Olympic Reflections

I was watching badminton today. Why is it that the only time it is ever fun to watch badminton is when its the Olympics? And even that feels a little weird. Did you see the Tai-Chi master's at the opening ceremony? That was impressive. Very beautiful.

The apostle Paul said: "Run the race so as to win the prize." The Olympics are a good time to reflect on that.

Are you running your life so as to win the prize after death? Or are you running in life (running your life) so as not to face death abd what comes after--the judgment?

Are you running in such a way as to win or are you coasting?

Phelps, the swimmer, wants several medals. Are you settling for a bronze as a Christian believer? Be a bronze husband? A bronze wife. A bronze in prayer. A silver in Bible. Not quite medal in evangelism. Maybe grab a gold in church leadership. Hmmmm.....

Funny too how we exalt certain gift-ings in the church: Like swimming and Phelps is to preaching and Piper. But who cares about the Badminton players: the servers, the helpers, the intercessors. If your thing is badminton in the church--the unpopular gifting--do it well! It is amazing to watch a person play there part well no matter what it is.

Olympics: glory and sweat. I like glory but don't like sweat: the pain, the panting, the side-aches, the pulled muscles.

It is good to know that the race has been ran. Jesus won. We are called to run the same route he already did knowing that the successes along the way are because of him and failures are forgiven by Him. We are also called to run knowing that many on the sidelines are cheering: a great cloud of witnesses who have gone before.

Abraham, the man of faith is calling you faith.

Joshua, the man of courage is calling you to courage, and Deborah, the woman of courage is calling you to the same.

Samson, in many ways a failure in many areas of life is calling you to rise and finish. You can be considered faithful even after a pattern of faithlessness--Samson shows us this.

There are many more.

The Olympics should remind us that Jesus is the champion that has defeated death, sin, and Satan (See the book of Hebrews not Carman) and gone before us, and others have ran in front of us and finished well; therefore run like an Olympian not like a lazy American that only sits and watches others do the running and get the glory.

How Shall We Escape?

"If disregard for the Mosaic law was appropriately punished, unconcern for the gospel must inevitably be catastrophic." William L. Lane (p. 37, 47A, Word Biblical Commentary)

"...how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation?" Heb. 2:3

Jesus is Better

Jesus is better. This is one of the main points of the Letter to the Hebrews and really to the whole story of God throughout the Bible. The arrival of Jesus on the scene in Nazareth, his death, and the vindication of Him as Savior and Lord in resurrection has proclaimed to the world that God has spoken in Jesus and no person, place, thing or idea is better. God has done what is best for the world and what is best is Jesus.

• "Jesus is the guarantor of a better covenant." Hebrews 7:22
• In Jesus "a better hope" has been introduced. (7:19)
• The covenant Jesus brings to mankind is better then Moses' covenant because it is "founded on better promises." (8:6)
• Jesus blood "speaks a better word than the blood of Abel." (12:24)

Trusting Jesus is always God's best for us. Sadly, we often turn to other things. We exchange what is better for what is not. Anytime we seek something else beside Jesus we opt for less. If we do our theology with someone/something else at the center we've chosen less. If we live life for the approval of someone/something else we've downgraded. If we seek forgiveness and wholeness in another system of belief or world-view we turn from what is better to what is worse.

Can you say Jesus is better then ________? Fill-in-the-blank. We should be saying that and believing it. For anytime we say_________ is better then Jesus either in our doctrine or our practice we've not truly listened to God and seen what He has given.

God's word to you today is: Jesus is better.

Unblemished

Something God taught me a few minutes ago:

Leviticus 22:20: "You shall not offer anything that has a blemish, for it will not be acceptable for you."

This is a problem cause: 1. I am full of blemishes; 2. Therefore anything I might offer would be blemished and imperfect. My sorrow for sin is imperfect my good deeds are not that good. No sacrifice or penance that I could offer would be enough. Verses like this make it clear: a holy God requires an unblemished sacrifice.

Hebrews 9:14: "...how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God."

Problem solved: 1. God gives what he requires; 2. God becomes the unblemished sacrifice in His incarnate Son. Now, I am accepted. My conscience is purified and all my works may be done in service to God in and through Jesus' work.

Amen.

Prayer with the Pope in the Context of Hebrews

In the prayer service at Washington Church, as the pope makes his US tour, a woman just read from the letter to the Hebrews on the great person & work of Jesus as our High Priest.

And I can’t help but think did not this scene supposedly done in worship to Jesus in fact misrepresent him. The golden symbols of candles and altars, the elevation of the pope as Vicar of Christ, the arrayed bishop apparel, the reverence of the altar of the transubstantiated Eucharist...

Is not all this shadows and substitutions for the Substance and Substitute?

It's as if by reading Hebrews they rebuked the very things they stood for and performed.

Jesus Outside with the Lepers

Just past post #100 here at blogspot. I figured I'd give the blog a new look. Here is a morning meditation.

"The leprous person who has the disease shall wear clothes and let the hair of his head hang loose, and he shall cover his upper lip and cry out, 'Unclean, unclean.' He shall remain unclean as long as he has the disease. He is unclean. He shall live alone. His dwelling shall be outside the camp." Lev. 13:45-46

Jesus' is good news for lepers like me:

"For the bodies of those animals whose blood is brought into the holy places by the high priest as a sacrifice for sin are burned outside the camp. So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood." Heb. 13:11-12

Acceptable Worship is Important

Leviticus 10:1-2
"Now Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron each took his censer and put fire in it and laid incense on it and offered unauthorized fire before the Lord, which he had not commanded them. And fire came out from before the Lord and consumed them and they died before the Lord."

Hebrews 12: 28-29
"Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire."

The Old & The New

I have found it a blessing lately to read a chapter or two of Leviticus and then read portions of Hebrews in chapters 9 and 10:

The old: "...if anyone sins in that he hears a public adjuration to testify, and though he is a witness, whether he has seen or come to know the matter yet does not speak, he shall bear his iniquity; or if anyone touches an unclean thing...when he comes to know it, and realizes his guilt; or if anyone utters with his lips a rash oath to do evil or to do good, when he comes to know it, and he realizes his guilt in any of these; when he realizes his guilt in any of these and confesses the sin he has committed, he shall bring to the Lord as his compensation for the sin that he has committed, a female from the flock, a lamb or a goat, for a sin offering. And the priest shall make atonement for him for his sin." Leviticus 5: 1-6

The new: "For since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near...But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifce for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God...For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified." Hebrews 10:1, 12, 14

Because of our many sins atonement is necessary, and because of Jesus one sacrifice atonement has been accomplished.

A Sermon - Hebrews: A Call to Jesus and a Call to Endurance

The sermon I preached at The Crossing Church in AZ is now up. It is an overview of the book of Hebrews. Let's call it Hebrews: A Call to Jesus and a Call to Endurance (click to listen or right click and "save as" to download). I will probably post the text eventually but for now here is the audio.

Carpe Diem

Paul Ellingworth states of the letter to the Hebrews' audience: "The readers are to seize the opportunity of access to God which Christ's priesthood and sacrifice have made possible." (p. 522).

If you are a Christian you, by God's grace, should seize this day to draw near to God in prayer and into His presence. See verse.

Access to God as Close as Jesus

The astounding truth of Christianity culminated in the work of Jesus secures this unbelievable reality for all who trust Jesus:

"The access to God which believers have through Christ is no less close than that which Christ himself has attained..." (p. 517-518, NIGTC, The Epistle to the Hebrews, Paul Ellingworth)

If your a believer in the person and work of Jesus Christ, your access to God is as close as Jesus' access to God. That is extraordinary.

See Hebrews 10.

Our Tiny Temptations

"[Jesus] tasted our temptations with a sensitivity none of us has known precisely because He resisted them. Whatever your experience of temptation or suffering, Christ's was deeper because His humanity was sinless." (p. 27-28, In Christ Alone)

This is a great reminder from Sinclair Ferguson. Jesus temptations were so great not because He gave in, but precisely because he resisted. It is amazing how we self-deceive ourselves into thinking that because our temptations are so strong we give in to sin, yet the strongest temptations are the one's not given into. Our temptations are tiny in comparison to the temptation that the perfect Son of God faced.

May we follow Jesus' in resisting great temptation--not giving into tiny temptations. And when we sin, may we trust Him as a faithful High Priest who never sinned and died in our place for our sins.

"Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted." Hebrews 2:17-18

Pay Attention to Jesus

As I continue in Hebrews, I'm constantly reminded to listen to the voice of God in His Son Jesus. Hebrews 1 tells me God spoke in Jesus, and then barrages me with the deity of Jesus, the substitution of Jesus for sinners, the superiority of Jesus, and the exaltation and victory of Jesus. Hebrews 2, just in case I wasn't listening, tells me to "pay close attention" to what I've heard and not to "drift" from it. As I mentioned in an earlier blog post, the Gospel is easy to drift from and is to be actively paid attention to not just assumed. How easy it is to assume the Gospel, and in so doing one begins to move away from it, because we drift when we don't pay attention. In chapter 3 I'm told to "consider Jesus" and again the writer constantly points me back to Jesus: to think about Him, to listen to Him, to believe Him, and to see Him.

If we are God's House we must hold fast to him. If we are "sharer's in Christ" we will "hold our original confidence firm to the end." To the end, in this Christian life, it is Jesus, not just at the beginning!

So look at Jesus today. Pay attention to Him. Consider His nature and His accomplishments. Jesus. Jesus. Jesus.

Jesus Not Ashamed to Call Me Brother

I have been very affected by the reality that Jesus is not ashamed to call me brother. I think the reason why I find this difficult is because I'm ashamed that He would call me brother. Well, if He isn't ashamed to do this I should not be ashamed of it either. If you trust Jesus, be encouraged, for Jesus is not ashamed to call you brother.

"...he is not ashamed to call them brothers..." Heb. 2:11

Do read the context.

Hebrews Preaches the Old Testament

"For, more than any other NT book, Hebrews, from beginning to end, preaches the OT. The author's explanations of the text serve ultimately to communicate a forceful message aimed at convincing the hearers/readers to respond by persevering in following Christ and standing with his church. His Christology vies for a christocentric life. His hortatory material has one aim: to present a resolute call to endurance and holy living. This is the task that he takes up in taking up the OT, and he carries it out with rhetorical power and artistry." (p. 923)

Guthrie, George H. eds., DA Carson, GK Beale. Commentary on the New Testament use of the Old Testament.

A Driftwood Believer

The writer to the Hebrews calls one away from being a Christian akin to a piece of driftwood.

"Therefore we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it." (2:1)

Donald Guthrie comments: "He is not thinking of a deliberate refusal to heed, but of an almost helpless slipping away--literally to flow past like driftwood in a river. Hence the words, lest we drift away." (p. 81)

Hebrews. The Tyndale New Testament Commentaries. 2002.

How easy it is just to passively believe the Gospel and not pay close attention to it. We often just assume God's message rather then actively listening to His voice in Jesus. I picture it in this way, we should be anchored to the bedrock of the island of the Gospel not sailing past it like a floating log.