Christian, I have good news for you today!  Are you aware that you have been saved and set free from the power of sin in your life?  You call yourself a Christian, so you better be!  After all, that is the entire hope of the gospel.  The word "gospel" literally translates to "good news," and this it it...you have been reconciled to God through Christ.  Amen!

I think the Christian faith may be the simplest thing on the face of the earth.  Jesus died for my sins so I can be forgiven.  We teach this to our children in rhymes and songs so that they can recite it back to us.  It's not a complicated formula.  There's no elaborate rituals one needs to participate in.  The gospel is simple and to participate in it is even simpler.  We enter into the hope of the gospel by faith.  That's it!  We merely have to believe upon Jesus to take possession of his promises for us.

If it really is this simple, then why do we make it so difficult?  It seems that we can't help but to find ways to gum up the whole process.  The problem is that when push comes to shove, we lack faith.  We struggle to believe.  "It can't REALLY be that simple..." we tell ourselves.  Everyone knows there's no such thing as a free lunch (as the saying goes), right?

When the Apostle Paul was dealing with a church in Corinth that was being consumed by a myriad of issues, he started with the basics, "Jesus Christ and him crucified" (1 Corinthians 2:2).  This is significant because it points to our constant inability to remember the simple truth of the gospel and the remedy to that problem.  We desperately want to be able to point to all of the things we have done to earn God's favor.  This was one of the fundamental problems in Corinth.  Believers were pointing to the evidence of their apparent spirituality as affirmation of their place in Christ's kingdom, all the while ignoring rampant sin and wickedness among the body.  Jesus addresses this way of thinking in his Sermon on the Mount.

In Matthew 7:21-23 he says, "Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.  On that day [speaking of the final judgement] many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’  And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’"

In this passage, Jesus is addressing the heart that desires to glorify the self under the guise of works of righteousness.  His point is that someone can do religious things for the wrong reasons.  A true Christian though is not primarily identified by what he does, but rather what has been done for him.  You see, in Jesus' kingdom, it is the humble and the meek, who have an inheritance.

Under the Old Covenant ways, a great deal of energy was devoted to religious works.  God's purpose in this wasn't to establish works as a means to salvation, rather he meant to illustrate continually to his children the insufficiency of their efforts.  The author of Hebrews points this out in this week's lesson by drawing his hearers' attention to the ongoing nature of the sacrifices and the Levitical priesthood.  The Jews had to keep on offering sacrifices for their sins because no sufficient sacrifice to pay the true debt for sin existed.  This should have reminded them of their desperate brokenness and their need for a savior.  The sacrifices pointed forward to Christ.  And yet, so many missed it.

In our churches today, very little has changed.  We often still try to make it all about us.  We point to our service within the community, or the number of "decisions" that have been made, or the baptisms we have had, or the numbers in our service, or our robust programming, or the coolness of our modern worship "experience" as all of the ways we are living out the gospel.  Moreover, we create systems of ministry built to emphasize these things as primary.  We do all of this because deep down inside, again, we lack faith.  We don't really believe that Christ is sufficient to save.  We don't trust the power of his gospel.  If we don't make it flashy and appealing, people won't come and get saved.

The problem with this mode of thinking is that in many cases, even when people are present, they still aren't getting saved.  They aren't being confronted by their sinfulness.  And they aren't hearing the true gospel being preached.  As Jesus warned his hearers, we can seemingly do the "right" things in the wrong ways and miss the point entirely.  When our focus isn't set square upon Jesus...when the emphasis is on anything else, for any reason...then we are in serious danger of being counted among the goats in the last days.

In Grace,
Chris Morris

If you missed this week's sermon (or just want to listen again), follow the link below to listen. Or subscribe to our podcast in iTunes.

Part 20 - How to Draw Near to God

Questions discussed in this sermon:

1. Why is it important for us to understand old covenant worship?
2. Do our unintentional sins also need atoned for?
3. In what ways can we warp new covenant worship today?

Next week's lesson:  Hebrews 9:15-28

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