The Father’s Expectation // Pastor Bobby

I feel as though I warned you last week and you showed up anyway,

just so you know.

Because now we're going to dig into the struggle against sin.

Cause that's where I left it last week.

Remember the Hebrews,

chapter twelve,

verse four,

that begins with the words,

in struggling against sin,

you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood.

I thought about that this week while I was shaving.

Whiskers cannot be considered sin,

even though I bleed often.

Okay, so we're gonna dig into this a little bit.

Remember, we've been in the book of Hebrews for all year.

We've been under the topic of the object of our faith.

And Jesus is indeed the object of our faith.

And everything about the book of Hebrews points us to Jesus and points us

to God's design,

his provision,

his plan,

not simply for what we refer to as salvation,

but actually,

actually our redemption.

God had a purpose,

a plan,

a design to buy us back from sin,

death, and hell.

All right,

so this is what Hebrews is about.

It keeps pointing us to it.

And so we're going to dig into that today.

I'm going to read the passage,

but there's a couple things I got to tell you.

Baptism today.

Remember that today is the day that they're going to do the gathering 101

class. Gathering 101 is just an informational class kind of.

It goes over our priorities.

It goes over what is basically the four tenets of our covenant,

what we refer to as covenant relationship,

here in the gathering.

And that meeting is going to take place at twelve noon in the fellowship

hall. If you're interested,

show up.

They got lunch.

But if you didn't sign up,

then somebody's going to eat napkins.

But it's okay.

There's a restaurant down the street if you're really hungry.

Second thing is we're going to meet for baptism at 1245.

After I get done preaching.

During the last worship gathering at 1150,

we're going to meet here to get ready for baptism,

and then we'll cross over to the ocean and we'll do baptism right after

that.

So I always say,

1245, you want to attend baptism,

be on the beach at 1245.

Cause if we go over from here and you show up at one,

you might miss it.

We had folks that were supposed to take pictures one time,

show up,

and we were done,

and I wasn't doing it again.

So, plus,

we've seen a whole lot since the first of the year.

We noticed back in January and February that we were having seating

issues.

We had full rooms during 925 and 1040.

And even then back in January and February,

we were having parking lot issues.

And so that's.

And in the summer just makes that much more fun.

So what we're going to do is kind of,

we're going to ask somebody to step up and take a position of service for

the kingdom of God as parking coordinator to help develop and schedule

teams to coordinate parking.

The parking coordinator doesn't have to do it all,

but what I've been telling folks is the parking people are really just

outdoor greeters.

Right? Folks,

pull up.

You just get to greet people.

That's what you get to do.

And then,

too, because we started doing a lot,

anybody do flooring?

We've been doing lots of meals,

and we've got a lot of different kitchen teams and different ministries

within the gathering,

have their own kitchen teams,

but just want to try to find somebody to be willing to kind of coordinate

kitchen stuff.

So if you're willing to do either of those things,

please let me know.

All right.

Hebrews twelve,

413. Read it on the screens or.

Yeah, on the screens or read it in your Bible.

If you want to read it in a Bible,

there might be one in a chair in front of you.

Here we go.

Verse four.

In struggling against sin,

you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.

And you have forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons,

my son,

do not take the Lord's discipline lightly or lose heart when you are

reproved by him.

For the Lord disciplines the one he loves and punishes every son he

receives. Endure suffering as discipline.

See the connection he's making there?

Get ready.

He's coming.

God is dealing with you as sons.

For what son is there that a father does not discipline?

But if you are without discipline,

which all receive,

then you are illegitimate children and not sons.

Furthermore, we had human fathers discipline us and we respected them.

Shouldn't we submit even more to the father of spirits and live for they

disciplined us for a short time based on what seemed good to them,

but he does it for our benefit so that we can share his holiness?

No discipline seems enjoyable at the time,

but painful later on.

However, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have

been trained by it.

Therefore, strengthen your tired hands and weakened knees and make

straight paths for your feet so that what is lame may not be dislocated,

but healed instead.

Let's pray.

God, we just bow before you right now.

Just giving you thanks,

praising you,

God, that we get to gather,

that we get to come and just greet one another and love on each other.

And know God,

that as we meet,

you meet with us in this place.

And yet God,

as we meet,

we want to hear from you,

we want to hear your voice,

we want to acknowledge and recognize your words.

And God,

we want it to have an impact on us.

We don't want to do this without,

without reason.

We want to gather and be changed as you speak.

So God,

help us to hear you.

Help us to get a better glimpse of you.

And we pray it in Jesus name.

Amen. So the book of Hebrews,

and I'm going to do the quick outline of the first ten and a half

chapters. What is pointed to and what is revealed is that Jesus is the

object of our faith.

He is the Son and he is the heir of all things.

He is the creator of all things.

And he is the sustainable sustainer of all things created.

Okay? This is all in the first parts of Hebrews.

He is the exact expression of the essence of God.

This is a statement of Jesus deity.

He is the essence of God.

He is the radiance of the glory of God.

So when we see the glory of God shining,

that is Jesus,

the radiance of God.

He is the king,

the king of kings.

He is the highest priest of all priests.

The covenant of the Old Testament points to Jesus.

The tabernacle,

the temple point to Jesus.

The sacrificial system point to Jesus.

The law of the Old Testament points to Jesus.

Everything about the Old Testament points to Jesus.

Okay? The New Testament,

now this is where we get to be excited.

The New Testament reveals Jesus,

shows us Jesus,

gives us his life and the things he did.

I love seeing the nuance of the things that Jesus did in relationship and

interaction with his disciples and the people that followed along with

him and that sort of thing.

I just think it's the coolest thing to study the life of Jesus.

And then you study the called out ones,

the congregation,

the body of Christ,

the fellowship of believers that Jesus said,

I will build the body of Christ.

Right? So we've walked all through that and then we get to this book of

Hebrews. And I've admitted before that I never really studied it piece by

piece, taking it apart like we have over the last eight months.

But, but to be honest with you,

I look at it,

I go,

man, this ties it all together.

This is cool.

But now we get to the by faith part of it.

Chapter eleven says,

by faith,

by faith.

By faith.

Moses lived by faith.

Abraham lived by faith.

Abel lived by faith.

These men lived lives of faith,

and they are examples and witnesses to us of what God does when we live

by faith.

And so the challenge to us is to live by faith,

walk by faith,

right? That's what we're being called to.

So I made the point of today's message is to walk in righteousness.

Walk in righteousness because that's the father's expectation.

That's our father's expectation.

So the question we have,

do we have the ability to choose righteousness?

See, I believe we're being called as followers of Christ,

as those who have surrendered ourselves to the person and work of Jesus

Christ, to put off unrighteousness.

Not to make excuses for unrighteousness,

to put off unrighteousness.

I'm really loud,

Chris. Can you back me down just like a fraction?

Thank you.

Thank you,

Steve. Appreciate that.

I'm going to be loud anyway because my voice came back this week,

just so you know.

But to put off unrighteousness,

and I believe that means we are to personally put off unrighteousness.

But our struggle is against unrighteousness.

Okay. We are actually in a struggle against unrighteousness.

I think,

personally, my own personal battles with my pride,

my anger and lust or whatever.

Yeah. Those are things that I am personally day in,

day out,

morning, noon and night.

I am at war with in my own life.

And yet I look at the world around me,

the society,

the community,

the culture.

Guess what?

I am personally at war with unrighteousness in our culture.

Okay.

All right.

Some of you have been waiting for this message.

So we are to run the race like we mean to run the race.

That's what we're told in the beginning of chapter twelve.

Therefore, since we also have such a large cloud of witnesses,

those who have shared with us their lives by faith,

they're surrounding us.

Let us lay aside every hindrance and the sin that so easily ensnares us.

So not only do we have the witness of those who went before us,

but we become the witnesses to living by faith.

To those around us.

They're the witnesses.

What?

See, I got too loud,

didn't I?

All right,

see, they're the witnesses to our lives by faith.

They're watching us.

Do you stand up for righteousness?

Do you war against unrighteousness?

And are you willing to let the world see you oppose unrighteousness?

Yeah, run the race like you mean it.

And fix your eyes on Jesus,

because he has authored,

completed, finished what is our faith.

He has redeemed us.

It is finished.

It has been paid.

All right,

so discipline.

How many of you saw me run up the aisle a minute ago?

How many of you said,

pastor really shouldn't be running in church?

Anybody think that?

My mom used to get on my case.

So, parents,

when you see your child run in church,

just think he might one day be the pastor.

Discipline, obedience,

right? That's what we're called to.

This whole passage is a reference to discipline and ultimately our

obedience, because this gets into what is the father's discipline?

What is the father's expectation of our lives for?

Consider him who endured such hostility from sinners against himself so

that you won't grow weary and give up.

That's the statement about Jesus.

And then I,

we jump into chapter,

into verse four.

In struggling against sin,

you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.

And I said last week that that is an encouragement until you consider the

word yet.

And I started thinking,

even after last week,

I started thinking to myself,

all right,

how will my struggle against sin result in blood from shaving absolutely

nothing.

But if I am going to encounter and oppose unrighteousness,

how might I bleed?

Could I get attacked for opposing unrighteousness?

Could I find myself up against a system of unrighteousness?

Could I find myself in opposition to a.

An ideology of unrighteousness?

Might I find myself in opposition to a,

dare I say,

party of unrighteousness?

I don't know,

folks. God has called us to righteousness.

So if you consider verse three and say,

why were sinners hostile to Jesus?

Consider he.

Excuse me,

consider him,

right, who endured such hostility from sinners against himself?

What did he do?

He pointed out the sin in his world culture.

He pointed out the sin that was going on in his own people and got

crucified for it.

And what this is telling us is you've not yet been crucified.

But it's coming.

That's the yet part of it,

folks. If we take a real stand against unrighteousness,

we're going to encounter opposition.

If we obey our father,

we will face hostility.

If you obey God,

you're going to find some hostility.

Okay, so if we face hostility,

what will we do?

Look down at the very end of the passage.

Will we grow weary and give up?

That was at the end of the passage last week,

so that you won't grow weary and give up.

The end of verse three.

And then down at the bottom of this passage,

it says,

make straight paths for your feet so that the what is lame may not be

dislocated but he'll instead,

what he's saying right there is watch for the obstacles to your walk.

Watch for the obstacles in the race that you run.

Avoid the obstacles so you don't trip and blow out a knee or something.

We are to walk in righteousness.

That's what God's called us to.

God is using our suffering in this life,

in this world.

And remember,

this is a first century world.

This is not a 21st century world.

There's a first century world.

He says,

look, endure suffering is discipline because God's dealing with you as

sons.

So if you are living righteousness and you face opposition and you face

hostility, and you,

to the point of blood,

recognize God's allowing your suffering for your own discipline makes you

stronger. Okay?

So as I was working through this thing,

I was like,

whoa, this is going to get specific.

So, discipline.

The word discipline comes from the same root as the word disciple.

We're called to be disciples.

We're called to follow.

Well, the first word or the first definition of disciple is learner.

It assumes learning by following like I'm following Jesus and learning of

Jesus so that I can be more like Jesus.

And so God uses discipline and refining to make me more like Jesus.

So if I am encountering hardship,

opposition, struggle,

if I am encountering hostility toward me for living out righteousness,

God is using that hostility toward me or that struggle toward me to

refine me to be more like Jesus.

Okay. All right.

Discipline is also correction.

I have told y'all time and time again my childhood church experiences,

right?

Can I just tell you.

And I've told this story,

and parents love this story.

Kids hate this story,

but here it goes.

We had these big,

tall steps out in front of our church where I was growing up,

and right beside the steps were these great big old shrub bushes.

They were such big shrub bushes that they could hide anything behind them.

Now, you're already thinking,

what did that mischievous little bobby hide behind the shrubbushes?

It wasn't me.

You know what?

I'd been taken out of that church and behind those shrubbushes for a

totally different reason sometimes,

right, we had these slick pews.

There were no cushions back then.

Suffering was just sitting on the hard wood.

But they were,

like, oiled,

which made perfect slides.

And so I'd go.

I'd push off from one end and go,

whoosh. Right up to the point of my heart,

right?

See, discipline is sometimes correction.

So if we step out of line and we go with unrighteousness or we go with

the world,

we find ourselves in opposition to God and walking by faith,

therefore, we must be corrected.

And guess what?

God will correct.

God will also discipline by correcting.

So what has God required of us?

In one corinthians eleven,

we know that we are told to examine ourselves.

Do you take a healthy examination of your life,

in a sense,

on a daily basis to where you consider,

all right,

well, what is sin in my life?

What is preventing me from drawing near to God with boldness and

confidence? That's what we're encouraged to in Hebrews.

See, we step out of line.

God corrects,

therefore we are called to live righteousness.

We're called to denounce unrighteousness.

Our correction ready for this is a message to the world.

When God corrects our sin.

That's a message to the world to define sin,

to steer clear of sin,

not to play in the sin,

not to abide in the sin,

get out of it.

So that goes back to the question,

do we have the ability to choose righteousness?

Absolutely. We have the ability to choose righteousness.

God's identified righteousness.

We just make excuses for our unrighteousness.

And then I started to consider it because I have people all the time say,

Pastor Bobby,

would you please pray with me about this,

or would you please pray with me about that,

or, I'm struggling here.

I'm struggling there.

So then I went to some scripture passages.

You ready?

This idea of,

if your right hand offends you,

no, that's left.

Cut it off.

Better to enter eternity without a right hand than to not enter eternity

with Jesus,

right? Whoo.

So I hear this word all the time from politicians.

You ready?

Was Jesus just using hyperbole?

Don't you hear that?

Now, how many of you hear that a lot on the news these days.

Hyperbole.

Was he speaking metaphorically as to the extent of avoiding sin?

I think he was.

I think he was.

But here you go.

Let me make it more practical for you,

because I'm going to say this,

and I'm going to say it to some.

Everything I'm going to say,

I thought about it ahead of time.

This is not impulsive,

folks. If your computer offends your righteousness,

you probably need to throw it away.

If your computer offends your righteousness,

then you probably need to get a flip phone.

Okay? If youre romance novel offends your righteousness,

then you probably need to throw it away.

You see,

I told you all y'all didn't want to come back this week.

You see,

we are called to walk in righteousness.

Not make excuses for unrighteousness in our lives.

I remember telling young staff people over the years,

make sure that wherever your computer is set up that it faces the door to

the room so that anybody that walks in the room can see what's on your

computer screen.

Okay? In an office setting,

computers face the door,

not the back of the computer.

Right? Very practical stuff.

Because guess what?

If it offends you,

cut it off.

You see the other.

Abstain from the appearance of.

I wrote notes on my hands,

y'all.

Abstain from not evil.

Abstain from the appearance of evil.

Don't. Don't even open the door for somebody to consider that you might

be doing something evil comes from one,

thessalonians five.

Right?

Abstain from even the appearance of evil.

Whoa. That means you see evil coming,

man, you run the other way.

Finally, make no provision for the flesh.

No provision for the flesh.

That means don't plan.

Don't make a plan for your sin.

Like, I'm gonna go hang out here and.

Okay, I have to go with the thought,

oh, I'm gonna go drink this,

or I'm gonna go hang out with this person,

or I'm going to go do that.

See, I've always told you I won't make sin lists for you,

but I'm telling you,

God gave me a sin list this week.

Discipline is obedience,

discipline is correction.

And discipline is.

Press on.

Press on.

Guess what?

If we press on in righteousness,

we are going to face opposition.

Now I'm going to speak to the ideology I referred to a minute ago because

I did some reading this week.

I wanted to get a little bit better acquainted with Karl Marx.

How many of you know the guy?

Right? I love the nuance of our vocabulary.

You know what?

I think of myself as progressive in some ways,

but not marxist.

Okay? You know where this is going.

You know that Karl Marx called for the destruction of five things,

called for the destruction of family.

He called for the destruction of individuality,

personhood, you know,

the imago dei that God made us into,

right? He called for the destruction of eternal truth.

Jesus said,

I am the way,

the truth and the life.

Carl Marx called for the destruction of eternal truth.

Karl Marx called for the destruction of national identity,

of nations.

Karl Marx called for the destruction of history or the past.

Folks, if you don't have the eyes to see what's going on in our culture,

our society,

our nation,

then come and ask me,

and I will tell you.

I will tell you individually what I see,

okay? Because I see the destruction of families,

I see the death of innocent unborns,

okay? I see the destruction of personhood as God designed it,

planned it,

and provided for it.

See?

I see the destruction of the value of humanity.

I found it,

y'all. I think that's a sign.

I'm going to sound like a squeaky floor on these things over the next few

weeks, because this is the summation of the book of Hebrews and the

message of God,

y'all. I see the denial of eternal truth in our nation,

that God doesn't matter.

He's not truth.

There is no such thing as a God who has a design,

purpose and plan.

I see the destruction of nations,

our nation.

And I see the rewriting of history to accommodate,

to accommodate people's desire,

will and agenda.

Folks, if I.

And I'm not talking about y'all,

I'm not.

This is not a call to go out on whatever.

I intend to oppose unrighteousness in our culture.

And if I bleed,

I bleed.

You have not yet struggled right against sin to the point of bleeding.

That's a perfect picture to Jesus standing against a religious hierarchy

and a government empire.

And he was crucified.

And then he said to us,

before he was crucified,

he said,

you know,

the world hates me.

Don't you think they're going to hate you too?

So, folks,

I remember one preacher said one time,

and it was very convicting to me.

You ready?

If you're loved by the world,

hmm, you better watch out.

Okay, so let me summarize in the last three minutes that we have you

ready? It's all about Jesus,

folks. If you can't fix your eyes on Jesus,

that's a work that's ahead of you.

To fix your eyes on Jesus.

He is the author,

the finisher,

the perfecter of our faith.

Fix your eyes on Jesus.

Stand for righteousness.

Oppose unrighteousness.

Stand against unrighteousness.

Live by faith.

That means you've got to show the people closest to you,

the people in the outlying rings of your relationships,

what it means to stand tall,

to stand boldly for the righteousness of God against everything else,

because the world is the pressure against the righteousness of God.

All right,

all right.

Do you know Jesus this morning?

See, we celebrated yesterday.

I can tell this story,

can't I,

Tim?

We celebrated yesterday at 11:00 I don't even know how old she was.

She's a resident down at Woodbury.

But over the past few weeks,

as Tim has been leading the gathering at Woodbury.

That's what I'm gonna call it the gathering at Woodbury.

Tim's been leading the worship down there,

and she kind of worked her way up the hall to the hallway and started

coming to worship.

And sometime this week or sometime in the last several days,

she trusted Jesus for salvation.

And they called me and they said,

bobby, can we do a.

Tim's already been doing baptism at Woodbury,

but he was out of town.

So they called me and said,

can we do baptism at Woodbury?

And I was like,

yeah, when?

They said,

I don't know.

When can you do it?

I said,

well, I'm not back till Friday.

All right,

let's do it Saturday at eleven.

So we decided to do it Saturday at eleven.

So Tim decided to come home.

So we had a gathering at Woodbury yesterday of,

what, 15 people,

about 15 people in this hydrotherapy room,

because it's one of those walk in tubs,

and you shut the door and then you fill it up.

And we baptized a lady there at Woodbury yesterday because she had

decided to choose Jesus.

Right. And that's something,

folks.

Jesus is our focus.

If we get caught in the distractions,

focusing on the things in the world,

and I'll go ahead and say it.

If we put anything on the throne of our lives above God,

be it ideology,

even family,

career, any of those things above God,

that's idolatry.

And God tells us to stand against it.

Okay, if you don't know Jesus,

we want to introduce you.

If there's something else you need.

Want to pray about,

I'm going to be down front here.

We're going to sing one more song,

give you the opportunity to respond.

So let's pray.

God, thank you for today.

God, I thank you that your word's really specific in this struggle

against sin.

And it appears that the promise is we might bleed.

So, God,

my prayer would be that we would be fixed in Christ,

God. That we would be bold in our faith.

And that God,

when the world around us seems to crumble,

that, God,

we would speak and preach the foundation,

the rock that is set for eternity.

And that's Jesus.

God, help us to do that,

and we pray it in Jesus name.

Amen.