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127.
327.
Lord Jesus are the wireless being.
Old fight Odessa flowers and crucified and generously.
Now one in heaven about 327.
2536 Nice and we are one.
What rules or thou or fear?
He said to call the father strong, and we are in him there.
You both.
Where's Devon?
Hey bro. Chapter 6, verse 7.
For the earth that drinketh in the rain, that cometh off upon us, and bringeth forth earth meat from them, by whom it is dressed, receive a blessing from God.
But that was thorns, and Briars had rejected, and is nigh under cursing. Whose end is to be burned?
But beloved, we are persuaded better things of you and things that accompany salvation is always us peace.
Where God is not unrighteous to forget your labor, your work and labor of love, which we have showed Jordan his name in that he administered to the Saints and do ministers.
And we desire what everyone of you do show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope under the end.
That you be not small for the followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises.
For when God made promise to Abraham.
The God need to swear by no greater. He square by himself, saying, surely blessing I will bless thee, and multiplying I will multiply thee.
So after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise.
For men barely swear by the greater, and an oath for confirmation this of them an end of all stripes, wherein God willing more abundantly to show under the heirs of promise the immutability of His council, confirmed it by an oath. That by two immutable things in which it was impossible for John the line, we might have a strong consolation.
00:05:17
Who have fled for reference, to lay hold upon the hope set before us.
Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul.
Both sure and steadfast. And which enters into that within the veils, whether the forerunner is forest entered. Even Jesus made an high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.
There are two things mentioned, particularly in the 4th chapter.
That we should carry with us all the way through the book of Hebrews.
If we're going to understand the intent of the Spirit of God and giving us this book.
That is in the wilderness, those who are going on to their rest, that remain at the end of the road.
They must have, first of all, the word of God.
And then they must have a high praise.
And So what we've had this morning would have to do.
And particularly with that side of things.
It's the testimony of God, but it's a testimony now that leads us to higher and better things.
Now, what had to do with Jesus? And the Messiah was the word of God. There's no question about it, and he is coming.
To deliver his people as their king in the coming day.
But though we find that now.
We have not the earthly gift, but the heavenly gift, as we notice.
Now this is new instruction. This has to do with the new revelation to our souls.
It's heavenly thing, it's a heavenly gift, His blessings that belong in another world, as it were, not here on earth.
But where is that world? Why, it's where Christ is gone.
Well, that our affection should be there.
In practice, our life should be there.
That is, everything should be geared to that end down here.
And so if if perfection is seen in that way.
The beginnings were were good, but now we've come to that which has to do with perfection. As our breadth were telling us this morning. It has to do with something that brings in maturity and and the full revelation of God through our souls.
Now, it isn't simply the Doctor love it. That isn't the thought, good as that is.
But it's the lay hold of it ourselves that's what's before us here in Hebrew. This is a necessity for going on to that rest.
It isn't simply that there are doctrines that we hold. That's almost going back to the forms.
But this is a living reality in our soul. Now. If this is soul, there won't be any apostasy.
The living reality in our souls of Jesus.
Is the object of our hearts.
And not just holding a doctrine, as we see the Christian world around this so-called professing world, there are certain creeds that are held even in connection with Christianity. It won't do.
Christ must be a living.
Object for our hearts.
That's what we have here. One thing for us to get more of the truth is another thing when the truth lays hold on up. Yes, it isn't just the fact of the teaching of it is what I mean. And that's why in connection with the word that set before us in the 4th chapter, it divides between soul and spirit.
That is, it's the active thing going on continually, for instance.
In Hebrews it isn't a question of one, of getting in difficulties and and being restored. That is, that isn't a subject exactly.
But it's the Spirit of God continually bringing before us the precious word preservice in our path.
And the Father continually reminding us that isn't the way you're to walk. The Word of God shows you how to walk.
If I do that, I'm in the enjoyment of these things.
But if if that doesn't, if I don't follow this, then the 12Th chapter comes in where there's a chase thing so that we might be partakers of His Holiness.
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But here in the 4th chapter.
It's simply the Word of God and then the High priest, which we get here in this latter part of the chapter. These are two things that are musts.
If one is to reach that.
At the end of the road.
For as long as one holds to the Word of God, even outwardly, he's not an apostate. He may be an unbeliever, maybe on a road to a lost eternity, but an apostate is one who has turned his back upon Christ. And the very foundations of Christianity saw that in Hebrews 10. It says really what apostasy is. They trodden under foot the Son of God, and counted the blood of the covenant where he was sanctified and unholy things.
And have done this, but under the spirit of grace.
It's really despising the truth of God. And so an apostasy as we see it today would be in the giving up of the inspiration of the Scripture, the virgin birth of Christ, the blood of Christ for salvation, the deity of Christ. All these things are leading to the final apostasy, when all will be given up from the worship of man will replace it.
It has helped me to understand the epistles of the Hebrews, to see that there are really three groups. There are those who are real believers who are encouraged to go on and bear more fruit. There are those who are professors who are warned that if they give up the profession it would be apostasy. And then there are the apostates, for whom there is nothing but judgment.
And so he is warning those who were perhaps on the verge of giving up everything but to give it up with the apostasy. The important thing is that they should be saved. Of course, it would be just like if you had a neighbor and he was going to a place where he was hearing the gospel continually. But he's not saved. You know, in conversation with him. He's not born again, but he comes to you one day and he tells you that he is thinking of going to.
We will say that Jehovah's Witness where the deity of Christ is denied and so on. And you say, oh, I certainly would warn you not to go there. Well, he says, but I'm not saved anyway. All that you say, as long as you're going to a place where the gospel is held and preached, you might be saved. That's my hope and desires. But if you turn your back on us, God may allow you to be given over to Apostrophe so that.
The the third class, and the one that the professors are warned against, is that they might turn to apostasy.
Can we write in regards to modernists and liberals of the Christmas and Cosmates? And they still fly the Christian bands? Are they plastic?
There's a verse in 2nd Corinthians 4.
That may have its application.
Where the mind is involved.
2nd Corinthians 4 and four.
In whom the God of this world?
Hath blinded the minds of them which believe not. Now these aren't ignorant persons.
These are those who have had an opportunity, been right in it, but they didn't believe.
And so the lines of the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ was the image of God, should shine under them.
I believe there is such a thing as continually.
Treating the Word of God.
Like it would be the works of man in such a way that finally there's this darkness that comes over one.
Satan brings it, but it's allowed.
Or one who who continually refuses.
To believe the word of God.
There are three steps of apostasy, and they're given in the third chapter.
3rd chapter of Hebrews.
The eighth verse Harden not your hearts. That's the first step.
Now people who simply take the word of God so that they can see well how many things they can find wrong with it reasoning.
They soon find themselves hardened against the Word of God.
If they don't seek it by faith and even any of us.
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Who may hear the word of God and refuse to act on it but our wills? We might be guilty of this very thing of hardening our hearts, at least in measure against the truth. But I believe this is the first step of apostasy.
That we have here the very outset of the book. Now the second step.
Is they do always earn their heart, That is, every nature must express itself.
So here comes open, Sam. It's the expression of what's in the heart. But if they paid attention to the word of God, this wouldn't have happened. If they bowed to it, they had been preserved.
No, we find Judas as an example of this.
He spent 3 1/2 years.
In the presence of Jesus, I'm the most blessed ministry. But what was the result of his hardening his heart? He became a thief, and soon we have the next step.
In the 12 first an even heart of unbelief in departing from the living God.
But the 12Th verse wasn't the first step.
That's the last step. The first step is hardening the heart against the truth.
Now we should have tender hearts for the truth. We should seek that.
We should seek to be willing to bow to the truth as it comes home to us, whatever it may be and wherever it comes from. I mean, by that it might be a, a person that we're not particularly fond of who who rebukes us. Well, the way of correction is the way of life. We better take heed if he brings the word of God, because we better take heed.
If that word to my soul.
That may be the thing God said to stop me in my course, so I should vow to it now. That's the first step of blessing in my soul, the bow of the Word of God.
I don't think that we can call a person an apostate. They may be going in that direction, but God only knows who an apostate is. I believe that the apostles had discerned them. They could say, all could say.
To that man pulled out full of all equity, thou child of the devil, he could speak of them that way, and the Lord could say he of your father the devil. But I don't believe it would be right for us to call anybody a child of the devil or an apostate, and what they're doing may be in that direction. I was thinking of their first epistle of John in the 4th chapter.
First John, chapter 4.
It says in the second verse, Hereby know ye the Spirit of God, every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God, and every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God. And this is that spirit of Antichrist, where he of you have heard that it should come, and even now already is it in the world.
Well, I believe that's the spirit of Antichrist.
That giving up of the deity of Christ is the beginning, the spirit of it. The full apostasy will not be until after the Church is gone and the Antichrist comes. He is Antichrist that denies the Father and the Son.
When we see the trend in this direction and we we warn against pardon.
Whosoever.
Transgressor or both? Beyond the fact? Not in the doctrine, that would be impossible.
Yes, if he really believed it in his heart, then that here again comes We have seen people that we.
Believe are true that have been mixed up in these things and afterwards delivered. But one who really denies the deity of Christ from his heart couldn't be a true Christian at all. He'd be if he had known of him once, confessed it and then gave it up. He'd be an apostate.
In other words, it is quite possible of our brother termed it to still be under the banner of Christianity and being a prostate, although we are not the ones to point the finger at one and say that they are aside.
Would you perhaps feel free to say that such in one as Mary Baker, Eddie or Judge Rutherford, who are now gone?
00:20:02
Where actually apostates, although they would vigorously defend their position in Christianity, that is, the Bible was supposedly their textbooks, although they gave up and denied everything that was fundamental in it that so.
Here's in fact that was in First Corinthians chapter three. We find three classes of workmen there.
There is a saved Workman with good work which is rewarded. There is a saved Workman with bad work, and his work is burned up, but he himself is saved. And then there is one who built upon the Christian foundation, but defile the temple of God, and it says him, shall God destroy both he and his work are destroyed. That is, he didn't bring his false doctrine into a healing country, so to speak.
He brought it into in on the Christian foundation, and he defiled the temple of God.
Well, that would be an apostate and.
If it's not manifested here, or it will be manifested in that day when everything is brought to light, so that there are those who have labored under the banner of Christianity, who have professed to build upon the Christian foundations for really apostates.
Told to try the spirits in that chapter, you call her attention to the Halo.
In the first verse for the try of the spirits.
And that's the the point.
It's the spirit, it's either of God or it's of Satan, and there's discernment given to the believers. We have in first print in two months.
The anointing of the Spirit.
So he's able to discern the spirits.
This isn't a personal thing between one man and another. It's a question of.
Of trying the spirits, What is that spirit of?
Does it confess Jesus Christ?
That's coming come into play, that is.
One who came here.
Came from another place.
He had no beginning. That's the point.
The general Son of God.
Doesn't it make us value and feel the need of more and more?
The personal reading and the family reading and the assembly reading of the Word of God.
With all these dangers so subtly presented around us.
Our safeguard is not in knowing all about them, but in the personal reading of the Word of God, the family reading of the Word of God.
And certainly the assembly Bible readings for I believe I can say with very, very much Thanksgiving that.
In visiting among those gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus, I have never, never heard false doctrine. And that's a remarkable thing to be able to say. We have heard that which perhaps might be a little more accurate, but I don't believe that we have ever known of that which is false to be taught and allowed.
And it's a very, very wonderful privilege that we have and that the dear young people have in these difficult days.
To be privileged, to be present.
The assembly Bible reading where the truth of God is presented.
I was wondering about the last chapter of Hebrews where Esau is brought in as the profane person.
The picture of an apostate, that is, in a sense at least.
He was rejected the read of tears here, but they were not tears of repentance, but tears because he couldn't get the blessings.
Now you mentioned this morning.
If one rejects the truth of Christ, what is there left?
Well, it seems to be re echoed in ethos crime. My father has stopped but one blessing.
Well, the truth is God has one blessing, and if we do not accept the truth in Christ.
As God gives it to us in His Word, there is no other.
Then Esau, who despised his birthright, In other words, he despised God's way and to reach bitter fruit, the book of Obadiah.
On the 24th chapter of Numbers.
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Both testified to the Destiny.
Of Esau.
He will be left without an inheritance.
Because of his perpetual hatred for his brothers.
And although Hamlet was the first of the nations, his end will be that he perished forever.
Well, it's it was at the history supposed that we learned this that is.
Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated comes out not at the beginning of the history, but after their history is over. God said that the book of Malachi.
It certainly is the giving up.
Despising of the birthright, So there's nothing left if you despise that.
Well, the earth is that which deceives the rain, The little picture of the heart of man.
I was trying to say that for the crown of God that He has given us certain safeguards.
Yeah, down here against these things which would turn aside. We've been looking at first John 4.
And we have, I believe, 4 safeguards there for us.
In the 4th chapter.
In the second verse.
You have the person of Christ.
And the.
The the lake.
That Jesus Christ is coming.
Play and then we have in the.
Workers.
Ye are a gobble of children.
And I've overcome them.
That is you and I who by grace believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Have that new nature.
So we have that new nature of divine nature.
To safeguard us and then it goes on that same verse. Greater is she that is in you than he that is in the world. Spirit of God the the unction.
Will preserve.
He takes the things of Christ.
Shows them to us.
Phenomena 6 words We are of God, that is, that the apostles speaking. We are of God either knoweth God here enough.
The apostles quote the word of God.
And we have that in our hands, the Word of God.
So we have these four things that God has given to us.
Will preserve his own from the dummy entangles in these things.
True, it was Speaking of this apostasy.
Which is a true child God will never get into, but he may get entangled in these things.
Well, when I've mentioned here about.
The rain coming down, bringing forth herbs and then badwitch prayers, thorns and briars would have not show that the blessing of God pictured in the rain coming down, but it makes what has a good root grow and bring forth fruits, but it makes that which has a bad root blossom out and bring out what's bad. And so we find that very distinctly when the Lord Jesus came into the world.
For those who came to Him, who received new life from Him, all what a blessing His coming was. It meant salvation to them, it meant everything to them, but it brought out the evil of what was in man as it had never been brought out before. Saw that the Lord could say, if I had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sinned. But now they have both seen and hated both me and my Father.
And the full revelation of what man's heart is, and all its wickedness has been brought out more since the coming of Christ than before, Because just like the rain makes these thorns and thistles and all its bad grow too. But.
That that rain makes what good growth. And so you and I have entered into the blessedness of his coming, what that work means to us. And now the encouragement is to go on.
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There are more fruits as we have in John abiding in Christ. There will be fruit fairies because the roots good, but a corrupt tree cannot bring forth good fruit.
The wilderness proves what we are when the rain falls.
It will indicate what kind of a nature the plant is.
Because it will bring it to maturity and so in the wilderness.
We have the proving.
The believer is going on to the rest that remains. But it was in the wilderness of the children of Israel were proved only two entered the land that came out of Egypt. Who proved in the wilderness?
Will be so again to the 10 triads. So it's going to prove them in the wilderness.
But.
It's here that the rainfall. We're living in a day of grace.
As far as God and his part is concerned, He's giving the rain, but whatever nature it is will prove itself.
Here in the wilderness.
Isn't it?
And then to be burned. But then he turns immediately.
Because that isn't the subject of the Spirit of God would have us occupied with judgment.
He wants to encourage the people of God and all that He can encourage him. And that's why we're here at these meetings, to be encouraged in our souls, to be built up. Of course there are warnings, but the purpose is to encourage us and build us up. And he would start by telling us that.
Shirley is persuaded better things of you, because those are the ones that his heart was set upon the Saints of God, at least those who had given evidence formerly in what they had done, that they belonged to the Lord.
It's nice to be able to see Christ be placed in the vessel, isn't it?
We showed in this ninth verse that he's not talking about.
The same ones within the sixth verse, if they shall fall away, it's impossible to renew them again to repentant. That's the one who didn't have a probation and only had a probation and fell into apostasy. But when we come to the ninth verse, this is reality, and you find that continually distinguished.
Read in the 10th chapter of Hebrews this morning. He warns again there about those who draw back.
But he says, Beloved we are, He says that we are not of them who draw back on the perdition, but of them that believe to the saving of the soul. So all these warnings about the apostasy do not refer to a real believer, but they are given as warnings for those who had profession only, who were not born again of the solemnity of giving up.
And it's a very needed warning in this day because we find the foundations of the faith being swept away and people who had only profession going along with this sort of thing. And if it continues, they're going to find themselves landed in open apostasy.
From which there's no return.
Now there is a work that's connected with the pathway here.
The the thought is we get in the 4th chapter where we see God labor in the creation. On the 7th day he rested. And that's the pattern that we have in Hebrew. The believer is laboring now.
Not to get rest for his soul, but he's laboring in view of the rest that remains for the people of God. He has rest for his soul, but he's laboring now in view of that rest that's to come.
We've been created under good works and so the labor is passing through the wilderness and he's occupied with good works.
That's the pathway here. Now at the end of the road, of course there will be rewards in the Kingdom and all that, but the point here is that in the meantime.
He's occupied with good works, and so that's what the apostle calls attention to here.
Your work.
00:35:00
And labor.
But it's labor of love.
And so if a cold water is given, a cup of cold water is given.
It should be given in the name of Jesus. Shouldn't be. That is, it should be identified with that name that's been rejected here in this world. Otherwise it's simply doing it as other men would do it. But there's a reward in the coming day for a cup of cold water. It's given in the name of Jesus.
How very beautiful and how very different to the way in which so many look at it that is.
These first verses of warnings seem to produce a terror with some they feel that they better work very, very hard in order to maintain what they possess.
But it's very noticeable in 2nd Corinthians 5 where we have such strong words of certainty. We read there, therefore we are always confident. Then again, we are confident, I say.
And the very next verse says, Wherefore we labor.
Wherefore we labor. Isn't that lovely that God has given us that unshakable confidence? And then the very next verse is wherefore we labor.
Because of that which we know is ours and ours forever, the heart delights to labor, and it is really a labor of love. Not a labor in order to obtain something, or even in order to maintain, but a labor of gratitude and love because of that wonderful confidence that is power.
What's his name? That's Tim Parkin, isn't it?
That's the name that's been rejected here and I believe that's so important because.
Because there's so much work being done today and and the name of the church or the name of the.
Some society, but here's the name that's been rejected and this is what.
Will be rewarded that the judgment seat of Christ.
So that which is connected with the name of Jesus precious name.
The Lord values to what is done for his own, doesn't he? And that he ministered to the Saints, and do ministers I'll dear his own are to him involved persecuting them. The Lord said Saul, Saul, why persecute us down me?
And in the coming day, it is Matthew 25, he will say, As much as you have done it under one of the least of these, my brethren, you have done it under me.
Well, it's a lovely thing to think that in showing a kindness to one of his own, we're doing it for the Lord, and that He values it so much. The book of Ruth, she was commended for what she had done to her mother-in-law. That was the basis upon which Boaz took notice of her, what she had done for her mother-in-law.
There's a little labor also mentioned in the book of Nehemiah that I think is quite interesting.
Uh.
Something that we might not consider perhaps to be.
Of very great importance.
The 10th chapter of Nehemiah.
And the 34th verse.
We have read of the burnt offering and of the meat offering and of the peace offering and so on, and we can quite picture the Lords delight.
In these sacrifices that were brought to him.
But in the sense of Nehemiah and the 34th verse, we read and we cast the locks among the three, the Levites and the people.
For the wood offering to bring it into the House of our God.
The wood offering, That's an unusual expression.
I picture it this way that an Israelite goes out and gets an arm load of wood and brings it in to be used for these sacrifices.
Little thinking as he did so that it was going to be classified as an offering.
Without it, it wouldn't be possible to continue with the service of the temple though He brings his arm load of woods and the Lord refers to it as the wood offering. Well, I'm sure that at a time like this there are many little services that go on unseen by those of us who are visitors.
00:40:18
And it's a labor of love, I have no doubt. And if it's done for the Lord and in His name, how very sweet it is to realize.
The preciousness that there is in it for him.
And the appraisal that he will put a fine in that day.
There's some someone who said we don't appreciate the.
Water so much until the well runs dry. And how many services?
Of the brethren we don't recognize until perhaps they're missing.
And the one who opens and closes the door, for instance, until the door isn't open some morning, and then they see there's a brother that's doing a service. But all these things the Lord notices.
And values if it's done to its name. She did what she could. It's a thought I believe.
And then the next verse, it says that we desire that everyone of you to show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope under the end.
It's often easy to start doing something and to do it for a little while, then if we don't get thanks or are not noticed, to kind of give up. But here he desires that they would continue.
And as you're remarking about the one who perhaps ultimately closed the door and so on, how many there are have gone and continued to do these things year after year?
Well, it's easy to do something when it's just on occasion, but it's to be doing it constantly. The Lord values that.
The same with a Sunday school class. Perhaps you take a Sunday school class well.
Maybe all right in the winter time when you're not traveling around too much, but in the summer time comes and then there's a diligence required to perhaps work with some of your own pleasure to be there with the children. So the Lord takes notice of all these little things suddenly.
That's not only true of a Sunday school class, it's true of the meetings, the gospel meetings.
All these things and you're associating that particularly with the 11Th birth, brother, Yes, diligence to the end, continuing on and what we have brought before us in the end of the ninth verse and the 10th and the 11Th when you take it that way.
But it's done to the end. That is, it's really until the Lord comes. Yes, it's continuing until He comes with that which He's given me to do. Now we do have a verse in that gospel that shows the path of the servant. It says He appointed to every man His words.
So there's no St. of God needs to say, well, no, I'm one of those that just sits on the bench. I have no job. That is not true. And that's what brings exercise.
In his presence, to know just where we fit.
It certainly wouldn't be to follow some other brother and sister, but it would be deceitful.
In the Lord's presence, what He would have me to do. Now others may look down upon what I'm doing, but if I'm doing it for the Lord, well, that's what's important.
I suppose we have the Lord Jesus as our example in this as in everything. I was thinking of the first person, John 13 having loved his own, which was in the world. He loved them under the end, and that the end is.
Really never end service is he? Is there a God right hand as our high priest now? Love is the things he loves us under the southernmost. Well, that's the standard before us then.
But this is leading us into the line of things that he has. At the end, he's brought the word hope. Indiana, his first, his lemon first.
00:45:00
Of hope.
And that's what he's leading us on to, because that's at the end of the row.
Turned aside then, but now it's whole, pure hope.
So he brings, he brings Abraham before us from the subject of patience that goes along with this line of things.
Abraham was promised.
When he was back in UR the counties.
That God would show him the land.
But later on he was told he would be given the seed to be given that land, and then he was told he would be given it.
But he had to wait.
For 99 years for these promises.
For 100 years possibly.
Before he received the evidence in the son Isaac that this would be fulfilled. Now, that's a long time to wait, but I believe we have that expression here.
Umm.
Through faith and prosperous be not plausible no the 15 first so after he had.
Patiently.
Endure now that work patience is sometimes translated endurance in Scripture, but we have the two brought together here now so after he had patiently endured.
He received the promise.
That is, he received all this in Isaac.
The one who had been promised him would be the depositary of God's counsels and purposes.
But as after he had patiently endured, Moses gives us really the energy of faith, but here it's the patience of faith that we need in connection with the wilderness pathway to endure unto the end in that which we know that God has promised us.
To occupy in that until he comes.
Always that that the Spirit of God so graciously overlooks here Abraham failure.
He became rather impatient for me.
So they couldn't wait for Isaac Till.
Or we got eight meals.
Also became a brief to him, but it was really in the trial of that patient wasn't that he was not just purpose of the Spirit of God and looks at here that he was a friend of God.
So God takes account of our failures, all right, but when you have something rewarding to say to us.
He passes over by. They have been judged in their own time, but he does not mention it here. What a precious God we have that doesn't bring up against us all our weaknesses.
But if we.
Keep us a course goal in mind and reach that course God is so happy to tell us.
Well done and looks on the outward appearance and God saw Abraham's heart and that was the difference, wasn't it? He didn't overlook sin though, did he?
No.
Now this little word, followers of them, I think it's our first brethren, because we need.
We need one another.
If it is a question of Abraham walking across a desert into a land that was promised him alone, that's one thing.
But God has called us as Saints together, and we should remember that we need one another.
I know it isn't the subject of the one body here, but the principle is here.
It's a question here of following and how much we need to follow. Of course, it's looking back.
To the examples, but no doubt, but still it's the principle of following. So we need to to learn, I believe.
To that independent spirit is not good.
If it's the people of God.
Followers of them who, through faith and patience, inherit the promises.
Some of these examples of the Old Testament.
Then the examples of our brethren.
We're to follow their faith, as we learn later in Hebrews in the latter part.
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That's a great cloud of witnesses referred to also in the 12Th chapter, isn't it?
To know that we're not the first ones that have had to walk the path of faith. Those who have trotted before us have often had more difficult time than we. And if we think our path is difficult, it's good to look back and see what they had to endure and how long they had to wait. But how God finally did come in? Well, this encourages us, doesn't it?
But it's nice to see in that 12Th chapter. But then there's the one who's brought before us, who did it perfectly.
The great cloud of witnesses are those who walk by faith, as our brother remarked, and in the 11Th chapter 2, there's no mention of their failures. But the Spirit of God is careful then, to bring before us in the 12Th chapter the one who began the path of faith and completed it. If others have failed, they have, and each one of us have to confess that we have failed. We can have our eye upon one who never failed.
To walk the path of faith perfectly. So he's the perfect example, although we're encouraged by the faith of others.
That's the way he endured seeing him.
A remark was remade in Toronto concerning that.
Chapter with all the examples of faith.
And perhaps we sometimes feel that if we just have sufficient endurance of faith.
That eventually, we will.
Receive that which we have been waiting for, and our life will, after all, turn out to be quite a triumph.
But when you read the 11Th chapter of Hebrews, you read an account of quite a good many whose life seemed to be of that character. And then he says in the 32nd verse, And what shall I more say?
For the time would fail me to tell Gideon that the fair accident of Samson, and of Jasper, the David also, and Samuel, and of the prophets. Now this is the kind of thing we all like to read about, and wish it were a little more evident in our own experience.
Who through faith subdued Kingdom, drop righteousness, obtained promises, stop the mouths of lions, quench the violence of fire, escape the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong.
Waxed violent in fights, turned to flight. The armies of the aliens. Women received their dead. Raised to life again. We like to read of these and we call them heroes of the faith. And sometimes having read of them, we feel a little bit.
Impatient, or maybe disappointed because it hasn't been our experience, but the chapter goes on to say and others.
And others were tortured.
Not accepting deliverance that they might obtain a better resurrection. And others had trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, A moreover a bomb and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn asunder. We're tempted slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskin.
Being destitute, afflicted, tormented, of whom the world was not worthy.
They wandered in deserts and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth, these all having obtained a good report through faith.
Well, we would very much like our experience to be.
That experience of triumph that we enjoy reading about in the Old Testament. But there are also those who are listed here as part of the Cloud of Witnesses.
Whose experience of faith caused them to wander about in sheepskins and goat skins.
They suffered right through to the end, apparently.
And it says of them of whom the world was not worthy.
Well, if the Lord sees fit to allow something of that kind to be the experience today.
We can still take courage from what we have right here in this epistle. Where would we go if we find these afflictions? Intestines today, Albert.
We have things so easy comparatively, but I do feel that if we.
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Were more faithful and more separate, as we ought to be. We have a little taste of it, and the Lord alone knows.
Whether the dearly beloved young people are going to be faced with a lot more of this than we have ever known. He doesn't come soon and call us home, right in our own circumstances, on the job, at school. The Saints of God are passing through similar trials, only in another way.
I'm reminded of a story that I read in the church history.
Of a man who was called to design the Coliseum.
By one of the Caesars, I believe it was Nero and when he finished it.
And the Emperor took him out to view the completed.
Structure.
As they were standing there, the emperor said, Now this is the place where we're going to.
Burn the Christians.
The architect turned to the emperor and he said I am a Christian.
Now there was the test. He could have been quiet, you know.
Could have been quiet.
How, how often we have to confess that we're not wearing the name of Jesus on our forehead here.
We're going to wear it up there, but.
How many times we tested us to this down here?
Be not slow, but followers of them through faith and patience, inherit the promises. That's the end of the road. We're going to inherit it all. And so God is going to confirm this to our our hearts here.
And he says that.
God, when God made promise to Abraham, because he could swear by no greater, you swear by himself.
Saying surely?
Blessing, I will bless thee, and multiply I will multiply thee.
So after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise.
Men verily swear by the greater.
And an all for confirmation is to them, and end of all strife.
We're in, God willing, more abundantly, and showing the errors of promise. The immutability of His counsel confirmed it with an oath that by two immutable things in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us. Now what are these two amenable things?
God's word in the oath isn't. That's right, and I believe that it goes back to what we had in the 4th chapter.
And that is?
The word of God as you call your attention to, but also it's God himself his oath, but made good in Jesus, the forerunner who has entered for us. We have the both of them here in this chapter, do we not? It's made good to our souls and the one who's already gone to God's right hand.
Well, He wants us to have this confidence. Men think it's sort of humble to doubt that the 70s verse says we're in God willing more abundantly to show under the ears of promise the immutability of His counsel. Isn't it lovely that God has done everything that love could do to remove any doubts from our mind that He is going to fulfill everything, that He has purpose for us?
And the ground has already been laid. His word has been given.
The Lord Jesus is a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. Nothing can fail, because all depends upon Him, and He wants us to be sure of this.
All country, that is, to the thoughts of man who thinks, as I say, that it humbles. 1000 Even those who do know salvation, teaching such things as they can be lost again. All these things are contrary to that which God would sit before us through the work of His Son.
We have the priest here connected with the place.
As we get the end of the chapter where we have fled for refuge.
Now that takes us back to the 19th of numbers, doesn't it, where we have the cities of refuge brought in.
And you can just see a man running.
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And now he casts himself across, across the threshold of that city, he's saying.
Despite the Rapids, he's safe. But now how long is he safe? What is his confidence?
Until the priest died.
That's how long? Well, when will our priest stop?
Say he never died because I live, you shall live also.
And provision is in connection with the priest who's there. And so he's preserved. Of course, if he has really offended, his case will be taken up and he'll be tried. And but the one who simply.
Has fled to that city under the conditions of that 19th chapter.
He fled to that, to that city.
He's safe because the priest was safe.
If we go back home on the free side.
Well, yeah, but that's something else. That's his inheritance, of course.
Hebrews 725 gives us elaborate word on that.
Wherefore he is able also to save them to the honorable.
That come under God finance he ever liveth make an intention for them.
First, now there's this little typical thing in the death of the high priest. I think it was mentioned before in the meeting that the Lord said priestly work goes on, but the time is coming when that word will no longer be necessary, as all will be safely back in home in glory. Then his earthly people will return to the place of their inheritance. That is, they they killed they, they killed the Lord Jesus.
But he took their sin as a sin of ignorance, for there was only shelter in the city of refuge if a man killed another and unawares. So the Lord spoke of what they did is something that was done at unawares. And Peter mentioned this. And now brother and I walked through ignorance. She did it as it also your rulers. And so he assured them that because of this there's refuge, but there is a time when they will return to their inheritance and.
Possess it in peace.
But of course there is a thought brought before us here too, that there will be no death to the High priest, because he's there forever for us, and so that everything is assured to us in the heavenly glory.
The other thought is so very, very beautiful too, isn't it? Showing the loving heart of God? In the 30th chapter of Numbers, it tells us that if a woman utters A vow, she is chargeable by all the responsibilities of that vow.
But if her husband heard her utter that bow and he chose to disallow her?
Then she is delivered from the claims of that vow.
Well, would it be right to apply that to the case of guilty Israel, who said his blood be on us and on our children?
What a horrible bow that was.
The Lord Jesus heard that terrible vow, and perhaps we could say as husband to Israel, he lifted up his heart and said, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.
Seems to me that he is disallowing that awful vow which would have made it forever impossible for Israel under any circumstance to be brought into blessings. The Lord Jesus disallowed that vow so that Israel now is held guilty of unpremeditated manslaughter.
And is, I suppose we could say, taking shelter among the nations until the cessation of the service of the high priest, and then how lovely it is that they will come forth. But if an Israelite, even though he may have been guilty.
And tried to take shelter in a city of refuge. If he came forth during the lifetime of the high priest, the hand of the avenger of blood could fall upon him. Well, that's what Israel is doing now. They are returning to the scene of their crimes in unbelief and during the term of office of the high priest, and the hand of the avenger is going to fall upon them.
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And those who have pled to refuge have a strong consolation.
And so we have a hope, which is an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast.
The anchor is sure, and it's steadfast.
The old sailing vessels.
As they reached a port.
Oftentimes, they're unable to sail in between the rocks.
And.
A boat could go out ahead with a line.
And secure an end within the harbor.
And once that was secured then those on ship would brings the ship in on the line.
But it's a little picture, I believe, of what we have here. Saint Peter, There's one who has gone in already. The ship is secure, though, because of the line.
As one has already gone in, he's gone in for us.
We have a strong consolation.
We have a hope that's an anchor of the soul, and there's no question about the anchor, no question about that whatever.
And so all those who have this, who fled for refuge.
To lay a hold upon the whole set before us, which hopefully has have us an anchor of the soul.
Well, sure.
And steadfast, it cannot move.
But it also is the other end is anchored within the veil.
With as a forerunner is for us. Enter.
So we have the Lord Jesus as man who has gone in there for us.
Even Jesus.
Now we have the name of Jesus in Hebrews over and over again.
When it's a question of the work on the cross, it's the blood of Jesus in Hebrews. Maybe one exception, but generally speaking I believe it's the blood of Jesus.
Because the Spirit of God is bringing before us, I believe here the person.
And the Word and the offices of our Lord Jesus Christ.
He's he's bringing us directly in the presence.
Of the person of Jesus.
It isn't something that's simply a doctrine. The truth here brings us right into the presence of the person of Jesus. And so it's even Jesus.
Even Jesus.
Made of high priest forever.
After the order of milk and then what we have in Leviticus.
1650 Bring his blood within the veil.
Well, here it's a question of his everything, isn't it?
Of course that's true.
That.
The efficacy of that blood is what is taught in the later chapters where we get the sacrifices.
Wait, there's a contrast here that's wrong between the priesthood of Aaron and the Melchizedek priesthood, because the Melchizedek priesthood was before the people that entered into the agreement of the law. And then when they failed under the law, God provided the sacrifices by which he could go on with the people after they had entered into the agreement to keep the law.
But.
When the Lord Jesus had offered that one perfect sacrifice, then all it was foreshadowed under the Mosaic Law was fulfilled and settled. Now God, as it were, goes back to that which was before. They're entering into the agreement of law altogether, and shows how that Melchizedek had met the Lord, had met Abraham rather as he returned from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him.
He blessed him consequently, a victory that had been already won, and the blessing was entirely unconditional. He told him of the blessing, that from the Most High, and it wasn't conditional on anything in Abraham at all. Well, that's the lovely part of the work of Christ. All the claims of the law were settled. He's entered in once the question of sin has been settled, so that the types of the Iranic priesthood were fulfilled.
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Now he can bless according to that which was in his purposes that doesn't depend on man at all. And the priest forever. And then he also quotes from the from the songs where it's in the Psalms that the oath is given. I think it's the 110th Psalm where it says thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.
Lord has worn and will not repent. But the point is that at that time the people were still under the Mosaic law. They were still offering the sacrifices.
But God showed that He had some other purpose in view, and that when all that was fulfilled in Christ, then He could bless according to those original purposes. And that's what brought before us. And this is what gives a strong consolation, because all the tapes and shadows have now been fulfilled, and now the blessing comes unhindered as He as the priest after the order of Melchizedek.
What do you make out of that word that says it doesn't say that the hope just really enters, prevails, that it enters into fact within the base?
I think that was meaning the things that are concerned with that.
Well, in the fourth verse you have the heavenly gift in contrast to the millennial Kingdom on earth.
Could be that it's in view but.
Did you have some thought on it, brother?
When he mentioned that that is that the the work of the Lord and then the blood being presented there as a fulfillment of the Tyson within the 60s.
No doubt. That's the basic for all, isn't it? That's the basic for all our security practice. Lot of tightness.
What was within the veil was not the very presence of God Himself.
And that's where the high priest, where they were gayless, had gone, and that anxious.
Then in there where it's where it's actually within the veil, in the very presented dog. And if that's true.
Well, what the What need we fear? We have that hopeful assurance steadfast.
Well, the whole thing that was before the Jew was the millennial Kingdom.
And all the blessings of it. But.
We find that in Hebrews the Spirit of God takes the old types and shadows.
And puts them in a new light. But it isn't now. Some things, but it's a person.
And in that person is found everything that will satisfy the heart of God's people forever.
Well, thinking of this too, that's the the high praise in the days of the of Israel, the Commonwealth.
The the high presented in was very and friendly.
There was no peace.
Wasn't sure it wasn't steadfast then.
There was always a fear that something had not been there, done according to the prescribed order that God and the nation set forth.
If the word can touch their pieces, that perhaps be the key. Here we have the picture of an of the anchor of a ship.
Being safely put to anchor in the midst of a raging storm, possibly there until the anchor comes.
Well, not his event brings that thought before he was King of Salem and his King of peace.
And when looking into the holiest of all, there we see the ark, right? We see the cherubim don't see there he could meet all just justice and judgment, but that has been meted out and impeached has been made.
It seems to me it's so precious to look into the holiest, knowing that peace has been made.
And there's the Melchizedek speech, no?
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It's a lovely thing too, is it not, to realize that we never, never can fathom the full result of the finished work of Christ?
And the place that he now occupies for us.
That is, He has not simply entered within the veil in order that we might have an unshakable feast. That's gloriously and wonderfully true in the 9th chapter and the.
12Th verse It says neither by the blood of goats and calves bused by his own blood, he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us. The 24th verse. For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the truth, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us.
It's a very lovely and a very wonderful thing to know that we have an uncapable refuse.
And unchangeable peace. But it just seems that there might be that thought into that within the veil that is the opening up to us or something, which is far more wonderful than we actually long for when we felt our needs.
It's more than.
Simply a refuge, shall I say. I don't say that in any disparaging ways. A wonderful reality of a rescue.
Thinking about him called from above, and heavenly men by birth.
212.
The work we brought, the citizens of earth, the children here we seek a heavenly home, are a portion in the ages yet to come, 212.