Hello, this is Brother Denny.
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Praise the Lord.
This is the day that the Lord has
made.
And so it's a perfect day.
Amen.
And God has something for you today, I
trust, in His Word.
Got up early this morning.
Been praying about this message a little bit
and this passage of Scripture.
Just feel like that there's some things here
that would apply to a number of you.
So, though this is a Bible study, I
trust it will also be not just an
inspiration, but a challenge and perhaps even convicting
to some of your hearts here today.
So, turn in your Bibles to Hebrews.
And as we said yesterday, we'll begin here
in verse 7.
A very important passage in the New Testament.
Quite a few verses here that really go
over a similar principle.
But it's such an important principle that the
writer of Hebrews repeats himself many times it
seems like until you almost say, okay, I
think I've got it.
But the problem is God knows us and
we don't always get it, do we?
We need to hear it again and again
because we're leaky vessels.
So, let's just receive what God has for
us here and realize that this is something
very important.
And how many of you read this passage
as I asked yesterday?
Good.
Okay, well that's way over half.
Well, I would just say as I begin
and I'm going to read some of this
here, there is undoubtedly different applications we could
make from this passage of Scripture and different
types of people and situations that it could
speak into.
And that's the wonderful thing about the Word
of God is you can take one verse
and maybe preach 50 messages on it and
they're all right and they're all true.
Isn't that amazing what a treasure trust there
is in the Word of God and so
many different gems and jewels that can be
plumbed and used out of that.
But today, I'm going to probably direct most
of my applications or most of my comments
to two groups of people that I know
are sitting in this room.
And as we read about these people that
struggled with unbelief and therefore could not enter
into God's rest, again, we could make different
applications.
Who are those people?
We know who they are historically, but the
question today is why is He writing this
to the church?
Because this is to brethren.
And if it's to brethren, it's to you
and you and you and me and all
of us sitting here, right?
And so the question is what is the
application?
What is God saying to you?
Who is He talking to?
Me?
You?
And what groups of people?
And so today, I'm going to principally narrow
the field a little bit to two groups
of people as we read this.
The first group as we read these passages
would be those that struggle with assurance of
salvation.
Those that struggle with assurance of salvation.
Now, I'm not going to say this passage
has all the answers for those that may
be struggling with assurance, but it has the
fundamental answer.
It has the bottom line answer that needs
to be settled in your heart.
And I know some of you here struggle
with that, don't you?
It's something that does happen from time to
time.
The other group of people I believe is
a larger group of people that are sitting
here and that is that group of people
who are not, how would I say it,
are not fully surrendered.
They are not living the abundant, rejoicing Christian
life.
They do not have rivers of living water
flowing out of their bellies.
Born again?
Yes.
Okay.
I've been delivered by the blood of Jesus
and here I am.
I've said goodbye to Egypt.
But you live in this what I call
wilderness experience.
You're in a place of sort of aimlessness.
It's a desert.
It's a dry place.
Why am I not yielded to God the
way I need to be?
Why are all these blessings, why are all
these promises in the Word of God, why
am I not able to apprehend them and
appropriate them and use them in my life?
What is wrong?
Why is my Christian life kind of just
flat?
You know?
And so that group of people that is
not fully surrendered, fully yielded, fully surrendered, is
the group, second class of people, that we
want to make some applications here today.
So as I read this, if you're in
either one of those two classes, I would
just ask you to be honest with God
as we read this and allow God to
speak to your heart because I know that's
why you're here.
And this passage mentions the word heart several
times because God isn't just interested in performance.
He isn't interested in, you know, where you
go to church or where you go to
church.
He's going to be talking about heart issues
and a very, very important heart issue.
And that has to do with your faith
or your unbelief, as is going to be
taught here.
So let me read a few of these
verses here to get started.
We'll begin in verse 7.
Wherefore, as the Holy Ghost saith, today...
Can we just stop there?
What is today?
Today.
You know, this isn't for you to think
about and get a hold of a year
from now, OK?
It isn't for you to sit here in
condemnation and think, well, I didn't get it
last year.
Let last year in last year, OK?
Today.
Let's deal with where your heart is today.
There is a sense of urgency here in
the Word of God that you get something,
that you hear something from the Holy Ghost
today.
Today.
Can you just wake yourself up and see
today if you will hear His voice?
Heart and not sure.
And here's that word hearts.
This is a heart thing that we're dealing
with.
Intellectually, I'm glad if you understand some things
today.
But more importantly, I agree with the Holy
Ghost today.
I want your heart to receive it and
understand it.
That's what God wants.
Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation
in the day of temptation in the wilderness,
when your fathers tempted Me, proved Me, and
saw My works forty years.
Wherefore, I was grieved.
This is God speaking here so that you
understand what's happening.
God was grieved.
I was grieved with that generation and said,
they do always err in their heart.
God sees with a vision that you and
I don't see, doesn't He?
He can not only observe the way you
live your life, He can actually see into
your heart.
You know, He can just lay that thing
open to His eyes and He'll see what
is in your heart.
You know, your best friend may not know.
You may have them fooled.
But God knows because He sees your heart.
They do always err in their heart and
they have not known My ways.
These are strong words, aren't they?
Very strong words here.
And you want to think, why is He
writing this to a group of believers?
But that's who He's writing it to.
This is not a message that He's preaching
on the corner to a lost world.
We need to understand the context of who
He's speaking to here.
So I swear, now God is allowed to
swear.
You and I are not.
You know why God can?
Because He can swear by Himself and there's
nothing higher than that.
You understand that?
So He can do that.
He's taking an oath here.
So I swear in my wrath, they shall
not enter into my rest.
Now the word rest here is going to
be used 11 times in the passage through
the end of chapter 3 and all of
chapter 4.
And I recognize and I don't have time
to talk about all of this, but the
word rest is used in different ways in
the New Testament.
And there's several different applications we could use.
Today, that rest, again, that He's going to
be talking about, Canaan, is not heaven.
It's not heaven.
I'm not going to use Canaan as heaven.
Some people may preach it that way.
I'm not necessarily going to debate with them.
I don't think that's the best way to
make the application of this passage.
The rest here, I think the better rest
here is those that are leading that Christian
life of faith and surrender and they're yielded
to whatever God has for them and they
find that abundant, blessing Christian life with fruit,
just like the land of Canaan was full
of fruit, full of fruit and growth and
everything they touch is going to flourish and
their life is going to bless other people.
And all those things that should have happened
to them had they entered into Canaan land
but didn't are the example of the application
I'm making is there is a rest in
the Christian life where you're totally surrendered, totally
yielded, full of faith, and the promises of
God you lay hold of them, and may
I say they lay hold of you, and
your life is like your path is gold.
That's the rest that I'm going to use
here and I believe is, for me at
any rate, the best understanding of this passage
that we're talking about here.
Take heed, brethren, and again, note the word
brethren.
This is you.
Most of you sitting here are born again.
I do believe there's probably some of you
sitting here in a group this size that
are not born again.
And so this message is not necessarily to
you and yet it is to you because
you can make an application here too.
And you need to listen to the Word
of God.
But the warning here, this is the second
major warning in the book of Hebrews.
There's seven major warnings.
There's many others, but there's seven major warnings
in the book of Hebrews.
This is the second one and it's a
sobering one and it's a serious one.
Remember the first one was, how shall we
escape if we neglect such a great salvation?
Well, here's the second one and it's specifically
addressed to brethren.
Take heed, and that word heed is a
word again of warning, danger, wake up.
This could cause a major problem in your
life.
Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any
of you an evil heart.
It's dealing with your heart again.
An evil heart.
Where is your heart today, young people?
An evil heart of unbelief in departing from
the living God.
Now, I think I'll stop there just for
a moment to set the framework of this
a little bit in our minds for the
purposes of what God wants to show us
here today.
And I think we should just turn to
Numbers, chapter 13 and 14.
If we understand what happened, and maybe we
should just turn there quickly, turn to Numbers
chapters.
We'll just read a few verses out of
Numbers 13 and 14.
What God is talking about here is with
the children of Israel.
Well, let's back up to Egypt just for
a moment.
They were in slavery.
They were in bondage there for 400 years.
They sighed.
They cried.
And God heard their cry up in heaven.
And He sent a Redeemer, Moses, to lead
them out of the bondage.
And they were let out through blood.
The blood was put on the doorposts of
the lentils of their house.
And by faith, they had to believe that
God meant what He said.
And they were to stay inside and rest
in God's Word that if they did what
He said by staying where He said in
their house with the blood on the door,
that the death angel would pass over them.
And that first Passover was a wondrous thing.
It was a wonderful thing, but of course
it's only a shadow or a type of
Jesus Christ, our great Passover.
Through His blood, God passes over our sins.
So by faith, they had to stay in
their houses that night when there were screams
of agony and death all over Egypt in
animals and in men.
And so through that deliverance of blood, they
were then let out with the flame by
night and the cloud by day.
They were delivered through the Red Sea.
They saw God do a mighty victory.
They sang the song of Moses and Miriam
that God delivered them.
It was a wonderful thing.
So they had, may I say, a rest
of redemption in that they were redeemed out
of that Egypt, which is a type of
the world and a type of sin and
flesh and all of those things that they
were in bondage to it and captive to
it.
They couldn't even live their life the way
they wanted to live it.
It was affecting their children.
It was affecting all parts of their life.
And so God delivered them from that and
they were free to worship Him.
Remember, that was one of the cries Moses
gave them is so that they would be
free to worship God.
And so now they're free to worship God.
So they go through that.
They go to Mount Sinai and they get
close to Canaan.
They get close to the promised land, the
fulfillment of what else God has promised them.
They're free.
That should be enough, right?
No, God has more for them than just
deliverance, than just redemption.
He has a life that He wants them
to live.
He has a way that He wants them
to live.
He wants to make His name famous.
And He needs a people that will be
dedicated to Him and love Him and have
faith in Him that they'll go and they'll
win victories for Him.
They'll fight battles for Him.
All of these things.
And so that's what Canaan was supposed to
be.
And here they are on the precipice of
Canaan.
They're ready to go into the promised land
so that they can be a nation of
priests.
So that they can be a sign to
the Gentiles and a light to the world.
And Canaan land is part of that promise
and fulfillment.
And they get there and they get scared.
You know.
After all the signs and wonders, you know.
But really, we're just like them, aren't we?
We're like them.
And that's what this passage in the New
Testament is about.
It's not for us to judge them.
Don't ever sit in judgment of what the
Israelites did.
Because those things are written for examples to
us.
And may I say, those things are written
as examples of what we're like.
Can I say that too?
And that's why they're there.
And that's why God put this in the
book of Hebrews.
And so they come to this point of
rest.
They come to this place where they could
have all these things.
But they say, oh Moses, we better send
some spies in there.
We're not sure about all this.
And they murmur and they complain and they
grumble.
And this isn't the first time they grumbled
and murmured.
And God counts, by the way.
Do you know God counts?
So anyway, they send the spies in and
they come back with an evil report.
And we won't read all of this here,
but a couple of verses I do want
to read.
In chapter 13, look at verse 27.
And they told him and said, We came
into the land whither thou sentest us, and
surely it floweth with milk and honey, and
this is the fruit of it.
I mean, they admit there is a better
life.
They admit there is fruit.
They admit there is honey.
They admit there is sustenance.
They admit there is blessing.
And all of these things, they are there.
In other words, God has kept His promise.
There is such a place.
And Christian, there is such a place for
you too.
You know?
Do you see the application here?
Nevertheless, uh oh, here we go.
The people be strong that dwell in the
land, and the cities are walled and very
great.
Moreover, we saw the children of Anak there.
Now, the children of Anak are who?
They are what?
Giants, right?
That's where Goliath comes from.
And so they go on and list all
the people.
But it says in verse 30, And Caleb
stilled the people before Moses, and said, Let
us go up at once and possess it,
for we are well able to overcome it.
Verse 31, But the men that went up
with him said, We be not able to
go up against the people, for they are
stronger than they.
And here it goes back and forth.
And then over in chapter 14, it gets
to the point where the people believe the
evil report, and doubt and unbelief comes in
their heart.
And we know this as we read, you
can read Psalms and read a similar account.
I forget, is it Psalms 95?
I'm not sure where now.
My mind just went blank.
But anyway, Psalms talks about this, and of
course then we read it in Hebrews as
well, that their problem, if you understand their
problem was not the giants.
The giants did not keep them out of
Canaan.
The walled cities did not stop them.
It was unbelief that stopped them.
It was unbelief.
Look what happens here in chapter 14.
And in verse 10 it says, But all
the congregation bade stone them with stones.
And then 11, And the Lord said unto
Moses, How long will this people provoke me?
And how long will it be?
Now watch this, Ere they, what?
Believe me.
See the root of this whole scene, which
takes up several chapters here in the Old
Testament, and actually almost two chapters here in
the New Testament Hebrews, is this key phrase
here.
How long will it be ere they believe
me?
You think God is still crying that out
of heaven today?
I do.
You know, even Jesus said, what did He
say?
When I return will I find faith?
You know, how long?
It seems to be one of the cries
of God.
You know, how long ere they believe me?
How long ere they believe me?
For all the signs which I have showed
them.
Then you jump over to verse 24.
It says, But my servant Caleb, watch this,
because he had another spirit with him, that
means in his heart, and hath followed me
fully in his heart, him will I bring
to the land where unto he went, and
his seed shall possess it.
There is a place in here, I didn't
read it, where Caleb basically makes the statement,
you know, the inhabitants of the land, they
shall be bread for us.
I mean, he's so full of faith that,
you know, not in himself, he wasn't as
big as those giants was he?
He didn't have the weaponry or the arsenal
to knock down the walled cities, but he
said, if God is for us, they'll be
bread.
You know?
And so we see this spirit over here
of belief in his heart, and in those
with unbelief, and this is the scene that
we're dropping back into from a New Testament
perspective.
Sitting over here in the New Testament and
wondering why is God making us review this
story here in the New Testament?
I'm a Christian, I believe, and I would
say to you, you have the rest of
redemption, some of you, but you don't have
the rest of Canaan land.
Some of you are wilderness Christians.
You're in a place of desolation.
You're in a place, your Christian life, you
ever notice some of you, your Christian life
is just like this.
Do you know how long the journey was
from Mount Sinai to the Promised Land?
Does anybody know?
How many days walk was it?
No, it was eleven days.
It's eleven days, they figure approximately.
Eleven days.
But you know what?
They went like this for forty years.
You know where they got?
Nowhere.
Now God was with them.
He fed them.
Didn't even let their clothes wear out.
He was still blessing them.
Still took care of them.
Didn't let people destroy them.
You know, they had the rest of redemption,
right?
You ever feel like that in your Christian
life?
Just, I'm not getting anywhere.
Well, they didn't get anywhere either.
And so that's why I say, you know,
it's God's desire that we enter into this
rest of Canaan land.
This rest of Canaan land.
One way to illustrate this for that class
of Christian maybe might be this.
You ever heard the phrase window shopping?
You all know what that means?
You're going down the street, there's this big
department store, and if you've ever been to
a big city, New York, Atlanta, wherever, Dallas,
I know some of you from Texas.
I met a lot of you from Texas
yesterday.
It surprised me how many were here.
But anyway, there's these department stores and you
go by and there's these big glass windows,
you know, bigger than you, and there's all
this stuff in there.
And maybe it's things you really need and
you want to go in there and you
want to buy it, but you don't have
the money.
You don't have the resources to do it.
And so you're frustrated and you wish you
could, but you can't.
And you don't know how to do it.
You don't know how to get the money.
And you'd like to be able to do
it, but you're just not sure what to
do.
When really, the money is available for you
to go in and buy what you need,
but you just keep window shopping.
That'd be very frustrating, wouldn't it?
And that's what it is with a lot
of Christians like this.
They're looking through the glass and they see
Canaan land.
They see the honey.
They see the fruit.
They see in other people's lives.
They see in the Bible all of these
things.
You know, maybe they've never led a soul
to Christ.
Maybe they're even afraid to witness.
And yet, the Bible says God will give
you the power to speak, but they've never
been able to appropriate that.
And they don't know how.
And, you know, they just keep going in
circles like this.
And, you know, their Bible study's a little
dry and their prayer life's a little flat.
And they know it'd be a blessing, but
it doesn't seem to work for them.
And so on and so on and so
on.
And I would say the root problem, or
one of the root problems, is unbelief based
on this passage.
Because it says, take heed, brethren, lest there
be in any of you an evil heart
of unbelief.
So it seems like it is possible for
a person to know God, have experienced redemption,
gone through the blood of Christ, and yet
they're a wilderness Christian just like this.
Just like this.
And they wonder, why am I not growing?
Why is it that so and so is
growing and I'm not?
Why is it that they're advancing in the
Kingdom of God and I'm still back here
in the first grade?
Well, one of the reasons is so simple.
Without faith, it is impossible to please God,
the Bible says.
It's impossible.
You cannot go or grow or get into
that place and get past window shopping until
your faith is there.
And with that comes a complete surrender.
You see Caleb in the story here, you
know, if he had just fought a giant
based on his own strength, he wouldn't have
lasted ten seconds, would he?
But the basis of his another spirit that
he talked about was his faith in God.
Just as God said, how long will it
be before these people believe me?
God could say of Caleb, he believes me
wholly with his whole heart.
And so he was able to do great
exploits for God.
He was able to say forty years later,
give me that mountain, not in pride, but
in faith because he knew God had promised
him that mountain and he could claim that
promise in faith and stand on the record
of God.
God has said it that I can have
that mountain.
I choose to believe God.
Give me that mountain.
And he got that mountain, didn't he?
And that's a lot of the Christian life.
It's not trusting in yourself.
It's not trusting in things or in churches,
but it's believing God.
It's submitting yourself, submitting to the truth of
God and allowing yourself to be surrendered to
what he has for your life.
Now, I would also just say for a
minute, maybe the other application we talked about
here is those that struggle with assurance of
salvation.
Those that struggle with assurance of salvation.
And again, I recognize there could be different
reasons why you struggle with that.
And I cannot sit here and name all
those or go over all those things.
But one of the root reasons, one of
the problems that is in your heart is
a heart of unbelief.
You have to be able to get to
the point where you say, I am a
Christian because God says so.
And I believe his record and I believe
his son.
Now, that sounds so simple, but you know,
faith is that simple.
The effect is not simple.
The effect is very profound in your life.
And again, I am not talking today to
those that are sitting here that are not
born again.
If you're sitting here and you're restless because
you have a lot of sin in your
life, because you've not truly been to the
cross, because the blood of Jesus has not
truly cleansed you, I'm not talking to you.
I hope this message does unsettle you.
But those that are born again, but just
seem to struggle with assurance, may I say
you are under the load of works.
You're under the load of works.
It's like I read a story once in
a missionary book.
I don't remember which one it was.
Someone was in the Philippines and this missionary,
this was a number of years ago, was
riding down this muddy road there as they
have in the Philippines in a wagon.
And he was driving his oxen down the
road to go to the next village.
And there was this older man, a native
Philippine man walking down the road and he's
carrying on his back this big bundle of
heavy weight.
And the missionary stops and says, you know,
would you like a ride to the village?
And the old man agrees and he climbs
into the cart, you know, behind him because
the missionary is in the driver's seat up
here.
And a few minutes later he turns around
to say something and he sees the old
man sitting there on the bench in the
back, but he's picked up the burden and
he's got it up on his back again,
straining and sweating.
And the missionary looks at him and just
wonders, what is this man doing?
Why is he picking that thing back up?
And I think that those of you that
struggle with assurance of salvation, it's a little
bit like that.
You know, God has already picked you up.
You're in the cart.
You know, you have the way.
You're in the way.
You're going in the way, but you keep
picking up the burden again.
You know, you've got to give it to
God.
You know, you have to get to the
point where it's not a belief in yourself.
It's a belief, a belief in God's record.
And faith is not an intellectual thing.
It is an action word that will move
you somewhere.
And it will move you from the kingdom
of darkness into the light of His dear
Son.
Faith will do that.
And when we do, we do not want
to presume upon God by then picking up
those things that God has delivered us from
and putting them back on our back here,
even though we're in the wagon of God,
may I say it that way.
You know, that's here an evil heart of
unbelief.
That's doubting God.
And we need to remember that the number
one job of the Holy Ghost is conviction
of sin.
According to John, when Jesus is describing the
work of the Holy Ghost, the number one
job is conviction of sin.
And the number one sin He talks about
is what?
Believing in Me.
Believing in Jesus.
So, you know, if you've been convicted by
the Holy Ghost of your unbelief and then
you've put your faith in Jesus Christ, to
start picking that thing up and questioning it,
is questioning the work of Jesus Christ.
You don't want to be doing that.
You need to see that, may I say,
based on God's Word here as unbelief is
sin.
You know, I can say that very clearly.
Now, some of you, I may say that
and you kind of like recoil and say,
wait a minute, brother, I'm just struggling with
faith.
I'm just saying, look at the Word of
God here.
Beware, take heed, lest there be in any
of you an evil heart of unbelief.
You know, there comes a time when you
just have to believe.
You just have to have faith.
You have to take that thing off your
back and say, I believe God.
He's going to take me on down the
road.
He's going to get me to heaven.
It's not me figuring it all out.
It's not me doing this or doing that.
That's works.
You know, some of you are still under
the law, you know, and the law, the
letter of God, it says, the law says
that you are a killer.
You know, faith faith is so important to
enter in to have that another spirit like
Caleb.
The reason he had another spirit is what
faith faith faith.
OK, let's keep going here.
All right, the next verse here, I just
want to pause for a second on and
then we'll go quickly through some of the
others, because they are somewhat going over the
same thing several times here.
But this one is important.
Verse 13, and that is, But
exhort one another daily.
While it is called today, notice the word
today again, that's going to be in here
three or four times, lest any of you
be hardened to the deceitfulness of sins.
And what I'd like to say to each
one of you is, you know, you have
a part in my faith and I have
a part in your faith.
Your part is to exhort and encourage me,
and my part is to exhort, encourage you.
You see that here?
It's a command.
May I say it's a New Testament commandment.
It says, but exhort one another.
How often?
Daily.
Do you know why God does this?
Even though unbelief is a sin, God knows
this and at His heart of mercy and
understanding compassion says, it's a sin and I've
warned you, but you know what?
I know what it's like to live down
there.
My son has told me all about it.
And I believe him.
And so I know you're going to need
encouragement.
So I'm going to tell you what to
do.
Encourage, exhort one another daily.
So the word encourage in the New Testament
and exhort here actually means to take strength
from yourself and transfer it and put it
into somebody else.
Sometimes my hands are hanging down.
Sometimes I don't have the strength I need
for today.
And so what you have to do is
you actually have to take some of the
strength God has given you.
You actually have to push it and put
it down into my heart.
That's a powerful thing, isn't it?
You know, encouragement is a powerful thing.
It's a powerful thing.
It's like oxygen to the soul.
In other words, since it says daily in
here, I don't know if I'm going out
on a limb here, but I take it
to mean that I'm not going to make
it if you don't encourage me in my
faith and you're not going to make it
either.
Now, I would like to think theologically, well,
I can do anything.
All I need is God.
Well, I know that's true, too.
But look what it says here.
Exhort one another daily.
You know, one of the reasons we have
prayer groups is this here so that you
can do all the things you're here and
you can not only have some confessing back
there, but you can have some encouraging and
exhorting.
You need it.
You know, it's not doesn't make you less
of a man because you need encouragement or
less of a Christian girls because you encourage
me.
According to this, you need it.
I can testify I need it.
I need it.
Sometimes I don't have the strength it takes
in my own self, in my faith, today.
Sometimes I struggle with unbelief.
I do.
But, you know, during those times, it seems
like God will send somebody up to me.
I'll get a note in my mailbox.
I'll get a phone call.
And, you know, it's like 180 degree turn.
I suddenly strength comes into me.
I think, you know what, I can make
it the rest of the day.
Praise God.
I'm encouraged.
Do you know how that feels?
Well, if you know how that feels, do
it to somebody else.
That's the exhortation isn't here to just receive.
It's to do it.
Exhort one another daily.
It's so important.
Do not miss this little verse tucked here
in the middle of all these warnings here.
OK, because here's the mercy.
Here's the understanding, the compassion of God right
here in the middle of all these warnings.
Isn't that wonderful that God knows your frame
and knows my frame?
Amen.
Now, one other thing that I want to
touch on here.
There's so many things and so little time,
isn't there?
But well, turn to Galatians chapter five.
There's one point I want to make here
as we're talking about faith.
One little aspect I'd like you to see
quickly here.
Look at verse six here in chapter five
for just a minute.
We need to see that faith or belief
in God is also the root and the
beginning of love in our life.
Watch this.
For in Jesus Christ, neither circumcision availeth anything.
And.
Nor uncircumcision, but faith, which worketh by love,
which worketh by love, you know, until you
really, truly have got to the point of
fully trusting and surrendering to God, you will
not love him the way you should.
Now, you can say you love him, but
if your faith is weak, I'm sorry you
don't, because I have learned, I believe the
Bible teaches that trust or faith and love
are a double sided coin.
It's almost like you can't get one without
the other.
You ever seen anybody born again or ever
remember going through it for yourself?
You know, before you're born again, you didn't
love God.
You didn't you didn't love Jesus.
You were at enmity with him, the Bible
says, but then when you transferred your faith
from yourself and trusted him and trusted the
blood of Jesus, it opened the door to
all of a sudden you could look and
say, oh, praise God, I love God, I
love Jesus.
But which came first?
Your faith.
Right.
So the more faith, greater faith, greater love.
Greater faith, greater love.
That's a biblical principle.
Greater faith, greater love.
And with that comes the third leg of
that very important stool, and that is obedience.
Caleb, again, fully trusted God, loved God, had
another spirit.
And he was ready to obey him.
He said, where's the Giants?
Let me at them.
You know, he was going to obey God
no matter what he was.
I really believe I don't understand all this.
He wasn't afraid of the Giants.
Let them be bread.
He was ready to obey.
You know, obedience to God in this world
never makes sense.
May I say that in our logical mind?
If you try to intellectually reason it out,
it isn't going to happen.
I remember before.
Well, actually, I was born again and then
my wife was born again six months later.
And we had the misfortune of both having
a college education, which was a great hindrance
to us coming to Christ.
And I was twenty nine, I'm sad to
say, before I was born again.
And my wife was almost 30 because it
was about six or seven months later and
she had seen me reading the Bible.
So she began to read the Bible and
wondering, you know, what's going on with my
husband?
This, you know, smart, intellectual corporate executive is
now talking about God all the time and
she wasn't sure what to do with that.
And and she's much smarter than me.
If you know her, you know what I
mean.
She has a master's degree in education, which
is even worse than having a college education.
And she was just struggling as she thought
her struggle was intellectual.
But here's the trick.
Her problem wasn't intellectual.
She had a heart problem.
OK, and so she was like, you know,
wrestling with some of these things in the
Bible.
And of all things, you know, the thing
that tripped her up, Jonah.
Jonah being in the belly of a well
for three days, she said in her intellectually
college educated, master's education degree, mine said, God,
no, it can't be.
And you got to remember, we were Catholic
and we didn't know anything about the Bible.
And she said, if I could just believe
that, if you could just show me that,
then, OK, I'd know this whole thing of
being born again is probably for real.
And I don't recommend this and I don't
know what to do with all these things
other than the mercy of God.
So she just she did one of these.
You ever do one of these?
And her finger came down on the passage.
You know, the passage where Jesus said.
And the son of God, just like Jonah,
will go into the earth for three days,
and he used the story of Jonah to
explain him dying and going into the earth
and being resurrected.
She got on her knees and started crying,
you know, because she realized her problem wasn't
intellectual, that God has the answers for all
these things.
Her problem was in believing God.
And she was so humbled and embarrassed that
God would take mercy and show her that
when she didn't deserve to be shown that
because she thought she had an intellectual problem.
And he showed her she had a heart
problem that she just didn't believe God.
And so she believed Jesus and she was
born again that day.
And she called me at work and it
was great rejoicing.
But, you know, faith is not intellectual.
That's how I got on that faith is
not in God is not waiting for you
to agree with him.
He doesn't need you to figure everything out
because faith isn't a matter of intellectual ascent.
The Bible says that by faith, Noah built
an ark.
Well, intellectually, that was the dumbest thing he
could have done.
Here he is building a boat, whatever it
is, 400 and some feet long and 200
feet wide, whatever it is, in the middle
of a semi arid, almost desert land where
it's never rained.
I mean, nonsensical, but by faith he did
it.
So his faith moved him to an action,
right?
He did something.
Faith wasn't just a mental ascent by faith.
Faith was the door that moved him to
build that ark in that desert, dry land.
And but what was the result of his
faith then to the saving of his household?
And so all of these things you need
to start connecting in your mind as we
go through this.
Let me get back to our passage here.
We want to keep moving, starting to run
out of time.
OK, well, let's go through the rest of
these a little quicker here.
There's some things further on we want to
get to.
That was verse 13, verse 14, for we
are made partakers of Christ if we hold
the beginning of our confidence, which is our
faith steadfast into the end.
We talked about that yesterday.
Remember, you know, faith isn't faith if it's
a momentary spike on the graph.
You get a hold of it and you
hang on.
While it is said today, if you'll hear
his voice, harden not your hearts as in
the propagation of that word heart again.
For someone they had heard did provoke, how
be it not all that came out and
the not all here, of course, is Caleb
and Joshua out of Egypt by Moses.
But with whom was he grieved 40 years?
Was it not with them that had sinned,
whose carcasses fell in the wilderness and to
whom swear he they should not enter into
his rest, but to them that believed not.
So we see that they could not enter
in because of unbelief.
Again, notice the repetitive thing.
God is saying this over and over again.
If you're not entering in.
To the to the abundant, may I say,
surrendered Christian life, it's because you have a
lack of submission to God in your heart.
You are not submitting yourself to God's plan
for your life.
You're not believing him enough that he will
take you as you go up against that
walled city.
I know some of the things in your
life seem like a giant, like a walled
city.
And you say, oh, brother, you don't know
what's in my life.
I don't know.
You're right.
I don't know what's in your life, but
I do know God.
And I know what Caleb did looked foolish
to the world, but by faith he entered
in.
And so some of you, you need to
get out of this wilderness experience and believe
God and walk and move in faith.
Now, notice in verse four, chapter four here,
it says, let us.
Therefore, this is the first let us first
of eleven.
Let us therefore fear.
And the word fear here means all tremble,
revere, you know, just like you ever been
on a I was on a boat recently
in the ocean.
The waves were about 15 feet high.
Now, the same ocean that was holding me
up and keeping me safe and keeping the
boat afloat was also an awesome, trembling thing,
you know, that made me kind of hold
on and go.
Whoa, you know, this is something.
Well, that's a little bit of this kind
of fear.
God is the one that sustains us.
But at the same time, there needs to
be a trembling in your heart.
It is awesomeness.
Let us therefore fear, lest a promise being
left left us of entering into his rest.
Any of you should seem to come short
of it.
There are so many promises in the New
Testament.
We don't have time to go over those.
I know you know them.
You need to look at those promises in
the word of God and you need to
appropriate them.
May I say by faith, you will not
get them by studying it in the Greek
and the Hebrew and the Aramaic.
And I'm not against the Bible study.
If you know me, I love Bible study.
But it comes down to faith.
Will you believe what he says?
For unto us was the gospel preached as
well as unto them.
But the word and here's the Bible, the
word of God is important.
The word preached did not profit to them.
You know, you can know truth and it
does no good.
Truth without faith is flat.
You can know the Bible.
You can have truth.
But truth mixed with faith enables you to
then appropriate the abundant Christian life.
The rest of Canaan land, the grapes, the
honey, the milk, the victories that you need.
And may I say the kingdom of God
needs.
You know, God had a plan for Canaan
land.
That place was full of all the ites,
the Jebusites, you know, all of those people.
And God wanted those things taken.
And today, God has business to take care
of in the kingdom of God.
And wonder of wonders, he's given it to
you and I to do.
We're the ones, we're the ones.
And God needs you to enact those spiritual
victories.
But you're only going to do it by
faith.
Prophet, they're not being mixed with faith.
So you take the word of God, the
promises of God, you mix it with faith
and then you enter in to Canaan land.
You enter in to the abundant Christian life.
OK, for we which have believed to enter
into rest, as he said, as I have
sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter
into my rest.
Although the works were finished from the foundation
of the earth, for he spake in a
certain place of the seventh day on this
wise.
And God did rest the seventh day from
all his works.
And in this place, again, if they shall
enter into my rest, seeing, therefore, it remaineth
that some must enter therein.
And they to whom it was first preached
entered not in because of unbelief.
Now, that's a little bit talking about the
Jews.
The gospel was first preached to the Jews.
Remember that?
But many of them did not enter into
the gospel because of unbelief.
Now, some did.
Some did.
Again, he limiteth a certain day, saying in
David today, after so long a time as
it is said today, notice the word today
again, young people, please see this today.
Some of you have already allowed God to
work in your heart, but some of you
haven't.
And I would just beg you and plead
with you based upon this simple admonition in
the word of God today, today, today, today.
If you will hear his voice, harden not
your heart.
Isn't that a horrible thing that you and
I as a human being can harden our
hearts to God?
You know, what a what a power we
have, but a scary power.
And that's why it says, let us fear.
I hope you fear your own heart.
I hope you have a fear that your
own heart can get hard.
For if Jesus had given them rest, then
would he not afterward have spoken of another
day.
There remaineth therefore a rest to the people
of God.
And I just want to make a brief
comment about this thing.
He's using here now the Sabbath as the
seventh day, as as a rest, as an
example.
And, you know, there are people in this
New Testament age that unfortunately read things like
this and they get confused and they go
after the shadow instead of the reality.
OK, they they get hung up on which
day you worship God.
And I remember years ago I was living
in Florida and someone said to me, we
were I was in a church where we
were renting a particular building from a particular
denomination that only worships on Saturday.
I happen to be there doing some work
on Saturday, getting ready for church on our
Sunday in the afternoon.
And one of the men of the church
there said, well, you know, what is your
Sabbath day?
And I said, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday,
Friday, Saturday, Sunday.
And he said, well, I mean, which day?
And I said, every day, because Jesus is
my Sabbath and I can rest in him
every day.
I've entered into his rest and I don't
have to have a day to rest.
My soul is at rest in Christ.
And he said, wow, I never thought of
it like that, you know, because if we
get hung up on the shadow, we'll forget
who is the rest.
We have the people of God.
It says here we have entered into a
rest.
Have you entered into that rest?
The rest of God today is Jesus Christ.
He is the Sabbath.
He is the Lord of the Sabbath.
He is the rest of God.
He is the answer that God has for
your restless heart.
Let us labor, therefore, to enter into that
rest, lest any man fall after the same
example of unbelief.
Now, that's the second let us.
And some people struggle with this word labor
here.
You know, I would like to tell you
that the Christian life is all just a
bed of roses and it'll just all happen.
You don't have to do anything.
That's not true, is it?
On the one hand, we can't do anything
to save ourselves.
But on the other hand, once you are
a Christian and I believe this passages to
Christians, you do need to.
There are things God is asking you to
do.
You know, if you're not praying, if you're
not reading your Bible, if you're not ministering
to other people, if you're not, may I
say, one anothering, which there's a lot of
those commandments, if there isn't in you a
holy grip to do the work of God,
you're going to lose out.
You won't enter into the rest.
You won't.
You know, there is no such thing.
There is no place for a lazy person
in the kingdom of God.
May I say it that way?
There is no place for a lazy person
in the kingdom of God.
There is work to do.
Let us labor together.
There are things that God needs to have
done, and He's going to use you or
He's not.
He's going to use her instead.
For the Word of God is quick and
powerful and sharper than any two edged sword,
piercing to the dividing asunder of soul and
spirit and of the joints and marrow.
And as a discerner of the thoughts and
intents, again, watch this word of the heart.
The word discerner here means basically critic and
not critic as in critical, as in cutting
somebody down, but it will divide that thing
and reveal it.
And may I say it'll just lay it
open and expose it for what it is.
You need to get into the Word of
God.
It will increase your faith and it will
lay open your heart of unbelief and show
you who you really are.
The reason that this is attached on to
the end of this very story is God.
The reason God was so distraught, so upset
with these people that He finally said, this
is the tenth time you have murmured against
me.
And what He was really saying is, I've
given you my word and told you what
I'm going to do ten times and you
rejected my word.
It's like reading something in the Bible and
saying, I'm not convicted of that.
I'm sorry.
God doesn't need you to agree with what
He said.
He has said it.
It is a sword that will lay it
open and divide it and show it and
critique and show you your own heart.
Your choice is, will I believe it and
agree with God?
See, conviction of sin is finally agreeing with
God.
This is really where I'm at.
You understand that?
Conviction is really agreeing with God, seeing sin
from such the perspective, seeing your heart from
such the perspective for just a moment.
You understand this is where my heart really
is.
And you say, oh, no, I don't want
my heart to be there.
I want my heart to be with God.
And you acknowledge that and you confess it.
And we need the Word of God to
do that.
We need the Spirit of God to reveal
those things to us in the Word of
God.
And I believe the sharpness of it comes
because Jesus Christ has promised that the Holy
Spirit would be our guide.
And may I say, I believe the Holy
Spirit is the guide of the sword of
the Spirit.
And He guides that thing to cut right
into your life perfectly with precision where it
needs to cut.
And maybe it's different in your life than
mine, and maybe tomorrow it'll be the same,
but it'll still cut.
The same message can be preached to 10
people.
And, you know, they all can hear something
a little bit different.
But that sword is guided by the Holy
Spirit.
And it'll cut and lay open just what
needs to be revealed in their heart and
in your heart.
Neither is there any creature that is not
manifest in his sight.
But all things are naked and open in
the eyes of him.
And that's what I was just saying.
Verse 14, seeing then that we have a
great...
Now, it's going to shift a little bit,
but not really.
Seeing then is a word like therefore.
It's saying because of...
I know you're going to struggle with unbelief
because of the work that the Word of
God is going to do and lay open
your heart.
Once your heart is laid open, once you
see who you are, once you see your
need, what are you going to do with
your need?
Where are you going to take it?
The Bible has the answer.
Seeing then that we have a great high
priest that is passed into the heavens, Jesus,
the Son of God, let us hold fast
our profession, for we have not a high
priest which cannot be touched with the filling
of our infirmities, but was in all points
tempted, like as we are, yet without sin.
Let us...
Here's the third one.
Let us, therefore, come boldly into the throne
of grace that we may obtain mercy.
and find grace in our time of need.
I want to talk about this last part
here in the last five or six minutes
that we have.
This whole thing of Jesus being the High
Priest is a wonderful thing.
We're going to talk a lot more about
it tomorrow, but just a few things here,
particularly about the throne of grace that we
want to talk about.
When we come to God and our heart
is open, it's an admission of our dependence
upon Him.
Part of the work of the Bible and
in going to our High Priest of God
is an admission of our dependence.
Christians are some of the neediest people on
this earth.
Do you know why?
Because they see their need.
They know they're not going to make it
unless God helps them.
And that isn't a sign of weakness.
That's meekness and putting ourselves in submission and
yielding to God.
And in that, then, we get strength to
go on.
So the dependence isn't a weakness.
It is a sign of understanding.
It is the reality of knowing that I
need grace from on high.
See, the point of this passage in is
that we may get grace in our time
of need.
And the grace that it's talking about here
is not the grace that we need God's
favor to get saved.
It's the grace that's a strength that will
come in and undergird your soul and your
heart and your Christian life.
Because you need help sometimes, don't you?
You need a strength from above that will
sustain you and strengthen you so that you'll
be able to face the things that you
need to face.
You know, faith...
Sometimes, you know, this whole thing of faith,
I do want to say one more thing
about that too, is we try to make
it so hard.
But may I say to those of you
that struggle with assurance and also those of
you that are struggling to enter into the
rest, faith is not hard.
Let me just give you an example.
I was standing over here to the side
and in the back watching you as you
came in here this morning and as you
sat down.
And as I was watching, I did not
see any of you pick up your chair
and examine the bolts or the welding.
Or I didn't see you look at the...
I didn't see who the manufacturer was.
Was it a reputable dealer?
I didn't see any of you get on
your cell phone and check it out.
I didn't see any of you ask any
of the principals who was the craftsman that
built that thing.
You just took for granted, or may I
say you had faith, that it would hold
you.
And you know what you did?
You sat down.
But do you know what you really did?
You trusted somebody else for the strength in
that chair to hold you.
That's all faith is too.
I'm just asking you, can you not trust
Jesus Christ for the strength to hold you
up?
That's all I'm asking you to do.
That's all God is asking you to do.
It's not an intellectual ascent.
It's an understanding, and then it's a trust.
If you can trust that chair without checking
into it, why are you striving and arguing
with God about His Son?
Can you not sit down and just rest
in the promises of God in Jesus Christ?
Can you not do that today?
A couple of other thoughts here.
Jesus Christ here is our priest.
It's interesting that He's shown here on what's
called the throne of grace.
Normally, we would think that's a paradoxical phrase
because the throne denotes royalty and a king.
And grace denotes a favor or a giving
something that you don't deserve.
And those two wonderful things come together in
the person of Jesus Christ.
And this passage right here in verses 14
-16 was a very important passage in the
Reformation in Europe back in the 1400's and
1500's.
And out of this passage, there were three
principles that they espoused or cried out.
They said, no sacrifice but Calvary.
No priest but Christ.
No confessional but the throne of grace.
And so what this passage is saying to
you and I is that these three things
are very important.
And here, you need to find your way
to this throne of grace.
And I can tell you, you can go
to Jesus here because the verse before that
says, He is a great high priest.
He was tempted like you are in all
points.
You know, that word tempted again is stress
or pressure.
He was put under the full measure.
You know, if you take a submarine and
you take it down deep enough in the
ocean, you'll reach a depth somewhere where it
cannot stand the pressure and it will just
implode.
It will crush inward.
You know what I'm saying?
Jesus Christ was put to the utter depths
of all the temptation and pressure in this
world, but He didn't crush.
He didn't crack.
He didn't even buckle.
He understands.
So you have a great high priest.
I have one.
He knows your weakness.
I have weaknesses.
You do.
Go to Jesus Christ today.
He was tried and tested in all points
like you are.
And you can go to Him today and
He will know what you're saying.
He will listen to you.
And I think the final point I just
want to make is this.
When it says, let us therefore come boldly,
that word boldly there doesn't mean brave.
It means with a freedom.
The throne of grace is free and you
can come freely.
You do not have to come with anything
in your hands.
You do not have to qualify by something
you do.
You can just come boldly, meaning based on
the sacrifices of Jesus Christ, I come boldly,
meaning with freedom in your time of need.
And some of you still have needs.
Some of you here are struggling with assurance.
Some of you here have not entered.
Some of you here are still window shopping
on the Christian life.
And I want to warn you, lest you
don't apprehend these promises.
You need to fear.
And the reason you need to fear is,
do you know what happened to the children
of Israel because of their unbelief?
Whenever you have unbelief, do you know what
it ends up doing?
It leads you into other sins.
You know, they ended up fornicating.
They ended up saying they'd rather be back
in slavery in Egypt.
Can you imagine that?
Being delivered out of slavery and saying they
think they want to go back.
But you know, if you don't enter into
this Canaan land, if you don't enter into
rest, if you don't find your way to
the abundant Christian life, you don't want to
know why you're always struggling with the world,
young people?
Do you know why that temptation is still
there sometimes?
It's because you're not believing God and you
haven't entered in.
If once you've tasted truly Canaan land, once
you've found that rejoicing, that milk and honey
is so sweet and so good, and you're
free in Christ to come to that throne
of grace, that leeks and garlic and fish,
that's just garbage.
It's garbage.
It'll grow strangely dim, as the hemorrhoider says.
And that's how all this needs to flow
together.
This passage is very important for Christians in
our day and age.
It was written back almost 2,000 years
ago, but it's as applicable today as it
was then.
Maybe more so, may I say.
Maybe more so.
We have a lot of people who have
a lot of head knowledge and who have
understood what it is to get born again,
and then they're just still wilderness Christians.
Come out of the wilderness.
Come home to Canaan land.
Come to the throne of grace.
Believe God.
Submit yourself to God fully.
Surrender to Him today.
Amen.
Thank you for listening.
May God add further applications.
And tomorrow we'll try, Lord willing, to do
chapters 5 and 6.
6 is the big one a lot of
people have been asking about.
We will look at that tomorrow.
So if you can, read those two chapters.
Amen.
God bless you.