Essentials Of The Faith / Sunday Morning Sermon Series / Statement Of Faith

The Church Part 2

Intro: John Stockton spent more time as a POW than any other American...over 2000 days. He was continuously beaten and exposed to the elements. How did he make it through that literal hell on earth? Community. Although often separated from one another, the POW's devised a code to communicate with one another. It was heard in their cough, in how they walked, in sounds w/o words.  Why go to so much trouble? Because they needed to know that they were not alone...that they were part of something more than just themselves...they  needed a sense of community. It was this strong sense of community that gave men like Stockton the support they needed to survive.

EXP: What I want us to understand this morning is that as Christians, followers of Jesus Christ, we are also a community. And that is the emphasis in our passage this morning as we look at God's Church and our Commitment to it. The words 'us' and 'we' are vital parts of what the writer of Hebrews wants us to know, and apply.  You see, Believers have all been called by God to life in Christian community. And together we have responsibilities associated with that call.

Trans: What is that call and the nature of our responsibilities to this Christian community, the church? Open you Bibles to Hebrews 10:19.

Read: (Heb. 10:19-22)
I. The Call (Heb. 10:19-22)
    A. Draw Near to God
         The central element or truth in this passage, actually in the whole section up to vs 25 is  the composite phrase 'brethren, draw near to God.'  Three things to examine here.

 1. Who can draw near to God?
         According to the text, who can draw near to God? The 'brethren'. To believers in JC, to those who have accepted Christ finished work on Calvary as just payment for their sin debt to God. He is speaking to Christians..to you.

 2. On what basis do we draw near to God?
     By a new and living way
          In the OT, how did people draw near and get right with God? What was the process? People came to God through the priests and by way of animal sacrifices to atone for their sin before God. In the NT, how do people draw near to God? How do they get right with God? Christ would be the new way. No longer will a dead animal sacrifice atone for sin. Access to God is now through the shed blood not of a ram or bull, but of the living Christ. Christ is our High Priest who made atonement or forgiveness for our sin by his death on Calvary. And by His resurrection form the dead, he now continuously intercedes for us to the Father.

 3. How are we to draw near to God?
     a. With Confidence
          We are not to approach God with fear or timidity. We enter the throne of God through the work of Jesus Christ alone. In Him, we have complete confidence that we will be seen and heard by God.

     b. With a sincere heart
          A sincere heart is open and uncovered before God and is to those around us, all it appears to be. It means our hearts concerning God are genuine.

     c. In full assurance of faith
          Faith is not just believing God can but that He will. And if we are in Christ by grace through faith, God will draw us to Himself. We draw near to God in full, wholehearted trust in Christ alone for our access to God.

     d. Hearts sprinkled clean
         Bodies washed with pure water
          What the writer is saying is that a requirement for drawing near to God is that we be cleansed of our sin.

  Now that has been done for us once for all on Calvary, but we continue to sin and His blood continues to bring forgiveness to those who openly confess their sinfulness to God.

Read: 1 John 1:9 'If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.'

 That is why we have added a time of corporate and personal confession of sin during our worship service. We must have our sinful hearts sprinkled with the forgiving blood of Christ before we can enter His presence...or our access will be denied.

APP: God has done all this for us. He has made access to His throne of grace, through the life, death and resurrection of His son Jesus Christ. He has appropriated salvation for us and calls us to draw near to Him.  Logic and simple reason rightly leads us to see that the believer who refuses to draw near to God, when the door has been opened to Him, would be a sign of utter ingratitude and contempt for God and His Christ.

    It is because of this, the writer of Hebrews tell us what our responsibilities are now that we can draw near to God through Christ., individually and corporately as the community of faith.

II. The Responsibilities (Heb. 10:23-25)
Read: Heb. 10:3-25

    A. Hold Fast the Confession of our Hope w/o wavering
 The writer is acknowledging that there will be hard times, trials testing your faith, but he encourages us to hold on, don't let go of what you know to be the truth of the Word of God. God is faithful, He will not let you down. Hold on! One of the reasons people drift away from God instead of drawing near to Him is because they hold on to themselves and not to the truth of Gods Word and I might add they drift away from the love and support of  the community. Holding on to our hope, really is a community  experience. The text says...Let us hold fast the confession of our hope. We need each other to hold on to.

ILL: Ever play Tug of  War? It is best when both sides are even. But what happens if some of the people on your side decide to let go of the rope and get something to eat? You end up in the mud.

 As a community of faith, we must all, together hold fast to the confession of our Hope, which is life in Jesus Christ.

    B. Stimulate One Another to Love and Good Works
         The text says 'let us consider'. Now this doesn't mean that after you have thought about it that you can stop because you were only told to consider it, you weren't told to do anything about it. Although that sounds funny in the abstract, in reality that is what happens. We have good intentions but our intentions more often than not don't come to fruition because something more important, more pressing...more self comes along to stop us from stimulating others to love and good works.

 And we do that not by finger pointing and lecturing, but with encouraging words and a good example. The supportive love of Christians for each other is a powerful factor in maintaining spiritual vitality and intensifying the impact the church has on the world around it.

   C. Do not forsake Gathering Together
 Isn't it interesting  that the early church had attendance problems too. According to the text there were people, who for reasons not mentioned, were not regularly attending services. And the same is true today..even here at CBC.

CBC: We have over 100 men, women and children who attend here on a somewhat regular basis. Yet on any given Sunday, we will have about 70 show up. You do the math. That means 30 are staying home every week...and it is never the same 30.

Not a part of the group
 It seems that there is always something else going on that takes priority over attending worship service on Sundays. And it is no wonder that those who are irregular in attendance feel they are not a part of the CBC community. The truth is that they have no one to blame but themselves.

Effect on Children
 And what makes this worse is when they have children. Many parents neglect attending when their children are young or are inconsistent because they want to spend quality time with their kids, even if it is on Sunday. So they sign them up for sport leagues that have games or practices on Sundays. They take them to other events thinking it is only one Sunday. Except over the year those one Sundays add up and what the child sees and learns is worshipping God is only important if there is nothing better to do. Understand this, a parents lack of commitment to regular worship will be picked up by their children and God will not be pleased with what you are teaching them.

Conclusion
 Heb. 3:13 says 'But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin's deceitfulness.'

 That's what may happen when we do not make it a habit of meeting together and encouraging one another to love and good works.; we get hardened by sin's lies. If you or someone you know are not coming to worship services regularly, it may be an indication that you or they are getting caught up in Satan lies. And then you get stuck having to  justify your absences. The reasons almost sound biblical, but they surely deceive.

 Some of these excuses could be legitimate..to an extent, but they all conflict with the command given in our text this morning.
 Remember that I began by saying that the main emphasis in this text is drawing near to God and that the focus is on the 'us' and 'we'. The community of Christ? People who just attend when it is convenient are focused on their world and not on God's Kingdom. They have lost touch with what a Christian community is all about.

 They are choosing to ignore the commandments regarding the body of Christ and their part in it.

 They don't understand how they and their family need to be in community with other Christians.

 It is easy to lose sight of the truth that this little church of gathered believers in the Oceanport area are in fact, gathered up into the presence of the Lord every Sunday morning. And together with the great company of the saints throughout the whole world and in heaven we offer our sacrifice of praise to the One to whom we owe everything. Drawing near to God ought to be the desire of every believer and faithful attendance at corporate gathering for worship is part of the journey.

 Think about it. If 100 people here at CBC took this passage seriously we would need to add another service each week. Wouldn't that be something? But it rests with you. This is God's Church, what is your commitment to it?