Transcription
So tonight, uh, taking notes, we, we'll approach, we'll approach it a little bit different tonight here in chapter 12 because we're going to cover some ground. And, uh, the reason being, everybody, if you are a Bible student of God's word, there's sometimes in scripture where you cannot break up a section. It just does damage, uh, to the context of what's being argued. And, uh, this portion of Hebrews chapter 12 is exactly that.
By way of remembrance, do keep this in mind. It is called the Book of Hebrews. It's in the New Testament. But you might be thinking, well, what's that all about? But that shouldn't surprise you because if you're not aware, the Old Testament is obviously the Old Testament of the history of Israel. It is about the prophets of Israel, the great Hebrew prophets sent by God to his people, uh, from Genesis to Malachi. It is the most documented, it is the most, uh, literal, it is the most authenticated collection of writings known to man. So much so that the Old Testament is not only linguistically, historically, archaeologically, scientifically, mind you, accurate, but it is also fantastic in the sense that it's God's word to his people. And, and it records what God's plan is for his people and their conduct, good, bad, and ugly. It, it covers it all.
Why is that the case? Because God has chosen the Jewish people to be his messengers, to give his gospel message to the ends of the Earth. That's revealed in the book of Isaiah, among many other Old Testament scriptures. You say, well, what about the New Testament? Right on. The New Testament is also written by a bunch of Jews recording the fulfillment of those Old Testament prophets. And the New Testament explodes onto the scene with the great revelation of none other than the Christmas story, the Christmas account that, born this day in the city of David, is Christ the Lord, Bethlehem, the coming Messiah. The New Testament opens up with the advent of the Lord Jesus Christ. And when you look at the genealogies that speak about Joseph and Mary, why is that important? Because it's all about joining the Old Testament promises to the New Testament fulfillments.
And then we fast forward into the book of Hebrews and we ask, why, why is this the way that it is? Why is the book of Hebrews a tremendous overlay of a book that many people, I admit, it's, it's hard reading. The Book of Leviticus, nobody just goes to Leviticus for like, warm and fuzzy feelings. The Book of Leviticus is blood over here, blood over there, liver here, spleen there, uh, uh, sprinkled blood there, burn this, offer that. It is a bloody book. In fact, uh, I remember my friend Dennis Prager saying, you know, in the Old Testament, the priests were glorified butchers. And they were, you never think about that, do you? But that's what they did. And, um, wow, Leviticus. Well, what, what New Testament book answers to the Book of Leviticus? And it's, there's only one book, and it's the book of Hebrews. The Book of Leviticus is all about a priesthood offering up blood for the atonement of the people. And then the book of Hebrews announces that it's Jesus Christ who is the atonement for the people. And there's no more blood needed. That he's the fulfillment of it all. He's the, he's the one that finished it all. He fulfilled it all. It's all put together in him.
And so the book of Hebrews is a warning written to those who were Jews who got saved, or they were Jews who came out of Judaism and understood that by them believing in Messiah, it makes perfect sense to read the Old Testament and then come right into the belief that Jesus Christ is Lord and Savior in Christ. And it's awesome.
So chapter 12 opens up with, and we read it before, but it opens up with a, "Therefore." We saw that chapter 12, we studied this weeks ago, uh, which sent us back. When you see the word "therefore," it means go back and read what we just got done reading. And chapter 12 with that "therefore" means go back and know chapter 11. And it's all, all about the lifestyles and the names and the record of the righteous and the faithful. We talked about Gideon, it was Abraham, and the list is there. Given. So we saw that, therefore.
Now, when you look at chapter 12 and where we pick it up tonight in verse 12, it opens up again with another "therefore." Meaning, remember what you've read in chapter 12, all about the great cloud of witnesses that are awaiting our presence in heaven. We talked about how in this life, uh, we are children of God, and there's times when God will discipline his children because he loves us. Remember that? By the way, when I taught on that, nobody said amen. You guys sat quietly. And, uh, and yet it's a great thing for you to be in the family of God because God takes care of his own. He does not take care of those who are not his own. That's a strong statement, isn't it?
The fact of the matter is, is, and we studied this, Jesus said there's really two families in all of the universe. And one is the family of unbelief. And Jesus said that would be your father, the devil. Yikes. And then he said, if you are of the house of faith, and Abraham's your father. And that's a beautiful thing because it, it now causes all of the, uh, racial differences to evaporate. It, it causes all of the, uh, favoritism to go away. And I love that about God. Think about that for a moment. I do believe that racism is truly a manifestation of Satan's presence. I want you to think about that for a moment. Man, that's a, that's a tough thing to say. But think about it. We are literally one race of people. We're called the human race for a reason. Did you know that? You say, well, I'm Portuguese, or I'm Filipino, or I'm African. No, you're not. You're a human. You happen to have been born or raised on a particular continent. But we're one race. And that is a scientific fact.
By the way, this is fun. This is fun. The Bible says in the book of Acts that God created us all from one blood. Did you know that? The Bible says that 2,000 years ago. And if you are a scientist, biologist, chemist, if, uh, you've studied those things, what's the word I'm looking for? If you are a hematologist, you've studied blood. And you know that there's only one blood. And if you turned us all inside out, we all look exactly the same. And that our pigmentation, eye shape, skin color, those variations come from variations within the species of a human being. The Nordics are a certain pigmentation and hair color in, in, uh, light-skinned. But those of the equator, they're dark. Why is that? Variation within the species. It's not evolution. It's designed by God within the DNA. Why? We're not multiple races. We're one race. And that's why racism, I believe, is Satan stirring the pot to manifest hatred where man turns on man and kills one another. And Satan from hell applauds the actions of a Christless age. It's tragic. Terrible.
And so now we get into this section. And again, as I said, we're going to approach it a little different than normal. But, uh, we've got to cover some ground tonight. And so look with me in Hebrews chapter 12, beginning at verse 12. And in, in this, we're looking at a message titled "Growing Up Together." Notice that. Our last several titles have been like family type themes in the family of God. And now we're growing up together. And in verses 12 to 13, we see that we are growing up together in the house of the Living God. And I want you to think about that for a moment. You're not just in the house of God tonight. You're in the house of God if two or more are gathered together in the name of Christ. You guys do know that this building is just concrete and steel and glass, you know that, right? That's all it is. This ain't nothing until you show up. Then it becomes something. Something. This is not the house of God. You are the house of God. The Holy Spirit dwells in you. And when you come together, this is the church. And when you leave, this will be an empty building. But as you go on your way, the Spirit of God dwelling within you. So in this, I argue that you and I are the house of God.
Now, that reality can be, uh, stretched to mean some pretty cool things. When you pray, when we gather, we can go on a hillside. Look on, uh, every morning at 5:00 AM. It's just been so great. We're coming up on 30 days tomorrow where we've been meeting for prayer at 5:00 AM online on Facebook. Five. Well, I say five minutes. It was supposed to be five minutes at five, but it's usually eight to 10 minutes. It turns out. I'm sorry for that. Um, but, uh, it's kind of cool because people are posting their prayer requests from all over the world. And it's just amazing what's going on. Did you know that that's an image of the house of God? And I like it because we're redeeming technology in a good way for that.
Chapter 12:2 says, "Therefore, strengthen the hands which hang down." Now, I want you to put your Jewish hat on, your, your Jewish guard, if you would, because it, it'll matter. You see, "Well, I'm not Jewish." I know. Just pretend for a second because the author is writing to Jews who have come to Christ. Therefore, strengthen the hands that hang down and the feeble knees. Verse 13, "And make straight paths for your feet so that what is lame may not be dislocated, but rather be healed." And if you're a Jewish thinker, you're starting to think right now, this reminds me of something about the hands hanging down, the arms getting tired, weariness. Even in the house of God, as believers in this world, we, we get weary, we get tired. And here the Bible is telling us, don't let that overtake you. Which I love about this. People pull back and think for a moment. If the Bible says that you need to have your hands lifted up, I love the grace of the Bible. It implies, because it says you need your hands lifted up, that our hands often go down. Our arms are often tired. And I, I'm, I'm encouraged by that. When God says, "Be of good courage, do not be afraid." I'm encouraged by that. Why? Because whoever he's saying it to, they must have been discouraged and very afraid. And God is so good. And he says, even though you live in the house of God here in this world, we still drag around these bodies, and they get tired. Let's be honest. Sometimes our heart, our soul, our spirit might be weary, discouraged, whatever it might be. And we may not lower our hands out of physical exhaustion. It may be that we are almost sensing or feeling spiritually gutted. And we need to be renewed. All of us find ourselves in this situation from time to time. And I'm committed to this. I'm committed to believing this. And I, I do mean this. I do mean for this to encourage you. You can go ahead tonight and play it safe so that your arms never get tired and your knees or your legs never get feeble. You can play it safe. What does playing it safe look like? Stay in your lazy boy chair. Stay at home. Don't get involved. Go, take, take the easy, easy route. You'll never get tired. You'll never, you, you'll never be exhausted. You'll never be discouraged. And at the end of your life, you will have accomplished nothing for the kingdom of God. But you played it safe. Think about it. There's people today, not here. You guys are Wednesday nighters. You guys are rocking the world. It's those Sunday people we have to watch out for. But think about the spiritual potential that's here. Just in one week, count seven days on this campus and the thousands and thousands of people that make their way in and in and out of this campus in seven days, not just Sundays. Think about that. And think about the potential that each and every one of us. That if we were to say, "I'm going to stop playing it safe. I'm, I am going to go full out for Jesus. And I'm going to find out very thing that God wants me to do for him." I, I'm going to find out. Here's the fun thing about that is we don't have to push you to do that. Which is wrong. If we say you need to sign up to do this thing, that's how you get in big trouble as a church because you got people signing up to do things out of pressure. And they make a big mess of stuff because they shouldn't have been in that wheelhouse anyway. Does that make sense? It's not a good thing to do. What you want to do is give the word of God, the Bible. And it's going to land in the hearts of God's people. And over time, you won't be able to stand yourself. Meaning this, over time, the Holy Spirit will start going like this, "Okay, now it's time. It's time for you." And something's going to click. Something's going to snap in your head. You're going to say, "I want to do that." No one's going to have to say, "You've got to do this." You're going to want to do this.
I remember somebody saying, "You Christians are all about thou shalt not, thou shalt not, thou shalt not." And I said, "Where do you read that at?" You know, "Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not lie." So what's wrong with that? And it, it kind of, I just thought, what a weird thing. That guy's got such a weird view. Because I, I look, I went to a great church. I had the greatest pastor in the world. I came away with this, "Thou gets to do this. Thou gets to do that. Thou gets to do everything with Jesus." Amen. It's not a life of, of being sequestered. It's a life of being let loose. And I love it. But your arms can grow weary, so to speak.
And the Hebrew believer immediately is now reminded of Moses. So were you a moment ago? Moses, Aaron, Hur. What do I mean? Exodus chapter 17, verse 8. The Bible says, "Now Amalek came and fought with Israel in Rephidim. And Moses said to Joshua, watch this, excuse me, choose us some men and go out, fight with Amalek. Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in my hand." So Joshua did as Moses said to him and fought with Amalek. And Moses and Aaron and Hur went up to the top of the hill. And so it was. Which is, I, I've always wanted to ask, why? I, I want to know. I want to know more about verse 10. I want to know some background to that. Did Moses say, "I want you two guys to go with me?" Or did the two guys say, "You know, he's old, maybe we should go with them?" I don't think they said that. Um, I think that they were just profound assistants. Wherever Moses went, Joshua was there. And in fact, when, when Moses dies, what does the Book of Joshua say? Chapter 1, verse 1. It says right there that Moses, Moses died. Right? And it announces that Joshua was Moses's assistant. And Hur. So the three of these guys are on this hilltop. And so it was, verse 11, "When Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed. And when he let down his hand, and Amalek prevailed." So can you imagine this? Moses is like this, and Israel is just slaughtering the enemy army there. And then when Moses is like, "Oh, this is killing me." And you, he lets his arms down. And then it's like, "Oh my goodness." You know, was Joshua going like this, "Ah, can you wait, Moses? Can you put your arms up again? Ready? Okay, on count of three, put your arms up. One, two, three." Okay, okay. Put your arms down. Oh, put your arms up. Put your arms up. Isn't that something? My goodness.
But verse 12, "But Moses's hands became heavy. So they took a stone and put it under him, and he sat on it." And so what he sits down. Think about it in your mind. Here's two men standing beside Moses. But Moses is standing with them. So these guys are holding, they're going to hold his arms up. But it's like, "Wait a minute. What about our arms? We got it. Moses, sit down. We can just, you just hold your arms like this. Much easier. Much easier." This is thinking. And so, uh, Aaron and Hur supported his hands, one on one side, and the other on the other side. And his hands were steady until the going down of the sun. So, so Joshua defeated Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword.
You see, Jack, what does this have to do with anything? It has to do with everything. See, couldn't God have wrought the victory for Israel without Moses's arms being up there? Yeah, he could have. But God has established something. This is the way it's going to be. Best thing for you and I to do is stop second-guessing God and just obey. It's just better that way. Well, why did Moses have to do it that way? I don't know, except that thousands of years later, God would give the book of Hebrews. And it would be mentioned in chapter 12. We can get weary, we can get tired. And thank God, the Lord sends his people. I think every successful ministry has got someone there in the Aaron and the Hur position. Always, always. And when there is no Aaron and Hur, the ministry dries up and goes away. It's amazing to me. My goodness. I look around. Um, you guys, you guys know for those of you who attend here, I could be gone months. I never have been. The, the board of this church, I've been pastoring here 35, 36 years. The board of this church, they, they got together and they, they gave an announcement to me. They said, "We want you and Lisa to take a break. You guys have earned it. You need to take a sabbatical." You know, a lot of, a lot of ministers take sabbatical. It's part of the gig. And you, it's a learning trip. You go to places about faith and all. And it's, that's just great. And, uh, and they, they gave us, they gave us that about 10 years ago. We haven't gone yet. But when I, listen, when I am called away, you guys are spoiled. We are, we are spoiled here because, listen, if I drop dead today, which is not a, listen, this is no joke. I'm not kidding. These guys, they've been trained. They all have to have sermons pre-made, ready in the event of an emergency. During COVID, I didn't know when I was going to be arrested. And so they all had sermons ready to go. And the, here's this, this was the deal. If I got arrested at first service, and then Pastor Shadrach or Pastor Joel came out and he got arrested at second, then Pastor Joel or Shadrach, Pastor Tate, Pastor Call, they just were to keep coming until they all got arrested. And then I would, I don't know what we would have done if after we were all got arrested. But the point is this, this bench is deep in this church. We got a deep bench because God, this is a God thing. What, what's happening here is so amazing.
And so in verse 13, He says, "And make straight paths for your feet." That means a volume of things. "So that what is lame may not be dis, uh, dislocated, but rather healed." Um, this is interesting. You might want to, uh, mark this down when you research verse 13, the opening part of verse 13. When it says, "make straight paths for your feet," it actually means to stop. Stop going in circles. I don't know why it didn't say that. But the Hebrew meaning and the Greek meaning is, "Don't go in circles." It, it, are you guys listening? Yes. It's the picture of, um, two things. You know, a dog that, that goes in circles. Okay, that's something wrong. I love dogs, but when a dog goes in circles, something's wrong. They're sick. Something's not right. But supposedly, if you're lost in the, in the forest, I don't know if, I don't plan on being lost. Never have been lost in the forest. Don't plan on it. But did you know it's supposed to be true? Because, uh, every one of us, every single one of us, when we take a step, we have one step that, that is further than the other. I didn't know that. And you, now you know that about you. And if you start walking, you'll eventually make a gigantic circle and you'll come right back. You've seen that in movies, right? It's like, "Wait, weren't we here before?" But, you know, you're supposed to like, put markers if you're lost so you don't repeat the thing. And, uh, it's interesting because here the Bible is warning us that we need to be very careful that we walk a straight path and not in a circle. Because if we don't have guidance, we will go in a circle. You say, "How so?" How many times do we know in life, in our own lives, and we've witnessed it in the lives of others, that they'll just repeat the same thing over again? For example, this is going to hurt. I don't mean it to be, but let's fix it once and for all tonight, okay? You grew up a violent person because your parents were violent people and your grandparents were violent people. And so you learned how to be violent. That's your response. You think that's how you deal with things. Or, uh, your grandpa yelled, so your dad yelled, so you yell. Or your grandpa was quiet, your dad was quiet, and you're quiet. Learned response behavior. It's part of the human psyche. When life was tough, your grandpa reached for Jim Beam and drank it. Your dad thought, "That must be how you deal with problems." When a problem comes, "I saw my dad drink, so I'm going to drink when I have a problem." You see your dad doing what his, his dad did. And you think at the age of three, four, five, six, "Wow, I guess when life gets tough, you reach for that big brown bottle." There. And so when you get the chance, what do you do? You're, somebody breaks your heart, or somebody steals your car, or you get beat up, or you're down in the dumps. And what do you do? You reach over for the first time and you grab Jim Beam. Why are you doing that? Learned response behavior. You don't have a genetic precondition to do that. It's been imprinted on you. And this is how you respond. Why do girls who have a violent home, even an abusive home, wind up growing up and marrying abusive men? Is, don't you think that'd be the last person they would ever marry? It'd be the last person that they would date. And you've all heard of these stories or these things about, "Well, um, I like bad boys because I want to make them better. I want to fix them." Yeah, that ain't going to happen. News flash. Move on. On. What is going on? When we see this stuff, you're not walking straight. You're like the dog going in a circle. And you're like this verse. It's saying, "Listen, stop going in a circle. Break it tonight. Stop it tonight. Jesus Christ will give you the power to break that chain of either Jim Beam or bad women or bad men. You don't need to live like that anymore."
And listen, we, I wish time could stop and we could have a time of people coming up here and saying, "Yep, what he said is true because it's Bible truth. This is my life. This is what happened. And this is what Jesus did for me." And you could walk right off. And the next person would come up. And there'd be thousands of people who would have some sort of a message like that because it is a fact. Some people have said, and there's books written about it, basically they're saying, "Good luck. Generational sin. You're stuck." Nope. Not true. Generational sin by learned response behavior. When you left, when you open your life up to Christ, he breaks that chain. And you never have to go back to that. Maybe you'll fight it. Yes. Maybe the temptation will come. But you don't have to give into that anymore. You can be set free.
The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 9:24, it says, "Do you not know that those who run, uh, in a race, all run, but one receives the prize?" That's not a, that's not a woke verse, is it? In today, everybody gets the prize. Don't you know that? Everybody in a race all gets a trophy if you win or lose. It doesn't matter. Well, the Bible's smart. Uh, out of the entire clan of people running, the only one's going to get the, get the laurel wreath. "Run in such a way that you may obtain it." And "everyone who competes for the prize is tempered in all things." In other words, you condition yourself for the race. Now, they do it to obtain a perishable crown, that is the laurel wreath. That was the big deal. You won. Just the winning was the victory. But they, they designated you as the winner because they put this laurel, uh, wreath on your head. It's going to fade away. It's going to turn brown and die. You throw it away. But we, that is, we labor, we, uh, compete for an imperishable crown. Therefore, I run thus, not with uncertainty. I'm sorry, this is very funny. Paul is saying, "When I run, I don't run like I don't know where I'm going." When I run, I know exactly where I'm going. Could, I'm sorry, but could you actually see somebody running not knowing where they're going? I mean, that's kind of funny, don't you think? It's funny. "Where are you going?" "I have no idea." "Well, you're sure going fast." "I know, but I don't." It's like, "How do you know? How are you going to know when you get there?" "I'm not going to know." "I don't know where I'm going." But I'm so tired. Paul says, "I don't run like that. I don't run with uncertainty." Thus, I fight not as one who beats the air. I mean, come on. This is funny. Excuse me. "What are you doing over there?" "Oh, I'm just beating up the air." "Well, who you fighting?" "The air." I mean, if you combine someone who's beating the air and running aimlessly, they, they look, they look like somebody you know, messed up. Therefore, or he's announcing, excuse me, verse 27, "But I discipline my body and bring it into subjection, lest when I have preached to others, I myself should become disqualified." Wow.
And so we want to make sure that we, according to this verse, make a straight path for our feet. That, uh, we're not living our lives without a destination. Don't raise your hand, but there's some of you here, I'm sure that you're in college, you're in pursuit of a career, or you're in college and you don't know yet. I'm a big fan. In fact, years ago, years ago, Charlie Kirk said it, and I, I've always believed it, but he made it famous. I, really, parents are going to hate me. Young, hate. Young people, listen up. You'll love me for this. Your parents will hate me for this. In the short term, they'll love me later. If you're graduating from high school, you should take an entire year off from going to college. You should take a break and you should think and pray about what you should do next. A lot of people go from high school straight into college and they spend four years and they get out of college and they had more direction when they were in high school than they did four years later. And now they're broke and they don't know what to do. What I'm encouraging you to do is to seek the Lord and make sure that you have a destination. Which means you've got a purpose. It's implied in your walk. You know where you're going. God's going to give you the strength. And even when you get, watch, even when you get tired, or when opposition comes, you know where you're supposed to be going. Amen.
Because my friends, listen, if you embark on a course that you've concocted, or you think it's good, or, "Well, my grandpa was a surgeon, my dad was a surgeon, my uncles are all surgeons, so I guess I have to be a surgeon." Maybe not. Maybe not. Maybe God wants something different for you. But if you assume something, you're going to go down a path and boy, are you going to get weary really quick. And it's going to be so hard because you don't have the passion to do it because you're, you're in the wrong lane. God might want you to be an astronaut or whatever. I'm a big fan. I believe God has made us. The scripture says, "Train up a child in the way that he should what go." What on earth does that mean? Do you realize if we really believe that scripture, it would put an end to our class form of teaching? Because what we do is we put everybody in the same room, teach them the exact same thing, exact same level. They all come out the same. And I don't think the same was ever right. God said, "No, here's what you do. You study your child." You know, the Jews are amazing. Still to this day, when a child is born in Israel, most, most Jews, they don't name the child for like a week. Least. And I got to experience this. It was so cool. We have some friends in Israel, and, um, they were at the base. He was the commander of an air base of the Israeli Air Force. And so they said, "You have to come to our house. You have to come to our house." They had just gave birth to their baby girl, and she was like a week or two old. And they had not announced her name. And they said, "We waited for you guys to come. We want you to hold her. We're going to announce her name." It was so awesome. And so, you know what? All of their kids, all of the names they give to the kids, they give the names to the kids after they watch them for about a week or two. Then they say, "You know what? This one is, this one is of this or that." In fact, one of the, if I remember this right, I may, I may mess it up, but one of the times or one of the children, uh, was, I think Shoham was his name. And they told us when he came out, he was smiling. He was smiling. He's never, he's two weeks old. He hasn't stopped smiling since. He's just so happy to be in this world. And they named him Shoham, which I think means something regarding either happiness or joy or smile. And, anyway, that, that's just beautiful. Watch your child. And that's true all the way through. Some of you love architecture. Some of you love construction. Some of you love sciences. Some of you love, doesn't matter what is your passion. That's the thing you're supposed to be schooled in and dial down on.
In Matthew 7:3, Jesus says, "Enter by the narrow gate." You're not going to enter through the narrow gate going in circles. "For wide is the gate and broad is the way that people go in circles that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it." Heaven's very narrow. "You people are so narrow-minded." Yes, we are. God's, God's narrow-minded. It's a very narrow way to get into heaven. Jesus, listen, Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one gets to the Father but through me." That's pretty narrow. You can't get any more narrow than that. "Yeah, that's why I'm not a Christian. You guys are just so narrow." Well, I mean, come on. I mean, how many, how many paths of salvation do you want? To make it up as you go along? That's what most people do. "I'm pretty good. I'm better than my neighbor." Yeah, just keep telling yourself that. But down deep inside, you know it's not going to work. That narrow path is, stay close to him. Stay close to him. You don't have to worry about anything.
"Well, I'm afraid I'm going to lose my salvation." Wait a minute. Stop. Do you have it? Do you have salvation? If you have salvation, you're going to know it. How do, how will I know? Because you will discover you're not in charge of your life. You can try, but that doesn't last very long. He'll remind you who's in charge. He's very good at it, you know. And you will not lose it if you have it. But some people believe for a while. But after a while, the cares of this world choke out the word of God. They wind up quitting or saying, "It didn't work for me." And they wind up wandering off. They didn't lose their salvation. Jesus said, "These are they who believe for a while." Don't be like that. Make sure that your belief. Think about belief like a car. You have a car, and it's wrapped in the word "believe." Get in the car and drive over to Jesus and get out of the car of belief and get into his car, faith. Your belief should take you to faith. And then from the rest of your life, you live a life of faith. Does that make sense? That whole act is narrow. Everyone believes. Atheists believe. Humanists believe. Everyone has a belief system that's broad. That's the broadway. Everybody's on that road. But to take that belief and then drive onto a narrow lane, a one-way road, and there's Jesus standing right in the middle of the road, and he takes your hand and he puts you in his car, and you drive away with him. Now you've gone from belief to faith. That is key. A lot of people hang and circle about in belief and they never, never come to faith. Don't, don't be like that. Don't do that.
The second thing is this, verses 14 to 17, "Growing Up Together in the House of the Loving God." It says in verse 14, "Pursue peace with all people." Wow. "And holiness, without which no one will see the Lord." Did you know that? Everybody, did you know that number one, our duty, our response is to pursue peace with people? We, we are supposed to be peacemakers. Have you noticed? Romans chapter 12 talks about this. Well, I'm not going to talk about it now because we're coming up on it on Sundays. But Romans chapter 12 tells us, "As much as it is possible, be at peace with all." It's all of the brothers and sisters in, in faith. I love that. I love how, I love how honest the Bible is. "As much as is possible." Here it says that pursue peace with all people. When Paul says to the Romans, "As much as it is possible, live at peace with one another," it implies that it's so, sometimes going to be a real struggle. It also implies that you have to manage others in the church as they manage you. See, what are you talking about? Look, we're all going to heaven who are trusting Christ. We're in the family of God. J. Vernon McGee says, "And being in a family, that's why some of us don't get along so well with one another." We're in a family. And there's some people, have you noticed that? There's some people in your life, they're going to heaven, but they drive you up the wall. And there's some people where you have to learn that when you see them, you, you see them. Some, listen, it's, you've learned that you guys just, it's oil and water. That you just go like this when you see them. You, you just nod. That's the understanding that you guys have come to. It's like, that's far as it goes. Some people, you say, "How's it going?" "Fine." "How's it going to you?" "Fine." That's it. That's it. Because why? Because even in the family of God, you can say to somebody, "Hey, how's it going?" "Why are you asking?" "Well, I didn't mean anything by it." "What's that supposed to mean? Don't you care about me?" "You act like you don't care." "I, I asked you how you're doing." "Well, are you implying that there's something wrong with me?" It's like, "Oh, brother. I'm sorry you even asked." "Oh, now, so now you don't want to talk to me." You know what I'm talking about? Paul says, you know what? "As much as it is possible, live at peace with everybody." Learn how to be in the family. All right.
And here the Bible tells us, "Pursue peace with all." Figure that out. Doesn't mean you have to go up there and give them a hug when they can't, you know, they just like, "That's too close." Okay, okay. Honor them. That. But the Bible here tells us that without holiness, without your life and my life being set aside to God, that's what it means. We're not going to see the Lord. Wow. Did you guys get that? We're, are you guys okay? Really quiet in here tonight. Uh, without holiness, we're not going to see God. So, "Well, I'm not holy and I'm going to see him." No, you're not. Are you set aside? That's the word. Holiness. To Him. Because if you are, then you're going to walk with Him in a way that He's going to be talking to you in a way, and He's going to lead you in a way that is everlasting. Amen. And it's a great way to live. But somehow we get this stuff. We just mess it up where we think, "Oh my goodness, look at her. She's so, she's so holy." "Oh, how do you know?" "Well, she doesn't wear any makeup and she dresses like an Amish person. She's so holy." That's not what it means. If that, what if that's what it meant? Think about every church would have a, a clothing store at the church about. And you'd have to, this is where you, this is how big or how high the bun needs to be in the back of your head. That's ridiculous. That's not what it means. And then, you know, regarding, regarding cosmetics, by the way, J, I'm going to let J, you already know what J and McGee said. McGee said that's the people talk about this, you know, if you don't wear makeup, then you're, you know. No, no. J. Vernon McGee said, "If the barn needs to be painted, paint it." Is that, now, excuse me. Hello? J. Vernon McGee said that. I did not say that.
2 Corinthians 7:1 says, "Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit." Watch out what's going inside of you. Watch out what you touch. And watch out what you let inside. "Perfecting holiness in the fear of God." In the awe of the Lord. In the awe of God. Romans 14:9 says, "Therefore, let us pursue the things which make for peace and the things by which one may edify one another." Isn't that beautiful? "How can I serve you? How can I bless you?" That's what we're supposed to do. We have to really practice that. We need, we might need signs like this in the parking lot after every service. Edify one another. Not run over one another. But, um, I've told you guys before, and, uh, I think it's precious where we would seek to put ourselves down or away out of the, the P, the place of advantage or privilege or the better view or whatever it might be. And we, we bring the other brother and sister in that spot. That's, that's what the Lord would have us to do.
I'm going to have to end with this. We're at a time. There's a, there's a, somewhere in time, there's a commentary that speaks about all of these oarmen, these slaves that were in this ship, and they had been mistreated and they had been abused. And they wound up coming to faith in Jesus. But they were slaves in this slave ship. And they're the hoopers, the Greek word, they were the under rowers of the ship. Worst of the worst position. And so in their, in their confinement and their, in their abuse, they had, they had failed at rowing. And the, the masters said, "We're done with you guys. We're going to give you your last meal. We're going to throw you overboard." And they broke their arms. So, which, if you think about it, condemns them to drowning. Drowning. They're going to drown because they, they broke their arms. But they, then they said, they thought they were going to torture them. Break your arms. And then they set out this big meal in front of them. Can you imagine? It's your last meal. Last bit of pleasure on Earth. You can eat that. The last meal. Your arms are broken. You can't. It's a, it's a mess. And the masters, they're all laughing and making fun. But they discovered that if they picked up, if they were able to scoop with their clothing, the way that they had their clothing, they could put these boards, these almost like sticks, into their robe that they could scoop the food. But they couldn't bring it to their mouth. So they discovered that they could scoop up the food and reach across the table and feed the guy that was opposite them. They wound up feeding one another because they were Christian brothers, condemned to death. They wound up edifying one another. And in doing so, each was edified. They ate their meal. They were thrown into the water. And they went into heaven.
Think about it. We were talking before service in the foyer, and somebody had made mention about, you know, "Kids these days, young adults these days, all caught up in their their world." And a lot of the world is, uh, I don't know, lack of a better term, synthetic in my eyes. Synthetic in my, uh, estimation. Synthetic meaning, uh, gosh, the Greek word is plasto, plastic. And, you know, plastic melts. Uh, I'm old enough to remember everything being glass. Was awesome. We used to have milkmen. I've lived in Chino Hills so long, we had milkmen in Chino Hills, and they brought glass. Well, they don't do glass anymore. I think we're going to be getting back to glass with, uh, RFK. He's going to like ban plastic because it's like, "Oh, turns out there's like interesting connections between plastic when it gets warm and breast cancer and all kinds of." Yikes. But all of these, all of these things in life that people think, "I have to have this or else I can't live." Really? My phone? My phone? My games? My, my fantasy team? This and that? Or like, "Oh my goodness, what are we going to do? We don't, our internet's not fast enough." And some people think these are important things. Do you realize in our world right now, if we don't get grounded in Jesus, can you imagine? I actually don't tell anybody, but I know how to destroy America in a second. I really do. I could be the consummate terrorist. Pull the plug. Just pull the plug. What happened? Our, our internet's down. Can you imagine? Nobody needs to even shoot a gun. Just electronically. Lights go out. Look, we just came through those fires and the winds. And I don't know what's with my neighborhood. My neighbor told me, "It'd be great for you to move off of our street because every, they cut our power off for days and everybody else has got power in the region except our street." I think it's you, Pastor Jack, maybe. True. I don't know. But, you know, we're like rubbing sticks together to create a fire. But when people, when, when things get a little uncomfortable, where do you go? What do you do? Do you come apart? Oh my goodness. Do, do kids like, "I, I, I can't live like this." Like, what? It's, it's synthetic. It's a piece of plastic. They, I have to be connected to the world. I don't think so. Look what it's done to you. "He said, you're being kind of harsh." Really? Well, listen. Do they know how to change a tire on the car or their bicycle? Do they have a bicycle? You know what I'm saying? What if everything came apart and was undone? Guess what we'd have to do? We'd have to check on each other. "How are you doing?" "How are you doing?" "You want some food?" "You want a candle?" You know, we, we think this is impossible. It's not impossible. But this I know is possible. When such a thing happens, God's people will be possessed by His Holy Spirit to edify one another, to love on one another, to hold one another's arms up when we're tired. Amen. And to encourage each other when our legs and knees are feeble. We're exhausted. God's people come along. And what I really believe is when somebody says, "You know, the, you should never be judgmental." And of course, I understand all this. What a beautiful picture it is when the entire church is in need, and no one stands around pointing fingers at somebody because everyone's helping one another. The only one that would starve to death is the one that's too busy pointing fingers. You ever think of that? Let's edify one another.
Father, we thank You, God, for Your love and for Your joy and for Your peace and the practicality of Your Bible. We love Your Bible. We love Your word, Lord. And we pray, Father, that we would be a people that would be very, very mindful and conscious of the fact that we are in a family. It's the family of God. We're growing up together. Every one of us here on this night, we just grew a couple more inches tonight by being in worship and being in the word. It's awesome. Faith comes by hearing, hearing by the word of God. So, Lord, I pray until You come back, or until we see You individually, uh, via death, that we just continue to grow. If there's anybody in here tonight, if any of this sound attractive to them, that they might say to You right now, "Jesus, I want this. This is the most real stuff I've heard. This spoke to my heart tonight. Some of this stuff, I, I'm wondering if that pastor wasn't told about my life tonight." Nope. Nobody told me, friend. That's God speaking to you. Give your life to Him tonight. Decide right now to have your sins forgiven, a new life put inside you. He does that. He's real. He's alive. He's not only here, He's coming again. He's promised to return in an hour that we do not think. Wow. So, Lord, even so, come quickly. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.