Foundational Teachings, Part 2 (Hebrews 6:1-3)

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Hebrews chapter 6. We read together verses 1 through 3. Therefore, leaving the elementary teaching about the

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Christ, let us press on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and faith toward God, of instruction about washings and laying on of hands and the resurrection of the dead in eternal judgment.

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And this we will do if God permits. For in the case of those who have once been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and have been made partakers of the

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Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucified to themselves the

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Son of God and put him to open shame. I said verses 1 to 3 and I said verses 1 to 6, so you got twice what you paid for this morning.

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Let's bow our heads in prayer before we begin. Our Father, it is our desire that you would speak to us through your word.

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It is the eternal and unchanging word of our eternal and unchanging God. And we thank you that you have given us your

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Holy Spirit, by which we might not only know you and have faith in you, but by which we may be taught and instructed through your word.

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And we pray that our hearts would be open to that, and our mind and our emotions and our thoughts and attitudes may all bow before your word, that we may, as your people, study and learn together, and that you would teach us and instruct us in the truth for your sake, and that you may be glorified through the obedience of your people, both now and forever, we pray this in Christ's name.

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Amen. Well, we are dropping back into this middle of the sentence. Last week we looked at two, the first two of these six items that the author here calls foundational or elementary or introductory issues or teachings of the

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Christian faith. And we looked at repentance from dead works last week and faith toward God, and we saw what that means and how those go together and how they complement one another.

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And I offered you my very brief evaluation of what we would consider a non -heretical position held by our brothers and sisters in Christ who maybe are in the same theological camp as us, but who would view this list of six things in verses one through three a little bit differently than than we would.

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And I mentioned last week that my own position has some weaknesses in my own interpretive, my own interpretive approach to this passage has its weaknesses, and we're going to actually address those today, because verse two brings us face to face with what

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I think is the most difficult or challenging aspect of the passage to interpret from my theological perspective.

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So we're going to be honest about that this morning. One of the causes of the difficulty interpreting scripture is just quite frankly the the chronological distance between us and the original audience.

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And sometimes that makes interpreting certain passages somewhat difficult, because we're 2 ,000 years removed from the original author and the original audience.

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And sometimes it is difficult for us to get into their mindset, into their culture, and into their environment, and figure out exactly what it is that the original author meant when he wrote those words to his original audience.

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One thing we can know for sure is that the original author knew exactly what he meant, and the original audience knew exactly what he meant.

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And that there was no lack of understanding between those two parties about anything that we read in scripture, and this is true no matter what the book is.

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And here we are 2 ,000 years later trying to arrive at what did that original author mean when he wrote that, and what did they understand him to mean.

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And by the way, the goal of all Bible reading and interpretation and meditation is to arrive at that conclusion.

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Because when we come to scripture, we don't ask what does this mean to me? We don't ask what meaning do I see in here that I kind of want to draw out of the passage?

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And oftentimes we do that, we end up inserting a meaning into the passage and then pulling it right back out. And that's not what we want to do.

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The only question we have to ask is what was the author's original intended meaning in the passage?

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And that can be difficult when time has passed. Let me give you an illustration of why that's the case. Imagine that 2 ,000 years from now somebody was to take the transcript of the message that I preached last week, and they were to read through that, and they were to come across that part where I said as the sage of our age says, you just got to have faith.

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And as another sage of our age has said, you just need to let Jesus take the wheel. Now you know when

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I'm referring to the first one, I'm talking about George Michael and a song that he wrote in the 1980s. But I'm talking about the second one,

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I'm talking when I make reference to the second one, I'm talking about, I don't even know who that was, she didn't write in the 1980s, so she's dead to me as far as I'm concerned, but somebody else.

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And imagine that 2 ,000 years from now somebody was reading through that. And by the way, when I said that last week, you could tell from the tone of my voice

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I was being sarcastic. You could pick that up. And because you understand the cultural reference, you understand the sort of the analogy that I'm giving there, and what

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I was referring to, you would catch that, and you would kind of get what I was meaning. My meaning was clear, you understood what my meaning was, there was no lack of communication between the two of us.

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But somebody 2 ,000 years from now might read through that and say, now what does he mean by sage of the age?

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What is a sage of the age? Because that word sage can refer to a spice, or it could refer to a wise person.

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And age can refer to either the era in which one lives, or the actual number of years that an individual has lived.

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So when he talks about sage of the age, is he talking about the spice of his life, or is he talking about the the spice of the era, something that adds spice to an era, something that adds spice to a life?

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What is he talking about there? Now see, there's no lack of communication between you and I when I talk about the sage of our age, and I reference

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George Michael, but 2 ,000 years from now, George Michael's songs, most likely, as well as Jesus Take the Wheel, are going to be lost to history.

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Nobody will remember them, nobody will get that, and people will have a difficult time understanding what I'm saying to you, or to them.

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The goal of Bible interpretation is to get to the heart of that meaning, and sometimes there are passages of scripture where we say, whatever is meant here, the original author understood it, the original audience understood it, let's see if we can try and understand what would have made sense in that context.

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Most passages of scripture across the board are patently clear, there's no difficulty there, but there are occasional passages of scripture where the intended meaning is a bit more difficult to discern, and I think that that is the issue in Hebrews 5 and 6, which is why we have all this variety of understandings and theological positions on the matter.

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All right, so here's my position's weakness. I told you last week that I would be honest about what they are, my position's weakness are seen in this next set of two items that we're looking at in the list of six.

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In the list of six, which begins in verse one, he says we are to not lay again the foundation, and what is in the foundation of repentance from dead works and faith toward God, those are the first two in the list of six, then there are two more, instruction about washing and laying on of hands, and the third group of two is the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment, and I've suggested these can be grouped into three sets of two rather easily.

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We dealt with the first two last week, we saw how repentance and faith go together, repentance from dead works and faith toward God, there's a directional changing that must take place in repentance, how these are two sides of the same coin, and how these things are the initiation or the beginning of our

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Christian faith and life, repentance and faith. But then we come to this second one, and it is the the second group of two, which are grouped together under that heading instructions about.

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It is instructions about two things, or instructions regarding first, washings, and second, laying on of hands.

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And so when we read washings and laying on of hands, it does seem to us that those are elements that take us back to the old covenant.

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Now I suggested that the position of some within my own theological camp that I disagree with would be that this list of six items has to do with elements and features of the old covenant, and that the concern of the author is evangelistic to move these unbelieving

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Jews away from embracing the old covenant and the Aaronic priesthood and all the trappings of that, and to embrace fully

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Jesus Christ as a Melchizedekian priesthood under the in his priesthood under the new covenant. And so it is an evangelistic concern, and that this list of six things all pertain to the old covenant.

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Now that's the position that I do not hold respectfully. I hold another position. By the way, I'm not alone in it.

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So if you're going to start a website that says Jim Osmond comes up with brand new interpretation of the passage, and it's a heretical one, and here's what he says.

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If you're planning on that, don't bother. I'm not alone in this, okay? So this is not me starting a compound in North Idaho with my own take on the passage.

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In fact, the position for your comfort, and I say this for your comfort, the position that I'm laying out is actually the majority one of all the commentaries,

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Reformed commentaries that I have on my desk that I've been working through. Okay, so that's the position that I would respectfully disagree with.

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The position I take is that these six items refer to elementary foundational elements of Christian doctrine that would be taught to a brand new

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Christian. And he's talking about the foundational things that you would teach to brand new believers. That's my position.

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But the most difficult aspect of the passage to interpret from my position is this reference to washings and laying on of hands, because the washings and the laying on of hands seem distinctly to be elements of the

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Old Covenant. With the washings, the word washings is something that would be associated with the various aspects of cleansing and ceremonial cleansing from the

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Old Covenant. Every Jew would have in the entryway of their home a basin that they would use for washing their hands, washing their feet, washing their head as they came in, to ceremonially cleanse themselves in a symbolic way of their ceremonial uncleanliness.

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And they had various aspects and things that they would wash. They would wash pitchers and bowls, et cetera, all to ceremonially clean these things.

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So they understood that. And the term washing there seems to reference that. And the term laying on of hands seems to be a reference to the practice of laying your hands on a sacrifice.

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Before you brought it to the priest, you would put your hands on the sacrifice, symbolically identifying yourself with that sacrifice and saying, basically, this sacrifice is dying in my place.

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I have sinned. This is the innocent victim. The innocent victim is going to die and shed its blood in my stead.

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And so by laying your hands on it, you would be identifying yourself with them. And that was standard practice with many of the sacrifices of the

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Old Testament under the Old Covenant system. So it does seem as if the instructions about washings and laying on of hands is uniquely related to the

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Old Covenant. These two things seem to be connected to Old Covenant realities, but I'm going to suggest to you that there is a way of understanding this that would have been in the context of the

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Hebrews in reference to foundational basic elementary Christian teachings. So here's what we'll do.

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We'll take each of these things separately, the washing and the laying on of hands, and see what the author probably meant by those things. And again,

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I'm saying probably because this is my take on it. I don't know for certain, but this is, I think, most likely. And then we'll combine those two at the end to see what they mean and the significance of them when you tie them both together.

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So first of all, as I already noted, let's talk about the washings. As I already noted, the practice of washings or the reference to washings seems to be an allusion to the

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Old Covenant practices of ceremonial cleansing. The Jews, as I said, have baths inside of their homes, mikvahs,

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I think they're called, or mikvahs, ceremonial baths where they would cleanse themselves. They had these outside the temple mount so that when they would come up to the temple to worship, they would have these ceremonial baths that they would drop into and be cleansed in a symbolic fashion of all of their sins.

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And it was kind of a way of cleansing themselves ceremonially before they went and worshiped. So the Jews were familiar with this idea of cleansings.

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In fact, Mark in his gospel in Mark chapter seven, verses three and four notes this when in describing the

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Pharisees, Mark says this, for the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they carefully wash their hands, thus observing the tradition of the elders.

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And when they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they cleanse themselves. And there are many other things which they have received in order to observe, such as the washing of cups and pitchers and copper pots.

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Now Mark just adds that for his Gentile audience, which might not have understood the significance of the washings and the cleansings that he's describing there in Mark chapter seven.

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We see a reference to washings in Hebrews back in chapter nine, and it's the exact same word that's used here in this passage.

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And here's what the author says, accordingly, both gifts and sacrifices. And again, he's speaking here of the old covenant, the gifts and the sacrifices of the old covenant are offered and cannot take or make the worshipper perfect in conscience, since they relate only to food and drink and various washings, regulations for the body imposed until the time of regulation.

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So there in chapter nine, the author makes reference to washings and he clearly has in mind old covenant,

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Old Testament aspects of the law and the ceremonial cleansings. Is there another way of understanding the reference to washings that would be compatible with my perspective that this is foundational and elementary

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Christian truths that are being described? I think there is. The word translated washings is the

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Greek word baptismos. Does that sound familiar? Baptizo is the typical word that is used for baptisms in the

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New Testament, speaking of the ordinance of baptism. Baptismo is the form of the word that is used here.

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It should sound familiar because in fact, in the King James version, the translation here renders it instructions about baptisms, referring to them plural.

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Now those who are on the other side of the theological aisle for me, once again, within our camp, would say that baptismos is not the standard word that is used for baptism in the

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New Testament for the ordinance of baptism. And that's absolutely true. It's not. In fact, the standard word that is used to refer to the

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New Testament ordinance of baptism is baptizo. And this is not that word.

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And so they would argue since he uses a different word, he has something in mind other than the New Testament practice of baptism.

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But I think that there is a reason why the author uses a different word than the standard word for baptisms in this passage.

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In fact, it is a reason for using this as completely understandable, given the context and the audience to which he is writing.

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And I'll explain it to you. This was a Jewish audience. Remember that? A Jewish audience. So they would have been familiar with all of the ceremonial cleansings.

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They had seen it in their homes. They had watched when company came over, did this. When their family went up to the temple to worship, they would observe the ceremonial cleansings and the baths and the washings and all of the various aspects of it.

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And they saw what the Pharisees did and the emphasis that they put on it and how it was just part of their culture, part of everything that they did.

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It was just a feature of all of their life, the ceremonial cleansings. So the

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Jews would have understood that. Now, coming out of that Old Testament background and an

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Old Covenant understanding of the Old Covenant, the sacrifices and all of that, when they become believers in Jesus Christ and they have repented and placed their faith in Christ, what is the very next thing that they would be commanded to do?

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The very next thing? Be baptized. Now, if you're a Jew that's come out of the

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Old Testament, Old Covenant understanding of ceremonial cleansings and washings, one of the first questions that you would ask is, what is the relationship between Christian baptism and these

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Old Testament ceremonial washings that we did? You would need to have that answer.

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You would need some instruction about that. And that might not be the only thing that you would need to have clarified. If you had lived in the land of Israel during the days prior to the ministry of Jesus, there was somebody wandering around the countryside dressed really weird who was baptizing people with a baptism of repentance.

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And he was commanding everybody to repent and people were coming out to him and being baptized with a baptism of repentance.

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That's what John the Baptist's message was. Repent and be baptized because the kingdom of God is at hand.

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And so people would come out and as a mark of their humility and their penitence and their remorse over their sin, they would submit to the baptism of John the

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Baptist, who was preparing them in that attitude and spirit of repentance for the arrival of the Messiah.

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And that was John's message. It wasn't about him. It wasn't about his ordinance of baptism. It was about the one who was to come.

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John's work of baptism was not the same as Christian baptism or the practice of Christian baptism.

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Its symbolism was different. Its intention was different and its focus was different and its timing was different.

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It was entirely different. In fact, you see this in Acts chapter 19, when Paul is in Ephesus and he runs across some disciples of John the

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Baptist. And in talking with those disciples, Paul obviously understood that something is amiss with these guys.

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They don't understand something. So he began to ask them, did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? And what did those disciples of John the

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Baptist say? We haven't even heard whether there is such a thing as the Holy Spirit. We're unaware of that. That's Luke's kind of condensed way of telling you they had understood the message of John the

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Baptist, but the fulfillment of that, the arrival of the Messiah and his work on the cross and his death, his burial, his resurrection and his ascension and the giving of the

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Holy Spirit, these were realities that they were completely oblivious to. They didn't understand that. And so Paul then asked them, then into what were you baptized?

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And they said into the baptism of John. And then Paul says this, John baptized with a baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in him who is coming after him, that is in Jesus.

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And then Luke records when they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. So Paul recognized something is amiss.

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Did you receive the Holy Spirit? We didn't hear there was a Holy Spirit. Then into what were you baptized? John's baptism. Oh, then it all clicks for Paul.

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I get why you don't understand the role of the Holy Spirit. He wasn't even aware that the Holy Spirit had been given. So then Paul gave him the rest of the gospel message and they were saved and they believed.

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And Paul baptized them with Christian baptism. These were people who had been baptized by John the Baptist. Now imagine you have a congregation full of people who are familiar with the

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Old Testament ceremonial aspects of ceremonial cleansing. And then they have heard of the baptism of John the

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Baptist and maybe even been baptized by John the Baptist baptism. And now they've come and become Christians and you ask them, well, they need to get baptized.

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Now they'd have all kinds of questions. Number one, I was baptized by John the Baptist. Well, that doesn't work because this is a different baptism.

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Well, I need instructions about baptism, don't I? I need instructions about the baptism of John, how that's different than Christian baptism, the baptism of the

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Christian baptism, how that's different than ceremonial cleansing. How is the ceremonial cleansing different than the baptism of John? I would need instruction on all of these things so I can understand what it is that you're asking me to submit to.

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I would submit to you that this congregation of first century Christians might have been familiar with the ceremonial cleansings, familiar with the baptism of John.

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And then having become believers, they would be asked to submit to Christian baptism and they would have all kinds of questions. They would need instructions about washings, all of them.

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Instructions about the ceremonial stuff, baptism of John, and Christian baptism. They would need to have all of those blanks filled in.

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They would have to have all of that understanding so that it would make sense. These are the foundational things that you would teach a first century

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Jew coming out of Judaism into Christianity, especially anybody who was familiar with John's baptism.

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They would need instruction about baptisms. That's why I think he uses the general term and not the specific one for Christian ordinances.

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They would need instructions even about their relationship to the ceremonial cleansing of the Old Testament. If I'm a believer in Jesus, do

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I still need to wash my cups and my bowls and my hands and my head and my feet before I go up to the temple? Do I still need to go through the ritualistic stuff to show that I am penitent and repentant?

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How many times do I need to submit to these baptisms? All those questions would need to be answered. Now we do the same thing today with brand new believers.

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Hopefully we give them instructions about baptism because this is something that was commanded by Jesus in Matthew chapter 28.

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Go to all the nations, make disciples of them, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the

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Son of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you, and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.

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And that is exactly what the disciples did. On the day of Pentecost, when Peter got up and preached his sermon in Pentecost Square at the south end of the

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Temple Mount, and 3 ,000 people got saved, he got up and he commanded them, believe and repent and be baptized on account of your belief.

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And they were, and they baptized 3 ,000 people that day. And that is the pattern of the New Testament all the way through the book of Acts. You see

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Philip baptizing people, Peter baptizing people, Paul baptizing people. Paul baptized the people who were baptized by John the

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Baptist in Acts chapter 19. Paul writes to the Corinthians and said, I only baptized one of you, thankful I didn't baptize all of you because in the

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Corinthian church they had all kinds of misunderstanding about baptism and it became a cult of personality for them.

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Even in the New Testament times the understanding of baptism was warped and twisted amongst certain churches and that needed to be corrected by the apostles because people didn't understand this ordinance as well as they should have.

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So this is the pattern throughout the book of Acts, everywhere that believers believed, they obeyed and were baptized.

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And the symbolism of baptism is clear. Baptism is an outward expression of a spiritual reality as an acting out in the physical realm what is true of us in the spiritual realm.

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Because we have been identified with Jesus Christ and the Spirit of God has placed us into the body of Christ and that is expressed through our repentance and our faith and so we are in him, we are identified with Christ and with his body in the ordinance of baptism.

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And baptism is the acting out of what is true of us. The death of Christ is my death, it is your death if you're in him.

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His resurrection is your resurrection. His life is your life and because you are in him, you are identified with him in baptism when you are,

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I believe the biblical mode of baptism is immersion. When you are immersed beneath water, and I know there are some sprinklers and some pourers, don't get upset, the biblical method is immersion.

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When we immerse people in water, we are symbolizing their death, their burial, and their resurrection with Jesus Christ.

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That's what we do in baptism. We act it out and that is the symbolism of it. Now because it symbolizes that, it tells us something about who should be baptized.

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Who should be baptized? Believers. That is the New Testament pattern all the way through the

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New Testament. It is believers who are baptized because it is believers who have believed and believers who have believed are then baptized in obedience and as an expression of that belief.

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Not infants and small children. That is not the pattern in the New Testament. Not infants. I know that there are references in the book of Acts to entire households being baptized.

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I get that. But it is wrong to assume that a household includes infants in any or in every reference in the

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New Testament. I baptized a household once. None of them were infants. But it was a whole house full of believers.

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Okay, so the reference to households does not mean that they are included infants and there is no command in the New Testament to baptize infants.

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Baptism is for those who have believed and who have understood the cost of discipleship. That is who should be baptized.

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And they understand the symbolism of it and that baptism is not salvific. Baptism does not convey salvation.

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It doesn't make us savable. It doesn't cleanse us from sin. It doesn't further sanctify us. It doesn't do any of those things.

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It is a symbol practiced by obedient believers who have believed on Christ and then outwardly, publicly identify with him by observing the ordinance of baptism.

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The nature of baptism is not salvific. And baptism is a serious thing. See, all these are foundational elements we have to teach to brand new believers all the time.

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It's even foundational stuff that we need to sometimes review even for ourselves who are mature believers. Baptism is a serious thing.

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Baptism should only be taken on by those who understand that the call of the gospel is a call to die if necessary.

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And they have counted that cost. And they have believed and they are willing to follow

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Christ, to deny themselves, to take up their cross, and to be martyred if necessary. It's a serious thing.

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We shouldn't take it lightly. We cannot take it lightly. Ironically, in the church today, many people take it very flippantly.

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I'll tell you, it's weird because we take baptism flippantly in two different ways, on two different extremes of this pattern.

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First, we take it flippantly in that we sometimes, not we here, we don't, but Christians in our nation will baptize people who should not be baptized because they have absolutely no reason to believe that these people are actually saved.

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And so they'll baptize almost anyone. If you walk an aisle, if you check a box, if you raise your hand, if you say a prayer, if you say, yeah,

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I believe that, then come on up, brother, we need to dunk you in this tank as soon as we possibly can and add your name to the membership rolls of our church and add your name to the membership of those who have been saved this week so we can count you up and post you on the wall next

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Sunday. See, that's the attitude that many people have toward baptism. And we'll give you a free $5 gift card for a free smoothie at Dairy Queen if you're baptized this week, and we'll have all the kids come up.

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Sometimes churches approach baptism with that type of flippancy. And that type of irreverence is something that should be should be scolded.

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I just, it wasn't too many years ago, there was a story in the headlines, and it was all over the place of somebody who was doing a baptism service, and the guy who was supposed to be baptized got up onto the stage and then ran and jumped and did a cannonball into the baptismal pool.

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Of course, the church just thought this was great, and this was so wonderful, and the pastor laughed, and everybody applauded and thought that was so cute.

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So cool. And they baptized him anyway, and everybody laughed. What a joke.

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That's that type of stuff. Just if that doesn't, if that doesn't make you viscerally angry, then you have no appreciation for what the ordinance of baptism is and what it symbolizes.

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That should just stir in your gut and understand that we're, we're taking this way too flippantly in the church today.

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In some countries to be baptized is to sign your death warrant, because there are people standing around the river, watching who it is that's identifying with Christ, so they know who's house and who's church to burn down next week.

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And our brothers and sisters in Christ go out, and they do that when that is what they face on Monday morning. They do it.

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We take it too flippantly. We take it too flippantly by making little of it, baptizing anybody who makes any kind of profession of faith without any kind of an interview, without any kind of evidence of repentance, without any kind of evidence of saving faith at all.

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We just baptize them because, well, that's what we do with anybody who makes any kind of profession. That's a way of approaching it flippantly.

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The other way of approaching it flippantly is to say, yeah, I think I was baptized when I was a baby by my kids, and so that's probably good.

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No, you had a bath. That was not a baptism. Baptism is for believers. Baptism is a testimony of your belief.

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If you're baptized as an infant, I do not believe that that counts, because baptism is something that you do, not something your parents do you on your behalf in hopes that someday you will become saved.

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And our misunderstanding of baptism is created within the church in America. This perplexing and yet awful situation that John MacArthur, I think, is the first one

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I heard say this, and he's right. We have in America a whole bunch of unbaptized

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Christians and a whole bunch of baptized unbelievers. We have unbaptized

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Christians, people who are Christians. They don't want to get baptized. They won't submit to that. They don't think it's for them.

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They have whatever excuse. It's been a while. They think that when they were dunked as a baby, it was okay. And so they have never been baptized as believers.

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And then we have a whole bunch of people who are unbelievers who have actually been baptized. People who have been rushed into the baptismal waters and out the other side and then fall away three weeks later.

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And you have no record of their conversion, no record of who they are. And they never darken the door of a church again. I baptized some of those people.

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So we have baptized unbelievers and unbaptized believers. In the last hundred years, we have messed this up so bad.

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We need this instruction regarding baptism and how foundational this is. We ought not take it flippantly either in how we do it, how we approach it, who we baptize or in dismissing it and saying, well, it's just not for me.

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Getting wet in front of other people might be good for other people, but I'm not really one to get up in front of people.

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It is approaching it flippantly if we take the command of the one who died to give us life and we dismiss it with that kind of irreverence.

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It's a serious thing. So we need instruction about baptism. So these are the things that would be taught to a brand new believer, especially when coming out of a

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Jewish background. Ceremonial cleansings, baptism of John the Baptist, why you need to be rebaptized as a Christian.

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These are the things that they would have wrestled with. So that is why I think the author is describing that here. Foundational Christian teaching.

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What is baptism? What does it symbolize? What are we doing in it? How should it be approached? Who should be baptized? What does it mean?

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These are the things that need to be taught to a new believer. Second, the laying on of hands. Now the laying on of hands was something that was associated with sacrifices.

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As I mentioned, Leviticus 1 verse 4 says, He shall lay his hands on the head of the burnt offering, that it may be accepted for him to make atonement on his behalf.

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Leviticus 3 verse 8 describes another offering, and he shall lay his hands on the head of his offering and slay it before the tent of meeting.

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And Aaron's sons shall sprinkle its blood around on the altar. So that was symbolic in the

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Old Testament. You would bring the sacrifice to the temple. You would lay and identify, you lay your hands on it and identify yourself with this animal.

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And you would be virtually basically saying, this animal is going to die in my stead. I am the perpetrator.

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This is the victim. Blood is the cost. Somebody else is shedding that blood on my behalf.

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And you can, of course, see the symbolism and the connection between the sacrifices of the Old Testament in that regard and the offering of Christ on the cross.

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So that is an aspect. That is something that was done in the Old Testament. But laying on of hands was not something that was just done in connection with the

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Old Testament and Old Covenant realities and features. It was also done in the New Testament. And there are three different ways that laying on of hands functioned in the

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New Testament times. First, sometimes laying on of hands was done by the apostles in connection with healing.

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You get this in Acts chapter 9 verse 12 and Acts chapter 28 verse 8, where the apostles had hands, the apostles laid hands on people and they were healed as a result of that.

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Now, since I do not believe that the gift of healing still is given today through people, through apostles and prophets and healers within the church.

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I do believe that God heals, but not through healers. So since we don't do that, then there are two other ways that laying on of hands functioned in the

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New Testament. And both of these had to do with identifying or identification. First, it was done to commission people to acts of service.

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So for instance, in Acts chapter 6, when the deacons were commissioned by the elders, they found seven men, they laid hands on them, the elders identifying them and their giftedness and their calling and installing them to office.

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It happened again in Acts chapter 13, when the Holy Spirit said, set apart for me Saul and Barnabas for the work that I have called them to.

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And the church fasted and prayed, they laid hands on them and sent them out. It was the church's way of sort of identifying with them and saying, we're sending you, we're doing this, we're sending you out with our blessing, go and do and serve as it were on our behalf, as our representatives.

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And we did this some years ago when we sent the Kleinstras out. Do you remember that? One of our missionary families? We had them up front and the elders gathered around that.

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We laid hands on them and we prayed God's blessing upon them and prayed for them and sent them out with our blessing.

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So we practiced laying on of hands in that regard. And the third way it was used in the New Testament times, or a third example of that,

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I should say, is first Timothy chapter five, verse 22, where Paul says, don't lay hands on any man suddenly speaking about elders and leadership. They say, just be slow with who you recognize and put into these offices.

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Okay. So laying on of hands function to identify people in areas of service and to set them apart as gifted people for offices within the church and identification of laying on of hands seems to have been used in some way to either bestow or to recognize spiritual giftedness.

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So for instance, you have Paul saying to Timothy, stir up the gift that is in you through the laying on of my hands.

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And there seems to be a reference there to either Paul as a product of his apostolic authority laid hands on Timothy and gave him a spiritual gift, or Paul in the laying on of his hands on Timothy recognized

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Timothy's giftedness that the laying on of the hands symbolized. And there was a recognition and an identification of that spiritual giftedness and Timothy's call to serve alongside of Paul.

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So outside of the use of healing in the New Testament, laying on of hands did two things.

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It either commissioned somebody to an office or area of service within the church, or it identified giftedness, spiritual giftedness and calling within the church.

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So what would be the similarity or the connection here with this text?

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In what way would they need or have received instruction about the laying on of hands? Well, don't new

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Christians, as soon as they have repented and believed on Christ and then been baptized in obedience to that command, what is the first inclination of a regenerated heart?

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It is to serve other people. Because the regenerated believer looks at what Christ has done for them, says that is his example.

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I want to do for others what Christ did for me. I want to serve them.

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So there would be a need and there always is in every church at all times to be taught, what is a spiritual gift?

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Why are we called to serve? How are we called to serve? Are we commanded to serve? And we would need to be taught that we are commanded to serve in scripture.

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Paul says to use our freedom in love to serve one another. Peter in first Peter chapter four says, as each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another.

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And he's speaking there of spiritual gifts. And then he classifies the spiritual gifts into two categories, speaking gifts and serving gifts.

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In other words, gifts that have to do with teaching and preaching and speaking in the early church, revelation, et cetera.

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There were the speaking gifts, prophecy, for instance. And then there were the serving gifts, the gifts of help and ways that people served one another just in serving each other outside of a teaching role.

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And so Peter says this, whoever speaks is to do so as one who is speaking the utterances of God.

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Whoever serves is to do so as one who is serving by the strength, which God supplies. So that in all things,

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God may be glorified through Jesus Christ to whom belongs the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen. So what is the goal of spiritual gifts?

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It is the glory of God. And Peter says, every single Christian has received some spiritual gift.

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And therefore we are commanded in scripture to use our spiritual gifts in serving one another. And the greatest example of this is the

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Lord Jesus Christ. Even the night that he was betrayed, while Judas is there with them amongst them in the upper room,

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Jesus knelt down and he washed the feet of his disciples and took the lowliest, most menial task possible in that culture and washed his disciples feet.

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And when he was done with that, Jesus said, do you know what I've done to you? You call me teacher and Lord, and you're right for so I am.

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If I then the Lord and teacher washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I gave you an example that you also should do as I did to you.

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Just as Jesus said, Mark chapter 10, verse 45, the son of man didn't come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.

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So he's the ultimate example of this. And the spirit of God indwells us and has given us this spiritual gift.

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Every Christian has a spiritual gift. No two Christians have the same spiritual gift. No two

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Christians have the same degree of spiritual giftedness. No two Christians have the same unique combination of gifts.

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You're like a snowflake. You're unique, just like everybody else with your spiritual gift, because there are no two spiritual giftings or callings that are exactly identical.

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Because a spiritual gift is the way or the manner in which the spirit of God manifests himself through you in service to others within the body.

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And that is going to be as unique as your calling, your gifts, your abilities, your intellect, your background, your personality.

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It's going to be unique in every way. My spiritual gift of teaching is not the same as any other spiritual gift of teaching.

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You may wish it were a little better or different or something, but it's not. It's I am who I am. And I can't change that.

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Like Popeye, I teach what I teach. And no two spiritual gifts of help is identical.

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Everybody's gift is unique, but every Christian has a gift. And the calling and the command of God is we use this to serve one another in our spiritual capacity, because the spirit of God dwells within each one of us.

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And the spirit of God wants to work through us to serve other people. So the spirit of God that we have is giving us a gift, and he gives us the power to use our gift, and we are called to serve one another.

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Even though we're all unique, there is something that all of us have in common. First, we all have a gift.

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And second, we're all going to gain a reward or suffer loss for the use or misuse or non -use of that gift of serving other people in the body in some way.

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All of us will be held accountable for the use of our spiritual gifts. And that is something that needs to be taught to a brand new believer.

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Needs to be taught to a brand new believer. So that is washing of hands. Sorry, washings and laying on of hands.

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If we want to throw them together, we could just say washing of hands. That is washings and laying on of hands. Those are the two.

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Those two go together as sort of that middle group. And as you might have guessed, we're not going to get to resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment today.

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We'll talk about those two foundational teachings next week. But I want you to consider how these two things go together.

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Now we've looked at each one individually. Now I want you to consider how they go together. When we consider all six of them from the perspective that I'm offering you, that these are foundational

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Christian teachings and not aspects of the old covenant. When we consider them that way, you can see how these all kind of build upon one another and go together.

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The first two are repentance and faith. That's salvation. That's the beginning of our Christian life. What is the very next thing chronologically that we would do?

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You get baptized in obedience to the command of Christ. And then what is the very next thing that we do? We live our entire lives in service to one another.

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And where's the very last thing you do? You die and wait for the resurrection of the dead. So in handling it this way, there's a chronology here through all six of these, beginning from the very beginning of our

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Christian life on earth, all the way through to the end of our Christian life on earth and what it means to die. And the counterpart of that with the eternal judgment for those who are not in Jesus Christ, there's a certain chronology and a logical order to these things.

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He's already talked about repentance and faith. That's salvation. I think he's addressing baptisms and then how it is that we live and serve one another within the body of Christ.

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These are the foundational elements. Second, I want you to notice how both of these things pertain in some way to our sanctification. These have to do with how we live our

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Christian life, obedience and service. Your whole Christian life can be summed up in those two words, obedience and service.

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We obey the commands of Christ, even beginning with baptism. We obey there. And then our life is a life of obedience and our life is a life of service to others.

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That's what we are called to do. So these are intimately wrapped up in how we live our lives and in being sanctified and what it means to pursue and progress in holiness.

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And third thing I want you to notice, we consider both of these together, how they are connected to our place and position within the body of Christ.

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There is a baptism in scripture, and it's a dry baptism that is referenced by Paul in 1 Corinthians 12, where he says we're all baptized into one body by the

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Holy Spirit. There's one spirit and one baptism, one placing or immersion of us into the body of Christ.

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What put me in the bride of Christ? What puts us in the body of Christ? There is something that was done by the

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Spirit of God before the foundation of the world, when you were placed there in the body of Christ.

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That is the work of the Holy Spirit. So that is why I think that baptism is essential to us understanding even our role in the

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New Testament body of Christ. I am in the body of Christ because of what the Spirit of God has done in placing me there.

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And now having been placed there, what is it that I am called to do in the body of Christ? We are to serve one another with our gifts, with our calling in the ways in which

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God has gifted us and placed us within the church. Some to be elders, some to be deacons, not everybody to be elders or deacons.

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Some to be teachers, not everybody. Some to be servants, not everybody. Some evangelists, but not everybody. There is this unique variety of giftedness within the body of Christ that we recognize and we give

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God praise for. The diversity that exists within any body of believer. These are the foundational and fundamental things that would need to be taught to brand new

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Christian believers, especially those coming out of a Jewish background who are familiar with the Old Covenant.

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Being in Christ, they would need to be told about baptisms and service and spiritual gifts and serving in the body.

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So Lord willing, next time we are together in two weeks from now, we will look at those last two eternal judgment and the resurrection of the dead and see what is so foundational about those two doctrines.

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Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your mercy in calling us and blessing us and bringing us into the body of Christ by your grace.

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We thank you that this is your gift of goodness to us as your people. You have accomplished your eternal plan from eternity past by redeeming a people and placing us all in one body, uniting us in Jesus Christ, bought by one blood, baptized by one spirit, redeemed by one

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Savior, placed in one body, the church eternal and triumphant and glorious and glorified.

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We thank you that we belong and are numbered among those who are yours. This is all your work and we thank you for it.

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We pray that you would work in our hearts, a humble attitude of submissiveness and obedience and service to others, make us long and love the service to those around us, that you may be glorified through us, that we may manifest the glory of Christ and what he has done in serving so sacrificially on our behalf.

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We thank you for this grace and pray that you would extend it to us, your people, for the glory of Christ our King, in his name we pray.