Sermons on Hebrews 12:14

Hebrews 12, verses 14, started verse 14. It says, pursue peace with all people and holiness without which no one will see the Lord. looking carefully lest anyone fall short of the grace of God lest any root of bitterness springing up cause trouble and by this many become defiled. lest there be any fornicator or profane person like Esau who for one morsel of meat, for one morsel of food, sold his birthright. The danger of bitterness. Look at your neighbor and say, it's dangerous to mess with bitterness. The writer of Hebrews is unnamed. He does not tell us who he is, but we know who he's writing to. He's writing to some Jews who have converted to Christianity and they have faced challenges in their Christian walk and they are contemplating leaving Christianity and going back to Judaism. don't look so hard. Some of y'all become Christian. Y'all think about going to your way of living. Amen. Thank all both of y'all for that rousing. Amen. And in his dialogue, he raises this issue. …

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Hebrews 12, 14 says, Strive for that holiness without which no one will see the Lord. It's not a holiness scale. You need so many holiness points. It is simply saying a good tree bears good fruit. You show yourself to be changed. As you probably remember me saying before, just think very simply about a math problem. I won't make you think about it for very long. F equals faith in this equation. W equals works. J equals justification. If you say F on the board plus W equals justification anti-gospel, anti-Christian. So people say, okay, that's right, that's right. We don't put the works do not contribute to our justification. And what critics of Reformed theology say, see, you just erased the W. there's no W in your equation. No, there is. It goes on the other side of the equal sign. F equals J yielding W. Faith alone receives justification, and once justified, we are sanctified and ultimately glorified. So, we are not erasing the W. We are not saying that good works are indifferent in the life of the Christian. They are, in fact, necessary. And you say, well, does that really make a practical difference? Because either way, you're saying they're necessary. If you put the W on the one side of justification or the other side, does it really make a difference? …

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… strive for peace with everyone and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. see to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God just a side note here I think the first time this week was me the first time I realized in verse 15 he doesn't say see to it that you don't obtain the grace of God see to it that you don't fail to obtain it he says see to it that no one This is like chapter three. You're looking out for others that they would not fail to obtain the grace. See to it that no one, so you yourself, you don't fail to obtain the grace. But just keeping your own nose clean isn't enough for Hebrews. Yeah, you don't fail to obtain the grace and look out for others, bring them in. You don't want them to fail to obtain the grace. All right, so back to the context here. the intended effect of verses 18 to 24 is to astound you to overwhelm you to thrill you to awaken you to the fearsome privilege and joy that you already have in being included in Christ new and better people called the church and in that joy we gladly obey the commands of verses 12 to 15 and a bunch of other commands besides that how could you run toward Jesus and love others and have company like this and not fulfill the commands of 12 to 15 so simply put what this passage is trying to do …

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… imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. 1214, pursue peace, pursue holiness without which no one will see the Lord. 1228, offer to God acceptable worship with reverence and awe. Our God is a consuming fire. 134, let marriage be held in honor and the marriage bed undefiled. keep your life free from the love of money. For this great Christ has said, I'll never leave you. I'll never forsake you. Why would you love money? 1313. since Jesus suffered outside the gate, let's go to him outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured. That's where it's going. It's to move us outside the camp. That's where it's going. You can't just revel in the greatness of Jesus in this wonderful room, which we ought to pay off this year, by the way. Let's do this. Let's get it done for Kenny's sake and the new pastor and Jesus. He did not ask me to say that. It's not in my manuscript. All those practical things that I just listed, he says in chapter 13, God is working those in us through Jesus Christ to whom be glory forever and ever. If you live like that, he gets a lot of glory, which is what the book is about, right? So you want to really get in sync with the book. …

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… says that we should be at peace, seek peace with all men and holiness without which no man will see the Lord. So this is the will of God. Your holiness, your being set apart, your sanctification, that you should abstain from sexual immorality. That was a big sin in the modern, the Greco-modern Roman world. very loose, very immoral, very much like modern America. People didn't think twice about sleeping with somebody they had an affinity for. but that's for the pagan world. This is the will of God, your sanctification, that you should abstain from sexual immorality, that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel, probably referring to your body, in sanctification and honor. God's given you a body. Now that you're a Christian, what do you do with that body? What you should do with that body is what Paul said in Romans chapter 12. I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your body holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. …

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