Let Us Encourage One Another, Hebrews 10:19-25 (January 29, 2017)

Let Us Encourage One Another, Hebrews 10:19-25 (January 29, 2017) 19 Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, 20 by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. 23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. 24 And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, 25 not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near. PRAY This week our church launches a Celebrate Recovery (CR) program. CR is a recovery program, a twelve-step program, like Alcoholics Anonymous. Today is the final sermon in a three-week series where we ve highlighted Celebrate Recovery, and the way we ve done it is this: today s sermon, just like the last two sermons, will be a Bible exposition a sermon where, like every week, we study some passage of Scripture and see what God has to tell us from it. But in this series I ve also worked to incorporate some of the twelve-steps into each talk. And I hope it hasn t sounded like I m trying to make the Bible says something it doesn t in order to promote CR, because the twelve-steps are, properly understood, an outline of the Christian life. It s one way, but not the only way, of describing what it looks like to follow the Lord Jesus. In addition to teaching the Bible and explaining what CR is, I ve wanted to accomplish a couple of other things. First, I want to do away with the idea some in the church have that there are basically two groups of people out there: those who have their acts together over here and have their lives under control, and then those people over there in recovery. The Bible says no one has it all together. We are all sinners, we ve all hurt others and we ve been hurt by others and we ve all hurt ourselves, and therefore we are all in recovery. You don t have to call it that, you can just call it the Christian life, but we all need it. We are all in recovery. This sermon series has not been only for people in formal recovery program but for everyone, because we are all in recovery from sin. Second, I know that a lot of people in recovery programs feel that the church is one of the least safe places on the planet for them. They fear being judged, they fear being shunned, they fear they will never be accepted because they will be seen somehow as damaged goods. And they have good reason to feel that way, because that s exactly how many churches have treated them in the past. So if you are coming to Grace because of CR or another recovery program, I want to communicate as clearly as I can that this church is the place for you. Our struggles may be different, but we all need the same thing: the forgiveness of sins and love offered us by God through Jesus Christ. 2017 J.D. Shaw 1

We ve already looked at steps one through nine of CR, and I ll sum up those steps like this: you must admit you have a problem (steps one through three) and you must repent (steps four through nine). And I ll sum up the last three steps like this: if you want to stay in recovery, you must continue on the path. You are never cured of alcoholism. Instead, the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous says this. What we have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition. Every day is a day when we must carry the vision of God s will into all of our activities. Alcoholics Anonymous, 85. Recovery is not a one-time admission that you have a problem. Instead, you continually remember that you have a problem, and the rest of your life you work the program. The Christian life, likewise, is not a one-and-done activity; you re always admitting and confessing that you re a sinner as a Christian, and all of life for the Christian (until the day he dies) is one of repentance. At one point Jesus says, If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. Luke 9:23. And in both official recovery programs and in the Christian life, you will not stay on that path alone. If you re going to make it, you must walk with others. In other words, you must walk in community. Three points: first, the need for community. Second, the work of community. Third, the goal of community. First, the need for community. We, in the United States today, are the most individualistic people the world has ever known. We are more tempted and prone to an ideal of self-sufficiency, that we can figure out our stuff on our own, than any other culture that s ever lived on the face of the earth. And while this is true for all of us in the United States, I think it s worse if you're a man in the South a lot of us are brought up with the impression that we should be able to stand entirely on our own because a real man never needs help from anyone. But we do. More and more studies are coming out, secular books are being written, that human beings are incurably social animals. As important as things like income, education, race, genetics are as predictors of an individual s well-being, we are increasingly learning that it is the quality of the relationships in a person s life that might be the most vital factor in a person s happiness. You cannot thrive as a human being in an environment filled with toxic relationships, nor can you thrive alone. It s also not uncommon today for secular therapists and psychiatrists to admit they aren t confident in their various psychological theories of how humans work. They don t really know how human beings work. But last January in The Guardian, a British newspaper, I read an article by Oliver Burkeman, and in it he interviewed professionals across the secular, non-religious mental health spectrum. And while these professionals disagreed on just about everything, they did agree on this: What seems to matter much more [that the specific therapy used on a patient] is the presence of a compassionate, dedicated 2017 J.D. Shaw 2

therapist, and a patient committed to change In other words, we all need community. That s the most important factor. Christians and secular psychology don t agree on a lot, but Christians can totally get on board with the importance of community for mental well-being and spiritual growth. There are 59 different one another commands in the New Testament. Commands like love one another, be devoted to one another, build up one another, accept one another, admonish one another, greet one another, serve one another, confess your sins to one another, bear one another s burdens on and on it goes. All those one another commands add up to the Bible saying we need meaningful, sincere, and transparent relationships. John Wesley used to say, The Bible knows nothing of solitary religion. We see this in our passage for today. Hebrews is a letter written to a group of Christians, probably in Rome, who were facing persecution. Because of this pressure, they were in danger of abandoning the Christian faith altogether. So the writer wants to encourage them to persevere. And in Hebrews 10:24-25 we read this: 24 And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, 25 not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near. The author of Hebrews says, You must meet together. You need one another. Yet when it comes to spiritual growth, a lot of Christians have a tendency to think that they can do it all by themselves. All I need is my Bible, my prayer closet, maybe some sermons downloaded off the internet, and I can grow I can mature as a Christian. I can do this by myself; I certainly don t need the church. If anything, the church will slow me down. One passage that people have tried to use to support this view is Ephesians 6, where the apostle Paul talks about the armor of God. In Ephesians 6:16 he writes: In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one And a lot of Christians have looked at that passage and said, See, if I just put on the full armor of God, then I ll be fine but I don t have to have other people to help me. I can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one, the devil, if I just have enough faith. But what they don t realize that the book of Ephesians was not written to individual Christians it was written to the church, the congregation, at Ephesus. And the you in verse 16 is not the second person singular. It s second person plural. You know what Paul is literally saying there? If Paul were from Mississippi, he would have written, In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which y all can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one. The Roman shields Paul refers to were huge four or five feet long, big enough for a soldier to crouch behind but they were not designed for one on one combat. They were too big and bulky for that. And they offered no protection from the side or the rear, and 2017 J.D. Shaw 3

certainly not above. So, if you went up to attack a city archers on the wall could shoot their fiery arrows at you from the side or down from above and take you out. However, these shields were designed so that they could overlap one another, and when a unit of Roman soldiers marched up to a city and saw the archers up on the wall, they could link their shields together and form what they called a testudo, which is Latin for turtle. The shields, altogether, covered front, sides, rear, and top of the soldiers so that together, but not alone, they were impervious to any attack by fiery arrows. Friends, you have weaknesses in your life you have blind spots. You have blind spots spiritually, emotionally, in relationships, when it comes to money and politics. You don t know what they are that s why they re called blind spots. So you can t fix them on your own. And if you try to live a solitary spiritual life, if you are naïve enough to try that, the evil one will come up in one of those blind spots, shoot you with one of his fiery darts, and take you out. That s what he does. No, you need community you need people in your life who love you enough to get close to you and help you with those blind spots, help you to see what s really going on in your life, so that you can address those areas, change, grow stronger, grow more mature. That gets us to the second point. Second, the work of community. Let s read verses 24-25 one more time: And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, 25 not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some A lot of pastors have used this text to say this: See, this passage teaches that you need to be in church on Sunday mornings, you need to be in corporate worship. Is that what the author of Hebrews is saying here? Now I m all for Sunday morning corporate worship the body coming together to sing, to pray, to hear the Word rightly preached and participate in the sacraments. I think it s absolutely necessary for Christian growth, but it s not sufficient. And while the importance of Sunday morning gatherings is taught elsewhere in the New Testament, it s not what the author is talking about here. In verses 24 and 25, the Hebrews writer says that Christians must do three things in community: they must, first, consider one another, second, stir up one another, and, third, encourage one another. And when you see what these are you ll see this can t be referring to Sunday mornings. First, consider one another. The word translated as consider means to think carefully, observe, or contemplate. If we are going to do the work of community, it can t just mean that we get together in a big room and sing together or listen together or pray together, as important as that is. It means we must observe and think about one another. You re not doing that right now, are you? You re listening to me, you re applying what I m talking about to yourself, but you re not observing the other people. You re not listening to them, learning about their life. You can t in an environment like this. 2017 J.D. Shaw 4

But you know where it can happen? In healthy, intentional small groups of Christians. Sunday mornings are great; they are and should be the spiritual highlight of the week. But the work of community is done when everyone has a chance to talk, everyone has a chance to open up, be observed, and be considered by one another. And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47 praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved. Acts 2:46-47. The early church met both in the temple for worship and in homes to consider one another. Friends, we all need this, even the loners among us. If temperamentally you re an introvert, the last thing you want is to be carefully considered and observed by other people. You are just fine with coming to church on a Sunday morning, slipping in during the music, hearing the sermon, taking some notes, and slipping out before the service is over. That way you don t have to talk to anyone. You like being anonymous. If that s you, you need to know how unhealthy that is. Whether you like it or not, the one another commands apply to you, too. Even if you have a crippling case of social anxiety, which is a real thing by the way, you still need community. The loners and introverts need this, but families need this, too. I think some Christians think that as long as you are married and have kids you can skip the small group thing because you re getting plenty of community at home. It s those single people who need community, not me. It s not true. Second, we must stir up one another. I really like the Greek word translated as stir. We get our word paroxysm from it, which means a sudden, violent outburst. It s a negative word. The old NIV says, And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. Hebrews 10:24 (NIV 1984). Have you ever seen spurs on a rooster? Have you ever been spurred by a rooster? It s not pleasant. But the author of Hebrews says we should be doing this to one another. What? Now, obviously, it doesn t mean we stab one another. But it does mean this if we are doing the work of community, it means we have relationships in our lives where other people have permission to irritate us for our own good. They have permission to get personal and tell us stuff we don t want to hear. And of course when that happens it will hurt. But from time to time we all need to be spurred into loving others better, caring for others, and repenting of sin in our lives. This is why it s so important for all of us, even those in families, to be in small groups. If you are married or have children, sometimes you need to be spurred into loving them bettter. But when that s the case the last person on the planet who needs to spur you is the spouse or child whom you are neglecting. There was a man I knew in Starkville who had a ministry for years and years individually mentoring young men literally hundreds met with him over the years. And when a young husband would go and complain to him about something his wife wasn t doing 2017 J.D. Shaw 5

from him, he would tell the young man, You know, your wife probably does need to hear that. But she doesn t need to hear it from you. The young husband was not in a position to tell her, because he was hurt, it was personal, and it would just start a fight. But in community we find a place where people who care about us and consider us can spur us into love and good deeds. Third, of course, we must encourage one another. A little later in Hebrews we read this: Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us Hebrews 12:1. A lot of Bible scholars and commentators say this means that in heaven we all have an audience, a crowd of spectators made up of those saints who have gone before us (especially those in mentioned in Hebrews 11), and do you know what they are doing? They are cheering us on. They re encouraging us. They re saying, You can do this you can finish this race you re running. Now, I don t know if that s true or not it might be. It s a wonderful picture. But I do know this if they are cheering you on, you can t hear them. And if you can t hear their encouragement, then it s not all that helpful, is it? But you can hear the encouragement of other people in your small group. When you tell them the struggle you re going through you can hear them reply, I know this feels overwhelming, but everyone goes through this; this is totally normal. It s going to be okay. Or, when you ll hear them say, This is not normal. This is wrong. You ve got to deal with this. But I am going to be there for you. You are not alone. Most importantly, you can hear them when they say, I love you. Tell me how I can help. That s encouraging. Now here s the main reason why I m so thankful CR is coming to our church: in a CR meeting, you know it s going to get personal. The whole reason you re there is because you re admitting you are powerless before this addiction. Nobody s coming to CR group pretending like they have it altogether and just making small talk, or if they do come like that, they won t stay that way long. But that s all too often not the case in church small groups. All too often, the mindset is something like this: why am I here? This is a waste of time. I don t need this. I don t have to open up. And when that s the mentality of a lot of the people in the group, then the meetings feel strained and forced and no one wants to go. We may still attend because we think that s what we re supposed to do or because we gave our word we d go, but we don t look forward to it. Community groups are often seen as obligatory and life-taking [instead of life-giving]. We secretly hope the kids will be sick so we can stay home. We know if we go, then Sally is going to dominate the conversation with the same issues that we ve heard for the last three weeks, and insensitive Rob is going to miss the point and start lobing verses at her. As this drags on, Jim is going to try to prove he is the smartest guy in the room by parsing a Greek verb and quoting dead Puritans. Then, just when time is running out, we will go through prayer requests for each other s aunt s cats 2017 J.D. Shaw 6

that are suffering from angina This is not a picture of community. Community, Brad House (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2011), 98. It s not a picture of community, but it s the experience all too many of us have had in Christian small groups. But if we re all in recovery from sin, if we re all recovering from something, then it means that every community group needs to be a recovery group. We need to be considered, spurred, and encouraged. And I m excited about CR at Grace for a lot of reasons, not least of which is that I hope it can help lead by example in our church and show our groups how to do the work of community. But to what end? Third, the goal of community. Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, 20 by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Hebrews 10:19-22. Hebrews, you remember, was a letter written to Christians who were facing persecution and, therefore, were in danger of leaving the faith and, because they came from a Jewish background, they would return to the temple worship in order to draw near to God. And you can imagine how attractive the temple would have been to them. It had to have been a moving experience. A man goes to the temple and gives a sheep or a calf to the priest to be sacrificed in worship. The priest slaughters the animal, and a smile comes over the worshiper s face. Maybe he tears up a little. The temple worship was concrete, so you can see why they d be tempted to go back to it. Because, look, there s the priest! There s the sacrifice! There s the temple! But in the temple was a thick, almost soundproof curtain, and behind that curtain was the Most Holy Place. It was there in the Most Holy Place where the glory presence of God dwelt. And that was the problem, wasn t it? The worshipper could not get behind the curtain. No ordinary Jewish man or woman could get near that curtain into the presence of God; only the high priest could, and that just once a year. So you know the ordinary man and woman worshiping at the temple even though it was an awesome sight had to wonder, Is this animal really doing any good for me? In the old covenant, you couldn t draw near to God. But through the gospel you can. The gospel says that in Jesus Christ God himself became a man, and lived a perfect life on earth, the life you should have lived. On the cross he died the death we deserve for our sins, in our place, as our substitute. If we believe that Jesus did that for us, that he is our sacrifice, then the author of Hebrews says that we can draw near to God. Nothing holds us back. We can go through that curtain all the way in because Jesus made a way. We can draw near, the author of Hebrews says, with confidence and full assurance that God accepts us, because the gospel is that God gave up his son, Jesus Christ, in order to make us his children. 2017 J.D. Shaw 7

And children can draw near to their parents with confidence. Yesterday morning at 4AM one of my children drew near to me. He opened the door to our bedroom to ask for a glass of water. He did it without even knocking on the door. He didn t even say please. And guess what I did? I went and got him the water. Why? Because I wanted to go back to sleep, but also because he s one of my children, and my children can draw near to me with confidence and full assurance. Now you can t do that with me. I promise if you come into my bedroom at 4AM I will not react the same way. But because of Jesus Christ, his life, his death, his resurrection, his ascension, his intercession right now before the throne of God above, you are completely accepted by God. And because you are accepted and because you are his child you don t have to offer sacrifices to God (Jesus is the sacrifice), you don t have to prove yourself worthy to God (Jesus has kept the law), and you don t have go three or six or twelve months without making a mistake. You can just draw near and find the grace you need from him any time of day or night, because through Jesus you are his child. And the goal of community is to help you believe that. That s the point. You see, left to yourself, you won t believe that. Left to yourself, you ll get distracted. Left to yourself you ll start thinking all the pressures and stresses of life are more powerful than God or more important than God. Left to yourself the evil one will take you out. He knows the doubts and fears and anxieties that work on you and he ll fill your mind with them, he knows how to tempt you, and he knows how to get you to think that no one, especially God, loves you. You need a community around you reminding you of the gospel and of their love for you and of God s love for you. You need a group of Christians who know you, who aren t afraid to spur you, while also being your being fans. Do you have that? The people who are in recovery and working the program make those weekly meetings a priority in their lives. They don t miss them. Why? Because they know they won t make it without them. For far too long the church in the United States has not viewed their need for community with the same sense of urgency. Friends, encourage one another, because you won t make it without community either. You are in recovery from something. So find yourself a healthy, intentional small group of Christians and walk through this life with them. PRAY (pray for small groups, challenge to get in groups, commit to them, make them into the kind of groups that encourage, consider, and spur) 2017 J.D. Shaw 8