April 19

Hebrews 4:14-16

Jesus the Great High Priest

¹⁴ Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven,^[a] Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. ¹⁵ For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin. ¹⁶ Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

Hebrews 10:19-25

A Call to Persevere in Faith

¹⁹ Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, ²⁰ by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, ²¹ and since we have a great priest over the house of God, ²² let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. ²³ Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. ²⁴ And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, ²⁵ not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

Transcription

(Transcribed by TurboScribe)

As you saw, we're starting a new series next week, Sun Prayer, a short series of four, looking really forward to that. And at the end of the service, I'm going to ask you after the benediction to sit, the song that you heard a little piece of this morning, it's an AI song, and I heard this and it's so beautiful. So I went to Carrie and I said, can we do this as the song for the whole series? She said, sure, but it has no music.

And we can't find any music for that. So our music team sat down and they produced that music and all of that to go with that. And they're going to do that song for us this morning as our postlude.

And I want you to hear that because with God's grace, we're going to sing that every week for four weeks after the sermon saying, Lord, I want to pray. When you hear me, I'm going to pray. When I think you don't hear me, I'm going to pray.

When times are good, I'm going to pray. When times are not good, I'm going to pray. Still, I will pray, is the name of the song.

We're going to do that. So thank you to the praise team for all the work that they put into that. It's wonderful to have people that'll just say, yeah, I'm going to do that.

Bless you. Thank you for your word that guides us. Thank you for your word that feeds us.

Thank you for the word that just paints this beautiful picture, Lord, of who you are. Help us in this morning again, that as we read and as we try and speak, that we may see Jesus, the love of Jesus. In your name we pray.

Amen. Now, scripture reading this morning comes from the book of Hebrews, chapter four. We're going to read verses 14 to 16, and then we're going to go to chapter 10 and read verses 19 to 25.

And I'm reading from the NIV today. Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus, son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathise with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way just as we are, yet he did not sin.

Let us then approach God's throne of grace with confidence so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. And then we go to chapter 10. Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the most holy place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and a living way opened for us through the curtain that is his body, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings.

Having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water, let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together as some are in the habit, I think they missed the word there, bad habit of doing, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day approaching. Let us then approach God's throne of grace with confidence to receive mercy and to find grace to help us in our time of need.

Go underline that verse in your Bible and read it every day. It is one of the most beautiful promises that God makes, one of the most beautiful invitations that God gives in his word. Let us approach this throne of grace with confidence so that what can happen, we may receive mercy and find God's grace to help us in our time of need.

That word time of need in the Greek is one word. It's a beautiful word. It's the word eukairon.

You've heard the word kairos before, the kairos documents. Remember it was a big deal at some state. The word kairos in Greek means a defining moment.

Let's go to God's throne in all of the defining moments of our lives, those moments that will change our lives, those moments in which we stand before God saying, help me or God rejoice with me or be with me. But then it starts with the most beautiful word of all of those words. Let's go to God's throne of grace with confidence.

Greek word and Central knows by now when I retire they will all be fluent in Greek and Hebrew. Greek word for confidence is the word paresia. Paresia means boldness, frankness, confidence.

It comes, it's a technical term that comes from the old Greek city states. Paresia meant that if you were a citizen and you had citizenship of that city state, you had the right to speak in the assembly and that right was called paresia. You could stand up and you could speak and if we put it in today's words, you could make motions and you could vote on the motions as well because you had paresia, you had confidence.

It was your right to do that. That's the objective side but there's a subjective side on this too. It only became your right in that moment when you stood up and you spoke and you used that.

Can you hear the words? Since we have paresia, that's what chapter 10 said, that's why I took you there. Since we have verse 19, this confidence, then what should we do? Verse 22, let us then draw near to God. It's given.

We have the right. You're citizens of God's kingdom. You're children of the most wonderful father in the whole wide world.

The king of the universe is yours and he said here's the right that I give you. Will you please use that and walk into my holy presence? Can we talk about that for a second? How we do that, when we do that, do we do that? But I want to start in the old testament and this is where I'm going to need you Alexander because I was told you do not touch that yoke. Jay will come and he will, I don't know where Jay is sitting this morning, maybe he wouldn't.

He's my doc. He would come give me a hard time because my back should not be lifting this. Come on up Alexander.

You got to do the high lifting here. Don't lift it up yet. You can just hold it kind of up straight if you can get it out there.

But I take you to the book of Leviticus. I'm going to read one verse and I know you do not read one verse because there's a context. So I'll give you the context.

Context comes from chapter 26. God brought them into the promised land and now God says to them because you're obedient I'm going to reward you. I'll make it rain.

I'll take care of your crops. I'll give you cattle and I'll give you sheep. If you keep the Sabbaths I will bless you in so much abundance because you are obedient.

And then God says here's the reason why I want to do this. I'm the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt so that you would no longer be their slaves. I broke the yoke of slavery from your neck so that you can walk with your heads held high.

I wanted to show you a yoke because most of you I don't think have even seen a yoke. If you're younger you don't even know what that is. You think it's a thing that comes in an egg.

This is a yoke. This is one that you put on cattle. This was actually one that my wife's father used on his farm with the cattle.

They go on your neck and you can imagine if you put this thing on your neck. No don't do that. You're going to put that on your neck.

This is what it does. Thank you Alexander. You can not put it on my neck.

You can put it down. Thank you. I want you to just keep that image for a moment and see what God says.

He says when you were in Egypt you were slaves. They did not necessarily bear a yoke like that but they bore the yoke of being slaves. You were not allowed to look up and look people in the eye.

You had no rights. They bore the heavy burdens every day as they were building those two cities. They would carry that on their backs and your head is always down.

You have no rights. You have nothing to say. God says when I brought you out, I took that yoke off your back.

I took it off your neck so that you may walk with your head held high. We may approach the throne of grace with confidence, with our heads held high because the yoke and the burden of sin has been lifted off. We may walk into that room, that throne room of our heavenly Father and we may look our Father in the eye and say, Lord, I need you every moment of my life.

I need you. You're my one defence. You're my righteousness.

Oh, you may be bold and say, I can walk in there and I can say, Father, Father, can you just take my hand, please? It's a little tough right now. I can't do this alone. I need you to walk with me, not just a mile.

I need a few more miles than that and maybe, Father, if you don't mind, can you just carry me for a while? I can walk in there. Like Romans says, then the Holy Spirit can call out in me, Romans 8, Father, I love you and I know exactly that's who you is because it is a throne of grace where I can find peace, mercy, and grace for my times of need. Why can I do that? Why can I do that? Verse 14, 15 gives the answer.

He says, because we have a grand new high priest right there in heaven, not one who was distant from us on this earth because you looked at him and he was all gowned and robed and all kinds of stuff around him and he was holier than thou. We have a high priest in heaven who was just like us, who walked this earth with his own feet, who felt the hurt of his own people turning their backs on him, who felt his friends betray him, who would hear people yell crucify, who would know what it meant to have no house to sleep but always with a friend sleeping on the couch, who would know the burden of carrying the yoke of all I've ever seen, who would know the burden of being nailed to a cross and not having a moment that he could walk into that throne room because Father had to turn his back and close his ears when his son cried. My God, we have a high priest that understands us and when I walk into that throne room and I can bring myself, he gets it.

He gets me in all of my goodness, in all of my struggles, in all of my needs, in my yukairon moments, my moments of need where I stand before you. I don't know where you are in your life and maybe you're full of joy. Here's the cool thing, you can go right into that throne room and go spring jump and dance and sing with him because he wants to do that with you.

Maybe you're in the struggle time if I think of Lorna and I think of Alan Goberdan as they had to go down to New Jersey to go bury a brother and a mother. In that moment they could walk right in that throne room and Father God would understand and he would hold them to his heart because that high priest when they walked in there would say, Father, this is Lorna and Alan. Right now, Father, we need you so bad.

You can go to him because you have paresia, confidence, bought in the blood of Jesus Christ. But here's the coolest thing of all of this. If I take you back to the Old Testament again, remember in the Old Testament the high priest and only the high priest could go into the Holy of Holies.

Remember the temple was built where they would sacrifice and then they had the holy place and then they had the most holy place and then the most holy place was behind this curtain and there was the Ark of the Covenant. Had Aaron's staff and there it had the tablets that were broken and the new tablets and there it had the manna in there to remind them of what God did in the wilderness but also to remind God of how they rebelled against God was in there. On that was the cherubim that was the seat where God would sit and would look down on all of this.

Once a year, Leviticus 16 on Yom Kippur, Yom in Hebrew day, Kippur, atonement. On the day of atonement the high priest could go behind that curtain. He alone, after he was cleansed and brought sacrifices for his own sin, could go in there with blood and he would sprinkle that blood on the Ark of the Covenant.

The cover of the Ark of the Covenant is called Kippuret, Yom Kippuret, the atonement seat and he would make atonement for the sins of the people. It was such a holy place that he alone could go in once a year but if he did something wrong he would die because you were not supposed to see God. So they put a rope around his ankle that if he died in there they couldn't go in.

They could just pull him out. It is the cool thing about that, says Hebrews. There was a Friday there in the afternoon and on a Friday the world became really, really dark.

There was a man on a cross and his name was Jesus. In that moment when he died and he took that burden upon himself, that curtain that stood between us and God, fell away. And in that moment through the blood of the Son, he opened a new path right into the throne of God.

And you and I may walk right into that throne room. There is no more curtain. You can walk right up to your Father.

And when I walk in there, Jesus stands there smiling and he says, Father, it's Aubrey again. Boy, this guy can never stop. Gotta tell you about him a little bit, Father.

He's giving me a run for my money. He's, he messes up so often. He's with his face in the mud and I have to pick him up and I have to cleanse him again.

But I know he loves us, Father God. So I walk with him. Boy, does he give the Holy Spirit, you know, because Holy Spirit that's his job, isn't it? To walk right beside and to help.

Man, does the Holy Spirit have to walk with him all the time to keep him on the right path and to help him? So Father, I'm so glad that he's here. And Father smiles when he sees me. And Father says, what can I do? And I can just open my heart and I can speak because here's the thing.

Despite the fact that I mess up so often, despite the fact that I hurt him so often because of the stuff that happens in my life, when I walk into that throne room, my Father does not do this. Sorry, I never point fingers at you, do you know that? Feels horrible. My Father never does that because that was taken care of that Friday on a cross.

All of the judgement was taken care of. All of that slavery was taken care of. My Father tells me to lift up my head and look him in the eyes and see his face.

Despite of who I am, but because of who he is and what he has given me. Because I am his child and I have been made free and I have been washed in the blood of Jesus Christ. That same blood that this morning said to little Colby, little girl, here's my sign and my seal.

I'm washing you and you, little girl, can walk right into my throne room anytime you need me because I am your Father and you are my child. There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Thinking, not a person yet.

We are allowed to walk into the presence of our God with confidence to receive what? Mercy and grace. You know what grace is? God's free gift. For it is by grace that we have been saved through our faith.

That faith says Hebrews 10 that is washed in the blood of Jesus Christ and says come walk in. It's kind of like this little boy that sat with me this morning this week. It was a tough week and one evening I was sitting reading and he came up to me and he said, hey Opa, can I sit on your lap for a little while? I said sure buddy boy.

He jumped on my lap and he put his little head against my chest and I just held him. Didn't say a word. He just sat.

His ear was right on my heartbeat. I'm sure he heard me. Sat for about 3-4 minutes and looked up.

He said, thank you Opa. I think I'm okay now. He got up and went and played.

Since we have confidence, let us then draw near to God. You need to sit on his lap for a while. He's okay with that.

You need to cry with him a little bit. He's okay with that. Bette Midler got it wrong.

Remember she sang a song, God is watching us from a distance. Nah, not true. God opened his throne and he said, my son did this for you.

Come on in. He's not in the distance. He's right with you.

Everything is fine. It's up to us to be the walking voice, to walk in with confidence and to receive the gifts that God has for us. May you walk with your head held high and not with one of those yearnings because it's taken away.

Walk, Opa. Let God speak. Amen.

Take a few moments of silent prayer. Lord Jesus, thank you for going to the cross. Thank you for taking all of our sin, bearing that and then washing our sin with blood.

It has fallen right so beautifully in Colossians and then when you did that there on the cross and you washed, you took it away forever and you never seem to do it again. Help us then not to make ourselves slaves again, but to walk freely. Thank you that every day we may ask that you will walk with us through your spirit.

But Lord, on our own we can't do this. Every moment, every hour of our lives, we need you. We need you to walk.

We need you to talk. We need you to evolve us. Thank you for reminding us of who we are, the children of the most high and holy.

You're amazing and we love you with all that is in us. In this we pray in the amazing name of Jesus, our great High Priest. Amen.