In that passage that Brother
Randy read, Hebrews chapter 3, I want us to focus our attention
this morning upon the first six verses of this concerning this
subject, the house that Christ built. The house that Christ
built. I've been thinking about this
subject for a while concerning the church. Now that's, when
we talk about the house of God, or Christ's house, his household,
his family, what we're talking about is the true church of the
living God. It's what we read there in Paul's
address to Timothy, that the church of the living God, why
does he say the church of the living God? Because there are
dead gods. There are churches that preach
and center around and are founded upon idols, false churches. In the Bible, those are called
the tares of Satan. Now, I'm not going to go back
into that right now. I preached through the Sermon
on the Mount and I showed there, you know, a lot of times when
people think of wheat and tares, They think about believers as
being wheat and unbelievers being a tare. And in a sense that's
true. But when the Lord was teaching
those kingdom parables, he started off with the parable of the sower
and the seed where he showed that there will be people who
hear the gospel but don't believe it. That's the thorny ground,
the wayside, the stony ground hearer. And then he says that,
but God's people, the good ground here is they'll hear it and they'll
believe it. So there will be unbelievers in the world, we
know that. But as the gospel was going out in those early
days, God was raising up churches, plural. And he established them
upon the gospel, the true gospel concerning his glorious person
and his finished work, But then also, Satan was out in the world
busy sowing his tares, which are false churches made up of
false people. And somebody says, well, how
do you know the difference? It's often said, like on today,
somebody says, are you going to church? Or where are you going
to church? And technically speaking, church
is not something that you go to. The church has come together. And that's believers, the body
of believers, all over the world. And we come together in local
congregation, local bodies to worship. Well, how do I know
if this church, for example, Eager Avenue Grace Church, is
this a church that Christ has built? Or is it a church that,
is it one of the tares of Satan? And that's what this is all about. I wanna know. I don't know about
you, I don't wanna be deceived. And how do I tell that? Well,
these verses in Hebrews chapter three beginning here speak of
Christ as the builder of the church, called his house. And
the way that we know that we are members of his church, his
household, his family, that we worship the true and living God
and not an idol. Listen to what he says here,
look at verse one, he says, wherefore, now he'd been talking about the
greater glory and superiority of Christ over all things that
we could imagine, over angels, over Moses, over all. And he says, for this reason,
wherefore, holy brethren, I'll come back to this verse in a
minute, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the apostle
and high priest of our profession, Christ Jesus. Now if you wanna
know that if you're a member of or you're attending a true
church, it's got to begin right here. Consider the apostle and
high priest of our profession, Christ Jesus. Now that's where
it begins. Who is Jesus Christ? And what
did he accomplish for his people in their salvation? That's what
you gotta focus on. And that's what I'm gonna do.
I'm gonna bring us to two things we need to focus on. Number one,
Christ himself, the builder of the church. And then secondly,
the nature of his church. What is his church? What's it
all about? What does the word church mean? Well, you know the
word church means, literally, called out ones. Those who have
been called out. Well, what have we been called
out of? Well, we've been called out of the world and into the
kingdom of God's dear son. We've been called out of darkness
and into his marvelous light. We've been called out of false
religion, no matter what we called it or how good it may have appeared. We've been called out of that
into the truth. All of that. And we could go
on and on. But Christ, the builder of the church. It says in verse
two, look at it, who was faithful to him that appointed him. Now
who was it that appointed Christ to be the builder of the church?
It was the father. This is covenant language. Before
the foundation of the world, God the father chose his son
to be the redeemer, the surety, the substitute, the redeemer
of his people. That's what the Bible teaches.
He chose a people, gave them to Christ, put all the responsibility
of their whole salvation upon him. That's what the Bible means
in Isaiah chapter nine. For example, it says the government
shall be upon his shoulders. That's the government of the
kingdom of God. Is upon the shoulders of Christ.
It's not upon the preacher's shoulder. It's not upon your
shoulder. It's not upon the church's shoulder.
It's upon Christ, conditioned on Christ. and the father appointed
him, and Christ, he was faithful to do what he was appointed to
do. Well, what was he appointed to
do? Well, he compares it to Moses. Look at it, verse two. He says,
as also Moses was faithful in all his house. Moses was appointed
of God, to go down into Egypt and bring the Hebrew children
out of Egypt, out of the bondage of Egypt, and lead them to the
promised land. And Moses was faithful to do
that. Now we know that Moses, he's
not to be compared with Christ. In this sense, Moses was a sinner
saved by grace. That's what he was. And his faithfulness
was a gift from God. Just like our faithfulness to
believe in and to stay with Christ, that's a gift from God. We persevere
because he preserves us. But he's comparing it because
Moses was faithful to do what God gave him to do in all his
house, his family, which were the Hebrew children. Verse three.
For this man, now man is in italics there, he's talking about Christ
here. This person was counted worthy of more glory than Moses. Moses, again, was a sinner saved
by grace. There are some comparisons here,
but Moses in his person, in his glory, he doesn't even compare
with Christ. Like I said, you know, we don't
worship Moses. We don't follow, we follow Christ.
We worship Christ. And it said, inasmuch as he who
hath built the house hath more honor than the house. Now the
builder of the house gets the glory. And he says in verse four,
for every house is built by some person, that's what it means
here, but he that built all things is of God. It's all of God. Even
what Moses did, it's of God. The Hebrew children would have
never been brought out of Egypt had it not been for the power
of the glory of God. Is that right? In other words,
if it had depended on Moses, it would have failed. They would
have never been brought in. You know about the 10 plagues
of Egypt. You know about all them crossing
the Red Sea. You remember when Moses and Exodus
14, they were murmuring, they were standing on the shore of
the Red Sea and Pharaoh was behind, they begin to murmur in unbelief.
What did Moses say? He stood forth and raised his
hands. He said, look what I can do for
you. Is that what he said? No. He said, stand still, which
means literally shut up and sit down and see the salvation of
the Lord. See what God is going to do according
to his promise. God said he's gonna deliver you
out of here and put you into the promised land. Now stand
still, shut up, quit complaining, don't disbelieve, and see the
salvation of the Lord. Incidentally, the word salvation,
that's Exodus 14, what, 13? Or 12 or 13, that's the second
time the word salvation is used. The word in the Hebrew is Yeshua,
which translates to Joshua, which comes down to Jesus. And that's
what it all means. And that's what it's all about.
Everything we are, everything we have, everything we have possessed,
everything that we continue to do according to the glory of
God, everything that we will be, it's all the salvation of
the Lord. It's not us. And so think about
that. And he says, he says, all things
are of God. Verse five, he says, and Moses
was faithful in all his house as a servant for a testimony
of those things which were to be spoken after Verse six, but
Christ as a son over his own house, son of God, whose house
are we, the church now, the household, the family, if we hold fast the
confidence and the rejoicing of the hope from unto the end.
Now the if there is not a conditional if. In other words, he's not
saying that you're a member of his household if you meet this
condition. The if there is an evidence,
evidential. In other words, if you're a member
of his household, this evidence will be set forth. You will hold
fast. The confidence in the rejoinder.
Now how do you know the difference between a conditional if and
an evidential if? It's the covenant, folks. The
gospel. If you were Israel under the
old covenant law, the if there would be conditional. That's
the law of covenant. But we're not under the law covenant.
In Christ we're under what covenant? The covenant of grace. What is
grace? It's unconditional salvation. Salvation conditioned on Christ
who fulfilled it. And that's what makes it sure
and certain, and that's our confidence, and that's our hope. But I'll
get to that in just a moment. But let's look at, first of all,
Christ, the builder of the church, and go back to Matthew chapter
16 with me. And I wanna show you something
in this passage. You're familiar with this passage, Matthew 16.
This is where Christ gathered his disciples, and he asked them
the question in verse 13, whom do men say that I, the Son of
Man, am? Now that tips you off to what
the issue really is here, isn't it? Who is Jesus Christ? That's
what it's all about. And that involves not only who
he is in his person, but what he did, what he accomplished
in his work. Because we're talking about his
messiahship here. And he says, who do men say that
I am? And verse 14, look at it, it
says, and they said, some say thou art John the Baptist, some
Elias, others Jeremias, or one of the prophets. Verse 15, now
here he points the question to us. But whom say ye that I am? Who do you say that I am? And
Simon Peter answered and said, thou art the Christ, the Messiah,
the Son of the living God, your God, man. That's what he means. That's what the Son of God is
in the Old Testament. Who he is, it's who he is in
the New Testament. Somebody said, well, aren't we all sons of God?
Yes, but not, well, believers are, but not like him. He is
son of God by nature. He's the second person of the
triune Godhead. He's alpha and omega. I'm a sinner saved by grace,
but I'm not alpha and omega. I'm not the beginning and the
end. I'm not I am, he is. He is the I Am. And what did
He do? Well, He's the Christ. He's the
Messiah. What does the Old Testament say
about the Messiah? That He will save His people
from their sins. It doesn't say He's going to
come and try to save you if you'll let Him. That's not what the
Messiah is about in the Old Testament. His name shall be called Jesus,
S-U-I, for he shall save his people from their sins. Well,
can he do it? His name shall be called Emmanuel, God with
us. Yes, he's able. So whom do you
say that I am? And then listen to this, verse
17. Jesus answered and said to him,
blessed art thou Simon Bar-Jonah. Now I know Matthew before this
calls him Peter, but you know this is the, right here in history,
the first time that he was given the name Peter. Up until that
time he was Simon, Simon son of Jonas. So he says, blessed
art thou Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood hath not revealed
it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. This is a gospel
revelation. of who Christ is and what he
accomplished, verse 18, and I also say unto thee that thou art Peter.
That's when he named him Peter. Now the word Peter, petros, means
a stone, a little stone. And then he says, and upon this
rock, that's another, that's a different word. It means something
like a huge slab, a boulder. It's a different word. Peter's
the little rock. You know what you are if you're
a member of Christ Church? You're a little rock. I'll show
you that in just a moment. You're a little stone. That's
what I am, I'm a little stone. And he says, upon this rock,
upon this big rock, this rock of Gibraltar, that's what he's
talking about. It's the same, it's the same, you remember over
Matthew 7 in the Sermon on the Mount when he said, the man who
builds his house on a rock, same word. Upon this rock, he says. In Romans 9 33 when he was talking
about the Jews who rejected Christ Because he was a rock of offense
to them same word remember when he talked about and Paul talked
about the rock that followed the Children of Israel through
the wilderness Moses struck the rock and water come through and
that rock was Christ same word So this is this is not Peter. The church is not built upon
the little stones It's not even built upon all the little stones.
If it were, it would be a failure. It would go down. It would crumble. Isn't that right? The church
is built upon this rock. I will build my church. The rock
Christ Jesus. The solid rock. The rock that
cannot fail. What a foundation. That's the
church. And the gates of hell shall not
prevail against it. Who's that talking about, Peter?
No. They say, well, Peter was the first pope. He was not, but
even if he were, big deal. The church was not. Now the church
was built upon the foundation of the apostles and the prophets,
Jesus Christ being the chief cornerstone. What he's simply
saying there, the church is built upon what the apostles and the,
he who the apostles and the prophets preached. We point to Christ. And the gates of hell will not
prevail against it. In verse 19 he said, I'll give
unto you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever thou
shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever
thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Now that's
not Peter waiting at the pearly gates to talk to you, to open
the keys if he finds that you're worthy, no. The keys to the kingdom
of heaven, what do you think they are? It's the gospel. I've got the keys to the kingdom
of heaven. And what do I do? I point you
to Christ in preaching the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace,
the way of salvation, how God justifies the ungodly. Through
whom? Based upon the blood of Christ,
based upon his righteousness. And whenever I preach the gospel,
whoever is brought by God to believe it, that's bound in heaven. and whoever refuses it. You see,
it's all wrapped up in the preaching of Christ and him crucified.
The church is built upon Christ. Now, how did Christ build his
church? Well, look back at Hebrews. Look
back at a passage we looked at a few weeks ago, Hebrews 2.17. Hebrews 2.17. He built his church,
number one, by establishing the foundation of it. how did he
do that? Well look at verse 17 and you
remember here when he's identifying who the everyman is and he uses
the word church, you remember that? In verse 12 he talks about
the church, his brethren, he calls them the seed of Abraham,
the children of God, And it says in verse 17, listen to this,
wherefore in all things it behooved him. That's the Greek word for
debt. He was indebted. Remember, he
was made our surety before the foundation of the world. He owed
a debt. What was that debt? The debt
of our sins. The debt of all the sins of God's
people imputed to him. And how did he have to do to
pay that debt? Well, it behooved him to be made like unto his
brethren. That's his humanity without sin. That he might be a merciful and
faithful high priest in things pertaining to God. What does
the high priest do? He presents the sacrifice. Christ
is our high priest. Christ is our sacrifice. He's
the lamb slain, worthy as the lamb. The church is redeemed,
Acts 20 and 28, the church which he redeemed with his precious
blood, he paid the debt, he settled the matter, he brought forth
a righteousness whereby God could be just to justify sinners like
us. And it says, in things pertaining
to God, that is to the glory, to make reconciliation, propitiation
for the sins of the people, a justice satisfying sacrifice. That's
what he did. He redeemed his church. He purchased
his church. He built his house with the mortar
of his own blood. He's our rock. You see, we stand
upon who he is and what he accomplished. Now, if I stand before you today
and I preach something different than who he really is and something
different than what he really accomplished, what's happening?
I'm preaching a false gospel. You say, well, you're too meticulous. I don't think I'm meticulous
enough. I believe according to the word of God. But this is
how Christ established his church. He redeemed his church with his
own blood. Who are the church? They are
the chosen ones. It's what the Bible teaches.
They are the redeemed ones. They are the justified. Who are
the justified? That means they're forgiven of
all our sins. How? Upon a just ground by the
blood of Christ. That means we're righteous in
the sight of God. We have a right standing with
God in Christ. His righteousness accounted,
charged, imputed to us. We stand before him. And then
secondly, he builds his church by calling his people out of
the world into his church. Now look back at Hebrews chapter
three. Now look at verse one. He says, wherefore holy brethren. Now what is holy brethren? Who's
he talking about? Well, surely he's talking about
some super Christian. Somebody who's really, we all
look up to. Somebody who we all wish we could
be like. I used to think that when I was a boy coming up. We
used to have a fella in our church, they called him Brother So-and-so.
And I thought his first name was Brother. I didn't know he's,
but we all wanted to be like Brother So-and-so. He was really
dedicated, you know, really a hard worker. Is that who the holy
are? Well, what does holy mean? Most
people today, when they think of holiness, they think of moral
perfection. And if you're not morally perfect,
which none of us are, then some of you are closer to it than
others. How about that? That's the kind of thinking that
goes on. It's not so. The word holy simply
means separate. And if you think of holiness
that way, it's separation. That's the word sanctify. Christ sanctified himself. He
separated himself. Our God is holy. Our God is separate. There's no one like God. There's
nothing to compare to God. There's no pictures of God. There's
no paintings of God. He's holy. Separation. Well, what is it that separates
God's church? Well, it's the way they wear
their hair, or the way they wear their clothes, or what they eat,
or what they, is that what the Bible says? No, they're separated
by our gospel. They're separated by their doctrine. Think about it. God says that
you were the servants of sin, but you've obeyed from the heart
that form of doctrine which was delivered you, being then made
free from sin. You became the servants of righteousness. He that transgresses and abideth
not in the doctrine of Christ, he hath not God. But he that
abideth in, you say, well, are you saying it's the only doctrine?
Well, we live our doctrine. We're to live by it. We're not
to say one thing and do another, we're not to be hypocrites, but
it's our gospel that sets us apart, our message. Whereas the world preaches salvation
by work, salvation conditioned on sinners, we preach salvation
by grace, conditioned on Christ. Whereas the world presents a
false Christ who's a failure in most cases, Like the preacher
in Chicago who claims to be a Christian but talked about hell being a
monument to God's failure. Is that right? I don't preach
that God. How about you? I don't believe
in that God. Hell is a monument to God's justice. That's what it is. Against all to whom God imputes,
charges, accounts sin. But we preach salvation. totally by the grace of God,
based on the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ, and not
conditioned on sinners. And that's holy brethren, and
we're holy in Christ. And he says in verse one, he
says, partakers of the heavenly calling. What's the heavenly
calling? That's the invincible, irresistible call of the Holy
Spirit to bring Christ's sheep into the fold. You know the church,
it's called His sheep sometimes. Christ said he laid down his
life for the sheep, John 10, 11. He said, my sheep hear my
voice, I know them. What did he do? Christ sends
forth the spirit to give life to spiritually dead sinners.
Give us eyes to see, ears to hear, hearts and minds to understand. That's the heavenly call, that's
the irresistible call. You won't resist it, and you
know why? Because God the Holy Spirit will convince you of sin
and of righteousness and of judgment. You must be born again. When you were born physically,
came forth from your mother's womb, you didn't make a decision
to breathe, did you? You just breathed. And you know
why you breathed? Because there was life there.
And that's the same way in the new birth. You don't make a decision
just simply and then get born again. God imparts spiritual
life and you receive him, John 1, 12, and 13, born of God. And then he talks about, consider
the apostle and high priest of our profession, Christ Jesus. Consider him, who he is. Apostle. There are 12 apostles,
but the main apostle was Christ. He's the messenger. He's called
the messenger of the covenant. High priest. Israel had many
human high priests. They were sinners themselves.
They didn't last long. But Christ is the great high
priest. Our representative who appears
in the heavens for us. Presenting the merits of his
own sacrifice. O'Bunyan said he's our high priest,
he's our altar, and he's our lamb. Everything that it takes
to save sinners, to build his church, to bring sinners to God,
that's what he is. Consider him. Our profession,
what do we profess? We profess the gospel. We profess
Christ crucified and risen from the dead. We profess the righteousness
of God. I stand before God, not in righteousness
of my own, but in his righteousness imputed to me. That's what I
profess. I'm a sinner saved by grace,
and I'm nothing more. And I'll never rise above that
station while I'm here on this earth. It's like I mentioned
this morning in the Bible study. Oh, wretched man that I am. That's
what I am. But there's a blessedness in
being that wretched. Because he says, who shall deliver
me from this body of death? I thank God through Jesus Christ
my Lord. If that wretchedness leads you
to consider the apostle and high priest of our profession, Christ
Jesus, and the merits of his sacrifice, the merits of his
blood, the merits of his righteousness, if your wretchedness leads you
to grab hold of him by faith, cling to him, rest in him, That's
a glorious thing, that's a blessing. And then look at verse six. Here's the nature of his church. But Christ as a son over his
own house, son of God, whose house are we if, now remember
what I said, that's not a conditional if, that's an evident, in other
words, it's like saying, go back to the baby analogy. You know,
they say, well, I know he's alive if he breathes. Well, the if
there is an evidence of physical life. Well, this if here is an
evidence of spiritual life. If we do what? Hold fast the
confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end.
Well, what is our confidence? Well, Paul wrote it this way
in Philippians chapter three, in verse three. He said this,
for we are the circumcision. Now, what does he mean by that?
He was talking about spiritual circumcision. He was talking about the children
of God. We are the circumcision. We've
been spiritually in the heart and the ears circumcised by the
spirit. We are the circumcision which
worship God in spirit and rejoice in Christ Jesus. The word rejoice
there means to have confidence in. We have confidence in Christ
and no confidence in the flesh. No confidence in ourselves. In
Galatians 6.14, he said, God forbid that I should glory, have
confidence, save in the cross of Christ. He says, if we hold
fast the confidence and the rejoicing, that word rejoicing there is
our boasting of the hope. I have a hope. What is my hope? To live forever with Christ in
God. And my hope is built on nothing
less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. And to hold that continually
until the end is an evidence of the power and the goodness
and the grace of God. That's what it is. Over a few
pages in Hebrews chapter six, listen to this. He's talking
about how God made Abraham a promise. And God didn't go back on that
promise. And he says in verse 16 of Hebrews chapter 6, for
men verily swear by the greater, and an oath for confirmation
is to them an end of all strife. Talking about the oaths that
are brought forth between men. And they swear by their word,
and they swear by something greater than themselves. But he says
in verse 17, wherein God willed him more abundantly to show unto
the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it
by an oath. Now men, when they swear an oath, they swear by
something greater than themselves, but what about God? There's nothing
greater than God. So how does he swear an oath?
He swears by himself. In other words, he engages his
reputation, his honor, his name behind that oath. And here's
what he says in verse 18, that by two immutable things, two
things that cannot change, in which it was impossible for God
to lie, we might have a strong consolation, strong comfort. Now what are those two things
that cannot change? It's God's promise and God's
oath. God made a promise and he swore
an oath. What was his oath? He swore by
himself. he engaged his glory. In other
words, if this promise would fail in any one case, God's honor
would be damaged. That can't happen. You see what
I'm saying? If God promised to save you and
he failed to do so, his glory would be gone, and that can't
happen. You see that? So who is this
promise to? Well, look again at verse 18. To have a strong consolation
that we might have strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay
hold upon the hope set before us. Now, have you fled for refuge
to the hope that was set before you. And what hope is set before
God's people? Look at verse 19. Which hope we have as an anchor
of the soul, both sure and steadfast. It tells you right now it's not
conditioned on us, isn't it? Because it's sure and steadfast.
And which entereth into that within the veil, whether the
forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made an high priest
after the order of Melchizedek. You see, Jesus Christ is the
hope that is set before us. It's not what we do or what we
decide. We'll do many things, we'll decide
many things, but that's not our hope, that's not the hope that's
set before us. It's not salvation condition on me, it's salvation
condition on Christ. Look, consider. Consider the
apostle and high priest of our profession, Christ Jesus. This
is the church that Christ built. This is his house. This is his
household. This is his family. And it's
evidenced by our believing, resting in, we'll see later on in this
verse, those who find their rest, their Sabbath in Christ.