Oh, yes, I do too, but I'll just
go ahead and put it on the tape for his benefit. Mack Hatfield
didn't hear this morning. He called me on the telephone
to tell me that he had to go down and see his grandmother,
who is 96 years old, over on the East Coast. But I trapped
him. I talked about something else
and then went back. to the conversation. And he said, no, my niece has
two tickets to the football game. I said, aha. Aha. So I don't know whether
he's visiting Granny today or whether he's at the football
game. Now, I'll tell you the truth. You better at least stop
by and see her. I said, I think, at the beginning
that the book of Hebrews was not easy. I think one of the
reasons it's not easy, it was written to Hebrew believers.
There was a church full of Jews who believed the gospel. And
here Paul, and I'll stay to that as long as I live, I guess. Some
say that Paul didn't write it, but I know better. And Paul wrote
this to these Hebrew believers, to these Jewish believers, to
just keep them straight, because these Judaizers evidently were
thicker than locusts in a bad year. But even then, we've not
escaped them. They're still around. They're
still around. But they had some influence here,
evidently. And I didn't pause at chapter
6. and verse six, because I have
a reason for that. Paul is saying, don't go back
to the old ways. That's what he's saying. Don't
go back to the old ways. If you do that, there's no repentance. If you do that, there's no hope
in that system. So don't go back there. That's
what he's saying. But there are a lot of messages in Hebrews
that are to us as well. Now, there's a great controversy,
and I hope I can do this this morning and do it rightly. I
don't know whether I can. I just want to direct your attention
again to the first part. You don't have to turn to it.
To chapter 1, where Paul writes, God who at sundry times and in
divers manners spake unto the fathers by the prophets, hath
in these last days spoken unto us by his Son. whom he hath appointed
heir of all things, and by whom also he made the world." Now
right there is enough text for six weeks, but I'm not going
to do that. Because the person and work and
word of Christ is the only message for this fallen world. Now, you
can get into all, when you're preaching, you can get into all
kind of speculation. And I hear, occasionally, when
I suffer one, I hear that speculation gotten into. And
there's so, you have bishops, you know, that speak. And I don't
listen to bishops. I turned them right off right
now. But you get weird things. If you listen to television preachers,
strange things. So I'm not recommending that
habit at all. Because the person, word, and
work of Christ is the only message that there is. And if a man tires
of that, he better make his calling and election sure. That's just
the way it is. This is a fallen world. And Walter's
message down at the baptism has stuck with me, at least his opening
lines, that the world around us has not changed that much,
but evil men have waxed worse and worse, deceiving and being
deceived. And I think that's true. Yes, sir. I think that's
true. And it goes in the political
realm, in the social realm, in the educational realm, the medical
realm. It goes everywhere. And I appreciated that statement. And the religion, the religious
societies around us, they don't take this seriously. That Christ
is the only way. They don't take it seriously,
or they wouldn't have choirs that bore me to tears. They wouldn't
have heavy metal bands in their church,
and I guess you understand what I mean by that. They don't have three guitars
and a fiddle and a kettledrum in the background. But this is
the habit of religion around us. Religion around us has, and
I'm not being mean, I'm just telling the truth, religion around
us has engaged in entertainment rather than the gospel of Christ.
And we've become, even those who were 25, 30 years ago, say
50 years ago, who were called liberal would count as conservatives
now. Now that's the truth. That's
the truth. And unless there are a few of
us that keep telling the same thing over and over again, Well,
Christ asked the question. I mentioned it, I think, to Mason
the other day. When the Son of Man cometh, will
he find faith on the earth? It's a good question to think
about. This religion that we have today is not Christ as supreme Lord over all, But
it's an inclusive message. It includes everybody. And it's
based entirely upon free will and a universal offer of salvation. And it will take a stand, but
its stand is in proclaiming that we are all striving for the same
thing and worshiping the same God, as Billy Sunday did in national
television at the bombing of the Twin Towers. Jewish rabbi
and a Muslim and Billy Sunday. We all stand for the same thing,
because we all worship the same God, and I don't believe that. I don't, and I refuse to be brainwashed
by that idea, and I hope you do too. Catholicism, and I'm
not going to enter a tirade on this this morning, I want to
point some things out. Catholicism is reputed by the
media to be the voice of the church. You hear that all the
time. The church says, and then you
see some guy with his collar on backwards, or somebody with
a stick and a cross on top of it pushing him, or somebody all
humped over and you can't even understand what he says. He should
have been retired before he was appointed. You've got this, you face this
continually, and you young people face this continually, and you
think, well, good grief. You mean everybody's wrong but
us? Yeah, and a few others. Yeah, that's true. Everybody's wrong but us, and
a few others that are around. And that's just the truth. Now
the words we see before us now, I want to direct your attention
to, and I called your attention to chapter 8. I'm going to go
back to it. Let's begin at verse 6. But now hath he, that is Christ,
has obtained a more excellent ministry by how much also he
is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better
promises. For if that first covenant had
been faultless, Then should no place have been sought for the
second For finding fault with them he He saith behold the days
come saith the Lord when I will make a new covenant with whom
the house of Israel now I Told you about that pamphlet. I was
handed here a week or so ago took it home, and I read it and
One of the first lines I read was the fact that these pre-millennialists
don't understand that Satan is bound right now. And if the devil's
bound now, I don't know it. I just don't know it. I think
he's going rampant. And we smile at that. But hey,
the devil is real. You know, we kind of make a myth.
The devil is sort of a mythology. And we're religious, but we really
don't believe in the devil, you know. That's kind of the dark
ages sort of thing. That's why I'm talking about
liberals and conservatives. Liberals don't believe in the
devil. And you've got a lot of fundamentalists out here, they
call themselves, that don't believe the devil is all that active. They got very little to say about
it. Well, be that as it may, I don't want to But I'll make
a new covenant, he said, with the house of Israel and with
the house of Judah. Now this man who had this pamphlet
denied both of those. God has cast off the Jew. That's
what they say. Now does that sound like it?
See, Walter and I both try to keep this word in the forefront.
It doesn't sound to me like God has cast off the Jew. But the Lord Jesus Christ has
effected a better ministry, a better covenant, and founded upon better
promises. Look at verse 9. Not according
to the covenant that I made with them, I'm having trouble with
this light this morning. It's all right, I'll make it.
Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers
in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of
the land of Egypt, because they continued not in my covenant,
that one that he made with them then. And I regarded them not, saith
the Lord, for this is the covenant that I will make with the house
of Israel after those days." You see, this is identifiable.
There's no use for me to stand up and preach this to Gentiles.
I'll give you a Gentile verse in just a minute. But it's identified,
it's labeled, it's painted on the side of it clearly for all
to read. A new covenant will I make with the house of Israel. I will put my laws into their mind. I'm going to put them there.
I've said in years past and maybe months past or could be weeks
past, I wish it were possible for me to take the people that
I care about that have never acknowledged Christ in any way.
I'd like to drill a hole in their head and pour redemption in on
their brains. Well, you know God's going to
do that to the Jew? That's what it says here. That's
what it says here. I will put my laws into their
mind and write them in their hearts, and I will be to them
a God." He's not now. He's turned aside from Israel.
He has again sent them into the wilderness of the nations where
they yet abide, but God's going to regather. He's going to regather. And I will be to them a God,
and they shall be to me a people. And they shall not teach every
man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the
Lord, for all shall know me. Well, that can't be. How's that
going to happen by sovereign grace? by the power of the great
high priest, by that one who is both savior and sacrifice. That one who said, come and touch
me and feel me. Put your fingers in the nail
prints in my hand and in my feet and see if I am not what? Flesh
and bone. Where was the blood? Shed. Yes, sir. Shed. I'm going to
get ahead of myself if I don't watch it. For I will be merciful
to what? Their unrighteousness. Yes. You
see, here is not you do. Here is not you will and I will. It is I will. It's, I will, I will be merciful
to their unrighteousness and their sins and their iniquities
will I remember no more, sovereignly. Amen. In that he saith a new
covenant, he hath made the first old, now that which decayeth
and waxeth old is ready to vanish away. And I'm here to tell you
it's gone. It's gone. Yes sir. It's gone. It's gone.
Yes sir. I met a preacher the other day.
He was a doctor of theology. I might have mentioned it last
Sunday. And he said he was talking to this preacher, trying to,
you know, looking for a place, maybe fortune would favor and
we'd find someplace. So he was talking to this preacher,
who was a THD, and he said, well, my background is primitive Baptist.
So he knew where Matt was coming from. And Matt said, well, all right. Talked on, talked
on. Said, why don't you come to church
Sunday? Well, Matt had been there to church. That's the same guy
that preached on the fact that people were not to take vengeance
and use David as an example. And Matt was horrified with that.
So he said, I'm going to preach on the Ten Commandments. And so Matt said, I had to go
to church then to find out what in the world he said about Ten
Commandments. Some of you know Matt. Some of you don't know
him. Some of you are acquainted with him. You don't know him.
i was talking to him union i were talking to him the other night
and he said i said well how did the preacher do on the kid ten
commandments he said oh dad that was awful that's the only comment
i got that was awful i'm saying that this man has
a more excellent ministry than they deserve the tabernacle now
what what did I've not done it for ages and ages and ages, but
maybe I ought to talk to you about the tabernacle sometime,
and all the curtains, and all the ropes, and all the hangings,
and all the gold, and all the silver, and all the blue cloth,
and all the badger skins. When you approach the tabernacle—now
I'm going to get off. When you approach the tabernacle
from the outside, what do you see? Badger skins. Things of the earth. Not attractive, particularly. And when you went in and walked
through, you had a series of places. The people couldn't enter
into some of them. Just the priests. But nevertheless,
it was God's order and it was done exactly by Moses as God
had ordered. For a purpose. That it might
be a type the ministry of Christ in heaven
itself as the great high priest all right We had time this morning I'd
go back to that and stay with it a little while, but I may
do it later But the the constant round of sacrifices and law and were done away, ready, Paul said,
to vanish when he wrote this. They were to be done away. And
yet, well, why, preacher, were they
to be done away? Because Moses and Aaron and the prophets were
weak and failing and finite and dying men. And they could no
more keep the law than you can or I can and they did not Well,
what did God do? He had the blood of the sacrifice And from that I I I get lapped
over here either backwards or forward The blood of Christ now
that some fellow wrote a book one time What did he call that? Well, I can't remember. Anyway,
he talked about the thin thread, there I said it, thin thread
of the blood of Christ that ran from the sacrifice of Abel's
lamb up to the cross of Christ. And that's true. But it went
a little farther. It went right up into God's presence. right into the presence of God. Now this one who has this more
excellent ministry and I don't think, Walter, we can say this
too often in this age. This one who has this ministry
before God right now and it's as real as the fact that I'm
standing here today or Walter stood here. He has this ministry
before God as our substitute. He's the high priest, sure, but
he's also our substitute. He's our redemption. He's our
sanctification. He's our wisdom. You see, you
can go right down the line. He's all of these things, and
they're for us. God looks for wisdom in Walter
Pendleton. He sees Christ. He looks for sanctification in
John Farron. He sees Christ. He looks for
holiness in Earl Cochran. He sees Christ. Can I make it any simpler than
that? Instead of the believer who constantly
fails, falls, and is foolish, constantly, Christ stands in
his and her place before God. That's right. Walter, you said it this morning.
There's not one sin imputed to their account. Why? Because they're
laid on Him. Well, yeah, that's true of past
sins. Well, I've got my old question for you, kids. Listen just once.
I've got my old question. How many sins had you committed
when Christ died? I can believe that he wiped out
our past sins, but what about our future? Them too. Them too. That's just the way
it is. With Christ, reality comes. Bradley LeSueur was talking this
morning about looking unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of
our faith. And he was saying, and I agreed,
that we see too much of other things when our vision should
be concentrated upon Christ. As a little kid, you were lucky
to find, you see, we weren't allowed to play with matches.
But that was strictly forbidden. There was no fire protection
at all. So your house burned, it just
burnt. So it was a great fortune if you found a piece of glass
that would magnify. Now some way or other, Roy, these
things occurred in rare occasions. You found one and you washed
it all off and you took it out even in a weak sun. And you got
it focused just right. And you got a little pinpoint
of light on a piece of paper. And you just held it there. And
the smoke would start to rise. And pretty soon the paper would
catch on fire. And that was as near a miracle as I ever came. That was just the way it happened.
But we valued those magnifying glasses and carried them in our
pockets. We might have to start a fire
sometime, don't you know? And we often did. Fortunately, not in the barn.
But you see what I'm saying? This magnifying glass concentrated
its power in one little tiny spot. And that's what we're supposed
to do. make everything. Now I don't mean you ought not
to listen to anything else but the gospel or ought not to do
anything other than so-called Christian service. I'm not saying
that. What I'm saying that in all things our vision should
be concentrated like that magnifying glass on the person of Christ.
Make everything relative to him. And the sewer was saying this
morning, how disgruntled, you heard him, didn't you? How disgruntled
some people got about mopping floors and doing dishes. And
they just come here and sit around and leave me with a mess. He said that mess is your opportunity
to serve God. Now those are not his words,
those are mine. But when you're sweeping floors, and I've said
it a hundred times or more, when you're sweeping floors, washing
dishes, bathing children, that's where you are because God put
you there. And that is service, not just
to your house and to yourself, but it's service to God. Now, let me see if I can get
somewhere near finished here. You look at Acts 13. Well, let me say this first.
The morning and the evening sacrifice. You can find it back in Exodus
and Leviticus. The Passover lamb, the red heifers,
these offerings that were made. were all made by dying, changing
Levitical priests. And all of this was just a shadow
of Christ's priestly work. What was the high priest doing
in the Holy of Holies? Placing the blood for propitiation. I said that last Sunday, I know.
Placing the blood for propitiation. to reconcile us to God. To reconcile us. It's like a king, only it's the
king of the universe. He's got people out here, large
masses that rebel against him. And that this king is able to reconcile those people to
himself. He doesn't have to be reconciled
to the people, you see. And speaking of God the Father,
God so loved the world. And Paul spoke these words in
Acts 13, verse 6. Speaking of Christ, but now hath he obtained
a more excellent ministry by how much also he is the mediator
of a better covenant, am I in Acts? I don't know, which was
established upon better promises. For if the first covenant had
been faultless, I'm rereading what I had, what I quoted before.
If the first covenant had been faultless, then no place would
have been sought for the second. He is the mediator of that better
covenant now this same covenant We read about now you go over
to Hebrews 13 and verse 20 And you read these words I Think I'm right on this 13
and Verse 20. Paul says this. He's leaving them now. He's closing
his letter. He said, Now the God of peace,
I like that title. The God of peace
that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd
of the sheep. Now he is the good shepherd,
According to John 10 to Peter he is the chief shepherd and
to Paul here in Hebrews He is the great shepherd that great
shepherd of the sheep And you see what he did he brought
again from the dead our Lord Jesus Christ that great shepherd
of the sheep through the blood of the everlasting covenant Because Christ, bearing our sins,
became in the sight of God, and Walter, I'm almost afraid to
say this, became in the sight of God, contaminated by our disease. And he died as a malefactor before
God and men. Do you realize that? that when
Christ hung on the cross and God turned away from Him and
He cried out in that awful darkness which covered the earth at that
time and which certainly covered His soul as He suffered for the
sins of His people, He hung in agony and shed His blood. Now He didn't spill it. Nobody
spilled His blood. He shed it voluntarily, willingly. And this passage tells me that
even he, along with us, the people of God, was cleansed and resurrected
by that blood. Look at it. Do you see it there? It's an
amazing thing, and I didn't notice that until this past week. Now the God of peace that brought
from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep,
how did he bring him? From the dead. He died for us. He was dead as any other man
would be dead. Do you agree with that? You think
that's true? Alright. He was brought from
the dead then through the blood of the everlasting covenant.
Whose blood was that? Christ's blood. something had to cleanse from
sin. Now, you get the idea in evangelical preaching, Walter,
that the Holy Spirit comes along, and in a sense this is true,
to this one, and that one, and the next one, and selects them
to receive life, and they're cleansed. Well, as I say, in a way that's
true, but every one of God's elect were chosen in Him, as
Walter pointed out, for the foundation of the world, therefore their
sins were gone even then, insofar as God was concerned. All of
them. All of them. That's why we need, we see a
lot around us. I'm just going to quit because
I want to talk to you a minute. And I had this before I listened
to Bradley this morning. But we live in a world of sights
and sounds that we've never had before. My mind is not capable of receiving
what's out there and what I have. I couldn't tell you how a television
works if somebody was going to kill me on the spot this moment.
how a picture travels through the air and enters some pipes
on top of my house or a dish on my porch roof, and I can see
around the world. Now, you want to try to tell
me how that's done? I don't know. But you know what? I've grown accustomed to it,
and I accept it just like a glass of water. I don't know. So what? But you get to thinking about
what's taken place here in the last 50 years. When I was a boy, and Eunie was
a young girl, back when we were first married, the trains that passed about
a half a mile from the house were burning coal. And a man
stood with a number four screw and was swinging coal into that
engine all the time. keeping that pressure up, keeping
the steam up. And the engineer was handling
the valves and the throttle and the whistle. They're gone. They've either been restored
at huge costs or they're rust buckets sitting back of a junkyard
somewhere. You kids will never see a steam
engine unless you see it at a fair or like up at Thank you, Walter. Up there. I've never been there except
to pass by it. But you'll never see one. And yet we were raised
with it. And the very fact that I can
go out there and hook up two wires and turn on a knob and
talk anywhere in the world with another person talking to me
and I to him. No wires connecting us at all.
I've got a wire hung up, he's got a wire hung up. So, there
we are. But here's something far more
fabulous than that. I can go into that computer,
Paul, and I can type in a letter and send it to Timbuktu, if I've
got an address that's there, and in the speed of light, it'll
be received. Not a wire connecting us in any
sense. Now you tell me how. Well, it's
by computer language. Oh, zero and ones? What do you
make of that? That's computer language, how
you like to read it. Zeros and ones. So what I'm saying is that we're
surrounded by all of these things, and our attention is focused
away from Christ into these things. Now, as I said, I've got a computer,
I've got a radio, I've got a television. I'm not going to chop them up.
But what I'm saying is that in all things, Christ is to be the
center. Young people, in your dating,
Christ is to be the center. And you're to value spirituality
and chastity and purity. And you're to keep it that way. You're not to be diverted by
modern philosophy or modern things, modern pictures, modern ideas. Don't be influenced by this.
Some of them are fine. I'm glad that they don't have
a pull of tooth without anesthetic now. I'm glad of that. And I'm glad that Unabell can
go to Virginia and see a doctor after we've been through, what,
one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, I guess. I might
not be right. The last one, I think, made seven.
Because she was losing sight. So this one doctor at Charlottesville, he was the first. So Dr. Hatfield here in Beckley
sent her back to Dr. Prom and said, I can't do anything
for you. Been with what, two years? Three? I don't remember. They won't nod or shake, and
they know too. But the thing is, we got this
Dr. Prom called Dr. Cotter. at Roanoke and sent her down
there. Now, listen to this. This is pressure in her eye. I can go that far and say that.
He took a laser gun and put a hole in the back of her eyeball and
installed a filter and a tube. And lo and behold, it's getting
better. And he was nonchalant. He said, oh, we can fix that. See, our attention, do you know
who did that? God did it. You can't tell me
any other. If you go through anything, don't
let your attention get focused anywhere but in the person of
Christ and the purpose and will of God. Now one day we're all
going to lay down and die within the will and the purpose of God.
Now that's just true. And there's no need to go on
with tragedies and all of that. Everything happens by God's hand.
And it is for our benefit and for our profit. And that great
high priest, who today, at this moment, is seated at the right
hand of God, and he's dealing with God about his purpose and
our needs. He's making intercession, the
scripture says, for us. I think that's an amazing thing. The God that brought our Lord
Jesus Christ from the dead, through the blood of the everlasting
covenant, is with us and for us. And God will never be surprised
at anything that you do. People think, oh, I've lost all
my chances because of this. No, no, no, no. God has provided. If you believe Christ, God has
provided, even now, for anything that might happen in your life.
Now there may be some chastisement that's pretty severe. There may
be some darkness. There may be some rough trails. But God has provided. And I don't
know anybody if they lived any kind of a life at all in our
station in life that haven't had some rough trails and rough
roads. Everyone. But this is God's will
and God's purpose for us today. How do I know the great high
priest is still seated? Yes, sir. And you know what he said when
he was on earth? He said, all power is given unto me in heaven
and in earth. Is your attention focused on
Christ? In the simplest, unimportant things. Even in things that are enjoyable,
happy times, is your attention focused on Christ? How important that is. People
say, well I don't know, what's the matter with me? Is your attention
focused on Christ? Most of our attention is, I shouldn't
say ours, I guess, maybe that's not true. Most of attention of
most people are centered on themselves. Either what a hard time I've
had or what a good life I've made for myself, one of the two. When God did it all, through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Father in heaven, we're grateful today for your blessing. for
this hour, for this day, we pray that you'd go with us to our
homes and grant us some concept of what we have here. The worthiness
of this place, not a building itself, but being a place