Today's message will be taken
from the book of Hebrews chapter 2, and the title is Our Great
Salvation. Now the book of Hebrews chapter
2 begins with a warning. Someone said once that the book
of Hebrews is a book of warnings, but it's also a book of encouragement. And the warnings, there are five
warning passages throughout the book of Hebrews in all the 13
chapters. But let me say this about the warnings. The warnings
of Scripture are not legal threats of punishment. Now, what I mean
by that is this. Certainly, the warnings of Scripture,
there's a gospel message, which is a message of salvation. It's
a message of comfort. It's a message of God's free,
sovereign grace in salvation by the Lord Jesus Christ. And
certainly the gospel message, the message of grace, is a message
of salvation. But there's also a warning. The
Great Commission talks about how all who believe the gospel,
all who know Christ, shall be saved. But it also says, he that
believeth not shall be damned. But these are not legal warnings.
Now, a legal warning A warning, a legal threat of punishment,
is one that stirs up sinners to seeking a remedy, to seeking
salvation by their works, by something they do, something
other than faith in Christ. But the warnings of Scripture
are gracious warnings, and there are always warnings for sinners
to flee to Christ for all of salvation, to rest in Him. to trust Him for everything that
we need in order to be saved. Now, in verse 1 of Hebrews chapter
2, it begins with the word, therefore. What that means is that what
is about to be said here in the rest of this chapter, especially
in this warning in the first four verses, is based upon what
has been revealed up to this point in the first chapter of
the book of Hebrews concerning the greater glory of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Christ and salvation by God's
grace in him far exceeds anything that we could imagine. It far
exceeds all the types and all the pictures, all the shadows
of the Old Testament. In fact, all of those types and
pictures and shadows pointed to salvation by Christ. Pointed
to the glorious person of Christ who he is He is the Messiah He
is God very God of very God, and he is man very man of very
man 100% God 100% man He is so unique in his person the person
of Jesus Christ salvation is in a person and that's what we
preach we preach a person a We preach doctrine because doctrine
is truth that identifies and distinguishes the person of Christ,
who he is. But our preaching is a person.
We preach Christ and him crucified, Paul said. And then those shadows
and types and pictures pointed to his finished work. The work
that he would do as the mediator, as the substitute, as the representative,
the surety, the sin-offering, sin-bearer of his people, that
he would take their place under the law. He was made under the
law, under its curse. He obeyed the law perfectly.
He went to the cross of Calvary and shed his precious blood as
the complete payment for all the sins of his people, his church,
his sheep, all who believe on him. And in doing that, he satisfied
law and justice. He brought forth an everlasting
righteousness that would enable God to be both a just God and
a Savior. Now, based upon all of that,
Christ exceeds in glory everything that we could imagine. He exceeds
in glory. He has the preeminence in creation
because he created the world and he upholds all things by
the word of his power. He exceeds in glory and providence. That is God's government of this
world. This world is controlled. This
world is governed by the sovereign hand of Christ. He certainly
exceeds in salvation. For he is the author and finisher
of our faith. Salvation is of the Lord. It's not of man. It's of the
Lord. It doesn't begin with man. It doesn't continue with man,
and it doesn't end with man. It begins, continues, and ends
in Christ. We who are saved are saved by
Him. And therefore, He exceeds in
glory. He exceeds the prophets. All the prophets of the Old Testament
spoke of Him. And He exceeds in glory because
they preached the Word of God. Christ is the Word of God. He's
the living Word. He's the incarnate Word. He is
the fullness of the revelation of God, for in Him dwelleth all
the fullness of the Godhead bodily, and ye are complete in Him. He
exceeds in glory over the angels. The angels were messengers, and
they were servants of the old covenant, the law of Moses, to
Israel. They aided Moses and Israel. They were messengers. They were
ministering spirits. But even the angels worshiped
the Lord Jesus Christ. Even the angels are lesser than
him, and they are lesser than him as God and as man. And that's
one of the points that the apostle makes in Hebrews chapter 2. So
therefore, because all of this is so, because Christ is so great
in his glory, exceeding everything that he might have the preeminence,
that he is the first among all, he is all in all, and our salvation
is so great because of the greatness of who he is, the greatness of
our Savior. Therefore, now listen to what
he says in verse one of chapter two. Therefore, we ought to give
the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest
at any time we should let them slip. Now, the word we there,
that pronoun we, that plural pronoun is used three times in
this first verse. He says, therefore, we. Now,
who is, who are we? Well, he's talking about those
who are hearing the preaching of Christ. Because he says, we
ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have
heard. What have we heard? You think
about it now. Now, this doesn't apply to everybody.
Not everybody has heard the truth. Many people spend their lives
without ever hearing the gospel. Many spend their lives sitting
under the preaching of a lie. But those who have heard the
glorious gospel of God's Son, the gospel of God which was told
by the prophets, which was foreshadowed and typified in the Old Covenant,
the same gospel that Moses believed, Moses wrote of Christ, The gospel
of God's free and sovereign grace in Christ. How God saves sinners
by grace. God saves by mercy. Salvation
is not conditioned on the sinner. Salvation is conditioned on Christ,
who came and fulfilled those conditions by His obedience unto
death. You see, this salvation, this
gospel that we have heard, tells us of who Christ is, and it tells
the truth of Him, what He did, why He did it, and where He is
now. The things that we've heard, this gospel of grace, it tells
the truth about God, that God is holy and righteous and just. Yes, He is a merciful God. He
is a loving God. He is a gracious God. But He
will not be merciful and gracious and loving at the expense of
His justice and His holiness and His truth. He must be just
when He justifies. Our God is sovereign. Now, let
me tell you something. Whatever you're hearing and wherever
you're going, if they're not preaching a sovereign God, then
it's no God at all. Not the God of the Bible. You
see, we've heard of how sovereign God is. He's in control. None
can stay His hand or say unto Him, what doest thou? He declares
the end from the beginning. And a God who cannot declare
the end from the beginning is no God at all. He is the heavenly
Father of the redeemed. So it tells the truth about God.
How God justifies the ungodly. How God saves sinners. This is
that great salvation. It is of the Lord. You see, this
salvation is so great because of the source of this salvation
who is God alone. The God of election. The God
who created this world. The God who is Father, Son, and
Holy Spirit, the Trinity, three persons, but one God. We worship
one God. And these things we've heard
about ourselves. This great gospel tells the truth
about man, tells the truth about us, who we are, what are we,
that we're born in Adam, dead in trespasses and sins, born
under the wrath of God, without hope, without any hope of salvation
by our best works. We're sinners. And there's no
hope of salvation for a sinner based upon that sinner's best
works under the law. That we're spiritually dead,
totally depraved, and in need of a righteousness we cannot
produce. So we've heard things that tell
the truth about man. And then we've heard the things
that tell the truth about salvation. How God saves sinners in mercy. in grace, salvation, forgiveness
of sins based on the blood of Christ alone. The only way that
our sins can be forgiven is by His blood. Justification before
God, being declared not guilty, being declared fit for the kingdom
of heaven, being declared entitled to the whole inheritance of grace
and glory without our works, but based on the righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ, freely imputed, freely charged to our
account. Our sins were charged to Him,
and He drank damnation dry, stood in our place, and subjected Himself
to the death of the cross for the salvation of His people,
and His righteousness imputed to us. He died, was buried, and
rose again the third day for our justification. Telling the
truth about Christ, who He is and what He did and why He did
it, where He is now. Our salvation is secure and it
is such a great salvation because it's secure because of where
Christ is now. He's not in a tomb somewhere.
These people are looking for artifacts, they're looking for
shrouds, they're looking for pieces of the cross, they're
looking for Don't look for those things. They're no good. If you
did find them, what good would they do you? Christ is seated
at the right hand of the Father because He purged our sins on
the cross of Calvary. He satisfied law and justice.
The Bible says He ever lives to make intercession for all
who come to God by Him. So these are the things we've
heard. And we who have heard them, see, we who are sitting
under the preaching of the gospel, What Paul writes here, he says,
we ought to give the more earnest heed. We ought to listen well. We ought to take these things
to heart. This is serious business. This is not just philosophy.
This is nothing to be debated and argued. This is not just
pipe dream religion, pie-in-the-sky religion. This is the Word of
God. This is the gospel of the glory
of God. This is the gospel of the Lord
Jesus Christ, and it deserves our undivided diligent attention. And he says we ought to give
the more earnest heed to these things we've heard. And he says
this, lest at any time we should let them slip. Now the picture
here is this. These words paint sort of a picture.
And it's like a ship out on the sea, close to the harbor. And
there's a storm. The ship's being tossed and there's
safety in the harbor, on the dock. And rather than being diligent
to steer the ship and keep your eyes focused upon the harbor
and the dock there to go in and tie up in safety, you just slip
on by. Drift on by, the ship sinks. And that's what he's saying.
As you're sitting here listening to the gospel being preached,
don't just drift on by. Focus your attention on Christ
and Him crucified. Put your mind, or apply your
mind diligently to seeking the Lord, to looking at the harbor
and the dock, and tie up to it. Lay hold of him by faith. Don't
just let it go in one ear and out the other. You know, the
Lord spoke of a parable that he gave to his disciples, the
parable of the sower and the seed, in which he told them about
a sower who goes forth to sow. And he sows seeds. Well, the
sower is Christ and his preachers who preach his word. And the
seed is the word of grace, the word of salvation, the gospel.
And he sows the seed. Some of it falls on the wayside.
And those are wayside hearers. They don't even think about it.
They hear it with the physical ear, but they don't even consider
it. Don't think about it. They don't diligently apply their
minds and their hearts to it. to lay hold of what they've heard. And then you have some who fell
on stony ground, and they didn't take root, and the birds came
by and got them. And those were ones who received
it joyfully for a time, who claimed to believe it, but when persecution
came over the Word, they left it. You see, saving faith is
going to be tested. Then there's others that fell
upon thorny ground, fell among thorns. And the thorns rose up
and choked it. And those were the ones who heard
the word, claimed to believe it, but the cares of this world.
And the deceitfulness of riches took their minds off of the word,
and they left it. And then there's the good ground
here. The heart prepared by the Spirit of God to receive the
word of God. They thought about it. They considered
it. They laid hold of it and believed
it by the power of God. We're not going to do that on
our own, by our own free will. It is the power of God that makes
us willing. But from our viewpoint, the Scriptures
command us that when we hear these things of this great salvation,
that we diligently and earnestly heed, carefully attend in our
hearing, in our mind and understanding to the things which we have heard.
My friend, there is no greater message. than the message of
the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace in Christ. Whatever
you're hearing, make sure that it fits with what the scripture
says about who God is, who you are, and who Christ is, and how
God saves sinners. Now in verse 2, he makes a comparison. And he says in verse 2, he says,
For if the word spoken by angels was steadfast, And every transgression
and every disobedience received a just recompense of reward."
Now what is this word spoken by angels? He's talking about
the law of Moses there. You remember back up in chapter
1 when he was talking about Christ better than the angels, he referred
to the angels' special missions. Now the angels were messengers
of God. They were servants of God, and
they had a special office, they had a special role in the Old
Covenant. And that word that was spoken
by angels, whether directly or through the prophets or through
Moses, through the types and the pictures and the shadows,
if that word in the Old Covenant, in the law of Moses, if it was
steadfast, if it was firm, if it was immovable, If it really
meant something, you see, and listen to this, every transgression
and disobedience. Now, what's the difference? A
transgression is when one breaks the law of God. That is a general
term that refers to all of us as sinners. The Bible says, for
all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Now, that
refers to every man and woman born of Adam. There's none righteous,
no, not one. Now, that's Romans 3.10, and
that doesn't mean there's none religious. It doesn't mean that
there's none moral, as men judge morality. It means there are
none who are not guilty. The Bible says, for the law of
God declares all men and women guilty, subject to God's just
condemnation. So, we're all transgressors of
the law. We don't keep the law perfectly.
Some say they do, but that's self-righteousness. That's just
literally denying what the Bible says about us. They're not hearing
the gospel. But he says every transgression,
and then disobedience. Now, what's disobedience? Here,
he's talking about people who have heard the truth, but who
willingly and openly deny it. Who do not give the earnest heed
to it. Like the stony ground here and
the wayside here. Those who hear it, but they don't
believe it. So he says, now, if the word
under the law of Moses, those types, those shadows, and those
pictures, and the words spoken by the prophets, if that was
firm and steadfast, and every sin and every act of disobedience
received a just recompense of reward. You remember how the
children of Israel were punished for their disobedience. There
were times that God brought them into captivity. There was one
time when they disobeyed God by seeking to bring down God's
minister, God's mediator, Moses, and God sent fiery serpents,
poisonous snakes among them to bite the people. And you remember
Moses interceded for them, and God told him, He said, well,
make a brass serpent and put it up on a pole. and tell the
people, when they look at that serpent, the brazen serpent,
they'll live. And that's a picture of Christ.
He said that in John chapter 3. He said, as Moses lifted up
the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted
up, that whosoever believeth on him will look to him, shall
not perish, but have everlasting life. So, we see that the word
of the Law of Moses spoken was firm, and every transgression
and disobedience was met with justice and wrath. We'll look
at verse 3 then. In comparison to that, how shall
we escape? Now, there's the we again. We
who have heard the truth of the Gospel as it is in Christ. Who's greater than the Law of
Moses? Who's greater than the Old Covenant? Who's greater than
the angels? who is greater than all the types
in the pictures and the shadows of the Old Covenant. How shall
we, who have heard this great gospel, how shall we escape if
we neglect this great salvation, so great salvation? Well, there
is no way to escape if we neglect this salvation. If we do not
hear the gospel, if we refuse to believe the gospel, if we
don't give the more earnest heed, apply our minds and our understandings
and our hearts and our time to lay hold of Christ, to be found
in Him, Paul said. He said, not having mine own
righteousness, which is of the law, but having His righteousness,
the righteousness which is by faith of Jesus Christ. I don't
want to stand before God in my own wisdom. I want to stand there
in Christ, who is my wisdom. I don't want to stand before
God in my own righteousness. I want to stand before God in
Christ, who is my righteousness. I don't want to stand before
God in my own holiness. I want to stand before God in
Christ, who is my holiness. And I don't want to stand before
God in my own redemption, as if I had paid God for what I
owe Him. I want to stand before God in
Christ who is my redemption. You see what I'm saying? Don't
neglect it. You cannot escape if you don't
have Christ. You see, if you have Christ,
there is escape because He made a way of escape. And the way
of escape is salvation by God's free and sovereign grace in Him. It's the way of grace. It comes
by His blood. His perfect satisfaction to law
and justice, for the payment of all my sins. It is a way of
escape, because it justifies me before God. Christ took my
sins and He put them away. Who shall owe anything to the
charge of God's elect? It is God that justifies. Who
is He that condemneth? It is Christ that died. Yea,
rather, is risen again and seated at the right hand of the Father,
and ever liveth to make intercession for us. The only way of escape
from hell, from sin, from the curse of the law, is Christ,
His blood, and His righteousness alone. So how shall we escape
if we neglect so great salvation? Well, we can't. And I love this
term here, so great salvation. Why is this salvation so great?
Well, I've already mentioned several things. It is so great
because of the source of it, God Himself. He's the author
of it. Christ is the author and finisher
of our faith. And that's why it's so great.
It's so great because of the magnitude of it. You think about
it, this salvation is for sinners. It's not for those who qualify
themselves. It's not for them who fix themselves
up. You know, if salvation was based
upon what you did for God, that wouldn't be so great. That'd
be just what you earn from God. You see, that's what Paul wrote
in Romans chapter four. If Abraham were saved by his
works, then it would be a matter of debt, not of mercy and grace.
You see, this salvation is so great because this salvation
is for those who don't deserve it. And then this salvation is
so great because it is a full and complete salvation for all
whom God saves. It saves us completely. And he
says, How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation,
which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord? When he came
unto this earth, he preached the gospel and he said it was
confirmed unto us by them that heard him. That's the apostles
and the early evangelist. And it says in verse four, God
also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders and divers,
that's various miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost according
to his own will. When the apostles began to preach
the gospel, it was accompanied with great signs and wonders
and miracles. And these signs were not an end
of themselves. It wasn't a test of people's
faith. These signs pointed to God's Word. It pointed to Christ.
These wonders were from God and testified of His glory. These
miracles were a testimony to the power and the glory of the
Lord Jesus Christ to save us from sin, to save His people
eternally. And these gifts were the gifts
of the ministry that the Holy Spirit granted to each one severally,
as He will, in order to further the gospel, to preach the gospel
according to His own will. All of these matters of grace.
This great salvation, our great salvation, in the hands of the
Lord Jesus Christ, there is no other salvation. Peter said that.
He said there's none other name given among men whereby we must
be saved. The Lord Jesus Christ. Christ
said, I am the way, I am the truth, I am the life, no man
cometh unto the Father but by me. All the signs, all the wonders,
all the miracles, All the gifts of the Holy Spirit are not just
put on display to impress people and draw crowds. They were given to point sinners
to Christ for salvation. All the healing miracles were
given to point sinners to Christ who is the Great Physician. So
you think about these issues of this great salvation. We ought
to give the more earnest heed to these things because they
are so great. We cannot escape if we even neglect this salvation. What do you have to do to neglect
something? Nothing. Just let it go on by. It's the
easiest thing to do. But don't do that. Give attention
to these things. Lay hold of Christ for salvation.