Hebrews chapter 10 and we'll
be looking at verses 32 through verse 39. The title of the message this
morning is Encouragement to Endurance. Encouragement to Endurance. Now we have studied this 10th
chapter for quite a while because this is a Very pivotal and important
chapter in the book of Hebrews. Because it comes to the crescendo
of the gospel. How that Christ has once put
away our sin by the offering of Himself. That He has once
for all put away and perfected forever them that are chosen. Them that are sanctified, set
apart by God Himself. And he had given the three exhortations
in verses 19 through verse 24 or 25. He says, Approach the
throne of grace, hold fast our profession, and consider one
another. These are exhortations. to every
believer in Christ, approach without fear, because He is our
advocate. He is the intercessor between
us and God. He said, let us have full assurance
and then hold fast our profession. There are temptations in this
world. There are struggles in our own self to let go. I'll tell you, a lot of times
it's easy just to think about it. Well, if I just let go and,
hey, everything's be alright then. No. Not we who believe. We don't let go. Because He never
lets go of us. We never let go of Him by faith. And we consider one another.
We love one another. We enjoy one another's presence. And therefore we forsake not
the assembling of ourselves together. This is important. Because we
consider one another. I'll tell you this. A lot of
times people come And they have no idea how they encouraged me
just by sitting there. Sometimes people say, well, man,
I was so tired. It doesn't bother me. I was encouraged
that you were there at all. I was encouraged myself. Myself
was encouraged. And I know others are. So we
consider one another, not ourselves, not our condition, but each other.
And then he goes into a warning here in verse 26 concerning apostasy. Apostasy. that if we sin willfully,
that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth
no more sacrifice for sin, but a fearful looking for the judgment,
and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries." Apostasy
was preached unto professing believers. Because of the danger
of apostasy, this is the second time it is clearly mentioned
in this book. I believe there are three times
that he mentions it. But the two times he goes into
great detail concerning what is an apostate. It's someone
who hears the truth, receives it for a while, and then turns
from it willfully. Rejects it and goes away. That is an apostate. Demas was
an apostate. He was a preacher of the gospel
and he turned away because he loved the things of the world. He turned away. And so, after
warning these professing believers of the peril of apostasy, which
is to all who have professed faith in Christ, those who understand
the truth of the sacrifice for sin, either because of the love
of the world or the cares of this life, or a family or friends,
they turn away. I had a man hear the gospel one
time and understand exactly what I said. Salvation is by grace
alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, apart from works.
He heard that message. And he came to me after the service
and he said, Pastor, if what you said is true, then my family
is in hell. My mother, my father, my grandmother,
my grandfather, all believed in their works to save them.
And I said to him, why should you go? Believe on Christ. But yet, for the love of his
family, he willingly turned away from the gospel. He rejected,
refused it, and walked away. Friends, it is truly a fearful
thing to fall into the hands of the living God. I'll tell
you what, it is not fearful to fall into the hands of the God
of this age. The God of this age is such a
puny, minute deity that he must depend upon man to do something. If man doesn't do something for
God, then God is bound and cannot do anything. Now, I don't fear
God like that. Who does? No one should fear
a God like that. But our God is a living God.
Our God, the Scripture says, is a consuming fire. Our God will and must punish
all sin. And anyone outside of Jesus Christ
shall die in their sins. This is the plain truth of Scripture. But now he extends comfort. He
extends comfort to true saints of God as he does in chapter
6 when he discusses apostasy. You notice he gives this warning,
but then he extends comfort because, you know, the only ones really
concerned about being apostates are true believers. Apostates are never concerned
about apostasy. Boy, how dare he think that I
would turn away. Hmm. Only believers need comfort. Only believers know who they
really are by nature. Go over to chapter six. I want
you to see his comfort over there. Chapter six in verse nine. After seeing this, he said, but
beloved you that are beloved of God. You that are chosen of
God, you that are believers in Christ, we are persuaded better
things of you, and things that accompany salvation, though we
speak thus. For God is not unrighteous to
forget your work and labor of love which you showed toward
His name, in that you ministered to the saints, and do minister."
The apostle reminds them concerning the evidence of their faith. evidence of their faith. He reminds
them concerning the object of their faith. You see, He gives
comfort by saying this, God is not unfaithful. Isn't that good news? That God
is not unfaithful, because I am. I'm an unfaithful, wicked, sinful
man. But I know this, God's faithful.
And my faith is not in me. My faith is not in my faith.
My faith is not in the day that I believed. It's not in the future
when I shall believe. My faith is now in the living
God who saved me completely by His grace, by His mercy. And He's not unfaithful like
me. He's not. God is faithful. The apostle reminds them of their
the faithfulness of God, casting their eye backward to God's faithfulness
to them. God is not unrighteous to forget
the works and labor of love. Why? Because the Scripture says,
He worketh in you both the will and do of His good pleasure.
So even my good works are all because of Him. Anything I've
ever done that you would consider a good work, Anything done in faith and love
is a good work. And anything I've done in faith
and love is truly God wrought in me to do it. It's not of me. And then He encourages
us to continue, to continue in the faith. He desired that everyone
show the same diligence unto the end. The same diligence and
full assurance of hope to the end that they be not slothful. But followers of the saints,
what does that mean? Followers of others. Let me go
back. I'm sorry I turned my page here
just a second back in chapter six, he says, we desire that
every one of you show the same diligence and full assurance
of hope unto the end that you be not slothful, but followers
of them. who through faith and patience inherit the promises."
What is he talking about? The people that he's going to
mention later on in Hebrews 11, concerning those who have gone
before us. Have you considered the faith
of the Apostle Paul? Does that not encourage you to
faithfulness? The faith of the Apostle Peter,
the faith of Cornelius, the faith of all of these men, Most all
of which suffered martyrdom for the gospel. Does that not encourage
you? It does me. I follow the same faith that
they had. I have the same faith they had.
We all have what James says is a common faith. He said, I wanted
to write of you concerning the common faith. We have the same
faith, same Lord, and that we are to be patient.
This shows us that we are believers on Christ must not be slothful
in our faithfulness, in our love to God and each other. Remember,
we are free from the law of Moses, but we are not free from all
law. We have the law of love. That's amazing, isn't it? The
law of love. The law of faith. We should be
not slothful in these things. Can we be? You bet we can. You
bet we can be slothful in these things. And what does this slothfulness
produce? Fear, anxiety, discomfort, guilt
of conscience. To a believer, to a believer,
that's what slothfulness does. Therefore, believer, we must
endure to the end. Remember the scripture of our
Lord Jesus Christ who said, He that endureth to the end, the
same shall be saved. Now we know this, that salvation
is of the grace of God. Completely, absolutely and utterly
of free grace. There's nothing God ever saw
in me. There's nothing God ever would see in me. God saved me
because He would. For His own glory, for the glory
of His own grace, He chose me to redeem me. He came and died for me. He sent His Spirit to quicken
my dead soul so that I might believe, gave me faith and repentance
and life, and I believe today because of His grace. There's
no doubt. And if I continue, if it is true grace, I will continue
because His grace will keep me. You see, none of this depends
upon me. It all depends upon God. This
is the will of the Father, that all that He hath given me, I
should lose nothing. John chapter 6, verse 36-37,
you know it well. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me. And Him that cometh to me, I will in no wise
cast out. There is the same thing. Those
who He gave to the Son, The Son redeemed, and I'll lose none
of them." But at the same time, He ordained also the means. He
said, They shall come unto Me. And Him that cometh to Me. Who's
going to come? Those that were given. Those
that were given to Him of the Father. That He lose none of
them. They shall come to Him. And He won't cast them out. He
said, My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow
Me. He said, Other sheep I have which
are not of this fold, them I also must bring. So we know this, that salvation
is by grace, and if we're kept, it's going to be kept by the
power of God. That's it. But it is also just as true in
Scripture that we must persevere. Everyone who is saved by grace
is preserved by grace. And they will persevere. Persevere. It is the Father's will that
we persevere. We who are believers in Christ.
Just as sure as we are kept by the faith of grace, we will endure
and persevere in faith by the grace of God. The apostle in
our text, now go back to Chapter 10 here, and look at this with
me. This matter of apostasy and falling away in perdition, falling
into the hands of the living God, is to believers a constant
and reoccurring fear. Am I really saved? Who's asked
that? Daily, I come and look at this
book and at times it looks as though I'm reading a blank page. Sometimes it's a wall and I cannot
penetrate. I cannot understand what God
is telling me in His Word. And it feels as though, God,
how in the world could You call me to preach? And yet, the Word
seemed like a brick. How is that possible? Obviously,
I must not be saved. Obviously, You must not have
called me. It's just the way I fail so much. I'm so miserably wicked and sinful. Am I alone? At least Newton felt that way.
John Newton. I know I wasn't alone in that.
So if you don't ever feel that way, I just don't have your experience.
So I have not attained into that. Has any one of us ever said,
I've sinned beyond what God could forgive? Surely, this time is
done. Surely, I've slipped away this
time. But be assured of this, apostates are rarely concerned
about apostasy. Otherwise, they would never be
apostates. If they were concerned about
it, they would never be apostates. Yes, they may feel the fear of
hell. Who doesn't fear hell? You know,
you get a hundred survey of a hundred people together and you say,
okay, everyone that fears hell, raise your hand. You'll get a
hundred out of a hundred every time if they actually believe
in hell. Nobody wants to go to hell, so
you talk about hell and people get all convicted. And then what
do they do? They start looking back. They
start looking back trying to find something in their life.
Something they did. Something that they thought made
God to love them. They look back and try to find
an experience. Something that they can point
at and say, yes, here, this is my hope. Way back then I did
this and therefore I know that I'm okay. And you know what? Their conscience, it evens out
a little bit, quails it down just a bit and they go on. They
go on. My friends, these are impostors.
An impostor may hear of apostasy and start counting what doctrines
he knows. Well, let me see. I got five
fingers, so I must know all the doctrines. I can start counting
them. Codepravity, limited atonement,
irresistible grace, You know, all of the doctrines of grace,
you can just count them off and then his conscience is soothed,
you see, because he's relying on his knowledge. Yet there is no concern to endure
in faith, in prayer, in public worship, in breaking of bread,
and there is no need of the love of the saints. How many theologians do I know
that sit at home and have no need of fellowship? I'll tell you what, that person
is in danger of apostasy. He has no concern for God's people. And John says, how can you love
God whom you've not seen if you don't love the brethren you've
seen? It's impossible. If you don't love God, you're
a liar. That's what John said. John said, you're a liar. But
believers in Christ, we do think on these things. We do consider
these things and have the issues of life. We consider Christ and
His death constantly, His righteousness, His person. We long to know Him. Gil Burns, I know that you know
the Lord Jesus Christ. I am convinced of this. I am
convinced by your testimony, by your faithfulness. Now, I
don't know if you'll go off next week or not. I don't know. But
as of right now, I know His testimony, His report is that He believes
on Christ. But I know this also, you want
to know Him. Because I do. I know Him, but
I want to know Him. I don't know Him enough. I've
not had a checklist. I don't have a checklist because
it would be infinite. I want to know Him, not a list
of things about Him. If I want to tell you about my
wife, I don't want to just tell you about her earrings and her
necklace and her clothing. I wanted you to know her person. And that's the same thing about
Christ. It's not knowing a checklist, it's knowing a person. Do you
know Christ? Has He revealed Himself to you? I'm not talking about making
a decision to know Christ. Is that the desire of your soul? To be found only in His righteousness? That's mine. I don't want to
be found in any righteousness I've ever done. There is no righteousness
that I've ever done. Everything I've done is mixed
with sin. Everything. And everything you've
done is mixed with sin. The apostle says, all my flesh,
everything I do is mixed with sin. So if the apostle does everything
and his is mixed with sin, surely everything we do is mixed with
sin. I want to be found in His righteousness,
don't you? Is that your desire? Is that
your heart? Or do you want to be found in
something you did? Because I don't want to be found in anything
I did. Because everything I deserve is hell. That's what I deserve.
That's what I deserve. Scripture says my best works.
Isaiah said all our righteousnesses. Now you can put that, I like
that he uses the plural there. Righteousnesses. So that covers
every one of them. All our righteousnesses are as
menstrual cloths. Bloody, stinky, filthy rags. That's what he says. That's what
God thinks of our best stuff. But see, I don't want to be found
in the menstrual cloths. I want to be found in the perfect
righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. I want to be found in
Him, in union with Him. I want to endure, don't you?
I don't want to fall away. I don't want anything to do with
being away from my Savior. So Paul gives us some things
here. And I don't have time to go through all of them, so I'm
just going to go through one. I'll try to get to the others
later because I think they're important. Let's look at this
together. After he said it's a fearful
thing to fall into the hands of the living God, verse 32,
he said, But call to remembrance the former days, in which after
you were illuminated, ye endured A great fight of affliction. Remembrance. A call to remembrance
is helpful for endurance. Believer, it is important for
us to use our memory concerning what God has done for us by His
sovereign grace. It's important. Believer in Christ, the first
and foremost thing that God calls us to remember is our first love. Our first love. I'm not talking
about that second grade girl that you had. That's not love. That's not what
I'm talking about. I'm talking about the first true
experience of love. And that was not my wife. My first true experience of real
love was when the Savior came in love to me. He was my first love because
He loved me first. He loved me even when I was unlovable." The Scripture says in that while
we were yet sinners, Christ died for the ungodly. Is that not amazing? His love. And this is what our Lord told
that church in Ephesus in Revelation. He said, Remember your first
love. They had everything right. They
had the doctrine right. They excluded themselves from
all other false religion. And He commended them for that.
That was good. There was nothing wrong with
that. That's exactly what He wanted them to do. But they had
left off loving Him. Affection for these things. Education of something. and affection of something are
two different things. I want to know Him, and so I
must be educated. But I'll tell you this, if my
education is not filled with affection, it's worthless. It's
empty. I can know all of this book and
have not love. I am as a tinkling brass and
sounding cymbal. I'm nothing but noise. if I don't
love Him, if my affections are not on Him first. Friends, call to remembrance
the zeal that we have. Yes, I'll tell you what, when
we first believed, I thought our zeal was foolish, wasn't
it? I remember so many foolish things that I was so jealous
for Christ, I wanted to run out like I had my hair on fire. Doing all the wrong things. Running around like a chicken
with my head cut off. That's what I was doing. Running
in circles. I'll tell you what, there's nothing
like directed, affectionate zeal for Christ. Nothing. There's nothing that so encourages
our hearts as to Remembering His affection. And that makes
us affectionate to Him. You know that there was never
a time that God didn't love me? Ever? In eternity, God loved me. Now this is very important because
God never began to love me. Because if God began to love
me, then God changed, and He's not God. He said, Behold, I am
God, I change not. He tells us that His love is
eternal love. And so, He's loved me from eternity. He loved me when He sent His
Son, and I wasn't even born. He loved me when He died for
me on the cross and took my guilt. He took my guilt! I can't begin to understand that. We can understand something like
somebody taking your punishment, but we can't understand anything
about taking guilt, true guilt. Only God could do that. God did
that. He bore my guilt so that I might bear His righteousness. And then, I came out spitting
and cursing Him. I came out depraved, dead in
sins, born speaking lies. You didn't have to teach me to
do that. I did that all on my own and
hated God every step of the way. But one day, God came to me and
revealed Himself to me. This is only a miracle. Salvation
is not an act. of man, it is a true act of God. God must do it. If you've not
been saved by God, then you've not been saved. That's just simple. Remember when Christ came, and
remember when we were illuminated, what
happened? Did not the world turn upside
down? Did not the world flip on us here? What happened to our friends?
What happened to our family? What happened to those who used
to love us and care for us and those who used to be there for
us? And now then we profess faith
in Christ. And what happens? I don't want
any part of you. I don't want any part of that. People think that being a Christian,
everything begins to be rosy. That is not what God says. Again, I'm fixing to give you
my sales pitch. This is my Christian sales pitch. If you desire to
follow Christ, get ready for the worst experience you'll ever
have in your entire life. The worst physical suffering,
mental exhaustion, worst depression ever. The darkest days you'll
ever experience are being a Christian in this world. Jesus said, take up your cross. Not take up your easy chair. Take up your cross. I was reading the Fox's Book
of Martyrs this morning, and if you have not read it, you
should. A very faithful lady in the gospel,
she was tied to a post in the middle of the Coliseum, and the
beast came out, and as she was praying, they would not touch
her. They didn't come near her. She was thrown in prison, and
then a 15-year-old young man professed faith in Christ, and
he was put out there with her. And yet the whole time the beast
began to gnaw on them, and she prayed, and she encouraged him. And they both died. You want
to know what it takes to be a Christian? You gotta die. Okay. Okay. Yes! Yes! That's what I want. I remember the times when I had
endured affliction in my walk with Christ. And I remember every
single time that God delivered me. Do you remember that? In your afflictions, believers,
you and I have this same testimony, and I know it to be true of every
one of us, that in every affliction, in every trouble, in everything
that has ever happened that we consider evil or ill to us, God
has delivered us from such things. If He doesn't shut the lion's
mouth, He'll give me peace to be eaten. Either way, I'm delivered. Isn't
that what the young man said to the king? Oh, king, we're
not fearful about this thing about you and worshiping your
idol. If you throw us in there, if our God saves us from the
fire, He'll deliver us from you. But if He doesn't, He'll still
deliver us from you. So even in death, I'm delivered.
You see, my God will deliver me. So I can look back and I
can remember this for encouragement now. Now, I don't look back to
any of that for my salvation. He is not encouraging us to remember
any of that as a basis to be saved. But He is encouraging
us to remember it because it is our experience. Remember,
tribulation worketh, what? Patience. And patience worketh
experience. And experience worketh what? Hope. Hope. In the midst of my troubles,
by faith I have hope. Hope thou in God. Now, what is hope? Is it a wish? Is it some kind
of fantasy? No, my friends. Hope is a rock-solid
anchor. And it's buried into the rock
of Christ. And it won't move. My hope is
sure. And I'm encouraged to remember
Are you encouraged to remember? I am. When I feel the lowest,
I'm encouraged to look back and to see what God has done. Why
do you think God set up all those memorials? He set up all those memorials
for them to remember what great things God has done for us. I don't trust in them. I trust Him. But I'm thankful
for the things that He's given me so that I might have hope
of future promises that are laid up for me. Laid up. And there I went trying to get
into the second part. I pray that God would bless us
to your hearts, please, that God would encourage us and exhort
us to remember His greatness, His grace, His love, so that
we might endure as good soldiers serving Christ. God bless this
to your hearts.