Hebrews 3:1-6 truth in love podcast

Welcome to the Truth in Love Podcast and Upcoming Network Announcements

Welcome to the Truth in Love podcast. We are going to be back in Hebrews, Hebrews chapter 3. We're gonna have a Friday evening Bible study, Bible conversation.

Hope you'll stick with us. Welcome back to the Truth in Love podcast, a Friday.

Evening live edition. Dan, how are you doing? Fantastic, how are you doing? I'm doing good, I'm doing good. I've got my coffee, so I'm doing even better. Just wanted to do a few housekeeping things. I wanted to let everybody know that probably going on right now, we didn't mean to overlap, but there were some circumstances that happened this week that called Dan and I are normally on Mondays.

Couldn't do it Monday, we were going to get trapped for Tuesday. Circumstance happened, unable to do it Tuesday, so we scheduled for Friday night. But we're overlapping a fellow member of the Truth in Love Network, so go check out Elias and the Bible, the Reformed Berean podcast.

I think he started at 8 o 'clock tonight. Check out the Reformed Berean. He's on tonight. Claude, part of the Truth in Love Network, he is teaching a class on Thursday nights. Check out Claude teaching that class.

I think it's on prophesying, preaching the word basically, and so check out Claude. Labor's podcast is coming up next Thursday, and it is going to be on baptismal regeneration, so check out the Labor's podcast next Thursday.

Next Wednesday, Dan and I are going to be doing a recording. We will play it later. We're going to be doing a recording interviewing another pastor, another church, another denomination on their process of ordination, what it looks like.

Hope you'll be encouraged by that. Monday, Jay, the Reformed Berean, he's going to have some fellows on from the Truth in Love Network. He's going to be doing a podcast on Monday. Any announcements that you have, Dan?

No, no, we had a regular little heat wave here today. It was like 40 degrees outside. I've been hearing of some temperatures in like the, is it like the Midwest maybe that are in the negatives? Yeah, yeah,.

That's heading this direction too. We are expecting next week to have highs like in mid-teens and lows in the single digits. It's a, which I mean, to be honest with you, we shouldn't be anywhere close to 40 this time of year.

Normally we're, you know, solid 20s. 20s are about as much as we have, so this has been unseasonably warm. That El Nino pattern really helped us out. Not next week, but.

It has overall. It's been really wet here as well. Our possible first lakes could be next Tuesday, but we'll see. I'm not holding my breath. Honestly, we've.

Had some snow, but we haven't had that much. We've actually been a little drier than normal. Well, I say that we've been drier than normal on the average, but we've had some larger rain events that we normally don't get.

We had over an inch of rain not too long ago, and it rained snowfall conversions, like one inch of rain turns into like 10 inches of snow. Normally we'd have 10 inches of snow. That's nothing unheard of, but an inch of rain in January is, we don't get.

Rain in January. It's just weird. Right, right. We've got a lot of rain and it's caused a good bit of flooding down here in the mountains in Tennessee, here in the hills in Piedmont. Yeah, it's been pretty rough.

Just a few other things while it's on my mind, Labor's Conference coming up next April or yeah, this coming April, this year 2024, last weekend of April, Refromata Baptist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee.

It's free, but we'd like for you to register so that we know that you're coming. Go to laborersconference .com. You can see the conference speakers. You can see the topics. You can register there, and there's, I've tried to put some hotel information up there, some things to do in the area.

Good bit of stuff to look at there, but we'd love to see you. Yeah, I'm, I've.

Finished the rough draft of my sermon. Well, I say rough draft. It's like a second or third draft, but still, I finished that this week. I'm sure I'll end up running over it about 15 ,000 times before the end of April, and it'll probably look almost nothing like it does now, but I'm excited.

It's delving into some stuff that I hadn't anticipated, and it's been very beneficial to me, so I hope to be able to share that with y 'all. Well, Tyler, I know we.

Will be glad to hear that you've been putting together and working on your sermon. He's been asking who all's been digging in and getting ready, and he'd be glad to know. He'd be glad to hear that you are.

Oh yeah, I've got the outline and.

Everything. I'm gonna run over it, you know, like I said, 15 ,000 times.

Before April, but yeah, all ready to go. Nice. Well, we're gonna try to stick to around 30 minutes instead of an hour. We're terrible at that, but we're gonna try. We're gonna do the best we can, and we've not been in Hebrews in a while, so just for sake of recap, and by the way, the comment line is open, just let us know that you're watching.

We'd love to hear from you. Share, give us a like, follow. Just looking at chapter 1, nobody's for sure exactly who the author is, but whoever the author is, he says, God, after he spoke long ago to the fathers and the prophets, in many portions, in many ways, in these last days he has spoken to us in his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, to whom also he made the world.

So my question is, what does he mean by these last days? Is it just a wordplay on the time that they're in, in these, you know, these last few days? Is that what he means? These last few days, we got a couple inches of rain.

Is that what he means, these last few days? Or is he talking about the transition from the Old Covenant to the New Covenant? Because we have that transition, you know, you can look back historically, you can see there was a transition, there was a promise of the end of an Old Covenant, and Hebrews talks about the end of that Old Covenant, but then you have this overlay.

In between the time, Jerusalem and the temple is destroyed, and continuing before that happened, they still had that practice of sacrifice and kind of usual goings-on there in the temple, but then it was destroyed, and then you have the New Covenant, period.

Christ Speaking in the Last Days and the Superiority of the New Covenant

Yeah, I think he's really talking about both the time leading up to the destruction of the temple, and I think he's also talking about the time leading up to Christ's second coming. I think what he's trying to get at there, what he's saying is that we've been, throughout the Old Testament, spoken to by the prophets, God's given us his law, you know, many ways, dreams, visions, incredible things, miracles that you'd seen, you know, axe heads floating out of water, and so on, just God doing God's stuff.

But he says, but in these last days, things have changed. We're not hearing through those means anymore, where we've been hearing from, it's from God himself come in the flesh in the person of Jesus Christ.

So the last days of the Old Covenant are being changed over because Christ has spoken, and as the New Covenant begins, and we await the final consummation of all things, our word is not to shift back to various ways and diverse manners, but to rest upon the words of Christ and him alone.

So I think he's kind of, here's where we start, and this is where we're going. Because the whole thing is about how Christ is better than what has come before him, how everything was pointing to him, and how he is superior to all things.

So it only makes sense that all of the great stuff that God had done in speaking to mankind before has been, he upped the ante when Christ himself came to the earth, truly God and truly man, and walked among us and spoke.

That kind of, you know, God outdid himself. That's something that he don't do very often.

But, and that verse speaks to Jesus being worthy of being listened to, because he says in that last portion, through whom also he made the world. Right. Christ is given credit for making the world. He is our creator.

He's the maker of all this stuff. He's worthy of lending our ear to and listening to him and him only. Yep. So what about chapter 2 before we jump into 3? Chapter 2 starts off with a.

Warning. It says, don't neglect your salvation. So he's saying, you know, if the God-man has come, which he has, if the one who has created the universe has entered into flesh, which he has, then don't neglect your salvation.

Or how can you escape the coming judgment if you neglect the salvation that comes from God who has entered into the world and walked among us? No, he didn't phone it in. He showed up himself and got to work.

And how are you going to escape his judgment if you neglect what he has done to pay for sins? And so he starts off there and then it goes on and talks about Christ coming to the earth. Why he came, how he came.

It's made a little lower than the angels. How he was going to bring many sons to glory. He's going to be the founder of their salvation. He's going to be made perfect through suffering. That being, going to fill up everything that he came to do through suffering, completed his work through the suffering on the cross.

And all that brings in incredible, I don't know how many good incarnation type sermons you heard during December, but if you didn't get like 12 of them, you could go find some. Because thinking of the incarnation is absolutely mind boggling to think that Christ would come and become man, truly God, truly man, that he would enter into humanity in order to bring humanity alongside of himself as adopted brothers and sisters, where God is truly their father, where we are truly the brother of Christ, where he was tempted and suffered like we do, only he was without sin.

And then because of those things, it says verse 14, since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same thing. So he became a man in flesh and blood as well, that through death, he might destroy the one who has power of death, that is the devil.

So he came to the earth to experience the death of mankind so that way we wouldn't have to experience death fully and finally through the judgment that comes upon us through sin, through God's judgment.

It says to set free those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery. All of these things are incredible for several reasons. One of which is that if we are truly his brothers and sisters, if we're truly children of God, then we need to take seriously what's said in 2 Peter 1, that God has called us by his divine nature, given us all things for life and godliness through his promises, through his great glory, and that we have been made partakers of the divine nature.

Now, I don't have time to get into that, but if you show up to the conference, I will be speaking on that. That's one of those things that I've just been so blessed in studying out. But that's what's going on here, is that mankind has been somehow linked to God himself in a way that says that we partake in the divine nature.

Now, I don't believe that that means that we actually become God, because we don't. We were created beings. We're not going to be God, though we can shine so brightly because of God's grace that people see God in us.

And it's that greatness and glory that he tries to bring out a little bit in chapter 2, so that way in chapter 3, he's going to talk to these Jewish people and say, now you've heard of this one who was incredible, Moses.

Don't blaspheme Moses. Don't talk bad about him. It was in Jude. An angel and the devil were arguing over what happened to Moses' body, because it was a big deal. Moses is an incredible part of our faith.

So when he gets into chapter 3, he says, and Moses, as great as he was, it's nothing compared to our Christ.

Right, right. And you're talking about, you're just doing what Hebrews does, and you're carrying on about the greatness of Christ, and that's what Hebrews continues to do. And it just made me think about a video that I saw today on social media, and I'm not in no way giving any credibility to this video, what was said and what was heard, but it does make you think.

I'm not done the research. I don't know if it's credible or not. So I'm not going to say either way, but it was a video speaking of, it was a gentleman who claimed to have found the Ark of the Covenant.

There was, and I'm assuming, there's people that think that it was inside the rock, the place of the skull on Golgotha, and blood dripped down from the cross, went through the cracks, and landed on the mercy seat.

And that's where this guy found the Ark of the Covenant. I think that's kind of the backstory.

Right. Well, I mean, there was some tunnels involved around the time of the exile, and yeah, I don't know if you could prove that.

Yeah. Well, his story was he found the Ark of the Covenant. There was blood on the mercy seat, and he scraped some of the blood up, had it tested. I'm not going to go any further than that with what he was saying, but what it did cause me to do was Jesus existed in the form and fashion that you just described.

Therefore, not only is the spiritual aspect of all these things great, created the world, but then also just his incarnation, his being fully God, fully man, and that DNA, those chromosomes, all those things are mind-blowing to think how God did what he did and how wonderful and wise and brilliant genius he is to form a man from the spirit, give it, put it in the womb of Mary, just brilliant and genius and beautiful.

And when I have a glorified brain and can understand all those things, I can't wait to be fascinated in glory and the work of God and all that he did.

Right. Because in his incarnation, he really created a new humanity. It's weird to think about, but it says that we who are in Christ are a new creation. Yeah. It's incredible because he's called the second Adam.

So that as Adam started his covenant head of the world, falling into sin, we all fell with him so that all who are found in Christ are a part of that new humanity that is linked so strongly with the Godhead that it says that we partake in his divine nature, which is, it's just, it's incredible.

Yeah. I don't have time to get into that, but we wish I could. It's fun. It's good stuff.

I went dark on you. I think I have a short in my light here. Can you see me?

You'll see me pretty good. Yeah, I can see you pretty good. Okay.

My light went out and so we're not going to worry about it.

I had to look at mine. I've only got one bulb. It goes out to be completely dark down here.

We'll go with what we got. Anyway. All right. Let's, let's jump into the first one of chapter three. I'll give some initial thoughts and you can jump in. Let us know what you think. Therefore, holy brethren partakers of the heavenly calling, consider Jesus the apostle and high priest of our confession.

What I see in that is he, he's addressing a specific people. Holy brethren, your dedicated set apart brethren. You're not, God has called you out. You're, you're partakers in this. You've been saved. You've been born again.

You are his children. You are his, his kingdom. So he's making this thing. Basically he's making a distinction. And then he says partakers of the heavenly calling. And for me, they're using that terminology goes back to when Jesus says, my kingdom is not of this world.

It comes from heaven, but it um, has earthly effects. Yeah. And then I thought about this too, on that last part, consider Jesus. And I was interested to hear your thoughts, consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession.

To me, it seems like the author and, and in your estimation, you think it's Paul. Um, it seems like he is kind of recapping before he jumps into, you were telling us he's, he's going to be talking about Moses.

To me, it's almost like he's recapping. So you've got the, he says our high priest. Well, in, in chapter one, he talks about Jesus when he made purification of sin and he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high.

So, you know, just like the priest would, they would make purification of sins, but they never got to sit down. They were, they were continually making, um, intercession and purification for sin, but Jesus made purification for sin and sat down.

Um, so there's your high priest. And then he's also our apostle, which is messenger sent one. And, um, he, the, the Paul, the author or whoever the author is of Hebrews just finished talking, talking about angels.

So he's greater than the high priest. He's greater than the angels. And do you think that the author here is kind of recapping what he just talked about when he uses that terminology of apostles and high.

Priest? Yeah, absolutely. Um, what, one of the, uh, East Eastern thinking Jewish thinking, um, in the time, uh, it isn't necessarily like, um, it's not necessarily like the way we think, uh, here in America, you know, Western type thinking where we, we kind of think here's your starting point.

And then I'm going to go through this step in this step in this step. And then I'll end up at the finish line. Uh, the, uh, the Eastern way of thinking is that you start somewhere and you ruminate on it.

You kind of touch back a little bit where you were and you kind of start over and you go over and over to where you're, you're touching a lot of the same things over and over again, but from slightly different angles as you go through the same idea again and again.

So as he's going through this, he's picking back up the things that he said before in order to build his case. He's kind of, you know, working his way through and carrying it along almost in instead of a straight line, it's almost like a bunch of spirals linking together where he's, he's pulling the information together.

So you'll see him, uh, you know, in chapter one, talking about creation, chapter two, him becoming a man, chapter three, he'll bring in, uh, some of Moses and then he'll start getting into, um, some of the, the regulations from the old covenant.

And as he gets in the regulations of the old covenant, he's going to bring in the new covenant and he's going to continue to go on and on throughout the book of Hebrews, um, showing from creation to glory, how Christ is better than, than anything you could ask, think, or imagine.

Verse two, he was faithful.

To him who appointed him as Moses also was in all his house where he was, where he has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses by just so much as the builder of the house has more honor.

Than the house. Yeah. It says, uh, his house, who do you think the his is in verse two,.

This is Moses was also faithful in all his house. In my version, it's capitalized.

In my version, it says God's. So they went ahead and interpreted it for you. There you go. Um, but yeah, I, I'd agree that cause he's talking about, especially on down towards the end, it's actually says God's house and Christ's house.

And so it's, it's interesting. Um, the one who's appointed him was being God, uh, just as Moses was faithful in all of God's house being, um, God's, uh, house. Now what is God's house? Now that's, that's the question.

How do you identify it? Cause I mean, you could automatically, I, I would think of the temple, but I don't know because especially down here at the end of verse six, this is, uh, and we are his house.

If indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting and our hope. So Christ was the head of the house of God, being the people of God, just as Moses was, uh, in charge or was the head or the faithful servant of God's house over the people while he was there.

And it says, and Jesus has been counted of more counted worthy of more glory than Moses. Now that's incredible because Moses actually led the people physically through the red sea out of Egypt, through the wilderness, met with God on the mountain, gave them the law, uh, sat and judged them, you know, as a people for a long time, uh, during his life.

And he didn't quite pass over into the promised land, but he, he was right there as a figurehead and leader for the people of Israel for God's house. During that time, Jesus didn't do that. Kind of. He didn't do that while he was on the earth.

You didn't see Jesus, you know, gathering all of Israel to come and bring all their problems to him. You didn't see Jesus lead people through the red sea. You didn't see Jesus perform while he did perform miracles.

Uh, but you didn't see him in that public figurehead role. And yet it's saying that he has more glory coming to him. He's worthy of more glory than Moses. Now, how could that be? If all you take into consideration is what he did, uh, politically or as what we would consider being a leader.

But the fact of the matter is that he did so much more than Moses, because what Moses set up as a type in a shadow of Christ fulfilled. And I think I'm jumping ahead of myself, but it's just incredible that he, uh, he's counted worthy of more glory than Moses because he has done, uh, much more as it says in the last half of verse three, as much more glory as the builder of the house has, uh, than the house itself.

Moses, in fact, I think I preached on this at one point. I think the title of my sermon was just another brick in the wall. Uh, Moses was just another brick in the wall. He was just another part of the house of God.

And as he was just another part of the house of God, uh, Christ is higher and more and better than him worthy of more glory and honor because Christ isn't just another brick in the wall. Even though he became man, he also was sent by God as God in the form of man to, uh, truly man, to build this house of God, to bring many sons to glory, as it says before.

It says that verse four for every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God. Absolutely. God in the flesh, Christ and God, the father speaking from heaven, the Holy spirit hovering over the whole situation and making it, making it, uh, happen.

God, father,.

Son, and spirit right there. Great. I'll just make two quick observations here on what we just read. Um, building on what you were talking about, the, the verses here talking about a building, a house is to me, it seems like that is a key theme that is woven all throughout the new Testament in the gospels.

You have the gospels talking about, um, we, we are his workmanship. And then you have, um, the gospels and the new Testament talking about us being, being stones, being living stones. Jesus is the chief cornerstone.

Uh, we are built one upon the other on the foundation of the, the, the apostles. Um, you, um, and then you have this, this language of a new Jerusalem. Uh, we are individually temples of the Holy spirit and collectively, we are the temple of God, a city of Jerusalem.

Um, this new heavens, a new earth, this, the new temple, that language, that theme is, is all over the new Testament. Um, I think as you and I have discussed multiple times, uh, in different podcasts, talk about eschatology and post millennialism, partial preterism.

Uh, there's the connection there, uh, with what, how we're being described and then this eschatological language. And then the, the other observation that I made real quick is, um, there, there's no way that you can, um, understand God to be a deistic kind of God.

Even just looking at the first three chapters of Hebrews in Hebrews chapter one, he, we are, we see that God is the creator. Jesus, God through Jesus created the world. Okay. So we have a creator. What kind of creator is it?

What is the, you know, did you just wind up the clock and, and let us go? Um, he's also the, the builder of his house. So he is a creator who is invested and, um, actively participating with his creation, building a house.

Yep. Yep.

This is really, really cool. Um, yeah, verse five is, is, uh, it says now Moses was faithful, was faithful in all God's house as a servant. So he was faithful among God's people as a servant, uh, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later.

So what was Moses there for? Um, he was there to speak about things that were going to be explained more fully later. Um, Moses didn't write the greatest song in the world. It was just a tribute type of type of thing.

He, um, and it says this, but Christ is faithful over God's house as a son. Now the son has ownership. Uh, the son has, it says he's heir of all things and God's house. It says here in the next line or next sentences, and we are his house, but Christ is so go back, but Christ is faithful over God's house.

Us as a son, one who has ownership, one who has taken a vested interest in us. One who has, who has come alongside, who has entered into humanity to bring humanity up to, uh, where God is that we may be able to see him face to face.

Um, so that we can partake in the divine nature in some form or fashion. Um, it is incredible. Um, but here, here's the thing about it, that it says that he was faithful over God's house as a son. So Christ is faithful over his people because he came, he died.

He took the sins of men upon himself. He buried them with them. He rose again on the third day. He sat at the right hand of the father in heaven and, um, rules and reigns still from there until this very day.

And it says, and we are his house. If indeed we hold fast our confidence and boasting and our hope. So it calls out to us to remember, it says up there, consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest, the one who was sent and the one who actually put the blood on the altar of our confession.

The one, the one faith delivered to the saints. We're called here to listen to Christ, to consider Jesus and what he has done. And then to have a bold confidence to where it's almost boasting that this is my God who has come and become man like me so that I can leave, um, the sin that I have behind and join him as he makes me perfect and sinless.

And it says that we're, we're supposed to have a confidence and a hope. So I would encourage everyone today to do just that, to consider Christ, to look to him, to find in him the great high priest and apostle who comes to take away the sins of men, who has been faithful with every person he has called to himself.

He's never let one of his adopted brothers and sisters go by the wayside and to trust in him and find him to be your perfect savior. Cause that is what this, this section of Hebrews is really all about.

Christ as the Builder of God's House and the Greater Glory of Jesus

Yeah. Yeah. They're so influenced by, well, they have no choice, but be influenced by their past. And of course, Hebrews is explaining to them, don't look back. Don't go back. Consider Jesus as better than this, as better than he's your high priest.

He's your apostle. He's, he is your better Moses. He's the one that Moses was pointing to. He's better than all that. And he is the builder of this house. Be faithful to him. Don't turn back. Don't go back.

And as Dan said, we would encourage everyone that would, that would listen to us, even just for a brief moment to come to Christ, be in his house and, and be, be safe, be found safe there. That's the only place of refuge there is in this world is to be in his house.

And we need for you to be there. Any last words, Dan?

Nope. Cool. Cool. Ended on a good note. We'll stay there.

Ending with Jesus and talking about the gospel is always ending on a good note. So let me, let me pray this out. Father, we thank you for allowing us to get together. Thank you for your revelation to us that we may understand the things that you would have us to know about who you are, about your son, about your creation, your world, your, your building, your, your spiritual work, your physical work, and the, the ability and the chance to be yours, to be partakers in the heavenly calling, to be holy brethren, to be a part of this house and to enjoy your creation, to have joy that is nowhere to be found apart from you.

And so father, we're grateful and we're blessed and we want to live for you and glorify you. Thank you for our time together. And we pray all these things in Jesus name. Amen. All right. Thank you, Dan.

Thank you everybody for watching. We really appreciate you watching the truth and love podcast. We, um, check out Reform Recon, go back and watch the, uh, Reform Berean, his podcast tonight, check out Claude and his teaching on Thursday nights, the labors podcast coming up next week on baptismal regeneration.

I got a lot of good stuff coming out through the love network. Go check out laborsconference .com conference coming up at the end of April. We just want you to remember as always that Jesus is King. That's what we've been talking about.

Go live in the victory of Christ. Go speak with the authority of Christ and go share the gospel of Christ. Hope to see you real soon.