The Story of Faith

God wants to change our character, not just our circumstances.

Dr. Tony Evans says that's why you won't find a shortcut through difficult times. God will not skip your development to give you destiny or to let you experience His promise. This is the alternative broadcast featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr. Tony Evans. A steadfast faith, a promise you can count on, and encouragement to persevere. These are the life-changing principles Dr. Evans talks about today as he takes us further in our study of the book of Hebrews.

Let's join him now in chapter 10 in a message he calls, The Story of Faith. These Jewish Christians were considering returning to their old Jewish background worship because they were now running into difficulties being a Christian. They were being abused, ridiculed, rejected, and they raised the question that many have raised, many here tonight have raised, is it worth it? Is it worth the cost I'm paying?

Is it worth the price I'm paying, the inconvenience I'm paying, the rejection I'm paying? It would be a lot easier to go back. And so God authorized the writing of the book of Hebrews to tell those Jewish Christians and to tell us today to keep going, don't go back. As difficult as it may be, as challenging as it may be, if you go back, you're reneging on something that you're going back to the lesser.

You're not moving forward to the greater, even though it may not appear that way right now. Then I said, Behold, I have come, verse 7, in the scroll of the book it is written of me, to do thy will, O God. So now he speaks of Jesus Christ's coming in order to do what the Old Testament covenant could not do, and what no priest could do, which was to fully satisfy the demands of a holy God.

So sacrifices and offerings and whole burnt offerings and sacrifices, verse 8, you have not desired, nor have you taken pleasure in them, which are offered according to the law. Then he said, Behold, I have come to do your will. He takes away the first in order to establish the second.

So the reason God came with the New Testament is to really establish the second, which is why the Bible says Jesus Christ fulfilled the law. That's a whole other sermon that we don't have full time to get into, but here's the beauty of our Savior. Everything you have broken, he has kept.

Okay? Everything you have broken, every mistake you've made, bad thought you've thought, bad action you've done, he has successfully been victorious over. And that is what makes him special, because remember, every other priest, it says, had to offer sins for himself first, and then for the people. But Jesus, not having to offer anything for himself, he can offer himself for the people, and he has fulfilled or fully satisfied all the demands of God. Now, why is that important to you and me? It's important to you and me because when you have Christ in you, you already have the fulfillment of the standard of God operating inside of you. Now, that brings in the question of the flesh. We'll talk about that. But as far as God's justice is concerned, because he's satisfied with Jesus, and you're in Jesus, he's satisfied with you.

Okay? Or like they did on the Passover, when I see the blood, I'll pass over you. When I see the sacrifice, it covers you.

So guess what? We're going to heaven because we're covered. Not perfect, but we are covered if we trusted Christ. So every priest, verse 11, would daily minister, offering time after time the sacrifices that could never take away sin. But having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, sat down at the right hand of God. The right hand is God's place of authority, waiting for that time onward until his enemies be made a footstool for his feet. So Jesus Christ right now is awaiting a time—this is the same time we are awaiting— we are awaiting his return when all systems will be placed under his authority and he will rule in his millennial kingdom.

So we are awaiting that time when all enemies, all rejection of God, all rejection of Christ will be placed under his authority and he will rule. For, verse 14, by one offering he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified. By his sacrifice, you have been permanently redeemed, which is why you can't lose your salvation.

You can't lose your salvation because when he took care of it, he took care of it. Okay? You can't even sin your way out of salvation.

Okay? Now, Paul knew people could abuse that, and that's why he said, Shall we sin that grace may abound? Shall we sin? No. The glory of his sacrifice should make you want to please him, not want to take advantage of his grace. Okay? And you'll see why in just a second.

And it's a whopper. The Holy Spirit also, verse 15, justifies us for after saying, This is the covenant I will make with him. After those days, said the Lord, I will put my law upon their heart and on their mind and I will write them. And he says, And their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more. For where there is forgiveness of these things, there is no longer any offering for sin.

Now watch this. God says, I'm writing my law on your heart. On your heart. So in your—inside your soul, in the centerpiece of your soul, like your heart is the center of your body, the spiritual heart is the center of the soul, is written God's law. God's standard is inside of you. Because God's standard is inside of you, that's why there's conviction of sin when you break it. There's conviction because the standard has been placed inside of you, has been deposited. That's why the Bible says, Receive the implanted word.

It has been planted. So God's standard is situated there. The Holy Spirit is there, and his job is to enable you and me to fulfill that standard, because Christ has already fulfilled that standard.

So as you grow in your Christian faith, you become more aware, sensitive, to the fact you don't meet the standard, but yet you increase in your desire to want to meet it. Okay? So as you grow, there's an increase in desire, an increase in sensitivity, which is why you have to force the word out in order to free yourself up to disobey. Okay? You gotta not think about it, avoid it. That's why people avoid church, Christians avoid church, or avoid listening to the word when they're living disobediently, because they don't want their heart to be stirred.

Okay? Because then they gotta deal with not only what they're doing, but the stirring inside. So they got this dual problem, because it's been written on your heart. It's been deposited within you as a believer in Jesus Christ, because that's what the New Covenant says. But at the heart of the New Covenant is forgiveness. It is released from a debt. We are eternally released, and as we walk with the Lord, we are temporal released.

Now that becomes very important. So, his whole point is, don't go back. This leads to this well-known section, verses 19 to 25. Therefore, brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, because in the Old Testament, they had to come because the blood was put on the mercy seat, well, we have Jesus Christ. He is our mercy seat. By a new and living way, which He inaugurated for us through the veil, that is, His flesh, His death on the cross, and since we have a great high priest over the house of God, Jesus Christ, let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water, let us hold fast the confession of our hope. There we go. Keep going.

Don't quit. Without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day drawing near. He says, first of all, I want you to come to God with confidence. Now, you have to appreciate the Old Testament background. In the Old Testament, as we said earlier, you couldn't walk into the holiest of all. There was the outer court, the veil, with the incense, then the inner court.

You weren't going into the inner court. High priest once a year, and even he had to be careful, because that was the Shekinah glory, the visible, concentrated presence of God in the holiest of all. And you could not walk in there. But he says, this veil was removed in Jesus Christ, in His flesh on the cross, so you can shimmy on up to the holy place, 24-7.

And watch this. And when you go, you can go boldly. You don't have to tiptoe, and is it okay, and what gonna happen, and all that. He says, when you come into God's presence now, because of what Jesus Christ did, you are to come with full confidence. You are to hold your head up high and strut into God's presence.

Unfortunately, many Christians don't come to God boldly. Dr. Evans will have more on the simple reason we don't need to tiptoe to the cross when he returns in just a moment. First, though, I want to let you know that today's lesson is the final installment we'll be presenting on the air from Tony's 13-message sermon series called, Don't Ever Give Up. This series is a deep dive into the theologically rich New Testament book of Hebrews that clarifies so much about the central teachings of Jesus Christ, the foundations of our faith, and the victorious Christian life. These lessons encourage us to remain steadfast in our faith as we trust more deeply in Christ's perfect sacrifice for each of us.

Now, even though today's message is the last one we're presenting on the broadcast, you can still get the complete series for yourself on CD or digital download. In fact, it's our gift to you when you make a donation to the Ministry of the Alternative. And as a special bonus, we'll also include a copy of Tony's helpful paperback, Can God Be Trusted in Our Trials? It'll give you the courage you need to press on in the face of hard times.

But more importantly, you'll get a glimpse behind the scenes of what God is up to in your life and discover how today's trials prepare you for tomorrow's victories. Just visit TonyEvans.org or call us at 1-800-800-3222. Make your contribution and let us send you, as a thank you gift, the complete Hebrews audio series, Don't Ever Give Up, and Tony's book, Can God Be Trusted in Our Trials? I'll have our contact information for you again after part two of today's lesson.

Here's Dr. Evans. Have you ever talked to somebody and they're talking all around the Marbury bush and you have to say, what's your point? But these folk in the book of Hebrews are struggling.

They're trying to survive. And he says, you ought to come in my presence boldly with confidence. You don't have to come apologetically. You don't have to tiptoe into my presence. I want you to come strong. And see, this is when prayer becomes vibrant. Prayer becomes vibrant when we become real.

Guess why? Because the things we don't want to talk about, Jesus has already dealt with. When the high priest went to the holiest of all, he offered and sprinkled blood for his own sins.

In other words, he had to come clean first before he could help anybody else. So that's why you can go through the veil, Jesus Christ, and you can lay it all out. You can unveil it. You can say, this is where I am. This is how I feel. This is how deep it goes.

This is where I'm wrong. This is what I don't understand. And God says, okay, we good. And you know, in a lot of our lives, God is waiting for that conversation. He says, draw near with boldness and confidence behind the veil, and he's doing it in a context of sin. He's talking about what the priest has to do in the house of God. So you hold fast your confession without wavering, and then he says, and you be in an environment where other people can encourage you.

You notice that. Stimulate one another to love and good deeds. Verse 25, encourage one another.

Keep each other going. And that's what the body of Christ is supposed to be. It's not just supposed to be a preaching station and a singing station.

It's supposed to be a place where people are helping each other to keep going. Because the reality is, it many times is hard to be a Christian. It's hard to be a Christian sometimes. These believers were dealing with it. Now, why does he tell you to draw near to him and to hang out with some folk who can keep you going?

This section is one of the warning sections of the book of Hebrews, gives this stern warning. For if we go on sinning willfully, in other words, you won't draw near so I can help you. You won't let other folk help you because you forsake the assembling of yourselves together. So you keep going down this road of disobedience, rebellion, and sin. And you're doing it willfully. In other words, you are choosing this route. You're choosing to ignore me. You're choosing to not get the help you need from the family of God.

After receiving the knowledge of the truth, so you've heard the Word of God, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins. Now, this is taken from the Old Testament concept of willful sin or raising a high hand against God. This has to do with a believer who develops a defiant spirit. Think of a child, your teenager, who develops a defiant spirit.

I don't care what you say, okay? So Houston, we now have a problem. We have a problem when they disobey. But now we have a bigger problem when they disobey defiantly.

Now the problem of sin has grown into something bigger. The Bible makes it clear that God will keep His promises, even when it looks like He is not keeping His promises, even when it looks like He is contradicting the keeping of His promises. It should have taken Israel less than a month and a half to get from Egypt to the Promised Land. It took them 40 years, but not because there was a change in the promise. They refused to do the will of God. They refused to do the will of God because they kept looking back. Boy, back there in Egypt, we had the leeks and the onions, and we had the meat and the beef and the, you know, we had, oh, it was so good back there.

Of course, when they were back there, they were fussing and cussing. But now we are here in this hot wilderness, it's hot out here, you know, we got all this inconvenience, and why you bring us out here to die, Moses? And so they wondered, and never, that generation, never saw the promise. It took a whole nother generation to see the promise. Remember the threefold process. Deliverance, development, destiny.

Okay? Deliverance from Egypt, salvation. Development, spiritual growth through trial. Destiny, experiencing the promise. And you can never, ever, never, never, never, ever go from deliverance direct to destiny.

That will never happen. God will not skip your development to give you destiny or to let you experience His promise. And in fact, I'll make another statement here, and in fact, the more contradictory the situation you're in, the closer you are to promise. The more it seems like He's doing absolutely nothing.

You have just moved closer to promise. Because God wants to change our character, not just our circumstances. He's trying to make us more like Jesus, that's His goal.

And He knows wrestling through this process is what He uses to do that. The just shall live by faith. There's only one way you're going to keep going, and that's you've got to go by faith. You persevere to the saving of the soul. When He says the preserving of the soul, He's not talking about salvation because He's talking to Christians. He's talking about your soul experience of God. Salvation here in the book of Hebrews has to do with two things. It has to do with God's power to deliver, because that's what salvation means, to be rescued.

And then it has to do with being part of the metachoi, the Greek word for the companion, being a participant in the special benefits that will accrue in Jesus' millennial reign. So He says, keep going. Keep going. Don't go back. And if you've gone back, come home.

Come home. Dr. Tony Evans, sharing important inspiration from his 13-part series on the book of Hebrews. Now, if you've been encouraged today to move forward with God, but are questioning how to do that, Tony's back with this encouragement. Some may be thinking or feeling that you've gone too far, you've sinned too greatly, you've been gone too long for God to ever save you. Do you know you are the perfect candidate for salvation?

Because He died for sinners. And He is so great in His perfection, He can go beneath your deepest sin. He can lift you out of your greatest regret. It's called being born again.

You get to start life all over again spiritually. So no matter how badly you've sinned, how long you've sinned, how deeply you've sinned, how many people you've sinned against, God offers you forgiveness, and He offers it to you for free. So right now, why don't you pray after me? If you're on the road, you can pray as you drive. If you're sitting at home, you can pray as you sit.

Whatever you're doing, you can pray this prayer as long as you attach faith to it. Lord Jesus, I know I'm a sinner. Lord Jesus, I know I need a Savior.

I recognize I've sinned too greatly, and I can't save myself. But I receive the offer you make to me to become my Savior. I place my eternal trust in Jesus Christ, in you alone, for you to forgive me and for you to grant me a brand new eternal life. I embrace it and receive it now. I place my faith in Jesus Christ alone for my personal salvation.

Thank you for saving me. If you prayed that prayer with Dr. Evans today, we invite you to visit his website, tonyevans.org, and follow the link at the very top of the page that says Jesus. You'll find plenty of information and resources there to help get your life and Christ headed in the right direction.

And while you're there, don't miss out on your final opportunity to take advantage of that resource package I mentioned earlier. All 13 messages from both volumes of Tony's current audio series, Hebrews Don't Ever Give Up. Along with the insightful paperback, Can God Be Trusted in Our Trials, they're yours with our thanks when you make a donation to help keep this listener-supported program coming your way. Just visit tonyevans.org to make the arrangements or call our resource center at 1-800-800-3222, where team members are standing by to assist with your request.

That's 1-800-800-3222 or online at tonyevans.org. Well, with Thanksgiving just a week away and the Christmas season right around the corner, holiday TV specials have already hit the streaming services. This year, don't let your family miss the Christ-centered Stories from the Storyteller animated Christmas episode called The Incredible Christmas Dream. Kids will enjoy watching as Cam unexpectedly recaptures the true meaning of Christmas with a little help from his parents and the friendly caretakers at the local Christmas tree lot. Check out The Incredible Christmas Dream and other stories from the Storyteller at tonyevanstv.com.

That's tonyevanstv.com. It's been said that a smart person learns from their own mistakes, but a wise person learns from the mistakes of others. Tomorrow we kick off a captivating study of the book of Revelation as Dr. Evans looks at the seven letters written to first-century congregations and the important reminders they hold for us today. Be sure to join us for that.