The People of God | Simply Irresistible

So as I said in the beginning of the worship service, we are continuing the sermon series, Simply Irresistible, where we're looking at Jesus, why He is the greatest, why He's the best, why He is simply irresistible through the lens of the book of Hebrews, that the writer is really trying to get his point across to whoever wrote it, to the group that he's writing to, which we will take that as us today, because that's cool how the book is written.

That we need to put our trust and hope in Jesus for these reasons. We started with why Jesus was higher than the angels, why Jesus then came down to die for humanity, became a human, fully God, fully man, to die for humanity, to make the atoning sacrifice for our sins, that one day we will be holy with God forever.

And now we're going to look, as I stated at the end of last week, we're going to look at kind of these series of conversations as the writer of Hebrews is going to go through the Old Testament, the New Testament was kind of already being written in that time, but going through really the law and the prophets as to why Jesus is better.

Not discounting certain individuals, because we're going to talk about that, but he's going to kind of set all of these individuals and contrast them to Jesus, which they're never going to measure up because that's the deity, the Christ, the Holy One, the Messiah, capital M.

And so we're going to talk that through because the people that are reading this letter back in 70ish AD, the intended audience and then for us today, they love their Old Testament. They love the law and the prophets, they love the story of the Egyptians coming out of slavery in Egypt, which is appropriate.

We can't even plan that, how well it works up with a prep Sunday when we talk about the Ten Commandments, but the person of Moses, we're going to talk about him today and a little bit next week.

My guess is we don't talk a lot about Moses, but I'm going to get ahead of myself because there's some really cool aspects to what Hebrews has to say.

But we've also been looking at this through the eyes of one of our confessions, the Canons of Dortz, talking about irresistible grace.

Now, someone mentioned that we had irresistible faith up one time. That was an error, though it could make sense.

It is irresistible grace.

But we're going to look at another confession today, the Belgic Confession, Article 24, talking about sanctification and good works, that this is part of that grace and the irresistibleness of Jesus and how the Holy Spirit works in our life,

that as we grow in faith, as we grow in love with Jesus and God and walk in his ways more and more, that's called the process of sanctification.

It's not a one and done. You can't say, okay, I was sanctified at this camp at this time and that's it.

It doesn't work that way. It is an ongoing process, which is a good thing because look at us.

We are ongoing projects, right?

God plays the long game with all of us and praise God that he does.

But from Article 24 of the Belgic Confession, we believe that this true faith, now earlier on, it defines what true faith is.

You can see that in all, actually all three of our confessions, right?

Where's Dan, our Catechism guru? True faith can be defined in Dan's terms as?

Ask Cam. So, what? Ask Joe. Okay, let's just say it's going to make its way to Randy. I have a feeling. Yeah.

Yeah, so Randy, okay, be ready.

They didn't know I was going to do this, so I'll wait.

You got this. I know you do.

Knowledge and assurance. Way to go. Claire, give him a high five.

You give a high five. You put your hand out, Cam. You're good.

All right, I already brought you out too much in the sermon. He's dazed and confused.

Yes, it is knowledge, right? There's a conviction and an understanding of what God is doing, right?

What God did, what he continues to do. True faith is that gut feeling, and feeling is the wrong word,

conviction of not only our sin, but also the good news of the gospel and understanding that, right?

If we confess with our mouth and believe in our heart, that's part of that true faith.

So, we believe that this true faith being wrought in man may, by the hearing of the Word of God and the operation of the Holy Ghost,

doth regenerate and make him a new man, causing him to live a new life and freeing him from the bondage of sin.

Therefore, it is so far from being true that this justifying faith makes men remiss in a pious and holy life,

that on the contrary without it, they would never do anything out of love for God, only out of self-love and fear of damnation.

Therefore, it is impossible that this holy faith can be unfruitful in man, for we do not speak of vain faith,

but of such a faith as is called in Scripture, a faith that worketh by love,

which excites man to practice of those works which God has commanded in his Word,

which works as they proceed from the good root of faith, are good and acceptable in the sight of God,

for as much as they are all sanctified by his grace, how be it they are of no account towards our justification.

For it is by faith in Christ that we are justified, even before we do good works.

Otherwise, they could not be good works, any more than the fruit of a tree can be good before the tree itself is good.

I believe that's it, right?

Nope. Therefore, we do good works, but not to merit by them for what can we merit.

Nay, we are beholden to God for the good works we do, and not he to us,

since it is he that worketh in us both and will to do his good pleasure.

Let us therefore attend to what is written, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you.

Say, we are unprofitable servants, we have done that which was our duty to do.

Lot of words, right? Even some old English, which we always can enjoy.

Hard to say. But what all of that means is that when the Holy Spirit is working in you,

and you are growing in your knowledge, conviction, and mission work of the Gospel, that has really nothing to do with you.

It's the Holy Spirit at work doing good, which God has told the Spirit to do.

The same God that commanded where the stars go and all of these things has the power to command you to do good works.

The hard part is when we go, well, I've done good works, where's my quid pro quo?

Right? I do good works, therefore I should get something.

Friends, that's already been done. It's called salvation.

But in 2023, and for the latter part of forever, man and women, they have put their own terminology, their own desires on those good works that are being done.

Why do I have all these problems in my life? I teach one of our GEMS classes, I volunteer in the food pantry, I make meals for teen mother choices.

Why do I have hard things going on in my life?

Or, okay, I have this faith, I'm really in a lot of debt, and so I'm going to pray that Jesus would give me a bunch of money, but that has yet to kind of happen.

We want to quantify that grace. We want to quantify that faith.

That if I just have enough and my faith meter keeps rising, then the blessings should also rise.

We have that mentality. That is not at all how it works.

When we say it's about Jesus always, period, end of discussion, that is that.

And what does that mean for you in your situation?

A lot of times that's the check of the heart, of the soul.

Well, I will love Jesus. I will follow Jesus. I'll even go to church.

I'll take the spiritual gifts inventory. I'll do the things that my church asks me to do, but I just, I want a bigger audience with God then.

It doesn't work that way. It never has.

Your salvation is not based on you.

Your salvation has and always will be based on the work of Christ on the cross.

And now the power of the Holy Spirit, which is at work in you, regenerating your heart, giving you a new heart,

a heart that doesn't want to worship idols, that doesn't want to worship self, that doesn't want to be led astray by X number of things,

that your heart is centered on Jesus. That out of everything you do, you want Jesus to be not only glorified,

but in everything you do, you want Jesus to be seen.

And I know that as I say that, my whole body starts to clench.

Everything I do, even in the room by myself, even in the room where it happened, all of those things, yes.

But a lot of times you go, well I'm going to be around people today, so I'm going to put on my best Jesus suit,

but then take it off when I'm by myself. It doesn't work that way either.

Because the same irresistibleness that faith should have for you and that you should be living out for other people, you should have always.

And that's part of what the book of Hebrews is trying to get us to understand.

How can we be faithful? How can we walk that out and help other people?

How can we actually, tangibly, take this irresistibleness of faith?

And I'm going to pause for a second because I'm just getting a feeling in the room that for some of you, your faith is worn out.

So I'm going to go off book a little bit, but if you're here this morning and your faith is worn out,

I think for a lot of us we like to point to why that is and point because it's other people's fault.

Maybe you're pointing it at me. Maybe I've asked too much of you.

I'll probably fight you on that, but no, but maybe I have.

We do a really good job when our faith gets hurt, when our faith gets burned out.

We like to point at other people or other systems and the church gets your blame a lot. It does.

But I don't think that's the right question to ask because when I'm feeling hurt and I feel burned out and I have, guess what?

It's about me. That what is going on in your life?

What voices are you listening to? What paths are you going down that's drying your faith out, not invigorating it?

Man, I've been in the church 40 years and I don't know, I've just worn out.

What if you flip that on its head? You've been in church 40 years.

There are people that don't make it a week and God has sustained you in church for 40 years?

I think of Lisa Scott. You've been doing children's ministry for how long?

A long time. She doesn't even know the number.

Don't ask Mike because he'll probably blame somebody else.

Now, what I believe about anyone that works in youth and children's ministries is when you get up there, your room will not be by the ice machine in heaven.

I've said that from the get-go. I think you'll have a nicer room than that. You have a really nice mattress and all that kind of stuff.

That's just me and that's idiocy and that's fine. But understand that there are people that get tired.

There are people that look at their life in faith. They look at their life in church and they're just exhausted.

Why? For those of you that have been in this church for years and years and years, all I can say to you is thank you.

Because you've put up with a lot. Because no church is perfect. How do I know? Look who's in the room. Look who's leading it.

It's all sinners. And that is why if we're all striving for Jesus together, unencumbered, unbarricaded Jesus, our faith should be invigorated.

That irresistibility should be there. But if I had to guess, and then I'll get back to my sermon, we blame others, we say that's enough, and we check out.

Or we start to have this mentality of, well I can have my own personal faith. I don't need a church. I don't need to serve.

And I'm not saying that because we have a budget to make. I'm not saying that at all. But do you not think that's part of Satan's plan?

Alright, let's get them away from the group. Let's get them by themselves. And we're just going to flood them with, look at all those people probably talking about you.

Look at all those people that are probably judging you. Look at all those. That's not Jesus saying that, just to be clear.

Right? Jesus doesn't tempt. Jesus convicts and Jesus brings life change. And Jesus should be glowing out of all of us.

I'm just sensing there's some hurt and pain in the room today. So let's talk about why Jesus is better. Let's go to verse 1 of chapter 3.

Therefore, so this is coming on the back of chapter 2, holy brothers, you who share in heavenly calling, consider Jesus the apostle and high priest of our confession,

who was faithful to him, who appointed him, just as Moses was also faithful in all God's house. For Jesus has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses.

I know that doesn't mean a lot to us today. That meant a lot to people in the first century.

As much more glory as the builder of the house has more honor than the house itself.

For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God. Is that the first four? We're good.

I mean, it's right there. What the writer of Hebrews is trying to get across is that Moses had a plan. Right? Moses had a part to play.

God called Moses from a pretty incredible interaction. I don't know about you, I've never gotten a burning bush. Right?

Or have I ever found myself at a camp out or a fire in the backyard asking the fire to speak to me. Right?

Because if that's happening, there are worse things that probably happen during the day.

And so Moses gets this amazing divine revelation, gets called, gets equipped with Aaron. Right?

Let's not forget Aaron. Every good Moses needs a good Aaron. OK? That's for our leaders, both up front and the leaders in the background.

And he does something amazing. He is the mouthpiece for God in Egypt. He calls them out.

Moses didn't do any of it on his own. And guess what? When Moses starts to make his own decisions, what do we see?

Impatience, frustration, multiple times wanting God to be like, alright, we've got to find a new group of people.

We can't lead these people. And out of impatience, not waiting on the Lord, not being dependent on the Lord, strikes that rock a second time.

And there are consequences. And he doesn't get to see the promised land.

That the call of God that came through Moses is even greater in Jesus, because though Moses had a part to play in that story, Jesus is the story.

That Moses was pointing his way to Christ. That everything in the Israelites being freed from captivity to be brought to the promised land is a foreshadowing of our lives to Christ.

We need to be freed from bondage. And friends, a lot of times it's not the bondage that other people have put you in.

Right? Even though we're pretty good at going and putting spiritual bondage on other people or think we're doing that, we put it on ourselves.

For the sins that so easily entangle us, this is later in Hebrews, become handcuffed to us. They become shackles. They become weight, cement on our ankles from running the race of faith.

So maybe, just maybe, I'm not a runner, right? I'm a walker. Where's my applause? Just kidding. Right?

Because you're walking slowly, your body fatigues. Right? That if you're on a long walk, and how many runners do we have?

That's why I love this church. Man, I love this church. Yeah.

That when you are working out and you're running that race, which we'll get to in a couple weeks in Hebrews, the worst thing you could do is put weights on your ankles.

That's ridiculously counterproductive. Right? My wife ran track. What was your event in college? You ran the, what is that, 400? I never know what that means.

How many times around? Just one time around. Amen.

How would that work if the coach said, here, I'm going to put 25 pound weights on your ankles? You'd lose. Yeah.

You'd probably be worse than that. Yeah, you'd probably get very injured. That's so counterproductive.

But, my friends, that's all Satan wants to do. As you're all running your race of faith, as I'm running my race of faith, that is all Satan wants to do.

Just slow you down. Because what's going to happen? If the coach puts the weights on your ankles and makes you run, who are you going to blame?

The coach. So, if Satan's going, if you're running the race for Coach Yahweh, sure, and all of a sudden it's really hard,

you're going to start to complain. You're going to complain a lot. You're going to make excuses. You're going to start blaming the coach.

It's funny, the individual doesn't blame themselves. Why did I put these on? Like, I can just easily take them off and keep running.

No, we want to blame somebody else. We serve at the idol of blaming others. That's all Satan wants.

Satan's not cheering you on. Satan wants to go, no, it's the coach's fault. Quit. Give up the run of faith.

It'll be so much easier. So much easier when you can do what you want, say what you want, lie, cheat, steal.

Don't listen to the coach. The coach is saying, be disciplined. Let's run the race. Look to me. I'm the author and the perfecter of your faith.

Now he's saying, Jesus better than Moses. Let's keep going. I still have a sermon to preach. Just kidding.

Now Moses was faithful in all God's house as a servant to testify to the things that were to be spoken of later.

But Christ is faithful over God's house as a son, and we are his house if indeed we hold fast our confidence and are boasting in our hope.

One of the things we see a lot in kind of CRC churches and kind of in the Midwest, you have a lot of family owned businesses.

And the hope, for the most part, and I know nothing about it. Now funny story, my dad was just about to open a chain of fish stores

with his friend Bobby Wagner in kind of the Lockport area right before they were going to sign on for property. He died.

And so I always think about that. Like what if that was the family business? And I think about that because a lot of times in a family business,

now I know a lot of you family owned business people will probably come up and tell me I'm wrong, but I do think I'm right in this.

You hope to keep it in the family. That a family owned business is just that.

And so understanding that you hope and pray that you have people in your family then that want to invest in the family business.

That want to give to the family business. That don't want to tarnish the name of the family business.

Let's flip that on its head and bring it to the church. If the church is the family business of God, now that sounds super like exclusive and not friendly.

And I don't mean it that way. But if we are the bride of Christ, the church, and we all have a part to play, the hope is that we don't want to tarnish the family business.

Because if we're out living lives as wild, wild sinners not really caring or holding to Christ, then people go, ooh, that person is an elder at Munster Church?

That person leads in the children's ministry at Munster Church? All of a sudden Munster Church doesn't look so good.

Right? That's why I always say if you're going to put the Munster sticker magnet on your car, be careful how you drive.

Believe me, I'm saying that to myself as well. Me and my wife, Carrie O'Andretti, we really are, we watch how we do that.

If anybody has a spare room for me to stay tonight, that's probably going to be what happens.

But what we just read in Hebrews is that the son understands. Right? The son does not go outside of the father's will.

The son being Jesus, the father being God, the creator of all, and he has done the work.

And he's given it for us to do.

We're going to talk a little more in detail about this next week, but I'm going to leave you with this challenge.

There is a story at play at this church. There's a story at play. At any true church of Christ, there is a narrative at work.

It's the gospel narrative. The question I have along with you, if you pick up the news and notes, there are questions for further study in there.

A, what part are you playing in the family business? What role do you have?

How are you supporting that? And how are you stepping into the work of Jesus Christ?

And if Jesus has done the work in your life, and you claim Jesus Christ,

then what are the good works coming out of your faith?

It's because of your faith you do them. Not we get it because of what we do. No.

But if Jesus has done the work and he's now currently at work in you, what are you doing?

May I be so bold as to ask, and I'm probably going to get emails about this, but we'll have a great conversation.

What are you doing for the gospel? If the gospel has made a difference in your life,

then what difference are you making in the life of the world?

Again, you don't have to die on the cross. Jesus already did that.

But if you're looking at the church, not just Buntzer church, but the church in general in the world, what are we doing?

Are we being faithful? Are we walking? Are we leading? Are we a Moses? Are we an Aaron?

Are we finding our place in the people of God and doing stuff?

Not for the sake of doing it, right? We don't put on our fall family just because it's fun.

We do it because we want to meet people. We want people in the community to know where we are.

I ask this of my council and my staff all the time. What would happen?

What would the world think? Not the world. What would a one-mile radius of this church think if this church closed tomorrow?

Would anyone know or care?

It kind of looks like a church. Was that a church? Who was that? What was that? What did they do?

No. Our hope is that they go, I was loved there.

Regardless of my narrative, regardless of my story, they took me in.

They taught me about what they believed. Maybe they fed me, maybe they clothed me, maybe they befriended me.

Hopefully they did.

That's some of the work we can do. And that's the collective.

And I got to tell you, it's easy to do it collectively.

Now there's planning and communication and all of those things and yeah, we don't always get that right.

But as I close, I'm going to ask you, individual you, what are you doing?

Where are you being faithful?

I don't know what other word to use. It's in there. What are you producing for the gospel?

Again, I don't mean it that way. But if God's calling you out, if God's asking you to step up or step into something or whatever,

are you doing it?

I hope and pray people are asking me that, giving me that self check.

And I hate to say it, it's part of my role to do that for all of us.

But please understand, I'm looking in the mirror before I ask any of you.

Because one of the things I struggle with is doing, I don't mean this narcissistically,

is doing too much and being busy for the sake of the gospel.

Being busy doesn't make it good. Being busy doesn't mean that that's the right way to do it.

Maybe am I being too busy so that I don't have to look at me because I'm just going to go out and do?

I hope that's not the case either.

So wherever you find yourself, wherever you are in the quote unquote family business, what are you doing?

I'd love to know. I would love to have those conversations.

And maybe you're here and you don't know what to do or you don't know how to do it.

Let's have that conversation as well.

Because if he built the house, he knows all the nooks and crannies.

He knows how each thing is supposed to work.

So we just got to ask him.

And then we can have that conversation. We could discern that together.

Let's pray.

Father, we love you and we thank you.

Father, as we go out into our week, may we ask ourselves that question.

What am I doing with my faith?

How am I walking that out?

Am I complaining all the time?

Am I being critical?

Am I making it all about me?

Am I just kind of wandering aimlessly?

Father, may you be our vision always.

Father, help those in this room that may need their faith invigorated.

Maybe they're tired.

Maybe they're hurt.

Call them into a conversation, a reconciliation.

You're about all that.

We give you thanks for that.

Father, be with us as we have these conversations.

Be with us as we continue to do our best.

To strive, as the Belgic says, or the Heidelberg says,

to strive for walking that knowledge and assurance and conviction of faith.

All this we pray.