True Rest: Considering Jesus | Weekend Sunday Service | Josiah Smith

A message by Pastor Josiah Smith on Hebrews 3:1-6

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Transcript

Cliff Jumping And Needing A Guide

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Back when I was in college, I went to Cedarville University in Cedarville, Ohio. So Cedarville, Ohio is a small town about 3,000. So the university itself was actually bigger than the town, and there wasn't very much to do. I mean, we were surrounded by cornfields, and so maybe that was good for us as college students, but not a lot going on in Cedarville, uh Ohio. But one of the things that we did do that I did as a freshman uh was cliff jump. We had this local gorge right next to Cedarville called Clifton Gorge. It was kind of in Yellow Springs, which was you know about 15 minutes from where Cedarville was. And so we would go to the gorge and we would cliff jump and we would uh jump into the river there, and it was a grand time. But I remember the first time I ever did it, I uh I'd like to pretend like I was brave, but I was not. I was terrified. And I'm not really uh terrified, I'm not really scared of heights in general, but for whatever reason that day, looking down, peering over a 30-foot cliff with a rock jutting out at the bottom just didn't seem like a didn't seem like a good idea at the time for for me. So I was scared and I just stood there and I stood there and I stood there and my heart was was pounding. And I actually refused to jump altogether until my friend went first. You know, we had to have a sacrificial lamb, and it wasn't gonna be me. And so I I I made my friend, he was like, I'll do it. So he went and he did it, and and uh that gave me the confidence that I needed. And so I ended up making the 30-foot jump, and it was it was good. It reminds me a lot of my daughter when she sometimes she gets afraid of going down the slide, and it's just that one time, like go just go down it once, and then it's again and again and again and again and again. That was kind of like me when I was a freshman in college. I did it and I was like, great, now I can do it again and again and again. It was fun, but I I needed help, and I'm not ashamed to say that I needed someone to lead the way, I needed someone to go before

Why Hebrews Turns To Rest

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me. Now, as we transition to Hebrews chapter three, the topic is gonna shift to rest. And that's why the title of the series is True Rest, Heavenly Rest. And we're gonna define that more in the weeks to come. We'll start with a general definition here this morning. But the but the author begins to transition, and in our text today, we are going to see that Jesus is ultimately the one that leads the way, that he is the one that's going to get us there. That if rest is something that we want, and trust me, and I hope it'll be clear in our weeks of study through Hebrews 3 and 4, that rest is something that your soul longs for. It is something that only finds satisfaction and contentment in Jesus. And if we're gonna get there, if we're gonna get to the rest that Jesus offers, we need to recognize that Jesus is the one who leads the way. He's the one that has gone before, he's the one that ultimately makes it possible for us to find true rest. And so, my hope and my encouragement for you is that you would find rest in Christ and that you would recognize that if you're gonna get that, and if you're gonna receive that, you need to look to Jesus to lead the way and to go before. So let's look at it together. Hebrews chapter three. I'll begin reading in verse one. We'll read down through verse six. So Hebrews three, verse one says, Therefore, now remember these therefores are connecting things back to previous thoughts. So the therefore is uh, in some sense, a continuation of what the argument was in chapter two, but in in some ways it's also a hinge. So it's swinging backwards to remind us of where we just came from, but it's also swinging us forwards to remind us of really to prepare us for where it is that we are going. So, therefore, because of everything that we just talked about in Hebrews chapter two, because of all the warnings of paying attention so that we won't drift away, because of the suffering of Jesus, because of the help that he provides. Therefore, holy brothers, you who share in a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession, who was faithful to him who appointed him, just as Moses also was faithful in all God's house. For Jesus has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses, as much more glory as the builder of a house has more honor than the house itself. For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God. Now Moses was faithful in all God's house as a servant, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later. But Christ is faithful over God's house as a son, and we are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope. Now go back to verse one. I want you to notice this. Here's how it begins. It says, Therefore, holy brothers, you who share in a heavenly caller calling, consider Jesus. This is really the governing imperative of this entire section. Consider Jesus. Think about Jesus. Now, when we say consider in our context, a lot of times it's kind of like, well, we're trying to persuade someone to do something, right? Well, just consider it. Just think about it. Give it a try, give it a taste, 30-day trial. Maybe you'll return it after. Maybe you'll like it. I don't know. That's not what consider here means. When the author Hebrew says consider in Hebrews chapter 3, he's basically saying, I want you to set your mind fixed firmly on Christ. I want you to set your thoughts on Jesus. And so that's how he begins. Consider Jesus. Think about Jesus.

Consider Jesus As Apostle And Priest

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He's the apostle and high priest of our confession. Now, what does that mean? Well, to say that Jesus is our apostle, and if we're to think about that, it's to mean that that Jesus is who makes it possible for us to hear from God. He's our apostle. We hear from God through Jesus. That's what it means. An apostle was uh someone he can be translated as a sent one, someone that has the message of Christ, someone that's delivering a message on behalf of God. So he's our apostle, he's our messenger. We hear from God through Jesus. And that's by the way, why Jesus says in the Gospel of John, my sheep hear my voice. They hear my voice because he's our apostle, and we hear from God through him. And this is, by the way, why in Hebrews chapter one it says, God has spoken to us in these last days through his son. Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Israel, as we continue on through the Old Testament, through the prophets. But in these last days, he has spoken to us by our apostle, by Jesus. Hear from it means to hear from God. So Jesus is our apostle, but it's also, it says, that he is our priest. So it's not that we just hear from God through Jesus, it's also that we are brought to God through Jesus. So we hear from God, we we understand who he is, he reveals his nature, his character, his plan of salvation that he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in him. We hear all of that through Jesus, but we also are brought to God through the priestly work and ministry of Jesus. Now, twice already we've had a reference to the priestly work of ministry in Hebrews. Hebrews chapter one, where it says, after making purification for sins, he sat down. Towards the end of Hebrews chapter two, he had to be made like us in every respect so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God. So he's our priest, and a priest is someone that brings you, makes it possible for you to approach God. So the priest in his work, Jesus as our priest, he makes it possible for us to be brought to God. We hear from God through Jesus, and we're brought to God through Jesus. And knowing these things, knowing that Jesus is our apostle and our high priest, the command in Hebrews 3 is to consider Jesus, to fix your whole mind, to fix your thoughts on Jesus. And that's my encouragement for you this morning. Point number one, fix your thoughts on Jesus. And again, if we're gonna make it to the rest that Jesus provides, the rest that he offers, the rest that he extends. Well, part of the way that we're gonna get there is to fix our thoughts on Jesus. He is the one that leads the way. So again, this passage serves as the hinge between the warning of drifting away and the promise of entering God's rest. So why do we fix our thoughts on Jesus? Well, we fix our thoughts and our eyes on Jesus so that we don't drift away. We pay much closer attention, we stay spiritually alert as we just finished talking about in Hebrews chapter two. But we also fix our eyes, we fix our thoughts on Jesus so that we can experience rest. Now, what is rest? And again, hopefully this will be increasingly clear and more nuanced as we go. But let me start with just a broad definition so that we're all on the same page. Rest, you could define it this way, is salvation in Christ and all of the spiritual benefits associated with it. That's rest. And it's used in a variety of different ways. But here in Hebrews, rest is the ultimate salvation in Christ with all of the spiritual benefits associated with it, both now and in the future. That's what rest is. And so the author of Hebrews in chapter three and in chapter four is saying, here's how you experience rest, here's where you find rest, here's who provides rest. It's your apostle, it's your high priest. Fix your thoughts on him, fix your thoughts on Jesus for you to experience rest. Salvation again in Christ and all of the spirit, the spiritual benefits associated with it.

Spiritual Bumpers That Keep You Steady

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Now, to help us with this, I want you to think of bowling. Any bowlers in the room? Got any bowlers? Okay. All right. Well, I want you to think of bowling. All right. If you're a bowler, maybe uh perhaps you don't use uh bumpers when when you're bowling. Some of you perhaps do. That's okay. No judgment here if you use bumpers. Uh, but what are the purpose of bumpers? To keep the ball on the lane so that you have a greater chance of actually getting a strike, of getting a good score in bowling. And so they serve that purpose. They keep you from falling into the gutter. And so that's what we need. We we need some spiritual bumpers that are gonna help us bowl strikes, as it were, when thinking and fixing our thoughts on Jesus. And by the way, these are bumpers uh that never should get lowered when you start off in bowling, especially when you're maybe a younger kid, or maybe even if you've just doing it for the first time, you start with the bumpers and then you get more competent, you get more comfortable, and then usually they come down and you don't play with the bumpers. But here, spiritually speaking, these bumpers never come down, you never grow beyond them, you never mature past them. You need some spiritual bumpers, and this is what the author of Hebrews in chapter three says. There's two of them. The first one is that found in the phrase holy brothers. First bumper on one side of the lane is holy brothers, and that really it just means the family of God. This is a callback to Hebrews chapter two, where Jesus says he is not ashamed to call us brothers. And then he quotes a psalm, Psalm 22, 22, and he says, That I will tell of my brothers in the midst of the congregation. And so this is a callback to that, the holy brothers, the family of God. And the author of Hebrews is talking not just to individuals, but to a group of people that have a shared identity, that are familial, they're brothers and sisters in Christ. And so, in that sense, if you're gonna fix your thoughts on Jesus, you need other holy brothers, you need other holy sisters. And so, in that sense, you need the local church family, you need your local church to help you fix your thoughts on Jesus, to look to him, to go before, to be your founder, to be the one who is your front runner. You need someone to help you with that, not just someone, you need something, you need the local church, you need the body of Christ. Now, an old testament sort of comparison, an analogy that I thought of was Exodus chapter 18. You remember the story where Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, goes to Moses and basically says, Hey, bud, uh, you're doing all of it by yourself and you need to cut it out. You need to stop. You need some help. He's he actually says, This is not good. You remember Moses from morning to night is basically just uh delegating, and he is deliberating all of the problems of Israel, right? All of the issues, all of the questions, all of the concerns, all of the conflict is going through Moses, and he's doing it by himself from morning to night, and it's not sustainable. And his brother and his father-in-law Jethro says, Cut it out, quit it. So here's what it says in Exodus 18, 21 through 23. It says, Moreover, this is Jethro speaking, look for able men from all the people, men who fear God, who are trustworthy and hate a bribe, and place such men over the people as chiefs of thousands, of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens, and let them judge the people at all times. Every great matter they shall bring to you, Moses, but any small matter they shall decide themselves. So it will be easier for you, and they will bear the burden with you. If you do this, God will direct you, you will be able to endure, and all this people also will go to their place in peace. And Jethro says, You need help. You need people to bear the burden with you. And that's exactly what Moses does. He finds help, he finds men of integrity, he finds men that are trustworthy, men that hate bribes, and places them over thousands of hundreds of fifties and of tens. And he shares in the work. What a great analogy of the body of Christ. You can't do it alone. Everyone in their life needs a jethro that comes to them and says, Cut it out. You need help. Surround yourself with other people. Find men and women who are trustworthy, who are holy brothers, holy sisters, that they're they're gonna help set your gaze, fix your thoughts on Jesus. This is the analogy. Because do you recognize how easy it is to fix your thoughts on just about anything except for Jesus? Do you recognize that? How difficult it is at times to fix our thoughts to, as Hebrews 3 says, consider Jesus, our apostle and high priest. Our minds get consumed with the details of life, the the deadlines at work, the frustrating co-worker, the unrelenting manager or boss. Oh, we get we get consumed with projects at home, maybe tension at home, relational, relational difficulties with our kids, with our wife, with our husband, tension in our marriage, vacations we hope to have, friends we hope to make, security we hope to find. I mean, the cares of this world, they they just bog us down. They fill our minds, they occupy them such that there's often little room for Christ. If we're not careful. And so we need some Jeffroes to walk into the room and say, cut it out. This is not good. Find some other people, find people within your local congregation to help you. If we aren't watchful, if we aren't engaged with the other holy brothers and holy sisters, our thoughts can suffocate us and squeeze out thoughts that are fixed on Christ. Our worries can suffocate us, they consume us, they keep us up at night. And so we need some other people to say, Hey, I need some help. I need some help because my mind's getting pulled down here, but I want to look to Christ. I want to keep my mind fixed on Christ. I want to set my mind on the things that are above, not on the things that are below. Or uh we want to set our minds on Christ, on things above, where he is seated at the right hand of the Father. And we'll get to this later on in Hebrews chapter 10. But Hebrews 10, 24 through 25 says, Let us consider how to stir one another up to love and good works. That's this whole letter, this whole sermon, the the letter, the book of Hebrews is to a church, is to an assembled people that have a shared identity. They're a family, holy brothers, holy sisters. And he's saying, let us consider how to stir one another up to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day drawing near. And I love how it's put in Exodus 18. Jethro says, So it will be easier for you, and they will bear the burden with you. This is not what Paul says in Galatians. Bear one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ. That's a bumper in this bowling alley, this bowling lane of trying to fix our minds on Christ. That's the strike that we're aiming for. We need a bumper of the people of God to keep us in the middle, to keep us moving forward. That's the

A Heavenly Calling And A Coming City

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first one. The second one here in the text is a heavenly calling. Do you see that? Holy brothers, you who share, that's that there's that familial language, a shared identity, a shared experience, a shared destination. You who share in a heavenly calling, consider Jesus. Now, what's interesting about heavenly calling is it kind of has this idea that the calling comes from heaven, right? Because Jesus is our apostle. God is calling us through his son. He speaks so that we can hear the truth of God, the revelation of God. But it's also we're being brought back to heaven for eternal life. And so there's this heavenly calling. It's remembering where we are headed and who it is that will get us there. That's the idea of a heavenly calling, something that comes down from heaven to bring us back up, something that is supposed to encourage us, is another bumper that gets us back into the center so that we can again aim for fixing our thoughts on Christ. So, where are we headed? Well, Hebrews answers this in a variety of different ways, but at the end, as the author's concluding his comments, Hebrews 13, 14, here's where we're headed. For here in this life, in this world, in this time, we have no lasting city. But we seek the city that is to come. That's where we're headed. In Hebrews chapter 11, it's called a better country. In other places in Hebrews, we we are called sojourners. We are exiles, we're we are headed towards a heavenly calling, a heavenly city. That's where we're headed. And who's gonna get us there? Of course it's not you, of course it's not me, it's Jesus. John chapter 14, verses 2 and 3. Jesus says, In my father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. I will come and take you to myself. I will bring you to where I am. That where I am, there you may be also, Jesus says. So where are we headed? To a city that is incorruptible, the celestial city, as it's called in Pilgrim's Progress. The place that has a foundation that cannot be shaken, it says in Hebrews. That's where we're headed. And who's gonna get us there? Jesus is going to get us there. And so Hebrews 3 starts by saying, You who share in a heavenly calling, holy brothers, consider Jesus. Think about him, fix your thoughts on him. And you need the bumpers of the local church family, the holy brothers and sisters, and you need the constant reminder of this world is not your home. And those two bumpers will serve to narrow your focus and your thoughts on Jesus. How easily we get distracted, how easily our minds get waterlogged with all kinds of nonsense that distract us from fixing our thoughts, our minds, and our hearts on Jesus. If we want rest, the true rest, the true rest that Jesus provides. We look to Jesus, we fix our thoughts on him. Here's how the text continues in Hebrews chapter 2. He is our high priest, he's our apostle, the high priest of our confession. We believe these to be true about Jesus, who he is, what he has done. Now look at the faithfulness of Jesus that's that's highlighted. Faithfulness dominates the remainder of these verses. It's mentioned twice in verse 2, once in verse 5, once in verse 6. Jesus is faithful. And specifically, there's this contrast between Jesus and Moses being faithful over God's house. The word house is used seven times in these verses. Let's look at it together. Pay attention to those two things faithful and house. Who was faithful to him? Jesus, the apostle and high priest, who was faithful to him who appointed him. Now, this is reminiscent of Hebrews 2. He had to be a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God. God appointed him for that task, for that role. Jesus was faithful to do what God called him to do. He was faithful to him, who appointed him, just as Moses also was faithful in all God's house. For Jesus has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses. As much more glory as the builder of a house has more honor than the house itself. For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God. Now Moses was faithful in all God's house as a servant to testify to the things that were to be spoken later. But Christ is faithful over God's house as a son, and we are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.

Jesus’ Faithfulness Greater Than Moses

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The author of Hebrews says, Consider Jesus. Fix your thoughts on Jesus. Fix your thoughts on him being your apostle, your high priest, but also on his faithfulness. He is a faithful high priest. He was faithful to him who appointed him. Verse 6, but Christ is faithful over God's house as a son. And this is something for believers that we should cherish, that we should revel in, find deep satisfaction in, enjoy and be thrilled that our Savior is faithful. Point number two, cherish the faithfulness of Jesus. Cherish the faithfulness of Jesus. And here's what I'll say what you delight yourself in, you will devote yourself to. You know this. If you delight in certain foods, you devote yourself to eating those foods, right? If you delight yourself in certain activities that you find fun, meaningful, worthwhile, you devote yourself to those activities. What you delight yourself in, you devote yourself to. And for Christians, we ought to delight ourselves in the faithfulness of Jesus. Because here, let's just think about this. There are so many people, so many instances, instances in this world, in this life, of people that aren't faithful, that don't do what they're supposed to do, that don't do what's asked of them, that don't do the right thing. There are so many instances of unfaithfulness. It should be a breath of fresh air for us as Christians to know that Jesus is faithful. He did it exactly how God told him to do it. He was faithful to him who appointed him, it says in verse 2. He was faithful in the service of God. We should delight in that. Think of rest as a heavenly door that was locked. You could not get in. And the key to unlock the door is Jesus' faithfulness. That's what we're seeing here. Only the faithfulness of Jesus could unlock it and let us in. And in that sense, maybe another analogy if you're into climbing, Jesus is our lead climber that goes before, leads the way, secures the route, ensures the safety. He's our lead climber. In other places in Hebrews, he's referred to as the founder of our salvation. He's the trailblazer, he's the front runner who, armed with the suffering of death, cleared a path for us to walk through. That's what the faithfulness of Jesus accomplishes. The faithfulness of Jesus is the key that unlocks the heavenly door of rest that your soul desperately longs for and desperately needs. Ecclesiastes says that God has placed eternity on the hearts of men. You could really kind of frame that as a sort of ache for rest. God has placed eternity. To ache for something only Jesus can provide, only Jesus can offer. And the faithfulness of Jesus in his service as our apostle and our high priest is the key that unlocks the door. Without it, friends, we have nothing. Without Jesus' faithfulness, we have no hope. We have no heavenly calling. We are not brothers. We are not sisters. None of this matters. But of course, we see in Hebrews 3 that Jesus is faithful. He was faithful to him who appointed him. He is faithful over God's house as a son. And there's this continuing contrast in the book of Hebrews of Jesus being greater than. Jesus, according to Hebrews 1, is greater than the prophets of the past. Hebrews 1 1. Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. But in these last days, he's done something far greater. He has spoken to us by his son. He's greater than the angels. So which of the angels did God ever say, You are my son, today I have forgotten you? Or you today I will you will be my son, and I will be your father. Which of the angels did God ever say that these that your throne, O Lord, endures forever? He is greater than the angels. He's even in our text, he's greater than Moses. He's greater than Moses, who, by the way, God Himself describes in Numbers 12.3 as the meekest man on earth. Think about that. God himself says he is the meekest man on the planet, and yet Jesus is greater. Now, why this comparison to Moses? Well, of course, these Jewish Christians are being drawn back to Judaism. In that sense, they they're they're turning their gaze not to Jesus but to Moses, which is why in Hebrews chapter 2 it talks about uh the the angels that mediated the law of Moses. We talked about that at Mount Sinai. But Moses uh is not who they should be looking to. Moses is not, of course, who you should be looking to. Why? Because Jesus is greater. But Moses is considered in the Old Testament the greatest prophet. Look at Deuteronomy chapter 34, or I'll just read it for us. Deuteronomy 34, uh 10 through 12, and it says, And there has not arisen a prophet since in Israel like Moses. He's the greatest, whom the Lord knew face to face. There is none like him, it says, for all the signs and the wonders that the Lord sent him to do in the land of Egypt, to Pharaoh and to all his servants, and to all his land, and for all the mighty power and all the great deeds of terror that Moses did in the sight of all Israel. There is no prophet like Moses, according to Deuteronomy 34. He's the greatest, he's the greatest prophet Israel had. And there was plenty more that came after him, but Moses is the greatest. It's only Moses that it said that the Lord knew him face to face. There is a unique role that Moses had, which is why Hebrews 3 is comparing Jesus to Moses, because he was a great figure, he was a great prophet, he was a faithful servant, but Jesus is greater. And ultimately, Moses would be appalled at these Jewish Christians looking back to him because Moses is pointing over their shoulders to Jesus, who's behind them. I'm pointing to him, Moses says. And Hebrews 3 tells us that Moses was faithful in God's house as a servant. He did what God called him to do. We've been reading about that in Exodus and Leviticus, and we'll continue to read about that through Deuteronomy. But he was faithful. He did what God asked him to do. Not always. He was not always faithful. But holistically, as you zoom out and look at his life, God says that he was faithful in my house as a servant. Now notice the language here. Moses was faithful in God's house as a servant. Jesus is faithful over God's house as a son. Do you hear the escalation there? Moses is in the house. Jesus is over the house, and he is a son, not just a servant. Moses was uh faithful and he was a servant in the house, but he was also part of the house. Uh the house in this instance is the people of God. He is part of the house. Moses is in it because he's part of it, but Jesus builds it. Jesus is the builder. And that's why Hebrews 3 says, a builder has much more honor than the house itself. Moses is part of the house, but Jesus is the builder of the house. And the builder of the house gets much more honor, much more praise, much more recognition, much more glory than the house itself. Of course, that is the case. Just like a painter has more honor than the painting itself. The artist receives the praise for the artwork. Even the value of the art is tethered to the artist who created it. You've seen these abstract paintings of one splash of black paint on a white canvas that sells for millions of dollars. What a fiasco of a world we live in. But it's because of who did it. The painter gets the honor and the glory, and the price of the painting goes up just by virtue of the one who painted it. That's what we see in this slide. That's that's that's normal. Uh, gold in the Olympics gets more honor than silver. Silver gets more honor than bronze. We recognize this. Jesus gets all the honor because he is the builder. He's the builder of the house. Moses pointed forward to the builder. He said, There's even in Deuteronomy, he says, there's a prophet greater than I that is coming. He pointed forward to the builder. For as faithful as Moses was, Jesus is more faithful. And his faithfulness as a son to build the house, the people of God, whom he's forming and fashioning and keeping and preserving, he who began a good work in you is faithful to complete it, the day of Jesus Christ. He's the one leading us home. He's the one leading us and protecting us and guiding us to our heavenly city, our home that whose foundation cannot be shaken. That's who Jesus is. That's the faithfulness

The Locked Door Of Rest Opens

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of Jesus. Now, again, you need to recognize that if not for the faithfulness of Jesus, the door of heavenly rest would still be locked. And I want to just have a brief sidebar here. We've been talking about Jesus and rest and salvation. And my plea for those of you in the room that don't know what I'm talking about, you don't know what this salvation is or the blessings that come from it. Can I just say, you need Jesus? You need a faithful savior. You need someone that did exactly what God required him to do to provide a way for you to have a right standing with him. You need the gospel of Jesus Christ. You need the rest that your soul longs for, that ache late at night where you go, there's got to be something more than this life. Jesus is the one that will satisfy your soul. Believe in Jesus, believe in the gospel. I mean, that's every verse in Hebrews is look at Jesus. He's greater. Look at Jesus, he's your high priest, he provides the sacrifice, he's the propitiation for the sins of the people, it says in Hebrews 2, 17. He's the one that if you believe in him, you will find rest, you will find life. I came so that you will have life and have it more abundantly, Jesus says. That's only if you trust in Jesus. If you see his faithfulness as the key that unlocks the door that you didn't even know you were looking for, that's the one that he's the one that'll get you into eternal heavenly rest. Look to Jesus. A builder has more honor than the house itself. Jesus is said to be the builder. Now Moses was faithful in all God's house as a servant to testify to the things that were to be spoken later. But Christ now is faithful over God's house, over his people as a son. And we are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope. And so the question again is well, who who are these people? Who is this house? What it says in verse 6, we are his house, holy brothers, those who share in a heavenly calling, those who were talked about in chapter two, the brothers that Jesus refers to, those who are being sanctified, those who are children that share in flesh and blood. We are the brothers. We are the house. If indeed we hold our fast, our confidence in our boasting in our hope. Point number three, confidently cling to Jesus. Confidently cling to the one that can get you home. Now remember, the house in Hebrews 3 is the people of God. It represents the people of God, but it also represents the place where God dwells. That's the whole concept of the house of God. Peter talks about this in 1 Peter 2, 4 and 5. As you come to Jesus, a living stone rejected by men, but in the sight of God, chosen and precious, you yourselves, like living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Peter says, as you come to Jesus, as you look to him as your front runner, as your lead climber, as the one who prepares the way, the trailblazer, he says, you yourselves, like living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Paul comments on this as well in Ephesians chapter 2, 19 through 22. Paul says, So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are a fellow citizen with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets, including Moses, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. So houses. But houses they signify a lot of things. This signifies safety, uh, security, provision, rest. Even think about the way that you use your house. It's a it's a home base of operations. Uh, you go there, the most intimate moments in your life happen in your house. Uh, you you find and feel a sense of safety and security in in your house. You you you feel perhaps most at rest in your house. You know those people uh that can't sleep in any bed other than their bed? They can't use any other pillow other than their pillow. Maybe that's you. I can't I'm not gonna sleep tonight. You know, I need I need my my bamboo pillow. I need the fan on a certain a certain angle. I need this and that. That's fine. That's fine, but it's it's it's all within the context of the house, safety, security, provision, and rest. And that's what God is offering to you in Christ. That's what I said. Salvation, rest is salvation in Christ, and all of the spiritual benefits associated with it, all the spiritual benefits of comfort and peace, and and God, even in 2 Corinthians chapter 1, where it says God is the God of all comfort. That comfort is given to you through Christ. You are his house, you are the dwelling place of God, as Paul says in Ephesians chapter 2. But who gets to experience these things? It's those that persevere until the end. Do you see that in verse 6? But Christ is faithful over God's house as a son, and we are his house, holy brothers who share in a heavenly calling, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting and our hope. Now, this isn't saying that the holding fast and the confidence and the boasting and their hope is the mechanism of salvation. That's not what it's saying. It's not saying if you do this, then you will be saved. It's saying that you are his house if indeed you hold fast to your confidence and your boasting. So it's basically laying out that those who are truly a part of the household of God, the household of faith, they will persevere until the end. And how do you know? Well, you do it. You know that you're God's house if you hold fast and persevere, if you boast in the hope of the Lord. So this isn't some sort of condition for salvation. This is something that reveals the reality of your salvation. Those who are in Christ, they hold fast, they cling to Jesus. We hold fast to our confidence and our boasting in our hope. What

Hold Fast With Confidence Until The End

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great words to think about Jesus and our Savior. I wonder how often in your life you can think about your salvation and feel these words, not just read them on a page, but feel them. The Puritans had this whole category that they called experiential theology, where they they they believed, of course, that God's word was inspired, that it was the supreme authority, uh, that they they had a high premium on God's word. And so, because of that, they sought to be doers of the word and to experience, to have the truth of God's word reflected in every aspect of their life. That's why if you if you look into Puritan collections, they write about everything under the sun and they write about marriage, they write about parenting, they write about uh having a business, they write about all kinds of things because they wanted to bring the word of God to bear in every aspect of life. They were confident, they wanted to experience this kind of confidence if we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope. Our confidence increases as we fix our minds and our hearts on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith. The scriptural analogy here is when Peter gets out of the boat and the and when Jesus is walking on the water, when his eyes were fixed on Jesus, he kept walking. But as soon as he looked away, the fears of the storm, the maybe the unbelief, the disbelief of walking on water, whatever happened, he looked down, he began to sink. That's the same for us. When we are not fixing our eyes, our minds, our hearts on Jesus, we're not gonna feel confident. We're not gonna experience any reason for boast, being just so thrilled and delighting in and cherishing Jesus. If we hold firm to the end, that proves, that reveals that we truly are the people of God. And so we need to cling to Jesus. Isn't just uh this feels similar to Hebrews 2, verse 1. Therefore, we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it. That word drift is is uh the idea that you're just aimlessly kind of floating away like a boat that's not tethered to a dock. And you need something to cling on to. And so Hebrews 3:1 says, that's Jesus. You cling to him, you you you keep your mind and your thoughts fixed on him with those spiritual bumpers of the church and the reminder of where you're going, where you're headed, and who's gonna get you there. And then you persevere. You persevere by holding fast to your confidence and your boasting and your hope. And both of those things, the confidence and the boasting are in Christ. That's why Paul he says, I will boast all the more, not in himself, not in his ability. He he had a he had a proper view of himself. I did not come to you, he says in 1 Corinthians, with lofty speech or wisdom. I came with much fear, I came with much trembling, so that your faith, your confidence would not rest in the power of men, but in the spirit of God, Paul says. By believing that when Hebrew says that he's greater, he's greater than angels, he's greater than prophets, he's greater than Moses, he's greater than all the things. He's just lining up all the things that these Jewish Christians would have any sort of temptation to think were greater than Jesus, and he's knocking them all down. He's greater than your prophets, he's greater than the prophet in the Old Testament, Moses. He's greater than angels, whom you are fearful of because of their involvement in Mount Sinai and the mediating of the law and all the great fear and trembling and the smoke and all those things that went on at Mount Sinai when Moses was convening with God. We need to know that. Jesus is greater than all of that. Jesus is greater. We delight in him. We fix our minds on him. We hope in him. We look to Jesus as the author, the perfecter, the founder, the trailblazer, the front runner of our faith. And we trust that in him we will have rest because of his faithfulness, the key that unlocks the heavenly door, that lets you in. And that Jesus says that where I am, there you may be also. It was his faithfulness, his work, his sacrifice, his atoning, propitiation that he makes for the sins of the people, it says in Hebrews 2, that makes it so that we can experience true rest. Friends, cling to Jesus. Hold fast to your confidence in him and what he has done and boast in the hope that he has provided. Let's pray. God, thank you. Thank you that Jesus is our founder, that he is our apostle. As sheep, we hear his voice. God, he is our high priest. We not only hear from you through your son, but we also are brought to you through him, through his life, through his death, through his resurrection, through his ascension, through the gospel of Jesus Christ. God, I pray that we would find true rest in Jesus, that we would fix our thoughts, not get distracted by the burdens of this world. Help us to have those bumpers, those spiritual bumpers of your people and of the reminder of where we're going and who's going to get us there. God, I pray that we would be the people talked about here in verse six, that we would hold fast our confidence and our boasting and our hope. And that on that day, that would prove the reality of our salvation that was genuinely provided through the sacrifice of your son. Help us as a church to continue to grow in our confidence. Help us to find this rest that's talked about here. I pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

Prayer And Final Blessing

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Well, thank you so much for joining us today. May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.