[0:00] Our Father, sometimes husbands can't hear their wives, wives can't hear their husbands, children can't hear their parents, parents can't hear their children.
[0:13] People who work together all the time can't hear one another. People who worship together can't hear one another so that. I pray for us by your grace this morning as we turn to your word.
[0:32] That all our deafness, hearts, and fear may be shaken with us. And that we may hear you. We need to hear others as we look at you as we look at you.
[0:45] In Jesus' name. Dr. Robin Taylor, who was here for a long time, has returned briefly.
[1:06] Our outreach committee sent some money for some work that he was associated with in Northern Ireland. And he beautifully has brought back for us a 12-minute slide and tape presentation, which will be given in the chapel following the service this morning.
[1:27] So hang around if you want to have a firsthand report on Northern Ireland right now. And Dr. Taylor has just come from there for a few days.
[1:40] Thank you. We're looking at Hebrews chapter 5 today. And it's in your new Bible on page 205.
[1:52] And I don't know if you ever read these over in preparation. It would be nice if you would. But when I first read this over this week in thinking about preaching, there was a couple of good texts to preach from.
[2:13] You'd like to look at them. These I have abandoned in favor of a third text that I want to preach from. But I can't resist having you speculate about it. The verse 11 is, you have become thou of hearing.
[2:33] That would be one you could work overnight, wouldn't it? And so I just thought I would pass it on to you. It's not my word, of course. It's what the writer of the epistle says to the people who heard it, who received it.
[2:51] There's another one which is particularly appropriate for the first week in December. And it's in that same text. It's verse 12 of chapter 5.
[3:04] By this time, you ought to be teachers. And with Sunday school opening next week, you can see how you could develop that sermon too, don't you?
[3:18] Just mentioning in passing that probably the best way for you to come to grips with the content of the Christian faith is to try and teach it to somebody else.
[3:31] So that it's not bad advice to consider that perhaps you ought to be a teacher. Now, this is what I'm going to look at this morning.
[3:42] And you'll find this by looking carefully at the chapter. And it's in verse 8. And those three words, he learned obedience.
[4:01] That is, he has learned obedience. He's referring to Jesus Christ. And then it says, He is the source of eternal salvation to all who obey.
[4:26] So the text that I want to preach on, which is a contraction of those two verses, is, He learned obedience.
[4:38] We are learning obedience. He learned obedience. We are learning obedience.
[4:50] He learned obedience. He learned obedience. Now, if you were to look at the end of chapter 4, you would see the picture in verse 14 of chapter 4.
[5:03] Let us, He says, Let us hold fast our confession. Let us hold fast our confession before we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God let us hold fast our confession for we have not a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness but one who is in every respect has been tempted as we are yet without sin let us with confidence draw near to the throne of grace as of it our high priest if you look carefully you will see chapter 5 again with the high priest a high priest chosen from among men appointed to act on behalf of men verse 2 he deals gently with the ignorant and wayward since he himself is beset with weakness he's bound to offer sacrifices for his own sin as well as for those of the people now I want to give you three fast pictures they're not going to be as fast as you might like them to be but I realize I've got to get through them quickly in order to get to finish some time the first picture is this high priest if you went to Jerusalem today you would find the old city surrounded by stone walls the highest corner of the old city is the temple is the dome the great dome and it's all now totally Islamic but it's where the temple stood and it was at the temple on the most sacred and holy day of the year for the Jewish people that the day of atonement came when the day of atonement came there was the great high place which was the holy of holies with the curtain across it and in behind it where the mercy seat with the cherry of him carved out and standing over the the ark of the covenant and that marked the place where God resided among his people in the holy of holies and then if you came outside that curtain in the temple courtyard there was a great altar and great chunks of wood on the altar and on this day of atonement the high priest would come out in a simple white garment having put aside all his high priestly garments and there would be brought to him a bullet and his throat would be cut it would be slashed up and put on the altar and then the blood from it would be taken into the holy of holies and sprinkled on the place where God
[8:21] God was that is at the ark of the covenant and that would be for the sins of the high priest and he would come out again and a goat would be slain and the blood would be taken in and put on the holy of holies by the high priest who alone would go in behind that curtain everybody else had to stay well back far off as they say and when he came out with the blood he would then sprinkle it on the people as an atonement that's that lovely English word which says an at one then between God and his people through the sprinkling of the blood of his goat then another goat would be taken and the prayers and the confession of the people would be made over the head of the goat and the goat would be driven out into the wilderness the original scape goat and then prayers would be said and the ritual of the day of atonement would be finished it was all done according to a prescribed pattern every rule was observed every ritual was followed through carefully the place was carefully cleaned and this ritual of the day of atonement was accomplished and that was the function of the high priest and he did it year after year after year to remind people that some kind of at one had to be created between God and his people that's picture number one then the high priest at the temple on the day of atonement now I want you to see a less highly prescribed ritual and in this ritual
[10:34] Jesus is presented as taking the part of the high priest and you will see that it says about him in chapter five very important for you to see this in the days of his flesh Jesus offered up prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears to him who was able to save him from death and he was not heard for his godly fear I just put in not there because there's some debate about how that should reach that's one possibility that he was not heard because he went to the cross subject maybe at a deeper level he was heard but it says then in verse eight although he was a son he learned obedience through what he suffered now the high priest's obedience was obedience to a ritual that was set down and the high priest year by year followed every job and tickle of the law concerning the ritual for the day of atonement jesus said with loud cries and tears comes to us as our high priest which in gethsemane that the loud cries and tears were heard and seen you and you remember the picture of the garden of gethsemane was the cup and the cup was his death jesus prayed let this cup pass from him that was his cry and that was his fear his will was that he should not have to drink the cup the father's will was that he should drink the cup and so he fully represented you and me who don't want to do what god wants us to do and we refuse the cup that he offers us and do our own thing but this high priest jesus took the cup and in the cup obedience to the father and he was made perfect having learned obedience through what he suffered i want to praise the events that followed that very briefly and show you how he learned obedience how the father taught him obedience he cried in the garden of josemite my soul is very sorrow yet i want to learn obedience let this cup pass from me yet i want to learn obedience obedience the disciples went to sleep but jesus wanted to learn obedience a great crowd came at him with swords and clubs in the garden jesus prayed father may i learn obedience obedience and judas came and kissed him and suffering that betrayal jesus prayed
[14:35] i want to learn obedience the disciples in panic fled jesus followed praying that he might learn obedience through suffering this desert the whole company gathered around the high priest and they sought false testimony against him and jesus suffered that wanting to learn obedience and they spat in his face and struck him he prayed that he might in fact suffering learn obedience and as they struck him they mocked him and said prophesy who struck you he prayed that in that too he might learn obedience he was delivered up to pilate and before pilate he gave no answer afraid that through the suffering and insignation and humiliation of this moment he might learn obedience and he who had taught and worked among the people and healed them listened as pilate offered him or barabbas for release and they all cried for repentance in this suffering i want to learn obedience to learn obedience pilate the only person who in his own estimation could have saved jesus washed his hands publicly in front of them and jesus suffered this in order to learn obedience when he was taken into the praetorium and he was stripped and then a purple robe was put on him a crown of thorns was pressed down upon his head a reed representing a scepter with wood in his hand jesus suffered this because he wanted to learn obedience and they spat on him and struck him in the face and then led him out to crucify him and jesus suffered this because he wanted to learn obedience when they offered him wine mingled with gall as a kind of anesthetic he refused him because he wanted to learn obedience when as he was nailed to the cross he prayed for them because he wanted to learn obedience obedience and lifted on the cross they came and said if you are the son of god come down from the cross he suffered that because he wanted to learn obedience for three hours on the cross he
[18:36] hung and by his suffering learn obedience this was jesus as the high priest not being obedient to a ritual which was laid down for the temple but being obedient to the father's will for the presentation to the father of the sacrifice we talk about in the service this morning as the one perfect and sufficient sacrifice for vision and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world and that's why the writer to the hebrew says although he was a son he learned obedience through what he suffered he has learned obedience because he has learned that obedience he becomes the totally consecrated high priest he offers the perfect offering for sin he people stood afar off and he said draw near when he made the offering of himself on the cross the curtain covered the holy of holies with rent and tooth and the presence of
[20:12] God became available to all the people and Jesus the high priest said to the people draw near he nothing to be afraid of then the third day when he rose again from the dead that was a sign if only the people knew that this sacrifice unlike all the sacrifices that have been made on all the days of atonement through all the years the the sacrifice was accepted by God and the evidence of that acceptance was that he raised Jesus from the dead so Jesus instead of following in the train of those high priests that had come and gone and each sought to serve God in his generation this high priest became the eternal high priest that's why it says about him chapter 5 he learned obedience through what he suffered and being made perfect which means fully consecrated being made perfect he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obeyed him so he learned obedience in order that as our perfect high priest ever living to pray for us we might learn obedience to him that is the obedience of faith by which we are called to live so your life might be suffering is such a wonderful commodity and there's so much of it that there's enough for everybody and more if you haven't got enough of your own you don't have to look very far to find it and this commodity of suffering you can share and in sharing in it you can learn obedience from him who has learned obedience and become for us the source of eternal salvation and I just tell you that we do have a lot of temporary sources of salvation if you have an acute appendix a doctor becomes your savior if your business is on the skids the bank manager becomes your savior if you have lost your job an employer becomes your savior if you are caught in the grip of alcoholism
[23:30] AA might well prove to be your savior if you have broken down on the highway British Columbia Automobile Association might be your savior to come and rescue you but that's all entirely different from what Hebrew says about Jesus Christ is that he becomes the source of eternal salvation verse 9 to all who obey so that in every situation in which we find ourselves we are to pray as Jesus prayed Lord in this suffering teach me to obey him in the raising of my children teach me to obey in the choosing of a life partner teach me obedience in the way I conduct my business teach me obedience the way
[24:42] I handle myself on the job teach me obedience in the debilities of old age teach me obedience in the catastrophe of failure teach me obedience in the acquisition of friends teach me Lord Jesus to obey him in the management of my moods and tempers of anger and frustration and depression and discouragement and joy and ecstasy Lord Jesus teach me to obey him so you have in this wonderful picture of Jesus as our high priest the source of eternal salvation to those who obey him you have the very source from which we are to live our lives in obedience to heaven and the own grace
[26:25] We have grace to pray that we might learn to obey you. In places of a truth, help us to cry out to you that your will be done, that we may be given the grace to obey you.
[26:44] In the broken and hurtful places of our lives, help us to embrace you.
[26:57] We pray that you will teach us within them. We will pray. We have him who learned obedience through the things that he suffered.
[27:18] He has become for us the source of eternal salvation. We draw on that salvation and we, in faith, seek to live our lives in obedience.
[27:36] We are God's commandments and we are seated. In the present service, we give our own love. We may praise you.
[27:50] Whatever situation that you bring in, may buy out. My Path. Then, faith...
[28:05] In honor. In honor. In greed. the time of intercession let us continue by praying let us continue by saying together in the prayer at the top of the page for all missionary workers spreading the gospel to the other world particularly we think of lionel gurney and built in park who uh presently arrived this morning traveling for the red sea oh god we will that all may be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth prosper we pray thee all those who labor in the gospel at home and in distant lands protect them in all peril and support them in loneliness and in the hour of trial give them thy grace and bear faithful witness unto thee and do them with burden and zeal and love that they may turn again to righteousness through jesus stripes our lord amen this area as mentioned this is a time of the year when the year we could turn over the page page 45 let's pray for the university colleges and schools let us remember this morning charlotte data and all the workers of campus crusade for christ and charlotte has and charlotte has moved this summer back to edmonton and is acting as a missionary among the students at the university in heaven almighty god of whose only gift comes wisdom and understanding we beseech thee with thy gracious favor to behold our universities colleges and schools that knowledge may be increased among us and all good learn and all good learn and learn and learn and learn bless all who teach and all who learn and grant that in humility of heart they may ever look unto thee who art the foundation of all through jesus christ our lord amen and we turn to page 54 we should pray especially for the teachers
[32:12] in all schools perhaps we can remember joanne curry as she continues teaching at the brief swissing and sue and brian salter they're teaching in did wadway and matt and beth allen they begin another year at st john's school in stony place so together grant we beseech thee oh heavenly father to all who teach in our schools the spirit of wisdom and grace that they may lead their pupils reverence through desire goodness and rejoice in you so that all may come to know and worship thee the giver of all that is good through jesus christ our lord amen we could turn to the middle of page 600 and lead to there's a lovely prayer here beginning oh lord it reminds us that this time of year is also time of harvesting after the glorious sunshine of the summer oh lord we pray thee sow the seed of thy word in our hearts and send down upon us the showers of thy grace that we may bring forth the fruit of thy spirit and that the great day of harvest may be gathered by the holy angels into the heavenly garden to jesus christ our lord