chapter 4 I'm reading it the last verse verse 16
let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace
that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need
now we know that some of the greatest new testament writings came from defending the faith
against those who were wanting to attack the christian faith and while that was true
certainly of in the new testament it's also true throughout the history of the church that some of
the best writings that we will find have come about from those who are trying to defend or who
are defending the faith against attack from without and within you think of people like augustine and
luther and calvin and right down to the likes of dr martin lloyd jones and to tim killer and there's a
huge list of people who have written great things but some of the best writings have come about
as they are seeking to defend the faith from attack and that's what we have very much in this chapter
because the writer here is writing to christian jews and they are under attack from non-christian jews
who are telling them that they're lacking that the faith they have the beliefs they have that they're
not the real thing because they're missing out on so much these non-believing jews or jews who haven't
embraced the christian faith they're saying listen you don't have sacrifices you don't have altars you
don't have a priesthood and above all you don't have a high priest so they're saying you're you're you're
really missing out so the the apostle here is writing in a way in which he's saying that isn't true
that that we have that's what it says in verse 14 since then we have a great high priest who has
passed through the heavens jesus the son of god let us hold fast our confession and when he writes that
since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens you can almost picture as you
remember back in the in the in the old testament times there was only one day in the year when the
high priest was allowed into the most holy place or the holy of holies that was in the great day of
atonement and just this one time in the year he passed through the curtain in there
now jesus of course is the great high priest and he has passed through and he has passed through
everything and he has arisen from death and he has passed into the heavens and you remember when
jesus cried on the cross it is finished and when he gave up his spirit that there were various
phenomena that occurred and one of the things that happened was at the veil in the temple that veil which
separated to the most holy place where the presence of god was most most found that that veil was torn from top to bottom
and god was showing at that moment that the old was gone and that there was an immediate access through christ
into his presence and that there was now no need for the altar and the sacrifices and the priesthood and the high
priesthood that these were types these were ceremonies these were rituals that were all pointing to jesus christ
and had been fulfilled in jesus christ and just as the high priest passed through the curtain
into the most holy place so jesus passed through into the presence of the father and he had achieved and he had
he had made this this way possible so that's what the the the writer is he here saying not only do we not have we have the greatest of all
and then in verse 15 he tells us that our high priest although he is the god man although he is all majestic and powerful and mighty and wonderful
he is also one with us he knows every single thing about us not only as god but he understands us
because he has actually gone through everything with us as well because our god is not a god who is distant
and remote and far removed he is a god who is with us a god who is in us he is emmanuel god with us
and so this is a wonderful thing that we have that our high priest our lord he knows he knows everything
about us not just as god but also by way of experience because he understands what this world is like
that is a cruel that is a a painful place it's a place of hurt a place of betrayal a place of disappointment
jesus christ was touched that's what we're told in he's with all our our weaknesses and he was he was
touched in every area apart of course from from from in temptation apart from sin and you and i know the one of
the the great things of supposing you go through some very difficult trying experience something that's
heartbreaking and heart-rending and people will come to see you and people will sympathize with you
and it's one of the things and any minister will say the same as you deal with or try to deal with people
in their sorrows and you sympathize with them and while your heart genuinely goes out and you really
feel for them there are often many situations where you are sympathizing with and praying with and
listening to and you have to say well my heart goes out i don't completely understand because i've never
been there and sometimes you say thankfully i haven't been there because as some people go through very
hard and difficult experiences you're you as we say your heart goes out but you can't properly understand
because you haven't you yourself experienced but if somebody who has experienced exactly the same thing
as you comes to see you that makes a difference in the sense that you know that they know exactly
what you're feeling well that's a wonderful thing about the high priest that we have jesus he understands
exactly he's been touched with the feeling of our weaknesses he knows our pains he knows our
sorrows he knows when we what it's like to be let down he knows what it's like to be betrayed he knows
what just in all the difficult different situations he knows what it is to be lied about and where false
accusations are leveled against knows all these things and he knows the force and the power of temptation
although he didn't have sin within him yet he he was battered by satan so this is a
high priest that we have one who sympathizes with us and his sympathizing wasn't just when he was here
in this world because we know that when he was here in this world as for these 33 years it often
says that he was moved with compassion his sympathy didn't stop when he left this world he's the
unchanging jesus and he is as sympathetic tonight as he has ever been at any stage so that's a wonderful
thing that we have is that we have this wonderful sympathetic high priest and that's why we're then
told let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace and how thankful tonight that it is
a throne of grace that it's speaking about imagine if it was a throne of judgment because one day it's
going to be one day jesus christ won't be on the throne of grace as we have here he'll be on the throne
of judgment the judgment seat of christ where everyone will have to appear and i know that on that day
there'll be many people and they'll wish that they had gone to the throne of grace many people who
didn't believe many people who didn't want to go many people who couldn't be bothered going but on that
day that that throne this throne the throne of grace won't be available in the way that it is now
although grace doesn't end there will always be grace and grace will be complete in glory but the thing is
that tonight it's a throne of grace that we that we have here before us and there was grace of course in
the establishing of it this grace was this throne was established by god's grace as we know grace
is a is an undeserved favor and so god established this throne and it was purely of grace that he did so
because we didn't deserve it god would have been completely right to have said i will do no such thing as
establish a throne of grace this people deserves nothing because of what they have done
but he has made he has set out this throne of grace for us and it's something we should always remember
that it is it was established by grace and this grace that is given this throne of grace we must always
remember has come at a great cost you know sometimes we just take it for granted and we think oh well
we have this throne of grace we have this throne of grace and we can go anytime let's always remember
what it cost cost the death of the lord jesus christ without the death of jesus christ there would be no
throne of grace we wouldn't be meeting in this kind of way we wouldn't be enjoying the benefits that we do
were it not for the death of the lord jesus christ so we must always remember that
that tonight this privilege that we have cost heaven's greatest treasure where god gave his son
where jesus christ gave himself so we must always remember that so we have this great invitation to
come and this invitation let's say is to everyone some people think that this invitation is purely
for the christian it's not it's for everyone how did we come to faith was it not by coming as sinners
to the throne of grace this is where it began and the invitation we've always got to remember although
it's a christian that uses the throne of grace most of the time that throne of grace is available
to everyone and that's where we begin that's where our journey began by calling out to the lord
calling out to him to to hear us to pardon us to forgive us our sin that's where a sinner first finds
pardon from all their sins is at the throne of grace so it is as we say it's a throne that is there
for everyone so how do we come we're told we come with confidence or boldness it's the idea of somebody
coming to a higher rank and that doesn't mean that we come brazenly or come with a super confidence
but it means that we come with an assurance that god is not going to deal with us according to our
everybody serving because we could easily be inhibited and think you know i i can't come
but the lord is saying no you can't come you have a sympathetic high priest who wants you to come who's
available all the time and i often think that we should in fact it was just mentioned in the prayer
and it's very very difficult to prepare properly midweek when people have been have a busy a busy schedule
and to come and was just highlighted there of how and quite often when we come to a prayer meeting
we become very conscious of maybe how we didn't prepare before we came now i know that it is often
in the hurried rushed pressurized life that we live today very difficult or impossible to prepare as we would
want to but i believe that when we have our set times of private prayer we should seek to prepare for it
because if you and i were going to meet king charles are going to meet some dignitary we would prepare
and so we should prepare as we come to meet with the lord at his throne and always as we said remember
the privilege what a what a wonderful thing it is that the creator of heaven and earth the god who
holds this world in the hollow of his hand the god who counts the number of the stars and he names them
one by one has said you come tonight you come today you come anytime to me tell me what you need tell me
what you want i'm listening i'm sympathetic it's the most amazing privilege that we have
which far too often we take for granted now as i said often we don't have the time to prepare because
often when we come to the throne of grace it's spontaneous we all of a sudden we cry to the lord
we're in a time of need and we cry for help we ask lord lord help me here i don't know what to do
i don't know what to say lord put a guard over my mouth in case i say the wrong thing we're so often
asking the lord like that or it's a a sigh of confession lord forgive me forgive me my sin
so that a lot of our coming to the throne of grace is like that it's it's spontaneous
but also there are times that we should come and we should be more prepared in our coming
and so we we need to we need to come and be persuaded that the lord will hear us satan will
whisper into your ear and say lord's not going to listen to you you look at your life you look at
you look at the many ways you've let the lord down you look at all the things you've done and all the
things you've said lord's not going to listen to you we're told here that we are to come with this
confidence with this assurance and what are we to seek for very briefly that we may receive mercy
and you know that's where it where it all began so we sang this poor man cried god heard and saved him
from all his distresses and all your days you will be crying the first cry that you ever had
god be merciful to me a sinner that's how it began and you will never the christian will never ever stop
asking the lord lord be merciful to me and you know that that mercy that we have it we've said it
before that mercy is often we is that where there is a need on the part of the one requiring mercy
and there are resources sufficient on the part of the one bestowing mercy you've heard the story of
you know it well of the the man who was to be shot in the time of napoleon and the man's
mother came to napoleon and he said she pleaded for her son to be spared and napoleon said justice
demands he dies and the mother said it's not justice that i'm looking for it's mercy please be
merciful to him napoleon said woman he doesn't deserve mercy he deserves to die the mother said it wouldn't
be mercy if he deserved it and that's the wonder of it that's what mercy and she said just be
merciful and napoleon was struck by that and he said i will grant mercy you see it wouldn't be
mercy if we deserved it but it's this undeserving and as god is merciful to us and he is let us pray
constantly that we in turn will be merciful to others as we receive mercy and you know we can be harsh
with other people when god is so gracious and so merciful to us so we must seek always to be
merciful as we have received mercy and then again we see we ask for grace that's what it says let us
that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need when through mercy we've come
to know god's peace and we're through this journey through this wilderness through this world
every day we're looking for that grace and we're told in the bible that that grace is sufficient for us
now you and i know that there are times that we will very readily make our way to the lord and we'll
say to the lord oh lord help me i need your grace i'm struggling sometimes it might be physical sometimes
it might be mental it might be emotional might be spiritual might be a combination of all these things
because sometimes we can't separate all these things are so often intertwined
and we go to the lord and say lord i need your grace but you know there are there are times that
will rebellious and there are times we're in the huff dare i say it in the huff with god
and we won't go to him for grace and we'll say i'll see this myself i'll see i'll sort this myself
i'll put on as it were like the stiff upper lip i'll deal with this i'm not going to take the
christian attitude here you know that's so wrong and god will sometimes allow us to just like little
toddlers our little children to have their wee sort of moments of being sort of like this a wee strop
sadly we have our strops before god but you know the lord is gracious and he teaches us that it is by
grace that we have to go through this world leaning on him and relying on him irrespective of what the
situation may be whether it is whether their family difficulties whether their physical difficulties
whether their financial difficulties whether their relationship difficulties whether their sorrows
bereavements losses crosses doesn't matter what the grace is sufficient and it's through god's grace
through these trials that come into our lives that we learn so many things and i'm sure every one of
you tonight can echo in a different way to the way that paul did but remember how paul prayed to the
lord that he would remove this thorn in the flesh and he prayed and he prayed and he prayed about it
god said no i'm not going to remove it but i'm instead i'm going to give you my grace
and you know i'm sure the lord is doing that for every single one of us here in a different way
there's always going to be something you don't want in your life
and you wish that you were saying if only this could be removed i would be a better person
i would be a better christian my life would be so much better why is this here and the lord is
saying in order that you will discover my grace because it is by grace that we walk every step of
the way and the lord is saying there is a sufficiency at this throne please make it the habit of your life
to come to that throne so that we might all indeed every single one of us may receive
this mercy and this grace to help in time of need let us pray lord our god we give thanks for our time
together we give thanks for this word so often we're we're so familiar with this version indeed we so
often quote it but help us to remember more and more the the depth of truth that's in it of the amazing
mercy and grace that is to be found at your throne and we pray that you'll equip us as we
go through life at every turn and at every corner we pray that you'll help us and we pray that you'll
be with everybody here tonight according to their needs that they will discover your help your strength
your grace we pray lord that you'll do for us far and beyond what we may ask or think we pray that
you'll bless us in our homes and our families be with all whom we love with all who can't be here
tonight who would want to be be with those online lord we pray your blessing upon us do us good
cleanse us we pray and take us to our homes safely forgiving us all our sin in jesus name amen
we're going to