Hebrews: Making Progress in the Christian Life - Dr. Tom Russell

You're listening to a message preached at Front Range Baptist Church.

It is our prayer that this message will be a help and an encouragement to you in your spiritual walk.

All right.

Well, thank I thank the pastor for allowing me to take the pulpit for tonight.

And uh it's a great blessing.

And we're gonna be in the book of Hebrews.

If you want to turn there.

Now, this is going to be how can I put this?

This is gonna be a little strange.

Not because of me, but it well, maybe.

But uh we're going to do something a little bit different.

I'm going to give you some doctrines from Hebrews, and and here's why.

Uh I got saved in 1970.

I was at San Diego State University studying nuclear physics, 17 years old, and I was in the West Commons, and this weird guy in a suit and a coat walked up where I was eating my hamburger.

Leave me alone when I'm eating my hamburger.

And he said, he introduced himself and said, if you died.

Outer space, you ready for the rapture?

It's happening right now.

And he said, if you died if you died, that took care of it.

Okay.

He said, if you died today, do you know for sure you'd go to heaven?

And I lied to him and said, Well, of course.

I go to church every Sunday.

And uh he taught me for a little while, and I I had lied to him, and he left me a little tracked.

I think it was called God's Four Spiritual Laws.

I think that's what it was called.

And I took that thing home and read it, and it scared me to death.

I mean, it talked about hell and judgment, and the only way you could get out of it was through Jesus Christ, no other way.

And I accepted Christ that night.

And uh and then I I my my wife now invited me to a fundamental Baptist church in Power, California.

And uh the church I was used to going to, the guy came out in a dress, and he never had a Bible or anything.

He just made a speech, maybe Newsweek magazine or something.

And all I remember is when they played the spooky music, you got to leave.

That's all I remember.

And his son was my best friend.

We lived two doors down.

I I was at his house all the time.

He never gave me the gospel.

That preacher, I don't think he knew the gospel.

Uh, but anyway, so I went to this Baptist church, and where I was, when people come in, they're like, and they sit down there real quiet.

And I walked in this church, and people are laughing and shaking hands and talking to each other, and I thought, what in the world is this?

This is church.

Well, I found out that's what church is it's learning to love people as you love Jesus Christ.

And so I started growing in grace, and and um I started going through the Bible and studying the Bible.

Now, I'm so glad for Pastor, he is a he is so good at this.

I don't want to take anything away when he teaches the book in Hebrews, so I decided to do a little bit different.

But uh anyway, so I I had just gotten saved and I signed up for a religion class at San Diego State.

First day in there, the guy says, We're gonna talk about all the religions except Christianity.

We're not gonna talk about that at all.

And that kind of torque me off right there.

I just gotten saved.

So he's given us tests, and I would put down, well, this is what you said, but this is what Jesus said.

And I got his stuff right and I got Jesus' stuff right.

He couldn't flunk me because I gave him every answer he wanted, but I wouldn't let up.

Oh, my science teachers love me.

You know, how old is the universe?

4.3 billion years, that's what you say.

But it's really only about 6,000.

Uh but anyway, some of you don't get that.

You would if you understood the Bible really well.

But uh anyway, you will someday.

Uh you know how old the oldest tree in the world is?

It's 4,400 years.

Anyone who know what happened 4,400 years ago?

The flood.

Uh we could go on and on, but I'm not going to teach that today.

So here I am here I am going through the uh the I'm I'm going through the scripture.

I I joined a Bible study at our church, and uh I was doing fine going through there.

We went through the gospels and everything, and uh that was over with, and I kept going, and I got to the book of Hebrews, and I was so confused because there's more bad doctrine, false doctrine that comes out of Hebrews than nearly every other book.

And I read it and I didn't understand it.

Here's what I found, they said.

Number one, they said, Who's it written to?

Well, one guy said it's written to unsaved Jews in an effort to see them converted to Christianity.

Well, that can't be true, and I'll tell you why.

And then I read another author, and he said, it's written to Christians in danger of losing their salvation.

And warning them that if they do, they can never regain it.

That's Hebrews chapter 6, a great misunderstanding of scripture.

Hebrews 6 · chapter mention

And then I read another one, and it was written to the almost saved, but they were going to reject Christ, they were in danger of rejecting Christ.

And then I read another one, and it said it's written to Hebrews Christians in danger of lapsing back into Judaism.

And I'm going, I this is incredible.

Everybody believes something different.

What do you do when that happens?

You start studying the Bible instead of listening to people.

You know, the Holy Spirit's a great teacher if you allow him to be in your life.

And uh I found out really, it's written to Hebrew Christians, exhorting them to grow into grace, to grow in grace, and to become mature in Jesus Christ.

It's written to saved Hebrews that had been saved long enough to be teaching the Word of God, and they weren't.

And so it was an encouragement.

When you're studying things like this, and I'll give you a few things in the in the scripture.

I I will I will try to be shorter than pastor was last week.

Uh that was great last week.

How many of you sat here and it was over and you went, oh, that's just normal.

No, it was it when he starts talking, I I just go into a phase, okay?

But uh you have to have a plan to study the scripture.

Uh many years ago, my family, uh David and Coco and Mika and my wife and I, um, they had a very large puzzle.

One of those, what was it, Dave, 5,000 pieces or something?

I forget.

3,000, 3,000 pieces.

And so we'd sit at a table a few minutes, put some pieces together, and then we'd leave.

And we did that for a little while.

It sat on the table, I don't know how long.

And finally it got down to where there was only like 50 pieces left.

And then everybody was putting pieces in.

And we're putting pieces in and putting pieces in, it's grown and grown, and we put a piece in, there was one piece left, and it wasn't there.

We're looking under the table, under the cake, you know, all over the couch and everything.

And I looked at my son.

He gets this goofy look on his face.

And so I shot him.

Uh, but anyway.

Now, when they do it, they make you, everybody has to put their hand on the last piece and put it in together because of him.

Okay?

So, anyway, you you have to have you have and by I was gonna say this was him, but it wasn't, it was this lady.

She was putting together just a 250-piece puzzle.

250 pieces.

She worked on it three hours a day for 65 days.

She finally got it finished.

And somebody asked her, said, Well, well, how do you feel about it?

She said, Well, I'm very proud of myself.

They said, Really?

She said, Yes, the box says four to five years.

So if you're going to put together a puzzle, you have to have a plan.

Now, all of you know what the plan is, right?

First, you turn the pieces right side up, then you look for all the ones with the edge.

Now, they got these puzzles that don't have edges on them.

Don't get those.

They're only good for target practice.

Uh so you do that, you put them right out, you separate all the border out, you make the border, and you start working in, and once in a while you get something in the middle, and and you have a methodology, an assembly way.

If you just pick up a piece and pick up a piece to see if they go together, put it down, pick up another piece, you'd be there forever.

And so you have to have, uh, just like you're doing a puzzle, you have to have a logical way to study the Bible.

And uh if you if you just pick it up and read things, you can get it completely wrong.

There's a story of a guy that he was in a hurry and he was doing his devotions, and he said, Well, I'll just and gee and I'm laughing at my own joke.

And and Judas went out and hanged himself.

He said, I don't like that.

That's not a good devotion.

Get it again, put his finger down.

It says, go and do likewise.

He said, That's crazy.

Did it one more time, it says, Whatsoever thou do it too quickly.

That's a bad way to study the Bible.

So I want to help you a little bit here.

You have to have a logical strategy to study the Bible.

Now, when I was in Bible college, you don't have to do this, but when I was in Bible college, our professor made us read the book that we were studying 15 times before we did anything.

Um and that worked for me because it showed, it puts starts putting things together.

But anyway, you after that you start developing an outline, and after that, you want to find the theme of the book, you want to find the words that are used the most often, and then you want to look at the individual chapters, and then you want to look at the verses, and then you want to look at the sentences, and then you want to look up the words within the sentence to see what they mean from the Greek.

Okay?

And I'm not a Greek expert.

I I oh I say I'm an never mind.

Uh so anyway, uh, that's the way you do it.

So I I just want to show you what you what you do and how you might help yourself, and we'll learn some doctrine while we're at it, okay?

We can't go through the whole book of Hebrews.

I did it in my connection class.

It took over a year and a half.

Um, and by the way, if you're not in a connection class, get in one.

I like the early ones.

I have one, and Brother Stalins has one, and he's an excellent teacher.

You can't go wrong, go into his.

And uh me, I'm mediocre, but we have a lot of fun in our place.

So, anyway, um, for example, these things, like it was written to unsave Jews.

Well, the Bible says in Hebrews 3:1, listen to the verse, wherefore holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the apostle and high priest of our profession, Jesus Christ.

Hebrews 3:1

Can that be written to unsave people?

There's no way in the world it can.

So take that guy and throw him away.

Right?

That's what I did.

I threw him out the door.

Okay?

Um that eliminates one and also eliminates two, because it the number two is written to the almost saved, whatever that's supposed to mean.

I have actually written down in my notes the people that said this, I got it out of their books, so I'm not kidding you.

They actually put it there.

Approach number three, which said it's written to Christians in danger of losing their salvation.

I'll show you why they believe that, but the honest truth is something taken completely out of context because you can't lose your salvation.

John 10 28.

You ought to memorize it, put it down.

It says, I give unto them, I give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish.

Neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.

If you look at that uh ver that uh word there, I give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish.

Look that up in the Greek.

It means never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never perish.

And I didn't even give enough nevers.

It's adamant that you can't lose your salvation.

Now listen to what they take out of Hebrews out of context.

And later on I'll explain what it means.

But here's what they say: Hebrews 6, 1 through 6.

Bad doctrine that they give.

Therefore, leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on to perfection, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith towards God, of the doctrine of baptism, laying on of hands, and resurrection of the dead and of eternal judgment.

By the way, all those things you learn when you're a brand new Christian.

Then it goes on to say, and this will we do if God permit.

Now listen what they use.

For it is impossible for those who are once enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift, that's Jesus, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away to renew them again unto repentance, seeing they crucified in themselves the Son of God afresh and put him to an open chain.

You take those verses out of context, and does it sound like you can lose your salvation?

It is impossible, it says, for them to gain repentance.

Now, you need to know how that applies, and I'm not going to tell you till the end.

And if we go too long, you don't get to know.

So approach number four falls apart when you examine the book.

The book of Hebrews does make a lot of references to Old Testament illustrations, but there's no indication in the book at all that they were going back to Judaism.

No indication at all.

So that one falls apart.

So if we approach the book correctly, like I believe that we are in this in this uh church, the pastor believes the same thing.

I've talked to him about the book of Hebrews lots of times.

Um if we we we approach it as written to immature believers, exhorting them to grow up, all of the problems, chapter six included, disappear.

And the thing makes perfect sense.

These people had been converted out of Judaism, they had been long saved long enough to have grown to maturity.

They were supposed to be teaching others and they weren't doing it.

Now, if I step on your toe, it's okay, it'll heal.

Hebrews 5, 12, and 13.

For when, for the time ye ought to be teachers.

Now that doesn't mean you're a Sunday school teacher or something.

You're teaching other people that you run into.

Um ye have need that one teach you again, which be the first principles of the oracles of God, and become such as have need of milk and not of strong meat.

For everyone that uses milk is unskillful in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe.

So I have a chapter in the book I wrote called Grow Up.

And he says, Look, if you're like this, you are a baby.

Have you ever had a baby?

They whine, cry, eat, and poop.

That's all they do.

And you spend the first couple of years trying to save their life because they want to put their tongue in the light socket and stuff like that.

You you they're they're dumb as a rock.

My friend was an evangelist and he spoke on dinosaurs and stuff like that in public schools.

And uh he saw a kid drinking a Coke.

I was by him, so I heard this, and he says, You're drinking that Coke, son?

He said, Yes.

He said, if you drink that Coke, your children will be born illiterate and naked.

Kids looking at that Coke camera.

Anyway, I run around with a lot of weird people.

Um, but anyway, uh, so from this passage that we just looked, we learned two things.

They should have been teaching others, but they needed to be taught themselves.

They should have been spiritual adults, but they're classified as baby Christians.

You know, you have to put up with some Christians, they're brand new, and they whine and complain about everything.

Just know they're just a babe in Christ.

Give them the word of God and they'll grow up.

Amen.

Be patient.

And why is this so important for these Hebrew Christians?

If you knew the framework of Hebrews, they're about to go in, they have a real dilemma because they're about to go in to severe persecution by both the Gentiles and Jews.

And when you're a baby Christian and you're going to suffer intense persecution, you can fall flat on your face very easily.

So he's saying, grow up, grow up, grow up.

You're going to you're going to have to in the future.

Uh so when we do this, for example, I said you need to find the key words.

Well, if you go through Hebrews, you're going to find two words that are used over and over again.

And let me give you this too.

Um, there's a difference between a definition and an interpretation.

Uh a definition of the word is simply what the word means.

You can look it up in strong's or you can look it up in better things than strongs, it gives you all the other derivations.

But anyway, uh those are good, those are good tools.

Interpretation tells how it's used in the scripture.

You have to pull out the difference.

So the two key words in Hebrews are better and perfect.

Better and perfect.

By interpretation, better is used nearly every time in reference to Christ.

He's better than the angels, he's better than the prophets, he's better than Abraham, he's better than Moses.

I think Paul wrote it.

I'll just say Paul.

If you don't, I'm not gonna argue with you, I know I'm right.

Uh anyway.

Oh, good night.

Why do I say things like that?

Uh anyway.

Uh that's what that's what the whole first part is.

He said Christ is better, better, better, better, better, better.

And uh, I have a whole list of verses, we're not gonna go through all those, but uh so Christ is better than anything they have.

Now, what's that refer to?

That refers to their possessions.

Christ is better than anything they have.

Uh, whatever you name in your life that you like, Christ is better than that.

I love my Tesla.

Christ is better than that.

Except to save my life again today on the way home.

Somebody tried to drive in the side of our car and it's it moved over automatically.

So, anyway, uh so and then so by definition, perfect is something, by definition, perfect means to be complete.

It does not mean sinlessness.

It does it by interpretation, it means to be mature, to grow up, to act like an adult.

So, in other words, it refers to our practice.

So, when we talk about the definition of better, that means Christ is better than anything else we have.

And the word perfect means our practice ought to match what Jesus Christ is.

In other words, we need to learn to live right.

Had somebody tell me one time, you old fundamentalist, well, I am old, and I am a fundamentalist, so they were right there.

Saying, You don't believe in liberty.

I said, What do you mean I don't believe in liberty?

Well, the Bible says we have liberty in Christ.

They said, Yes, it does, and I believe that.

So that means we can do whatever we want to do.

I said, you don't understand the scripture, sir.

Liberty is not the right to do what you want to do.

Liberty is the power to live as you ought to live, like Jesus Christ.

That's liberty in Christ.

And we got Christians that are messed up on that.

They think they can do all these things that the world does and they're wrong and they're sinful, and they say, well, I'm liberty.

You know?

Anyway, that was free.

That's not in my notes.

I just throw that in there.

So the whole theme of the book, take these things we've talked about, because remember, you look at the words and all that first, you develop a theme.

The theme is making progress in the Christian life.

Get out of being a kid and a baby, grow up, and learn the scripture and start living like Christ wants you to live.

Now, I'm going to give you the, and then you develop an outline.

So here's the outline.

I'll give this to you if you want it.

In chapters 1 through 6, it talks about the motivation for progress.

The motivation for progress.

And that's the person of Christ.

He is what motivates me to try to be like him.

I mean, here is God in the flesh willing to die for me.

He gives me grace.

Everything I am comes from Jesus Christ.

He's my motivation.

It's better than a TikTok influencer.

In fact, the Bible says to consider him.

That consider means to observe him fully, and then you want to emulate who he is.

And how do you do that?

That goes through the study, and one thing that we've lost in Christianity is meditation.

We think that's a Far Eastern thing, and you cross your legs and go, blah, boom.

Meditation is taking the Word of God and thinking about how to apply it to your life.

And we're supposed to, and by the way, it's one of the only two things we're supposed to do all the time.

Meditate day and night and pray without ceasing.

So anyway, all of those are separate sermons.

Okay, so that's that's the first division.

The next division is chapters 7 through 10, and that's the ministry of progress.

Isaiah 7 · chapter mention

In other words, um, how is this possible that we can be like Christ?

And that's the priesthood of Melchizedek.

Do you know how to spell that?

Me either.

It's M-E-L-C-H-I-S-E-D-E-C.

Melchizedek was a Christophany.

It was an Old Testament appearance of Jesus Christ.

Remember, he paid tithes to him and so forth.

We won't go into all that.

But it's the scripture says the priest of Melchizedek is a scriptural name for the ministry of Jesus Christ and what he's doing right now, tonight, for you.

And he'll do it all night long and all tomorrow.

He is interceding for us.

And it's his intercession, the Bible says, that can save us to the uttermost.

Well, that uttermost again means perfection.

So it can save us to maturity.

It's him that does it, it's not us.

I remember when I was a brand new Christian.

How dumb was I! I'd sit there and the preacher would preach.

Oh man, somebody was talking about me to him.

Because he kept saying things that I was doing that were wrong.

So somebody was a gossip.

Is that how you ever felt?

That's how I felt.

And and uh I'd get up and I'd come forward, I'd kneel there, and I'd say, God, I'm not gonna sin anymore.

I'm not doing that anymore.

I'm making up my mind, I'm not gonna do it.

Guess what happened?

I go back and do it again.

You know why?

Because progress isn't up to me.

It's my obedience to Him.

So I changed my prayer.

I come up now and say, God, I'm wicked.

And I got this sin.

And I who said yeah, my wife.

Uh you're just agreeing.

Amen and me.

Okay, I got you.

We have fun in our Sunday school class.

Uh so anyway.

I change my prayers.

I go up and say, God, I am so wicked and so sinful that if I do not have your power, if I don't have your direction, if you don't bring Bible verses up to me when I'm about to do something I shouldn't do, I will do it again.

Lord, it's up to you to help control me through the word of God.

So I admitted to him, I'm too weak to do what's right.

But he isn't.

And so when I started praying like that, all the sins started dropping off.

Not all of them, a lot of them.

I still got a lot more in this pocket here.

Uh but anyway, number three is 11 through 13, and that's the means of progress.

How do we move forward in the Christian life?

And I hope we get to talk about this at the end.

We probably won't.

Uh it's the principle of faith.

The principle of faith, something something that Christians have forgotten about.

So let me give you the key illustration now.

You all know it.

The children of Israel have been in Egypt.

Um they uh go out of Egypt, they go to the Red Sea, and they cross the Red Sea on dry ground.

And by the way, if you haven't figured it out, they went by faith.

If you had two walls of water on both sides and it opened up, would you step out?

Well, they did.

And by the way, if you study the there's too many things going through my brain.

If you study the Red Sea, it's very, very deep.

But there's one place where it's not very deep, and that happens to have a huge beach that'll hold millions of people.

And they have found scuba diving the eight-spoke chariot wheels from the Egyptian chariots.

Everybody says, oh, that's just a story.

No, no, no, no, it's real.

And uh anyway, so they went across and then they got into the wilderness, and you know what happened in the wilderness?

They griped and complained, and God had to deal with them in so many ways.

They were baby Christians, they illustrated baby Christians.

And so here they go, and uh, under God's direction, they've left the red, they've left Egypt, they've gone across the Red Sea, and finally they come to the Jordan River.

Now catch this because lots of Christians have this messed up.

We sing songs about this.

We're gonna cross, after we die, we cross the Jordan River and we're in heaven.

When they crossed the Jordan River, they went to war.

I don't think there's war in heaven.

That Jordan River, the other side is called a successful Christian life.

It's not heaven.

You're gonna have battles there.

Some you win when you're walking in faith, and some you lose when you're not walking in faith.

Uh, but it is a place for mature Christians.

And we'll we'll get to that in a second because this is where something really scary comes up.

Uh so if you remember, they got to Jordan River and they uh appointed 12 people.

God didn't tell them to do this.

They appointed 12 people to go and check it out.

And they came back and they said two things.

Wow! There's great things over there.

There's grapes the size of a golf ball.

Grapes of escrow.

You had to put them on a stave, and two people carry it.

He said a wonderful place.

But there's giants up there.

And they make us look like grasshoppers.

And uh let's take a vote.

Where do we go?

And the vote was they took a Baptist vote.

Shouldn't be voting on this.

God already said to do it.

And they took a Baptist vote, it was 10 to 2.

And uh God said, You're not going.

They said you're not going, and then God said, You're right, you're not going.

And they said, Well, if, and he said, You're never going.

And they said, Well, then we'll go.

And God said, No, you won't, because I'm not going with you.

And they tried to go and it didn't work.

And what did they end up doing?

They went back into the wilderness, and everybody over 20 was going to die before they could go across the Jordan River.

And by the way, that's that is a symbol of a a backslidden Christian.

They looked just like a baby Christian.

They whined and complained and wandered and died.

And by the way, when they got there, there's only two results defeat and death.

Because they would not do what God said.

This is where it starts getting a little scary.

Okay?

Hold on, okay?

I'll try to make it less scary, but it is scary to me.

Um remember if somebody comes up with a doctrine that doesn't sound right, if they can't show it illustrated in the Old Testament, it's not a New Testament doctrine.

Every New Testament doctrine has a vestige in the Old Testament.

Just remember that because people get all that mixed up too.

And so I want to say this it is impossible to enter Caden, the land of Caden, the victorious Christian life, in your own power.

It is Jesus Christ that takes you.

How'd they get across the Red Sea?

Split, how'd they go to the how do they go from one side of the Jordan to the other?

It's split, they did the exact same thing.

They crossed the Red Sea, for that's by the way, a symbol of salvation, in case you didn't know.

They crossed it on dry ground, and because they went across by faith, just like God told them.

After the other group died, when they went to the Jordan River and Joshua was going to lead them across, the exact same thing happened.

The Jordan River parted and they walked over on dry ground.

They walked over in faith.

And it's faith that helps a Christian grow.

Not your will, not your intelligence, not not you doing it.

That's like a work.

It's kind of like work.

Some people say, well, we're saved by grace, but we grow by works.

No, you don't.

You have works when you fall in love with Christ and start doing what the Bible says because you want to follow him by faith.

It has nothing to do with you.

It's him putting his power on you.

And by the way, um, well, let me.

If you're in asking people in my Sunday school class, do I ever finish anything?

After about four weeks in the same thing, I finally finish it.

I never finish the whole thing.

So anyway, uh, because there's too much to teach, right?

But I want to teach you how it starts.

How do you start going downhill in your Christian life?

Number one, if uh write this down, it's Hebrews 2, 1 through 4.

The first thing that happens to you is drifting through neglect.

You drift away from the Word of God.

Now, all of you who have been saved a long time, you've seen people active in the church, and then they start missing a service, and then they start missing another one, and pretty soon you never see them again.

Because uh there's some really interesting things about drifting.

I found this out when going fishing with my uncle.

My uncle was a fisherman, and we went out on the lake, we rode out there, and he said, Okay, throw the anchor out here.

Well, the anchor was a piece of concrete, you know what I'm talking about in those little boats.

We threw that out and he says, Okay, get out the stink bait.

That is the proper name for it.

Oh, man, it crossed your eyes.

And uh, you put that out there and let it down.

Boom! A catfish had hit it.

We roll it up.

I mean, we were pulling in catfish like crazy, and all of a sudden it stopped.

Now, by the way, I won't eat catfish because they eat stink bait.

There's something wrong with that.

I'm not eating that thing.

I'll catch it.

Somebody else can eat it because I'm not eating that thing.

Uh but anyway, and and I'm going like, well, uh uh Floyd, his name is Floyd.

I said, Floyd, we must have caught them all.

And he goes, He said, Look over there, what do you see?

Oh, there's a big boulder over there.

They said, That's where we started.

We have drifted out of the hole.

And that leads me to teach you this drifting is almost imperceptible.

A lot of times you don't even know it's happening to you.

And this is a very dangerous thing.

This is the first thing that happens to you.

Also, drifting is accidental.

You cannot become a victorious Christian on accident.

But that's what drifting is.

Um in San Diego they have a place called the Silver Strand.

Anybody ever been to San Diego?

Beautiful beach back then.

I don't know what it is like now.

But uh when I was young, we I go with my brother and his friend and I.

I was three years younger than my brother.

He was such a good brother, he'd take me with him every place.

He didn't go like you can't go.

He took me every place.

God bless his heart.

And uh and for 50 cents you could rent a raft.

Now the rafts were canvas, they were heavy as all get out, and you'd go out in the breakers and you'd ride them in.

Well, that's what I was doing.

I was going out, riding them in, going out, riding them out.

Man, I was having a blast.

And uh at the Silver Strand, they have a lifeguard station, and they have a flag on that side and a flag way down there, and that means you can do this, but outside of that, there's riptide, so don't go out of this place.

I was going in and out and in and out of a ball, and I finally looked up, and there's nobody on the beach.

I had drifted clear around the corner, and uh, I didn't know it.

And that takes me to the third one.

Drifting is a slow process, it happens a little bit at a time.

Okay, so, and I'll just tell you the rest of the things.

I have stuff to back it up, but we don't have time to do it.

So, drifting through neglect.

This next one is Hebrews 3.7 through 4.16, and that's doubting because of hardness of heart.

Oh, I wish I could stay on that for a while.

Hebrews 5.11 through 6.30 is the third one, and that's dullness because of slothfulness.

You ever hear anybody say, oh, that was a dull sermon?

Well, the Bible says there's dull hearers, it doesn't talk about dull preachers.

Number four, it's despising willfully despising the word of God.

And when you get to these last two, you're probably finished.

In Hebrews chapter 12, it's defilement by refusing to hear God's word because of bitterness.

Hebrews 12 · chapter mention

Does that scare you?

Uh-oh.

Should I skip this part and go right to the end and tell you what those verses mean?

Um let me say this real quick.

Chapters 7 through 10 are all about the ministry of progress, which is the priesthood of Melchizedek.

And that's Jesus Christ.

Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost, to maturity.

They come unto God by him, seeing ever liveth to make intercession for them.

And that's what Jesus is doing right now.

When you got saved, three things are happening, hap.

Well, there two are happening, one will happen.

Now you don't get saved three times, but it's a threefold process.

Number one is justification.

That's when you trust Christ, and Christ justifies you and takes your sin away.

The second one is sanctification, and that's what we're all living through right now.

When you become more and more like Jesus, that's the sanctification process.

And the last one is glorification.

Boom! We're like Jesus Christ in heaven.

Amen?

I can't wait for that.

I don't have to worry about my sin anymore.

And so if I'll kind of shorten this up, but it's his prayers for us as the high priest, not our works for him, that are the basis of victory in our lives.

You've got to get this.

It's not your works.

We have Christians that are doing things for Christ because they think they're gonna get brownie points.

It's not how it works.

It's all him.

His prayers make it possible for us to advance in our Christian life.

He always gets his prayers answered.

And when he prays for you, you can get that.

I wish we had like a half hour to do with that.

So right now he's our advocate.

That means he's our lawyer, he's our intercessor, he defends us, and um and uh that's the result.

The results of his priesthood are this the devil's a defeated foe.

You remember Flip Wilson?

Anybody remember Flip Wilson?

The devil made me do it! No, he didn't.

The devil can't make you do anything.

You did it because you're wicked.

We always want to blame somebody, right?

Remember when you were a kid?

Uh my brother threw a football at me and uh it missed and hit my mom's favorite vase, and the car drove up just then, and they came in and we said, Look what the dog did.

He jumped up and hit that vase.

That was a lie.

Okay?

But we always want to uh blame something.

So let me finish with this.

And this might scare you a little.

Remember where it said, I want I want to read Hebrews 3, 8 through 11.

Harden not your hearts as in the provocation.

What in the world does that mean?

Well, I'm gonna tell you in a second.

In the day of temptation in the wilderness, when was that?

When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works forty years.

Wherefore I was grieved with that generation and said, They do always err in their heart, and they have not known my ways.

This is Hebrews 3, 8 through 11.

So I swear in my wrath, they shall not enter into my rest.

Where did that come from?

Well, it came from Psalm 95.

Paul was writing, and he took the Old Testament and brought it into the New Testament.

Psalms 95 says this.

It's gonna sound just about the same.

Harden not your hearts as in the provocation, as in the days of temptation in the wilderness, when your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my work.

Forty years long was I grieved with this generation, and said, It is a people that do err in their heart, and they have not known my ways whereto whom I swear in my wrath that they shall not enter into my rest.

Now, what does that mean?

They came up to the Jordan River, and God said, Go.

I got everything planned for you.

And they said, No.

We see problems over there, and we're not going.

That was the day of provocation in the wilderness, and God said, Fine, die in the wilderness.

You're never gonna be victorious.

Count your crowns gone.

Isn't that sad?

Here's the problem.

Had they griped and complained and had God rebuked them all those times they were going towards the Jordan?

Here's the thing.

You never know when you the time you say no to God and said, I'm done with you.

You know, we always say, God is gracious, he gives us chance after chance.

Well, yeah, he gave them lots of chances.

But he got to one place and he said, No more.

It is a very dangerous thing.

When I was in college, I was studying something completely different.

I was sitting right about where you are, Larry, and the preacher, I didn't even know what he preached about, but God said in my heart, I want you in full-time Christian service.

And I got out of my seat and uh I was getting ready to graduate, okay?

I got out of my seat, got on my knees, and said, God, I'll do whatever you want me to do.

And he said, Go to Bible college.

We packed up.

I was newly married, we packed up and we went to Hammond, Indiana.

Oh boy, that armpit of the world.

And uh and I went to Bible college.

I did what God said.

I often wonder if I would have said no, where I'd be today.

So do you see how dangerous it is when God speaks to your heart and you don't react in faith?

Can I show you one more thing real quick?

Go to Hebrews chapter, I'll do this real quick.

Go to Hebrews chapter number 11.

And we're not going to read this, but everybody, what's, say it out loud.

What is Hebrews chapter 11 about?

Hebrews 11 · chapter mention

The faith hall of fame, we often call it, right?

Uh this they said this guy he did it by faith, this guy he did it by faith, this guy they did it by faith.

Some of them died, uh, some of them were torn asunder, but they all did it by faith.

Now, answer me this.

When these letters were written, were they written in chapters and verses?

It was a letter.

And we often stop at the end of chapter 11 and we don't go on to chapter 12.

Wherefore, seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, you know what I'm talking about now?

Yes.

Okay, and what does it say next?

Let us run with patience, the race that is set before us.

Uh, what do we do first?

We lay aside every weight and the sin that just so easily beset us.

Now, I've read that verse dozens of times and it finally occurred to me.

Does anybody know the difference between a and the?

English teachers help me.

What's the difference between a and the?

A means anything.

If I said, go in my room and get a book, I have two full bookcases and another case, they go all the way up to the ceiling.

You you can choose from hundreds of books.

If I said, get me the book, that means one book.

That is the Bible when I use it in that term.

Now I want you to know this because I think that a lot of people misinterpret this verse.

I could be wrong.

Probably not, but I could be.

Lay aside every weight.

Weights are good if you're lifting them, build muscles.

They're not good if you're trying to run track.

Put those things that don't do any good in your life, put them away.

That's what he's saying.

Not sin, it's just dumb.

And look what it says.

And the sin which says does so easily beset us.

You know what the sin is?

What was it talking about in the previous chapter, which really isn't it's really connected?

What's he talking about?

Faith is the besetting sin.

Any sin you can mention, it's because you don't have faith in that area to conquer that sin.

You we all have that sin.

We all have lack of faith sometimes.

So I thought I'd share you that with you.

Two things that should scare you.

And the one is you might not cross the Jordan River if you say no to God.

When I learned that, I learned to say yes to God with everything He put on my heart, even if I didn't want to do it.

And this don't let your besetting sin, the lack of faith in your life, keep that sin in your heart instead of letting it go by faith.

Because remember, God's gonna give you the power to overcome that sin through faith in what He can do in your life.