WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.600 All right, our scripture reading today comes from Hebrews chapter 10, verses 19 to 25. 00:00:09.080 --> 00:00:12.380 ! David, one of our ministers here, is going to come and read for us. 00:00:16.120 --> 00:00:21.660 Let's hear and read God's Word as we find it in Hebrews 10, reading from verse 19 to 25. 00:00:21.660 --> 00:00:29.120 If you're following one of the larger Bibles, it's page 1007. Let's hear God's Word. 00:00:30.780 --> 00:00:37.719 Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, 00:00:38.740 --> 00:00:44.740 by the new and living way that He opened for us through the curtain, that is, through His flesh, 00:00:44.960 --> 00:00:53.740 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full 00:00:53.740 --> 00:00:59.460 assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience, 00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:09.120 and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, 00:01:09.620 --> 00:01:18.460 for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, 00:01:18.459 --> 00:01:26.879 not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more 00:01:26.879 --> 00:01:32.019 as you see the day drawing near. This is God's Word. 00:01:32.019 --> 00:01:39.159 All right, well, if you're visiting today, I come up here not so I can take the position of power over 00:01:39.159 --> 00:01:44.920 anyone, but only because I'm too short for the balcony of people to see when I preach, so that's 00:01:44.920 --> 00:01:51.359 the main reason. So we finished a series on James last week, and next week, as I mentioned, we'll start 00:01:51.359 --> 00:01:56.959 looking at the road to Emmaus for four Sundays. And so we're going to take one look today at Hebrews 10 00:01:56.959 --> 00:02:03.979 on this New Members Sunday, and it is a monumental declaration of the foundation of Christian 00:02:03.979 --> 00:02:09.659 community, that passage that David read for us. And the claim of the passage is that the blood of 00:02:09.659 --> 00:02:18.799 Jesus Christ creates a unique community. So let's explore it three ways. Number one, the uniqueness of 00:02:18.799 --> 00:02:24.400 the Christian community. Number two, the foundation of that community. And then finally, we'll look at the 00:02:24.400 --> 00:02:30.860 practices of the Christian community. So first, the uniqueness. It is well known to all of us in this 00:02:30.860 --> 00:02:36.840 room that we live in an age where the sociologists and the journalists and the public health officials 00:02:36.840 --> 00:02:46.420 say it's the age of loneliness. And we, in the UK, in 2018, established a position in the government, 00:02:46.540 --> 00:02:51.540 the UK Minister of Loneliness, and something corresponding to that has happened in the States and other places. 00:02:51.539 --> 00:02:59.979 You can be surrounded by people in this room even, and feel alone, of course. And loneliness is a form 00:02:59.979 --> 00:03:06.359 of relational suffering. You can be surrounded by people and feel alone, because to really get at the 00:03:06.359 --> 00:03:12.519 problem of loneliness, the only solution is to know that you are known by somebody deeply and loved, 00:03:12.599 --> 00:03:16.599 no matter what. And so you can be around all sorts of people in life and still feel alone. 00:03:16.599 --> 00:03:26.439 Jesus Christ, in the New Testament, offers community, a unique community. But that community 00:03:26.439 --> 00:03:34.019 is not primarily built on what you would expect. So the solution to loneliness, the answer that the 00:03:34.019 --> 00:03:40.180 Bible gives of community is not just being surrounded by people in a church community. It's something 00:03:40.180 --> 00:03:47.260 deeper than that. It's something thicker than that. And to get at it, you've got to see, you've got to 00:03:47.260 --> 00:03:53.319 know a little bit about the backdrop that leads into this passage. And the backdrop, before Hebrews 10 00:03:53.319 --> 00:04:01.700 comes Hebrews 9, right? Hebrews 7, 8, 9, 10, all the way up to chapter 10, verse 18, and then we read 00:04:01.700 --> 00:04:07.480 verses 19 to 25. And in that section, it's summarizing basically the whole Old Testament, 00:04:07.479 --> 00:04:16.300 and giving you language like covenant, tabernacle, sacrifice, priest, lamb, veil, blood, the holy place, 00:04:16.579 --> 00:04:22.079 even the word Melchizedek. So all these Old Testament concepts that are the author is wrapping 00:04:22.079 --> 00:04:28.219 up into one narrative. And what we just read is the culmination point. Chapter 10, verse 19 says, 00:04:28.459 --> 00:04:34.060 therefore. So we just read this big climactic point where the whole Old Testament story is being wrapped 00:04:34.060 --> 00:04:42.240 up into one main idea, and that's what we find in 19 to 25. And to get at that main point, there's an 00:04:42.240 --> 00:04:47.540 assumption from 7 to 10, and it's found, if you have a Bible, you can see this if you back up to chapter 00:04:47.540 --> 00:04:55.060 10, verse 4. There's a line like this, it's impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. 00:04:55.699 --> 00:05:01.240 So that's a summary statement that says the whole Old Testament sacrificial system could not ultimately 00:05:01.240 --> 00:05:06.420 accomplish the one thing we need most, and that's the removal of sin. And so here's the assumption, 00:05:06.920 --> 00:05:11.000 the assumption of Hebrews 7 to 10, the assumption of the whole Old Testament, the assumption of New 00:05:11.000 --> 00:05:17.319 Testament Christianity, and it's incredibly anti-modern. And it's something like this, that my 00:05:17.319 --> 00:05:25.800 actions, my choices, my desires that stand against the Lord deserve the forfeiture of my life. 00:05:25.800 --> 00:05:32.020 And the sacrificial system was in place to really preach that and to tell humanity that. 00:05:32.900 --> 00:05:38.819 And so the rituals of the sacrificial system, the bringing of the animals, the curtain that you read 00:05:38.819 --> 00:05:46.120 about all through Hebrews 7 to 10, was preaching that our sins do indeed, our rebellion against God do 00:05:46.120 --> 00:05:50.819 indeed deserve the forfeiture of our life. And that's really what the veil is. So if you know anything 00:05:50.819 --> 00:05:56.759 about the Old Testament and the Levitical system, that's the summary in the background of the passage 00:05:56.759 --> 00:06:02.099 we read. And you'll maybe remember that there are multiple curtains in the temple and the tabernacle. 00:06:02.759 --> 00:06:08.360 And each of those curtains is effectively saying to you, you cannot draw, you cannot come all the way 00:06:08.360 --> 00:06:13.680 in to the presence of God. And that's exactly what we have. If you have a Bible, you'll see this again 00:06:13.680 --> 00:06:20.759 back in chapter 10, verse 1. At the very end, it says that the sacrifices offered every year could 00:06:20.759 --> 00:06:26.500 not make perfect those who draw near. And so the Old Testament story is really this, that we were made 00:06:26.500 --> 00:06:32.600 by God to be worshipers living in God's presence. And the entire temple system was preaching to you, 00:06:32.680 --> 00:06:38.180 preaching to us, is the fact that because of our sins, we're unable to draw near. We can't go all the 00:06:38.180 --> 00:06:45.240 way in. We can't get past the veiled curtain. And so that leaves us with the terror of distance from God. 00:06:46.160 --> 00:06:52.759 And it really is a terror. You might remember that in the Old Testament, in Hebrews 7 to 10 talks about 00:06:52.759 --> 00:06:58.639 this. There was only one man, one time a year, who could go all the way in. And that was the chief 00:06:58.639 --> 00:07:05.540 priest on the day of atonement, Yom Kippur. But if you remember, how did he go in? He went in with a rope 00:07:05.540 --> 00:07:11.700 tied around his waist. He went in scared to death. He went in afraid. He went in afraid that he wasn't 00:07:11.700 --> 00:07:17.220 going to come out alive. And when you come to this passage, if you look at our passage that we read 00:07:17.220 --> 00:07:23.020 in chapter 10, verse 19, he says, therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to 00:07:23.020 --> 00:07:29.120 enter. And you see, this is the moment, the culmination point that says, because of the blood of Jesus, 00:07:29.939 --> 00:07:34.680 everything that the Old Testament was all about has found its solution in the fact that because of 00:07:34.680 --> 00:07:40.780 Him, you can now go all the way in. You can enter, you can draw near, you can come into God's presence. 00:07:40.900 --> 00:07:46.500 And so in the Old Testament, worshipers could not come all the way in. And in our sins, we cannot come 00:07:46.500 --> 00:07:53.899 all the way in. And the great damage that is, the terror that is, why that's so awful for us is that 00:07:53.899 --> 00:07:58.660 every single one of us today were made to enter all the way into God's presence. 00:07:58.660 --> 00:08:07.240 We were made to have our deepest longings fulfilled with Him and in Him, close to Him, 00:08:07.840 --> 00:08:12.840 and close to one another, looking at Him together. And if you come today and you find that your 00:08:12.840 --> 00:08:17.920 longings are not fulfilled in this life, you've got emptiness, you've got things you've chased but 00:08:17.920 --> 00:08:23.620 haven't satisfied, I want to say to you what the Bible says. And you may not agree with it yet, 00:08:23.680 --> 00:08:27.700 but I want to give it to you anyway. And what the Bible says is this, that all of your deepest 00:08:27.699 --> 00:08:32.059 longings, all the holes that you find in your heart, they ultimately cannot be filled without 00:08:32.059 --> 00:08:37.019 entering all the way into the presence of God. That's where the fulfillment of all of our longings 00:08:37.019 --> 00:08:43.039 are found. And so because of our sin, we were banned. In the temple, you may remember from the 00:08:43.039 --> 00:08:48.139 book of Exodus, when the temple instructions, the tabernacle instructions were given, one of the things 00:08:48.139 --> 00:08:54.799 that was required is to embroider cherubs, cherubim, on the temple curtains. So the curtains weren't 00:08:54.799 --> 00:08:59.979 blank, they weren't empty, they had stitching of these angelic beings with swords on them. Why? 00:09:01.059 --> 00:09:06.459 Because the temple was there to remind us, it was just to be a shadow of the Garden of Eden itself. 00:09:07.059 --> 00:09:11.000 And in the Garden of Eden, remember when Adam and Eve rebelled against God, they were kicked out, 00:09:11.219 --> 00:09:16.359 and cherubs were put at the gate with swords. They couldn't come back in. And so on the temple curtain, 00:09:16.479 --> 00:09:21.819 you had cherubs embroidered to remind you, you were made by God to be in the Garden of God with God, 00:09:21.820 --> 00:09:27.080 and yet you don't have access, you can't draw near. And so there's the terror of distance. 00:09:27.960 --> 00:09:34.000 And Moses, even the one man in the Old Testament invited to come so close, even he could not see 00:09:34.000 --> 00:09:41.620 the face of God fully. Even he could not come all the way in. Now, the turn, verse 21 and 22. You see 00:09:41.620 --> 00:09:47.140 what's happening here in the passage we read? The language all across Hebrews has been saying, 00:09:47.139 --> 00:09:53.080 you cannot draw near. You cannot draw near. And then you come down to verse 21 and 22. 00:09:53.340 --> 00:09:59.539 Therefore, since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart 00:09:59.539 --> 00:10:04.819 and full assurance. And he's saying, the uniqueness of Christianity and Christian community is that 00:10:04.819 --> 00:10:10.360 because of the blood of Jesus, you can enter all the way into God's presence. And that means that 00:10:10.360 --> 00:10:15.879 Christian community and the value of it and the value to treat loneliness and so many other issues 00:10:15.879 --> 00:10:22.000 is not just that there is a place to come and see people. The real idea of Christian community 00:10:22.000 --> 00:10:27.820 is that you can, with others shoulder to shoulder, draw near as worshipers into God's presence. 00:10:28.360 --> 00:10:35.220 What is real Christian community? It's actually being in communion with God together. That's the 00:10:35.220 --> 00:10:39.480 heartbeat of Christian community. And so here all throughout this passage, I mean, you can scan your 00:10:39.480 --> 00:10:45.360 eyes across it and look for the pronouns. You know, the pronouns aren't now you individually can draw near. 00:10:45.360 --> 00:10:51.419 It's we draw near. Let us come together. Let us draw near. Let us, the one another language is all 00:10:51.419 --> 00:10:57.060 over the passage. And really what this text is saying is because the entire Old Testament was fulfilled 00:10:57.060 --> 00:11:02.639 by the blood of Jesus Christ, now you can have a community where you with one another draw near to 00:11:02.639 --> 00:11:09.639 God side by side. Remember what Jesus said in John 14, 6, he said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. 00:11:10.279 --> 00:11:14.480 And very famous passage, of course. What did he mean? That's temple language. 00:11:14.480 --> 00:11:21.659 I am the way. You can't get behind the curtain without me. I am the way of access. I am the way 00:11:21.659 --> 00:11:29.420 that you can get behind that holy veil. Now that means when we struggle with the ache in this life 00:11:29.420 --> 00:11:35.899 of being surrounded by people even, but yet feeling alone, the truth is that the root of the problem of 00:11:35.899 --> 00:11:41.840 loneliness is not ultimately found in not being known and loved by people, though that is so important. 00:11:41.840 --> 00:11:47.320 God made us for that. Absolutely. But the real root, the ultimate foundation is separation from God. 00:11:48.519 --> 00:11:55.780 We were made before anything else to be known and loved by God, known intimately and loved anyway, 00:11:56.500 --> 00:12:01.759 and therefore then in a community finding knowledge and love of other people within the knowledge and 00:12:01.759 --> 00:12:08.660 love of God. And so the real root is a spiritual problem. It's separation from the living God. 00:12:08.659 --> 00:12:18.959 And I was at a gathering of church leaders recently, and it was very Presbyterian, if you know what that 00:12:18.959 --> 00:12:24.319 means, and very Reformed. Sorry to use that word, but very Reformed. It was the kind of place where 00:12:24.319 --> 00:12:32.079 everybody in the room wants to quote John Calvin to each other and things like that. And in that meeting, 00:12:32.080 --> 00:12:39.100 we were singing hymns, we were singing psalms, and I was a few rows back from a guy, and I just noticed 00:12:39.100 --> 00:12:43.920 something every time we would sing something very odd, I thought. And he was breaking all protocol, 00:12:44.360 --> 00:12:50.440 especially in Scottish Presbyterian culture. And we were singing, and during the song, he would turn 00:12:50.440 --> 00:12:57.840 around and look, I mean, and I mean, connect with people eye to eye across the room. And he did it to me. 00:12:57.840 --> 00:13:03.200 He looked at me, and he stared at me, and he's singing at me. And I realized what he was doing 00:13:03.200 --> 00:13:08.360 with his body language. He was saying, do you believe this with me? Do you hear this? 00:13:09.220 --> 00:13:13.899 And that is really just Hebrews 10, 19 to 25. Incredibly awkward, right? 00:13:15.980 --> 00:13:20.680 Incredibly awkward. But Hebrews 10, 19 to 25 is just saying, because of the blood of Jesus, 00:13:20.679 --> 00:13:27.279 because you have a great high priest, you can draw near to the presence of God together 00:13:27.279 --> 00:13:35.919 with one another. And so I expect in a moment when we sing the final hymn that many of you will turn 00:13:35.919 --> 00:13:41.879 and awkwardly stare into your neighbor's eyes until they acknowledge it and say, I'm with you. I believe 00:13:41.879 --> 00:13:48.500 this as well. But one day we will. So even if we can't get past that in our culture today, one day we 00:13:48.500 --> 00:13:53.259 will. One day we will do that, because that is what drawing near into the Holy of Holies, the presence 00:13:53.259 --> 00:13:59.179 of God, this passage is ultimately all about, that we do it together, not merely as Western individuals, 00:13:59.399 --> 00:14:04.720 but as a deep and abiding community. And friends, that's membership. That's church membership. That's 00:14:04.720 --> 00:14:10.500 the ultimate membership. All right, secondly, the foundation, the bedrock. Now, I've already given the 00:14:10.500 --> 00:14:14.720 answer to this, but I want to give you one more thing that the text points us to in Hebrews 10 00:14:14.720 --> 00:14:21.220 specifically. What makes a church member a church member? And it's all found, let's go back to that 00:14:21.220 --> 00:14:28.519 little word in verse 19, therefore. You'll see after that in verse 19, a couple times the word 00:14:28.519 --> 00:14:34.220 since, since we have confidence to enter the holy place. And then a little later on in verse 21, 00:14:34.480 --> 00:14:39.540 since we have a great high priest, then let us draw near. Because of that, let us draw near. Now, 00:14:39.540 --> 00:14:44.139 those are little conjunctions. You would be tempted to say prepositions, but I looked it up. 00:14:44.139 --> 00:14:50.980 They're conjunctions. Therefore, since. And those are tiny words, but they have such power. 00:14:51.840 --> 00:14:57.259 In seminary, you go and they tell you in Bible interpretation class, always ask, what is the 00:14:57.259 --> 00:15:05.699 therefore, therefore? And 1 to 18 has been telling us what it's all there for. Because of 1 to 18, 00:15:06.259 --> 00:15:10.200 therefore, we can draw near. And we've said it, because of the blood of Jesus, we can draw near. 00:15:10.200 --> 00:15:14.680 Because he is the way we can come together as worshipers into God's presence. But I want to 00:15:14.680 --> 00:15:19.300 highlight one more aspect of that that's all throughout chapter 7 to 10 that culminates in 00:15:19.300 --> 00:15:24.200 this moment. And if you look back at chapter 10, verse 1, if you have a Bible, it says, 00:15:24.340 --> 00:15:29.640 for since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come, instead of the true form of these 00:15:29.640 --> 00:15:35.460 realities, it can never ultimately work. It can never forgive sins. So at the beginning of this 00:15:35.460 --> 00:15:42.420 chapter, it says that the whole Old Testament law, the sacrificial system was a shadow. But the 00:15:42.420 --> 00:15:50.960 therefore, in verse 18, 19, is saying Jesus Christ is the reality of that shadow. Because the whole 00:15:50.960 --> 00:15:57.560 Old Testament was a shadow cast towards something of substance, Christ has come as the substance. 00:15:57.559 --> 00:16:06.779 If you imagine standing in London in the financial district, and you look up at the tallest skyscrapers 00:16:06.779 --> 00:16:10.759 in the city there, and you're standing in the street, you don't look at the building, but instead 00:16:10.759 --> 00:16:16.639 you look at the shadow that's being cast on a sunny day down the center street, and you see this massive 00:16:16.639 --> 00:16:24.719 shadow. It's only when you turn around can you see what the substance is, the real thing. And this 00:16:24.720 --> 00:16:31.460 Hebrews 7 to 10 says that the whole sacrificial system was a shadow, a foreshadow, and that you've 00:16:31.460 --> 00:16:37.960 got to turn around to see Jesus Christ as the real thing, the substance, the once-for-all sacrifice, 00:16:38.060 --> 00:16:44.399 that in His body broken, His blood shed, you have the ultimate point of all of human history, 00:16:44.779 --> 00:16:50.680 that all of history was culminating to that one point where the cross took place. The cross 00:16:50.679 --> 00:16:55.319 is the centerpiece of history, the moment that makes sense of the whole Old Testament, 00:16:55.819 --> 00:17:00.599 and the very thing that creates the possibility of drawing near to God and having real community 00:17:00.599 --> 00:17:07.539 for all of your days. The cross, it means everything. That's the real heartbeat of this passage. It's the 00:17:07.539 --> 00:17:10.339 bedrock, the foundation of all Christian community. 00:17:10.339 --> 00:17:21.259 C.S. Lewis in 1944 gave an address to the graduates at King's College London called The Inner Ring, 00:17:21.519 --> 00:17:27.559 a very famous essay published in a couple books of his. And what is The Inner Ring? The Inner Ring 00:17:27.559 --> 00:17:34.559 is a community within a community. So we all exist in multiple communities, church communities, work 00:17:34.559 --> 00:17:39.959 communities, school communities, university communities. We could number countless communities. 00:17:39.960 --> 00:17:44.579 We're all involved in. And then we all know that in all of those communities, inner rings form, 00:17:45.240 --> 00:17:50.840 circles within the circle. So an inner ring is a group of people where maybe you're in the boardroom 00:17:50.840 --> 00:17:56.840 and you're having a meeting in your business, and the boss just picks two people at the end of the 00:17:56.840 --> 00:18:02.259 meeting and says, you two come and see me in my office. And what you know is that those are the two 00:18:02.259 --> 00:18:07.819 people the boss actually prizes the most, actually wants to hear from in solving a problem. That's an inner 00:18:07.819 --> 00:18:13.619 ring. And there are inner rings that exist in all sorts of communities. I see it so much in my kids. 00:18:14.720 --> 00:18:19.179 They're at different stages of now trying to enter the inner ring of their little communities. 00:18:20.179 --> 00:18:23.700 And it's something you really have to work with. But it's a problem with adults as well, 00:18:23.700 --> 00:18:31.059 very much. And what happens is when you are standing on the fringe of that community, you want in so much, 00:18:31.059 --> 00:18:36.159 you start to dress like the community dresses, you start to speak like the community speaks, 00:18:36.639 --> 00:18:41.079 you start to take on the behaviors and the practices that the inner ring you so want to be a part of 00:18:41.079 --> 00:18:49.059 takes on. And then if you are one of the lucky ones that finally gets in, you make it just as hard for 00:18:49.059 --> 00:18:54.079 the people on the outside to get in because you had to go through that experience. And that's the truth 00:18:54.079 --> 00:18:58.259 of inner rings. Now, C.S. Lewis is very careful to say that there are some inner rings that are very 00:18:58.259 --> 00:19:05.439 healthy, like deep friendship. But most rings that we create in this fallen world are because of 00:19:05.439 --> 00:19:12.139 competition, because of envy, because of our pride, because of our need to be seen as better than others, 00:19:12.500 --> 00:19:18.960 because of stubbornness. You can think of, and snobbery, you can think of a no better example than 00:19:18.960 --> 00:19:25.740 all of Jane Austen's novels and how much she has contempt for the Victorian attitude of the social 00:19:25.740 --> 00:19:30.100 elites who want to create inner ring after inner ring after inner ring after inner ring and exclude 00:19:30.100 --> 00:19:37.100 everybody else. I saw this so much in my time in academia, where academia at its best is a pursuit 00:19:37.100 --> 00:19:45.180 of the truth. But the truth is in academia that there is a moral, and it goes like this, publish or 00:19:45.180 --> 00:19:51.779 perish. And if you are not regularly pumping out articles and books, you will never get on the inside. 00:19:52.019 --> 00:19:55.880 You will never get a job. You will never get to the scholarly elite. It's the inner ring. And so 00:19:55.880 --> 00:20:00.980 sometimes the truth is in peril because you've got to publish, publish or perish, and that's an 00:20:00.980 --> 00:20:07.160 inner ring. We do this. Every one of these inner rings that we create, these communities, have curtains, 00:20:08.340 --> 00:20:14.560 veils. They're little temples. And to get behind the veil, you've got to perform. You've got to show your 00:20:14.559 --> 00:20:19.839 metal. You've got to do what the community expects of you to do and really show that you're worth it. 00:20:20.259 --> 00:20:27.759 And only then would you think, I'm known and loved. And of course, for most of us, we never get in 00:20:27.759 --> 00:20:32.460 to so many of these. And so we feel a weight of shame. And I see this working out in different ways 00:20:32.460 --> 00:20:38.259 in my own kids' lives. You feel the weight of shame. You never got in. This passage, Hebrews 7 to 10, 00:20:38.259 --> 00:20:45.779 is effectively telling you, there's a truth in it. There's a desire there that's right. You were made 00:20:45.779 --> 00:20:53.279 for an inner ring. You were made to draw all the way in by a great high priest into the living presence 00:20:53.279 --> 00:20:59.519 of God with people who know and love you. And that all these inner rings we create in this world are 00:20:59.519 --> 00:21:07.599 just relative little tiny shadows mixed with so much sin when you look at the real ring, the real circle, 00:21:07.700 --> 00:21:13.359 the real veil that has to be torn. This is exactly what you were made for, to enter the garden of God 00:21:13.359 --> 00:21:18.299 with the people of God in the presence of God. And it's only when you can know that you're known and 00:21:18.299 --> 00:21:25.480 loved by God despite your performance. You see, every inner ring that we try to get into says, 00:21:25.480 --> 00:21:31.720 do this, perform this way, show your mettle. There's only one, and it's lasting, boy, is it lasting, 00:21:32.059 --> 00:21:39.380 that says you can come in by the power of another. You can come in by the substitutionary blood of 00:21:39.380 --> 00:21:44.539 another. You don't have to prove it. You can come in by faith. And it's in that community where you 00:21:44.539 --> 00:21:48.759 draw all the way into the presence of God that you will be accepted and you will never be forgotten. 00:21:49.500 --> 00:21:54.980 And that's the community of the invisible church made visible, the ecclesia, the gathering, 00:21:54.980 --> 00:22:04.339 God's people made by faith, forgiven by the blood of Jesus. Lewis James' famous hymn that you probably, 00:22:04.559 --> 00:22:08.680 if you're young in this room, probably only ever listened to because the algorithm popped up a 00:22:08.680 --> 00:22:14.400 Gaither video on your YouTube channel. There's power in the blood. There is power in the blood. 00:22:14.559 --> 00:22:20.099 There's wonder-working power in the blood. And what is that power? Verse 19, you have confidence and 00:22:20.099 --> 00:22:24.940 access to go all the way into God's presence. And you can do it with one another, knowing that 00:22:24.940 --> 00:22:30.880 you have a community that will never leave you. So let me finish with this. This passage then, 00:22:31.160 --> 00:22:39.360 in verses 22 to 25, gives us practices how to live this out today until that moment where we together 00:22:39.360 --> 00:22:44.720 go all the way in behind the curtain, when Jesus comes to us and brings the garden temple to us, 00:22:44.740 --> 00:22:49.059 when we one day will indeed be willing to turn around during hymns and look at one another. 00:22:50.059 --> 00:22:53.960 That day is coming. But until then, what are the practices that we've got to live out? And so let 00:22:53.960 --> 00:22:59.839 me just briefly give them to you. There's four or five here. I'll just highlight them. And the first, 00:22:59.960 --> 00:23:06.519 the heading comes to us in verse 25, very famous verse that many of us will have come to before. 00:23:06.519 --> 00:23:13.940 And it says, do not neglect to meet together as is the habit of some. And so in this life, 00:23:13.980 --> 00:23:18.539 one of the commands we have to practice this community, this everlasting community is not 00:23:18.539 --> 00:23:23.920 to neglect to meet together. You're here today. You're not neglecting to meet together, 00:23:24.119 --> 00:23:32.379 but it simply is true that all the stats bear this out, that even the most avid attender of church 00:23:32.380 --> 00:23:39.500 and the assembly of God, the ecclesia here, the most avid attender attends on average less and less 00:23:39.500 --> 00:23:45.120 and less every couple of years. So there is a command here, don't neglect church on Sunday. 00:23:45.380 --> 00:23:54.460 Absolutely. And you could not fulfill all the commands that are involved in that little verbal 00:23:54.460 --> 00:24:00.680 command. Do not neglect to meet together by just attending church on Sunday. So it also means more 00:24:00.680 --> 00:24:03.960 than that. There's something, there's something so true there. You got to be here. You got to come to 00:24:03.960 --> 00:24:08.759 church. And also there's something more than that. And it's found in the word itself. The word 00:24:08.759 --> 00:24:15.220 meet together is the verbal form of the noun epi synagogue, the word synagogue, the Jewish 00:24:15.220 --> 00:24:20.460 gathering, the place of worship. Epi synagogue is just the word congregation. And so when it says, 00:24:20.580 --> 00:24:25.880 do not neglect to meet together, it says congregate together. This is telling us we are a 00:24:25.880 --> 00:24:35.300 congregation, not an aggregation. And so you could come here every week and assemble, but live as an 00:24:35.300 --> 00:24:42.400 aggregation, not a congregation. By treating church, and of course we know that this can happen so easily 00:24:42.400 --> 00:24:49.440 in our hearts, like coming to a TED talk and getting the petrol station of a good or bad, maybe boring, 00:24:49.680 --> 00:24:54.880 sometimes, sometimes not, talk from a pulpit, and then sort of feeling emotionally refilled, 00:24:54.880 --> 00:25:00.020 and then going back out and living separate lives. But that would be to live as an aggregation, not a 00:25:00.020 --> 00:25:07.100 congregation. And this word is be a congregation. And so we're given a few practices here, and they're 00:25:07.100 --> 00:25:14.380 all found in the let us, verse 22, 23, 24, three let us, let us draw near. We've looked at that one. 00:25:14.640 --> 00:25:18.920 And then just after that, you'll see in verse 23, let us hold fast the confession. 00:25:20.420 --> 00:25:24.140 Let us hold fast the confession. Here's how you can live out the community. Here's how you can be a 00:25:24.140 --> 00:25:29.120 congregation at an aggregation. Let us hold fast the confession. That hold fast is the Greek word 00:25:29.120 --> 00:25:35.060 katecheo, where we get the word catechism from. So this is saying, let us catechize one another. 00:25:36.640 --> 00:25:43.120 That's why we do catechism with the kids. But it's saying to adults as well, go from here beyond just 00:25:43.120 --> 00:25:47.800 the moments in church where you're all sitting facing the pulpit and catechize one another. 00:25:47.799 --> 00:25:53.740 And what does that mean? Well, it could mean that after the service, you walk up to a friend in the 00:25:53.740 --> 00:26:00.419 room during tea and coffee and you say, question 20, who is the redeemer? And you say, did you, 00:26:00.519 --> 00:26:04.680 come on, memorize it? Did you memorize it? That's a good thing to do, actually. Catechism is wonderful. 00:26:04.799 --> 00:26:09.759 They've been doing it since the second century. That's why we do it here. But to catechize one 00:26:09.759 --> 00:26:15.799 another really just means talking about God. So I'll ask you, do you talk about God with Christians? 00:26:16.619 --> 00:26:21.579 Do you have conversations about Jesus and your faith? That's what the let us hold fast the 00:26:21.579 --> 00:26:28.579 confession really means. It's catechize one another. Notice back in verse 19, he says, 00:26:28.579 --> 00:26:34.700 brothers and sisters, let us. He's talking to the Christians, the local church. Secondly, 00:26:34.700 --> 00:26:42.799 he says, let us, verse 24, consider. So that word consider is a really, it's a bit of an unusual 00:26:42.799 --> 00:26:48.380 word to choose for the author here in the Greek text. It means more than reflect or just think about, 00:26:48.620 --> 00:26:54.440 it's got a real intensity to it. So it says something like, consider with intensity, think, 00:26:54.519 --> 00:26:59.440 really think about over time how to stir one another up in love and good works, encourage one 00:26:59.440 --> 00:27:05.420 another. I think it's something like this. I had a deacon that I knew in the previous church I was a 00:27:05.420 --> 00:27:10.500 part of, and some of our deacons have very much done this in St. C's in my time here. But I just 00:27:10.500 --> 00:27:16.180 remember the story, a deacon who would come to me, he came to me on several occasions, this was regular 00:27:16.180 --> 00:27:22.059 for him, but he came to me once and he would say, you know, I've been thinking, how do we start a 00:27:22.059 --> 00:27:28.840 garden service, a lawn service for the homebound in our church? Now this is in Mississippi where you're 00:27:28.839 --> 00:27:35.500 always losing to the grass, always. And he said, you know, the yards are just covered, the lawns are 00:27:35.500 --> 00:27:39.899 covered, and how do we do this? And so he worked it out and he figured it out and he gathered guys 00:27:39.899 --> 00:27:45.439 and he started regularly cutting, mowing the lawns. And this same guy came to me a while later and he 00:27:45.439 --> 00:27:52.339 said, you know, I have this idea, how could we, what if we chose a street nearby the church and we just 00:27:52.339 --> 00:27:57.899 went and started taking care of all the gardens? And we just simply said, look, this is for free 00:27:57.900 --> 00:28:03.720 and we just want you to know we're from the church down the street. We love you. We'd love to hang 00:28:03.720 --> 00:28:10.640 out anytime. And so this deacon was come and doing, let us consider, kate, kata, not kate, 00:28:10.700 --> 00:28:15.660 kate, it's a different word than that, kate, kate, no A. He was considering, he was deeply thinking, 00:28:15.740 --> 00:28:21.000 he was saying, how do we, how do we do this together? And maybe in a city group, you can say to 00:28:21.000 --> 00:28:27.060 somebody that lives in your area, I've noticed a need. How can, it's deep consideration. How could we love 00:28:27.900 --> 00:28:33.720 encourage, how could we stir up one another to love and good works in this area? Thirdly, let us 00:28:33.720 --> 00:28:38.540 consider how to stir one another up. Now we just mentioned that, but I want to highlight the word 00:28:38.540 --> 00:28:46.160 stir one another up because it's another unusual choice. And it's a word that actually has this 00:28:46.160 --> 00:28:52.400 connotation of irritate. So it says, how do we irritate one another to love and good works? 00:28:52.400 --> 00:28:59.759 And that's maybe what I'm doing to you now. I'm saying, you know, have you, are you talking to 00:28:59.759 --> 00:29:04.780 anybody in the church about your faith? Are you talking to anybody about God? Are you saying to 00:29:04.780 --> 00:29:09.380 your neighbor that lives down the street from you, that's a believer, how could we have a dinner with 00:29:09.380 --> 00:29:13.780 our neighbor that we've never met before? Are you stirring one another up and irritating one another 00:29:13.780 --> 00:29:18.380 to love and good works? And so when I come and irritate you or somebody else irritates you, 00:29:18.380 --> 00:29:24.840 you can just say, the Bible tells me so I'm supposed to do this, right? You're being asked to irritate, 00:29:24.920 --> 00:29:31.580 to really keep coming at it and keep thinking about how to get one another to love, to do love and good 00:29:31.580 --> 00:29:37.320 works together. And then lastly, and this is implied in verse 25, let us not neglect to meet together. 00:29:37.780 --> 00:29:45.500 Let us instead encourage one another. That's a famous word. Sometimes English book titles will have 00:29:45.500 --> 00:29:50.900 the title of that Greek word, perakaleo, to come alongside one another. It really is the word for 00:29:50.900 --> 00:29:57.180 counseling. So this has the connotation of actually considering people who might have real need in the 00:29:57.180 --> 00:30:02.339 congregation and saying, how can I encourage them counseling, meeting their needs physically, 00:30:02.480 --> 00:30:07.079 materially, spiritually, emotionally. That's really the heartbeat of the word. Let us come and encourage 00:30:07.079 --> 00:30:13.299 one another. And he says this, why? Because the day is drawing near. And we'll conclude with this. 00:30:13.299 --> 00:30:19.519 He's saying, don't be an aggregation, be a congregation because the day is drawing near. 00:30:19.839 --> 00:30:26.399 The day where you will draw all the way in, draw near to God behind the curtain, that day is coming. 00:30:27.659 --> 00:30:34.019 And so be a witness unto that day now in this life, because it won't be long. It won't be long 00:30:34.019 --> 00:30:39.680 till we enter all the way in. We see Jesus Christ, we see God, and we do so side by side, shoulder to 00:30:39.680 --> 00:30:44.680 shoulder together in the holy temple that he brings down. He's saying, the day is coming. So today, 00:30:44.820 --> 00:30:49.580 witness to that reality by being a living congregation. We've got to meet up with one 00:30:49.580 --> 00:30:55.019 another. We've got to know one another. We've got to irritate one another to help each other get to 00:30:55.019 --> 00:31:05.120 love and good works. Jesus Christ, by the power of his blood, has created a way for you 00:31:05.119 --> 00:31:11.199 to go all the way in to the very thing you were made for, the presence of God, to be known, 00:31:11.439 --> 00:31:17.279 to be loved, and to do it together. And that's a congregation. That's what we are. That's what 00:31:17.279 --> 00:31:23.319 membership really is. Let's pray. Father, we ask that you would make us a congregation. We ask, 00:31:23.459 --> 00:31:27.879 Lord, that you would help us to love one another, to stir up one another, to love in good works, 00:31:27.919 --> 00:31:34.139 even to irritate one another to love in good works. And we recognize, Lord, our imperfections in this, 00:31:34.140 --> 00:31:42.020 our lack, our longing to be individuals, our longing to be so attached to our screens that 00:31:42.020 --> 00:31:49.060 we don't know each other well. And so I'm so thankful before you, Lord, that there are so many 00:31:49.060 --> 00:31:56.680 people in this room now that do love one another so well and do congregate so well and do irritate 00:31:56.680 --> 00:32:02.000 one another toward love and good works so well. So I thank you, Lord, for the health of that at 00:32:02.000 --> 00:32:07.740 St. Columbus. But we know we're not perfect. We know that we can always tend to aggregate instead 00:32:07.740 --> 00:32:13.000 of congregate. So we ask, Lord, that even now in tea and coffee, you would help us to long to know 00:32:13.000 --> 00:32:18.720 one another and to do it as worshipers of our living God. And we pray this in Christ's name. Amen.