Scripture and Our Great High Priest (Part A)

In making us product of his environment and the spirit. Don't dismiss it when you think you know waiting for example, one thing that bothers me about waiting is that I might be waiting for not I might be waiting for something that I am not impressed with was not my business.

I have to guard against that I have to understand it is your will be done, not my will be done and be committed to that, whether I like it or not this is cross reference radio with our pastor and teacher Rick Gaston. Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville.

Pastor Rick is currently teaching through the book of Hebrews. Please stay with us after today's message to hear more information about cross reference radio, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching, but for now let's join Pastor Ricky in the book of Hebrews chapter 4. As he begins a brand-new study called Scripture and our great high priest, we will begin at verse 1111 through verse 16 turn there in your Bibles. Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to same example of disobedience. The word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of the soul in the spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

There is no creature hidden from his site, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of him to whom we must give account. Seeing then that we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus son of God, let us hold fast our confession but we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. While we look at the 11 verse again where the writer is continuing making his point and again we will be reminding ourselves of this throughout our study in Hebrews that he is telling them he is warning them, you cannot mix Christianity with anything else and still be left with Christianity. If you try. Then you will forfeit whatever gains you made in Christ you will lose it all and so he is telling them throughout. He started off saying in the second chapter in the first verse of the second chapter. He encourage them.

He said therefore we must give the more earnest heed to the things we have heard, lest we drift away and then he went on to tell them about the Jews who fell short of entering into the promised land because they did not believe any use that is is backdrop to make his point and so he's continuing that that's why he says let us therefore joining what he is about to say with what he has already been saying I would may take us several months to go through Hebrews, but that's not how it was written you could probably read through and about 15 minutes. I don't think you'll make it because if you're anything like I am when I read the Scripture I stop and I think it starts to penetrate, it starts to dig into me causes me to stop. It would take a discipline to read through without pause.

So he says let us therefore be diligent to enter that restless anyone fall according to the same examples of disobedience so he tells them to be zealous for Christ and not Judaism. Magnificent advice to tell them to be diligent were not all diligent because of our fallen nature, we tend to be sluggish. Too often we benefit from encouragement from someone coming along, especially someone we admire or respect and nudging us along, telling us to be watchful and work not one without the other.

Diligence involves both to be careful and to labor some work hard are not careful enough they can cause problems. That way you employers of others you know this firsthand. Some are careful, but they're not hard-working enough so the writer says be both strike this balance.

Be diligent, therefore remembering the things that happen to those who do not believe as a Christian recovered.

This will ribbon talking about this a little bit from our study in Chronicles on Wednesday nights. As Christians, do we pray God, may I not cause pain, not conviction. The time one time when it's time to convict with truth and gentleness. That's not the same thing is hurting someone to be diligent in our prayers to be mindful of such examples from the Scripture and to draw them as we would go to a well to draw water and to say the Lord in our prayer Lord, that I would not cause pain. She would expand my territory but I would not be this recluse that I would not have these gifts which have no use because I have drawn my lines made my borders myself. No, I'd rather Lord you expand my territory. Well, that's how Jabez prayer and that's a diligent prayer.

It's a little off the trail from what the writer to Hebrews is saying to his audience because he saying don't you depart from Christ, but I'm taking the opportunity to say let's be diligent in our walk with Christ says to enter that rest is heaven even say that these gone to his resting place.

One day I will rest from all the troubles in this world and that rest will fully be realized.

We are diligent and stay the course. Lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience. Israel is very blunt.

He comes right out and says he is telling them the stakes are too high to not be diligent falling short of the promised land dropping dead in the wilderness, they did not enter in, says I don't want you to be that when we say the same thing to someone who is on a course away from God.

That's where they were so is bringing them back as best you can and he's going to hit it when we get to chapter 6, he is going to slam it, we won't get there this morning. Verse 12 for the word of God is living and powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of the soul in the spirit and the joints and the marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

I think it helps to remember that he is essentially talking about the Old Testament we have a greater revelation now is we have a fuller revelation does not reduce the size of the Old Testament. It just because it it all to shine brighter. What God has to say cannot be steam esteemed enough by any preacher of the gospel.

A preacher from the pulpit. It's just too big. But in our attempt to do so we get a lot of work done. We damage the causes of hell by preaching the word in line with trying to live up to it. Also, just preach the word is not enough. We must be diligent, we must work hard and be careful ourselves. This preaching is good for us. We need to hear it.

You won't find it outside the church like this.

Where else can you gather a bunch of people listening to the word of God being preached at the same time subconsciously even aware that their brothers and sisters around them are being ministered to by the same Holy Spirit who authored the word of God and who is ministering the word of God.

Ministry of the word is more than just preaching. It's doing something with it. He says that the word of God is living.

It is alive with meaning with purpose, with application with truth with results with prophecy, with eternal life.

The recipe for eternal life. Here is what David said, that great Old Testament articulate of the Scripture.

Psalm 19 verses 10, 11, sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. Moreover by them your servant is warned and in keeping them there is great reward. That's what he's telling that's what the writer to Hebrews is telling is his audience.

The word of God is living and it is powerful that sharper than any two-edged sword New Testament balls is all Scripture is given by inspiration of God, it is God breathed as God put life into Adam. He formed them out of the click and he breathed into him and his Dustin deity in that sense word of God. Just words until God breathes into those words. Now it becomes Scripture, it is profitable for doctrine, that's right thinking or reproof that is correcting wrong thinking, for instruction in righteousness and that is how to pull it off.

The man of God may be what complete the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work the right gear the right training right timing the right usage of these things we don't we don't live in the presence of miracles as the parting of the Red Sea or Eliza being Eliza being taken up in a chariot of fire. It is those quiet times, those still times when apparently nothing is going on, that God is still working in us making us a product of his environment.

In the spirit.

Don't dismiss it when you think you know waiting for example, one thing that bothers me about waiting is that I might be waiting for nothing. I might be waiting for something that I am not impressed with was not my business. I have to guard against that I have to understand it is your will be done, not my will be done and be committed to that, whether I like it or not, that God can do with me whatever he wants to do with me doesn't have to be merciful to me, and I'm greatly delighted that he is what I I also understand he is so high and so lifted up the doesn't have to be. But he does because he is obligated himself and that just draws me more to wait for him to be patient knowing that he knows what he is doing his word is taught me this and, in that it is alive the mention of the word of God.

It should produce feelings in the believer of warmth and hope and excitement should stir us even on a lower's moments. Psalm 119 verse 103. How sweet are your words to my taste sweeter than honey to my mouth. Job have not departed from the commandment of his lips. I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my necessary food. We need food we all know that. He says the word of God is powerful again so powerful that it damages the course of the devil. The work of Satan, the word of God does damage to that causes the guilty to squirm in their seats at the hearing of the word of God makes enemies even of some professed Christians by simply preaching it and upholding it. It is powerful is the word of God. That said, let there be height and there was light. Sharper than any two-edged sword. Now, this sharpness means the Bible cuts deep into the guilty and the innocent alike, and the innocent in this sense, there are innocent souls that feel guilty over things they've not done in the word of God comes and relieves them of that. It cuts in and says no this is not humility. I cannot use you this way. I need you to understand right and wrong to be a discerner of that which is good for you and bad. Good for others, in good and and bad for others, as the case may be, God's word cuts deep into the conscience is no sword like there's nothing like the word of God because Rick cuts it offers eternity. Nothing else can do that, not eternity in heaven is double-edged sword for the battlefield. This life is the battlefield is Dozier a W Dozier was often saying this life is not a playground it's a battleground.

I don't like that but it's true I can get away from. Therefore, I have to stock up for it, train and retrain buildup.

The arsenal, the inner man in the spirit make sure my sword is sharp and ready to be released when necessary. Sword is an excellent metaphor for God's word. Ephesians 617 take in addition to the other parts of the Christian gear course, the helmet of salvation, the breastplate of righteousness, the shield of faith, the feet shod with the gospel. Take the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God. Unquote many Christians believes it more of a pocketknife than a sword. How many how many people are in pulpits this very moment, who simply don't believe that they may have some respect. They claim to have respect for the Bible call themselves churches have a cross here.

There they don't believe it. They don't believe that the word of God is living and powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword, so they don't preach a preach with universities.

Tell them to preach, preach what the cultures telling them the preach. They preach what they think the people in the pew. One heard from the pulpit. I have no idea what you want to hear. Overall, those of you. I know that love the Lord, I know you want to hear the word but I don't know what applications to make II asked God what he wanted to say and he unfolds it and presses it. Next thing I know it's there and that's how we conduct the ministry one way the ministry of the word. Nothing about a sword, especially a double edge sword is that there is very little of anything humorous about it, especially when it is unsheathed. It is a serious tool. The facts of Scripture are just like that.

They are a threat to everything evil in me and outside of me in the spirit and in the flesh word of God goes against those things. Word of God and as a sword is both offensive or defensive.

You can use it to shield intact, or you can use it to make an attack, it is necessary for both. We should learn to do both those who use the word of God and also be cut by the word of God is double edged. It speaks of the church militant that the church militant will be the church victorious.

If she has her sort. It speaks of a holy war, not physical violence, never that spiritual violence to destroy the works of principalities and powers in spiritual wickedness in high places to come against them. Psalm 149 verse six. Let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a two edge sword in their hand. The psalmist may have been speaking about violence also saying let us praise the Lord and defend the land of the Lord and under the Old Testament economy that was totally permissible but in the New Testament we are not looking to cut people with a sort of violence except to say violence to those ideas to the lies of hell to those ideas that can't are contrary and offensive to God. Taking every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ Jesus. Paul said in second Corinthians 10. So, the enemies of the church are not flesh and blood, wickedness, wickedness out of the mouths of the lost wickedness in the hearts of the loss wickedness of our own flesh.

But take sword to it. Scripture, where would we be without aware when you are saved, be without God's word, and maybe, maybe there is someone here who is not a Christian and you think this is just rhetoric you think is just an alternate view.

I hate for you to find out the hard way that your raw you have an opportunity to find out the sweet as honey way or perish in your sin.

The enemies of the church never been a shortage of them. There won't be till Christ returns and purges the world of them.

But for now they are here in our primary weapon is the sword you can have people that are into praying and into doing good things, but that they have departed from the expressed will of God, which only comes to us through his word is the final authority than you have a problem.

You can find people in other religions that want to do humanistic things sort of goodness towards humanity that can pray can cut themselves and flog themselves in this way or that, but is totally disinterested in the word of God that cuts that is powerful. Proverbs tells us Satan has a double-edged sword to is looking to cut you with it.

Also, speaking of the immoral woman could be just the immoral person but in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword. Proverbs 405. Verse four is piercing.

That means it gets in there penetrates you know the three wounds.

The puncture the laceration and the abrasion the punctures. The worst one gets in, and well, of course, by degree, but the soul and the spirit are pierced. That's where life resides well for some some just have a soul there. They only part of them alive other than their flashes that part that interact with other human beings, but they had no interaction with God because this spirit is dead, and that they think they do. It's a false God because they're not rightly related. They are not born again that's offensive to those who object to the gospel offended you will be God as offended and return. You know those people who act like there offended that everything out. Are they that dense. Do they not understand that they too can be an offense to someone but is all about them right. Well, it's not all about me as it should be well the part of us that deals with God is the spirit and in view are not born again the spirit is dead and you are dead in your sin, but when God when you're born again when God touches you from a God above you come to life. Your spirit is alive now and he divides these things.

He separates them. There'd been there very detailed and complex to us but not to God, people are even Christians. The best of us are very complex at times, but not to God we were created as a mention from the dust and then God breathed into us, his life, he gave us life that he has any offers to us to the identical eternity going forward that he has and he invites all to come and get it in those again who don't are judged. He says of the joints and the marrow. There are the intricate details.

Scripture finds no part of us unreachable when talking about the Bible and the writer is saying to the Jews therefore be diligent to remember your Scripture as I've been calling to you too. You've been thinking about going back to the temple to offer sheep when Christ was crucified for you. You better pay attention to the word of God because therein are the blessings and the judgments.

It is a discerner that Greek word crit E costs means it is a critic we get our English word critic from that Greek word there are those who think that they are criticizing the Scripture, but in the end, the Scriptures, criticizing them, it is the supreme critic and that's how it penetrates the Bible says, out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. And what is in the heart defiles the man you read those words and you can't help but saying that is true.

I don't need a scientist to tell me that I don't need a preacher to tell me that I know it's true. My own experience my own heart.

God's word judgment. No matter what they say or think God's word judges them and, in that it is living and it is powerful.

It is sharper than any two-edged sword, pierces even to the division of the soul and the spirit, and of the joints and of the Morrow cuts all the way through, if necessary, it will several limbs if necessary.

Verse 13 pausing a moment. Remember we said there's nothing humorous about a sword unsheathed when someone pulls a pistol on you.

It's not ha ha that's funny sword in a pistol. The only difference between the two really is distance one can cut a thousand feet away. The other cannot. Well, maybe thousand feet of derringer that still has a greater reach verse 13.

Well let me close that C how what we talking about Scripture is serious business just as serious as someone pulling a weapon God's word is a weapon on sin and if you are enjoying sin, you have not repented about it. You are careless about a relationship with Christ that sword is drawn on you. You've been listening to cross reference radio the daily radio ministry of Pastor Rick asked Calvary Chapel in Mechanicsville, Virginia. As we mentioned at the beginning of today's broadcast.

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