are three things needed. First, what he calls felt faith. There must be felt need.

Secondly, what he calls content. And third, what he calls commitment. There must be felt need. And by that, he means we must feel our need of God. There must be conviction of sin. There must be a sense of urgent need for God and for His salvation, for faith to be exercised.

So first of all, we must feel our need. Secondly, there's content. There's gospel truth. There is information that is given to us by God. We don't make up what we believe. We don't imagine what the gospel ought to be.

We don't adopt from those around us what we think the Christian religion is all about. But we go to the Bible, the Word of God, and we learn what it says and what it reveals to us about Christ and about salvation in Him, about man's sin and his need. This is the truth, the content that we need in order to exercise faith. We must absorb, we must embrace the truth that God has given us, and there is then, third, the commitment. We must commit ourselves to what God has spoken. That's the requirements of faith. And my question is, does this describe your faith?

Does this describe your heart? Does this describe your relationship with God? Is this the posture with which you are coming into the place of worship today? A sense of need, an embrace of truth, a commitment to the truth that is there. True worship requires faith.

True worship evidently also requires assurance because our text says not just faith but full assurance of faith. In other words, when people gather together for corporate worship, pretenders cannot truly worship. Those who are not truly born again but have come together for some other reason, whatever that may be, and are pretending to be worshippers of God through Jesus Christ, but they're not because their hearts are not really fastened upon Christ. They haven't really been changed by the Spirit of God.

They are pretending to be something that they are not. They cannot possibly worship God in spirit and in truth. Doubters struggle with worship. True born again believers who don't have a full assurance of faith, who are struggling with their relationship with Christ. Have I been saved? Have I not been saved?

Have I lost my salvation? All the many ideas that sometimes people have. And when you're not sure of your relationship with God through Jesus Christ, you don't have an assurance of a living faith in Christ, and you're going to struggle with being able to worship God. But biblical assurance of faith in Jesus Christ based upon the gospel as given to us by God, that enables worship. And so worship requires faith. Worship requires assurance that you have living faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And thirdly, true worship requires a clear conscience.

Did you see that in verse 22? An evil conscience. An evil conscience is a conscience upon which sin has fastened itself because it has not been removed.

Having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience. You cannot worship God aright if you have known, unconfessed sin in your life. When I say known, we may have sin that we're not aware of, and when God wants us to be aware of that and to confess that, he will make us aware of it, won't he? He will cause his Holy Spirit to come to us through the truth of God's word and show us our sin that we may not have been aware of before.

So we may come to God with unconfessed sin that we are unaware of until he makes us aware of it. But once God makes us aware of sin, the only proper option is to acknowledge it, to confess it, to yield it to God, to turn away from it, and then we can worship him. But if we're not willing to do that, we'll not be able to worship. If I regard iniquity in my heart, the psalmist said, the Lord what?

Will not hear me. We can't worship God that way with unconfessed sin in our lives. I'm not talking about a perfect performance necessary for worship. I'm talking about a complete confession necessary for worship. There are no perfect Christians.

There are no sinless Christians. We all sin against God. But the question is, when you sin, do you acknowledge it, confess it, forsake it, ask God's forgiveness and come to him with a contrite heart?

Or do you justify it, hide it, shield it, ignore it? And if you do that, you can't worship God. You are regarding iniquity in your heart. And it may be that even as I speak these words, the Holy Spirit is laying his finger upon the hearts of some of you, and perhaps you need to do business with God even as I talk.

You don't have to wait for a later time. You can turn your heart upward to God even now and say, Lord, you just showed me, you just reminded me, you just convicted me of this sin. I acknowledge it as sin.

I confess it. I forsake it. I ask your cleansing. So number one, let us draw near in faith. Number two, three practical exhortations for Christian living. Number two, let us hold fast in hope. Verse 23. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering for he who promised is faithful. And in this verse, we are told, number one, what we must do, and number two, why we can do this. What we must do, let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering. What we must do, we must maintain a tight grip and not let go. As far as we are concerned, as far as we are able, knowing that only by God's help and power can we truly hold that grip. I think it was in 1 John. I preached through that.

It's been many years ago now. But I remember in one commentary, there was, in fact, maybe it was the whole title of the book on 1 John that was entitled, His grip don't slip. And it doesn't. His grip doesn't slip. Our grip does slip at times, doesn't it? But we have a responsibility to hold on with all the enablement that we can, calling upon God to enable us to hold on, because we don't have all the power that it takes. But we are praying to the Lord what that songwriter said, Keep me, Lord, oh keep me cleaving to thyself and still be leaving. We should be praying that regularly. Keep me cleaving, keep me clinging, keep me holding on.

We must maintain a tight grip. Secondly, we must maintain a biblical hope. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope. And so now we've moved from faith drawing near in a full assurance of faith to hope, maintaining a tight grip, holding fast the confession of our hope. Now, what is hope? Hope is faith looking to the future. There's not a great difference between faith and hope. In fact, you really don't have hope unless you have faith. You really don't understand hope unless you are building it upon the foundation of faith. But we might say that hope is a specialized compartment of the larger subject of faith. Faith is believing everything that God has said. Hope is believing particularly those things that God has said that pertain to things future. And when we trust God for the unknown, when we trust God for the future, when we trust God for those things that look frightening to us tomorrow and next week and next month and next year, the things that we don't know what's going to happen and it worries us because we want to have all of our ducks in a row. We want to have everything planned, everything organized, everything under control. And God says, but I don't let you have everything under control because then you wouldn't need to trust me.

I deliberately leave you suspended in some things so that you know you don't have control, so that you will be forced to trust me for those things that you clearly cannot control. And that, therefore, becomes the exercise of hope. Hope in the Bible is not hoping that things will turn out correctly. Hope in the Bible is assurance that they will turn out correctly, not because of who we are, but because of who God is, not because of what we determined, but what God has said he will do.

That's hope, believing the promises of God for what is yet to come. And we are to confess our hope to others. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope, the articulation of our hope, the conversation of our hope.

It is spoken to others. This is what we normally call testimony. We testify to others of what we believe.

And sometimes we think of testimony in terms of what has gone before. I testify to what God did. I testify to what God has done in this instance, that instance, in this crisis, in that crisis. I can tell you what God has done. And that is good testimony for the children of God, to tell others what God has done for you and how he has fulfilled his promises for you.

But how about those things future? I confess that I believe that everything is going to be all right because God said so. I confess that. I believe that. I'm confident that all will be well.

I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know how it's going to turn out, but I know what God has said. Remember Romans 8 28? And we know this is for Christians.

Only they can claim this promise. And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to his purpose. Do you love God because he has loved you first and given you his love within your soul for him? Are you one of the called according to his purpose? Can you say, I don't understand fully this doctrine of election, but I realize that if I am trusting Christ, it is because I have been called to Christ by God and it is because of his choice of me in eternity past.

I'm amazed at that. But yes, I have reason to believe that I am one of the called. Well, then you should know assuredly that whatever is in your life right now is for your good. An unconverted person doesn't have that promise. Don't try to comfort unconverted people by quoting this verse or some condensation or summary of this verse and say, well, everything's going to turn out all right.

It always does. No, it doesn't if you don't know the Lord. Sometimes things go from worse, from worse, from worse, to worse, from worse, to worse, from worse, to worse.

And then when you die, it gets really, really worse. No, everything doesn't work out for good to those who don't know the Lord. But if you are a child of God, God has promised that all things will, all things do, all things are working out for your good.

Do you believe that? Do you have a hope, a Bible hope, a firm grip upon the promises of God as they apply to the future? What is going to going to eventuate?

What is going to happen out of these difficult circumstances is going to be so clearly good. But it may take some time for that to be clear, to be seen. But can you have that hope now? Can you have that assurance now?

Can you confess that you believe that is true now? Can you rejoice in that hope? Can you demonstrate joy in your heart because of this hope that God has given you? Let us hold fast the confession of our hope. I'm confident that all will be well because God's word has promised that.

I believe in a better world to come, better than this world and all of its difficulties. And so to maintain a biblical hope, that hope must be understood. We need to know what that hope is, its faith in the future, believing the promises of God for what is yet to come.

That hope needs to be confessed. We need to be willing to say to others, I stand upon the promises of God and I rejoice in these difficulties because I know that God is going to turn them into good. And then we need to maintain a disciplined consistency.

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering. That means we are responsible to maintain a consistent Christian life. We are responsible to maintain a consistent Christian walk.

We are responsible to maintain consistent Christian actions and attitudes of life. If you're up one day and down the next, if you're serving the Lord and rejoicing in him one day, the next day you're off living with the world and indulging in sinful practices. And then the next day you're back to talking and acting like a Christian, but that doesn't last. Then you're off in another direction.

And so it goes up, down, up, down, up, down, up, down. Then you're not going to have any hope in God for the thing's future. But if you will hold on to this confession of hope without wavering, then you have a biblical hope.

That's what we must do. And why can we do this? And the last part of verse 23 tells us why.

We've already touched on it. For he who promised is faithful. Is that true? Is that true that what God promises will inevitably, without any possibility of failure, it will come to pass? If God said it, it's as certain as if it's already done. That's what the Bible teaches us. Do you believe that or do you doubt that? He who promised is faithful.

Do you have any reason to doubt that? If you're a child of God, I don't think you have any reason to doubt that. Have you experienced in the past that God has kept his promises to you? And surely every true child of God can say, yes, yes, I can tell you about this.

I can tell you about that. Can you read in the Bible how God has kept his promises to his children? Over and over and over again, do you have any reason to doubt that God will keep his promises?

Really now, do you? Now, if you're an agnostic, if you're a skeptic, if you're an unbeliever, of course you will articulate your doubts. But if you're a Christian, you don't have any reason to doubt and surely you should not, therefore, be doubting. Have you read and heard the testimonies of others? One of the things that will strengthen your life is to read the biographies of Christians who have gone before.

That is so strengthening to faith. I couldn't begin to tell you how many times I have been helped and what biographies have been so helpful to me. I have a whole section in my library which is not as well organized as it ought to be, but one section is still pretty well organized. It's a bookshelf about this wide from floor to ceiling and it's completely filled up with Christian biographies. And I have read 98% of the ones that are there. I don't know how many books are there.

Two or three perhaps I haven't read. But I've read them all over the years and they have been a tremendous help to me. I'll just mention one that was tremendously impactful to me back in 1985 when I had that serious cancer and I had that very extensive surgery at Duke.

My recovery time made it impossible for me to do anything but just stay in the house and be quiet and be inactive. And I said, well wonderful, now I've got plenty of time to read and I had acquired and was looking for an opportunity to read the two volume biography of George Whitefield by Arnold Delamar. And I read it during that time. And I can't begin to tell you how impactful that was reading the story of one who believed God, who proclaimed the gospel, who believed in the sovereignty of God and salvation, who believed the doctrines of grace completely and fully, and yet was a flaming evangelist who stirred up the fires of revival in England and stirred up great fires of revival in America from north to south, from Philadelphia to Savannah, Georgia and every place in between. He's the one who had an outdoor ministry primarily. He preached to crowds outdoors. Initially because though he was an ordained clergyman in the Church of England, the Anglican clergyman stopped letting him preach in their pulpits. He was preaching a gospel which they had forsaken and it made them look bad. People came in such numbers to hear the gospel that he proclaimed. So he just started preaching outside. And we are told that sometimes as many as 20 to 30,000 people gathered in a field or some public place to hear him preach.

That's amazing, particularly in those days when the population was so little. And in America, Benjamin Franklin took a real interest in George Whitefield, not because I have any reason to believe that Benjamin Franklin ever became a true believer, but he certainly was enamored with George Whitefield and with his gifts and his voice. And he decided one time to figure out how far away from the speaker could George Whitefield's voice be heard in a day before PA systems. And so he started walking and counting his steps away from Whitefield on one occasion and came and could still hear him clearly one mile away. God prepared him for that, obviously.

How many people could do that? Tremendous messenger of God, tremendous servant of God. How that impacted my soul, how that encouraged me. Now, when you read the testimonies of people that God has used in that way, you will be encouraged. And so your hope will be stirred up. You will be reminded and renewed in your faith that God is able to do what he says and that God does what he says, what God promises he will do. A salvation point.

Do you believe that? Amen. And then number three. Number one, let us draw near with a true heart and full assurance of faith. Number two, let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering. And number three, let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another and so much the more as you see the day approaching. Let us consider one another in love, faith, hope, love. Draw near in faith, hold fast in hope, and fellowship, consider one another in love.

What we must do and how we must do this, what we must do. Verse 24, we must be concerned for others and we must be involved with others. Let us consider one another.

Let us consider one another. We are just concerned about our welfare, but the welfare of others. We're not just concerned about our spiritual life and our spiritual growth, but also in the spiritual welfare and wellbeing and progress of others. That, according to scripture, is our responsibility in part. Obviously, we're not totally responsible for another person's relationship with God, but God has so designed the body of Christ that members of the body minister to other members of the body and are part of God's process.

They become God's tools to help others in their spiritual wellbeing and progress. We are to be concerned for others. We are to be involved with others. Let us consider one another, that's concerned, in order to stir up love and good works. That's being involved with others to produce this effect, to stimulate greater love for Christ and for others in their hearts, to stimulate greater good deeds, good works for Christ in the lives of others as well as in ourselves.

We are to do this. We are to stir up. That's a strong word. Some translations say provoke. You say, well, provoke kind of has a sharp edge to it. It's like prodding people with a goat or something.

That's really the idea here. Stir up, provoke, stimulate. But what are we to stir up? What are we to provoke in others?

Love and good works. We're not provoking strife. We're not stirring up rancor. We're not stirring up arguments.

That's what usually gets provoked, doesn't it? But we are to provoke people to love and good works. We are to stir up love.

How do we do that? I think the best way to do that is just by exercising a heart of love toward them. Demonstrating true love toward others will provoke others to do the same. It will show them what ought to be done.

It will remind them of what they ought to do. It will give them an example of what Christian love looks like. It will encourage them to follow that example as you have demonstrated Christian love to them. So now they will demonstrate similar Christian love to others. The best way to stir up others to love is by your active love to them. Jesus said, by this shall all men know that you are my disciples, that you have love one for another. As you do that, you are going to stir up love in others.

And good works. Good works, I think we can stir up both by example and exhortation. First, our example of good works done in the name of Christ will be noticed by others.

It will be copied by others, others who are truly saved and have a desire to serve Christ. They'll see you doing serving Christ this way and you'll say, oh, that shows me how I can do it. That stirs me on to greater good works for God. And you can also help others by talking to them, instructing them, inviting them to join you in what area of ministry, what area of good works you are involved in.

Here's what I do in this situation. Here's what I do to minister to people who have lost a loved one. Here's what I do to minister to people who are sick. Here's what I do to teach God's word to others. Here's what I do to encourage people in the Christian faith. Show them what you do.

Take them into your circle of activity and demonstrate good works to them and teach them how to do it. And thus you will be provoking one another both to love and to good works. That's what we are commanded to do.

That's the third let us. Let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works. But what is the mechanism that is given to us for this to be done? And that's that verse which is often taken out of context, but here it is, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another and so much the more as you see the day approaching. Church participation, local church involvement. This is the God designed mechanism for God's people to interact with others of God's people in order to stir one another up to love and good works.

This is where that's done. My faithful assembling, not forsaking, not forsaking the assembly of the saints, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together. In order to do with one another what the Bible says we ought to be doing with one another, we've got to be regular. We've got to be there. We've got to be present. But more than that, we've got to be involved.

But it starts with being present, regular attendance, not occasional visits, by regular attendance, by intentional interaction. Why are we faithful to the assembly of the saints? According to this text, so that we can exhort one another, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, exhorting one another. How are you exhorting other Christians? Can you exhort others? Do you exhort others? Why are you not exhorting others? For most Christians, it seems a little intrusive, doesn't it?

What, me? Instruct others? In the Christian faith, well, there must be a proper way to do that.

There probably is an improper way to do it, a harsh way, a brash way, a nosy way, an inappropriate way to do it, but evidently there's got to be an appropriate way to do this in a God-honoring way. It's a command of what we are to do. We come together in the assembly of the saints not just to worship God. That should, of course, be foremost on our minds, but there are other matters that are also important and are God-given, and one of them is we come together so that we can exhort one another, instruct one another, help others to grow in their walk with the Lord and in their exercise of good works. And clearly, to do that, we have to develop relationships with one another.

That's the key. Some people attend church, maybe even fairly regularly, for years, but they never develop relationships within the body of Christ, so they don't ever exhort one another. They don't have that kind of relationship. Clearly, to do this requires a certain level of relationship that enables you to speak lovingly, kindly, and appreciatively into the lives of others in such a way that they don't feel like you're being intrusive because they know you love them. They know you're their friend. They know you have their welfare in mind.

You've demonstrated that by the relationship that you have cultivated with them before you speak truth into their lives. I think that's a tremendously missing ingredient in most church involvement today. Too many people think about church as something that I go to and sit through and depart from, period. No, it's something you go to in order to build relationships with those around you and utilize those relationships to minister to one another to stir up love and good deeds by exhorting one another.

And we are to do this because of future considerations. And here's that interesting phrase, exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the day. My Bible has the word day capitalized, the day approaching.

What is that day? Well, almost all of us would say, well, that's got to be the second coming of Christ. And as I will explain, I think it probably is. But I was surprised in studying these probably eight or nine commentaries that I examined on this particular text how that almost all of them said to the Hebrews at the time this was written, that day that is approaching was the destruction of Jerusalem that happened in AD 70. They were much more aware of that than we are. That's kind of distant history to us.

We don't give that a whole lot of thought. But to those who understood the words of Christ, to those who understood that a great portion of the Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24 is talking about the destruction of Jerusalem, the destruction of the temple, the destruction of the Jewish religion, the dispersion of the Jews, and they believed that was coming, and they saw that it was coming closer and closer and closer than when the writer of Hebrews said, do this so much the more as you see that day approaching, probably the first thing they thought of was the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70. But there's no reason to think that that's the only thing that is intended. And the very fact that it's not spelled out so specifically that we can be sure, it just says the day and leaves it a bit undefined. It's ambiguous deliberately, I think. So that after AD 70 occurred and these words from the New Testament were now being read by millions of Christians for the last 1900 years, then what we would think of is the day of Christ's coming. And those things are very intertwined. I have spent countless hours in the past trying to go through Matthew 24 and to figure out what statements refer to 70 AD and what statements refer to the second coming of Christ. I don't think I've ever gotten it right yet.

I don't think I've ever been absolutely certain yet. They're so closely intertwined it's almost impossible to tell. What I'm sure of is both are referred to, both are spoken of there. You can't understand the Olivet Discourse if you think it all refers to the second coming of Christ because some of it clearly refers to the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70. But if you think it all refers to AD 70, I don't think you'll understand it either. Some of it can only refer to the second coming of Christ. It's all intertwined and so when this phrase, so much more as you see the day approaching, I think we have to conclude that the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70 was something of a foretaste of an even greater destruction that comes when Jesus comes again. That day is coming, isn't it? The second coming of Christ, the day of final judgment. The day of rewards for the children of God, but the day of final judgment.

Now keep that in mind and take these instructions seriously. This is an important exhortation that every child of God needs to keep in mind, not forsaking the assembling of yourselves together. And so much the more as you see the day approaching because that day is approaching and one of these days Christ will be here and you'll say, oh wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute, I wanted to do this and that and the other and I just didn't have time.

Get busy now. He may come today. He may not come for a thousand years. But we are to be expecting Him every day and working and living for Him as if He will or very well may come today or tomorrow.

That's the way we are to live. Now let me wind this up with some lessons, some applications. Mindful that I've already given you a bunch of applications as I've moved along.

But let's do some closing applications. Number one, let's say what this, let's consider what this tells us about Christian individuality. We Americans are very individualistic, very independent, very much wanting to have things to ourselves, kinds of people. That's part of our culture. It's different from some of the cultures of the world where there's a much stronger interconnection, much stronger communal sense. Christian individuality. We need to keep in mind two things. Salvation is personal and individual. Nobody gets saved until they recognize their need of Christ. They acknowledge what great sinners they are.