Sunday Night Bible Study: Hebrews 13 - Part 3

Good evening and welcome to Sunday night Bible study with pastor Josiah Shipley of Witten Baptist Church today

We finished our mini series on Hebrews chapter 13. We left off on verse 17.

So 17 through the end of the chapter Let's read God's Word Hebrews 13 verse 17 through the end of the chapter

Obey your leaders and submit to them for they are keeping watch over your souls as those who will give an account

Let them do this with joy not with groaning for that would be of no advantage to you Pray for us for we are sure that we have a clear conscience desiring to act honorably in all things

I urge you to more earnestly to do this in order that I may be restored to you a sinner Now may the

God of peace have brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus the great Shepherd of the sheep By the blood of the eternal covenant equip you with everything good that you may do his will

Working in us that which is pleasing in his sight through Jesus Christ to whom be the glory forever and ever.

Amen. I Appeal to you brothers bear with my word of exhortation for I have written to you briefly

You should know that our brother Timothy has been released with whom I shall see soon See you if he comes soon

Greet all of your leaders and all the Saints for those who come from Italy send you greetings grace be with all of you

All right guys a few highlights here from the end of this chapter as Next week we start our series on the book of James Here's what we got here

First it says obey your leaders and submit to them. Now. We know from last week.

This is referring to the leaders within the church These are the pastors for example remember last week we said in verse 7 says remember your leaders

Okay, and Carefully observe do a double take look again at the outcome of their lives and then imitate their faith

So you check what they say how they live based on what the Word of God says and if it checks out then you imitate

Their faith then they can say along with Paul follow me or imitate me I'm following Jesus as all of us as leaders should be able to say

Once that is done verse 17 you obey your leaders and submit to them for they are keeping a watch over your souls as Those who will give an account

Let them do this with joy and not with groaning for that would be of no advantage to you as a pastor this verse scares me as it should

Obey your leader and submit to them. They're keeping watch over your souls as those who will give an account.

I Have to give an account for the sheep under my care now

Don't misunderstand. I am not responsible for their eternal destiny. That's between them and God.

I give an account I Give an account based on what?

We did as a flock of God here so just like as the federal head if you want to think of it that way just as Adam and Eve sinned and God came to Adam because he's the federal head just as people of Israel sitting and sinned in 1st

Samuel 22 or 15 and God went to Saul the king God will look at the pastor and say

What's going on with this place? Why is this place not doing X Y & Z? He wrote the letter to the angel the pastor in Revelation chapter 1 2 & 3

The pastors of those local churches saying what's going on here? Why are y 'all not doing this? Now it says let them do this with joy not with groaning because I'll be a no benefit to you remember

There is the great white throne judgment which separates the goats from the sheep the tears from the wheat

That determines your eternal destiny heaven or hell But then there's also judgment of works

Where if you're in heaven? Yes, you're gonna go to heaven there's a judgment given based on what did you do at the time you had here?

There's different reward systems in heaven for that same with hell There's not levels of hell, but there's different degrees of punishment in hell based on your judgment of works

What those degrees of punishment look like we don't exactly know the Bible doesn't give us too much detail Same with the rewards in heaven.

I mean there's talk of crowns and such but not much detail there Verse 18 pray for us member.

We don't know who wrote the book of Hebrews This ending sounds a lot like one of Paul's Salutations, but again,

I'm not convinced Paul wrote it, but some are pray for us For we are sure that we have a clear conscience desiring to act honorably in all things

Ask yourself that question. Do you desire to act honorably in all things?

I Urging the more earnestly to do this in order that I may be restored to you the sooner verse 20 now

May the God of peace remember there's the peace of God and the God of peace May the

God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord. Jesus the Great Shepherd of the sheep

All pastors are shepherds. That's what the word pastor means It means shepherd, but he is the Great Shepherd the

Great Shepherd of sheep. He has Brought again from the

Lord Jesus the Great Shepherd of sheep. How is he the shepherd of sheep by the blood of the eternal covenant?

The first covenant was not eternal The Old Covenant Sinai covenant the

Mosaic of it. The new covenant is eternal It's bought by blood and that blood is the blood of Jesus For those of you who think you can lose your salvation.

I want you to read those words again eternal covenant If you can back out of that covenant was it eternal see a covenant is an agreement between two parties

With a mediator Jesus is the mediator and he's also the other part of the party If that covenant could ever be broken then was it ever eternal answer no

Equip you with everything good That you may do his will may he equip you with everything good

Everything good we need comes from God and his word. We don't need anything else That you may do his will not yours

Working in us that which is pleasing in his sight What makes us happiest as Christians is pleasing

God. I know I'm raising my daughter, right? When she is pleased to please daddy and mommy

When she desires to please mommy and daddy That should be the same with God Through Jesus Christ to whom knew the glory forever and ever

I appeal to you brothers bear with my word of exhortation That I've written to you briefly 13 chapters isn't exactly brief, but whatever

You should know that our brother Timothy. So the writer of this knows who Timothy is intimately With whom

I shall see you if he comes soon With whom I shall in other words Timothy and the writer of this are gonna go see who they're writing to Read all of your leaders and all the

Saints Those who come from Italy sending greetings Grace to you and peace be with you.

See that's confusing that makes it sound like this person who's writing. This is in Italy But I wanted to point out says greet all your leaders and all the

Saints just like in Philippians and Ephesians He refers to the church leaders and then he talks about to all the

Saints who are in Ephesus to all the Saints in Christ Jesus What is a Saint? A Saint is a Christian.

A Saint is one who has been set apart It's not some special super Christian. A Saint are those who have been set apart by God That's what a

Saint is. A Saint is a Christian a believer People get this wrong all the time Saints are not special Christians or anything like that They are just Christians to all the

Saints in Christ Jesus who were in Ephesus Grand Philippi including the overseers and deacons pastors and deacons included

But the rest of you as well There's no such thing as a super Christian So that's the end of Hebrews 13 a lot of great stuff there a

Lot of great practical advice in the beginning a lot of great wisdom for pastors a lot of great

Teachings about going outside the camp just like Jesus went outside the camp to suffer So we go outside to suffer separate ourselves from the world and to bring a sacrifice of praise to God Pretty awesome chapter.