Book: Hebrews

Full Transcript:

Let’s take our Bibles this morning and turn to Hebrews 13, which is the last message we’ll do in Hebrews. I feel like I’m leaving an old friend here, since it’s been a really rich study for me that helped me grow in the Lord in understanding many Old Testament passages and how they relate to the sacrifices and Christ. It all points to one Person, and we’re looking for our glorious future as believers as we dwell in the city whose Maker and Builder is God.

This is the end of the message to the Hebrews. The writer leaves us with a reminder that as we run the Christian race and grow in our knowledge of God and His promises, and our faith increases, our we can hold fast to the testimony that we have in Jesus Christ. We are not done yet. We will still have a continual need for paying attention to the Word of exhortation. We will still continue to have a need for taking notice and greeting fellow believers, and we will continue to need to think of and practice God’s grace.

Let’s read the passage, Hebrews 13:22-25 says:

But I urge you, brethren, bear with this word of exhortation, for I have written to you briefly. Take notice that our brother Timothy has been released, with whom, if he comes soon, I will see you. Greet all of your leaders and all the saints. Those from Italy greet you. Grace be with you all.

That’s the end of this book. While I was in Hebrews 12:1, just look there for a moment, the Scripture brought to our attention that the Christian life is very similar to a race. It says:

Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.

The nature of this race is that you and I are in it the moment we come to Christ. We are in it to give all our effort to crossing the finish line. But remember, it is not a race to determine how fast you run. Neither is it a race that is competition with others, which determines success or failure in reaching the goal. The point of the race is not the one who finishes first. The point of the race rather, is that you simply finish regardless of the number you come in. According to Hebrews, you must finish with endurance. And truth is what gives you endurance, your relationship with Christ, the Spirit of God, all give you endurance.

We need to think of the Christian life as a foot race or like a cross-country race, than any other kind of race. If you’ve ever run cross-country, there are always ditches and holes and fields that you have to run through. There are protruding rights and inclines and declines, and other obstacles of all kind. This is really how the Christian life is. The purpose of the race is just to finish the course despite hardships, exhaustion, aging, pain. Part of running the race well is removing those things which slow you down and hinder you from making good progress.

There are things you will need to continue in so that you endure until the end and finish the Christian race well. That’s how we kind of ends the book. I already mentioned them but we’ll take a closer look now. In Hebrews 13:22, that author says to the audience that they have a continual need for paying attention to the Word of exhortation. The verse says:

But I urge you, brethren, bear with this word of exhortation, for I have written to you briefly.

In other words he is saying to us that he has taken major theological topics and just barely skimmed the surface in his writing. He encourages them that those who have been urged have found the course disagreeable, and they might lose out on the benefits of what is being taught. But it is a general exhortation to all believers that we can never get along with the Word. So he presses us yet with another imperative and that word right there bear with is the imperative. Scripture is called us not only to hear the message of the Word of God, but also to pay attention to it’s details.

Along the way, you have to ask yourself this question, about what practical difference has this message made in your daily Christian experience? What has changed in your life since hearing the Word of God? We should always be asking ourselves that question, no matter when you’re taught something or what book you are in.

Has it encouraged you not to forsake the assembling of yourself together as a manner that some have. Has it struck fear in your heart by its warnings? Has it caused to well up with joy in your heart because of its promises? Has it convicted you of the exclusiveness of faith in Christ alone for salvation? Has it provided you to open your heart more and more towards those who are in need to provide generosity and hospitality when it comes to your attention? Has it caused you to consider the shortness of your life and that earth is not your permanent home but that you are heading towards your permanent home? Has it made you loosen your heart’s grip on possessions and things and caused you to be content with what you already have? Has it moved you to pray with an open and sincere heart before the Lord and be honest with Him? Has it caused you to appreciate the extent to which the Lord went in order to supply you with full and final salvation. Has it taken you to glory? Has it caused you to stand in the middle of the city whose Builder and Maker is God? Has its teaching helped you to grasp the supremacy of Christ and moved you to humble yourself in reverent worship?

The Word of God should have done all this and more, because an exhortation like the book of Hebrews does this. It is designed to stir you up to unceasing watchfulness, especially against your own back sliding and caused you to press on in this race after Christ to the goal of Christian hope. Therefore we ought to accept and ponder its message. We ought to obey its message, and warnings, and instructions, and exhortations. Why? Because it applies to you. When you stop listening, you start doing your own thing. In other words, you start living for yourself again.

See we could never be done with the Word of exhortation and the preaching of the Word of God. That’s a continual thing that must always be present in the life of a believer no matter who you are, where you are, how long you have lived, etc. You’ll never get to the place where you know it all and where God is done with your sanctification. You’ll never get to that place because right from sanctification you go to glorification, and only then will you be perfect. But that’s God’s choice, not yours. So you’re never done!

But that’s a good thing because we need the Word of God. It’s the important ingredient that we can never get away from. The second thing I want you to notice is that we should be greeting fellow believers. Look at Hebrews 13:23:

Take notice that our brother Timothy has been released, with whom, if he comes soon, I will see you.

This is an imperative to notice! And then in verse 24 it says:

Greet all of your leaders and all the saints. Those from Italy greet you.

He is saying to them at the end that he wants them to take these two imperatives and practice them in their lives because if we don’t take notice of other people, who will? He mentions a person to take notice of, who is Timothy their brother. Timothy is a pastor and evangelist, and probably currently in jail for preaching the gospel. The intention and emphasis here is that this Hebrew church had something to do with Timothy’s release, either by prayers or action or both. It’s the church that ought to pay attention to those who are downcast and have been afflicted and inflicted. We need to pay attention to those that others don’t take notice of. Especially for someone who ends up in jail for preaching the gospel.

As a matter of fact, anybody can be incarcerated. Even if it’s because of their own sin, we ought to take notice of them because if we don’t as a church no one will. Just for example, I recently received a letter from a young man that I knew in the past that came to our church as a Rutgers college student. He came to know the Lord back 15 or more years ago. Then he back slid and gotten away from Him and ended up leaving the church in the wrong way.

I lost track of him and tried to contact him a few times. But I learned that when people don’t want to be contacted, they know how to stay at an arm’s length and even become invisible. That’s what he did. We couldn’t reach him and I recently received a letter from him in last December, right after Christmas. And when I opened it there was a handwritten letter. I want to read a part of it to you. It says:

“Greetings to you in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Please forgive me for leaving the church in the manner that I did and that I have not been in contact with you for so many years. I humbly ask that you will please forgive me. I hope and pray that you and your family, and all that are at Calvary are well.”

That was from fifteen years ago. I haven’t heard from him or talked with him since. He tried to call me one time but it didn’t work out and I happened to lose my phone’s numbers, and one of them was his. Obviously, the Lord didn’t want me to talk to him at that point. But it shows signs of righteous behavior in this particular letter. I thought to myself that it looks like the Lord got a hold of his life and brought him back to himself. I was reminded of the passage of Scripture in Hebrews 12:8-11 which is on God’s discipline. It says this:

But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may share His holiness. All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.

It seems like the Lord got a hold of him and was disciplining him. I did not mention to you that this came from Safford, Arizona, which is the home of the Federal Correction Institute, of which he is a resident. This young man fell in with the wrong people and was led away by his own passions and desires of the flesh and ended up committing a federal crime and got caught. Now he is doing time for his crime and he is receiving justice.

After receiving that letter, I could say to myself that I’m glad he is doing better and that God has a hold of him. But he is in prison and if we don’t take notice of him, who will? I didn’t give you his name purposefully because I want to write a letter and then give it to you. Then I want everyone to write. He is going to get more mail there while incarcerated during a 4 year time than anybody else. I pray that will happen.

In our culture, that claims general goodness of him, he and people like him are considered human trash. They’re considered the lowest of the low. But the human view of goodness is upside down and backwards. According to the Old Testament in Psalms 14:3, it says:

There is no one who does good, not even one.

Well Paul picks that up in the New Testament in Romans 3:23 by adding:

All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

As Christians we understand at the end of the day that we are in the same boat. We are no better than the vilest offenders. Do you see yourself like that? Are you being corrected in your mind as to who you really are? We ought to see ourselves through the lens of Scripture. The difference is that we have a hope, an assurance that we have been forgiven by God through Christ Jesus. But what about those who are locked up? Who will give them hope? Do they deserve a second chance? Maybe the world says no but the church says yes. As long as they have red blood running through their veins, they have a second chance. They blew it and got caught. They are incarcerated and did things that are wicked.

But remember Hebrews 10:34 says:

You showed sympathy to the prisoners.

And one of the prisoners could have been Timothy and that’s why he brings it up at the end. They prayed for him, they had something to do with his release. Now this young man that I was talking about further wrote this:

“I will gladly share as factually as I am able, the events that have led up to me being here and how God has exceedingly graciously been working in me over these years and still now.”

God’s got His hand over him and is keeping him. If God has to bring someone to a situation like that, that’s God’s grace. He is recognizing that, which is huge!

So he has something to do with us and we ought to take notice of him. If we don’t, no one else will. Maybe his family will, but that’s it. So I will a letter addressed to him, and then I will make his address available to you. Some of you know him, but I know him and I pray that you would come to know him too.

So he is saying in this passage of Scripture to take notice, that’s a command. In other words, don’t just live for yourself in your own little world. If you know all this stuff and God’s been gracious to give you this knowledge, you are hugely responsible. You can’t just stick your tail between your legs and walk out the door as if you don’t know anything. You’re part of the Church now, which ought to be different. Part of being different is noticing people, especially those who have been knocked from pillar to post in this world by their own family and sin.

In the passage of Scripture, the writer says that he will come with Timothy if no one notices him. It seems very Pauline at the end here, and some people think that Paul wrote Hebrews. I don’t think he did, I think Apollos wrote it. Remember Apollos and Timothy and Paul were all together ministering. Therefore the writer says that he will come with Timothy. Then he says in Hebrews 13:24:

Greet all of your leaders and all the saints. Those from Italy greet you.

This is the third time that he is talking about leadership and I think the point here is to express kind and respectful attention towards those who bear an office in the church. In other words, they are God’s gift to you. So the attitude that you should have towards them should be one of welcoming and greeting. That should include praying for them, lifting them up, and encouraging them.

And then he says in the verse that we should take notice of those who are downcast, the leaders, and finally all the saints in and outside of the congregation. From time to time their names are going to come up for some reason. And I love how he uses the word saints, which means separated ones. If you don’t believe it, well you are a saint if you know Christ. You are set apart by God for Himself, and from this world and from this darkness. And you are devoted now to love and fear the service of God and His Son and people. We are to welcome the true members of the visible church, wherever they are and wherever they come from.

Then he says for the readers to have mutual regard for everyone because those in Italy greet them. How true it is that Christianity breaks down social behaviors and melts all kinds of prejudices. The Christians in Italy are contacting a Hebrew church. Gentiles are greening a Hebrew church. You know that the Romans and Jews did not get along. But here you have Italians and Hebrews, who were accustomed to regarding each other with contempt and hatred. But in Christ Jesus, there is neither Jew, Roman, Italian, nor Hebrew. All are one in Christ. There is no such thing as skin color that divide people. When we become believers, we become one group.

If I think of our own congregation, we have Jamaicans, Hawaiians, Islanders, Brazilians, Chileans, Puerto Ricans, Hispanics, African Americans, Italians, Thai, Taiwanese, Korean, Arabian, Jewish, Philippino, English, Irish, Scot, Slovakian, German, and Polish. The last one is me. But you know what? None of those things should matter in Christ, for everything is broken down in Him. We are just like each other and we have a common bond.

I think what he is saying here at the end is that all the barriers break down, whether social, political, or otherwise. It should melt down all kinds of prejudices in the church until there are none left. That’s what the church is about and that’s what Christ does in your heart. If you come from a particularly prejudiced type of family, whether they are social or passed down, in Christ those things are going to be broken down. Until you no longer see people as black, white, yellow, or any other nationality or color.

It’s neat to have fellowship with people who are so different from you in their mannerisms and in the way they speak and what they eat. I think it’s exciting to meet people from all different cultures and learn from them. We are to take notice of other believers who they are, how God is working in their lives, and how can we pray for and help them. That is what we ought to do.

But then there is one more thing we should do. We should have a continual need, not only for the Word of exhortation, but also for taking notice of others regardless of who they are. And then lastly we have a continual need of thinking of and practicing God’s grace in Hebrews 13:25:

Grace be with you all.

Grace or favor is often used as a fixed formula at the beginning and end of Christian letters, and it is so in this passage. But you have to ask yourself why should grace be with you? Why is it so important? We must always be thinking about and practicing God’s grace. If we’re going to endure this race together, then we have to remember and practice God’s grace, the divine sovereign, kindness of God. May you always be ready to recall the proofs of His particular love and care for you because His loving kindness is better than life.

But you know what? One of the most misunderstood things in the Christian life is this very word grace. I am still learning about it. Now I want to bring to your attention what the writer of Hebrews does with this word grace. He mentions it seven times in different contexts.

But before I go through them, I want to step back a bit so that you may once again, grasp an understanding of the risky business of the full impact of God’s grace. And that you would do so in order to hedge against the temptation to become grace abusers or grace killers.

We must go back to the doctrine of justification. The definition of justification is the sovereign act of God whereby He declares righteous the believing sinner, while still in his sinning state. I’m stressing the sinning part of God’s work in justification. It doesn’t meant that the believer stops sinning once the become believers. And it doesn’t meant that the believer becomes righteous in the sense that they suddenly become perpetually perfect. The sinner is declared righteous by God. He sovereignly bestows the gift of eternal life on the sinner at the moment he believes.

Thereby He declares the sinner righteous while the sinner lives a life marked by periodic times of sinfulness. An example is of a person who hasn’t joined the church yet, hasn’t been baptized, hasn’t started giving, or live a sacrificial and pure life yet. He has simply taken the gift of eternal life, seen himself a sinner needing salvation from Christ. His mind has been changed in regard to Christ and he has trusted him by faith, which is repentance. He has received the free gift of God apart from any works that he can offer, and the transaction is complete!

By grace, through faith alone, God declares the sinner righteous. That’s justification. From the moment of justification, the moment a sinner is justified, he begins the process of growth through maturity. That is sanctification. And little by little, he learns to lead a life that honors God. It’s a whole process.

Justification means even though someone still periodically sins, and find themselves unable to stop sinning on a permanent basis, God declares him righteous when he believes. That has everything to do with God’s grace and graceliving. You and I will continue to sin from time to time. Therefore we should have all the more reason to be grateful for God’s grace. As a sinner, our only hope for survival is grace.

Just imagine that you have a six year old son whom you love dearly. Tragically one day you discover that your son was horribly murdered. After a lengthy search, the investigators of the crime find the killer. At that point you have a choice, if you use every means in your power to kill the murderer, that would be vengeance. And God says that vengeances is His and He will repay. If however, your content to sit back and let the legal authorities take over and execute over him what is proper including a fair trial, a plea of guilty, capital punishment, that would be justice. God allows us to get justice in the world through our system.

But if you should plead for the pardon of the murderer, if you should forgive him completely and invite him in your home. If you should adopt him as your son, that is grace! God’s grace is risky. Yet that is what God does every single time someone comes to faith in Christ. He takes a condemned, guilty, believing sinner who says that he is lost and unworthy and guilty as charged. And God extends the free gift of eternal life because of Christ’s death on the cross and because His death has satisfied God’s demands against sin. God sees the guilty sinner who becomes by with alone as righteous as His own Son. In fact, He even invites us to come home with Him and adopts us into His forever family. Instead of treating us with vengeance or executing justice, God extends grace. I find that no explanation can cause us to fully grasp God’s grace and what He actually did for us!

If you’re not grasping grace, you’re either going to fall into the category of being a grace killer, and some people call that legalism. And someone who is legalistic in their thinking always emphasizes works over grace. They opt for giving lists of dos and don’ts, whether it’s personal or traditional. It is up to them, in their mind, to earn God’s acceptance. But God has already accepted them, which is justification. There’s nothing you and I can do to gain God’s favor or grace.

Also a grace killer leaves no room for gray areas. Fellowship is based on whether there is full agreement. Rigid standards are more important than relationships. Grace killers try to work off sin. And when they do that, they have misunderstood and move away from what the Bible says about God’s grace.

Grace abusers are people who give license to their sin. They go too far and set aside all self-control. They take their liberty to an extreme so that they end up serving sin again. Like what Paul says in Romans 6:15:

What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? May it never be!

Grace abusers blow off sin. Both of those ideologies are wrong. You can’t work off sin, or you’ll try to add to the work of Christ on the cross. And you can’t blow off sin because now you are a believer in God’s family and God’s not saying you have to do this, but He is putting in your heart a desire to want to do this and love Him and serve Him out of gratitude and thankfulness.

That’s why the Bible always emphasizes graduated and thanksgiving because when you are thankful, you are definitely gracious in your expression of praise to God for what He has done for you. You are hedging against being a grace abuser or a grace killer.

God has saved us to such an extent that we can’t do anything at all to add to it. Now, let me just take you to the seven occurrences that is used in Hebrews for this word grace. In Hebrews 2:9, when expounding on the work of Christ, the writer of Hebrews says this:

But we do see Him who was made for a little while lower than the angels, namely, Jesus, because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, so that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone.

So even in the work of Christ and in dying for sinner, it is God’s grace that moves Him to be as sacrifice for His children. In Hebrews 4:16 when we are invited to pray, we are reminded of God’s grace where it says this:

Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Even when we are prodded to pray, what is the overarching word? Grace. When Scripture expounds perils of apostasy, we are reminded of the seriousness of falling backward away from Christ. It says in Hebrews 10:29:

How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace?

In other words, God’s Spirit who is offering to you freely God’s salvation, people just blow it off. You know there is no forgiveness of sin for people who do that. When Scripture warns the congregation to make sure that no one falls short of the grace of God. Hebrews 12:15 says:

See to it that no one comes short of the grace of God; that no root of bitterness springing up causes trouble, and by it many be defiled.

In other words, we begin this life of faith by God’s saving grace, and only by grace can we move forward and continue. The author is concerned that no one in the race will fall behind and turn aside from the prize that is set before them. The passage there is speaking of the absolute and disastrous eventuality of cutting oneself off from the grace of God. Instead of being carried forward by God’s grace, this person turns from it and is left behind and lost.

Not believing in Moses is one thing, but not believing in Jesus Christ is quite another. Not believing in the greater than Moses, the faithful Apostle and High Priest Jesus Christ is ruinous to someone’s eternity.

When we are called to thankfulness, the author brings up the word grace again in Hebrews 12:28-29:

Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe; for our God is a consuming fire.

In other words, grace is the practical application of goodwill, a sign of favor. It is a gift that God gives us and in turn we give to others and practice in our lives ourselves. Scripture reminds us in Hebrews 13:9 that the only to be strengthened in this race is by grace:

Do not be carried away by varied and strange teachings; for it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace.

In other words this is especially in light of the works based teaching of false teachers. They are trying to get you to do something by false ideas, which is not by grace. Keep returning to the idea of grace, what the Lord has done for you, and that it is completely free! The Christian life is not an easy one, but we are not left to fend for ourselves. We are regularly reminded in Scripture that we have a God who is generous, kind and will meet all His people’s needs. That is what Hebrews teaches us.

We find as we grow in our knowledge of God, and as we grow in our faith in Him, that when we depend on grace we cannot be shaken. When we live like this, we will keep running until we finish. I believe that we have embarked on a journey that has brought us to a place in which we all have the opportunity to once again fall in love with our Lord Jesus Christ and come to worship Him more consistently and deeply than ever before.

I pray that if this study has done that in some way, I praise God for that. But also if you didn’t really know Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior, that by this study you were led to faith by repentance and His Word. If you have, then let somebody know about that. Talk to someone about what you have learned. My prayer for you today is that you will know forever and follow Him all the days of your life.

If you do not know Him, I pray you would come to know Him. If you did know Him, I pray that your understanding of the supremacy of Christ would become clearer and more solidified in your heart and mind than ever before. So the writer ends it by saying: Grace be with you all.

Well, remember he does say this. When we are running the race, it will be by faith. He says for us to run and endure to the end and finish well. It doesn’t say that we will finish perfectly. The direction of our lives is to please God with our heart, mind, and soul. We need to pay attention to what God says in His Word. We need to take notice of others, and when we do we hedge against the sin of selfishness and self-centeredness. We need to think of and practice grace. When we do, we will think of sin seriously and we will hedge against being grace killers or grace abusers. If we do that, we will run the race well. That’s why he ends with, grace be with you all. That’s what we need more than anything while we run this race. Never forget that.

Let’s pray. Lord thank You this morning for Your kindness to us. Thank You, Lord, for Your divine graciousness to us. We know from reading the Word of God that we don’t deserve Your grace. Because You are a gracious God, You give it to us and You have done everything possible to secure the offer You make to us as free. You do that through Your Son Jesus Christ, who has the supremacy of all persons and things, in Heaven and earth and through all creation. Seen and unseen, there is no one like Jesus Christ. There is no one like Your Son and we praise You for that and for the understanding we have of that.

I pray that as we walk out and live our Christian life, as we run this Christian race, we would remember our responsibility. I pray that we would remember our needs and I pray that we would continue and that we would be challenged by the Word of God so that it would increase our faith and cause us to endure the race that is set before us. I pray that we would not have our eyes on ourselves, but on You and others. I pray that we would see the needs of others and that we would want to meet them and share in the lives of others. I pray that we would also see that need of the unmerited favor of God that has been given to us through Christ Jesus. I pray that we would realize that we can easily slip onto one side or the other. I pray that You would give us balance and that Your Word would strengthen us. As we do that, Lord, I pray that Your Spirit would take hold of us and would continue that sanctifying process. If need be that You must discipline us, please do so in order that we may share in Your grace.

Thank You, Lord, again for this time, for this book, for all that You have taught in it and worked in the hearts of Your children. I pray that now we would learn to live and desire to live in the glory of Your great Name. I pray this all in Christ and for the advancement of His Church, the evangelization of the world, and for the building up of the Church, thank You Lord, I pray this in Christ’s Name, Amen.

Full Transcript:

Alright let’s take our Bibles this morning and turn to Hebrews 13 and look at the end of this book where there is a message that was actually written to be preached. Certain circumstances took place so that the one who wrote it sent by letter instead. He was hoping to come back to his brethren and have fellowship with them.

Today we’re going to be looking at Hebrews 13:20-21, and just follow me as I read. It says:

Now the God of peace, who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant, even Jesus our Lord, equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

Let’s pray. Lord, thank You again for this tremendous privilege to be in the Word of God and to be able to see it, hear it, and think about it with our eyes, ears, and minds. It contains the very things you want us to know on this earth so we can live for the purpose in which You saved us, and so we can do Your will and please You. Lord, enable us to do that and understand that more today from this passage. I pray this in Christ’s Name, Amen.

I’ve been saying that acceptable Christian worship is that which pleases God. We already saw that the reason all believers are to offer up spiritual sacrifices, and the reasons that church leaders and congregations are to harmonize with each other, is because it pleases God. It is appropriate at the end of a correspondence like this to any church, that the most important things would not be considered for church leaders and congregations alike. These are the things that bring to light our dependence and our state as Christians. The two inseparable spiritual responsibilities that we have as a congregation are to attend earnestly to the Word of God because through it God speaks to us and teaches us. The second thing is to engage earnestly in prayer through which we speak to God. But it’s more than just speaking to God. The great need for church leaders is to be supported by the prayers of the people and their sheep.

That should always be and remain the highest important in the church. If these two things go south, then you just have a social club. These two things are the most important things in the church: prayer and preaching. What is the underlying reason though? It is so that our work for Christ can be effective and so that we can be fruit bearing. Apart from the Word of God and prayer, you cannot be fruit bearing. That is when we are mutually delighting in prayer together and mutually loving and being obedient to the Word of God. That’s when things happen. God’s Word goes out and is glorified. So we as a congregation ought to listen to God from His word, as it is preached, taught, and read. And we as a congregation ought to pray to our great God and Savior with lips of praise and thanksgiving and adoration, along with requests of all types, intercessions for others and petitions for ourselves. Why? Because Jesus Christ has a great regard for the prayers of His people. He loves when we pray and the devil laughs when we don’t. Even he knows the prayer there is in prayer when God’s people lift others up with sincere hearts to Him.

So the author of this message and those with him have humbly requested prayer because in Hebrews 13:18-19 it says:

Pray for us, for we are sure that we have a good conscience, desiring to conduct ourselves honorably in all things. And I urge you all the more to do this, so that I may be restored to you the sooner.

Obviously this writer was part of the congregation and was moved for some reason which is not given in this epistle. He wants to come back to them but knows he can if his people prays for them. We’re talking about acceptable worship here and that includes our approach to God. If anyone is going to approach God acceptably in prayer, they must have a good conscience. I covered what that was and how you are to receive it the last time. They must willingly live honestly in all things, and we also looked at that.

It should be clear in your mind what we have in Christ, which is a good conscience. And you should be clear in your mind what you are to do, which should give you a strong intention to conduct your life honorably before God. As a follower of Jesus Christ, you have been summoned to a holiness of life, which is completely different from what you knew before. That should bring you to Hebrews 12:14:

Pursue peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord.

In other words, holiness is to be prayed for. Here we saw that holiness is to be pursued. The reason that it was in that text is because holiness is required for our well-being. Remember that God’s goal when He disciplines us in the context of Hebrews 12:10 is so that we may share in His holiness. He does correct us, drives out the sin that is in us, but only in order that we may truly be children that God would have us to be. Be sure of this, that He would have us to be holy. God has called us to be holy, not to live in unclean our impure lives like the Thessalonians. He has called us not to impurity, but to sanctification.

Holiness is about being different because they have come to Christ. It describes those who have been set apart to God. The holiness that comes to us is an essential attribute of the character of God already. And as we are indwelled with the Spirit of God, that character begins to work out through us. For we are to be holy as God is holy. It’s what makes us so different.

So we are called to and must earnestly strive for personal and practical holiness and that means that believers are to be set apart from evil, but separated to God, consecrated, and entirely given over to His service. Ultimately that is what God is doing. Holiness is also necessary for effective service. From 2 Timothy 2:21, it says:

Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from these things, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified, useful to the Master, prepared for every good work.

These are tied together: prayer, holiness, and the Word of God. The third thing why holiness is necessary in our lives is that it gives us assurance of salvation. It lets us say confidently that we are true children of God. The only safe evidence that we are in Christ is a holy life. If you know nothing about holiness, you shouldn’t flatter yourself that you’re a Christian. Bottom line is that it’s not those who profess to know Christ who will enter heaven, but those who live holy lives.

It doesn’t mean that those people don’t have a profession, they do, but it is coupled with a holy life. They are called to salvation and also to holiness, blamelessness. In fact, you can’t even see the Lord without holiness, according to Hebrews 12:14. You can’t make it into His presence if you haven’t been set apart by Him.

Set apart Christians are to reflect attitudes and behaviors that are consistent with our new relationship with God in Christ. The admonition is to keep pursing a life that is more and more set apart to the Lord. How do we do that? One way is definitely by prayer. It includes corporate and individual prayer of the saints.

Now I’ve been saying along the way through the book of Hebrews, that as our knowledge increases about God, automatically our faith increases in God. That leads to our prayer lives becoming more dependent on God. It leads us to a deeper and more abiding and consistent, Christ-exalting prayer life. And at that point, we become fully persuaded by two things.

Number one: all blessings that you and I stand in need of could be obtained from God and Him alone. Everything we need for life and godliness can be obtained from only God. The second thing is that prayer is the appointed means for obtaining these blessings. Sometimes we wonder why our faith is weak and passionless. We ask why we don’t see ourselves growing in the Lord. Well, it is because we don’t do a very good job in the area of prayer. We don’t set aside prayer as a serious thing, as something that ought to be a serious discipline in our lives. Or if we do it, we don’t do it well. It’s something we are always fighting against, but we should be challenged this year to change that.

If you’re reading through the Bible in a year, you should be coming to the last few days now. You may have missed a couple days at times, but you got back on track and continued on. I pray that for some of you, if you didn’t do well, would start again and push through. We must overcome the flesh and get the Word of God into us.

Alright now let’s look at our passage in Hebrews 13:20. First thing is we want to take a closer look at the object of our prayer. This is how we end this benediction about what he is telling the church. The object of prayer of course in verse 20, is about the God of Peace! He’s not our enemy anymore is not against us because of Christ! So we come to the God of Peace through Christ; there is no other way to God. That’s what the whole book of Hebrews is about. He is the One who can lead us in the way of peace. He did not have to make peace with anyone of us rebels, but He acquired for us a good conscience so that we can be at peace with God. This peace was already won for us through the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ.

Paul told the Romans in in Romans 5:1:

Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

In the Hebrew culture, this term of shalom or peace, meant everything which makes for man’s highest good. It means for us that God has His utmost good in mind, especially that of a tranquil state, a soul assured of the salvation that they received through Jesus Christ. We don’t have to fear anything when we come to God because He is the God of Peace. It’s just like in John 16:33 where it says:

These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world.

The first thing is that we come to God who has a character and the first part of it is that He is a good God and you’re at peace with Him. The second thing in Hebrews 13:20 is that it says:

Now the God of peace, who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant, even Jesus our Lord.

Now the term for brought up is not the common one for resurrection. He doesn’t use the word rise, but instead it is one that means to lead out and bring out. The term is used for the powerful intervention of God, who is leading out His people. Just like He brought Jesus out from the dead that will bring many sons to glory. If Christ had not risen, His death could not have completed our redemption and we would have been still in our sins. But He has completed it for the reason that He is a mighty God that leads His people out from the slave market of sin freed.

If God brought Jesus up from the dead, such an unbeatable God has no problem answering our prayers. None of our impossibilities, problems or difficulties can be greater than the problem of leading a person out from the dead. The greatest enemy we have is death; no one has ever conquered it, overcome it, or escaped it except for Jesus Christ. He not only overcome and escaped it, but also defeated it. He put it finally to death. It is done, along with Satan who used death to put fear in people.

Another thing we learn from Hebrews 13:20 is that God is a compassionate God. Keep in mind that a shepherd denotes one who presides over a collection of people or animals, and governs and guides and protects them for the purpose of doing everything necessary to promote their joy. He is the only Great Shepherd. In John 10 He is also the Good Shepherd who gave His life for the sheep. He submitted to death as a victim for us. No one is as caring and compassionate as the Great Shepherd who cares for His under-shepherds and the whole flock of God. By His risen power, He continues to provide double security for His sheep.

This double security is in John 10:27-29:

My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.

Here he stresses that Jesus is the Great Leader of the sheep. He has us in His hand and the Father has His hand over Jesus’, giving us the picture that no one can snatch us from God. These sheep are protected by the Good Shepherd, the Good Leader of the sheep. Moses and David were viewed as caring shepherds in the Old Testament, but Jesus is the One who surpasses all leaders and leads His sheep where no one could lead them, right in to the presence of God. He is a compassionate God.

In Hebrews 13:20, Jesus is also a faithful God because the verse mentions the blood of the eternal covenant. Covenant has been a great subject in the book of Hebrews. The covenant is only good as the faithfulness of the one who made the promise. So it was through the new covenant that made possible the relationship between God and man. The new covenant Jesus secures spiritual and eternal blessing for the guilty and depraved children of men. Because Jesus demonstrates this love at the Cross where the covenant had to be ratified through his blood, Paul could write in Romans 5:8:

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

In His substitutionary death, He took away the terror of God forever and He does it by pacifying God’s wrath. The God of peace was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. He didn’t impute to men their trespasses seeing as He made Him to be sin for us who knew no sin. So we come to God through Jesus alone and we find favor with God in that approach. There’s no other approach we can take to find favor with God. In fact, without Jesus it is dangerous to approach the God who is a consuming fire. So those who have their own self-styled way of approaching God, they think they don’t need Christ or the Cross. They will be in for a rude awakening because they won’t meet with the God of Peace, but the God of Wrath.

Jesus has forever taken away from us the terror of God. The sheep doesn’t have to be afraid of the shepherd. The shepherd treated the sheep in a way so that the sheep never thinks the shepherd is against them or is going to harm them. Even if he does discipline them, it’s always for their good so they don’t do something wrong or veer off the path or get too close to the cliff. To have in mind the very character of God in prayer is so important because we come sometime with great guilt on our consciences because of our sin. We feel like God has left us or is against us or will condemn us. But with Christ, none of that is there anymore. We come to the God of Peace with whatever we have and have done. We know that at the cross it was all taken care of so we never come to God being afraid of Him. We come to God boldly because of what Christ has done. But we also come humbly because sin is a serious matter for a believer because we have offended God. The blood of Christ has cleansed us from sin and all unrighteousness. That’s what we should be involved with because part of prayer is to pray for each other. We need Christ to clean us up and make us more like Him. That’s a huge project! We’re all under major construction!

As a believer coming to God, you shouldn’t feel afraid. You come with a sincere heart and coming with the sin you’re struggling with. You come telling Him what is making you anxious and worried. These are the things you pray for yourself. Sanctification and prayer go together. So now we come to the very content of the prayer.

In Hebrews 13:21, the author offers up prayers on behalf of His sheep. He wants to make them sure who they are coming to in prayer, and through whom they are coming to prayer in. He prays that his Christian brothers and sisters would be complete for the Master’s use and to finish the Christian race well. The content of the prayer is found in the verse, which says:

May the God of peace equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

He is praying to God that He would equip the sheep. In fact, the verb equip has a rare mood connected to it. It’s called the optative mood, which is only used about 70 times in the New Testament. In our passage, it is used to express an obtainable wish or prayer. And it is frequently used to appeal to someone’s will, in particular when used in prayer. It is usually for using a polite request without doubting what the response will be. We have a similar phrase, for example a mother asking her kids, “Do you think you might be able to help with the dishes tonight?” That’s using an optative mood with a typical response of yes. It’s different from a command, for example, “CAN YOU PLEASE HELP ME WITH THE DISHES?”

Here we don’t have a command when the author asks God to equip the sheep. The optative is used in the language of prayer to refer to a prayer wish. Here it is addressed to God whom Scripture just described. Wouldn’t you want to pray to a God like this? The answer is yes. Prayer offered to false gods in ancient times could be expected to be haggled over or rebuffed. But the God of the Old Testament is bigger than that. The prayers offered to Him depends on His sovereignty and goodness. When prayer is offered to God who raised Jesus from the dead, its meaning is often moved into the realm of expectation.

An optative request is that of expecting a result because of the way you say it. In this case it’s also different because of the character of the One you are saying it to. If this is God’s will and I prayed this, then I expect Him to answer His will. It is simply that you and I would be equipped. If any uncertainty is part of the package of prayer it is not due to questions of God’s ability. It is because of the partitioner’s humility towards the great Shepherd of the sheep.

So the prayer request is offered to God without a hint of doubting what the response would be. Doesn’t that sound like faith? Coming to God knowing that He is the Rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. Someone who has been engaging God in prayer is someone who diligently seeks Him. This person asks and communicates with God. There are several prayer wishes in our passage.

The first one is that God will equip or outfit you in a proper condition. The request conveys the writer’s desire that the believers might be fully fitted for the task. It’s actually the same term used in Hebrews 11:3 when it says that the world was framed by the Word of God. The worlds were arranged and put into order from a chaotic state and then fitted to perform their purposes that we experience today.

So God is equipping you and I however He may to do what He created us to do. He has allowed us to use the gifts He has given us in the church to do His will. The end result is that you would do the will of God. A second prayer wish is the verb form and it is God who restores and repairs and mends someone. It is included in the word. It is to set what is out of order to be right. In other words, He equips us to do His will and many of us were out of order. We were not working out spiritually.

We were out of order when it came to our relationship with God. We had no purpose and were by nature unfit to obey the divine will of God. We were unfit to desire the will and also unfit for loving His will. Once we become believers, the Great Shepherd is not only able to supply what is necessary to do His will and make us fit for it, but is also able to repair what has been broken in our lives. Just like a battle ship is fitted with the necessary equipment and personnel to go into a battle and win. We as believers would be fitted by God by the necessary things to accomplish His will. And without God’s help, we can do nothing. The will of God is our sanctification in body, soul, and spirit. Sanctification is when we become holy. The Holy Spirit is the Author of our being set apart to God.

The author of the Scripture prays this prayer: Lord I pray that these people would be fitted to do Your will and that what was broken would be mended in their lives so they can actually understand your will, identify it, and do it.

Secondly the author says this in Hebrews 13:21:

Equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight.

Here is a prayer that God would work in us to bring us to the goal. Now you see the goal is that we would live pleasing in His sight. The goal of the Christian life is righteousness. The Holy Spirit is cleaning us up. He’s making changes in our lives and He is bringing us into conformity to the will of God. So God is working in us by His Spirit. Conformity happens from the inside out because He is working in us. I believe He is doing that because God wants us to see fruit.

Prayer is about fruit bearing so that we are sanctified and will do what is right and pleasing to God. We should ask God to make us more loving, kind, gentle, joyful, long-suffering with people, and patient in circumstances. God has to do that from the inside. Behavior is at the center of concern and sanctification. Behavior shows what is or what is not going on inside of you. As God works in you according to this passage of Scripture, He will also work out of you. No eternal transformation means that you can walk around with righteous behavior but without internal change. That’s hypocrisy.

In fact, hypocrites totally externalize righteousness. You can clean up the outside but be filthy inside. A believer is someone who has been already given a good conscience and has been washed in the blood of Christ. Therefore God is working in us first to give us a new heart and conscience so that we have new behavior to be changed. The Holy Spirit is inside of us to produce good fruit. Lord, make me more fruit bearing that I may please you. This next year we have another opportunity for us to come to the Lord in prayer. This is me asking God for you to make you more fruit bearing. That’s for you to pray about for me too. If we don’t pray for each other, then we aren’t using the very means God is giving us so that we are actually transformed on the inside so we can manifest behavior that is not hypocritical but actually genuine that comes from the depth of your heart because of your relationship with God to other people. That’s where God is bringing us.

What does the Holy Spirit use to change us? Well He convicts us about what is wrong and evil before God. He also convicts us about what is right and pleasing. That is conviction of what is right and good and pleasing in God’s sight. Don’t we want to know that? We just want to do things that are pleasing to the Lord. Even John said about the Spirit of God that He would come and convict the world of sin, righteousness and judgment. He’s going to convict us of righteous living. How can we do what is right and pleasing to God if we have no idea of what that is? It’s not just a matter of prayer, but also the Word of God.

The Holy Spirit will change the whole mode of your thinking and feeling to conform to the will of God. He does not do this by miraculous implanting. Instead He addresses your mind, and to do that He informs your understanding with the truth. The Spirit is not only the Holy Spirit but He is also the Spirit of Truth. He has written the Word of God and meticulously used language to give us the mind of God for this time in which we live. He is working on our consciousness with truth. This is not foreign to other parts of the Word of God. In Romans 12:2 it says:

And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.

In 1 Corinthians 14:20 it says:

Brethren, don’t be children in your thinking.

In fact he is saying there to stop acting like babies in your spiritual life. Don’t remind as a baby but start growing up. But be infants when it comes to evil. He says this next:

In your thinking, be mature.

The Spirit of God is not bypassing your mind, but is transforming it with the truth of the Word of God to make you mature in Christ. People in our day are despising the instructions of the mind by the Word of God. No one denies believing the Bible but people don’t have it preached and taught to them, nor do they read it. So it’s really not transforming our minds and setting us apart like God intended it to. So our thinking is not transformed and therefore our maturity is not there. We live in an age of anti-meek. 1 Corinthians 3:2-3 says:

I gave you milk to drink, not solid food; for you were not yet able to receive it. Indeed, even now you are not yet able, for you are still fleshly.

This is a rebuke because they aren’t growing as they ought to. Then he mentions by the Word of God the very things that are holding them back from being mature. In 1 Corinthians 3:3 says:

For since there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not fleshly, and are you not walking like mere men?

He can’t give them the next level of spiritual training because they are still stuck on level one. The Holy Spirit in you convicts you and points out sin by the Word of God so you deal with it. That’s our responsibility. When it comes to us, we are responsible to take care of how we are listening to the Word of God. Every Sunday when the Word of God, the Holy Spirit is doing different things in your life which maybe no one else knows about but you definitely do. If you notice the passage of Scripture in Hebrews 13:21, it says:

[He is] working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever.

We’re living before God, and that is a transforming truth to get up every day to know that every thing I think and endeavor to do, I do it before God well. This is where the sincerity of heart comes in. I already know what the God in whom I serve has done on my behalf so I’m not going to try and pull the wool over His eyes. That’s why John says that those who say they don’t sin actually deceive themselves. The greatest deception is self-deception. I’m more convinced of that than ever in ministry.

So you get rid of the jealousy and strife in Corinthians and then you can move on. God does not bypass our intelligent and moral natures. In His Word He gives us a plain, well-accredited revelation of His mind. In other words, this is what He wants you to do and not do. God is pretty clear in Scripture, and actually much of it as prescriptive. God tells us what is on His mind and what pleases Him. By the necessary influence of the Holy Spirit upon us, He leads us to understand it and then to believe the revelation that we hear and grasp so that the revealed mind of God becomes your mind and your will. It’s not apart from prayer and the Word, so if you keep yourself apart from those things then it will never happen.

If you look in Hebrews 13:21 again, we know that His working in us is necessary to enable us to will and do. It’s not just the understanding but the doing of it too, and in His presence. Worship is learning how to please God. We don’t just worship when we sing songs on Sunday morning, but also on Mondays too. We worship while driving in our cars and when go to the supermarket. We worship everywhere we go because we are God’s representatives on earth to others. We are the vessel God wants to bring to others a character that they don’t see in other people because we know Christ and He is transforming us. You are not who you used to be! God’s Word transforms us so that we develop deep, Biblical convictions so that our consciences will not allow us to live against our convictions.

So we desire in the end to do what is right and to live in a pleasing manner before the Lord Jesus Christ. Prayer is for sanctification, change, power, the battle against the devil, and more. In fact if you care to look at verse 21, you will see this at the end of the verse:

…through Jesus Christ…

It only can be done through Him. You can only approach God with favor through Jesus Christ. Not only that, the aim of prayer and transformation is to bring glory to God. The end of all life and prayer is doxology, giving glory to God. When prayer is set aside, God is outlawed. When prayer becomes an unfamiliar exercise among His people, then God Himself becomes a stranger to those people. But when prayer is a familiar exercise among God’s people then it ends in giving Him glory!

So we ought to set aside this year serious discipline and consistent time of prayer because it is for putting you in order and for mending you. It is for conforming you to the mind of God’s will and for fruit bearing, it’s all those things. If we don’t pray, then we are left to our fleshly decision on things and we don’t have transformation.

So we bring glory to God. Doxology really should be spoken more. We can praise God with our lips, but we should also do it with our lives. Doxology means honoring God with the conduct of our lives and doing what is pleasing in His sight and bringing glory to the One in whom it is due. Let Thy will be done on earth as it is done in Heaven, that is the prayer of the saints. That means that when we pray to be changed, then you have to actually look for God to change you because it is His will. I’m praying God’s will when I’m asking God to change me or to sanctify our people. Don’t let us get stuck in a rut, God! I pray that our lives would glorify and exalt Christ.

So using three points from one person that I have respect for and has written on prayer, he says this. “Make it a point every day to pray. Don’t leave it to chance. Pick a time, pick a place, and show up. Good intentions don’t work when it comes to prayer.” That seems simple to do, right? Well it sounds simple, but it may not be so.

But I tell you that if God calls you to be there, then you should make every effort to go. Prayer is not the same kind of duty that could be interpreted as legalism. Here is God’s people disciplining themselves for godliness. They set aside time not only for prayer but they greatly desire it so as to show up for it even though at the same time they are struggling with the flesh. When we come to prayer, we are struggling with our schedules and with what the world thinks, and what our families are doing. Sometimes you may go earnestly into your prayer time and then five minutes into it, you’re thinking of all the things you have to do that day. So you get sidetracked because the devil doesn’t want you to pray.

That’s why a second thing this guy suggests is this: combine your prayer time with reading your Bible. This is so that your mind doesn’t wander so quickly. If you’re reading Scripture, you’re getting something about God’s character and plans, something about sin and how people respond to situations, and you begin to have your mind moved to a place where you are thinking Biblically if you were not reading the Bible.

A third thing he suggests is that you ought to pray in this way. You start with yourself by examining your heart. You pray for your own sanctification and what you are struggling with. Pray for where you fall short spiritually, or just to keep reading and praying. Then, move on to your family and pray for their sanctification and other issues. Next, move to your church and prayers for your elders and deacons. This is what God is doing in all our lives! Then we move out globally to what God is doing in missions, and where we can do evangelism. We need to pray for those of other religions and nations because others are not praying to the same God, Jesus Christ. If they are not praying to Him they are praying to a false god who they are calling their creator. Lastly if you have time, pray for the rest of the world.

Prayer is so necessary, like breathing. You don’t have to breathe but you won’t be around for long without it. This is not a give or take thing. This is essential to your spiritual growth and life! To your family and our church and the evangelism of our community! I think what I’m going to do after we finish with Hebrews is Ephesians. But before I do that, I’m going to preach on the Lord’s Prayer in Matthew. We all need it. We can no longer put up with mediocrity in our spiritual lives. Ministry and living the Christian life is too difficult without God’s power. That means we are going to have change some things.

Let’s look at how he ends this section:

To Him be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

Let’s pray. Lord, thank You, for the conviction of the Word of God. Lord, now we need Your help. We already know Your will to pray. We already know that it pleasing to You when we pray. But we also know that it is what changes us. It’s what transforms us to Your will and moves us to do it. So Lord, this next coming year in 2012, I pray that everyone of us today would walk away with a desire to want to implement the challenge before us. Not only would our minds be regularly challenged by Your Word, and that we would not just talk about prayer, but that we would actually do it and wanting to corporately pray with each other. I pray, Lord, that we would be faithful this year in our spiritual goals to spend every day with You in prayer. I pray that You would enable us to do it and overcome the battles and the difficulties. I pray that nothing in the world would keep us from it and we would discipline ourselves. We know You will give us help to do this. Thank You, Lord Jesus, that You are the God of Peace, and that those serious matters are taken care of by You already. Now let us do what is pleasing to You. I thank You for this and what You will do in Christ’s Name, Amen.

Full Transcript:

Alright let’s take our Bibles and turn to Hebrews 13, looking at and continuing the Christian’s acceptable worship. Today we will be beginning with mutual dependence. Acceptable Christian worship is what pleases God and we have already learned that the reason all believers are to offer up spiritual sacrifices like the fruit of the lips and giving thanks and sharing, and the reason spiritual church leaders and the congregation are to harmonize with each other is because it pleases God. Now, anything that does not please God is evil.

Today in our passage we come to the thing that is most important for church leaders and congregation members alike, and it is surely pleasing to God. It is the very thing that brings to light our dependence as Christians and our two inseparable spiritual responsibilities. These responsibilities we must never underestimate or carelessly lay aside.

The first one is to attend earnestly the Word of God, because through it God speaks to us. And secondly, we must engage earnestly in prayer, which this section is about. And in prayer we speak to God. In His Word, He speaks to us and in prayer we speak to God. The great need for church leaders is to be supported by the prayers of their sheep and for church leaders to earnestly support the sheep in prayer. They go together and they should always remain of the highest importance, which is where Satan attacks the most in the church.

He convinces us that we are too busy to pray and that we don’t know how to pray or just can’t seem to make it to pray. That’s the great attack, to keep God’s people from praying for one another, to keep pastors from praying for their sheep, and to keep the people from praying for their leaders. So why should we engage in this? so that our work for Christ can be effective. When it is effective, it is aided and supported by mutual and delightful prayer and mutual and loving obedience to the Word of God.

So the author of Hebrews at this point in the message is humbly requesting prayer. Look at what it says in Hebrews 13:18-19:

Pray for us, for we are sure that we have a good conscience, desiring to conduct ourselves honorably in all things. And I urge you all the more to do this, so that I may be restored to you the sooner.

Now it says there simply to pray for us. There’s a little bit of a problem here, because in all the translations, some put a period after “pray for us,” some put a semicolon, some put a colon, and some put a comma. And this creates a problem for the interpretation of the text. There is no problem in the Greek because there is no punctuation. But in English, there is punctuation. The King James Version puts a colon, the New King James Version puts a semicolon, the NIV puts a period, and the NASB puts a comma.

Now the reason could be that the author is using another imperative and it could read “pray for us.” But it could also mean that he is using a very unusual reason for the prayer request. It’s really unusual how he puts that request to be restored to them. He’s making a statement before asking for the request. I thought about that for awhile and kept looking at it, and thought there is some reason for this the way he writes it. It’s like he is saying that he’s confident about what happened on the inside.

You may ask what does happen on the inside when one comes to believe in Christ? The conscience of a believer has been cleansed when coming to Christ. Here is one of these statements that displays a person’s assurance of not only their position before God but the difference that has taken place inside of them that they are aware of. Their conscience is no longer tormented or guilty or dead. These people are experiencing on the inside rest, peace, and life. Look at how our passage reads, “Pray for us for we are sure that we have a good conscience.”

Now someone may say that that sounds arrogant statement. No one can really be sure about such things. That does raise a few questions that needs some investigation. And I think the questions could be like this, “What does it mean to be sure you have a good conscience?” A second question could be, “What does a good conscience have to do with prayer?” Those are the questions that I want to answer this morning. Remember we are talking about acceptable worship this morning, and that includes our approach to God. This means if anyone is going to approach God acceptably, they must have a good conscience.

Now to investigate this, I’m going to try and stay in the integrity of the book of Hebrews. Turn with me back to Hebrews 9:9, where we saw how the worshippers would come and bring their gifts and sacrifices to God just like they were required to do. But these gifts could not make the people perfect on the inside. In other words, these sacrifices were powerless to remove sin and guilt. When we become believers in Christ, the Lord really does a work on the inside, and that’s how we know that something has happened. We just didn’t stop our bad habits, but something happened inside of us when we came to Christ. My whole life is different because I came to Christ! The way I look at the world and people is different all because I came to Christ.

Hebrews 9:9 says this:

Accordingly both gifts and sacrifices are offered which cannot make the worshiper perfect in conscience.

In the end, the worshippers’ experience no abiding rest, no abiding peace but continually live with a guilty conscience. Now just to refresh your memory a little bit, the term conscience can be defined in this way, that it is the soul. The soul as distinguishing between what is morally good and bad, is prompted to do what is good and shun the bad. That’s what the conscience is right? When you do something bad, then you’re condemned in your conscience, and when you do something good, you are commended in your conscience.

So the conscience that is guilty is a soul conscious of sin; the person has done something wrong and broke a certain law. Sin of course is a word often used in Scripture that gives the picture of a prisoner that has been taken captive and has been dominated by its power. Sin is said to dwell in us. So basic is the hold of sin over man that sin is not merely an external power that exercises sway over a man, but has gotten into the very fiber and center of his heart to occupy him like an enemy occupies a country. Romans tells us in the Word of God that there is a close connection between the law of God and sin. The law teaches us what sin is.

In fact Paul wrote this to the Romans in Romans 3:20:

By the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.

Once there is law, then there is also the knowledge of sin. Paul really nailed it in Romans 2:15, when he says:

They show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them.

There is a Biblical definition of the conscience, and who better to define it than God Himself who created it? The conscience is that which bears witness to what is right and pleasing to God, and what is wrong and evil. When one does wrong and sins, they feel guilt. Some people walk around with guilt just piling up year after year. They don’t know what to do with it and their conscience is just weighed down.

You might hear people sometimes that when they trusted Christ, a weight just fell off them. Well they’re talking about guilt. They say that their guilt is just gone. Maybe this is a good place to clarify six characteristics of what a good conscience actually is. Because it is the only kind of conscience that can approach acceptably, and that’s a good conscience. The point of the passage is that God wants you to know that you have one. Do you have a good conscience? Well after today you should be able to say yes or no.

The first thing is that a good conscience is one that comes by Jesus’ superior sacrifice. Look at what it says in Hebrews 9:13, and by looking at this passage I want you to think of this that you cannot acquire it on your own. Someone has to acquire a good conscience for you. So the gifts and the sacrifices were offered in the Old Testament by the worshipper which could only purge the flesh but not the conscience. The verse says:

For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling those who have been defiled sanctify for the cleansing of the flesh.

Now it could only be removed externally. Under the old covenant in this passage of Scripture, the worshipper benefitted in a personal way that when they follow the procedures for cleaning and offered the correct sacrifice, then the sacrificial blood of animals did remove their defilement and set them apart as holy unto the Lord. At the end of verse 13, it says that it only does so for the cleansing of the flesh. It did not free the conscience from the guilt of all evil deeds done by a particular person. See the conscience needs a far greater cleaning to put it to rest. And of course a good conscience only comes to us by the Lord Jesus Christ who offered the sacrifice that would take care of a bad, evil, guilt-ridden conscience.

A second thing is that a good conscience is one that has been cleansed by Jesus’ superior sacrifice. The lesser sacrifices that were limited, consisted of the blood of bulls and goats. The greater sacrifice it the blood of Christ which is complete. The solution to an inner defiled conscience is found in Hebrews 9:14, which says:

How much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

It is the blood of Christ that cleanses from all external and internal uncleanness and defilement which incurs guilt and then cleanses the conscience. So it is the blood of Christ that is God’s answer to man’s disturbed, troubled, and weighed down conscience. So if you have a disturbed conscience, well the law of God is working in you and prompting you through Scripture to receive God’s remedy, which is of course Jesus Christ. The person who comes to Christ is forgiven. Christ sets us free from the penalty and the power of inward sin. Therefore Jesus’ atoning sacrifice provides inner purity as well as outward external deliverance.

So the believer is given the ability to believe by faith and then is set free from the slavery and dominion of sin is cleansed internally of a guilty conscience. A good conscience is one that is cleansed by the blood of Christ.

Thirdly, a good conscience is one that has bee cleared from all dead works. Look again at verse 14, it says to cleanse your conscience from dead works. Now these are your good works. In other words, dead works are all the formal, empty, false, legal observances and self-invented works whereby you and I seek to stand before God. These are the things that we try to do to please God, and to consider ourselves to be good people and acceptable to God. At the end of the day, there is nothing you can really offer God. Even if you define your own works as good, they are still dead before God because you are dead in your sins when you offer them.

But dead works just further defiles a person and provide no ability to truly cleanse the conscience or give power to obey God rightly. Some people hope that having done such things, their good deeds would outweigh their bad and they would be acceptable on their merit. That’s self-salvation, or exoterism. You’re trying to save yourself by what you do. A conscience could never be cleared of dead works by you offering dead works! You will remain dead with your works because you are just offering it up to an idol of your own creation in your mind.

Fourthly, a good conscience is one that no longer has consciousness of condemning sin. In Hebrews 10:1-2 it says:

For the Law, since it has only a shadow of the good things to come and not the very form of things, can never, by the same sacrifices which they offer continually year by year, make perfect those who draw near. Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, because the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have had consciousness of sins?

In other words, because a believer has a one-time effective sacrifice which is unrepeatable and efficient, then Christ’s superior sacrifice has removed all condemnation from the conscience. Therefore, a person is freed. In fact in Hebrew 10:1 the verse has a phrase that says “can never.” This means that these sacrifices offered, even the prescription that God gave to offer those sacrifices had no ability in its effectiveness. A genuinely effective thing does not need to be repeated. Repetition is proof that there remains a deficiency in the sacrifice. That’s why it says in Scripture all the time that Jesus died once, why? Because His sacrifice was so efficient that it never had to be repeated. That means when a person understands and receives Christ, they know that the ineffective, repeatable sacrifices can never purify people’s souls.

In fact it says it there at the end of verse 10, they were not able to make perfect those who drew near to God. Never was it able to do that. If it was able to make them perfect, then two things would have taken place. The sacrifices would have stopped and there wouldn’t be a need for them. Secondly, worshippers would have no more consciousness for sins. It says that at the end of verse 2. It proves the sacrifices’ inability to cleanse from sin. When I was preaching on this passage before, there was a particular ability that these sacrifices reminded worshippers that they were not pure and that their sins still stood between them and God. They could never get farther than the next year’s Day of Atonement; it was just a vicious cycle.

But it was a reminder and a picture of what Christ was going to do. It was a hope that what was being done then finds its fulfillment in Christ, and those who did it then, did it by faith. When Christ died on that cross, they too were forgiven of their sins and made right with God. So Scripture has established the inability of the law and its prescribed sacrifices to reach God’s intended goal for His children, which is perfection. That means a far different and vastly superior sacrifice is needed, and that of course is Jesus Christ.

So the conscience is really important when it comes to prayer. A conscience that knows you are not condemned by your sin because of the effectiveness and extent of the death of Christ. You can come with confidence like that when you know those things. So what does a good conscience have to do with prayer? Well a fifth thing would be this, that a good conscience is one that may come before God with bold confidence. In Hebrews 10, a good conscience has overcome three main obstacles to prayer. What are they? In verse 21, it says:

Since we have a great priest over the house of God.

In other words, the obstacle then was the people coming before the very presence of God in prayer. We’re not just talking to anyone, but God. Hebrews talks about God being a consuming fire! So what kind of person can enter into the presence and house of God in prayer? It is a person who comes through Christ’s sacrifice who is cleansed and cleared of dead works, sin, and guilt. That is the person that can come and pray before God.

A second obstacle that is overcome by a good conscience is found in Hebrews 10:22, which says:

Let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.

The second obstacle was an evil conscience, which we all have! Everyone has an evil conscience, because anything that doesn’t please God is evil. All you do when you don’t know Him is displease God. The amount of things we do that displease Him is so great that we can’t even remember them after awhile. But God does. The obstacle of an insincere heart is there.

We know all about this because when we talk to others, we can often justify our words and actions before people. But the moment we come before God in prayer, our consciences begin to speak to us and we can no longer defend ourselves. All we see is our insincerity. When you come before God, don’t you see your own insincerity? Unless a person deals with conscience, he or she doesn’t really pray. Like the psalmist said in Psalm 66:18:

If I regard wickedness in my heart, The Lord will not hear.

But a good conscience overcomes coming into the presence of God because they have a High Priest Jesus Christ who has entered in before them as their atoning sacrifice. Also, we overcome by a good conscience this insincere heart because the Lord has cleansed our hearts and has given us clean hearts. Of course, this leads to a third obstacle at the end of Hebrews 10:22, which is the sense of uncleanness:

Our bodies washed with pure water.

When we come to prayer, we sense the pollution of sin and we feel dirty because of it. We feel the sense of total unworthiness when we sin. Christians feel that even more than unbelievers, but we don’t lose our confidence or boldness because we already know what Christ has done. That prevents us from going on and on in our sin because we know that that displeases our Lord. So we don’t let our sin become a habit or pattern in our lives so we cut it off and put it to death. We grow in gratitude and praise to God because you know that you don’t deserve His praise. I know that I can get up and sense that I am made clean and worthy because of the truth I know in God.

So how is it that a person riddled with an evil conscience can come to the presence of God. I think we need to realize these obstacles and overcome them. And we do so by a good conscience. This is how we approach God in the way He requires; here are some essential practices so we can really pray with confidence.

He’s describing here the kind of heart that draws near to God in prayer. It’s not a proud, sufficient, or insincere heart that does that. But it is a good, sincere confidence and in fact some way these are descriptions of a good conscience. In verse 22 again, it says:

Let us draw near with a sincere heart.

A sincere heart is literally a true heart. Let us come to God honestly and let’s not try to cover or push aside our sin. Let’s just come to God honestly with a sincere and true heart. One that is not fictitious but real. One that is not counterfeit but authentic. One that is not just imagining things but is the real deal. One that does not pretend but is without hypocrisy and that is honest with God about sin.

Believers according to our text, are to draw to God with a true and sincere heart which assumes that we are to be aware of what kind of heart we are to come to God with. There is an understanding about what happens on the inside. We need to have some level of discernment about our own hearts. We can’t meet with God with insincere hearts. Some of the people do that, but we are not going to.

According to Hebrews, no creature is hidden from His sight and all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do. So we come to God in a new way, not by the old, dead works. We don’t come to Him through ceremonies or rituals, but in the new way that God has planned. There is no real access to God but by the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ because He alone answers the problem of a guilty, polluted, evil conscience.

So a good conscience has a true and honest heart towards God. Also a good conscience again has a cleansed heart. In verse 22, it says:

Having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience.

It is the heart that has been cleansed on the inside, that Christ is the end of the law so it cannot any longer condemn me by His all-sufficient, totally effective sacrifice. Christ bore my sin and condemnation and by His blood, has washed my evil conscience. So if the law is satisfied because Christ has bore our sin and guilt, then our consciences are clean. Christ has satisfied my dirtiness because I have overcome those by the blood of the lamb.

Good conscience not only has an honest heart, but also has a cleansed heart. So to know that your heart has been comprehensively cleansed by the blood of Christ inside and out. Our bodies have been washed by pure water. So there is no outward cleansing that can cleanse real pollution of sin, but it is only by the blood of Christ. And even when the old enemy of our souls come agains us, I can point the devil to my Lord Jesus Christ who is exalted and risen, and I will proclaim with confidence that if God is for me then I have nothing to fear, even the devil himself. Because he will stir up all the guilt of the past and make it as real as if it were just happening.

Unless you know that you have a good conscience because of Christ, he can’t get a foothold on your life. As a matter of fact, there is nothing that can get a foothold on your life if you know that. So here is the bottom line, true believers with their doctrine and understanding of what Christ has done can enter with confidence into God’s presence and come with freedom of speech and courage to express their prayers to God on their own behalf and on the behalf of others. That’s why prayer is mutual. You pray for me and I pray for you.

But see that the precursor is that have to have a good conscience. Why do you have a good conscience? Because of Christ. Doesn’t that give you a level of boldness and assurance? Also they know how to regularly draw near to God in prayer with their honest and cleansed hearts, and they are sure that the have a good conscience. Now look back at Hebrews 9:14 one more time because I want you to notice another thing that is linked back to our text in Hebrews 13. That is that all this leads us to outward service of God. Look at what it says in Hebrews 9:14:

How much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

That means that a good conscience leads to consecrated service. The reason why Christ cleanses me of all these things and the reason why the Lord brings me into a position before Him in which I am cleansed in this way and made right with Him is to serve Him while I’m here. It brings me to serve Christ while I’m here.

You and I have received this new life that restores our fellowship with God so we can exchange and engage in energetic service to Him. With that in mind, it says in Hebrews 13:18:

Pray for us, for we are sure that we have a good conscience, desiring to conduct ourselves honorably in all things.

This means that my good conscience has now affected my behavior. It has affected my desires. We’re looking at inward cleansing and outward service, at someone who is now really serving God. This person’s desire has become comprehensibly changed about how and where they want to live their life. He wants to let his people know that he is sure he has a good conscience and a good relationship with God. He has boldness that when he prays to God, it will be effectual. James 5:16 says:

The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.

This is because he knows who he is coming to. And then his desire is to conduct himself honorably in all things, not just a few that he chooses. If this passage of Scripture doesn’t grip with real conversion, then I don’t know which one will. He’s concluding here what really believers are like! And then they are free to go and serve God, which they weren’t able to do before. They wanted to do it God’s way. It’s just like the Thessalonians who turned from idols to serve the living God and to wait for Jesus.

So how is it that we can ask for prayer, pray for others, serve God with such confidence and assurance. It is only because we a have peaceful conscience. There is nothing to condemn you anymore. Number two, you have access to God through Christ and there is nothing to prevent you from enjoying God’s presence. You have new desires to serve God, which you never had before. You have no more fear of hell because there is nothing that can send you there because Christ has been punished in your place and therefore justice cannot touch you again. And you have the expectation that in death there is sudden glory and that heaven has an open door for you.

So what are we to do? The most we can do for another is to pray, and sometimes that is the last thing we do if we even get to doing it. Then by the time we do get to it, we are so exhausted and beat up that you we can’t even mumble the words out. You know how I know that? It’s because I’ve been there! For any service that’s gonna have any effect, we must pray for each other and we must take it seriously. This upcoming year is an opportunity to make some changes in this area. And I believe we need to.

Now we do have prayer meetings on Wednesday nights and I know everything in the world is going to prevent you from coming out, from being tired, to traffic. We can do other things to pray for each other but I’ve always had a prayer request from a long time ago, that our prayer meetings would be attended more regularly than they are. That people would know why they are there, and would just pray. But mutual prayer starts with people’s good consciences. Do you have one? Have your desires changed because of your good conscience to want to serve God? Have you changed your desires to want to pray?

In fact this was getting the author so excited that this was his prayer request in Hebrews 13:19:

And I urge you all the more to do this, so that I may be restored to you the sooner.

It seems that the author was part of this congregation at one time but something pulled him away and he couldn’t get there to preach this message. Hebrews really is a homily, something that should have been proclaimed. He said he couldn’t be there to see them face to face but even after sending the letter, he wanted to come to them. He knew that they could benefit each other with their prayers. That’s the point of the church, to build up one another.

Let’s pray this morning that we would really take prayer this year seriously. I can beg, and email, and text you to make it out on Wednesdays. We can organize different prayer groups and do all kinds of things so that everybody prays, but you have to want to do it. You gotta get through the wrestling of just getting to prayer and then offer up to the Lord only things He can answer.

Let’s pray. Lord, I pray this morning. You’re so good for doing this for us. You’re so good for working out such a great plan of salvation where we can know that we have a good standing with you. I can come before you with an honest heart, how many people can know that? That their guilt has been taken care of once and for all. Lord, I pray for myself and Your people that this year would be one that we take more seriously than ever before the discipline of prayer. We’ve already had our obstacles to prayer removed. So any other obstacles must be placed there by the enemy. I pray that You would help us to juggle schedules and responsibilities so at least we could get together at a certain time during the week so that we can seek Your face. We know that from the Word of God that is acceptable worship and it is pleasing to You. Make us people who pray. And I thank You, Lord, for what You will do. I pray this in Christ, Amen.

Full Transcript:

I trust you all had a good holiday and had plenty of turkey or ham to eat. It’s always a good time to get together with family and friends. This morning, we are continuing in Hebrews 13. So take your Bibles and turn there and let’s look at this passage.

Now I’m getting into the area of the practicality of the Christian race and walk. Today we are going to be looking at the Christian’s acceptable worship. What exactly is acceptable to God when it comes to our worship? Sometimes we complicate things too much in this area, whereas the Bible simplifies it to the point that we can look at our own lives, see what we are doing, examine ourselves, and actually answer the question about whether our worship is acceptable. If it is not in certain areas, you would adjust as needed.

After some time of examining the essential marks or virtues of the Christian life lead to a very specific action, which is that of the believer offering up sacrifices to God that are acceptable. Here we come to a section of Hebrews that teaches us that we can come before the Father and offer up sacrifices before Him.

Using sacrificial language is not unfamiliar to the book of Hebrews, but it surely is unfamiliar to a postmodern day. It does conjure up thoughts of offering up animals on the altar, but it is the best imagery that the Bible offers. The animal sacrifices of earlier days have been rendered forever obsolete by Christ and His self-offering. That has been evident throughout all the book of Hebrews. But there is always room for worship rendered by obedient hearts, those who know Christ.

In the Old Testament times when the saints offered up sacrifices, they did so anticipating by faith a better sacrifice, which was Christ Himself. He is the complete, perfect, and unrepeatable sacrifice for believers as a High Priest.

Now that Jesus’ sacrifice is complete, it doesn’t mean that God’s people stop offering sacrifices to God. We just offer sacrifices for a different reason and in a different way. The different reason is because Jesus inaugurated the new covenant with His blood. People are called by the gospel to receive Jesus as their substitute sacrifice, and once they have accepted God and are in fellowship with Him, they begin to be strengthened by grace every day. And they don’t offer up sacrifices to God in order to secure their redemption, which is already made so by Christ’s blood.

In Hebrews 9:12, the writer has said to us:

And not through the blood of goats and calves, but through His own blood, He entered the holy place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption.

In Ephesians 4:30, it says:

Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.

Our redemption has already been sealed, so we don’t offer up sacrifices to God in order to secure redemption. The only reason we offer these sacrifices that we are going to look at today, is this. Look at the last phrase in Hebrews 13:16, after the comma:

For with such sacrifices God is pleased.

That’s the bottom line. If you want to sum up the Christian life, then basically you need to live a life that is pleasing to God. All over the Word of God, you are going to find this particular admonition to the believers. In 2 Corinthians 5:9, Paul says:

Therefore we also have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to Him.

Why does he say this? Because we all will appear before the judgment seat of Christ to be recompensed for deeds done in the body whether for good or bad. And then right here in Hebrews 11:5-6, which says:

By faith Enoch was taken up so that he would not see death; and he was not found because God took him up; for he obtained the witness that before his being taken up he was pleasing to God. And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.

We have an example here of someone who lived a pleasing life before God. The author is saying here that we have an Old Testament example here, and Enoch pleased God. In Genesis where this passage comes from, it says that he walked with God. It says it in several places that Enoch walked with God, and God took him without dying.

The word walk suggests action; it’s a metaphor of Biblical faith. R. Kent Hughes says that this word means there must be mutual agreement with the one you are walking with. Amos 3:3 says:

Do two men walk together unless they have made an appointment?

So if you are walking with God, then you are agreeing on the destination, the same place. If you are walking with God, you are agreeing to follow God’s path, not anyone else’s. Also if you are going to be agreeing with God, then you will be agreeing on the same pace. If you are walking with someone, you can’t run ahead or lag behind, you have to be on the same pace.

So he is saying here that he pleased God by walking on the same path and on the same pace with God. And God liked that so much that he took him. Pleasing God in Genesis included steadfast, consistent, and forward looking faith. Genesis 5:23 says:

So all the days of Enoch were three hundred and sixty-five years.

This was 365 days of righteous living with God pre-flood times, terribly evil times. This is what the Word of God says about the times before the great flood in Genesis 6:11:

Now it came about, when men began to multiply on the face of the land, and daughters were born to them.

Enoch lived in the midst of a cesspool of sin and wickedness where the evil in the people’s heart was continual of everyone around them. And here’s this guy living a simple life following God. Even in the wickedest times and places, it is still possible to live with an enduring faith that pleases God. So the necessary condition for pleasing God and walking intimately with Him is faith.

He supported that necessary condition in Scripture with three things. What does it really mean to believe or have faith in God? Well number one, we must approach God believing. It says in Hebrews 11:6:

…for he who comes to God must believe…

That’s part of what faith is, believing what God said about Himself that He actually is real. It also says in the verse a second thing:

…that He exists…

He has real personalities and is involved in this world and in your life. Doug Wilson, who writes in a small magazine called Credenda/Agenda, said that there’s only two kinds of atheists. One who believes there is no God, and the other who hates Him. They kinda go hand in hand. If you don’t believe there’s a God, ultimately you believe that it’s all about you and about what you can do. There is no order and the world is a chaotic place. So you just do what you feel or think is right. But ultimately, there are those who just hate God, and doesn’t have a personality or care for them. They might believe that God has wound up this world in some way and just let it go to do it’s own thing. That’s what deists believe, which mostly include those who signed the Declaration of Independence.

Therefore, faith means that you believe in God’s Word and that He actually is a person involved in your life. You also believe in Hebrews 11:6, in His personality generosity. The verse says:

He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.

That’s God’s grace. Enoch came regularly and daily believing that He was alive and He was God. He also found that God responded positively and abundantly to those who sought Him, because He found out that God is a Rewarder, not a Condemner of those who live by faith. The bottomline is that you can’t really know that He is a Rewarder of those who seek Him unless you already rely on Him as the only true and almighty God, unless you trust Him that He will fulfill all His promises, and unless you find Him to be the source of your deepest satisfaction. Remember that Enoch enjoyed walking with God.

Christian life and faith will always bring you to the place where your affections for God are heightened to a place they never have been before. The more you know about God, the higher affection you have for Him, and the more desire you have for Him in your life every single day. The Lord becomes the most important part of your life.

What we do understand from Enoch’s example of faith is that real believers desire God as a Companion and seek to please Him wherever they go and in whatever they do. So what did Enoch get for such desired fellowship and a pleasing lifestyle before God? Well it’s in Hebrews 11:5, God took him. God said, “I enjoy fellowship with you so much, Enoch, that I’m just going to take you to Heaven and you can forget the death part.”

Isn’t that not real for a Christian? Doesn’t God forget the death part when we trust in Christ by faith? Death has no mastery or rule over us anymore, it’s not our enemy anymore. God has taken care of it, He has defeated death and Satan. God translates us from life here on earth to life in His presence. That’s where faith brings you.

With that in mind, let’s dip back into the lettuce bowl of Scripture that will help us to see what acceptable worship is for the Christian now today. Here’s the first thing in Hebrews 13:15. Let me just back up in this verse and talk about the proper approach for Christian worship. It says:

Through Him then, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that give thanks to His name.

The proper approach to God and offer worship is through Jesus. That’s the only way. Proper worship to God is always through our eye High Priest Jesus Christ. There are not many religions that lead to the same place, there’s only one way to approach God without coming under His wrath, and that is through Christ. So He doesn’t go into great detail in verse 15 because the whole book is about that!

He says that today as a believer if you are going to worship God, you come through Christ. He is the doorway through proper Christian worship. In fact, it was the Apostle Peter who said almost exactly the same thing in 1 Peter 2:5:

You also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

You’re not going to get a conflict of interest on this point with Biblical writers. There is only one way to approach God, and that is through the sacrifice of our High Priest Jesus Christ. Here’s the second thing in Hebrews 13:15, it is about the frequency of Christian worship. It says:

Let us continually offer up a sacrifice.

Here is the frequency of Christian worship. Now why does that say that here to the Hebrew audience? Remember that in their mind to offer up sacrifice was connected to a festival, a special day, and a time of the year. The author is saying here to know for the believer who comes to God through Christ that it is to be continual. In other words, the worship should be day by day. The sacrifices are not regulated by some festival, holiday, or a certain time of the year. Christian worship is to be offered day by day, at the moment we awake. When we wake up we are either to grumble or thank God. Even when it’s harder to get up every day because you’re getting older, you’re still thanking God because your body is growing older and your spirit is growing stronger.

According to one linguist, the rabbinical tradition teaches that all the Mosaic sacrifices would have come to an end except for one, which was the sacrifice of thanksgiving. The thank offering was the only thing that never came to an end. And all prayers would cease except for the prayer of thanksgiving.

Well that leads us to the next thing. I went quickly through those two because I want to get to the next one which is the particulars of Christian worship, found in Hebrews 13:15, in the last part of the verse. And this really answers the question for us as to why the sacrifices are different, and that’s because they are of a different kind than the Old Testament. We are to sacrifice ourselves, and Paul says that also in Romans 12. We are to come to God as a living sacrifice. That sounds like an oxymoron because a sacrifice is usually something that dies. We already died in Christ and now that we are alive in Christ, we offer up ourselves as a living sacrifice. This is what he is getting to, it’s the different kind that we are to offer to God ourselves and our very lives. And how do we do that? Well look back in verse 15:

Through Him then, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that give thanks to His name.

So here He is, we are offering up praise to God every day of our lives. Now if we just got done reflecting on what just came before, let me back track a little. Let’s go up to Hebrews 13:1, and I’m just going to package it like this. Shouldn’t we offer up praise to God for brotherly love? Brotherly love that has been shown to us in our Christian lives since we became believers. Also we learn that God loved us first and that His greatest demonstration love toward us was expressed in His sacrificial death in the class.

When we learn all that, we remember that we didn’t love God first. God was the One that loved us first! Then we found out that because of His demonstration on the cross that God really loved us individually. Can you praise God for that and for the love that comes with others because of the relationship you have with Christ?

Shouldn’t we also offer up praise for the hospitality we receive in Hebrews 13:2?

Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by this some have entertained angels without knowing it.

Isn’t being hospitable something we should be doing something on a regular basis? You know, after preaching on hospitality, my wife and I last week were in New York City for our anniversary. We came back late at night when it has already been raining all day long. We were standing in New Brunswick at the train station and it’s like we had a tag on us, “Just ask us for help!” We stood there and people just kept coming up to asking to borrow a cell phone, etc. And what kept ringing through my mind was radical hospitality. We couldn’t say no to anyone!

It came down to this one girl who was desperate for some reasons, and we ended up paying the taxi cab to drive her where she needed to go. If she had stood there any longer, we probably would have set up a stand to start preaching. Of course it was still pouring and miserable and cold, but the Lord was just ringing through our minds, “radical hospitality.”

That’s something we can do because God did it for us. So we open up ourselves to help others. And then Hebrews 13:3 says:

Remember the prisoners, as though in prison with them, and those who are ill-treated, since you yourselves also are in the body.

Shouldn’t we offer up acts of sympathy like it says in the verse? And verse 4:

Marriage is to be held in honor among all, and the marriage bed is to be undefiled; for fornicators and adulterers God will judge.

God is teaching us about purity before and during marriage, which is honorable in His sight. Shouldn’t we give Him praise for the institution of marriage that He designed? When we live it out properly and honorably, all the benefits that God intended come out in it. Then verse 5, which says that God has met all our material needs.

Make sure that your character is free from the love of money, being content with what you have; for He Himself has said, “I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you.”

And He is presently helping us to learn realistic contentment. Being content with what you have and praising Him for His providential and protective care every single day matters.

Also shouldn’t we offer up praise to God for His imitable loyalty, like in verse 7-12?

Remember those who led you, who spoke the word of God to you; and considering the result of their conduct, imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. Do not be carried away by varied and strange teachings; for it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace, not by foods, through which those who were so occupied were not benefited. We have an altar from which those who serve the tabernacle have no right to eat. For the bodies of those animals whose blood is brought into the holy place by the high priest as an offering for sin, are burned outside the camp. Therefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people through His own blood, suffered outside the gate.

We need to be able to emulate and follow those who have gone before us, whether it be a pastor, Bible teacher, parent, or even a book! All these share with us and live the Word of God! Also we should want daily to offer up sacrifices of praise to God, like for the mercy of Jesus and the changelessness of God every day. We should be praising Him for the God-breathed Scriptures and the sound doctrine we have access to. we should praise Him for the salvation that we have been offered in His grace, and which is maintained by grace. We should praise Him for the future plan of God that He has offered us in the Word of God. We are living in a time now that is temporary. We live in tents but one day we will live in a city whose Builder and Maker is God.

So every time we praise God, it’s a sacrifice before Him! And that’s pleasing to God. It’s like it says in the Old Testament about a sweet smelling savor in His nostrils with a proper sacrifice. Take your Bibles really quickly and turn to the last Psalm, which as to do with praise. Praise in Hebrew is hallelujah. Look at Psalm 150:

Praise the Lord! Praise God in His sanctuary; Praise Him in His mighty expanse. Praise Him for His mighty deeds; Praise Him according to His excellent greatness. Praise Him with trumpet sound; Praise Him with harp and lyre. Praise Him with timbrel and dancing; Praise Him with stringed instruments and pipe. Praise Him with loud cymbals; Praise Him with resounding cymbals. Let everything that has breath praise the Lord. Praise the Lord!

Do you realize what He is saying here? In song, this is what pleases God, when you live your life and praising Him for everything. And when we come to worship, what we lift up with our voices should be loud. It should come from deep in our hearts because we’ve been praising Him all week.

Now that leads us to the last part of Hebrews 13:15. And I’m breaking this up to give you a sense about what the author is saying about our sacrifices. He says in the verse:

Through Him then, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that give thanks to His name.

He goes from praise to thanks. The fruit of your lips. Now that we are under the New Covenant, no longer do we have a heart of stone. That means a heart that blocks God, is hard towards God, and is dead towards Him. Under the New Covenant, we have been given a heart of flesh that is responsive to God, pliable to the will of God, and no longer dead but alive. This heart wants to walk with God and bears fruit of the lips.

Things are coming out of your mouth because of what has happened in your heart. So what is already in your heart comes out through your lips. In fact what we really believe in our hearts and lives comes out of our mouths.

The author uses the same word that is used in Hebrews 10:23, when he says:

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.

The same word is for making a confession. It shows how much Jesus means to you when you talk about Him and openly confess your faith in Jesus Christ. It’s not always a systematic point of the gospel, that’s not what he means here. Instead, he is talking about your whole demeanor. It’s about what you think and what comes out of your heart by openly acknowledging Christ and what He’s done for you.

One translation puts this passage like this: “proclaiming our allegiance to His Name.” That’s a great way of saying it. Where’s your allegiance? The definition of this word is, “loyalty or commitment of a subordinate to a superior or of an individual to a group or cause.” See our allegiance here is to Christ. When it comes right down to it, our allegiance is always to Christ.

Again it’s the Psalms that tells us this. Look at Psalm 50:12-14, it says:

If I were hungry I would not tell you, for the world is Mine, and all it contains. Shall I eat the flesh of bulls or drink the blood of male goats? Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving and pay your vows to the Most High.

And then in verse 23:

He who offers a sacrifice of thanksgiving honors Me.

So it’s about a Christian living their every day life when they are praising God for all the things mentioned in this chapter and more. And then it comes down to what comes out of their lips, and it shouldn’t be back-biting, complaining, gossiping, or moaning about your situation. James 3:11 says:

Does a fountain send out from the same opening both fresh and bitter water?

It can’t happen! See God wants us by His Spirit to spew out sweet water. There’s no room for gossip and complaining in a Christian’s life. And when you’re there, you’re already being displeasing to God. Proverbs says that God hates gossip because of all the damage it does in the body of Christ and in a family. You stay away from people who gossip and complain. We should call each other on the carpet when we notice it and confess when we do it in our own lives. We’re going to fall in those ways and yet at the same time we are to give sacrifices that come out of our lips to thank God because our allegiance is Jesus Christ and no one is going to move us from that position ever.

And then there is a third thing that comes under this in Hebrews 13:16. This verse is about Christians offering up the sacrifice of compassionate service.

And do not neglect doing good and sharing, for with such sacrifices God is pleased.

I thought about that when I read it. What is it though? Do we forget to do good? Is that why this is here? The way this verse is designed to have a present imperative with a negative, means that to forbid a habitual action from happening amongst the congregation of believers. This means that as a member of the congregation, you would forget to do good! We have to be reminded to do good.

It’s about simply showing kindness to others and doing them good. From the Ephesians passage, it’s about simply walking in and practicing the good works that you were ordained to do already. It says in Ephesians 2:10:

For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

Don’t forget to walk in the ordained works that God has already called you to. I’ll tell you what, if you are praising God and giving thanks, you will. If you’re not doing those things, you will forget because you will forget the source of all you have, which is God Himself.

In fact the very word in Ephesians for “His workmanship” is a word that can be translated to “poem.” We are God’s poem. It’s amazing that that word is used. A poem is a piece of writing that really partakes of the nature of both speech and song. It is nearly always rhythmical. It’s got meter to it and exhibits a form of elements like rhyme and stanzas and structure to it. In fact, poems are often considered to be beautiful literature because of the way they are set up. God is saying here that when you walk in your ordained works, you are displaying His poem to humanity.

God speaks the universe and everything into existence so that it is His spoken word through us so that He exemplifies who He is to other people. So when a Christian is engaged and ready to do good, they are actually displaying the wise generosity of God.

Let’s take our Bibles and turn to Proverbs 3. When I was looking in that passage of Scripture, I came across an interesting phrase. It says this in verse 27:

Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to do it.

In other words, the wise person is obligated before God to help. And of course the words here for generosity or sharing material goods is “our neighbor’s right for help.” Christians have a right by God Himself to help those who are in need.

If it’s in your hand and you have the power to produce the need, then you act like God when you act good in supplying someone’s need. In a very real way, our neighbor has a claim on any goods that we can spare to help meet their needs. Of course, there is always a choice in it. I can help or not help someone, as it says in Proverbs 3:28. We have a choice to delay helping someone, which can be a good tactic, because you hope the person forgets or finds someone else to help them. But look what it says in the verse:

Do not say to your neighbor, “Go, and come back, and tomorrow I will give it,” when you have it with you.

Procrastination can be a ploy to infinite postponement, but the Bible says that it’s not wisdom but foolishness. When it’s in your power to do it, God’s not asking you to give away stuff that you cannot do. He’s asking you to be wise about what you have so you can help others. When you have the things with you, don’t delay in giving them because you display the deeds of kindness that God has displayed to you already.

When we look at a passage of Scripture like this we come head on to the radical nature of God’s wisdom, which leads to a life of goodwill and helpfulness. A wise person becomes a blessing to any church, community, or job site.

One last thing in Hebrews 13 when we are talking about the particulars of Christian worship. Not only do we have thankful praise, but also shameless witness before others. It also includes compassionate service and the last thing is big-hearted, open-handed giving. Verse 16 says:

Do not neglect doing good and sharing.

Be big-hearted and open-handed as a believer, that’s the very word for fellowship here. Sharing is fellowship with God as you fellowship with others. So if you are praising and thanking God, you will be that vessel of good works that displays goodness, generosity, and sharing with other people. And when you do that, all those things are pleasing to God. Those are your sacrifices. Simple right?

You’re sharing what you have, which includes monetary offerings on behalf of needy people, and it includes regular, methodical and cheerful giving that we ought to do as believers according to the Word of God. Really we have come full circle in explaining the real reason why we offer these sacrifices to God, which is to please Him. That’s what we have in all of verse 16, which again says:

And do not neglect doing good and sharing, for with such sacrifices God is pleased.

Don’t you want to please God? Is that difficult to understand? I think the intention of the author is to make it as simple and clear as possible that this is how you are to live your life. With all the theology in Hebrews, this is how you are to live. All that theology doesn’t produce a big head, it produces a big heart. And it produces a big heart for God first and then for people. That’s what theology does.

If theology just gives you a big head, you’ll feel like you’re going to explode with trying to answer all the questions that people have. That’s not what it’s meant for. It’s actually amazing what Paul says to the Colossians church. In Colossians 1:10, it says:

So that you will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.

Now if you remember way back when I was saying that if you want to increase your faith, you must increase your knowledge of God. We live a life that is pleasing to Him in all respects, we bear fruit of the good works that God ordained us for, and we increase in the knowledge of God. So you gotta ask yourself, is this a pattern of your life? That’s what it means to live by faith.

This next coming year, let’s make this a point of our prayers. That whatever pleases God, that’s what we’re going to decided to do. And the things that you have been doing in your life that have not been pleasing to God, that’s what you will decide not to do anymore. Keep driving things out that don’t please God with things that do please Him until you die. Until God decides to take you, like Enoch. That is how we ought to live. It’s easy to just take a look at your life and asking yourself how you’re living, what you’re thinking, and who you’re allowing into your life. Ask yourself if your affections for God are heightened every single day. Ask if Christ your highest allegiance or if you have other allegiances that have taken His place.

Let’s pray. Lord, this morning, I thank You for Your Word. For mostly of the simplicity of what it says. We can be all these things by Your Spirit. All those who come to You and approach You through Christ, those who live by faith in a pleasing manner. Those who, Lord, want to do it in every respect of their life. Those who are Your poem and who are displaying the good works You are working through them. And those who, as they are learning the Word of God, are increasing more and more in the knowledge of God so therefore their faith is increasing. Lord, help us to worship You day by day, and that it would be filled with thankful praise. Also that it would be filled with shameless witness, and a compassionate service, and a generous heart. I pray as we do that, Lord, that we would be able to display before the world the very things that You want the world to know, because we know You in a very personal way as our Lord and Savior.

Lord, this coming year let it be our prayer that we would examine ourselves to see how pleasing we really are to You and that we would adjust our lives and repent of our sin and get on track in walking in pace and on step with You and Your Word. And I pray that You would receive the glory and honor, and that this next year would be a great year of growing deeply in our faith with You and our relationship with You to the point that we would not want it any other way. That our affections would be so heightened that our love for You would be displayed in what we say, think, and do. And I pray this in Your matchless Name, Amen.