Apostasy Described Part 3 (Hebrews 10:28-29)

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June 20, 2021

Description: The author brings three serious charges against the apostate to show that the severe punishment of the apostate is just. An exposition of Hebrews 10:28-29.

Running With Endurance, Part 4 (Hebrews 12:1-3)

00:00: Oh, rise, my joy, when trials are abounding.
00:09: Your faithfulness is my refuge in the night.
04:11: His name is Jesus. His name is
04:17: Jesus. Oh, his name is Jesus Christ.
05:43: Set the boundaries of life, hung the stars in the night. The face on the moon made the planets to move.
06:00: Tells the clouds when to pour, thunder to roar. Amazing are your creation, saints of youth.
06:32: Glory fills all that you do. I would say, fallen man, mercy afloat.
07:13: Amazing are your creation, saints of youth.
07:39: Glory fills all that you do. Be praised forever.
07:56: Fills all that you do. All things are from you.
08:09: Things are through you, oh, God. Things are for you.
08:23: All things are to you, oh, God. You command heaven and all my record.
08:50: We're going to go ahead and get started. If you could have a take a seat, please. OK, we're going to go ahead and get started.
09:12: If you would have a seat. Thank you. Thank you. This morning, we will be in Samuel chapter 12, verses 12 through 19, or possibly 18.
09:29: So I'll read the passage, which we'll be in, beginning with verse 12, in chapter 12 of 1
09:36: Samuel. When you saw that Nahash, the king of the sons of Ammon, came against you, you said to me, no, but a king shall reign over us, although the
09:49: Lord your God was your king. Now, therefore, here is the king whom you have chosen, whom you have asked for.
09:57: And behold, the Lord has set a king over you. If you will fear the
10:02: Lord and serve him and listen to his voice and not rebel against the command of the
10:09: Lord, then both you and also the king who reigns over you will follow the
10:15: Lord your God. If you will not listen to the voice of the
10:20: Lord but rebel against the hand of the Lord, the command of the
10:31: Lord, the hand of the Lord will be against you as it was against your fathers.
10:37: This great thing which the Lord will do before your eyes, even now, it is the wheat harvest today.
10:48: I will call upon the Lord that he will know and see that your wickedness is great, which you have done in the sight of the
10:57: Lord, asking for yourselves a king. So Samuel called to the Lord.
11:03: And the Lord sent thunder and rain that day. And all the people greatly feared the
11:08: Lord and Samuel. Then all the people said to Samuel, pray for your servants to the
11:15: Lord your God so that we may not die, for we have added to all our sins this evil by asking for ourselves a king.
11:27: Father, as we look at this text this morning, I pray that we would be understanding the work that you did through these men, your people, in the
11:39: Old Testament, and through your judge and prophets. We ask,
11:45: Father, that you would guide us and that you would illuminate this to us and that they would all be edified and that most of all, you would be glorified.
11:55: We pray this in Jesus' precious name, amen. So in the days of judges,
12:02: God had sent heroes like Gideon and Barak and Jephthah.
12:08: And finally, we have Samuel. Now, there were more judges, but Samuel is the one who served
12:17: God all his days. We find the Lord's faithfulness throughout
12:22: Scripture in delivering his chosen people, Israel, both in the
12:29: Old Testament and New Testament. We know that God loves his chosen.
12:35: God worked through his prophets and judges, even though his faithful kings also were servants to him, especially
12:45: David. In our present text in 1 Samuel 12, the Israelites had faced the threat of Nahash, the
12:54: Ammonite king, whose evil plot was to maim and disfigure all the men of Jabesh by gouging out their right eye, every one of the
13:06: Israelites in Jabesh. By carrying out this evil deed, he wanted to reproach, he wanted to bring reproach upon Israel.
13:16: So the people of Jabesh were given seven days so that they could send messengers throughout the territory of Israel in order that someone might deliver them from this wicked king.
13:29: When the messengers came to Gibeah, Saul heard of this wicked plan.
13:37: Then the mighty spirit of God came upon Saul, or the spirit of God came upon Saul mightily, and he was angered.
13:49: So Saul took a yoke of oxen and he cut the pieces of these oxen and sent them throughout
13:55: Israel. Then he commanded, whoever does not come out after Saul and after Samuel, so it will be done to his oxen as well.
14:07: So as Saul was angered, he wanted to gather the Israelites to battle against these
14:16: Ammonites who wanted to disgrace Israel. As he did so, the dread of the
14:23: Lord fell upon the people and they came out as one man. He numbered them in Bezek, and the sons of Israel were 300 ,000 and the men of Judah, 30 ,000.
14:39: So then King Saul devised a strategy, how he was going to overtake the
14:45: Ammonites. So he split the troops and they made an attack and overcame the
14:53: Ammonites. Even so they scattered them and there's not two of them left together.
15:01: Samuel told the people of Gilgal to go to Gilgal. And when the
15:06: Israelites gathered in Gilgal, Samuel addressed the people. He first told them that he had listened to their voice in all that they had said to them.
15:22: And he appointed a king over them as they requested. Then he addressed the people and pointed out his lifelong service.
15:32: And before the Lord, he did nothing to disgrace his office.
15:39: Samuel asked the people to bear witness against him if he had taken anything from the people, or if he had defrauded them, or anyone had taken a bribe, or influenced them.
15:54: The people responded, you have not defrauded us, or oppressed us, or taken anything from any man's hand.
16:03: So as we begin in verse 12, Samuel said, when you saw that Nahash, the king of the sons of the
16:14: Ammonites, came against you, you said to me, no, but a king shall reign over us, although the
16:22: Lord your God is king. So they insisted upon having a king.
16:31: And this began back in chapter eight of first Samuel. According to the
16:36: Dead Sea Scrolls and Masoretic text, it was most likely the threat of the
16:43: Ammonites that was their impetus for demanding a king to rule over them.
16:49: The threat of these Ammonites was so great that they feared them so much, and they were so sinful and continued in their idolatry that they didn't want to call upon the
17:04: Lord, nor could they, because they were living in disobedience.
17:12: So Samuel rebuked them, and yet he went before the
17:17: Lord and told them their requests. And God says, give them a king.
17:27: We have to understand that they were under the covenant of the Old Testament law.
17:33: In Deuteronomy 28, one, Moses penned, now it shall be if you diligently obey the
17:41: Lord your God, being careful to do all his commandments, which I command you today, the
17:48: Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth.
17:54: So that was the contingent. That was the prerequisite for God to prosper them, to spare them from their enemies, which there were many, and to give them peace in the land.
18:11: Instead of obeying God's law, they turned to idols and they were living in complete idolatry.
18:21: So the consequences of their disobedience would be that the people who
18:27: Israel would be cursed and amongst the people and would be constantly attacked by their enemies.
18:37: But also in Deuteronomy 28, verse 15, he pens this, but it shall come about if you do not obey the
18:48: Lord your God to observe, to do all his commandments and his statues with which
18:54: I charge you today, all that these curses will come upon you and overtake you.
19:01: So he gives them a list of all the curses that will come upon them if they're disobedient to God.
19:08: They're obedient, God will reward them and give them peace. Disobedience brought his judgment.
19:15: God would always use the enemies of Israel to bring judgment upon them. Verse 13, we read, now therefore, here is the king whom you have chosen, whom you have asked for, and behold, the
19:32: Lord has set a king over you. So now he points out to these people that are gathered in Gilgal as their judge, he instructed him to do the following after the victory over the
19:50: Ammonites in chapter 11. Now Saul being present with them,
19:57: Samuel points out the fact in their presence that they had chosen
20:04: Saul to be their temporal king and leader. This was just another evidence of their rejection of their true king,
20:14: Jehovah. Back in chapter eight, verses one through three,
20:20: Samuel was old and had appointed his sons, Joel and Abijah judges over Beersheba.
20:28: Since his sons were dishonest and took bribes and perverted justice, this caused the people of Israel to demand a king.
20:38: They didn't ask, they went to the elders of Israel and demanded a king.
20:44: They didn't even have enough respect to go through the proper aspect of presenting this to Samuel, they just demanded it.
20:56: They showed no respect for Samuel. In the second half of verse 13, the
21:03: Lord has set a king over you. Israel was led by judges who were led and directed by God.
21:10: That was his governing way in the Old Testament until they demanded a king.
21:18: These judges would rule, they would keep them, direct them back to the
21:25: Lord and when they disobeyed, they would bring judgment upon Israel. So they were in direct communion with the
21:35: Lord and they were God's vessels. When we read the book of Daniel, as Cornel is going through that, he's already been through this, but in chapter four,
21:50: Daniel says this, that the Most High is ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows it on whom he wishes and sets it over the lowliest of men,
22:03: Daniel 4 .17. So in verse 13 of Romans, chapter 13,
22:12: Romans, verse one, we read this, every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities for there is no authority except from God.
22:24: So that's God's pattern. He's the one that sets authorities. He raises them up and he also takes them down.
22:34: They're all under God's sovereign providence. Paul also gave the purpose of the governing authorities in Romans chapter 13 as well, verses three and four.
22:50: He writes this, for rulers are not a cause of fear for good behavior, but for evil.
22:58: Do you want to have no fear of authority? Do what is good and you will have praise from the same for it is a minister of God to you for good.
23:12: But if you do what is evil, be afraid for it does not bear the sword for nothing for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath upon the one who practices evil.
23:26: That was God's intent. However, in many cases, those in authority are corrupt and wicked.
23:35: God will sometimes use these wicked rulers to bring chastening upon his people when they sin against him.
23:45: We know that oftentimes corrupt authorities will be used of God also to bring
23:53: God's testimony forward to his people. So many times when people are suffering for the
24:02: Lord, God will use that to bring glory to himself. He'll grant them the grace and the ability to do so, but he gets the glory.
24:13: There are two sides to the appointment of King Saul. The people had desired and chosen this king and appointed by themselves.
24:23: This is what they thought, to represent their nation in temporal matters. Jehovah gave them a king to represent his people, but the authority came from God and was limited by God.
24:41: Many of the kings of Judah were true representatives of Jehovah as of many of the judges who had been.
24:51: Perhaps David more than most. The people of Israel didn't just request the king to be appointed over them, but they demanded it.
25:08: This was the warning that Samuel had given the people. If they were going to have a king, they would take their sons, they would be used for horsemen,
25:20: I'm paraphrasing. The king would also take their daughters for perfumers and cooks and bakers.
25:27: He will take the best of your fields and your vineyards and your olive groves and give them to his servants.
25:35: He will take a 10th of your seed and your vineyards and give to his officers and servants.
25:42: He will also take your male servants and your female servants and your best young men and your donkeys and use them for his work.
25:52: He will take a 10th of all your flocks and you yourselves will become servants.
26:00: The people's response when Samuel gave him this warning, nevertheless, the people refused to listen to the voice of Samuel and they said, no, but there shall be a king over us that we will be like all nations, that our king may judge us and come out before us and fight our battles.
26:22: That's what they wanted. They had no desire to serve or obey God. They wanted someone to fight their battles.
26:33: They could live in peace. They didn't care if their sons and daughters had to be servants of the king, so they'll give them a 10th of their flocks, a 10th of the vineyards.
26:43: They didn't mind, they didn't care because they had no desire to obey
26:48: God's law. This would be the easy out for them. That's what they thought.
26:55: They had no idea how God would use these kings to bring about the judgment of their disobedience.
27:07: As we continue in verses 14 and 15, if you will fear the
27:14: Lord and serve him and listen to his voice and not rebel against the command of the
27:20: Lord, then both you and also the king who reigns over you will follow the
27:27: Lord, your God. If you will not listen to the voice of the Lord, but rebel against the command of the
27:34: Lord, then the hand of the Lord will be against you as it was against your fathers.
27:42: There was plenty of history that these Israelites had. They knew what their fathers had gone through and they knew of the deliverance of their people by God in Egypt.
27:56: They were slaved, they were being mistreated by the Pharaoh, and God finally delivered them and destroyed
28:05: Pharaoh's army in the process. Since the
28:10: Lord had given them a king, the welfare of the nation would depend upon whether they would follow the
28:16: Lord from that time forward or whether they would rebel against him.
28:23: Their historical past showed that they had a continual rebellion. God would judge them, bring a group of their enemies against them, battle against them, annihilate them, many of them.
28:39: They'd turn back to the Lord and ask their judges to pray for them or their priests.
28:46: They had the same cycle all the way through judges, through Joshua. As we read this, we see the wicked heart, and yet we have to look at the
29:00: New Testament church. As Christians, we also know that God desires our obedience to his word.
29:10: We're continually reminded as we see those professing Christians living in continual practice of sin and disobedience.
29:22: These who do so are following the way of the antinomians.
29:27: Remember the antinomians, which Paul rebuked in Romans. They were recognizing the grace, the gospel of grace, and so they figured, well, the more we sin, the more grace of God abounds.
29:46: And then Paul rebukes him sternly, of course, in chapter six, verse one, may it never be.
29:56: We're not to use God's grace as license. We're to understand
30:02: God's grace is so that we are able to be obedient to his word. So here's the prerequisite in verses 14 and 15.
30:13: If you will fear the Lord and serve him and listen to his voice and not rebel against the command of the
30:20: Lord, then both you and also the king who reigns over you will follow the
30:26: Lord your God. Since the Lord had given him a king, the welfare of the nation would depend upon whether or not they would follow the
30:35: Lord and obey his commandments. Samuel tells the people of the conditions required for them to have victory over their enemies and to live peacefully as his people.
30:49: Samuel does not continue with blessings. He just told them the conditions and the consequences of their disobedience.
30:58: He didn't tell them of any blessings that they would have if they were obedient.
31:05: He wanted them to realize the consequences of disobedience. We know as Christians that God desires our obedience.
31:20: He doesn't change. We serve the same God. As Jim is going through the book of Hebrews, this verse in Hebrews chapter 10, verse 31 is striking to parallel with that of what the
31:40: Israelites did against the Lord. It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living
31:48: God. Chapter 10, verse 31. Samuel continues in verse 15.
31:58: He says, if you will not listen to the voice of the Lord, but rebel against the command of the Lord, then the hand of the
32:04: Lord will be against you as it was your father's. So what does it mean to listen to the voice of the
32:12: Lord? It's not only to hear audibly, but it's to hear, understand, and to practice in obedience.
32:24: His law, even through the
32:29: Israelites, even though they're under a kingdom rule, or this time under the judge and now a kingdom rule, they must understand that to be obedient to Jehovah, their king, and obey his commandments, the king of Israel as well was subject to God's law.
32:53: If he disobeyed God's law, he would have the consequences as well. God is always gracious when his people repent and turn to him in humility and repentance.
33:09: He will always bring forgiveness if there's sincere repentance.
33:15: Now Samuel is going to call on God to bring forth a powerful and also an empirical example of the greatness of his power over the elements as well as the entire universe.
33:31: Verse 16, even now take your stand, see this great thing which the
33:37: Lord will do before your eyes. Now we have to realize something. God's judges had the ability to pray and intercede to the
33:48: Lord, and they had communication with the Lord. We read in Psalm 99, the psalmist pens this in verse six,
33:58: Moses and Aaron were among his priests, and Samuel was among those who called on his name.
34:07: They called upon the Lord and he answered them. Think about it. The priests and the judges had the privilege of going directly before the
34:19: Lord and interceding for his people. They had this judge,
34:27: Samuel, who served God from his youth. He first sat under Eli, who turned out to be a failure as a high priest, yet Samuel was devoted to God all his days.
34:45: He had failures, yes, but he loved the Lord and he followed the Lord all his days.
34:59: He says, even now take your stand and see this great thing which the
35:04: Lord will do before your eyes. When he says, take your stand, it is better translated, stand forth.
35:14: He wanted their complete attention because God was gonna do this great miracle before their eyes.
35:26: And see this great thing which the Lord will do before your eyes. Samuel's about to call upon the
35:33: Lord to perform a miraculous sign. Now he had done that earlier.
35:39: If you remember back in chapter 10, once Saul had been anointed by Samuel, he did this in chapter 10 verses two through six.
35:57: So Saul gave three signs. There would be the report given to him.
36:05: He gave Saul three signs. So one of them would be that the report would come to him that the donkeys had been found.
36:13: The second sign given to Saul by Samuel, he would meet three men going to Bethel.
36:21: And the third, he would have an encounter with the prophets. God has performed signs and miracles through Moses, Aaron, as well as Elijah and Elisha and Samuel.
36:36: In the New Testament, God has performed signs and miracles through the apostles.
36:43: God has always used signs for this purpose. They were miraculous signs so that they would know that both the message and the messenger was from God.
36:56: That was the purpose for God using signs. In verse 17, is it not that we harvest today?
37:05: I will call to the Lord that he may send thunder and rain. Then you will know and see that your wickedness is great, which you have done in the sight of the
37:17: Lord by asking for yourselves a king. Though thunder and rain was very rare, it did happen in this period of harvest.
37:27: Now, the general time of harvest in this portion of Israel was in May or June.
37:35: And they usually would not get any rain. But on this occasion, it was not an unusual thing.
37:43: This was a miracle because there was no evidence of rain. There was no sign of rain.
37:49: And now Samuel is going to call upon the Lord to bring a sign of rain, thunder, and the display of his mighty power.
38:02: I was working on this manuscript this past week. And Tuesday morning,
38:07: I don't know how many of you may have been in the line of the storm, but we had a pretty significant storm.
38:13: Thunder and lightning about four in the morning woke both Marsha and I up. It lit up the room, it shook the house.
38:19: It was right over us. And I thought, well, maybe this is a sign that I'm doing a good job on this text.
38:29: Just being facetious. God is always glorified when he demonstrates his power over the elements.
38:39: Job tells us this in Job 26, verse 14. Behold, these are the fringes of his ways, and how faint a word we hear of him.
38:51: But his mighty thunder, who can understand? This thunder and lightning is seen and known by all who are in the area that God displays it.
39:06: It reveals his awesome power and glory. And in verses 28, or chapter 28, verses 24 through 28 in Job, he pens this.
39:21: For he looks to the ends of the earth and he sees everything under the heavens.
39:27: When he imparted weight to the wind and meted out the waters by measure, when he set a limit for the rain and a course for the thunderbolt, then he saw it and declared it.
39:42: He established it and also searched it out. And to man, he said, behold, the fear of the
39:51: Lord. That is wisdom, and apart from evil is understanding.
39:58: So God's purpose is always to bring glory to himself and to always reveal his power to his people as all creation sees his mighty power.
40:14: The people clearly recognized that this was Jehovah bringing judgment upon the
40:19: Israelites for denying their true king. And that their demand for an earthly king was sinning against Yahweh.
40:29: Because God had brought thunder and rain that day would not only have revealed his power and his might, but the rain would possibly have destroyed the harvest.
40:41: So this was not only a revelation of God, but a rebuke of his people.
40:53: And we continue, the people cried out, do not cease to cry out to the
40:59: Lord, our God for us, that he may save us from the hand. Oh, I'm sorry, this is a text where this period of time in chapter seven, the
41:11: Philistines had come against Israel. They had destroyed 1 ,000, 30 ,000.
41:19: So God revealed to them their sin through Samuel.
41:27: So the people, chapters seven, verses seven through 11, when Samuel had called to the people of Israel to gather at Mizpah, the
41:35: Israelites had heard that the Philistines were launching an attack against them. So they called upon Samuel to intercede for them.
41:44: Do not cease to cry out to the Lord, our God for us, that he may save us from the hand of the
41:51: Philistines. At this time, not only was part of the office of Samuel being a judge, but he was also a prophet.
42:01: He was able to intercede on behalf of the Israelites. They called upon him knowing that he was
42:10: God's faithful servant. And yet they had been living in sin and not even considering obedience to God until God brought enemies against them.
42:23: So once again, now in chapter 12, verse 18,
42:29: Israel sinned against the Lord. They recognized it and because of their idolatry and disobedience to God's commands, he once again, in his goodness and mercy, gives
42:42: Israel a chance to repent and turn to him.
42:48: Following God's mighty display of his awesome power, the Israelites now call upon their judge,
42:56: Samuel, to intercede and cry out to the Lord that he might save them.
43:02: This was all too familiar occurrence for the
43:07: Israelites. As we looked at previously, they had continued the sin.
43:15: I have a question at this point. What similarities do we see today amongst
43:23: Christians? Is there any forms of sins, the sin of idolatry? The apostle
43:30: Paul gives us this command in the letter to the Colossians in chapter three, verses five through eight.
43:37: Therefore, consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire and greed, which amounts to idolatry.
43:51: For it is because of these things that the wrath of God will come upon the sons of disobedience.
43:58: And in them, you once also walked when you're living in them, but now you also put them all aside, anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive speech from your mouth.
44:16: That's Colossians three, five through eight. So God not only made that an imperative, but he reveals what that is, those sins as the sin of idolatry.
44:29: Israel's continual disobedience to the Lord always brought consequences, which
44:35: Jehovah had brought upon them. He used the judgments powerfully to turn them back to himself.
44:44: That was an act of pure love. God still shows that to us today.
44:50: The Israelites had already seen
44:56: God's judgment carried upon them before when they disobeyed his commandments.
45:01: Back in chapter six, verse 19, we read, because they had looked into the ark of the
45:08: Lord, he struck down the men of Bathshemus. Because they had looked into the ark of the
45:15: Lord, he struck down all the people, 50 ,070 men.
45:21: And the people mourned because the Lord had struck the people with a great slaughter.
45:28: We have to realize at this point, Israel was so disobedient that they had taken the ark of the covenant into battle.
45:38: That was what caused this. They had taken it into battle. The Philistines defeated them and captured the ark.
45:47: It went from one of their tribes to the, one of their kings to the other kings, five different areas of the
45:54: Philistines. Finally, God was judging them through each one that held the ark of the covenant captive.
46:02: And he judged each territory of the Philistines. Finally, they sent it back to Israel.
46:10: And the people seeing it rejoiced. They saw it when they were working in the fields coming through and they rejoiced and shouted and yet they disobeyed the very commandment that God had given them in the law.
46:25: Not to ever look into the ark for in it were all the holy implements.
46:33: Anyone that did so would be struck dead. That's what they did. Had no fear of the
46:41: Lord. So this was a stern warning to anyone who may try to look at the ark of the covenant.
46:49: It was strict law from God, strict commands.
47:02: So back in chapter six, verse 19, they called upon Samuel again. Then all the people said to Samuel, pray for your servants to the
47:11: Lord, your God, so that we may not die. After they saw all these Israelites who had looked into the ark be struck dead by the
47:22: Lord, they were in fear of God's judgment. For you have added to all our sins this evil by asking for ourselves a king.
47:33: These people were disobedient continually. Many of us today have seen
47:41: God's great display and yet we sometimes take it for granted.
47:50: We have to think, in closing, I'm gonna continue next week in this text, but I want us to consider where is the contemporary church today?
48:03: Where are we today? I know that there's many professing
48:10: Christians, they have market -driven church and they're full of false professions.
48:22: They no longer give the gospel of Jesus Christ and his death on a cross and his resurrection.
48:31: They just call people to Jesus, saying, well, they'll have a better marriage, a better life, and they tell them all the benefits of turning to Jesus.
48:41: Yet they omit completely the sin of mankind and their desperate need for a savior by which only one can bring salvation.
48:55: There's no other name under heaven and earth by which men may be saved. So we have this commission to proclaim the gospel.
49:04: We recognize that we each have that responsibility and God, when he brings people into our lives, we must always consider that and bring forth the truth of the gospel.
49:18: What a privilege God has given us and yet why do we have such fear?
49:26: Paul didn't. He was not ashamed of the gospel. He brought the gospel clearly, whether his life was threatened or whether he was placed in jail or the threat of jail, didn't matter.
49:37: He was a faithful servant of the gospel, to the Jews first and then the
49:43: Gentiles. So as we look at this text, it must remind us of God's great desire for us and his command for us to be obedient to his word.
49:57: He has done this work to give us this great privilege of salvation and the great privilege of prayer, but also his word revealed.
50:11: He has given us incomplete. Father, we just thank you for your servant
50:16: Samuel and for the great work that you did in and through him. But we also thank you that you are sovereign
50:24: God and that you don't turn away from those who obey you, but you bring consequences of sin.
50:35: We thank you that you are a loving God, a merciful God, and yet a just God. We ask that you would be glorified and that your word would edify your people.
50:46: And we pray Lord for the remainder of our worship time here, that you'd be glorified once again, through the proclamation of your word and through song and praise and hymns that we bring forth.
51:01: May you be glorified this day. In Jesus' precious name, amen. ♪ Live so all the strength to follow your commands ♪ ♪
52:48: Could never come from Jesus in my life ♪ ♪
55:30: Lord, you're calling me to come ♪ ♪ And behold the wondrous cross to explore the depths of grace ♪ ♪
55:41: That came to me at such a cost ♪ ♪ Where your boundless love conquered my boundless sin ♪ ♪
55:54: And mercy's arm were open wide ♪ ♪
56:00: My heart is filled with a thousand songs ♪ ♪ Proclaiming the glories of Calvary ♪ ♪
56:08: With every breath, Lord, how I long to sing of Jesus who died for me ♪ ♪
56:16: Lord, take me deeper into the glories of Calvary ♪ ♪
56:39: Sinners find eternal joy in the Savior's crimson flow ♪ ♪
56:52: And every wrath has been removed and your saints above ♪ ♪
57:03: Rejoicing in the risen lamb, my heart is filled with a thousand songs ♪ ♪
57:14: Proclaiming the glories, sing of Jesus who died into the glories of Calvary ♪ ♪
58:09: Eternal, we will sing the words that set us free ♪ ♪
58:20: We'll sing the glories of Calvary, eternal joy ♪ ♪
59:41: Was placed upon the perfect lamb who suffered, bled, and died ♪ ♪
59:47: The wisdom of the
59:58: Son rejoiced around your throne ♪ ♪
01:00:03: And, Lord, that you come to know the glory that sets the guilty free ♪ ♪
01:00:44: That justifies what has been proclaimed for those who were doomed ♪ ♪
01:02:07: A love incomprehensible, our minds could not conceive ♪ ♪
01:02:12: A mercy that forgives my sin and makes me like your
01:02:17: Son ♪ ♪ And now I'm loved forevermore because of what you've done ♪ ♪
01:02:28: And, oh, the glory of the Lord's in your
01:02:37: Son forevermore ♪ ♪
01:04:16: His faceless blood has ransomed me ♪ ♪ Mine was the sin that drove the bitter nature of the
01:05:12: Redeemer ♪ ♪ My life he brought, my longings sworn, now
01:05:25: I'm satisfied in him ♪ ♪
01:05:32: Yes, I will give his faithfulness my standing face ♪ ♪
01:06:12: Who carries me on eagles' wings ♪ ♪
01:06:17: He crowns my life with lovingkindness ♪ ♪
01:06:23: His triumph's song I'll ever sing ♪ ♪
01:06:35: And I am a poor Redeemer, yes, you ♪ ♪
01:08:40: But speak of your salvation and you're a fighter than we can imagine ♪ ♪
01:08:54: You are to beauty to be heard, regenerate and sing your...
01:09:24: ♪ ♪ We'll sing about the Savior who came to earth ♪ ♪
01:09:32: To bear the sins of those he came to save ♪ ♪
01:09:39: You fill our hearts with wonder, we'll worship you for eternity than we can imagine ♪ ♪
01:09:54: You are to beauty for us to feel the need to be free, to be free and worship you forever, worship, worship ♪ ♪
01:11:00: You fill our worship you forever, worship and you are to beauty because you are great, we can imagine, yeah ♪
01:11:36: And you are too beautiful, so beautiful to fathom.
01:11:50: Yes, you are so great and greatly to be praised.
01:11:57: You are, you are so great. I have a shimmer storm when troubles fall upon me.
01:12:44: Though fears are rising like a flood, my soul can rest securely.
01:12:54: O Jesus, I am with you, my place of peace and solace.
01:13:04: No trial is deeper than yours that comforts all my sorrows.
01:13:21: I have a shelter in the storm when all my sins accuse me.
01:13:30: Though justice charges me with guilt, your grace will not refuse me.
01:13:40: O Jesus, I am in you. I have a shelter in the storm when constant winds would break me.
01:14:38: For in my weakness I have learned your strength will not forsake me.
01:14:49: O Jesus, I will hide in you. With faithful hands that cannot fail, you'll bring me.
01:16:43: Seeds of praise. Your sunlight fills the skies. Your goodness fills my life.
01:16:53: Precious gifts receive my grace. Sooner drink the seas than fathom all your.
01:17:18: Like a never ceasing stream, our mercies through your sight.
01:17:24: The death of Christ alone deserves eternal song.
01:17:31: For such a love as his received my gratefulness.
01:17:36: I could sooner turn back time than turn your heart away.
01:18:22: Though the years go fleeting by, your mercies never change.
01:18:28: Before you made the sun, your love was set on us.
01:18:35: For all your faithfulness received my gratefulness.
01:18:45: No shout is loud enough.
01:18:59: No song is strong enough. No song is sweet enough to sing your love.
01:21:19: You sent your son to change our fate. Hopelessly imprisoned, he came to take our place.
01:21:30: Glory to the name. Glory to the old.
01:21:40: Ransom the captives. Your name is magic. Your children set apart.
01:22:05: You were in the mules at heart. But your spirit now has caused us to no longer doubt your love.
01:22:21: Our father, you have brought us. Adopted through your son of Jesus.
01:22:33: Glory to the holy name that saves. Ransom the captives.
01:22:41: Your name is magic. Your name is magic.
01:23:10: Glory to your name. Glory to your name.
01:23:19: Glory to your name. You have been given.
01:25:15: Good morning, and welcome to Kootenai Church. Would you please stand as we sing the song we just heard this morning,
01:25:20: Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise. Immortal, invisible,
01:25:33: God only wise. In light inaccessible, hid from our eyes.
01:25:40: Most blessed, most glorious, the ancient of days.
01:25:46: Almighty, victorious, thy great name we praise.
01:25:54: Unresting, unhastening, and silent as light. Nor wanting, nor wasting, thou rulest in might.
01:26:04: Thy justice like mountains, high soaring above.
01:26:09: Thy clouds which are fountains of goodness and love.
01:26:16: To all life thou givest, to both great and small. In all life thou livest, the true life of all.
01:26:27: Thy wisdom so boundless, thy mercy so free. Eternal thy goodness, for naught changeth thee.
01:26:39: Great Father of glory, pure Father of light.
01:26:44: Thine angels adore thee, all veiling their sight.
01:26:50: All praise we would render, O help us to see.
01:26:55: Tis only the splendor of Thine heightened feet.
01:27:07: Come thou fount of every blessing.
01:27:17: Tune my heart to sing thy grace. Streams of mercy never ceasing.
01:27:24: Call for songs of loudest praise. Teach me some melodious sonnet.
01:27:32: Sung by flaming tongues above. Praise the mount
01:27:38: I'm fixed upon it. Mount of thy redeeming love.
01:27:48: Hither to thy love has blessed me. Thou hast brought me to this place.
01:27:56: And I know thy hand will bring me. Safely home by thy good grace.
01:28:04: Jesus sought me when a stranger. Wandering from the fold of God.
01:28:12: He to rescue me from danger. Bought me with his precious blood.
01:28:21: O to grace how great a debtor.
01:28:28: Daily I'm constrained to be. Let thy goodness like a fender.
01:28:36: Bind my wandering heart to thee. Prone to wander,
01:28:42: Lord I feel it. Prone to leave the God I love.
01:28:48: Here's my heart, O take and seal it. Seal it for thy courts above.
01:28:57: You may be seated. Well, good morning, everyone.
01:29:07: We have a couple of announcements. Tomorrow evening is our Men's Fellowship at 6 p .m. Not 6 .30,
01:29:13: so if you want to be here for the Men's Fellowship, be here tomorrow evening at 6 p .m. And then this coming Friday night, we have our
01:29:19: New Families Night. If you are new to Kootenai Community Church and you have not been here long enough to enjoy a membership class, you're going to have some questions or comments and want to meet some of the leaders, and that is for you this next
01:29:31: Friday night. And that also begins at 6 p .m. But we will need you to sign up on the sign -up sheet that is in the foyer so that we know that you are coming and we can expect you and provide a meal for you this coming
01:29:42: Friday night at 6 p .m. And then we have a baptism class next Sunday if you are interested in being baptized because you have placed your faith in Christ but have never been baptized.
01:29:51: We would encourage you to do that strongly. And we would ask that you come to the baptism class next
01:29:58: Sunday after church. And we meet in this room back here, pack a lunch, and Dave is going to teach for four or five hours.
01:30:04: And then we will prepare you for baptism at the annual church campout coming up next month, about a month from now.
01:30:10: We have the privilege in our congregation of having one of our missionaries who has retired from the mission field to come back and to worship with us almost every
01:30:18: Sunday that he is in the area. And he and his wife Nancy and their children served faithfully on the mission field.
01:30:24: And it's Gordie Hunt. And recently he went back down to Paraguay and he has an update for us this morning.
01:30:30: So Gordie, come on up and share that with us. And we want to take a couple of moments for him to update us on a ministry that we have supported for years.
01:30:39: And I would just say if you have never heard the missionary interviews that I did with Gordie and Nancy, I think, and this is no joke,
01:30:46: I think it was about three hours worth of interviews that we sat down and just telling his story. And I would encourage you to listen to those.
01:30:51: Those are on our church website. And you'd be able to get to know Gordie and Nancy better than you will just by being around here casually.
01:30:58: Thank you. Okay. Yeah, thanks,
01:31:06: Jim. And thank you all for letting me do this and take this time. I just want to give you just a little bit of a background.
01:31:14: When we were still in the one who we work, we had a church that we actually helped them to build.
01:31:20: It was made out of adobe brick or mud brick. They had a steel roof put up, and then we put the bricks up.
01:31:26: Well, over the years, that building, after we left, that building kind of melted down from the rains, and all that was left was the steel roof.
01:31:34: And then the goats took over, and they began to live under that roof. And so the Montague Church then started, they moved out and met under the trees, and that was their church.
01:31:45: But all the while they were wishing and hoping that somehow they would restore that building. And then during this last year, during the year of COVID, God did some amazing things.
01:31:57: A Mennonite family, or a Mennonite church rather, where we used to live, decided to take on that project.
01:32:04: And so they brought construction crews out. They brought their own materials out, steel windows and steel doors, and they reconstructed underneath that steel roof a beautiful building.
01:32:13: What that did then was it really encouraged the Montague believers, and so they began meeting in that building, and they had lights in it as well.
01:32:20: So they began meeting in that building every single night. And a lot of young people came in as well, and a lot of them got saved.
01:32:28: And they're still to this day meeting almost every single night in that building. So that's something that happened, like I say, during a pandemic.
01:32:35: Incredible. And then February of this year, we had decided to take a trip down there and just to visit, because we have grandkids down there, and to visit the
01:32:47: Montague church as well. And so they decided they were going to have a baptism and coincide that with our visit. And also at the same time, they actually mentioned the fact that we were going to do this, since Gordie and Nancy are going to be there, we're going to do this in honor of you guys.
01:33:05: And so that was quite a privilege. It actually made us cry when we heard that. It was quite an awesome thing to go down there and see that.
01:33:12: So with that, let me show you the video. By the way, we appreciate being here. We appreciate being in fellowship with the church, and we know that some of you are actually continuing to even support us to this day, and we appreciate that very much.
01:33:24: Let's go ahead and look at the video. This is the
01:34:06: Lord's duet. This is the
01:34:13: Lord's duet. And in His blood.
01:34:30: This is the Lord's duet. This is the
01:34:38: Lord's duet. And in His blood.
01:34:58: This is the Lord's duet.
01:35:05: This is the Lord's duet. And it's marvelous.
01:35:11: And it is marvelous. This is the
01:35:25: Lord's duet. This is the
01:35:32: Lord's duet. And it is marvelous.
01:35:39: And it is marvelous.
01:35:56: But I can't give you, but I can't give you all the good that I can give you.
01:36:04: What shall I feel? What shall
01:36:12: I feel? To bring salvation to each and every nation.
01:36:30: Wonderful Counselor. Wonderful Counselor.
01:36:38: How dearly. We lift our heads.
01:37:42: Our sacrifice. We sing our praises as we stand.
01:37:55: Before your throne. Over a hundred believers.
01:38:30: Okay, well, I didn't want to say anything during that, but that's what was incredible. It was that many people who were baptized that day.
01:38:36: And one thing, the last thing I wanted to share with you is that our son Jeff, who's there with his family,
01:38:42: Jeff and Stacey, has decided that he wants to take on the responsibility of translating the rest of the
01:38:48: Old Testament that we didn't get finished. So he's going to be doing that for the next few years. And he's asked me to be one of his advisors and not consultants, so to speak, but at least helping it by checking the material.
01:39:00: So thank you so much. If you have not listened to those interviews that you did, that I did with Gordon and Nancy, you really should.
01:39:17: Just to get the backstory of that. It will fill your heart with joy.
01:39:23: Turn now, if you will, please, to the Psalms, to Psalm 100. Psalm 100.
01:39:47: This is a short scripture reading. It's only five verses. We'll read the entire psalm, obviously. Psalm 100.
01:39:54: Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth. Serve the Lord with gladness. Come before him with joyful singing.
01:40:01: Know that the Lord himself is God. It is he who has made us and not we ourselves. We are his people and the sheep of his pasture.
01:40:08: Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise. Give thanks to him. Bless his name.
01:40:14: For the Lord is good. His lovingkindness is everlasting and his faithfulness to all generations. Will you stand with me as we pray?
01:40:26: Let's bow our heads. Our Father, you are worthy of our praise because you are a God of salvation and one who saves your people.
01:40:33: We thank you that you are making the nations glad and joyful by saving your people from amongst all of the nations on this planet.
01:40:41: We thank you for the work that you have done through Gordie and Nancy and for the Montague Church. And we pray that you would continue to bless them and strengthen them in your word and continue to keep their pastors and their leaders faithful.
01:40:52: And we pray that you would continue to call out people out of darkness and into the kingdom of your son through the testimony of those believers who were baptized recently.
01:41:00: We pray that you would be honored and glorified through your people there and through us here. We pray that you would likewise create in us faithful and obedient and loving hearts.
01:41:10: And may we sing to you this morning in a way that is worthy of your great majesty, your great glory, and your great goodness.
01:41:17: We thank you that our God is faithful and that you are faithful to your word. And we thank you that you are good.
01:41:24: And we praise you and we thank you for this lovingkindness and grace of salvation in Christ's name. Amen. In Christ alone my hope is found
01:41:57: He is my light, my strength, my song This cornerstone, this solid ground
01:42:06: Firm through the fiercest drought and storm What heights of love, what depths of peace
01:42:15: When fears are stilled, when strivings cease My conqueror, my all in all
01:42:25: Here in the womb of Christ I stand
01:42:39: Christ alone, who took on flesh The fullness of God in helpless faith
01:42:48: His gift of love and righteousness Scorned by the ones
01:42:54: He came to save Till on that cross that Jesus died
01:43:02: The wrath of God was satisfied For every sin of Him was laid
01:43:11: Here in the death of Christ I live
01:43:20: Here in the ground
01:43:27: His body lay Light of the world and darkness slain
01:43:34: Then bursting forth in glorious fame Up from the grave
01:43:41: He rose again And as He stands in victory
01:43:47: Since curse has lost its grip on me For I am
01:43:54: His and He is mine Bought with the precious blood of Christ No guilt in life, no fear in death
01:44:15: This is the power of Christ in me From life's first stride to final breath
01:44:24: Jesus commands my destiny No power of hell, no scheme of man
01:44:33: Can ever block me from His hand Till He returns or calls me home
01:44:43: Here in the power of Christ I stand
01:44:49: A mysterious way
01:45:26: His wonders to prove whole He glides
01:45:33: His footsteps in the sea And rides upon the storm
01:45:42: Deep in His dark and hidden mud With never failing stead
01:45:52: He fashions all His bright designs
01:45:57: And works His sovereign will So God, we trust in You We trust in You O fearful saints, do courage stay
01:46:29: The clouds in the wilderness Are big with mercy and will fray
01:46:39: In blessings on Your head Judge not the
01:46:46: Lord by feeble stance But trust Him for His grace
01:46:54: Behind the frowning prominence
01:46:59: He hides a smiling face So God, we trust in You We trust in You When tears are great and comforts few
01:47:27: We hope and mercy's ever new We trust in You God's purposes will ripen fast
01:47:49: Unfolding every act The blood may have but sweet will be the flower
01:48:02: Blind unbelief is sure to err And scant is work in vain
01:48:12: God is His own interpreter And He will be
01:48:22: So God, we trust in You We trust in You When tears are great and comforts few
01:48:44: We hope and mercy's ever new We trust in You So God, we trust in You O God, we trust in You When tears are great and comforts few
01:49:16: We hope and mercy's ever new We trust in You The psalmist says in Psalm 37, verses 38 -40,
01:49:37: But transgressors will be altogether destroyed. The posterity of the wicked will be cut off.
01:49:44: But the salvation of the righteous is from Yahweh. He is their strength in time of distress.
01:49:49: Yahweh helps them and protects them. Protects them from the wicked and saves them because they take refuge in Him.
01:50:14: I rock in my Redeemer Greatest treasure of my longing soul
01:50:25: My God, like You there is no other
01:50:32: True delight is found in You alone
01:50:40: Your grace, a wealthy deed to fathom
01:50:46: Your love, it sees the heavens reach
01:50:53: Your truth, a fount of perfect wisdom
01:51:00: My highest good and my unending need
01:51:21: In my Redeemer, strong defender of my weary heart
01:51:31: My sword to fight the cruel deceiver
01:51:37: And my shield against his hateful guard
01:51:45: My song when enemies surround me
01:51:51: My hope when times of sorrow rise
01:51:58: My joy when trials are abounding
01:52:04: Your faithfulness is my refuge in the night
01:52:22: O Lord, my rock, gracious Savior of my room
01:52:36: My guilt and cross laid on Your shoulders
01:52:44: You suffered, let it die You rose, the grave and death are conquered
01:52:58: Spawns of sin and shame You rose, the grave and death are conquered
01:53:10: Spawns of sin and shame O Lord, my rock and my
01:53:20: Redeemer Bring glory to Your name
01:53:28: May all my days bring glory to Your name
01:54:13: When you found your place, let's pray together.
01:54:20: Our Father, we pray that You would be with both speaker and hearer this morning, and that as we focus upon Your Word, that the meaning of it, the somberness of it, the seriousness of this passage may not be lost on us, that You would open our eyes and our hearts to understand the significance of this passage and where we are at in relationship to us.
01:54:42: We pray that You would accomplish Your purposes in us, Your people, through Your Word, and that You would be honored and glorified through our study of it.
01:54:51: Give us clarity in our thoughts and in our minds, we pray, in the name of Christ and for His sake. Amen.
01:54:57: Hebrews chapter 10, beginning at verse 26, For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries.
01:55:11: Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses.
01:55:18: How much severer punishment do you think you will deserve who has trampled underfoot the Son of God and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which
01:55:26: He was sanctified and has insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know Him who said, Vengeance is mine,
01:55:32: I will repay, and again, the Lord will judge His people. It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living
01:55:39: God. As we give some thought to the subject of apostasy, it is quite easy for our hearts to break because we can all think of an apostate, somebody that we know, somebody who comes to mind who at one time made a profession of faith in Christ and at one time appeared to be faithful to His cause, but then has turned and walked away from it and left the faith that they once professed.
01:56:01: And this can be quite perplexing to us because we look at them and we think, how could they have known so much and have experienced so much and have seen so much and come to such an understanding of the truth and then turn around and walk away from it?
01:56:16: It seemed as if they affirmed all the things that we have affirmed. And it seems as if they loved all the things that we love and that they experienced all the things that we experienced and yet they turn around and turn their back on all of that and repudiate it and renounce it and deny it and then turn from that truth.
01:56:34: So how could they know the same things that I know and walk away from it, have seen the same things that we see and yet turn and repudiate what they know to be true?
01:56:44: And then we turn to Scripture and to passages like this, which so forcefully and so clearly talk about the destiny of the apostate who turns away from the gospel and away from Christ and we come face to face with Scripture's teaching regarding their judgment and their eternal damnation.
01:57:01: And Scripture does not pull any punches in its description of the destiny of the apostate.
01:57:07: And we understand what justice demands from God in terms of what the apostate deserves. We understand that egregious evils warrant a severe punishment.
01:57:17: And that the more egregious the evil, the more egregious the crime against God, the more worthy the person who commits that crime is of judgment, of his damnation.
01:57:28: We see that taught in Scripture. We see it right here in this passage. And we are left to compare the apostasy of the apostate, their abandonment of the faith with the judgment that God promises that they will receive.
01:57:41: And one of the challenges, one of the things that comes to our mind is, is this really a just punishment for the apostate?
01:57:48: And the purpose of the author in this passage is to show us that yes, what the apostate receives in his judgment from God is exactly what he deserves.
01:57:56: Because his crimes are that egregious. What is right and just? What is the right and the just thing for God to do to somebody who has been brought face to face with their own sin and been given a clear understanding of what the truth is, but then has turned away from that and repudiated it and renounced it and walked away from it for their sin for a season or the pleasures of this world or the approval of men and instead they renounce all that is right and true and good and holy and righteous and turn instead for their sin and turn instead to enjoy their pleasures of this world or what the world might offer.
01:58:33: What does one who does that, what does he deserve? And the answer to that is a fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries.
01:58:40: We have this description in verse 29 that describes the sin of the apostate and we've been looking at these three phrases that the author uses.
01:58:47: This person receives this severe punishment, verse 29, he deserves it because he has these three phrases, trampled underfoot the son of God and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified and has insulted the spirit of grace.
01:59:00: And we've been looking at that description there. All three persons of the Trinity are slighted and sinned against in the sin of apostasy because the father is sinned against in that the son whom he has sent, a savior of the world and upon whom he has put his blessing and approval, the one who manifests the grace and the character of the father, he is trampled underfoot.
01:59:19: And of course the son is himself slighted and sinned against in that he is the one who is trampled underfoot and the apostate regards the blood of the covenant by which the son of God has been sanctified and made our high priest.
01:59:31: He regards that blood of the covenant as an unholy, common or impure thing. And then the spirit has been sinned against because the spirit has been insulted.
01:59:39: And this is the third phrase that we're looking at this morning. He has insulted the spirit of grace. How much severe punishment do you think he will deserve who has insulted the spirit of grace?
01:59:49: That's the third phrase and that's what's going to occupy our attention here this morning. This is a reference obviously to the
01:59:54: Holy Spirit. He is the one who is referred to here with this term spirit of grace. And the way that the author describes the
02:00:00: Holy Spirit here indicates to us that the Holy Spirit is a person and not just a power. You can't insult anything other than a person.
02:00:09: You can't insult a power or a force. And so this is, of course, in contradistinction to the theology of Jehovah's Witnesses who believe that the
02:00:19: Holy Spirit is nothing more than a designation of God's active power or his force. It's the description of the way that the
02:00:25: Bible describes God's energy or the power by which God does his work or activity. They would say that's what the
02:00:30: Holy Spirit is. That the Holy Spirit is not a person. He is not divine. You can't even refer,
02:00:36: Jehovah's Witnesses would say, to the Holy Spirit as a he or as a person because he is not a person or a personality.
02:00:42: He is simply God's active force or his power. Well, the author says you can insult the spirit of grace.
02:00:48: Insult him. Can you insult a power, a force field, an energy field? Only a person can be insulted, right?
02:00:55: I've said a lot of horrible things about electricity in my life. Mostly when I run afoul of electricity in some way or when it goes off in the middle of a football game,
02:01:03: I have cursed electricity but never in cursing electricity have I ever been worried that it might be insulted and not come on again before the game is over just to show me that it is insulted and upset with what
02:01:14: I said about it. You can only insult a person, not a power. And so therefore the spirit of God is a person and personal attributes are attributed to him.
02:01:24: In fact, not only is that true that you cannot lie to a power but only to a person, you can't grieve a power either.
02:01:30: And yet the scriptures warn us against grieving the Holy Spirit in Ephesians 4 verse 30. You can't lie to an energy force but scripture tells us that we can lie to the
02:01:39: Holy Spirit. Ananias and Sapphira did it in Acts chapter 5 and it cost them their lives. You can't quench a power or a force but scripture warns us against quenching the
02:01:48: Holy Spirit in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5. And of course you can't blaspheme a power or a force like electricity but you can blaspheme a person.
02:01:57: And not only are those actions only possible to be done to a person but the Holy Spirit also performs personal actions or activities.
02:02:05: He is the one who gifts God's people. He is the one who calls us, who speaks through his word, who regenerates us and empowers us to service.
02:02:12: He moves, he comforts, he convicts, he indwells, he sanctifies, he seals us, he draws us to the sun.
02:02:19: This person has a will and scripture uses personal pronouns like he and him to refer to the
02:02:25: Holy Spirit. He is a person. And not only is he a person, he is a divine person because scripture says that the
02:02:31: Holy Spirit is God. In fact, in Acts chapter 5, the passage that I just referred to with Ananias and Sapphira, Peter said to Ananias and Sapphira after they had sold their property and given part of it to the apostles and lied about the amount that they had sold it for,
02:02:44: Peter said to Ananias, you have lied to the Holy Spirit. And later in the same passage, he says you have not lied to men but you have lied to God.
02:02:51: There the Holy Spirit is called God in Acts chapter 5. And he performs divine acts. He does things that only a divine person can do like regenerating and giving spiritual life to God's people, his elect.
02:03:03: The Holy Spirit was involved in the creation of all things in Genesis chapter 1. He is the one who raised
02:03:08: Christ from the dead in Romans chapter 8. And he performed miracles through the Lord Jesus Christ as Christ did all of his miraculous works in the power of the
02:03:17: Holy Spirit in the gospels. So these are divine acts that the Holy Spirit does. And notice the title that is given to him here in verse 28.
02:03:26: He is called the Spirit of Grace. Now that is familiar language to a Jew who was a conversant in his
02:03:33: Old Testament because that language, that phrase is taken, that description of the Holy Spirit is taken from Zechariah chapter 12 verse 10.
02:03:41: In fact, there are only two times in all of Scripture where the Holy Spirit is called the Spirit of Grace, where he's given this title.
02:03:47: Once is here in the book of Hebrews chapter 10 and the other is in Zechariah chapter 12 verse 10.
02:03:53: Here's Zechariah 12 verse 10, a familiar passage once I read it to you. What is
02:04:14: Zechariah describing there? He is describing a future time when God will fulfill all of the eschatological blessings to the nation of Israel and he will pour out on the inhabitants of Jerusalem and on the house of David a spirit of supplication and mourning, that is the
02:04:29: Spirit of Grace. And that Spirit of Grace will cause all of those of the house of David and in the city of Jerusalem to look on, this passage says it is
02:04:39: God speaking, to look on me whom they have pierced and mourn for him as one mourns for an only son.
02:04:45: And there this one who is pierced is given the attribute of divinity.
02:04:50: It is God himself who says he is pierced. And they mourn for him as one mourns for a son. So there the work of the
02:04:56: Spirit of God is to draw the focus and attention of the nation of Israel, the people of God there in the old covenant nation of Israel, to the
02:05:03: Messiah whom they had pierced and to create in them mourning as they recognize their sin and grieve over it and come to him.
02:05:10: That is the fulfillment of the eschatological blessings promised to the nation of Israel under the new covenant. When Paul says in Romans chapter 11 verse 26 that all
02:05:18: Israel will be saved, that is the event that he is talking about. He is looking forward to the national salvation of Israel.
02:05:24: So that phrase Spirit of Grace occurs in the old covenant, in the Old Testament I should say, in reference to the new covenant blessings, particularly the end time eschatological blessings that will be poured out on the nation of Israel.
02:05:37: But it also occurs in Zechariah chapter 12 in the context of describing the sacrifice of Christ.
02:05:43: They will look on me whom they have pierced. So it's interesting then that the author would use that description of the
02:05:49: Holy Spirit which only occurs one other time in all of Scripture and then it's in the Old Testament referring to the new covenant blessings promised to the nation of Israel and referring to the sacrifice of this divine son.
02:06:01: And it is the Holy Spirit who in reference to that eschatological promises and in reference to that sacrifice of the divine son is going to do this work in the people and the nation of Israel, creating in them a knowledge of their sin and a turning to the person of Christ.
02:06:17: So here the author uses that phrase, that descriptor for the Holy Spirit to remind us of what that work of the
02:06:23: Holy Spirit is. What is the work of the Holy Spirit in Zechariah? In Zechariah the context is sacrifice and new covenant blessings.
02:06:31: And what is the context of Hebrews chapter 10? It is sacrifice and new covenant blessings. It's the same descriptor used of the
02:06:38: Holy Spirit in both of those passages. And the contexts are similar in terms of their subject matter and their promises.
02:06:44: So what is Zechariah? Why does he use that description? Well, because in Zechariah, sorry, in the author of Hebrews, why does he use
02:06:51: Zechariah's description? To remind us of the work of the Holy Spirit that he was promised to do in the book of Zechariah.
02:06:57: That is to turn people's attention to Christ, to bring them a knowledge of their sin and create in them a mourning and repentance over that and to create in them an understanding of what they have done against that son.
02:07:09: And this brings us to the work of the Holy Spirit. We've talked a little bit here about the person of the Holy Spirit. He is the Spirit of grace, the
02:07:14: Spirit who gives grace, the Spirit who does even a gracious work. So what does Scripture say is the work of the
02:07:20: Holy Spirit? And we're covering all of this so we can understand what it means that when we insult the Spirit of grace.
02:07:26: The work of the Holy Spirit is a gracious work and it is a Christ -centered work. Jesus in his last discourse with his disciples on the night before his betrayal, sorry, on the night of his betrayal and the night before his crucifixion.
02:07:37: In John chapter 16 verse 14 he says, he will glorify me, that is speaking of the Holy Spirit, he will glorify me for he will take of mine and will disclose it to you.
02:07:46: And Jesus was promising there to the disciples that the work of the Spirit of God would be to reveal to them the things of Christ.
02:07:54: He will take of those things that belong to me and he will reveal them to you and disclose them to you. And that describes the gracious work of the
02:08:01: Holy Spirit in drawing attention to Christ. He reveals the nature of the Lord Jesus Christ. He illuminates our hearts and our minds to show to us the glories of Christ and his oneness with the
02:08:11: Father and the magnificent and glorious nature of his sacrifice. The Holy Spirit points and draws our attention to the
02:08:18: Lord Jesus Christ, showing Christ as the sacrifice for sins and showing that forgiveness of sins looks like in those who turn to Jesus Christ.
02:08:27: So the Spirit of God directs our attention to Christ and it is the work of the Holy Spirit to do that, to draw his elect to him, to turn our focus and attention on the
02:08:35: Lord Jesus Christ. And I would say something here at this point that I've said a number of times before. Any ministry or any emphasis or any theology that focuses attention and almost a fixation upon the
02:08:48: Spirit of God is not a biblical ministry or theology. Because the work of the Spirit of God is to point to Jesus Christ.
02:08:55: Why? Because in the person of Christ we see the nature of the Father revealed. So the way that we glorify the triune
02:09:02: God is when the Spirit of God turns our attention not upon himself but upon Christ so that we may behold in him all of the glory and the nature of the
02:09:12: Father. And when we see in Christ all of the glory and the nature of the Father and it is the work of the Spirit to show us that, then we can worship and adore our triune
02:09:21: God. Understanding that the role of the Spirit is not to draw attention to himself and not to create in us a longing and a longing and a longing and a singing and a singing for more of the
02:09:32: Holy Spirit but rather a focus and a fixation upon the Lord Jesus Christ. That is the biblical role of the
02:09:38: Holy Spirit. That's what he does. He takes what belongs to Christ and reveals it to us. This is what he will do in the end times when he causes the nation of Israel to look to whom?
02:09:46: The Holy Spirit? No, to Christ and mourn for him as one mourns for an only son. So it's a
02:09:52: Christ -centered work that the Spirit of God does. And it's a gracious work. That is a gracious thing.
02:09:59: Second, it is a convicting work. Jesus said in John 16, 8, and when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment to come.
02:10:08: The Spirit of God grants an understanding to us of who Christ is and of our sin and he does this to the apostate as well.
02:10:16: He shows to the apostate the nature of his sin and the apostate understands and is brought to understand by the ministry of the
02:10:23: Holy Spirit that the remedy for his sin is to be found in the person of Jesus Christ. And the apostate is brought to understand his need for that remedy and he's brought to understand that he lacks righteousness and that that righteousness can only be provided in the person of Christ.
02:10:39: And the apostate, his eyes are directed to Christ as the remedy for his sin, the remedy for his lost condition, as his mind is illuminated and all of that truth is brought to bear upon his heart and his soul in an external and superficial way.
02:10:54: And third, the ministry of the Holy Spirit is a church building work because after we are brought to a knowledge of the truth and we repent and we believe, it is the
02:11:03: Spirit of God who indwells his people and gifts us to serve one another. He motivates pure affections and worship.
02:11:10: He makes the people of God holy, granting us victory over sin, sanctifying us, energizing our hearts to serve him, motivating us to mortify sin and put to death the members of our body and our flesh.
02:11:23: He is the one who fills us with love and joy and empowers us to serve him in a God -honoring and Christ -exalting way.
02:11:29: All of that is the work of the Holy Spirit. All of that is a gracious work. And when we say gracious, we mean that none of that is deserved.
02:11:37: What do we deserve? We deserve none of that. We do not deserve in ourselves being born as children and descendants of Adam.
02:11:45: We do not deserve to have our minds enlightened and our eyes opened and our hearts changed and to be indwelt by the
02:11:50: Spirit of God. We do not deserve any of the gracious works that the Spirit of God does to us. But the apostate experiences these things superficially.
02:11:58: He sees the grace of God on display. He sees the works of the Spirit of God amongst the people of God as the apostate sits in the congregation of God's people.
02:12:08: He sees grace on display. And he benefits and experiences all of the gracious works that the
02:12:13: Holy Spirit does in and amongst the people of God. He experiences all of the blessings of the
02:12:19: Spirit of God superficially as he sees them poured out upon God's people whom he is among and whom he is with and whom he pretends to be one with.
02:12:27: He is warned of the judgment that is to come and he is given examples and he sees examples of people who have escaped that judgment by repentance and faith.
02:12:35: And the apostate is called to repentance and called to belief and the truth is put right there in front of him.
02:12:41: And what does the apostate do with that truth? He insults the Spirit of Grace. That word insults is a word that doesn't just mean insulting somebody but it means to mock them and it has the idea of showing contempt for the person who is so insulted.
02:12:59: I may insult you quite innocently by saying something or doing something that you would consider to be insulting or offensive and it might be a personal insult to you but I might be able to do that or I might do that having no intention to do so doing it just accidentally as we're not even realizing that what
02:13:15: I'm doing is an insult. That's not the kind of insult that is described here. This has the idea of doing so with intention.
02:13:21: It is an act of mockery and it is an act that demonstrates your despising of the Holy Spirit and your hatred for your contempt for the
02:13:29: God of truth. The apostate turns away from all of those gracious acts all of those gracious works all of the grace that is shown him by the
02:13:39: Holy Spirit. He shuns the gracious testimony of the Holy Spirit disavows it repudiates it and renounces it and shows his spite for the
02:13:49: Holy Spirit in rejecting the gracious works that the Spirit of God does amongst the people of God. This is the true nature of apostasy.
02:13:57: This is the true nature of one who knows the truth and turns from it. The true sin of the apostate is that he regards the testimony of the
02:14:06: Holy Spirit as untrustworthy and false. Think about this.
02:14:12: The Spirit of God shows us and testifies that Christ is sufficient that he is glorious that he is trustworthy that Christ is of more value than all that the world has to offer that Christ is more precious than the pleasures of sin for a season that Christ is worthy of our honor our adoration our praise and our worship.
02:14:34: The Holy Spirit testifies that Christ should be and is worthy of being more precious to us than anything else that the world may offer.
02:14:42: He is worthy of us laying down our lives taking up our cross and following him and dying for him if necessary.
02:14:49: That is the testimony of the Holy Spirit. That's the testimony of the Holy Spirit through Scripture. And what does the apostate say?
02:14:55: The apostate says no, that's a lie. Christ is not more valuable than what the world has to offer.
02:15:01: Christ is not more valuable than the applause of men. Christ is not more precious than my sin for a season.
02:15:07: Christ is not worthy of my confidence my trust my adoration my praise or my thankfulness.
02:15:13: Christ is not worth any of that. The apostate in his act of turning away from the truth is saying that the testimony of the
02:15:21: Holy Spirit concerning the Divine Son of whom the Father said this is my beloved
02:15:26: Son in whom I am well pleased that the Spirit's testimony concerning him is a lie. Further, the apostate's sin says that the testimony of the
02:15:34: Holy Spirit concerning our sin is a lie. Whereas the Holy Spirit testifies that I need a
02:15:40: Savior because I am a wretched lost depraved helpless hopeless sinner who has violated
02:15:46: God's law turned his back upon the truth and sinned against a most holy and most benevolent sovereign in the
02:15:52: Lord Jesus Christ. And therefore, I need salvation and I need atonement for my sin and payment for my sin and that I desperately need righteousness because I am unrighteous and if I stand before a holy
02:16:03: God I will perish on that day because I need righteousness and I need forgiveness. That's the testimony of the
02:16:08: Holy Spirit. And the apostate says, no, that's a lie. I don't need a covering for my sin.
02:16:14: I don't need righteousness. In fact, I am able to stand in front of a most holy God on the day of judgment and I will trust in my own righteousness to avail for me on that day.
02:16:24: I don't need atonement for my sin. I don't need a sacrifice. And most of all,
02:16:30: I don't need the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. The sin of the apostate is that he says concerning the testimony of the
02:16:38: Holy Spirit about our sin that the Holy Spirit is a liar. And the sin of the apostate is that he regards the works of the
02:16:45: Holy Spirit as lies and as frauds. He sits, the apostate does, and enjoys the giftedness of the
02:16:52: Holy Spirit and the lives of the people of God around him. He sees the graciousness of people. He sees the lives of thieves, ex -thieves, and liars, and prostitutes, and drug addicts, and wife abusers, and wife beaters, and haters of God totally transformed by the gospel of Jesus Christ and their lives turned around.
02:17:12: And he says concerning that gracious work that it is merely a, it's not real, it's just a psychosomatic ruse, it's just a myth, there's nothing to it, it's created by something else.
02:17:24: He says regarding the work of the Spirit of God that it is not a gracious work and that it is not true.
02:17:29: The sin of the apostate is that he regards the testimony concerning Christ as a lie. He regards the testimony concerning our sin and our need for Christ as a lie.
02:17:38: And that he regards the works, the gracious works of the Holy Spirit which he sees each and every day as he is around the people of God as a fraud.
02:17:46: Now, Ananias and Sapphira were killed as a judgment from God because they lied to the
02:17:53: Holy Spirit. And now I ask you, how much more severe punishment do you think he deserves who calls the
02:17:59: Holy Spirit a liar? If the Spirit killed a man and a woman because they lied to the
02:18:05: Spirit, how much more severe punishment do they deserve who call the Holy Spirit a liar? Are you starting to see,
02:18:12: I hope, the depth of sin and the seriousness of the act of apostasy from the faith?
02:18:20: To repudiate and to reject the gospel is to cast reproach upon the gracious work of the Holy Spirit who has worked in and through the gospel and bears testimony to the grace of God, even putting that testimony clearly in view of the apostate.
02:18:33: And the apostate sees that truth and turns his back upon it. This is a blasphemous insult.
02:18:42: And it's a serious blasphemous insult given that the apostate at one time agreed with the testimony of the
02:18:48: Holy Spirit and agreed with the testimony of all of God's people. Maybe even agreed with that testimony in his baptism and in telling others of the gracious works of the
02:18:59: Holy Spirit as he shared what was going on and shared the truth that he was coming to understand and to learn.
02:19:06: But then he turned away from that. And now the apostate disdains the Spirit's testimony, disavows the truth, and denies what they once affirmed.
02:19:14: They are spiritual Benedict Arnold of the worst kind. For they have betrayed the truth from the inside.
02:19:21: They have betrayed a truth that they knew to be true. Now this is not how the apostate views themselves. Understand that.
02:19:27: The apostate would never describe themselves in these terms. But that is irrelevant because the only thing that matters is how
02:19:33: God views the apostate and how God would describe the apostate. And this is it. He has trampled underfoot the
02:19:38: Son of God and regarded as unclean and impure the blood of the covenant by which the Son of God was sanctified.
02:19:44: And he has insulted the Spirit of grace. That is what the act of apostasy is. And the apostate always flatters himself thinking that he's going to get away with his crimes and get away with his sin.
02:19:54: That if he can commit spiritual treachery and treason and turn against the truth and turn against the Spirit of God and the
02:19:59: Word of God and go and do his own thing that he will be able to sin with impunity. But the apostate must be made to understand that his sin will always find himself find himself find him.
02:20:11: The sin will always find him out. It will pursue him and chase him down and eventually it will catch up with him and overtake him in due time.
02:20:18: Having once received the truth they then turn from the truth and they deserve the punishment that is described in this passage.
02:20:25: The fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries dying without mercy a severe punishment vengeance the
02:20:31: Lord will judge his people. It's a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God. One of the objections that is often raised against scripture is that the doctrine of eternal conscious torment in the lake of fire is an onerous punishment given the nature of our crimes.
02:20:48: I mean so what I've told a few white lies. So what I have not worshipped God with my whole life.
02:20:54: So what I do my own thing. I've missed a few Sundays at church. So what if I blaspheme
02:21:00: God's name a few times taking his name in vain and saying these things are really no big deal and you're telling me that the justice for that the justice is eternal conscious torment in the lake of fire that never ends that that is a just thing.
02:21:12: Some of the new atheists like Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens they describe such a doctrine as a moral crime.
02:21:19: They would say it is an outrage against morality that God would ever punish anybody for their sins like that in the lake that burns with fire that goes on forever and ever.
02:21:27: They would say that's not just that's a moral outrage. No the moral outrage is that people would spurn the grace of God and that they would turn from his loving saving benevolent grace.
02:21:37: That's the moral outrage. For in doing so they demonstrate that they are God's adversaries and that they deserve the fury of a fire which will consume them.
02:21:46: The act of apostasy turning from the truth is to turn from a gracious God and to insult his spirit and to spurn his son and to tread upon that precious gift as if it were nothing.
02:21:59: It would be a moral outrage if such people were not punished for eternity in the lake that burns with fire.
02:22:05: When we understand the greatness of the God against whom that sin is committed and the seriousness of that act of turning away from the faith and abandoning the truth it's not a moral outrage to face the fury of a fire which consumes the adversaries.
02:22:20: The moral tragedy is that people spurn the grace of God and having known the truth that they turn from it that is a moral outrage.
02:22:29: That is a moral tragedy and God's judgment is just and those who would escape that judgment can do so only in the person of Jesus Christ.
02:22:38: God sent his son into this world to live a perfect life and to die a death on the cross to pay the price for sin for any and all who will turn from their sin and believe upon the
02:22:48: Lord Jesus Christ. That is God's gracious and saving gift. And to say that my sin is more precious than that that my selfishness is more precious than that the approval of men the tinkerings of this world are more precious than that is an insult to the spirit of grace and it is to regard the work of Christ and the blood of his covenant as an unholy impure and common thing.
02:23:12: That is a moral outrage. If you are in Jesus Christ you are safe and secure from his wrath.
02:23:19: If you are not in Jesus Christ you can be if you will repent of your sin and trust in his salvation.
02:23:27: Believe that Jesus Christ died to pay the price for your sin turn from your sin come to him repent and believe and place your faith in Jesus Christ and he will save you he will forgive you of your sin he will give you his righteousness and he will take you to heaven to be with him.
02:23:42: He will keep you safe and he will keep you secure. To turn from that truth having heard everything you have heard today is to turn from the only road to salvation.
02:23:54: It is to turn from the only offer of grace and salvation and that is found in Jesus Christ and in Christ alone.
02:24:00: Repent and believe the gospel. If you turn away from the gospel and you will not repent and believe then you demonstrate by walking away from him that you are his adversary and you deserve the fury of a fire which will consume you.
02:24:14: Repent and trust Christ. Let's bow our heads. Father we are grateful to you for your merciful salvation found in your son.
02:24:23: We thank you that you have done a work in the hearts of your people that you might turn us from our sin and we pray for any who are here who have never believed upon Christ for salvation that you would do a work in their heart and show them their need for salvation and bring them to saving faith and gather together your people that they may honor and glorify you as saved and redeemed people who love you and who cherish the sacrifice of Christ and who will worship you forevermore.
02:24:46: We pray that you would do this so that your son the Lord Jesus Christ may receive in full all of his bride all of his people all the sheep whom you have given to him and that we may be a bride who honors him everlastingly for all of eternity.
02:24:59: We praise you for this gracious work of salvation and pray that you would continue to do it amongst us and give us grace to be faithful to you to heed the warnings of this passage and to stay faithful to Christ and to Christ alone.
02:25:10: We ask this in his name for his sake and for his glory. Amen. Please stand.
02:25:17: ♪ O fount of love
02:25:32: From my Savior's bleeding side Where sinners trained
02:25:39: With filthy rags For his righteousness
02:25:45: Applied Mercy cleansing Every stain
02:25:51: Now rushing o 'er Us like a flood
02:25:56: Where the wretched And vilest ones Stand adopted
02:26:03: Through his blood O mount of grace
02:26:13: To thee we cling From the law Have set us free
02:26:19: Once and for all On Calvary's hill Love and justice
02:26:27: Shall agree Praise the Lord The price is paid
02:26:34: The curse defeated By the Lamb We who once Were slaves by birth
02:26:43: Sons and daughters Now we stand
02:26:54: O well of joy Is thine to drink For my
02:27:00: Lord Has conquered death Victorious For evermore
02:27:08: The ancient foe Is laid to rest Hallelujah Christ is king
02:27:17: Alive and reigning On the throne Our tongues employed
02:27:24: With hymns of praise Glory be to God alone
02:27:31: Hallelujah Christ is king Alive and reigning
02:27:38: On the throne Our tongues employed With hymns of praise
02:27:44: Glory be to God alone Our tongues employed