The Point of Hebrews (Part 1)

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Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the

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Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.�

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In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you.

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By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her

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King. Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry.

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My name is Mike Abendroth. And why is this on my desk? This is a special card that I have.

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I know it�s backwards there for you viewers, but it says, �Find Strength Through Adversity.�

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And it has a few things here. Sorry, I was just eating an orange. It has a few things here in case you�re going through tough times, so I�d like to help you.

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You can consider me, Mike Abendroth, your personal life coach. And for a small fee,

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I�ll help coach you every day, Monday through Wednesday, and sometimes on Thursdays and Fridays.

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Have another player tell you about a time she, he, zee thought they would never succeed.

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Help the other player understand that God always wants them to succeed. That�s a game.

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Great people aren�t those who are happy at times of convenience and content, but are so in times of catastrophe and controversy, according to Dr.

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Martin Luther King. Have you ever faced catastrophe? If so, how? Unsee for the game today.

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Turn your face to the sunshine and all shadows fall behind. What if it�s kind of snowy out right now?

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Said Helen Keller, a deaf -blind woman who became a role model for millions of people. Tell everyone about a time when you kept walking to the sunshine instead of dwelling in the shadows.

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Oh no, I�m walking on sunshine, it�s time to feel good. Well, my name is Mike Abendroth, we�re talking today about Jesus, the great high priest, in the book of Hebrews.

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And friend, while maybe your background is Roman Catholic, and you�re thinking to yourself, I don�t really like priests, in the sense of office, we�re not talking about a particular person, but I don�t like the office,

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I don�t need a priest, I can go directly to God. And I don�t have to go confess my sins to a priest,

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I don�t have to get absolution from a priest, I don�t have to get sacraments from a priest,

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I am a priest, a priesthood of all believers. And I understand what you�re saying, but you still need a priest to access the thrice holy

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God. You have to have a mediator. This is Jesus� role, of course he was a prophet and a king, but he�s also an advocate.

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There�s one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. Job talks about an arbitrator, an umpire, in Job chapter 9.

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I�ve said before that what makes heaven heaven is you�re in the presence of God with a mediator, and what makes hell hell is you�re in the presence of God without a mediator.

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And you ought to think to yourself, priest, and of course the Old Testament was helping you with Leviticus and Mosaic Law, Exodus, what was a high priest, who were able to be high priest, and what were their functions.

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But you, Christian, need a high priest. No one in their own sinful stead, our lives, could approach

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God without a high priest. And therefore the pinnacle of God�s revelation, the pinnacle of God�s working, the pinnacle of the priesthood, is not found in the

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Levitical priesthood, the Aaronic priesthood, it�s found in a different kind of priesthood that David tells us about in Psalm 110, harkening back to Genesis 14.

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The priesthood of Melchizedek.

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Therefore today on No Compromise Radio, I want to remind you of this high priest from the book of Hebrews, chapter 8, so that you, if you�re ever tempted to be discouraged, if you�re ever tempted to go back to whatever kind of system, it could be

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Judaism, it could be Rome, any kind of sacerdotal priestly system, that you don�t go back.

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And this passage in this section helps everyone, including me, to be motivated to endure.

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Now, you might not be going through what the recipients of this letter were going through.

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Persecution, losing their homes, losing their material goods on the run, and eventually probably some of them died.

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But whatever it might be, you can be encouraged to endure.

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Real motivation for endurance. And it says in chapter 8, verse 1, �Now the point in what we are saying is this, we have such a high priest, one who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the majesty in heaven.�

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What motivates you to obey? Why obey today? Why love your wife today?

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Why submit to your husband today? Why evangelize today? Why get stuff done around the house today?

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Why read your Bible today? Why worship the Lord Jesus today? Why honor God today?

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Why be sexually pure today? Why be a good dad today? Why be a good worker today if you have to work?

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Why be a good Christian? What�s the reason you obey? And maybe you say, �Well,

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I have a duty to do that.� Maybe you say, �I have to stand before God, and I don�t want to lose my standing before God.�

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You could say a lot of things. And I�m not saying those things are right things, quite the opposite, and that last one especially.

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But we obey not to secure our legal standing. We obey for many reasons, but one is to show evidence of and to show fruit of our legal standing.

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That�s right. If I say to you, �Obey ,� and that�s all

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I tell you, here�s the crux of it. If I tell you you need to obey God, okay, so far so good.

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You need to love God, so far so good. You need to love your neighbor, so far so good.

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Whatever the commands are in Scripture that are applicable to you, you need to do that, so far so good.

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But if I only tell you, �Obey, obey, obey, obey, obey, obey ,� and by the way, that�s what we get a lot of in churches, including some churches that preach the

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Bible verse by verse. If it�s just simply, �Obey, you�ve got to obey four more rules to do today ,� and there�s no talk about who

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Jesus is, there�s no talk about His work and His life and how it applies to even the

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Christian life, then two things are going to happen. One, pride, because you will hear those sermons and you�ll say, �I need to do those ,� and then you�ll do those, and they won�t be perfectly, they won�t be, there�s a jogger just going down the street, they won�t be perfectly done.

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You�ll examine your life and you�ll say, �I think I do that ,� because if your standing before God requires that, or if your relationship with God is simply, �I just have to obey

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Him ,� you�ll be prideful or you�ll show despair. Most of the time this happens,

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I think, because you think, �How could I ever do this? I just fall so short.�

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Therefore, when you�re telling people to obey, even if you�re a parent and you�re telling your children to obey, which you should, sometimes

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I have to tell your children to obey, the hope that you have,

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Christian, the hope that your children have, receiving your orders to obey, can�t be, ultimately, in your obedience.

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That can�t be the ultimate hope. Your ultimate hope has to be in Christ�s obedience,

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His fulfilling the law. If your hope is in your own progress, then you need to have the greater hope outside of yourself.

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Yes, it is God who works in you, both to work and to will for His good pleasure.

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Jerry Bridges says it this way, �Just as we, by faith, look to Christ for our righteous standing before God, so by faith we are to look to Him for the enabling power to live the

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Christian life. This power comes to us as a result of our vital and living union with Him �Just as by faith we look to Christ for our righteous standing.�

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We do, so, by faith we look to Christ for the enabling power to live the Christian life. Now, I just saw Beth there. Hey, Beth, Denton, Texas. I don�t know what�s going on there in Denton, Texas today, but I bet you the weather�s better there.

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Although, it snows sometimes, I think. I went to Love Field once and it was snowing at Love Field in Dallas and I couldn�t land.

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How about that? Just as we look, just as by faith we look to Christ, Beth, you're messing me up here, for our righteous standing, we do, so believe in the

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Lord Jesus Christ, you shall be saved. So by faith we are to look to Him for the enabling power to live the Christian life.

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This power comes to us as a result of our vital and living union with Him. Now see, that's where you get hope.

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That's where you get encouragement, and you fail, and you falter, and you're fickle, and you're...

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How do you like that for alliteration? And you fall, fail, falter, fickle, let's make nouns verbs.

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And so what's your hope? You know what? You have died to the guilt of sin because you are in Christ, and Jesus will never count sins against you because they've been counted against Him.

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And you've been delivered from the reigning power of sin, and you are able by the

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Spirit's power to honor God, not to keep your standing, but because of your standing.

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Horatious Bonar is a man that you should read, and he really focuses on this idea of understanding who

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Jesus is and having a union with Him for your Christian obedience. Here's what he says.

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The secret of a believer's holy walk is... Now the ones... Once people start talking that way, I kind of get...

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It's a little sketchy. What's the preferred, secret, insightful, gnostic kind of deal here?

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Well, this is different because it's going to be true. The secret of the believer's holy walk is his continual recurrence to the blood of the

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Now, that doesn't sound like a lot of pietistic, moralistic, legalistic, neo -nomistic sermons that I hear.

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All divine life and all precious fruits of it, pardon, peace, and holiness spring from your hard work.

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The sixth Sola of the Reformation, Sola, bootstraps him. See, no, that's not true because the sixth

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Sola of the Reformation is Sola Homeschula. Pardon, peace, and holiness spring from the cross.

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All fancied sanctification, Horatious says, which does not arise wholly from the blood of the cross is nothing better than Phariseeism.

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If we would be holy, we must get to the cross and dwell there, else, notwithstanding all our labor, diligence, fasting, praying, and good works, we shall be yet void of real sanctification, destitute of those humble, gracious tempers which accompany a clear view of the cross.

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Now, see, that's what's so wonderful about the book of Hebrews, because he won't let you up for error. He won't let you up for morality error.

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There are plenty of commands and calls to obey in the book of Hebrews. Matter of fact, there are some stark warnings in the book of Hebrews, are there not?

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But the bulk of the commands for the Christian are in chapter 13, marriage bed undefiled, be content with what you have, remember your leaders, et cetera.

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The majority of the book is pointing to the Lord Jesus Christ and his priestly work on your behalf for the honor of the

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Father. That's what he's doing over and over and over. He will not let you deviate to a bunch of kind of how -to things.

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He wants you to think through things. He wants you to repent. He wants me to repent, to think differently, to change your mind, because if you change your mind, then everything else will change.

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And then the reasons you change, your actions will have, will be understood in your mind so you can be motivated to do it.

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Here's what Horatius Bonhoeffer goes on to say, false ideas of holiness are common, not only among those who profess false religions,

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I mean, we'd all say that their way of holiness is wrong and they're climbing on glass and they're cutting themselves and they're bowing down to some kind of weird image, but among those who profess the true, false holiness can be, you could have a false view of holiness.

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The love of God to us and our love to Him work together for producing holiness.

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Terror accomplishes no real obedience. Suspense brings forth no fruit unto holiness.

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No gloomy uncertainty as to God's favor can subdue one lust or correct our crookedness of will.

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But the free pardon of the cross uproots sin and withers all its branches. Only the certainty of love, forgiving love can do this.

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Now let's just stop for a second and think about this. Christian, you're forgiven. Can you imagine?

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Every single sin you have committed or will is forgiven. Remember that thing you did that you don't want anybody else to know?

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Forgiven. Remember those things in your closet? Forgiven. I regularly think about society now and people are going back, you know, 30 years and digging up dirt on people and then making them unqualified and some of that probably needs to happen.

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You go back to my life before I was a Christian, there's plenty to disqualify me from probably every political office in America, but I'm not disqualified from being a

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Christian. Why? Because I'm forgiven. Yes, I'm forgiven. I can't forget the things.

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One of the reasons I want to get to heaven, of course, I'd love to see the Lord Jesus, but I know that once and for all, all those skeletons,

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I'll think about them rightly. Oh, if I could only go back. But you know what?

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Jesus paid for those. I'm forgiven. He doesn't hold any of those things against me. He doesn't remember them.

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He's put them behind his back. He's cast them into the deepest sea. He'll remember them no more. Jesus paid for them on the cross.

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My awful sins. The things that I haven't even done, but just thought of.

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And so what's my response? Yeah, whatever. I'll just take advantage of that. I'm thinking he loved me and he gave himself for me.

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And he demonstrated and demonstrates his love for me that while I was yet a sinner, he died for me.

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And when you have a certainty of love, when you have a certainty of a forgiving love, as Horatius calls it, when you have certainty of free pardon, you're pardoned.

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Pardoned. Then you're motivated and it'll be an enduring motivation. I mean, all of us can just kind of duty it, but it's very interesting when you think, what is the ongoing motivation?

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Horatius ends the section and says, free and warm reception into the divine favor is the strongest of all motives in leading a man to seek conformity to him who has thus freely forgiven him all his trespasses.

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That's it. That's right. We're not the antinomians that people call us because we want to think about our union with Christ and think about our standing with Christ that cannot be changed and think about the love of Christ and nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.

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You think if anybody did that for me, I would be in debt for them. Can you imagine someone that saves somebody's life?

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And they think, you know what? I'm in debt to you. Thank you for what you've done. It's the guilt, grace, and gratitude.

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Drake is here and he says, Hebrews was one of the most influential tool used by God to keep me from crossing both the

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Tiber River and the Bosphorus EO. Greetings and blessings from Mount Vernon, Washington.

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Well, you know, here's the thing. I know the Tiber and I've seen the Tiber. Maybe I spit in the Tiber. I didn't need to spit in the

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Tiber because it was pretty polluted. I looked down below and I thought, I think that's where they filmed the

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Mission Impossible scene or something like that. But I don't know the Bosphorus. What's an EO?

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Drake, what's an EO? Bosphorus. And is it like sulfur and Bosphorus?

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And I don't know what the Bosphorus is. EO, equal opportunity EO, equivalent organization, the

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Bosphorus, the Tiber River and the Bosphorus. Well, maybe they go together. Maybe there's a lot of phosphorus in the

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Bosphorus. I have no idea what that is. Christian. Oh, Eastern Orthodoxy.

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Duh. Okay, now I get it. See, I'm just, I'm thinking about other things right now. I'm not thinking about that.

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So, thank you. I appreciate it. What's the motivation for Christian living? If it's just obey, then despair or pride.

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If it's, here's who Jesus is. In light of what he's done, in light of your guilt and in light of his grace, here's gratitude.

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That is a sustaining motivation. That is an enduring motivation. That's the kind of motivation the writer of Hebrews gives to those people, those dear people who are really suffering.

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Much more than most of us are suffering. Yes, there's some awful things going on in China and around the world. I understand that.

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But most of the people that listen to me, you're probably not suffering like these people at all. And the writer,

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Paul, or whoever it might be, knows long -term focus needs to be on the

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Lord Jesus Christ. Frankly, the people know, you know what? I need to get some food. I need to get some water.

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I need to do the five steps for living. I need to grab the kids and take them out of school. I need to figure out some kind of pack.

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I can put some extra food in. And they didn't have ammo at the time, but you know, they could have knives. You know to do that.

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But what you forget is like, oh, wait a second. In the light of all this, hey kids, we don't have a lot of time, but let's just kneel down and pray and say,

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Lord, we know who you are. And the worst thing that can happen to us is we'll get persecuted and die and go to heaven.

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It would be an honor to be persecuted. Built into our system, we want to survive and we want to live and we'd like to be free.

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And I'd like my kids to grow up in something different than this. We need some wisdom and we need some protection and we need some help.

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And we can trust in you. So Lord, help us to do what's in Proverbs, to trust in you with all our heart, to lean not on our own understanding.

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Help us to acknowledge you in all our ways. And we know you'll make our path straight and we're frightened.

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We're scared and we got to go now. So Lord help us. That would be the hard part is to remember that the easy part is grab your stuff, grab a bag, everybody grab a backpack.

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Don't put stuff in it that you don't need. Let's get some stuff that we do need. Let's fill it up with food and some weapons and run.

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That's basically what's going to happen. So the writer in the book of Hebrews is making a transition now from the end of chapter seven to chapter eight, because he's been talking about the son and his greatness.

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And he's going to say, this is kind of a pinnacle. This is a high point of who the Lord Jesus is.

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And it's going to lend him to talk about the covenant, the new covenant, the greater covenant.

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So we have the great high priest, essentially chapters one to seven. And then we have the great priesthood's covenant, the great priest's covenant in chapter eight and following.

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A new covenant, a better covenant, a lasting covenant, a covenant that's been established because of the

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Lord Jesus' life and death. A covenant that means Moses' covenant gone, abolished, fulfilled 86th.

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If you look at the idea that lends itself and bleeds into chapter eight is verse 22 of the previous chapter in chapter seven.

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This makes Jesus the guarantor of a better covenant. And that's what's going to go on in chapter eight.

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You've got a covenant that's obsolete because of who Jesus is. And then now, since we understood who he is, let's understand the covenant and what is entailed in the covenant.

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And it ends in chapter eight, verse 12, well, ends in verse 13, but 12, for I will be merciful toward their iniquities and I will remember their sins no more.

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That's the kind of Jesus that this is going to be stressing.

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And if you take a look at the word covenant, that's like the key word in chapter eight. If I said Hebrews eight,

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I want you to say covenant because where do you find this? It says in verse six, as the covenant he mediates is better.

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Verse seven, the first covenant. Verse eight, a new covenant. Verse nine, not like the covenant

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I made with their fathers. Later in verse nine, nor do they continue in my covenant.

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Verse 10, for this is the covenant that I will make over and over and over. Verse 13, and speaking of a new covenant, he makes the first one obsolete and what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.

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The writer wants you to say, we have a great priest and this great priest is a mediator of a great covenant.

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No one's better than this Jesus. And in light of that, I think of Hebrews quotation of Jeremiah 31.

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But before we get there, which will probably have to be next time, Jeremiah nine, thus says the Lord, let not the wise man boast in his wisdom.

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Let not the mighty man boast in his might. Let not the self -righteous man boast in his law keeping.

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Oh, sorry, that's not in there. Sorry. Let not the rich man boast in his riches. I heard one pastor say, don't boast in your brains.

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That's the wisdom. Don't boast in your might, that's brawn. And don't boast in your riches, that's bucks.

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So if you want the alliteration, you don't boast in your brawn, your brains are your bucks.

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And also don't boast in your 86th.

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Terry, 86th. I'm a Christian, so I don't know what that term refers to. 89, you know, 2017 is behind us.

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1986, you say when you were in 87. But let him who boast, boast in this, that he understands.

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See, can't you just hear Hebrews? That he understands and knows me.

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That I am Yahweh, Yahweh the Father, Yahweh the Son, Yahweh the Spirit, who practices steadfast love, justice.

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I'm not gonna say anything there, but I could. And righteousness in the earth. For in these things,

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I delight declares Yahweh. Yahweh the Father, Yahweh the Son, Yahweh the Spirit. That will give you long lasting motivation to do those things.

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To say, you know what? I can't go inside of me. I have to go outside of me.

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I have to think up. I have to think out. I have to think even with the reformation, not

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Christ in me, first of all. Although that's true, but Christ for me.

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And that's what the book of Hebrews, Christ is for me. Christian, Christ is for you. And if he's for you, who could be against you?

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Because even if people are against you, and I'm sure they are against you, or will be. If you have

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Christ for you, it doesn't matter. Anyway, my name is Mike Abendroth. And I've learned what the EO is.

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And I've learned what 86 is. And I've learned that it snows in Denton, Texas once in a while.

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I'm gonna come back in just a few minutes for the final Facebook live today on the NoCo channel.

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And we'll talk a little bit more about Hebrews. God bless you. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's Word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

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Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston.

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You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.