Let Us Draw Near – Hebrews 10:22

The Goal of Christ’s Death Is to Bring Us to God

And the passage that is to be before us this morning is Hebrews chapter 10, so if we find your place in your Bible, Hebrews chapter 10. Hebrews chapter 10, we'll read together verses 19 through 25, it's a little bit of the context of what we're going to be looking at in Hebrews 10.

Beginning at verse 19, therefore, brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which He inaugurated for us through the veil that is His flesh, and since we have a great high priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another and all the more as you see the day drawing near.

Let's pray together before we begin. Our Father, You are the high King of heaven, You are the ruler of all, and You have condescended to die in the place of sinners, to send Your Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, that He may die in the place of sinners and bear our wrath.

And we thank You for what that means for us and for all that has been purchased for us because of Him. We thank You that You have also condescended to reveal Yourself to us in the pages of Scripture. And You have given us a book, and You have given us the book of Hebrews, and we would just pray now that You would send Your Spirit to be our teacher and our guide and help us to understand the truth that is here before us, help us to appreciate what is here and how it connects to all of its context, and may we yield to You, obedient and loving hearts filled with joy and affection because of all that Christ has done for us.

We pray that You would work in and through us now by Your Word, in Christ's name, amen. The end goal of Christ coming to die was in order to bring us to God. In fact, this is how 1 Peter chapter 3 describes it when Peter writes,.

For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God. That is the goal, the end of His work for us, having been put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit, Peter says.

And in order to bring us to God, there needed to be a reconciliation that would take place, and sometimes Scripture describes us being brought to God in terms of reconciliation. And where reconciliation is necessary, it is necessary because two parties are at enmity or hostility one with another.

And we would not be able to be reconciled to God if the enmity or the hostility were not removed from between God and us. He is the offended party, and we are the offending party. And so there is between everyone born in Adam as a sinful creature, there is between that person and God a heap of guilt and transgression, a sinfulness, a hostility and an enmity that must be dealt with and taken out of the way before reconciliation between God and man is even possible.

And so Scripture describes us and our hostile state against God in Ephesians 2 verse 3 when Paul says, among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of the flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and we were by nature children of wrath even as the rest.

Children of wrath, describing children deserving of wrath or children under wrath, children characterized by wrath. Now why would God be angry with us or wrathful toward us? It's only because we are born in sin and hostility.

It's not that God is just angry with all of humanity for no reason whatsoever, and we are born into this situation where God is angry with us or He has wrath toward us and it is entirely without cause, it is entirely with cause and entirely justified because.

Of our sin.

Paul says we lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind. That's why we were by nature known as children under His wrath. James 4 verse 4 says to make yourself an enemy, a friend of the world is to make yourself an enemy of God.

We become enemies of God when we become friends of the world and part of the world system. Well, we are born into the world and we are born as friends of the world and we continue to make ourselves friends of the world and of course the one who makes himself a friend of the world is an enemy of God.

So that enmity must be removed, the hostility must be removed. Paul writes in Colossians 1 verse 21, and though you were formerly alienated and hostile in your mind, engaged in evil deeds, yet He, that is Christ or God in Christ, has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach.

At once you were alienated and hostile and now through His death He has reconciled you to God. Romans 5 verse 10, for while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son. Much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.

2 Corinthians 5 verse 18, all these things are from God who has reconciled us to Himself through Christ and has given us the ministry of reconciliation. And this reconciliation has one glorious and eternal result.

Jesus described it in John chapter 17 in His high priestly prayer. Jesus said, the glory which you have given Me, He's praying to the Father, the glory which you have given Me, I have given to them that they may be one just as We are one.

I in them, in you and Me, that they may be perfected in unity so that the world may know that you sent Me and love them even as you have loved Me. Father, I desire that they also whom you have given Me be with Me where I am so that they may see My glory which you have given Me, for you loved Me before the foundation of.

The world.

That is the eternal and glorious result of the work of the Son. Having removed the hostility, He has reconciled us to God and now we are one with God. The Christ is in the Father, the Father is in Christ, Christ is in us, we are in Him.

There is now this glorious unity that we as part of a humanity that was once deserving of His eternal wrath, now that hostility and enmity and wrath has been removed by the death of Christ and now we have been reconciled to God.

We are a purchased people. And as a purchased people, we are now having been reconciled, we are regenerated, we are sanctified by the work of the Spirit, we are redeemed, we are adopted into His family and our glorification is absolutely certain because of the work that He has done.

He has done all of this, all of that is part of the reconciling work. And so the ultimate goal of that is a people who have been chosen in eternity past by the Father, purchased in time by the Son, regenerated by the work of the Holy Spirit, and then glorified by the triune God to live and to dwell with Him forever and ever as a reconciled, redeemed, and regenerated humanity in eternal bodies.

That is the glorious result of our redemption, our reconciliation. It's a glorious picture, but the hostility and the enmity has to be removed before any of that can take place. Once we were a sinful people and now we have been reconciled to God, to the death of His Son.

So if the purpose of Christ dying in the flesh, the just for the unjust, is to bring us to God, to bring reconciliation between man and God, then it should not surprise us that after this long section in the middle of the book of Hebrews that the author would then begin to describe this closeness and this intimacy that we have with God or that we can have with God.

It's not surprising if the purpose of the death of Christ is to bring us to God, that after describing the death of Christ and its benefits in Hebrews, the author would say to us, therefore, draw near.

If the purpose of reconciliation is to bring you to Him, then having been brought to Him, draw near to Him. And that brings us to Hebrews chapter 10 in this passage that we just read. We find this in verse 22 of our passage.

This is the first of the let us statements, let us draw near with a sincere heart and mindful assurance of faith. In verse 23, let us hold fast the confession of our hope. In verse 24, and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds.

Now, those three let us statements are exhortations to a believing community of the implications, exhortations based upon the implications of the death of Christ. Because Christ has died, because He has given us this free and confident access to the throne of God, to heaven itself, and because we have Him as a priest over the household of God, let us, therefore, draw near to Him, hold fast to Him, and find ways to encourage other people to do the same.

Those are the three exhortations here in our passage. And we're just today looking at verse 22 in this first let us exhortation, let us draw.

Near.

What does that mean? What does it mean to draw near? That's what we're going to look at today. These three exhortations all have several things in common. I want to give you, before we jump into verse 22, I want to give you a couple of observations about all three of these.

I want you to notice, first of all, that these three things are connected. Let us draw near, let us hold fast, and let us encourage others to do the same. Let us draw near, let us hold fast. Now, there is nothing to hold fast to unless you draw near to it, correct?

You have to draw near to something in order to hold fast to it. And in fact, there is something in the drawing near to Him that gives us the strength and the certainty to hold fast to Him. But if we do not draw near to Him, whatever that means, we're not going to have the strength or the certainty to hold fast to that which it is that we were supposed to draw near to.

So all three of these things are connected to one another, and of course, they're connected to the context. Because we have a high priest over the house of God, because he has given us this access to the throne room of God, therefore, draw near to it.

It's all connected to the context. Second, I want you to notice that these are individual actions as well as corporate actions. Individual as well as corporate. Drawing near, holding fast, and encouraging others to do the same are things which we do personally, privately, individually as individual Christians.

They're also things that we do together as a body. And we'll tie all of this together later on when we get down into verses 24 and 25. The exhortation, let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together.

The author has in mind things which we do together as a body of believers. It's not just what we do in drawing near and holding fast that we do individually, personally. Just the single exhortation to you, it's not just that that is in view.

These are things that we do personally as well as corporately. We do these individually, and we do this together as a body, all three of these. We draw near individually, do we not? We draw near to salvation for salvation.

We have to draw near unto God for salvation. That's an individual thing. That's not a corporate thing. Just because you're here today amongst other people who are saved, doesn't mean that you're saved.

Other people have drawn near to God individually for salvation. We also draw near to God personally and individually for worship, do we not?

We do.

In our own private worship, the ways that we worship, the things that we do in worship, we are drawing near to God in worship and in prayer. These are things that we do individually, but they're also corporate.

We gather here together and we sing, Behold Our God, or Christ Our Rock and Our Redeemer, or Rock of Ages Cleft for Me. We sing those songs and we worship together. We lift our voices together, and we, in the meditation of our hearts, hopefully, and in the attitude and affection of our hearts and our minds, we are bringing ourselves to the.

Lord.

We are drawing near to Him in song. That is something that we do corporately, so it's individual and corporate. The holding fast is the same, by the way. You individually, you personally, must hold fast to your confession of faith and to the truth and not let go of it.

That is a personal exhortation to you, but we do this together as a body, do we not? We have to do this together as a body, corporately. When you see people who are not holding fast very well, that are starting to fall away or that are struggling, we want to come alongside of them, encourage them to love and good deeds, encourage them to draw near and to hold fast.

So this is an individual thing that we do. It is also a corporate thing that we do as a body, and we don't want to lose sight of that as we go through this because the author obviously has in mind our corporate gathering together and the importance of that when he says in verse 25, Do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together as is the habit of some.

It's almost as if the drawing near, the holding fast, and the encouraging of one another are things which can only be done in some sense as a corporate body of people. That is what makes what we do here so significant, so important, and so precious to the child of God each and every week.

So they are individual and corporate. And third, I want you to notice something about these three things, drawing near, holding fast, and encouraging others. That these three things are preventions for apostasy.

Down in verse 26, and I want you to notice it in your Bible, if we go on sinning, that begins the warning passage to apostates, if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sin, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries.

Verse 31, it is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Verse 39, we are not of those who shrink back to destruction, but of those who have faith to the preserving of the soul. What does he have in mind in verses 26 through 39?

It is a warning against walking away and turning away from this. All three of these things are preventions for apostasy. Draw near, don't pull away. Hold fast, don't let go. And be part of a body of believers who will encourage you to persevere all the way to.

The end.

And those three things, in doing those three things, those are preventions for apostasy. He's addressing believers in verses 19 to 25. He is addressing apostates in verses 26 to 31. And three of the preventions for apostasy is drawing near and holding fast, and doing so with a body of people who are helping you to draw near and to hold fast.

That will keep you from falling away. And if you will not draw near, and you will not hold fast, and you will not do so with others who can encourage you to do the same, you are in a very, very dangerous place, because you neglect those three things, you have terrifying expectation of judgment, according to the text.

You're going to fall into the hands of the living God, and you're in danger of shrinking back to destruction. You want to avoid that? Draw near, hold fast, and encourage others to do the same. Do this with a body of believers.

That's why these are important instructions. So those are the three things here that the antidote, the antidote to apostasy is drawing near, holding fast, and encouraging others. Let's look first of all now at verse 22, this first command, this first exhortation, verse 22, let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.

I want you to notice the exhortation is simple, let us draw near. Very simple exhortation. The explanation of how we do that, the attitude in which we do it, the manner in which we do it, what must happen for us and in us in order for this to happen, that's the rest of verse 22.

We do this with a sincere heart. We do this drawing near in full assurance of faith. We do this drawing near having had our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and having had our bodies washed with pure water.

You're saying, what does bathing have to do with drawing near to God? Is this a physical bathing? Is this a baptism? We'll get into that in due time. But the rest of verse 22 describes the attitude or the posture with which we are doing this drawing near.

So let's look at this exhortation. I want you to notice that the exhortation or the command to draw near is the most natural command given the context of what he's just said immediately previously. Is it not?

Since you have unfettered and free access, not to an earthly tabernacle and not to an earthly holy of holies and not to stand before an Ark of the Covenant and a mercy seat and a representation of Shekinah, the glory of God, you don't have access to that.

Since you have access to the very holy of holies and heaven itself, the throne room of God, because of your high priest who has gone before you as a forerunner, he has paved that new and living way. And you're not treading upon stone, you're not treading upon rocks on your way up to the temple.

Instead, you are coming in the way that has been given to you through Jesus Christ. It is the new, the freshly slaughtered and yet living way that he has inaugurated for you through his blood. Having removed that hostility, you can walk right in to the throne room of heaven itself.

And since you have a high priest over the household of God, one who intercedes for you, always able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through him, a high priest who always lives and never dies and is never disqualified and never stops his ministry, faithful, powerful, infinite, true.

Since you have those two things, what is the most natural response of a Christian who understands those two concepts? Stay home and watch football on Sunday morning? It better not be. What is the most natural response?

Draw near.

Draw near.

You have the way is wide open. Walk in. The door has been opened, the veil has been torn, the wall has been broken down, the enmity has been removed. We're no longer threatened with death by walking behind the veil.

Now we can come in to heaven itself. What is the most natural command that would come on the heels of all of this instruction that we have received? It's in verse 22, therefore, let us draw near. What does it mean to draw near?

What is the author describing there? This word, drawing near, is a favorite in the book of Hebrews. The author of Hebrews uses this seven times in the book and I'm going to describe to you how he uses this word, draw near or come near.

It is not used exclusively in a religious sense of approaching to God because the word simply is used elsewhere to describe approaching someone, seeking an association with someone to draw near to someone.

It's used of people walking up to Jesus physically. It's used of just approaching somebody out of the blue. It's used of coming next to a mountain or drawing near to something. It just describes one person approaching somebody else.

That's how it's used most of the time in scripture. But in the book of Hebrews, it is used exclusively in terms of worship and fellowship, prayer and praise and worship and of salvation. And the author uses it seven different times.

I'm going to describe to you here how he uses it. He uses it in terms of one who approaches God in worship. It's used this way in chapter 10, the beginning of this chapter, verse 1, for the law, since it was only a shadow of the good things to come and not the very substance or form of the things, can never by the same sacrifices which they offer continually year by year make perfect those who draw near.

He's describing there the one who would come to God with an animal sacrifice and he's likening that to the old covenant. Under the old covenant, you took the animal sacrifice and you would approach God with that and give that to the priest and you would offer that to Lord in worship.

And that was what drawing near looked like under the old covenant. But those animal sacrifices could never take away sin. And so the author describes those animal sacrifices as being unable to perfect the one who drew near to God in worship on the day of atonement or offering any other sacrifice.

So it's used in terms of sacrifice. And by the way, that was the point of failure of the old covenant, wasn't it? It was where the old covenant failed, to actually perfect us, to actually give us that access to God.

It was pictured in the coming to the priest with the sacrifice. It was pictured in the sacrifice being offered, but it never actually did those things. It just pictured those things. Second, this word, draw near, is used of one who is saved in the drawing near.

I already quoted this verse earlier, Hebrews 7, verse 25, Christ is able to save forever those who draw near to God through him since he always lives to make intercession for them. And there the idea is drawing nigh unto God for salvation, for this reconciliation.

Christ is our high priest who never dies is able to save forever those who draw near to God for salvation. The perfect high priest, always living, able to save. Third, the word drawing near is used in the book of Hebrews of drawing near in prayer.

So worship, salvation, prayer, Hebrews 4, verse 16, therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. And there the idea is intercession, drawing near unto high priest, approaching the throne of grace with petitions and prayers so that we may find grace to help in a time of need.

That's what it means to draw near in prayer. And then it is used a few times in regards to, to describe all of the blessings that we have been brought near to that are part of the new covenant. So Hebrews chapter 12, verse 18 says, you have not come, or you have not drawn near to nothing that can be touched and to a blazing fire and to darkness and gloom and the world.

Wind.

And there the author in Hebrews chapter 12 is describing Old Testament Israel at the base of Mount Sinai when Moses roped off the bottom of the mountain lest the people come up. And the people could draw near but only so close.

And there when God gave the covenant with the law was the fire and the smoke and the darkness and the gloom and the world wind and all that accompanied that supernatural manifestation of God's presence with the nation of Israel.

Well, the author says in chapter 12, verse 28, or 18, you have not drawn near to that, not to that mountain, but listen to what you have drawn near to, chapter 12, verse 22. But you have come, you have drawn near to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to myriads of angels, to the general assembly and the church of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, and the mediator of the new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood which speaks better than the blood of Abel.

What have you drawn near to? Not a physical mountain. You've drawn near to God, and you have enjoyed now the assembly of the firstborn, the church, the myriads of angels, the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God, to Mount Zion, to the spirits of righteous men made perfect, to Jesus, the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood which sprinkled speaks better than the blood of Abel.

We've drawn near to all of those new covenant blessings, all of those new covenant realities, those new covenant fulfillments of the Old Testament pictures, we have drawn near to that. So that's how the word is used in the book of Hebrews.

It's used in terms of our worship, in terms of salvation, in terms of prayer, and in terms of being brought near or drawing near to all that is accompanied in the new covenant when we draw near to God through Jesus Christ.

In Hebrews 11 verse 6, and this is the last scripture that I'll give you where it's used in Hebrews. This is a familiar one. Hebrews 11, 6, without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God or draws near to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently.

Seek Him.

And there it is just simply describing us coming to God in any one of these fashions. Whether we come to Him for salvation, whether we come to Him in prayer, whether we come to Him in worship, whether we come to Him in service, in fellowship, in thanksgiving, in repentance, in confession, whenever we draw near to God, it must be done in genuine faith.

It must be done believing that God is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently.

Seek Him.

So faith is the prerequisite for that. So the Hebrews uses the term draw near seven different times here to describe our worship, our prayer of salvation, and all of the new covenant blessings that we've been brought near to.

The book of Hebrews, the author of Hebrews also describes being brought near to God or reconciled to God using a different term that we've looked at before, and it is that word perfected. Remember chapter 10 verse 14, He has perfected forever those who are sanctified through the death of His Son.

That death of Christ has perfected us or made us perfect. It has accomplished that reconciliation, that redemption. That idea of perfection is itself another way of describing this being brought near and this reconciliation taking place.

The Old Testament law, the sacrifices, the Old Testament priesthood, these things were unable to perfect the worshiper, unable to accomplish that reconciliation and redemption and unable to bring us near to God.

But God in Christ through the death of His Son, through a better blood, through a better covenant, through better promises, through a better sacrifice and a better priest and a better priesthood has accomplished what all the Old Testament pictures could never do, namely the perfection, the forever complete perfection of bringing near His people.

Remember that word perfect means to bring to the goal. What is the goal of Christ coming? It is to bring us to God. He has done this by perfecting us. So there's two words that are used here in Hebrews to describe something very similar.

Us being perfected and us being brought near. He has perfected forever, brought us to completion and that final state. Now, you might be thinking or asking yourself the question, well, hold on a second.

If Christ has already perfected me, past tense, if He has already brought me near, then why am I commanded to draw near? If He's already accomplished this, if He's done this, why am I commanded to draw near?

Am I near or am I not near? And if I am near because Christ has brought me near, then what does it mean then to draw near if I've already been brought near? Somebody had a suggestion, it was indiscernible.

What does it mean to be brought near and then to be commanded to draw near? If Christ has already brought me near, then why am I commanded to draw near to Him? Have I already been brought near? I have.

Do I need to draw near?

I do.

It is the same thing with repentance and faith. Repentance and faith are commanded of the sinner for salvation. You must turn from your sin. You must believe on Christ for salvation. And yet, Scripture describes repentance and faith as a gift that God grants to His people.

So if you are brought near, it is because Christ has brought you near and if you draw near, it's because you have drawn near but you only draw near because you have been brought near and you're only able to draw near because you have been brought near.

So yes, you draw near and yes, Christ brings you near. Yes, you repent and yes, God grants you the gift of repentance. Yes, you believe and yes, God has granted you the gift of faith. These two things are both true.

It is the two sides of this coin of God's working, divine sovereignty and human responsibility. These two things are both true. Christ has forever removed the barrier between you and the Father, Christian.

No more wrath, no more condemnation you need to fear ever. Never the frown of God. That enmity has been entirely removed and in terms of your position and in terms of your justification and your standing before God, He has brought you as near as you can be forever.

But in terms of your own security, in terms of your own willingness to obey and your own experience, you must draw near to Him. So there is the command to draw near and there is the provision that He has brought us near.

There is the command to repent and there is the provision of His gift of repentance. These two things go together. So they're not one or the other, they do go together. If you have been brought near, you have been brought near by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

And if you draw near, it is because you draw near through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Positionally you've been brought near, experientially you must draw near. And you must draw near and you must hold fast.

Now He will not lose you, I promise you that. He will lose none of His, but you better hold on. He's not a bridge over troubled waters, but He will pull you through the troubled waters if you can stand the toe.

You have to hold on. He will not lose you. Both of those things are true. And because He will not lose you, He has promised that He will give you strength to hold on. You only hold on because He has promised not to lose you.

You only draw near because He has brought you near. You have to have room in your theology for both of those things. And if you don't, your theology is deficient. You have to be able to affirm both of them.

Now there's two aspects of drawing near. I should say two audiences to which we might address this command to draw near. There's the unbeliever and there is the believer. Now both of these were part of the original audience for the book of Hebrews, so we have to address this command to both of these groups.

The author of Hebrews knowing that he was speaking to people who were fence sitters, they were sitting on the fence and they had lots of slivers from spending a lot of time sitting on the fence. They were considering going back to the old covenant and back to the old sacrifices.

They were considering turning around and going back to what was familiar to them. And the author all along has been encouraging them not to do that but instead to press on, to look forward, to persevere with Christ and to persevere all the way to the end.

So he is addressing people who are undecided. They were unbelievers. They are the apostates described in verse 26 through 31. That warning that is given is given to those who are considering drawing back or shrinking back to destruction.

Verse 39 describes them that way. Shrinking back to destruction. So I want to address this drawing near to both the unbeliever and to the believer. First to the unbeliever. If you're an unbeliever sitting here, you might be an almost Christian.

You've been raised in a Christian family or you've attended church as a young child or you are familiar with the things of the Lord because you have attended Adventure Club here or Iwana here or you are blessed to grow up in a family where your parents have taught you the things of the Lord.

But you've never been regenerated, you've never actually repented of your sin and trusted Christ for salvation. You can say the right words. You can mouth the right sentiments. You know how to sing all the songs that we do and even make it look alive and like you.

Mean it.

You're able to do that. And you're able to serve in various capacities within the church and do so while people recognize you and think that you're a great Christian person, whatever your age may be. But you're an almost Christian.

You're not actually a believer. You put on a good show. It's a convincing show. Convincing show to a lot of people. But you and the Lord know the true condition of your heart. You were commanded to draw near and here's what that means.

You know the truth. You have heard the truth. Do not turn away from it. If you turn away from the truth, you will face nothing but the certainty of a terrifying expectation of the judgment that is to come.

You will fall into the hands of the living God and I promise you, I promise you, you do not want to have that happen. You will shrink away to destruction and He will destroy you and you will deserve it and on that day, you will recognize that you deserve it and you will confess that you deserve it.