Misconceptions About Hebrews (Part 1)

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry.

The Book of Hebrews as a Theological Wonder

My name is Mike Abendroth. I want to introduce you today to one of the wonders of the world. Well, historian Herodotus, back around 400 BC, and the scholar Calmacus of Cyrene, they listed seven wonders of the ancient world.

It wasn�t ancient in their day, but to us it is, at the Museum of Alexandria. And these seven wonders of the ancient world are, any guesses, what would you guess if I guess what these wonders were? Great Pyramid of Giza, Hanging Gardens of Babylon, Statue of Zeus at Olympia, Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, that�s hard to say, that�s Carnitas, Colossus of Rhodes, Lighthouse of Alexandria, and the only one that still exists is the Great Pyramid, according to the internet site.

Great Wonders of the World. Now then they had the wonders of the medieval ages, and those weren�t seven total, a different list had different wonders, Stonehenge, Colosseum, Catacombs of Qom el-Shaquafa, Great Wall of China, Porcelain Tower of Nanjing, Hagia Sophia, Holy Wisdom, I don�t know what that is, Leaning Tower of Pisa, Pisa, Taj Mahal, Cairo Citadel, and a couple others.

They actually have wonders of the world that are natural, so they have seven natural wonders of the world. Well they�ve got undersea wonders of the world, undersea boats, I mean they�ve got all kinds of things.

Grand Canyon, Great Barrier Reef, Harbor of Rio de Janeiro, Mount Everest, Aurora, Paracoutan Volcano, Victoria Falls, maybe you think it�s the Mont Blanc Mountain, I don�t know what you think the wonder of the world is, but today I want to introduce you to a theological wonder of the world.

I can�t give the top seven, but I can tell you this is one of the peaks, and it is the book of Hebrews. Is there another epistle like it? Now on No Compromise Radio, sometimes we just talk, sometimes we laugh, and sometimes we actually teach the Bible.

Isn�t that nice? You know in the old days we taught the Bible every day. Now sometimes we teach a biblical truth that must be extracted from all the humor. We just use the humor to lighten it up, to open you up to our message, and then we bury the hatchet.

I have this Joel Osteen Best Life Now game notepad in front of me. My immediate goal is, and I need to write down, I just got done interviewing Don Green, I need to write that down, and now it�s Hebrews, so I know how to take care of the show.

Somebody asked me a while ago, �How much time do you spend editing No Compromise Radio That was easy, zero. You don�t have any time or money to edit. It�s a website that wants $120 ,000 to keep going, and I thought, �I must be in the wrong business.

$120 ,000? I don�t know, it�s probably a couple thousand it takes NoCo for the year, and we�re glad for that. We broke down, there is a donate site now, a donate button on NoCo, but it�s getting rusty.

Hebrews Is a Word of Exhortation, Not an Academic Treatise

All right, here�s what we�re going to do. We are going to talk about the book of Hebrews and why you should study it. This is a new journey for us. I�m going to begin preaching Sunday mornings in the book of Hebrews.

It will probably take us several years to get through it. I don�t really know. I can�t plan out how many weeks it will be, but my guess is it�s going to be a couple years. And I want you, the listener, of course you can listen to all the sermons on bbcchurch .org as you pay $5 a download.

Just kidding. But there are some misconceptions about Hebrews. I think I stole this from Abner Chow. Before he teaches a book of the Bible, he likes to say, �Here�s some misconceptions. And he uses that as a device to explain what the Bible actually says about that topic.

So I�m going to do the same thing, although my misconceptions I don�t think are his. I can�t remember who his are. I didn�t steal from him. Maybe there�s some overlap because maybe he�s thinking like, �After all, he�s young enough to be my son.

That�s pretty scary, isn�t it? I�m trying to get you to study the book of Hebrews, to read the book of Hebrews, to meditate on the book of Hebrews. Somehow my computer sound over there is still on. But anyway, we just have to keep going.

Misconception number one when it comes to the book of Hebrews. Misconception one. Hebrews was written at a seminary level. It's academic. It's difficult to understand. It's pie in the sky. I�ve got my own issues.

I deal with anxiety, and Hebrews doesn�t seem to fit in. I can�t understand it anyway. Well, that�s a misconception. If you look at Hebrews 13 .22, then we will let the author define his terms. Hebrews 13 .22, �I appeal to you, brothers, bear with my word of exhortation, for I have written to you briefly.

Isn�t that interesting? I�ve written to you briefly, and he calls it a word of exhortation. I like that word �exhortation. It�s where we get the word �comforter, parakaleot, come alongside. It could be �urge.

�I�m urging you, brothers. I think that�s probably the right way to translate it. �I want you to bear with me. I�ve got �encouragement and comfort. We�ll see in just a moment that that word is used elsewhere in Hebrews as �encouragement.

�I want to edify you. �I want to encourage you. �I want to teach you. You see his care for them, �brothers. Here�s something that is not an ETS article that�s read to them, and high and mighty bunch of Greek words.

We�ll talk in a little bit that it is tough to understand certain parts, yes, but this is a sermon, basically. It�s something that the writer prepared to be delivered orally. He wanted them to read this.

Of course, it�s a letter. It�s written. But if you read it, you can get the sense that this sounds just like a sermon, and sermons are to edify and to encourage. He wants them to listen to God�s Word about his Son.

If you had to summarize all the book of Hebrews, how would you summarize it? Well, we�re going to get to that in the next misconception. He wants them to listen carefully. It might be a long letter. Oh, it�s not as long as 1 Corinthians.

It�s not as long as Romans, but it is a little longer. He wants it to be a book of exhortation. Hebrews 3, �But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called today, that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

Hebrews 6, �So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us.

We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain. The writer of Hebrews wants to encourage. I appeal to you, brothers, bear with my word of encouragement or exhortation.

I want to urge you to do that very thing. This is not a book that is beyond you. This is not a book that requires a doctoral degree in theology to understand. It's a word of encouragement. It's a word of exhortation.

It's a word of edification. Did I just say that? I think I did. Misconception number two. This is related to the first one, and I alluded to it, but it's my show. You can write us at info at nocompromisedradio .com.

Many of you do, and I usually get those emails on Tuesday. Spencer forwards me the emails on Tuesday, unless you're that one crazy guy that changes his email address to try to continue to, I don't know, tell us about Satanism, King James only stuff.

Those just get blocked. So I forgot your name. I think it's Daniel. And I just want you to know that if you're trying to get through, I never see one of your emails. Isn't that fun? That's why Spencer's around.

Spencer either puts them in junk or he just deletes them. He doesn't read them. And I love it that the people who are so like that, trollish, they just can spend all their time. I think they think it's for ministry, and yet I never read it.

Isn't that fun? That's so fun. Misconception number two on the book of Hebrews. It's so complex, Hebrews is, that you can't even summarize it. You can't distill what it actually is going to say. What's the main point, right?

If you hear somebody preach a sermon, what's the main point of the sermon? Now I put this in form of a misconception because I want you to understand what the main point of the sermon is. I want you to understand what this main point of exhortation is, and that is Jesus is superior.

If you had to summarize the book of Hebrews, it's Jesus is superior. The writer is writing to these folks, some Jews that believe, some Jews that they're on the edge. Do we go back to Judaism? And he, the writer, puts together a theological basis for Jesus' superiority, and that's found in the first 10 chapters through 10a, chapter 10a.

Then there's an outworking of said theology in the next chapters through chapter 13. And you will see the demonstration of Jesus as he's superior to everybody and everything. He's superior to prophets, he's superior to angels, he's superior to Moses, he's superior to Aaron, and he's superior to the old covenant ministry.

And you'll see as you work through, those are the highlighted outline sections. But if you had to go to one passage in Hebrews to summarize this superiority of Christ, I would go to Hebrews 10. This passage highlights the summary of the book, because it's good for you to know if we're going to go through a book of the Bible, what's the summary?

Maybe Nate, he would write an article, why Hebrews is the best book of the Bible. He does that for every book of the Bible, and he writes those summaries in an easy to understand, excellent manner. I should probably give you a link, where's Nate when I need him.

Hebrews 10, 11 -14. And every priest stands daily at a service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until his enemy should be made a footstool for his feet.

For by a single offering, he has perfected for all time, those who are being sanctified. Here we have Jesus's great work. You have priests that have religious duties, that's where we get the word liturgy, and they just do those services over and over and over, but they can't remove sins.

Doesn't it say that in verse 11, which can never take away sins. But on the flip side, Jesus's work, to contrast to those priests, one sacrifice. And if you want to look at the Greek, there's an emphasis on one, one sacrifice, and then that's it.

How many hundreds, thousands of sacrifices did those Old Testament priests do? And it essentially didn't work. It didn't have any efficacious power. Well, it showed things and it demonstrated things and it was part of what God had proclaimed in the Old Testament.

I get that. But sacrifices, offerings, here we have a sacrificial system carried out by the high priest and day after day, we had those rituals. Can you imagine finally get done at the end of the day?

And then what'd you have waiting for you in the morning? So many sacrifices. Could there be a little stream of animal blood? Probably. Unending, innumerable priests, innumerable sacrifices. Don't you just think, you know, does this work?

Or is this just futile? And kind of like to take a rest. I would like to sit down, but there's no rest because it doesn't work. Just drop my phone. But for Jesus, the superior sacrifice, the superior priest, he sets down, the work is finished.

That's amazing. You could never sit down if you're an Old Testament priest to take a rest. Every priest stands. Doesn't the text just say that? I think it does. Every priest stands daily. Notice the contrast there.

What'd you have in the sanctuary for the Old Testament priests? Tables, lamps, the ark, altars of incense, no chair, no chair. I need my sins actually taken away, don't you? Wouldn't you like your sins gone, taken away?

And Jesus, the superior priest, the superior sacrifice, one sacrifice for all time, and he sits down. Redemption accomplished. And then Jesus takes his seat of honor, the right hand of God. By a single offering, he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.

First word in the Greek sentence in verse 14, one, one and done, emphatically. The Lord unto his Christ has said, sit thou at my right hand until I make thine enemies submit to thy command, the Psalter hymnal says.

That's exactly right. Alluding to Psalm 110. Who is Jesus? He is the great high priest. He is the great sacrifice. Maybe you could summarize Hebrews with a gospel verse. It is finished, John 19 30. That's a good definition.

Jesus had received the sour wine. He said, it is finished. And he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. He didn't say gave up his spirit and bowed his head. He's in control of death to the very end. Forgiveness via once and for all sacrifice.

For those of you coming out of the Roman Catholic church and the mass and re-sacrificing Jesus every day, every moment. When you see Jesus for who he is and you have him, he has you. You're not going to desire anyone else.

In the morning when I rise, give me Jesus. Give me Jesus. You can have all this world, but give me Jesus. That's the writer of the epistle to the Hebrews. Misconception number three. The epistle of the Hebrews is not devotional.

Hebrews Is Devotional and Christ-Centered

It's not devotional. So what I'm trying to say is if I teach positively from my negative outline, this letter is a wonderful letter of encouragement and exhortation. It's very practical. It is a letter that is summarized by Jesus is superior and he has taken away sins.

If you believe in him, your sins are gone. Isn't that good? And Hebrews is very devotional. People probably, when they look at the book, there's not enough of them in the book for them to like it very much at first blush or at the immature take.

It is not about us. And that's good. I pretty much had enough of me. I don't know how many times a day I say I'm so stupid. I say that all the time. I'm an idiot. Now, sometimes it's under my breath and sometimes it's out loud.

And I don't really care who hears it because it's true. And what I know and what I do and the gap between, it's a chasm. I want to know about Jesus. And you say, well, yeah, but sometimes I kind of get bored with that.

You know, Jesus, death, burial, resurrection every week. Friends, I don't know what to tell you then. I have nothing else to offer. Maybe go find a different church to go to. I just saw the other day, there's a church.

It's not Rendezvous, but V-O-U-X. Maybe if you're in a different country, you say words like that, but I'd never go to a church named the VOUX. If you say to yourself, I know about Jesus. I need to graduate to real life issues.

I need how to stuff. Then the book of Hebrews is especially for you. We need a reminder of the significance of Christ's priestly functions. We need a reminder about the cost of discipleship and who Jesus is so that we can follow him.

We need to have our faith bolstered as we waver in our commitment. And then we see Jesus in the word. Some need to see Jesus for the first time and believe on him, the resurrected Christ. We need to go against moralism and legalism.

And this book, the epistle to the Hebrews is a good remedy for all those ills. You will have to stare at Jesus, look at Jesus, what he did, exalting the person and work of Jesus so that we might trust him more and love him more and adore him more.

If you don't like Jesus, you're not going to like it here the next three years at Bethlehem Bible Church. The spotlights on Jesus, nobody else. The only time there's a spotlight on someone else is to just quick show you how much Jesus is better.

And you're going to see that theme in the book of Hebrews, better, better, better, better, better. No document, Leonard Walmart says, I didn't say Walmart, Mart said Walmart. No biblical document outside the four gospels focuses as totally and forcefully on the person and redemptive achievement as Jesus.

Here we have Jesus, the superior high priest, the eternal high priest. And you might like angels, they're pretty cool. Jesus is better. Moses was a good man. Jesus is better. Aaron, Jesus better. Old Testament covenant, Jesus is better.

This book is going to show you who Jesus is. For example, it'll show you that he became a man. Can you imagine the son of God, the eternal son becomes a man. Hebrews chapter two tells us that verse 14, since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things that through death, he might destroy the one who has the power of death.

That is the devil and deliver all those through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery. For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham. Therefore, he had to be made like his brothers in every respect so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted. This book is going to show you the person and work of Jesus. It will show you not only who he is, the eternal God, man, but it'll show you why he died.

Hebrews nine. Therefore, he is the mediator of a new covenant. Verse 15. So that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant.

We have this new covenant mediator and Jesus's death redeems us from transgressions. How great is that? This book will tell you who Jesus is, the God-man. What Jesus did, he came to redeem sinners. What's Jesus doing now?

Hebrews seven. He's able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him since he always lives to make intercession for them. Chapter seven, verse 25. Making intercession for us. What's Jesus doing now?

Will he come back in the future? What's going to be the future? Well, it says in chapter nine, so Christ having been offered once to bear the sins of many will appear a second time. This book deals with the person of Christ, the work of Christ, and what he did in the past and what he's going to do in the future.

It's all about Jesus. Looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. That is Hebrews two. You know, the writer of Hebrews tells his readers to do what, in fact, he does. Since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight of sin or every weight and sin which clings so closely and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.

Looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or faint hearted.

You Hebrews, listeners on the radio, you made a profession of faith, and let's not just casually look at Jesus. Let's concentrate on him. Let's look away from the Levitical system and any works righteousness and look not at distractions, look not backwards, but look at the finish line.

Concentrate on Christ. I think that's what Stephen did in the hour of his time of being martyred. Well, my name is Mike Avendroth. This is No Compromise Radio. See how we're diving into Hebrews and you don't want it to stop, but it's a 24 and a half minute radio show, and maybe we will do part two next time.

God bless you.

Program Close and Station Disclaimer

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Avendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life-transforming power of God's Word through verse-by-verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbcchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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