Consider Jesus
Hebrews 3:1-6
June 21, 2015
As you know we are studying the book of Hebrews.
I have told you several times that we don’t know who wrote it
Or who the writer wrote it to.
And so we just maintain the obvious.
THIS LETTER WAS WRITTEN BY THE HOLY SPIRIT
2 Timothy 3:16 “All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness;”
That is certainly true of Hebrews.
Furthermore, we are convinced that this letter was written by the Holy Spirit because we know the Holy Spirit’s favorite subject.
John 16:12-15 “I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. “He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you. “All things that the Father has are Mine; therefore I said that He takes of Mine and will disclose it to you.”
The Holy Spirit most definitely has a favorite subject,
And that subject is Jesus.
One of the ways you know the Holy Spirit is involved
Is that the message of Jesus is clearly proclaimed.
The Holy Spirit absolutely loves to talk about Him.
That reality helps us to understand the main point of this letter.
We said that the problem with those who are receiving this letter
Is that they were not taking Jesus as serious as they should have.
(Obviously that does not sit well with the Holy Spirit)
HE WROTE TO ADDRESS THAT.
One thing we have not talked about up until this point
Is what we mean by people not taking Jesus seriously.
This letter (as derived from the context)
Is clearly written to three different groups of people.
SOME TO BE SURE WERE BLATANT NON-BELIEVERS.
They loved Judaism, they loved the ritual, they had no interest in placing their faith in Jesus Christ or seeking redemption through Him.
And to them the Holy Spirit preaches the gospel,
Reminding these blatant non-believers that there is no other sacrifice for sin and if you reject this great salvation there is no way you will escape.
OTHERS ARE THOSE WHO HAVE INTELLECTUALLY COME TO BELIEVE IN CHRIST, BUT WHO HAVE YET TO PLACE THEIR TRUST IN HIM.
They know Jesus is the Christ. They know Jesus is the Savior,
But knowing the facts and trusting them are two very different things.
These people are afraid of the consequences and persecution
That will come if they trust Jesus.
They are those we dealt with in chapter 2
Who are “drifting” and neglecting this great salvation.
And to them the Holy Spirit repeatedly pleads for them to
Get off of the fence, to embrace adversity, and trust Christ anyway.
Namely because only in Christ do we have anything that truly lasts.
And then there is a third group that the Holy Spirit seems to continually be addressing in this letter, and that group are
THOSE WHO HAVE MADE A CONFESSION THAT THEY WILL FOLLOW CHRIST.
They claim to believe, and because of those claims
Have already endured great suffering.
And the problem is now that following Jesus is so hard,
THEY ARE TEMPTED TO RETREAT back to the comforts of ritualistic religion, namely Judaism.
They are contemplating giving Jesus up
And returning to their former way of life.
And the Holy Spirit is adamantly imploring them not to do this,
For rejecting Christ in this way will only lead to destruction.
And I want to clarify this here because
It is this third group that we are dealing with this morning.
You will notice that the writer identifies them in verse 1
(1) “Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling…”
Then at the end of the verse he mentions their “confession”
So obviously we are dealing with people that have made an outward confession of Christ and now identify themselves as Christians.
• Only Christians are considered “holy brethren”
And this because Christ has sanctified them and made them holy.
• Only Christians are “partakers of a heavenly calling”
So we are dealing here with those who have claimed to believe in Christ, and who claim to be Christians.
The part that makes this chapter tricky then
Is the warnings that are given later.
For example.
(6) “but Christ was faithful as a Son over His house – whose house we are, if we hold fast our confidence and the boast of our hope firm until the end.”
That almost sounds like these true believers might lose their salvation.
You look at verse 12
(12) “Take care, brethren, that there not be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God.”
And again
(14) “For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end.”
And so when you take this chapter as a whole,
It sounds like the Holy Spirit is addressing Christians
Who are in danger of losing their salvation.
But do not fall into that trap.
SALVATION IS SECURE.
You could do nothing to save yourself
And you can do nothing to secure your salvation.
The security of salvation has always depended on
The strength of the Shepherd, not the strength of the sheep.
John 10:27-28 “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand.”
John 6:37-40 “All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out. “For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me. “This is the will of Him who sent Me, that of all that He has given Me I lose nothing, but raise it up on the last day. “For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life, and I Myself will raise him up on the last day.”
Even Hebrews says:
Hebrews 7:23-25 “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. Therefore He is able also to save forever those who draw near to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.”
Jesus doesn’t lose His sheep,
And that is a topic we’ll talk about even more later in the book of Hebrews
As it pertains to His role as our High Priest.
We are not dealing with the threat that some genuine believer in Christ
Might lose their salvation.
So what are we dealing with?
That someone who claims to be a Christian
Might prove that they are phony by falling away from Jesus.
1 John 2:18-19 “Children, it is the last hour; and just as you heard that antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have appeared; from this we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, so that it would be shown that they all are not of us.”
John was clear about the people who abandoned Christ.
They weren’t genuine believers who lost their salvation,
They were phonies who were proven phony when they left.
John said, “if they had been of us, they would have remained with us”
It they had been real, they would not have left.
Listen to Jesus speaking to some who claim to believe:
John 8:31-32 “So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”
Jesus knew a true disciple was one that stuck with Him.
One who didn’t stick with Him was never a true disciple.
So hopefully then the next point of the Holy Spirit in this letter to the Hebrews is becoming clear.
• There are people, sitting in the pews,
• Who have publicly confessed Christ,
• But they are drifting a little in their faith,
• They are not taking Jesus as serious as they should,
• The writer is afraid that they may fall away and prove their faith was never really genuine.
And to further understand where the writer is coming from
You need to understand why they might be ok with abandoning Jesus.
Any time a person abandons what they already have for something else,
There are always two main factors involved.
1) They devalue what they have
2) They overvalue what they pursue
It’s the old “The grasses is greener on the other side” issue.
And the writer of Hebrews can see this
Beginning to emerge in some of their lives.
He can see that they are beginning to devalue Jesus.
And he can see that they are beginning to overvalue the religion they once left, namely Judaism.
SO THE GOAL OF THE LETTER?
To show the value of Jesus,
That His value is so much greater than their former religion,
And that placing Judaism on the same level as Him would be a huge mistake.
And isn’t that what we’ve seen taking place?
• Chapter 1:1-2 – JESUS IS GREATER THAN THE PROPHETS
• Chapter 1:5-14 – JESUS IS GREATER THAN THE ANGELS
• Chapter 3:1-6 – JESUS IS GREATER THAN MOSES
• Chapter 4 – JESUS IS GREATER THAN JOSHUA
• Chapter 5 – JESUS IS GREATER THAN AARON
• Chapter 9 – JESUS IS GREATER THAN THE SACRIFICES
And on and on and on and on
And this is just as important for believers as it is for non-believers.
It is a constant temptation even to believers
To find their peace, security, and comfort in their religious ritual.
So long as they remain moral
So long as they stay in church
So long as they read the Bible regularly
(THEY FEEL LIKE THEY ARE GOOD)
And it doesn’t matter so much that
Their relationship with Jesus is sorely deficient.
The problem is that their comfort in tradition and ordinance
Sort of numbs them to their lack of a genuine spiritual relationship.
And that is precisely the problem here with the Hebrews.
They were so comfortable with historic Judaism
And its feasts and ordinances and sacrificial systems
That it didn’t seem to bother them
That they weren’t walking very close to Jesus.
To them Jesus was a good plan, but He wasn’t their only hope.
They always had a comfortable “Plan B”
So the command at the outset of chapter 3 couldn’t be clearer.
“Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling, consider Jesus…”
And incidentally the word there for “consider” in the Greek
Translates KATANOEO (kat-u-ni-a-o)
NOEO (ni-a-o) means to “perceive with the mind, to think about; to ponder”
KATA in front of it intensifies it.
It means to really ponder this.
To really gaze on something.
Not to just let it escape your grasp, but to study it, dwell on it,
And to do so intensely with the aim of understanding.
And the Holy Spirit wants you to do that with Jesus.
“consider Jesus”
And it doesn’t matter if you are an avid non-believer,
Or a faithful Christian, or somewhere in between,
The command is the same. “consider Jesus”
Perceive Him, Ponder on Him, Think about Him, Dwell on Him,
Look Closely at Him, Study Him
And the reason is so that you will see that
He has more value than any other religious system,
And so that you will see the danger of falling away from Him.
SO THIS MORNING we begin looking at this very penetrating chapter,
Where the Holy Spirit asks even those who have claimed to believe,
To consider Jesus one more time in order that
They make sure they don’t fall away from Him.
And as I told you a moment ago,
The first 6 verses are dedicated to one thought.
JESUS IS GREATER THAN MOSES
Now, before we (as Gentiles) can fully grasp the weight of this argument,
You first need to understand what a delicate debate this is.
You can talk about Abraham or David all you want,
But in Jewish history the pinnacle Jew isn’t even a debate.
To the Jew no one even comes remotely close to Moses.
There are some Jewish Rabbis that even teach that Moses ranked higher than the angels.
• Moses was divinely protected by God at his birth
• Moses was privately buried by God at his death
• Moses was the savior of Israel from Egypt
And beyond any of that,
Moses enjoyed privileges that no other Jew ever enjoyed.
Exodus 33:11 “Thus the LORD used to speak to Moses face to face, just as a man speaks to his friend. When Moses returned to the camp, his servant Joshua, the son of Nun, a young man, would not depart from the tent.”
You may even remember that God showed more of Himself to Moses
Than any other human…ever.
Exodus 33:17-19 “The LORD said to Moses, “I will also do this thing of which you have spoken; for you have found favor in My sight and I have known you by name.” Then Moses said, “I pray You, show me Your glory!” And He said, ” I Myself will make all My goodness pass before you, and will proclaim the name of the LORD before you; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show compassion on whom I will show compassion.”
It was Moses who used to go and speak to God “face to face”
To such an extent that Moses face even radiated the glory of God.
Beyond that, when God gave the Law to Israel, He gave it to Moses.
And by the time of Jesus, the Law and Moses were absolutely synonymous.
In fact many Jews didn’t even refer to it as “The Law of God” but as what?
“The Law of Moses”
And even when Jesus was here, the religious elite were quick to let the world know that Jesus ranked nowhere near the level of Moses.
John 9:29 “We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where He is from.”
The point is, to a Jew, there was no greater human than Moses.
• No one ranked higher
• No one accomplished more
• No one came closer to God
• No one brought more of God’s word
• No one better typified what a Jew should be
Moses was the best.
And that is part of the problem.
The Jews were not too concerned about rather or not they had Jesus. Why? Because they had Moses.
Moses brought them the Law of God
And in this they boasted and in this they were content.
But the writer of Hebrews is seeking to show these Jews
• That Jesus brought a new covenant
• That was better than the old one that Moses brought,
• And so he is charged with the delicate task of proving that Jesus is greater than Moses.
It may not seem like a difficult argument to you,
But I promise you it was to those whom it was written.
And so this morning it is why Jesus is greater than Moses.
AND HERE IS THE WHOLE ARGUMENT
Moses was faithful as a servant in the house.
Jesus was faithful as a Son over the house.
(1) “Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of our confession.”
Now, there is the first indicator.
He gives you the dual role; the dual office of Jesus.
Jesus was both “Apostle” and “High Priest”
And “Apostle” is a “sent one”.
It is one who goes on the authority of the One who sent him, and with the purpose of delivering the message or carrying out the mission.
A “High Priest” is one who communicates to God on behalf of men.
Now Moses may have certainly been considered an “Apostle” of God,
But he most certainly was not a “High Priest”.
Who was the high priest in Moses day?
That was Aaron.
Jesus however perfectly filled both roles.
And it’s not the first time the author has told you that.
He told us in Hebrews 1:2 that God “has spoken to us in His Son”
And he told us in Hebrews 1:3 “He made purification of sins…[and] sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high”
Jesus spoke from God to man
And Jesus speaks from man to God
He is both “Apostle” and “High Priest”
This Moses never was.
It is important to note that the goal here is NOT TO BELITTLE MOSES.
In fact, the author is very careful not to do that.
(2) “He was faithful to Him who appointed Him, as Moses also was in all His house.”
The writer is not out to belittle Moses.
If he had wanted to, he might have mentioned Moses murder of the Egyptian,
Or Moses striking of the rock, but that isn’t the goal.
The goal is simply to acknowledge that while Moses was great,
Jesus is greater.
Moses was faithful.
Numbers 12:7 “Not so, with My servant Moses, He is faithful in all My household;”
Moses was faithful, but so was Jesus.
The difference is that they were faithful to different roles,
And Jesus’ role was greater.
Look at what I mean.
(3-4) “For 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. For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God.”
Moses and Jesus may have both been faithful,
But Jesus gets more glory, Why?
Because “the builder of the house has more honor than the house”
First, let me ask, WHO IS THE HOUSE?
When you read the Old Testament you read about “the household of David” or you read about “the household of Israel”
And so when we are talking about “the house”
We are talking about God’s people.
This is made clear again down in verse 6.
“But Christ was faithful as a Son over His house – whose house we are…”
Now here is the fact about Moses.
Moses was a part of that house and Moses was a servant to that house.
Isn’t that true?
Sure.
Moses was one of God’s children,
And Moses was a faithful servant to God’s children.
In fact, Moses may have been the most faithful ever of all time.
I mean look again at what verse 2 said.
“He (Jesus) was faithful to Him who appointed Him, as Moses also was in His house.”
The Holy Spirit compared the faithfulness of Moses to that of Jesus.
That’s pretty faithful!
Imagine if at your funeral someone said,
“He was faithful to God like Jesus was faithful to God”
Seems far-fetched doesn’t it?
And yet that is what is said about Moses.
Moses was faithful
He was faithful as part of God’s household
And faithful to serve God’s household.
But Jesus gets more glory because Jesus wasn’t a part of the household, Jesus was “the builder of the house”
And “the builder of the house has more honor than the house. For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God.”
And so you can see the argument.
It isn’t that Moses wasn’t faithful,
It’s just that he didn’t occupy the same position.
Let’s go one further:
(5-6a) “Now Moses was faithful in all His house as a servant, for a testimony to those things which were to be spoken later; but Christ was faithful as a Son over His house…”
Now we even learn in what way Moses was faithful.
Moses was a faithful servant and that “for a testimony to those things which were to be spoken later”
And this is a very important point.
If you are going to esteem Moses
Then make sure you understand Moses purpose
Moses was a servant to the house
To make sure the house recognized what was coming later.
Moses pointed to Jesus.
John 5:45-46 “Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father; the one who accuses you is Moses, in whom you have set your hope. “For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me, for he wrote about Me.”
Moses’ goal as a servant to the house
Was to make sure the house recognized its builder.
And so the writer of Hebrews is making a very bold statement.
You honor and esteem and follow Moses,
But if you aren’t seeing the One Moses testified about,
Then you are missing the point of Moses all together.
Moses was a servant to the house,
But the One you really need to see is Christ.
WHY?
“Christ was faithful as a Son over His house”
Do you see that Christ is more important?
• Moses was faithful, but only as a servant to the house
• Christ was faithful as a Son and the builder of the house
You can go to the White House
And there are several people who have jobs in the Oval Office
One sits behind the desk and makes the decisions
One cleans behind the desk and takes out the trash
Now it is important that both be faithful to their job,
And both are rewarded based on their faithfulness,
BUT WE UNDERSTAND THAT THE JOBS ARE NOT EQUAL.
No one here is slighting Moses, he was faithful as can be,
But do not assume he was on the same level as Christ.
In fact Moses tried to point the household of God to Christ.
WHICH IS WHY THE WRITER OF HEBREWS SAYS THIS:
“whose hose we are, if we hold fast our confidence and the boast of our hope firm until the end.”
If you claim to be part of God’s household,
Then you will hold to the builder of that house firm until the end.
If you reject the builder of the house
And go back to following the servant of the house,
Then you have missed the point of the servant
And you have missed the glory of the builder.
DO YOU SEE WHAT THE WRITER IS SAYING?
YOU HAVE TO HOLD ON TO JESUS, NOT MOSES.
There is no retreating here back to the comforts of Judaism.
There is no retreating here back to the comfort of ordinances and traditions.
And that is what I hope you will realize this morning.
It is real easy to just get comfortable in the routine.
• Get up go to church
• Deliver Meals on Wheels
• Serve on a committee
You know the routine, and there can be a lot of comfort
And affirmation in doing that sort of thing
And while those things can have some value in and of themselves,
They are a pitiful substitute for an intimate relationship with Jesus.
SO WE MUST CONSIDER JESUS
We must “hold fast our confidence and the boast of our hope firm until the end.”
Don’t substitute religious involvement for a relationship with Jesus.
Don’t substitute bible knowledge for a relationship with Jesus.
Don’t substitute ordinance and tradition for a relationship with Jesus.
All of those things are the symbol – Christ is the substance.
And if you try to involve yourself in those things without Christ,
You have nothing but empty religion.
YOU NEED JESUS
HE IS GREATER THAN EVERYTHING ELSE
And if we can fast forward in the chapter a moment:
READ HEBREWS 3:12-14
Don’t feel so secure in your religion
That you are ok with letting go of Jesus.
IT WON’T WORK
