A Hope of Heaven

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically from the audio and may contain small errors.

Good morning. I will never forget the very first morning that my wife and I had as husband and wife. It was a very strange morning, obviously. I was now a husband. That was cool. And my wife was a wife, obviously, and that was cool. But after I got up and after we just started talking just for a minute, my wife kind of looked at me and she says, okay, okay. She goes, I'm paraphrasing at this point, but she goes, you got me. You could be some mastermind criminal, but you got me. I don't know if that was exactly what you said, but it was something less dramatic that I'm sure, but essentially, she was just kind of like, not flabbergasted, but just kind of realizing like right there in the moment, just like, this is it, right? It's done, you know? What's that? I'm stuck. I don't think she used that phrase. You're being colorful now, babe. I cry in the middle of the sermon. You don't know why. Since then, since that

day, my wife has very slowly come around to the fact that I'm not a mastermind criminal. And truly, truly, we are, we're doing well. There's lots of trust between us, except when when it comes to salted caramel. And I don't know where she hides that, and I'm a little sad about it. But if salted caramel is not involved, there's a lot of trust between us, okay?

It is so good. It is so good. I'm not trying to brag, I'm just trying to say, it is so good to be in a secure relationship. It's just good. There really is nothing like it. It's just good. And as good as that is, it is equally as bad when that relationship is insecure, when you are on thin ice, when things are shaky. And not a little shaky, not like you forgot to lock the door again shaky, but like really shaky, really on thin ice, where every time, every time, like if we were, if my wife and I were on thin ice, every time she were upset, I would really wonder, will she leave me this time? Will she leave now because she's this upset? If we were really shaky and I messed up, and I messed up big time, I would have no incentive to tell her about it. I would want to hide that for fear that she would leave me.

That's what an insecure relationship looks like. And so when you're starting to talk about having a difficult conversation, hard honesty, no. That's not happening. The relationship can't handle it, right? It's insecure. It's shaky. Good marriage, as we know this, good marriages, even just good friendships, should be able to withstand or take hard honesty. They should... it is a sign of a healthy relationship

that it is moving into a type of healthy security. That is a good thing. Today, in our verses, what we're going to be doing, we're going to be moving from happily ever after, which is, you know, kind of what we're talking about, to eternal life. Okay? We're not talking about marriages or friendships anymore. We're talking about our eternal relationship with the Father. I want you to open to Hebrews chapter 10 verses 26, following. We're going to pick up where Daniel Oster left off last week. And where he left off last week in verse 25, it says, Hey, don't forget, don't neglect meeting together. Okay. And in verse 26, honestly, it seems like it's taking a left turn. So last week, don't give up on meeting together. And then in 26 and 27 of Hebrews chapter 10, it says, for if we go on sinning deliberately, Like okay, here we are if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth there no longer remains a

sacrifice for sins but a fearful expectation of judgment and a fury of fire that will consume the Adversaries, how do you do on a Sunday morning? I mean you said hey, hey, don't neglect meeting up together For if we go on sinning, okay And what this is doing, this is circling back to the idea of sinning deliberately. And I say circling back because in Hebrews already we have touched on this. It's in Hebrews chapter five verses 11 through, five eleven through chapter six verse nine. So the end of five, the beginning of six, dealing with its exact same thing. I preached on that before. If you want to go back and look, it's the May 1st sermon. It's called a promise higher than negligence. May 1st, 2022, a promise higher than negligence. You wanna look at those verses, Hebrews 5, 11 through 6, 9. When we read these verses, when we misunderstand these verses,

when we read these verses in isolation, it perpetuates a belief that we can lose or earn our salvation from Jesus. And in the same way, in a shaky marriage, how you cannot be real, how there can really, truly be no security, how you're always feeling like you are on thin ice, right? When we feel that way with Jesus, whenever we feel like we're on thin ice with the Lord God in heaven, then every difficulty threatens condemnation eternally.

Every difficulty threatens condemnation. Every doubt is potentially the beginning of the end. And I just ask you, how could anybody, anybody, any human alive, how could they have security in a relationship like that? How can we approach the throne of grace with confidence? What Daniel Oster preached on last week. How can we do that? How can we have any confidence at all? And we know how that works. It doesn't, there is no confidence. There is no security. You can't bring up hard things. If you're always worrying about losing the relationship, and you're not secure in that relationship, you're a mess. You're a mess. And that truly is not the kind of relationship that Jesus wants with us, where we are continually wondering if we are safe, where we are always afraid that if we mess up too bad, that we're going to be condemned forever. That's not the kind of relationship Jesus wants with us.

Jesus wants us, I want to just be super clear here, Jesus wants us to have a sure hope of our salvation. I just want to let that sink in just a second. Jesus wants you to have a sure hope of your salvation. This is the series that we've been in where we talk about a higher hope. Two weeks ago, we talked about a hope of perfection. Last week, we talked about a confident hope, a hope whereby we have confidence. Today, we're going to be talking about a sure hope, a hope of heaven, a hope of eternity. But to see that, to see that we absolutely need context when we read verses like Hebrews 10, 26, and 27. So I want to begin again in those verses. They say, again, if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries.

Okay, in summary, if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the truth, the only thing we can expect is a fearful expectation of judgment. Here's the situation. And I want to be really clear, because it matters. The situation that this is describing is if you are in a pattern of willful sin, willful rejection of the Lord, you acknowledge that you are doing that and you do not care. Okay, so I'm going to be real specific. You are rebelling against the Lord God in heaven. You have full knowledge of what you are doing and you are doing it on purpose and you do not care. What those verses are saying is that the only thing waiting for you is judgment because you are acting as an enemy of God If you are doing this you are acting as an enemy of God The only thing that you can expect the only thing you should expect is what enemies of God get eternal judgment

And there's more description of this in the next two verses So Hebrews 10 28 It says, if anyone, sorry, excuse me, anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. So he's making a quick allusion to the Old Testament. And he says, look, under the old covenant, okay, it was, let's remember that was pretty harsh, right? Old covenant, two or three witnesses, you died quickly. Next verse, verse 29. How much worse punishment do you think will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified and has outraged the Spirit of grace. Okay, so what these three things do right here, they give us insight into what it means to go on sinning deliberately. What does that look like? You are you are trampling underfoot the Son of God

You are profaning or making or you're defiling The blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified You're unsanctifying the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified and then lastly you are Outraging the spirit of grace what the author of Hebrews is telling the church right here is watch look Notice people that are spurning grace notice people that are reviling the Holy Spirit If they act like God's enemy, they probably are Right if you are if you say for example, and you know for this for this church here if people say like I'm a Christian But they are they are doing things like that They are trembling enough for the Son of God profaning the blood of the covenant Outraging the spirit of grace if they are doing those things, right if they're willful and they are doing those things What the what the preacher in Hebrews what he's telling the church is they are God's enemy in our own lives

Not just when we're noticing other people in our own lives What what the Hebrews what Hebrews these verses and Hebrews are telling us is to look out for what we are calling spiritual negligence Spiritual negligence this brings us back a few months. We've talked about spiritual negligence before it's really helpful in Hebrews 511 through 6 9 it's also really helpful here spiritual Negligence, let's just talk about it for a second so that we understand it When you are in spiritual negligence when you are negligent of your kind of spiritual life, okay? This is a there should be That should set off an alarm for you. Let me describe what spiritual negligence is, right? It is three things. It is cyclical, willful, and progressive. So cyclical, and I'm just getting all of this from the verses that we've read already. It's cyclical. It says if we go on sinning. In other words, we're not talking about one-offs, right?

We're talking about something that continues to happen. And look, we all sin, and we all sin repeatedly. So please hear me when I say those things. What we're talking about here with cyclical, it's a merry-go-round that you cannot get off of. It's a merry-go-round you cannot get off of. The second is willful. And we just picked this up in the word deliberately. If you go on sending deliberately, specifically we are talking about spiritual apathy, right? And so in verse 25, in Hebrews 10:25, what Daniel was preaching on last week, It's talking about missing church services, basically, not being a part physically, a part of your body, and you don't care, right? If it's deliberate, you just don't care. You ignore the spirit's prompting, and it doesn't bother you, right? This is willful disobedience. If you have children, you know the difference between an accidental

disobedience and a willful disobedience. Up until they're about 13 you can see it in their eyes man. You know when they hit 13 they get smarter I don't they just they they learned to change. I don't know they change their eyes, but But like when you I mean when you you know you watch a one watch a one-year-old disobey It's here. You could see it man. You know they're just like like they put their hands on something you say no no and

They just shoot you that way That's willful disobedience. Okay, that's exactly what that is. So we're talking about something willful. We're also talking about something progressive. Verse 29, what we just read, right? So maybe just say it this way. We don't start, no one starts as, you know, they're starting out as a believer or they're starting out kind of like exploring the gospel. They don't start by trampling the Son of God underfoot or profaning the blood of the But sin has a way of pulling you in, right? So sin, it starts with maybe some unresolved frustration. But then it pulls you into hatred.

And then it pulls you into malice, physically doing things against people that you hate. It starts maybe with an unrepentant, lustful thought. But then it turns into fantasy. And then it turns into an affair It starts with unaddressed doubt It turns into put sin pulls you into deep anxiety over that and then you continue to get pulled into self-harm It doesn't we don't start with malice. We don't start with an affair. We don't start with self-harm We start with very small things that then lure us in slowly But surely what spiritual negligence is is all three of those not one or two of those, but it's cyclical It's willful and it's progressive spiritual negligence is all three and so I just It's almost impossible to kind of formulate some kind of diagram to help you understand if you're in spiritual negligence or not I don't even know if I would ever want to publish such a thing. It just seems weird, but I

Do want to ask you some questions It's a lot of questions. I just want you to interact with them kind of in your mind. If you say things out loud, that's on you. Just saying. If you want to confess it, that's cool. What kinds of things do you find yourself getting upset over? Is it the stock market? You're really upset over that? What about politics? You're really upset over that? Oh, I heard some murmurs. What about how other people think about you. Get real upset about that. Somebody, somebody misrepresents your intentions. Do you get that upset over the spiritual condition of other people? Honestly? What about, what about subjects that you want to linger over? Right? What about that category? Things you like to talk about? Is it politics, political landscape? You know, is it art, culture? Is it your yard? I don't know if some of you love talking I'm not your yard.

Goodness gracious. Your family? I don't know some of you, I can just ask about your kid, and I'm there for 30 minutes. I mean, that's it, man. Or your grandkid. I mean, tell me about your grandkid. Oh, I pull up a chair, it's time to sit. I mean, we're talking. And there's nothing wrong with those things. But do you like having discussions about spiritual things? Do you linger over those subjects? Do you want to? Where are you at with that? Maybe ask a different kind of question here. What things actually change your behavior? What things actually get you moving? Do you only do spiritual things out of coercion or guilt?

Is that the only thing that gets you off the couch? Are you living however you want and repenting on Sunday? Is that you? What about making disciples? Is your soul stirred to make disciples? Do you just ignore other people's spiritual journey because of excuses? Do you connect morality to making disciples? Or do you just consider yourself a good person and that's kind of enough? I gave you those questions because I want you to think, like, is that me? And what I don't want you to do in answering those questions is think somehow like, oh, maybe I'm not a Christian. That's not the point of those questions. The point of those questions is to say, are you spiritually negligent? Are you lax in your faith? Are you, maybe in some cases, are you so beaten down by sin, yet you so willfully participate in it that you really can't stand yourself? Where are you with that?

Now I want you to listen to everything I'm going to say next in its entirety, because it's really important. cut me off halfway, it's bad. I wanna just say, if that's you, if that's really, all those questions are kinda washing over you, you're feeling conviction, you're like, that's me, that's me. If that's you, the Spirit is telling you, be afraid. Be afraid. But the location of that fear is very, very specific. For example, I say be afraid, But you should not be afraid of messing up bad enough for Jesus to quit on you. That's not the fear I mean. That's not the fear that the scriptures talk about. That's not the fear we're talking about today. It's not the fear of lying in bed wondering if you're saved because you've just sinned too much or you've committed that one big sin that you never thought you'd do or you did it again. You feel like you're on that mirror, go around.

That's not what we're talking about. That's not the kind of fear that the Bible tells us to have. The Bible tells us to fear, right? It does. But the proper location of that fear is extremely important. The proper location of that fear, be afraid that you have not committed to Jesus. Be afraid that you have not committed to Jesus. afraid that you have mistaken Christian community or spiritual experiences for a commitment to follow Jesus. Because here's kind of the problem, and here's just where we live, man. I mean, we are in Burleson TX, okay? And here's kind of our problem specifically. You have people that, and maybe this is you, you've kind of grown up in the South, whether it was Burleson proper or not. You've grown up in the South and you've kind of always considered yourself a Christian because your parents are Christian and that's just kind of normal for you.

And then, so then, you know, you don't even know you're going through the motions, but you're kind of going through the motions because you're involved in this Christian community called the church and like that's cool. And you've even had these spiritual experiences. You've gone to camp, you've prayed, you've read the prayer of JBeds or something. I don't know, but you did something. You went through a class. You went through experiencing God. Man, you even had a moment one time whenever Joel Osteen was on TV, and you were like, yes. I had a spiritual experience. Something must be right. But then you hit a wall, and you're thinking, dang, something must be wrong. Because the feelings aren't there. The community disappointed you. Oh, listen, every like 19 year old I know that I talk to, and I do know a few, believe it or not, I need them.

To hear them talk about how much they distrust the church, it's upsetting, honestly. There've been like two occasions where I've fought back tears, no kidding, because it's just so disappointing to hear them say it, and it's so disappointing to know that they're not making that up. I mean, sure, they were like 17 and they were experiencing it at a 17 year old and that's fine, but man, we got some people that are done wrong and they're walking away from the Lord because of it. I know some of you in your own life, your own testimony is, I grew up in church, I was extremely disappointed by the church and only slowly did I ever come back. That's a lot, I could name like six of you in this room right now, I'm not going to, obviously, but they're here, just believe me, they're here, okay? And I don't mean, I mean everybody. I mean members that have been here a long time,

people, I mean, it's everybody, everybody. At South Brillouin, we talk about exploring the gospel, and that's a good thing to do, but that ain't the same as committing to Jesus. We can explore the gospel, we can have spiritual experiences, but whenever we commit to Jesus, this is a sober commitment that lasts more than a week, Where you say yes, Jesus, I'm yours your mind. I will follow you and when we when we make that commitment when we make that commitment and Our relationship with Jesus moves from insecurity to security it Changes the dynamic of everything Because you will still want to please him, but it's not because you're afraid he's going to leave you You will find a whole new set of motivations to please the Lord Not because you're afraid you're not spiritual enough You will want to grow but not because you're feeling like you need to measure up. It's completely

Free and joyful and good It's all the markings of a healthy relationship. Really? You might say okay fine What if I am secure? Capedon What if I am secure, but I'm still going through a season of doubt? What if I'm just slogging here? What if I'm just moving through the mud? How do we navigate those seasons where we are fighting particularly heavy waves of sin? This is where we bring it back to Hebrews 10. I wanna give you three words, really important three words. All three, and we're gonna go through each one. Remember, our hope. Remember our hope. I want to start with remember Hebrews 10, 32 through 33, it says, but recall the former days when after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with suffering, sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated.

He says, recall, remember, don't forget. He brings it back to the former days. He doesn't say if you're going through this, he didn't say, hey, work really hard to please God and maybe those feelings will go away. He didn't say, hey, just strive to make up the difference. He says, remember, because you've forgotten something. It's not about your effort, it's about your mind. Remember, recall. In a season of doubt, in a season where you're just bearing a heavy, heavy, heavy, heavy weight, you can remember God's goodness in a previous season. And it describes that season here. Next verse 34 of Hebrews 10, it says, for you had compassion on those in prison and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property since you knew that you yourself had a better possession and an abiding one. This is reminiscent of Hebrews 6:9 where it says, though we speak in this way yet in your case, beloved,

we feel sure of better things, things that belong to salvation. What the preacher in Hebrews is telling the churches, is church, you show evidence of salvation. And that doesn't count for nothing. Saying, remember when you were chasing heart after the Lord, remember when you read scripture and it came alive, remember when you were excited about what Jesus was doing in your life? The Apostle Peter echoes the same idea of remembering in 2 Peter chapter one, verses nine through 10, it says, whoever lacks these qualities, once he just listed, whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted, that he's blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins. Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election. For if you practice these qualities, you will never fail. Confirm your calling and election. And you might say, but I'm not sure I was ever saved,

not sure of my salvation right now. Great. You can make a decision today. Like you can just get that thing solved. If you are unsure that you are following the Lord, If you're unsure if you've ever said yes, it's the simplest thing whatever you've done However you identify Whoever you've hurt however you vote wherever you've been Jesus says come to me and It's not qualified come to me everybody come to me all who labor and are heavy-laden I will give you rest take my yoke upon you learn from me I'm gentle lowly in heart you'll find rest for your soul for my yoga disease and my burden is light when you are weary or tired of Carrying your own mode. Jesus says you're ready

Follow me. Are you not tired of carrying your own load yet? I'll wait When you're tired though when you when you are convinced that you are not your own Savior you are ready you're ready for a true Savior. And this is this is someone that everyone who is secure can remember. Look at the next two verses in Hebrews 10, 35 through 36. This is this is our so we remembered we remember our it says, therefore do not throw away your confidence which has a great reward for you have need of endurance so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is All those used there, they're all plural. They've been plural the whole time, really. I'm just highlighting it right now. All the used are plural. So what he's saying is church, don't throw away your confidence. Church, you need collective endurance. So I just want to say remember, remember when you enjoyed singing together as a church?

Remember when you prayed for each other's needs? Remember when the spirit was building something in all of us and there were people that confirmed it? confirmed it, what a beautiful, beautiful thing to have a church, a spiritual family that builds one another up. We don't receive a lot of endurance separately. Like, we are not a collection of lone rangers here. It says, you collectively have need of endurance. We need to remember that we are together in this. The hour is plural. Lastly, it's hope. I feel like I can't do any better than Daniel Oster did last week on preaching about hope being as strong as its object. He I can show a picture though. He didn't show a picture. Yes.

This is Angel's Landing. This is this is the place that Daniel Oster talked about last week. What state is it in, you talk. Okay. So if you I don't know if you can see from the picture, but that's that's near death. Okay. That's a long way down, not surviving that fall in any way, shape or form. The only thing that guy on the left is holding on to is a chain. Okay. And what Daniel has encouraged us and what scripture encouraged us last week was don't loosen your grip, hold on to the chain.

And I will just say this, if that pole that he's holding on right here, if any any of that is loose. Any of it is loose. That dude's holding on in vain. That dude's just holding on to his death. That's all he's holding on to. If he's gripping that chain real tight, where that pole comes right out, well he's dying just as if he were not holding on to the chain at all. When we're talking about being a sure hope of heaven, you know, you know if you got the chain or not, but you don't have to worry about the pole, man. The pole's gonna stay. Truly, in our situation, we are holding on to something, but the hope that we have is holding us. We can remember, don't forget what Jesus has done. We can remember it's us that we're not alone, that we're part of the body. And in Jesus, we are never true victims, because He has defeated everything that can truly destroy us, everything.

Slavery to sin, death, fear, even significant loss. I mean, God forbid someone lose in our church, someone lose everything. Someone lose their family. Someone lose all their finances, lose their career. They've lost a lot and that's good and they can grieve that and we can be there for them. But we can all know that that person has not lost lost the most precious thing they have. Jesus has defeated everything that can truly destroy us and our ultimate hope is trusting Jesus to do what he said he would do. We have an unassailable hope that Jesus will bring us to heaven when we die. We have an unassailable hope that Jesus, like it says in Philippians 1 6, will bring to completion what he has begun in us. I would encourage you to make sure that hope today as we move into our time of response.

Dave is going to come up and just play and sing a song as we do. I'm going to be up here. If there's something you want to do, there's something you want to, a decision you want to make, if you want to be sure of salvation, maybe you're not, maybe you are. I just want you to be sure of that today. I just want you to make your calling and election sure. And I want you to have a sure hope of heaven. Let me pray for us, Jesus. We love you, we thank you. You are our hope, you are our salvation. Pray that as we sing, that we would respond to you in our spirits, in our hearts. It's your name that we pray, amen.