Go with me, if you would, to
John chapter 12. John chapter 12. Now, our text
is going to be Hebrews 4, those last five verses. And it's going to be pretty easy,
I believe, to see why I titled this what I did. I titled this
message, The Bad News and the Good News. You know how people say, I have
good news and I have bad news. Which one do you want first?
I always pick the bad news first. I want to end on some kind of
an up beat. Don't you hate ending on a bad
note? Give me the bad news first and
then give me something to turn that corner, turn up. God's Holy Spirit has written
His precious Word that exact way, and I love it. I love it. In those five verses
in our text, the first two are bad news. It's just clearly bad
news. And then the second two are good
news, and then that last one is an exhortation to all of God's
people. Let me give you the bad news.
And this is bad news. This is bad, bad news. John 12 verse 48 says, this is our Lord speaking. He
said, He that rejecteth me and receiveth not my words, Hath
one that judgeth him the word itself, the word that I have
spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day." The man
or the woman who rejects this word is going to be judged by
this word. This Word will judge every man
or woman who rejects Christ and His Word. Now that's what the
first two verses of our text are saying. That's exactly what
those two verses are saying. So turn with me now to the text,
Hebrews 4. Hebrews 4 verse 12 says, For the word of God is quick. The word of God is quick. That word means, when you look
it up, that word means alive. That's what it means, alive. This word is living. This word is living. Somebody
will hear that and say he meant that figuratively. God does not
speak figuratively. He doesn't speak figure. Yes,
he does speak through parables, but he never says what he does
not mean. There was a time I remember when
I was young and hearing people talk about the scripture and
talk about people reading the Bible and not understanding what
it meant. I used to have it in my mind that the Bible said one
thing but meant something else. That's not how it is. That's
not how it is. You know, they're reading it
and it says one thing and they're believing the wrong thing. Our
Lord says exactly what He means to say. Always. And he said, this word right
here is alive. This is alive. I was thinking
about that in the study. Dwelling on the fact that this
word is alive. And I was thinking about people mocking that. You
tell somebody, this is a book. I got some leather on the outside.
These are pages and it has ink on the inside. And you tell somebody,
this word is alive. Can't you see people naturally
mocking that? Saying, well, okay, so you're saying you have to
feed it? No. This Word feeds me. This Word feeds me. This Word spanks me. This Word corrects me. This Word rebukes me. This Word exhorts me. This Word hugs me. You know what I'm talking about.
This Word embraces me. This Word speaks peace to my
heart. This Word is alive. It's alive. This Word is quick. Now to those
who don't bow to it, To those who reject it, the bad news is,
it's alive. It's alive. Verse 12 says, for
the word of God is quick and powerful. That word means strong,
full of energy, and effective. That's what it means. It is going
to accomplish what God sends it to do. Whatever God sends
this word out to do, it is going to accomplish it for every soul
that has rebelled against God, sinned against God, rejected
God, which includes every man and woman on earth, which includes
us. You and me. Here is the bad news
for every soul on earth. Verse 12 says, For the Word of
God is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword,
piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit. This Word is able to separate
the soul from the spirit. This Word kills. And it goes deeper than that.
It goes on to say in verse 12, and of the joints. You see that? It pierces even through the dividing
asunder of soul and spirit and of the joints. You've cut up
a whole chicken, I'm sure. You get a sharp edged sword and
you go looking for the joints. Isn't that right? And you start
separating the joints out. This word separates the joints
of the bones, but it goes deeper than that. It goes even deeper
than that to say in verse 12, it says, and of the joints, it
goes deeper to say, and marrow. Where is the marrow? It's in
the bones. Not only does it separate the
bones, it cuts to the core. I mean it cuts to the core. But it goes deeper than that.
Verse 12 goes on to say, it is a discerner of the thoughts and
intents of the heart. It cuts all the way to the secret
sins and motives of the heart. Verse 13 says, neither is there
any creature Any creature includes you and me. Neither is there
any creature that is not manifest in his sight, but all things
are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have
to do." What bad news. What bad news. I would say one
of the greatest fears for men and women with any amount of
morals. Some people have no morals. But
for men and women that have any amount of morals, I would say
one of the greatest fears would be to be stripped naked in front
of everybody for all eyes to see. Well, that's how a sinner is
going to stand before God. That's how a sinner is going
to stand before God completely exposed, completely exposed,
whatever. covering a sinner thinks he has
is going to be stripped away. It's going to be stripped away
and the Word of God is going to go to work. It's going to
pierce, it's going to slice, it's going to separate, it's
going to cut every soul that stands there, every single one.
Verse 14 says, seeing then that we have a great high priest. Now wait a minute, what did you
say? seeing then that we have a great
high priest." What was the job of the high priest? You know
what the job of the high priest was? He went in to meet God instead
of the people. That was his job. He went in and he stood before
God because the people couldn't. God said, you tell them all,
if they come in here I'll kill every one of them. I'll pierce
them, I'll cut them, I'll divide them. He went in instead of the people. Now how did he do that? How did
that high priest do that? He took a sharp edged sword and
he pierced a sacrifice. He divided the soul and the spirit
of that sacrifice. He killed it. If you go back,
we're not going to, but if you go back to where God told Moses
how he wanted this done, he said this is exactly what the high
priest is supposed to do. The high priest was supposed
to divide that sacrifice into parts. He was supposed to cut
it up and lay out the parts of the meat. Separate all the joints. And that priest had to go all
the way into the heart of that sacrifice and take the marrow
of that life, the blood. He had to go all the way in,
cut all the way in and get the blood, the core of that sacrifice's
life. And when the high priest went
in and stood before God, and when God saw that the sword had
already pierced, And the joints had already been separated, and
the cut had already gone to the core, the marrow of life, the
blood. When God saw that, the people
lived. He said, You come in and don't
come in without blood. When God saw that, the people
lived. Verse 14 says, Seeing then that we have a great high
priest, that is passed into the heavens. Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession.
You know what that means? The bad news is over. Bad news
is over. It's all good news from here
on out. And for us, I thought about the
fact that every time we come, this is our third message today.
You know how we started the Bible study? Bad news. You know how we start our messages? Bad news. Lord willing, we're
going to come back Wednesday night. I would guess, I haven't
studied anything yet, but my guess is we're going to start
with some bad news. But the fact of the matter is, is in Christ,
for every soul that's in Christ, there is no more bad news. There
is no more bad news. From here on out, it's only good
news. Verse 14 says, seeing then that
we have a great high priest that is passed into the heavens. He didn't just enter into a tent
out in the wilderness. He passed all the way in to heaven
itself. Who did this? Who is the great
high priest? Jesus, the son of God. Jesus
the Christ, Jesus the Messiah, Jesus Christ the only mediator
between God and man. I love how John wrote. He said,
My little children, these things write I unto you that you sin
not. You know that's our exhortation. Don't sin. Don't do it. He said, I'm writing all this
to you that you sin not. Well, we're just sinners. We're
just going to sin, so I might as well just He said, don't do
it. He said, and if any man sin,
we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. Verse 14 says, seeing then that
we have a great high priest that is passed into the heavens, Jesus,
the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. What is our profession? What are we confessing to be
all our hope? Absolutely all our hope. Verse
15, For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with
the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted
like as we are, yet without sin. Not only did our high priest
make a sacrifice for us, that was the job of the high priest,
he sacrificed a lamb, and he's the one who brought it before
God. Not only did our high priest
make a sacrifice for us, he made himself to be the sacrifice. He touched himself with all our
infirmities. He tempted himself with everything
that we are. And when he did that, God's holy
word pierced him. When he went and stood before
God with all of those infirmities on him. All of that temptation
on him, God's holy word went to work, pierced him, separated
his soul from his spirit. He died. He was separated from
God and he hung there stripped naked before God. Isn't that
how he hung there? In studying this, I thought about
this for the first time. This is the first time I've ever,
this has ever entered my heart. He had to hang there stripped
naked before God because that's how I had to stand before God. And he was standing, he was hanging
there as my substitute. He had to be completely, completely
exposed. Because that's what I am. And
God was judging me. He hung there naked before God
with the infirmities and the temptations of His people all
over Him and in Him. God's Holy Word pierced and sliced
and cut and divided all the way to His joints. Go over to Psalm
22 and let me show you that. Psalm 22, this is our Lord speaking. This is where he said in verse
1, ìMy God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou
so far from helping me and from the words of my roaring?î Now
verse 11 says, this is Christ speaking, ìBe not far from me,
for trouble is near, for there is none to help.î Thereís nobody
to help me. Here I hang with all of these
sins, all of these infirmities. All of these lies. Over in Lamentations
3, he said, my teeth are all broken with gravel stones. All
these lies in my mouth. Verse 14, he said, I am poured
out like water and all my bones are out of joint. Every single
one of them. Separated, divided. He said,
my heart, my core, My marrow is like wax. It is melted in
the midst of my bowels. Turn over to Psalm 40. Again, this is the Lord Jesus
Christ speaking. Psalm 40 verse 12 says, For innumerable evils have compassed
me about. Now watch this. He said, Mine
iniquities. Mine iniquities. He said, My
sin. Now was Christ a sinner? Absolutely
not. Absolutely not. But He made our
sins His own. He stood before God Almighty
and said, My sins. That's amazing. My iniquities
have taken hold on me. We did all the sinning. He did
all the suffering. All the suffering. Through His
suffering. When God saw the suffering of
our great high priest and sacrificed, the people lived. He went in,
made intercession for their behalf, and the people lived. And I love
this, Psalm 40, he said, I waited, verse 1, I waited patiently for
the Lord, and He inclined unto me and heard my cry. He brought
me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and
set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. He hath
put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God. Many, all
those people that he was making intercession for, many shall
see it, and fear, and shall trust in the Lord. Now that's the bad
news and the good news. That's the bad news and the good
news. I want to close this with the exhortation for every single
child of God, every soul that this great high priest made intercession
for. Go back to the text, Hebrews
4. This exhortation right here is a message in and of itself.
I love this. This right here is a message
by itself. This is about to tell us who,
what, How, where, why, and when. All right? Who, what, how, where,
why, and when. Verse 16, back in Hebrews 4,
says, let us. Let us. Christ did not make himself
to be the great high priest and the sacrifice for every soul
on this earth. He didn't do it. He made himself
to be the great high priest and sacrifice for every soul God
gave to him. Every soul that God took the
sin off of that sinner and laid it on Him, pressed it into Him.
That's who He did it for. Look at verse 9 in Hebrews 4.
It says, There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God. That's who He did it for. The
people that God chose to save. Who are the people of God? It's
whoever obeys the exhortation. This last verse is the exhortation
of God's people and whoever heeds the exhortation is the child
of God. So verse 16 says, let us. Who us? They may not. They may not, but if God has
put a desire in us, let us what? Let us therefore come. Let us come. That has to be one
of the sweetest words we could ever hear our Savior say. Can you envision? Can you hear the voice of our
Savior? Come. I think about kings sometimes,
when you went before them, you had to stand off and see if they'd
hold out the scepter to accept you. They're either going to
kill you or accept you. You walk into his presence and
he says, come. Let us therefore come. How? How should we come? Verse 16 says, boldly. Every time I read this, I have
to say that does not mean arrogantly. That does not mean arrogantly. God forbid that we would ever
become arrogant or haughty over a salvation that we didn't accomplish. God forbid. An atonement that
we did not make. Moses has to be the boldest man
I know of in the scripture. He has to be. But Numbers 12 verse 3 says,
Moses was the meekest man on earth. He was the meekest man
on earth. We come in humility. We come in meekness. But we come
in the confidence and that's what that boldness is. It's the
confidence of His promise that He will not pierce and divide
and cut to the core. It's Christ that died. That's
how we come. We come knowing it's Christ that
died. So let us therefore come boldly. Next question is where? Verse
16 says, to the throne of grace, to the throne of God's favor,
to the throne of God's free gift. Why? Verse 16 says that we may
obtain mercy and find grace to help. If we'll go there, We'll
find all the mercy we need and all the grace we need to help.
We'll have all the help we need. When? Last question, when? Verse 16 says, in time of need. Well, that's all the time, isn't it? I need help right now. Then
go to him. Go to Him. Walk straight up to
the throne of God's grace. The one who is sitting on the
throne is the Lamb slain. The one who redeemed us. The
one who made intercession. The great high priest in sacrifice
is sitting there. Anytime we need mercy and grace,
we can confidently, freely walk right up to Him. I can't get
that straight in my mind. Somehow there's going to be a
number no man can number in glory. I believe that. But somehow every single time
I need to walk right up to that throne, I can walk straight up
to that throne. Every time I need to sit at his feet and just listen
to his voice, I can sit right down at his feet and just listen
to his voice. Every single time. Our great high priest, we can
go to him pleading our profession, his own blood, his own blood. Thank you for your blood. And
he'll receive us and he'll help us in our time of need. I just,
I don't know of anything more precious. I don't know of anything
more precious. The bad news is bad news. The good news, the word good,
there's got to be a better word than good because it's good news. Let's come. Let's go to him.
Let's all stand together. I want to close with a song.