From Ritual to Redemption

Welcome to Built on God's Word, the preaching and teaching ministry of Highland Park Baptist Church in Bartlesville, Oklahoma.! Pastor Mike Scrivani preaches on Hebrews 9, verses 1-14.

Please stand with me right now as we honor the reading of God's Word in Hebrews 9, verses 1-14. Now even the first covenant had regulations for worship in an earthly place of holiness.

For a tent was prepared, the first section in which were the lampstand and the table and the bread of the presence. It is called the holy place. Behind the second curtain was a second section called the most holy place, having the golden altar of incense and the ark of the covenant covered on all sides with gold, in which was the golden urn holding the manna and Aaron's staff that budded in the tablets of the covenant.

Above it were the cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat. Of these things we cannot now speak in detail. These preparations having thus been made, the priests go regularly into the first section performing their ritual duties, but into the second only the high priest goes, and he but once a year, and not without taking blood which he offers for himself and for the unintentional sins of the people.

By this, the Holy Spirit indicates that the way into the holy places is not yet opened as long as the first section is still standing, which is symbolic for the present age.

According to this arrangement, gifts and sacrifices are offered that cannot perfect the conscience of the worshiper, but deal only with food and drink and various washings, regulations for the body imposed until the time of reformation.

But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent, not made with hands, that is, not of this creation, he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves, but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.

For if the blood of goats and bulls and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit, it offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.

May God add a blessing to the reading of his word. Would you please be seated? Amen. Last week marked a year since our family moved into our new house, and sometimes after you move to a new place, you find yourself accidentally driving back to the place where you used to live out of habit.

Well, about six months ago, for the first time after we moved, I had taken Jack to his baseball practice. I was deep in thought about something I can't remember.

But I took a turn down a street and was about halfway to my old house before I realized, what am I doing? Where am I going? And I turned around and headed back to my home.

Maybe that's happened to you before. I heard some laughter. Sounds like it has. I think it was Benjamin Franklin who said, old habits die hard. And while some habits are good habits, others are hard to break.

I've mentioned before the saying that the book of Hebrews was written by a Hebrew to Hebrews, telling them to stop living like Hebrews. It was hard for this original audience to break from old covenant rituals that were now obsolete and vanishing under the new covenant realities secured by Jesus' sacrifice through His redemption on the cross.

I believe the book of Hebrews primarily addresses two groups. One group consisted of genuine Christians, genuine believers in Christ.

They were Hebrews. They were Jews who converted to Christianity. The other group consisted of people who were Jews, but they had confessed faith in Christ, but the persecution that they were enduring as a result of that confession tempted them to drift away from Jesus, to slip back into old habits prescribed under the old covenant and were in thus danger of neglecting the great salvation promised in the Old Testament and now fulfilled in Jesus Christ.

The original audience as well as the human author of Hebrews were very, very familiar with the Old Testament and all the rituals and the regulations and the ceremonies and the religious observances that were prescribed under the old covenant.

As we saw last week in chapter 8, those old covenant observances were a shadow, a foreshadowing of Jesus' coming and enacting a new and a superior covenant as a superior high priest after the order of Melchizedek.

In chapter 8, the writer of Hebrews reasserts the central thrust of his point, the point that he's been making throughout the first seven chapters of this book.

He's told them and us what we've needed, and now here he's telling us again that we have exactly what we need. We need Jesus, the eternal, divine Son of God, as a superior high priest who mediates a better covenant for us.

In Jesus, we have all that we need. A high priest who inaugurated a superior covenant enacted on better promises.

In chapter 9, the writer of Hebrews builds on his earlier warnings that he gave in chapters 5, verses 11 through chapter 6, verse 12, to those who were drifting away from their confession of Christ.

He cautions his audience against neglecting the great foundation found in Jesus and reverting back to old covenant practices, rituals that once pointed to Jesus' coming, but are now obsolete under the new covenant Jesus has enacted, again, based on better promises as recorded in Old Testament Scriptures.

In chapter 9, the writer of Hebrews demonstrates the superiority of the new covenant over the old by contrasting the temporary earthly tabernacle with the eternal heavenly one.

He draws a distinction between earthly high priests whose access to God and sacrifices were limited, and Jesus, the eternal Son of God, whose perfect priesthood and once-for-all-time sacrifice have secured everlasting results.

And so the main idea for this morning's sermon is that old covenant external rituals failed to provide the eternal redemption Christ secures in the new covenant.

Old covenant external rituals failed to provide the eternal redemption Christ secures in the new covenant. Why does this matter for us?

Why does this matter for New Testament, new covenant Christians? Well, look back with me at Hebrews 5, 11 through 6, 3, at that warning which prompted this instruction here now in chapter 9.

There the writer of Hebrews says, About these we have much to say, talking about the superior priesthood of Jesus Christ, about this we have much to say, and it is hard to explain since you have become dull of hearing.

For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness since he is a child, but solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.

Therefore, let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith towards God and of instruction about washing, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment.

Just as old habits are hard to break, so too are long-held traditions in the church. We need to be on guard against elevating traditions or adhering to extra-biblical beliefs that only produce dead works and cannot purify our internal conscience to serve the living God.

For example, we need to be on guard against legalism, thinking that our salvation depends on not just what Jesus did for us, but external actions that we need to perform to gain God's approval by checking off a series of boxes every day or every week.

I read my Bible. I prayed. I went to church. I gave my tithe, etc. These are good things, but our motivation for doing them should be based on a desire to serve the living God because of His grace that we've received to save us, not because we think we need to perform actions so that God will save us or keep us saved.

We need to be on guard against that. We need to be on guard against treating earthly structures as possessing some kind of sacred power. Now, this area up here, marked off by these beautiful green and purple stripes, is not the Holy of Holies.

It doesn't grant you any more access to God than you already have by faith in Jesus Christ in the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

God will hear your prayers just as loudly and clearly in the pew you're sitting in or in your home as He will up here.

Jesus preached outside and in the temple. His words in the temple weren't any more or any less authoritative than when He sat down outside to preach the Sermon on the Mount.

Yes, I think that there should be reverence in this place for the Lord and how things are arranged. I've talked about this pulpit and what it symbolizes to me, but this is not the Ark of the Covenant.

You will not die if you touch it. It's heavy. Be careful. If you move it, get help, but you will not die if you touch this piece of furniture.

This is not the Ark of the Covenant. We also need to be on guard against elevating pastors and clergy in the church to a place where we treat them as if they have more access to God than any other born-again believer.

James 5.16 says, Again, yes, there should be reverence and respect for the position and those whom God calls to it because we are called to keep watch over your souls and will give an account to God for what we have done, but in Christ you have, brother, sister, complete access to God.

You don't need clergy to act as your intermediary between you and Jesus thinking again that we have somehow more access to God than you do.

We don't need another mediator. We don't need another sacrifice. We don't need another priest because in Christ we have all that we need.

He and only He secures eternal redemption for us. In Christ all your sins have been completely, fully, totally, and permanently atoned for.

It's this truth. It's this gospel. It's the indwelling of the Holy Spirit that gives us confidence to approach God in our time of need, purifying our consciences from thoughts that there's more for us to do, that we need to add something to what Jesus has done already.

Brother, sister, Jesus is all we need. And in Him, we have all we need. And this truth should motivate within us a desire to serve the living God as living sacrifices with joy.

today, I want to ask you, is that true of you this morning? At Highland Park, our mission statement is that we exist to develop disciples of Jesus Christ who delight in Him and demonstrate His goodness as we declare His gospel to our neighbors and to the nations.

if you're trusting in external rituals, if you think you need to add something to Jesus' sacrifice to atone for your sins, then you are in danger of developing into something that looks more like a Pharisee than a disciple of Jesus who truly delights in Him.

But if you're developing into a Pharisee, you won't delight in Him. In fact, you'll end up denying Him thinking that the cross wasn't sufficient. Instead of demonstrating Jesus' goodness to others based on the goodness He's done for you to make you righteous, you'll be doing things because you think that they are necessary to make you righteous.

And if that's the case, then the gospel that you will end up declaring is a different gospel which is no gospel at all. Old covenant rituals failed to secure the eternal redemption Christ secures in the new covenant.

Two principles from our text this morning reveal this truth and I hope and I pray will encourage you and I, us, to serve the living God with joy.

with joy under the new covenant that He's enacted, inaugurated, under better promises because He is our superior priest.

Jesus is all we need. The first principle, the earthly tabernacle provided limited access to God in temporary cleansing from sin.

The earthly tabernacle provided limited access to God in temporary cleansing from sin. Verse 1 again says, now, even the first covenant had regulations for worship and earthly place of holiness.

The first covenant here refers to the old covenant. Under that covenant, God prescribed in detail to Moses how His people were to worship Him.

The old covenant system, its sacrifices and its furnishings were not contrived by Moses or any other person.

Israel could not worship God according to their own preferences. Their worship was regulated and defined by God according to His instructions.

Israel was not permitted to speculate, innovate, or experiment in any way with the kind of place and the objects within it that were used and prescribed by God for the worship of Him.

I think it's important to state here that the New Testament also contains instructions for orderly worship when we gather as a church to worship the Lord.

In 1 Corinthians chapter 14 verses 26 through 40 we have some of those instructions. In verse 33 it says, for God is not a God of confusion but of peace.

Again, referring to how we are to be ordered in our worship of Him. Verse 40 of that passage concludes, but all things should be done decently and in order when we gather for worship.

So, all that we sing and do and say in worship must follow in order that matches what we read in Scripture and reflects and communicates the character of God.

Drawing attention to Jesus and not to ourselves. Churches in our culture today struggle with this.

I've seen videos of pastors jumping on trampolines as part of their sermon. I've seen one pastor using a squirt gun. I've seen a pastor descending from the rafters in the back on a harness to the pulpit.

Recently, I saw a church that did a Star Wars theme where everybody was dressed up as Jedi Knights and the staff was on the stage engaged in a lightsaber duel in the middle of what was supposed to be a worship service.

I like Star Wars. Pastor Tyler likes Star Wars more than I do, but that stuff is silly. It's ridiculous.

And it makes the church look silly and Christianity look ridiculous and ultimately it mocks Christ who is not worshipped for things like that.

Under the old covenant, God designed and he prescribed a specific place, the tabernacle, later the temple, and specific furnishings to be used in worship of him in that place.

In verses 2-5, the writer of Hebrews outlines God's specific commands for the tabernacle which communicated his holiness. Again, those verses say, for a tent was prepared, the first section in which were the lampstand and the table and the bread of the presence.

It is called the holy place. Behind the second curtain was a second section called the most holy place, having the golden altar of incense and the ark of the covenant covered on all sides with gold in which was a golden urn holding the manna and Aaron's staff that budded in the tablets of the covenant.

Above it were the cherubin of glory overshadowing the mercy seat. Of these things we cannot now speak in detail. And so here the writer of Hebrews is describing again the furnishings in the holy place, in the tabernacle, and he moves from the holy place inward into the most holy place which was separated by a veil.

And that veil was a constant reminder that sinful humanity is unfit to be in the presence of a holy God.

It was the last barrier and only the high priest was permitted to enter through that veil and he could only do it once a year.

And inside the holy of holies or the most holy place were the altar of incense which was actually outside of the holy of holies but was an essential component for the regulations that took place on the day of atonement was there and the next was the ark of the covenant an ornate chest designed to house the stone tablets inscribed with the ten commandments.

The real significance of that was the mercy seat. The Hebrew word for mercy seat meant cover, appeasement, or place of atonement. The mercy seat was the lid of the ark of the covenant.

It was the place where the high priest sprinkled the blood of the sacrifice on the day of atonement to appease God's wrath for the sins committed by his people.

And it was there where mercy was dispensed. The golden urn holding the manna was a testimony to God's people of how he sustained them during their forty years of wandering in the wilderness.

Aaron's staff that budded was a reminder of how God chose Moses' brother Aaron and his descendants after him to serve as priests in the tabernacle later again in the temple.

All these furnishings had a purpose and were sacred objects that reflected the holy nature of God. In verses 6 through 10 of Hebrews 9, the writer shifts from the arrangements of the furniture in the tabernacle to the ministry of the priests within it.

In verses 6 and 7, again he says, these preparations, having thus been made, the priests go regularly into the first section, the holy place, performing their ritual duties, but into the second, the holy of holies, only the high priest goes, and he but once a year, and not without taking blood, which he offers for himself and for the unintentional sins of the people.

So again, the first section there refers to the holy place, the area just outside of the most holy place where the Ark of the Covenant was and was separated by a veil.

There were a lot of regulations and instructions for the priests to follow as they arranged all of these furnishings in these holy places.

they were to place the bread of the presence every Sabbath. There's instructions for that in Leviticus 25, 5-7.

In the same way, the priest tended the lampstand to shed light in the holy place. There's instructions for that in Leviticus 24, 4, Numbers 8, 2-3. Incense was to be burned and offered daily.

Exodus 30, verse 8 has instructions for that and twice a day sacrifices were to be offered. Exodus 29, 38-42 has instructions for that.

What is being emphasized here in Hebrews 9, 6-7 is the regular, repeated work done by the priests in the tabernacle which needed to be reduplicated every day, day after day after day after day.

However, ministry in the most holy place, the holy of holies was much different as verse 7 indicates. Only the high priest had access to that place and only one time of year on the day of atonement.

And when the day of atonement came, he did not go into that place empty-handed and I don't think that he entered into that place confidently. God told Moses in Leviticus 16, 1-2, the Lord spoke to Moses after the death of the two sons of Aaron when they drew near before the Lord and died.

And the Lord said to Moses, tell Aaron your brother not to come at any time into the holy place inside the veil before the mercy seat that is on the ark so that he may not die.

For I will appear in the cloud over the mercy seat. But in this way Aaron shall come into the holy place with a bull from the herd for a sin offering and a ram for a burnt offering.

Aaron's sons died because they offered unauthorized strange fire in their censers which did not follow the Lord's detailed commands and instructions.

This mattered to God. This mattered to Him. How His people approached Him what they thought of Him was important.

This wasn't like a list of rules that maybe you would see at a neighborhood swimming pool where there's no lifeguard to enforce them and people are kind of like well, you know, maybe we will run around the pool today.

I don't know. All of these regulations, the specifics about the placement of the furnishings inside the holy and the most holy place and the access granted to the high priest alone and only on the day of atonement to pass through the veil into the holy of holies communicated that sinful man even when provision was made on the day of atonement had extremely limited access to the presence of a holy God.

Only the priests had access to the holy place and only the high priest had access to the most holy place again once a year to sprinkle the blood of the sacrifice on the mercy seat to atone for the people's sins.

The writer of Hebrews details all of these things to make the point that under the old covenant people had limited and restricted access to God and the sacrifices they made were limited in their ability to have permanently atoned for the people's sins.

Verses 8-10 he says By this the Holy Spirit indicates that the way into the holy places is not yet opened so long as the first section is still standing which is symbolic for the present age.

According to this arrangement gifts and sacrifices are offered that cannot perfect the conscience of the worshiper but deal only with food and drink and various washings regulations for the body imposed until the time of reformation.

The Holy Spirit indicated he was revealing the difference between the old and the new covenants. The tabernacle its furnishings its priests and high priests who offered sacrifices mattered.

It was necessary for them to follow those regulations to hold back God's wrath towards the sin of his people. However these regulations were conducted through external rituals dealing with food drink washings etc.

They provided a temporary limited external cleansing but they did not perfect the conscience of the worshiper. It couldn't bring about the internal transformation where God writes his laws and his commands on the hearts and the minds of believers in the new covenant.

These old covenant regulations again had to be repeated because there was no final purification for sin.

As soon as one sacrifice was made another would follow and this went on and on and on and on The earthly tabernacle provided limited access to God and temporary cleansing from sin.

The old covenant required incessant and imperfect offerings that could not completely purify the depths of the human heart. But all of that changed when Jesus appeared.

So we come to our second principle. Jesus entered the perfect tabernacle providing complete access to God and permanent cleansing from sin. Jesus entered the perfect tabernacle providing complete access to God and permanent cleansing from sin.

Under the old covenant the tabernacle later the temple was the epicenter of worship. Under the new covenant the focused shifts away from the earthly tabernacle to the eternal son of God Jesus Christ.

The epicenter of new covenant worship is not an earthly place but a person. As we read in Hebrews 9 11 through 12 again but when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come then through the greater and more perfect tent not made with hands that is not of this creation he entered once for all into the holy places not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood thus securing an eternal redemption.

In contrast to the old covenant priests our new covenant priest fully and finally atones for the sins of his people and ushers in the good things that have now come to us through faith in him.

His salvation actually accomplished what the old covenant regulations were pointing to. After Jesus proclaimed on the cross it is finished he appeared as the high priest in the true heavenly tabernacle to the father.

The offering he brought was himself his own blood securing for all who believe in him an eternal redemption. The Greek word translated eternal describes that which transcends temporal limits and endures without ending.

Back in Hebrews 5 9 the writer uses this same word in comparison Jesus' priesthood to Melchizedek. Hebrews 5 8-10 again says although he was a son speaking of Jesus he learned obedience through what he suffered and being made perfect he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him being designated by God as a priest after the order of Melchizedek.

Salvation in Christ is irreversible grounded in a work accomplished beyond the reach of decay or change.

Jesus is the source of eternal salvation and through his sacrifice secured for us eternal redemption.

redemption. The Greek word there translated redemption appears only three times in the New Testament here and in two other places and it portrays deliverance from bondage through the payment of a costly ransom.

The word combines the helplessness of the captive with the sufficiency of the deliverer binding together themes of slavery debt with covenant loyalty and restored inheritance.

Let's look at those other two passages in Scripture where this word appears. The first is Romans 3, 23-25. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith.

This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. The other passages Colossians 1, 13-14.

He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved son in whom we have redemption the forgiveness of sins.

Jesus Christ is our great high priest who has liberated us sins penalty and sins power.

The purchased price was his own blood. 1 Peter 1 18-19 says knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers not with perishable things such as silver or gold but with the precious blood of Christ like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.

This redemption is guaranteed and it's eternal. Ephesians 1 7-8 says in him we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of his grace which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight in verses 13-14 in him you also when you heard the word of truth the gospel of your salvation and believed in him were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of his glory.

The writer of Hebrews now presses this truth home in verses 13-14 again he says for the blood of goats and bulls and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer sanctify for the purification of the flesh how much more will the blood of Christ who through the eternal spirit offered himself without blemish to God purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God and so here we have his argument from the lesser to the greater God if a person thought the old covenant sacrifices were beneficial to them which only cleansed the outside how much more then should they see Christ's sacrifice as infinitely more beneficial which cleanses the inside the only way to have an eternal sacrifice that is eternally sufficient is to have an eternal savior

Jesus entered the most holy place and through him we have complete access to come in full confidence into the presence of our holy God knowing that Jesus has ransomed us from our sins he has eternally redeemed us and that our salvation in him is irreversible I grew up in a church that I loved but who taught that you could lose your salvation and I remember as a kid especially as a teenager spending nights awake in my bed thinking well where is the line where is the line between I'm saved and I'm not saved anymore because it seems to me like one sin is enough where now

I'm over in this unsaved territory I would stay awake just thinking of all of the sins that I had committed and there are many and it's good to confess our sins to the Lord but I would be troubled because I'd be thinking what have I forgotten and I'd be troubled thinking I know that there's some sins that I've committed that I'm sure I was just even unaware not only the things that I did that I shouldn't have done but the things that I should have done that I didn't do and this was troubling to me I lived in dread of the Lord not in delight of him this truth changed all of that for me I live to serve the living God as a living sacrifice knowing that Jesus has done all the work for me that he has completely saved me and keeps me and so this is why we need to preach the gospel to ourselves every day every day because every day we sin and every day it seems we are tempted to think that instead of receiving

God's grace we're going to receive his condemnation that he's going to divorce himself from us that he's going to kick us out of his kingdom it's true that God disciplines the one that he loves but if we've experienced the goodness of Christ to save us and to seal us with his Holy Spirit to have God's laws inscribed on our hearts and our minds to delight in him who as strange as it seems delights in us his children that's a source of great joy and delight for me to know for us to know in Christ that we have complete access to him and we can approach him confidently in prayer in our time of need I write most of my sermons in my office at home on Thursday and when I do that

I'll shut the doors and that just helps me better focus especially when the kids are at home on summer break I'll do that in my office sometimes too most of the time my door is open but if there's some times where I just really need to focus then I'll shut my office door or maybe I'll have a phone call or something like that just needing a little bit of privacy and in most cases when my office doors are closed at home or if they're closed here at the church people don't disrupt that rarely will I even get a knock on the door and if that's the case it's usually an emergency even Danny she's really good about if those doors are closed they're closed for a reason you know who's not very good with that my children my children they've gotten better but especially when they're younger I mean it's like the doors might as well not be closed and just busting in you know whatever it might be with a question or hey did you see this thing or let me show you this thing that I did or whatever the case may be that just bust in and you know what

I don't mind when they do because they're my kids and I want them to know that they have access to me whenever they need me there are some times I really don't come in through the doors these times but I love my kids and I don't want them to ever think that dad is too busy for me or that dad loves other things more than me those doors are closed and I'm not welcome in Christ you have been adopted by your heavenly father the veil has been torn access has been fully granted to you through Jesus you and

I in Christ can come confidently into our heavenly father's presence at any time at any time because Christ has atoned completely totally finally and permanently for all of your sins all of the wrath of God for the sins that you committed were poured out on him at the cross and now we can come confidently into our father's arms like little children and that is possible only because of who Jesus is and what he's done for us this is the good news of the gospel this is the good news that causes us to delight in

Jesus at all times now maybe you're here this morning and you've thought that being a Christian means performing that checklist you have to do all these different things and then and only then will God be gracious to you you think that you have to earn something that you have to do something brother sister that is not the gospel and that doesn't save anybody what saves you is realizing that you're a sinner and that Jesus is the savior that you need and that his death on the cross was sufficient for you that the blood he shed has atoned for your sins that he rose again on the third day that he's coming back that he's interceding for you right now that he's done it all and that's what brings joy that is such good news now again maybe some people they think that they are a believer and they maybe have professed faith in

Jesus Christ maybe they've come down during an altar call maybe they've been baptized and they have the certificate to prove when they were baptized and they treat all of that as if it's some kind of get out of hell free card you know well I did all of those external things and so we're good right so now I can go on and live however I want sin however I want because I've been forgiven of all of it right if that's your motivation brother sister friend you have not truly been saved in the new covenant the word of God the commands of God are written on our hearts and on our minds and we should want to follow him because of a motivation for our love for him and knowing what he's done for us and so if either of those describe you I hope that you've heard the gospel today and that you know why it's good news and

I pray that you would turn to Christ that you would be saved that you would be sealed that you would be that you would be transformed that you would delight in him who saved you from your sins now and forever if you are a believer if God has been gracious to save you then I think one way we need to adjust our lives according to what we've heard is to examine yourself to see if you are in the faith examine yourself to see if you are in the faith this is again for all of us Paul's primary concern was to bring spiritual health and wholeness to the Christians in the community in Corinth and if the individuals were genuinely in the faith they would know that Jesus Christ lived inside of him his Holy Spirit would be at work within them promoting sanctification and moral living a change of desires within them and what they delight in but if their lives showed no evidence of the

Spirit's activity then Jesus Christ was not truly indwelling them and if he do you understand that his sacrifice was sufficient totally sufficient to atone for your sins are you living in the joy of knowing him or maybe you've slipped into thoughts that there's more for you to do or that somehow he doesn't love you he's not pleased with you or you're concerned that maybe what

Jesus did again was not enough and there's more that you need to contribute whatever the case may be I'm going to pray and during this time of prayer I'm going to start out just quietly and I encourage you to use that time to examine yourself to see whether or not you are truly in the faith Let's pray may may!

!! may may Lord, there's a lot here for us to digest and think about.

But the message is clear and it's simple. We have all sinned, we have all fallen short of your holy and righteous standard.

And we all need Jesus. And Lord, you've provided for us the sacrifice that is totally and completely atoned for our sins.

Lord, as your body was ripped apart before and on the cross, and as you declared it is finished, the veil which separated sinful men's access to you on a permanent basis was torn in two.

And in you, Lord, we can come to you as your children. Confidently. Knowing that you love us. That you care about us.

That these truths that you've written on our heart and our mind are truths that you want us to delight in. Knowing you and knowing you more. So, God, for those who have been saved but who are tempted to drift into a legalistic approach to you, thinking that they've got to check off all these boxes in order to earn your love or keep your love, Lord, I pray that through your word today you've shattered that lie.

Lord, for those who are trusting in external actions for their salvation. They've made a confession. They've prayed a prayer. They've entered the waters of baptism.

But they know that there's been no transformation that's really taken place. And they're trusting in those external actions when the reality is, Lord, they know. That they have not truly believed.

God, I pray in the same way in your grace you would shatter that lie. That you would open their eyes to see their need for you. And that in you they have all that they need.

And that they would come to you. And that you would save them. Lord, I pray that as a church, we would not drift into developing people who look more like Pharisees than disciples of yours.

That God in our church, our members would be those who delight in you. Who do good in demonstrating your goodness to them. Not out of a motivation that's selfish or self-serving in any way, but just because they're just so eager to show the goodness of Christ because of how good you've been to save us.

And to keep us and to help us. And that, Father, collectively we would delight in you that we would declare your gospel.

And that people would see in us a genuine transformation. That they would see that we're different in the ways that we live, in the ways that we talk.

And that they would know that you've made all the difference. So, Lord, we thank you that you have provided the permanent sacrifice for us that cleanses our conscience from our sin, that cleanses us from the consequences of our sin.

That we are new covenant people. And so, Lord, I pray that we would live to serve you with joy. And that you would be glorified in our lives. And we ask these things in Jesus' name.

Amen. To learn more, visit us in person or see the website at highlandparkbaptist.net.