Be Bold! Be Free!

Be Bold! Be Free!Hebrews 9

Our Bold, New Freedom (Heb.8-10)

A Bold, New Freedom: Approach God!› The pivotal argument in Hebrews: Jesus

Christ is the only ‘High Priest’

For, on the one hand, there is a setting aside of a former commandment because of its weakness and uselessness (for the Law made nothing perfect), and on the other hand there is a bringing in of a better hope, through which we draw near to God. Hebrews 7:18-19


A Bold, New Freedom to Approach God There Is No Reason to Fear God!

Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. Hebrews 4:16


A Bold, New Freedom to Approach God There Is No Reason to Fear God! Because All Our Sins are Forgiven

Forever!The former priests, on the one hand, existed in greater numbers because they were prevented by death from continuing, but Jesus, on the other hand, because He continues forever, holds His priesthood permanently. Hebrews 7:23-24



Forever!who does not need daily, like those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for His own sins and then for the sins of the people, because this He did once for all when He offered up Himself. Hebrews 7:27 (NASB)



Forever!But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things to come, He entered through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this creation; Hebrews 9:11

and not through the blood of goats and calves, but through His own blood, He entered the holy place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. Hebrews 9:12 (NASB)



Forever!But now Christ has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself. Hebrews 9:26



Forever!But now Christ has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself. Hebrews 9:26



Forever!By this will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Every priest stands daily ministering and offering time after time the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins; but He, having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time onward until His enemies be made a footstool for His feet. For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified. Heb. 10:10-14



Forever!

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Forever! The “Old & Useless” is Replaced by

HopeFor, on the one hand, there is a setting aside of a former commandment because of its weakness and uselessness (for the Law made nothing perfect), and on the other hand there is a bringing in of a better hope, through which we draw near to God. Hebrews 7:18-19



Forever! The “Old & Useless” is Replaced by

Hope Leave Behind “Old Covenant” Symbols!

› Last week: OT symbols no longer appropriate

If you have died with Christ to the elementary principles of the world, why, as if you were living in the world, do you submit yourself to decrees, such as, "Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch!" (which all refer to things destined to perish with use)—in accordance with the commandments and teachings of men?

These are matters which have, to be sure, the appearance of wisdom in self-made religion and self-abasement and severe treatment of the body, but are of no value against fleshly indulgence. Colossians 2:20-23

Therefore no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day— things which are a mere shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ. Colossians 2:16-17

Why This…?

Why This…?Now you are no longer a slave but God’s own child. Before you Gentiles knew God, you were slaves to so-called gods that do not even exist. So now that you know God why do you want to go back again and become slaves once more to the weak and useless spiritual principles of this world?You are trying to earn favor with God by observing certain days or months or seasons or years. I fear for you. Perhaps all my hard work with you was for nothing. Galatians 4:7-11

Why Fear Freedom? Modern teachers: ‘fornication!’,

‘murder!’ Unpredictable Consequences

› Not just theoretical› God isn’t frightened by it

He Motivates by Love, not Fear/Threat Radical, carte blanche Would you reject your own kids?

Why Fear Freedom? Modern teachers: ‘fornication!’,

‘murder!’ Unpredictable Consequences The POWER of Manipulation…

› Throughout HISTORY!There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love. 1 John 4:18

BE BOLD! BE FREE! ALL Old Testament Forms are Obsolete

› These forms were only pictures (8:5)…who serve a copy and shadow of the heavenly things, just as Moses was warned by God when he was about to erect the tabernacle; for, "See," He says, "that you make all things according to the pattern which was shown you on the mountain." Hebrews 8:5


› These forms were only pictures (8:5)› Something was wrong with the traditions

(8:7)

For if that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no occasion sought for a second. Hebrews 8:7



(8:7)› These were always temporary! (8:8-12)God says, "Behold, days are coming, says the Lord, When I will effect a new covenant With the house of Israel and with the house of Judah; not like the covenant which I made with their fathers…” Hebrews 8:8-12



(8:7)› These were always temporary! (8:8-12)

"For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel After those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws into their minds, And I will write them on their hearts. And I will be their God, And they shall be My people. "For I will be merciful to their iniquities, And I will remember their sins no more." Hebrews 8:8-12

BE BOLD! BE FREE! Old Testament Forms are Obsolete Christian church seems unaware of

this!› Also in Col. 2:16-17



this!› Also in Col. 2:16-17



this!› Also in Col. 2:16-17› Also Gal. 4:9,10But now that you have come to know God how is it that you turn back again to the weak and worthless elemental things, to which you desire to be enslaved all over again? Galatians 4:9-10

You observe days and months and seasons and years. Galatians 4:9-10


this!› Also Col.2:16-17› Also Gal. 4:9,10› Also John 4:20-24"Our fathers worshiped in this mountain, and you people say

that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship." Jesus said* to her, "Woman, believe Me, an hour is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. John 4:20-24


this!› Also Col.2:16-17› Also Gal. 4:9,10› Also John 4:20-24"But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers

will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. "God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth." John 4:20-24


this!Holy

Space! Altars

Priests Robes

Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? 1 Corinthians 3:16


this!Holy

Space! Altars

Priests Robes


this!Holy

Space! Altars

Priests Robes

Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? 1 Corinthians 3:16


this!Holy

Space! Altars

Priests Robes


this!Holy

Space! Altars

Priests Robes


this!Holy

Space! Altars

Priests Robes


this!Holy

Space! Altars

Priests Robes


this!Holy

Space! Altars

Priests Robes

Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. Romans 12:1 (NASB)


this! Dangerous To Play With the ‘Shadows’

What’s Wrong with a little“Religious comfort” ?



› Leads away from the ‘finished work’[those who have] fallen away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucify to themselves the Son of God and put Him to open shame. Hebrews 6:6

Behold I, Paul, say to you that if you receive circumcision, Christ will be of no benefit to you. Galatians 5:2



› Leads away from the ‘finished work’› God is radical about His Grace!How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who

has trampled under foot the Son of God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace? Hebrews 10:29 (NASB)



› Leads away from the ‘finished work’› God is radical about His Grace!› Ritualism is Necessarily Impersonal

By these regulations the Holy Spirit revealed that the entrance to the Most Holy Place was not freely open as long as the Tabernacle and the system it represented were still in use. Hebrews 9:8



› Leads away from the ‘finished work’› God is radical about His Grace!› Ritualism is Necessarily Impersonal

Questions for Ritualists

Why keep repeating the same words?

Why keep repeating the same actions?

What value do these have for God?

Has God called on us to do this?

Is this kind of relationship personal?



› Leads away from the ‘finished work’› God is radical about His Grace!› Ritualism is Necessarily Impersonal› The Motive to Keep People Ignorant!

See why they keep

the Bible out ofpeople’s hands?

Irenius: "We confound all those who in any way, whether for self-pleasing or vain glory or blindness or evil-mindedness, hold unauthorized meetings" (Irenius , “On Tradition and Sucession,” Documents of the Church, [Oxford])

Evolved into: Death Penalty!



› Leads away from the ‘finished work’› God is radical about His Grace!› Ritualism is Necessarily Impersonal› The Motive to Keep People Ignorant!› GREAT PRESSURES to replace Radical

Grace




Grace

" . . . many worshippers . . . seek an 'experience of the holy.' They come looking for awe and reverence, mystery and transcendence. Furthermore, many of their sensory faculties need to be engaged: Their senses of sight, sound, touch, and smell are powerful avenues of communication. One glance at the Old Testament directions for orchestrating temple worship will remove all doubt that this is our task. Fire, incense, tapestry, and gold joined with ritual activities that reminded the worshiper of the reverent awe demanded of them. Bells and breastplates provided a visual feast evoking images of God's presence . . . Evangelicals need to reclaim their Old Testament heritage. …

Gary M. Burge, "Why So Many Are Rediscovering Worship In Other Traditions," Christianity Today, October 6, 1997, Vol. 41, No. 11, p. 20.




Grace

Among College-Age Evangelicals:

This is one reason I thank God for the liturgy. The liturgy does not target any age or cultural subgroup. It does not even target this century. Instead, the liturgy draws us into worship that transcends our time and place. Its earliest forms took shape in ancient Israel, and its subsequent development occurred in a variety of cultures and subcultures—Greco-Roman, North African, German, Frankish, Anglo-Saxon, and so on. Christianity Today 2/’08

Edward Norbeck: “Great religions have indeed arisen as ethical or philosophical principles for the guidance of man, but once they have become the province of multitudes…they have met a common fate of objectification; that is, of being cast into concrete form so that they may be actively appreciated by the eyes, ears, or other sense organs rather than remaining only abstract ideas and beliefs.” Edward Norbeck, Religion in Primitive Society, (Harper & Row, Publishers, New York, NY. 1961)p. 71

“Objectification in varying degree and form appears in all known religious complexes of primitive peoples and it has been outstanding in the religions of civilized societies.”

Eliade: “The enclosure, wall, or circle of stones surrounding a sacred place- these are among the most ancient of known forms of man-made sanctuary.” Mircea Eliade, Patterns in Comparative Religion. (The World Publishing Co.,Cleveland OH, 1958) p. 370

“We have heard him say that this Nazarene, Jesus, will destroy this place and alter the customs which Moses handed down to us!”(Acts 6:14)

“We have heard him speak blasphemous words against God!” (Acts 6:14)

" . . . many worshippers . . . seek an 'experience of the holy.' They come looking for awe and reverence, mystery and transcendence. Furthermore, many of their sensory faculties need to be engaged: Their senses of sight, sound, touch, and smell are powerful avenues of communication. One glance at the Old Testament directions for orchestrating temple worship will remove all doubt that this is our task. Fire, incense, tapestry, and gold joined with ritual activities that reminded the worshiper of the reverent awe demanded of them. Bells and breastplates provided a visual feast evoking images of God's presence . . . Evangelicals need to reclaim their Old Testament heritage. We need to unburden ourselves of those reflexes forged during the Reformation . . . that shunned the pageantry and visual media of medieval Catholicism . . .Gary M. Burge, "Why So Many Are Rediscovering Worship In Other

Traditions," Christianity Today, October 6, 1997, Vol. 41, No. 11, p. 20.

A Strange Thing About Freedom

"The liturgy begins … as a real separation from the world," writes Orthodox theologian Alexander Schmemann. He continues by saying that in the attempt to "make Christianity understandable to this mythical 'modern' man on the street," we have forgotten this necessary separation.

It is precisely the point of the liturgy to take people out of their worlds and usher them into a strange, new world

Theologian and pastor Eugene Peterson talked about our desire for relevance in a CT interview a couple of years ago: "I don't think people care a whole lot about what kind of music you have or how you shape the service. They want a place where God is taken seriously, where they're taken seriously."

In this regard, the liturgy is more relevant than we can imagine, because it's a place where God is taken seriously, and therefore where we are taken seriously.

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2005/march/26.42.html

Before he became Pope, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger wrote, "The grandeur of the liturgy does not rest upon the fact that it offers an interesting entertainment, but in rendering tangible the Totally Other, whom we are not capable of summoning. He comes because He wills."

In addition, the very rhythm of the service—the liturgy of the Word followed by the liturgy of the Sacrament, the praise that prepares us for the Word, and the confessions and prayers that guide our response to the Word—is a pattern that has not so much been created by the church as discovered. It was a holy pattern that within a couple of centuries began to seem (to take a phrase from the Book of Common Prayer) "very meet, right, and our bounden duty" to practice in just this way.

But what is interesting is that this liturgical shape became the standard shape of the Western liturgy for the following centuries—which prompts wonder at how this liturgy fit the thousands of cultures the church encountered over the centuries. How in the world has it been relevant in the Middle East, North Africa, Europe, the Americas, and Asia? Yet it has been the basic outline in Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, Lutheran, Presbyterian, and other communions, in many cultures and eras.

Why this liturgy? Why this form? Because not only its content but also its shape have ushered people into a transcendent culture, where they meet the Trinitarian God and take their first baby steps in his kingdom.

The liturgy, from beginning to end, is not about meeting our needs. The liturgy is about God. It's not even about God-as-the-fulfiller-of-our-need-for-spiritual-meaning. It's about God as he is himself: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It is not about our blessedness but his. The liturgy immediately signals that our needs are not nearly as relevant as we imagine.