Hebrews 4:12-5:10

23 Jun 2024

Hebrews 4:12-5:10

Passage Hebrews 4:12-5:10

Speaker Ben Tanner

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Passage: Hebrews 4:12-5:10

12 For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. 13 Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

14 Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin. 16 Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

Every high priest is selected from among the people and is appointed to represent the people in matters related to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins. He is able to deal gently with those who are ignorant and are going astray, since he himself is subject to weakness. This is why he has to offer sacrifices for his own sins, as well as for the sins of the people. And no one takes this honor on himself, but he receives it when called by God, just as Aaron was.

In the same way, Christ did not take on himself the glory of becoming a high priest. But God said to him,

“You are my Son;
    today I have become your Father.”

And he says in another place,

“You are a priest forever,
    in the order of Melchizedek.”

During the days of Jesus’ life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with fervent cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission. Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered and, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him 10 and was designated by God to be high priest in the order of Melchizedek.

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And active, sharper than any double edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account. Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess.

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to feel sympathy for our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are. Yet he did not sin. Let us then approach God's throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. Every high priest is selected from among the people and is appointed to represent the people in matters related to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins. He is able to deal gently with those who are ignorant and are going astray, since he himself is subject to weakness.

This is why he has to offer sacrifices for his own sins as well as for the sins of the people. And no one takes this honour on himself, but he receives it when called by God, just as Aaron was. In the same way Christ did not take on himself the glory of becoming a high priest. But God said to him, you are my son. Today I have become your father.

And he says, in another place, you are a priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek. During the days of Jesus life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with fervent cries and tears to the one who could save him from death. And he was heard because of his reverent submission. Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered, and once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him, and was designated by God to be high priest in the order of Melchizedek.

Thank you so much, Geoffrey. And may God add his blessing to the reading of his word. Please do keep your bibles open. Page one, two, three, and that will put you in the right book. We're in Hebrews and in chapter end of chapter four.

And let me lead us in a prayer as we come to look at that heavenly father, we've just read it. Your word is living and active, and so I pray that by your spirit you would wield the sword of your spirit now and show us Jesus Christ. Show us the joy of having a high priest who knows what we're like and was appointed by you. And so therefore I pray that these next few minutes would be ones in which we draw near to you, for I ask it in his name. Amen.

Hands up. Who would love a living relationship with God himself? Or who enjoys a living relationship with God himself? This isn't a rhetorical question. Hands up.

Good. I'm glad that most of us would like that or enjoy that. That is a brilliant thing, and it's a brilliant thing as we come to this book of Hebrews, because Hebrews was written to Christians, Christians a bit like us, except for they were from a jewish background. And if you were here about a year ago, when we were looking at this, we saw that the big push of the book of Hebrews is, Jesus is better. Don't go back to what you were used to, don't go back to what your friends were doing, don't go back to the old ways of doing things, because Jesus is better.

And we see here, part of the reason that he is better is because he gives them a living relationship. And part of that is through this word that's in front of us. Why is it that we come to study the scriptures week by week? Well, it's because at verse twelve, the word of God is alive and active, sharper than any two edged sword. It penetrates even dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow.

In any relationship that you are, in any real relationship, that's going to change you, isn't it? Friends will be alongside you and they will show you things about yourself and about them that changes you. Sometimes it's just a word, a word that comes and it kind of cuts under our little sort of defence systems and all of a sudden we go, oh, wow, I never realised that's really important to you, isn't it? Or perhaps they say a sentence and it kind of cuts through our kind of thick skulls and we go, oh, you really do love me, don't you? Perhaps sometimes it's that actually by being in a relationship with others, it actually just draws out stuff in us and we go, I didn't realise that I was quite like that.

There are parts of my life that actually just being with you has exposed. And maybe I love it, or maybe actually they're ugly things that are challenging me. The Bible says that the words that are in front of you, the words that we look at each week, are not just words on a page, they're not just any other book that was written once, but they are living and active. Those books that you hold in your hands or look at in front of you, are books that, as we read them, the spirit of God reads us. It is not a neutral thing to come to the scriptures.

They will always change us. They will always change us. They will either push us more towards him or push us away.

In fact, we see that, don't we, that the word by the spirit pierces between soul and spirit, joint and marrow. And it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. That means that there are times when coming to this scripture is wonderful. Because the Lord by his spirit, pierces right into us and drives right into us. Wow, I really am adopted.

I really am his child. I really am loved by the eternal God. But there are also times when that drives into us and we go, ouch. That feels a little close to the bone, quite literally, because it feels like God has put his finger on a little area of my life and all of a sudden it feels very exposed.

And I know that that's ugly and I know that it doesn't please him. And it's a little uncomfortable. In fact, I venture to say that if you've never read this book and it's made you feel uncomfortable, maybe we need to open this book and read it again, because it will at times make us uncomfortable. In fact, it says, nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight. We've been thinking about that over the past few weeks.

Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him, to whom we must give account. I don't know if you've ever had that dream and please, I hope somebody in here has, but it's that dream where you're walking through town and all of a sudden you look down and realise that you're naked. And it's really awkward. If you haven't had that dream. You can imagine how awkward that would be, wouldn't it?

Shockingly awkward. What would you do? You'd cover up and you'd flee, wouldn't you? That's what you would do if you realised that somehow, and don't ask me how somehow you got into that situation. Let me ask you, though.

What if it wasn't that you were physically naked, but that your thoughts and intentions were naked? What if you were in town and all of a sudden it was as if somebody was saying, the reason that she said that was really this. What he was trying to do in that situation was actually this. This is what he really wants. This is what she is really like.

I don't know about you, but I find that almost more awkward and difficult. I'd want to cover up and I'd want to run.

Here's the how is it then that if God's word sometimes does that, that only a couple of verses later, verse 16. Look at it with me. It says, let us then approach God's throne of grace with confidence. That feels like a strange juxtaposition. He's saying everything's laid bare before God and then let's approach him with confidence.

How does that work? And the answer is that Jesus is a better priest. The answer is a priest. And if, please, if you're sitting here and the image that comes to mind when somebody says priest is somebody. One of these silly little collars around the neck, please.

That's not what a biblical priest is. In fact, the best thing that you can do when somebody with a collar around their neck says, hi, I'm a priest, in your mind, immediately add, not in the biblical sense of the word. Now, a real priest is somebody who brings God to people and brings people to God through sacrifice. A real priest is the person that we hear here. And actually we see that there are a couple of things that that person needs to have me at.

Chapter five, verse one. Every high priest is selected from among the people. The high priest is to be from among the people of God. That's the first thing. And the second thing, verse four.

No one takes this honour on himself, but he receives it when called by God, just as Aaron was. So the priest needs to be a person from among the people and needs to be called by God. Two big things. And actually being called by God is fairly obvious, isn't it? You want somebody who is called by God to represent him.

I found out this week that if you want to, you can nominate yourself to be in the House of Lords. If you want to do that, some light summer fun for anybody. There's an online form, you just fill it in. But even when you filled it in and you've nominated yourself, what's going to then happen is there's a little committee that looks at you and then eventually the king will appoint you as a lord or a lady in the House of Lords. And that makes sense, doesn't it?

If we're acting on behalf of the king's house of lords, it makes sense that the king puts us in that position. Here we've got a God who puts priests in that position as somebody who is going to act for him. Now, why should this give us great confidence? Well, it should give us confidence because sometimes we think in our sin and in those areas that are laid bare before him, that God the Father, he kind of resents us a little bit. Or that God the father looks at you and says, I'm accepting you, but you're kind of a little bit like that annoying plus one at a wedding we really wanted.

I really want Jesus, so I'll have you.

But God kind of looks at you in your sin and goes, oh, really? Again, I'm stuck with them. And if you think God the Father looks at you like that today, look at what God the Father has done. In this passage we saw verse four. No one takes this honour on themselves.

He receives it when called by God or later in verse five. But God said to him eventually in verse six, you are a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek. Or in verse ten it was designated by God to be a high priest in the order of Melchizedek. You see what's God done? Throughout the Old Testament, he's put in person after person after person, priest after priest after priest.

Why? So that he could come and relate to you. It's not that God the father is sitting back going, oh, I'm kind of stuck with them. No, God the father again and again and again has pursued relationship with his people through putting priests in place. And in fact, it gets way better than this.

And it's with that kind of confusing bit about Jesus that we see there in verse five and six. In verse five and six we see two quotes from the Old Testament, one from psalm two, the other from psalm 110. You are my son today. I've become your father. And then he says, in another place, you are a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek.

Now that's awesome. And let me explain why, because it may well be that for some of us, we're fairly new to church, fairly new to this. And you're like Melchized who now Melch is a what? Basically, we're going to come back to him in chapter seven. But he's pretty important because, well, for two reasons.

Firstly, he is both a king and a priest, and we're going to see that Jesus is both a king and a priest. In fact, psalm two talks about Jesus being a king. That's partly why it's there. But more than that, Melchizedek is part of a priesthood that is seen as an eternal priesthood, one that doesn't have start or end.

And that, I think, is one of the big reasons why the verse from psalm two is there. Bear with me whilst I get highfaluting and theology for a moment here, because it's going to come down to land. Verse two contains this phrase, you are my son. Today I've become your father. Now, some of you guys who remember back to the eternal sermon that we did, you're thinking, wait a sec, Jesus didn't become God's son.

It didn't quite work that way. Theologians often talk about this as the words of eternal generation. In other words, that all the time that God has been in existence, he has been saying of his son, you are my son. That all the time the father has been saying of Jesus, this is my son. I'm speaking out his sonship.

He's always been there. Now, why is that important in this context? It's important in this context because that means that from before eternity began, God has been putting in place a priest. God has been moving towards you and me. He's been putting in place somebody who will represent God to us and us to God.

That means before you were even a twinkle in your great great grandmother's eye, before you were born, before you spoke a word, God had already put in place his son as high priest for you and for me.

He wants relationship with you. It's not that he sits back and is stuck with you. He has moved towards you. Just think about it. If the UK has an embassy and an ambassador in a different country, what does it say?

It says, on some level, I want a relationship with you. That's why kicking ambassadors out of countries is so important. It's a rejection of that whole country.

God, since before the start of time, has put a priest in place for us. And yet some of us are sitting here and thinking, okay, that's great that God's moving towards us. I love that. But I know the kind of God that we've been talking about over the last few weeks. We've been thinking about how God's different to us and why that's a good thing.

We've seen how he's eternal and omnipresent and how he's all powerful and sovereign over everything. And it's possible, although I absolutely love that series, it's possible that we therefore think that he's somehow aloof or at a distance that we go, okay, it's great that God's moving towards me, but what on earth can that God know of me, of my life?

And yet, what's the other thing that a priest needs to be chosen by God and from among the people? Verse 15. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathise with us in our weakness. We have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are yet he did not sin. This is incredible.

It's saying that that high priest who moves towards you knows what it's like to be you. And again, we might sit here and think, wait a second. But whenever I think of Jesus and him being fully human, he's always got that kind of get out of jail free card, you know, the whole kind of. He's also God, you know, he's not going to sin. What can he possibly know about what it's like to be somebody who struggles with sin?

What can he know about what it's like to wake up in the morning with deep seated regrets about what happened yesterday? What can he possibly know about looking back with pain on the hurt from sin? What can he possibly know on the other side about temptation? What does he know about temptation that gets so hard that at some point we say, well, I'm going to give in to this. If he never truly fell into sin, what can he really know about temptation?

Cs Lewis, the guy who wrote Narnia, wrote on this, and he wrote something that I think is really helpful. He says this, no one knows how bad they are until they have tried very hard to be good. A silly idea is current that good people don't know what temptation means. It's an obvious lie. Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is.

After all, you find out the strength of the german army by fighting against it, not by giving in. You find out the strength of the wind by trying to walk against it, not by lying down. A man who gives in to temptation after five minutes simply doesn't know what it would have been like an hour later. That's why bad people, in one sense, know very little about badness. They've lived in a sheltered life by always giving in.

We never find out the strength of the evil impulse inside us until we try to fight it. And Christ, because he was the only man who never yielded to temptation, is the only man who knows to the full what temptation means. The only complete realist, he says, because Jesus is the only one who never gave in. He's the only one who knows what it's like on that 10th, 11th, 13th hour of battling with sin.

Or to put it a different way, Jesus knows temptation.

He says that I understand temptation. Come with me as I kneel on the mountain and I look at the hell on earth that is approaching me at the cross, and I say to my father, take this cup from me. I don't want to go through with this, a very real temptation, just to step away from it. All. And yet, he continues, yet not my will, but yours be done.

He says, I have resisted temptation to the point of sweating drops of blood. I know what it's like. I know what it's like when temptation seems so easy, as if it will all just go away. I've been there. Jesus says, I get you.

And what's more, because we know that Jesus was made sin took my guilt and yours before the father. We know, too, that he knows the feeling of guilt from sin, that heart wrenching, heart sinking moment of just feeling convicted of our sin. He says, I get it. I understand it. In fact, the only part of sinning that Jesus doesn't get is those few moments of pleasure when we say those unkind words or when we indulge in a little bit of pride.

He gets the temptation, he gets the regret. We've got a high priest who gets you. You know, when we are, our hearts and intentions are naked before God. We have a God who doesn't resent. But in Jesus reaches out to us and jesus says, I know.

I know how hard. I know how hard it is and I have given myself for you.

So what? Well, the writer to the Hebrews tells us the difference. It says, therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus, the son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. Says, look, where else could you go? A Christian who's wondering about slipping back into Old Testament practises and religions, where else can you go?

Jesus is the best high priest. He truly gets how hard it is, and he truly has died in your place, providing a sinless sacrifice. And we'll think more about that in a few weeks, too.

Where else can you go than a father who has relentlessly pursued you since before the dawn of time, putting your heavenly priest in place? Let's hold fast to the faith that we profess. But he says more than that. He says, verse 16. Let us then approach God's throne of grace with confidence that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

How do we do that? Well, one great place to do that is to be opening up God's word, we say, when it exposes us. What do I want to do? I want to hide. I want to shut this.

I want to put it away.

Don't make next Sunday the day that you next open your Bible. Open up the living and active word day by day by day. Approach that throne of grace. When you're tempted and you feel tempted, run to the one who knows what it's like. Run to him in prayer.

Say, Jesus, you know how hard this is for me right at the moment? Please help me open up your scriptures. Let the living and active word of God once more show you your high priest put in place by your father.

Where could we go where we would find a better high priest? We can run and we can hide from our sin, but it will always find us out.

We can go to empty religion and try and work a bit harder. But empty religion, working harder just says to us, you're not good enough.

Or we can run to Jesus, the one eternally put in place as our priest by our heavenly Father. He says, I get you and I can help you. Let us approach his grace, his throne of grace, with confidence. Let me lead us in a prayer. Oh, heavenly Father, thank you so, so very much for Jesus, our high priest.

Thank you for that image that we see again and again in your scriptures. That he takes us though naked, and he clothes us not just in royal robes, but in his perfection, in his righteousness. Thank you. That he gets how hard it is to fight against temptation.

Thank you that as we call to you, as we look at your word, you can and will help us. So help us to draw near to you. I pray for. I ask it in Jesus name, amen.