Now we'll stay right there in
Hebrews chapter 12. Brother Mark read this passage
and the verse that I'm headed toward is verse 11 concerning
the subject of the peaceable fruit of righteousness. The peaceable fruit of righteousness. When we first learned of our
son having terminal cancer and began to realize that it was probably the Lord's will
to take him from this world and to enter the presence of his
Savior, I began to spend a lot of time with him, which I, again,
I do appreciate that the Lord enabled me to do that and used
you all to be very patient and understanding during that time.
And I was able to spend some real quality time with him reading
scripture, reading the commentaries and the devotionals, and it just
meant so much to both of us, to all of us. But it seemed to me that he,
our son Aaron, he accepted it, the fact that this was the Lord's
way of taking him home to be with the Lord. He accepted it
early on, more than what I did. I fought and fussed, argued,
sinned with a high hand, complained. But this is the verse, one of
the verses that kept ringing in my mind, right here. Because it seemed to me that
from what I saw in my son, who was also my brother in Christ,
the very embodiment of what the Bible here calls the peaceable
fruit of righteousness. Going through trials and tribulations, And I want to just bring a message
on this in the context of Hebrews chapter 12. What is this peaceable
fruit of righteousness? Well, the first thing that we
need to know is that if we don't understand the biblical concept
of righteousness, how could we understand a verse like this? What is righteousness in the
Bible? Well, righteousness in the Bible
is God's perfect standard of law and justice. Perfection,
you might say. I remember having lunch with
a gentleman one time, and he was talking about doing what
was required to be saved. And I asked him, I said, well,
what do you think is required for salvation before God? And
he said, well, that you believe. And I said, believe what? He
said, well, I really don't know for sure. And I said, well, first
of all, you have to start with this concept, this truth. What
is required for God to save sinners? The number one answer in the
scripture is this word, righteousness. Righteousness is required. Perfection. When I told the gentleman that,
he looked at me with wide-eyed and he said, well, nobody can
do that. And I said, that's right. That's
why salvation is by grace through the Lord Jesus Christ. and not
by our works. That's why salvation is a gift
of God, a free, sovereign, unearned gift from God. That's why it's
called in Romans chapter 5, the gift of righteousness. That's why Christ is called the
Lord our righteousness. You see, when we talk about the
peaceable fruit of righteousness here, we're not talking about
the fruit of our doings. We're not talking about human
morality. Should humans be moral people?
Of course. No argument there. If you're
a believer, you should be moral, upstanding, you should be an
example to others in every role that you play in life, husband,
Boss, worker, wife, mother, father, whatever role you're, you should
be a shining example. But here's the key, that does
not make you righteous in God's sight. Because anything we do
or try to do will fall short of righteousness. My friend,
that's why we need Christ. Christ said in the Sermon on
the Mount, except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the
scribes and the Pharisees, you shall in no wise enter the kingdom
of heaven. And you know what most people do with that? They
say, well, those Pharisees, they weren't sincere. Therefore, I've
just got to be sincere about what I'm doing. Well, let me
tell you something. Human morality, human religion,
human effort, human will, and human sincerity will not make
you righteous. It'll always fall short. Isn't
that right? So when we talk about the peaceable
fruit of righteousness, we're not talking about the fruit of
our doings or what we earn or what we deserve. We're talking about the peaceable
fruit of what Christ did, what Christ earned, what he deserves
as our surety and our substitute. You could say it this way, the
peaceable fruit of Christ. His obedience unto death. It's
his righteousness imputed, charged to his people. And he said that
in John 15. He said, I'm the vine. You are
what? The branches. And what do the
branches do? They don't produce fruit. They
bear it from the life of the vine. So that's what this is. Now let me show you how I know
that. Let's look at the context. You know, the whole book of Hebrews,
what the writer of Hebrews was inspired by the Holy Spirit,
was talking about perseverance, continuing in the faith. Don't
quit. You're a believer. And of course
we know that if you're a true believer, you won't quit. You
won't turn back. You may lose sight of some things
for a while. but God will preserve you. But
it's an encouragement because Christ is better than anything
else that you could ever turn to. You want to turn to angels? Christ is better. You want to
turn to Moses and the law? Christ is better. You want to
turn to Aaron and the earthly priesthood? Christ is better. You want to turn to the tabernacle
and the ceremonies? Christ is better. You want to
turn back to that law covenant? Christ is better. In fact, he's
so much better we can't even describe how much better he is. None of those things will save
you, will keep you, or bring you to glory. None of those things
will put away your sin. The blood of bulls and goats
couldn't do it. The earthly priesthood couldn't do it, Moses couldn't
do it, angels can't do it, Christ alone. How much more shall the
blood of Jesus Christ purge your conscience from dead works, that's
what he calls them, to serve the living God. For by one offering,
his one offering of himself, he hath perfected forever them
that are sanctified. It's all him. That's what this
thing is about, folks. It's not about you. It's not
about me. It's about Christ. We're not here to brag on you
or to make you even feel better. Listen, the only thing that makes
me feel better is looking to Christ, resting in Him. I'm not here to even give you
the power of positive thinking. I hope you're not a downer, and
I hope you're not negative about everything, but my friend, when
it comes to a right relationship with God, when it comes to living
the Christian life, the only power of positive thinking that
I can give you is right here in verse two of chapter 12, looking
unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. So the writer of
Hebrews was inspired to encourage them not to quit. Now he tells
us back in Hebrews chapter nine and verse 39, that we are not
of them who draw back under perdition, but of them that believe to the
saving of the soul. And what he's saying there is
this, if God has saved you, if God has saved you, you will,
by his grace and by his power, believe unto glory. He'll keep
you, he'll preserve you. But God uses means, and the means
is his preserving grace to bring us to persevere in the faith.
Continue believing. And so he had given him chapter
11, a list of Old Testament believers who had gone through so much
trouble in this life. You know, the life of faith,
the life of a true Christian, is basically a life of trouble. Isn't that what Christ said?
He told his disciples, in the world you'll have tribulation. But he said, be of good cheer,
I've overcome the world. And we can always invoke Job
at these times. Man is a few days and full of
what? Trouble. Now you may have some
times of joy and some type of earthly peace, but it won't last,
you know that. It seemed to me that my family
was doing well, and all was going fine, and my son and his wife
both had good jobs, and both were in the church up there in
Ashland, hearing the gospel preached by Brother Jim Byrd very faithfully,
very clearly, very consistently. kids were there in school everything
was going fine then boom you're sick you got a problem and what happens several months
later he's taken away from us and I can say it was an act of
God's grace You say, well, does that mean
you like it? No, I miss him terribly right now. I'll miss him the
rest of my days here on this earth until I go to meet him. Go to meet Christ, and I'll see
Aaron, too. I believe that, don't you? I'm
not trying to shoot you up with an opiate, as Karl Marx said. I don't want you just, well,
you know, feel good about it. No. The writer of Hebrews lists these
people who've gone through so much trial and trouble, and he
says some of them, they saw some marvelous things. Some of them
saw the dead raised to life again, but others were tortured. Sawn asunder, that means sawn
in two. Mocking, scourging, stoned, slain
with the sword. put out of their homes and lost
their jobs and had to live in the wilderness. Think about that. Here Abraham, you remember Abraham,
he's listed here. You know Abraham was a very rich
man, had a lot of money, had everything that a person could
need materially, a person could want. But not every true child of God
was like that. Some of them hurt terribly. Abraham
was, he was tested just like all of us. But he says this in verse 39
of chapter 11. He said, these all, having obtained
a good report through faith, received not the promise, God
having provided some better thing for us, that they without us
should not be made perfect. In other words, what he's saying
here is they looked forward to the promise of God to send a
savior to save them from their sins. No matter what their state
or condition, whether it was on the mountain or in the valley, And so what he does in this first
verse of chapter 12, and you do realize the Bible was not
written in chapters and verses, so it just flows right on. He
tells us what the worst problem that every one of us have, we
who know Christ, we who are true believers, we who are God's chosen
people, who Christ redeemed and who've been called, who've been
given life and been called into the fold by the Holy Spirit through
the preaching of the gospel. given the gift of faith. What
is our number one problem? We'll look at verse one. Wherefore,
seeing we are also compassed about with so great a cloud of
witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, every burden, every load,
and the sin which doth so easily beset us. Now in false religion,
I'll tell you how that was preached to me. You may have a certain particular
sin that you have a problem with and you need to deal with, that
you need to get rid of. That's not what he's saying.
Now, we have a lot of particular sins. The sin that does so easily
be sent, what's the context? What's he talking about? He's
talking about those who persevered in the faith. What is the greatest
hindrance to our perseverance in the faith? Tell you exactly
what, unbelief. Wait a minute, preacher, you're
a believer. Yes, I am. I'm a believer by the grace of
God. Faith is the gift of God. It's
not of yourselves, not of works, lest any man should boast. It's
the gift of God. I'm a believer. But you know
what my problem is? I still have the flesh to deal
with. And when you have to deal with
the flesh, you're dealing with sin. My former pastor used to
say it this way, he said, true children of God are not in a
state of unbelief. But they still have unbelief
in them. And he's right. And we have to, we pray like
the disciples. Lord, I believe, help thou mine
unbelief. It's a struggle. Because we have
so many things in this world that'll hinder us, try to hinder
us. Try to turn our eyes away from
Christ. That's right. You say, well,
I don't ever have a moment of unbelief. Oh, you never complain.
You ever complain about anything? Well, you know God's in control,
isn't he? I believe that. I don't think we're out here
just Adams smashing into each other by happenstance and chance. I believe God's in control, He's
on the throne. Whatever He brings about, that's
it. He said, I do my will. He works all things after the
counsel of His own will. The counsel of His will is perfect
wisdom, perfect knowledge for His glory and the good of His
people. When my son got sick, I complained. But you know what? The Lord wouldn't
let me go. By the power of his grace and
his spirit, he brought me to repentance. I shouldn't have
done that. I made statements that I should have never made. And it so easily besets us. It
doesn't take much to get us looking to ourselves, does it? Complaining,
oh, it's unfair. Why him? Why me? Doesn't take
much. It really doesn't. You say, well,
this is a whole lot. This is much because your son
had terminal cancer. But I'll tell you what now, it
didn't, that was the most severe trial I've ever, that is the
most severe trial I've ever gone through. I hope none of you have
to go through this. Maybe some of you already have.
My former pastor lost two of his children, his oldest son
and his only daughter. Job lost his whole family, didn't
he? He said, the Lord giveth, the
Lord taketh away, blessed be the name of the Lord. That's
noble words, that's of God, isn't it? But read on in the book of
Job. Read on about his problems, the
sin that so easily besat him. Lord, I don't deserve this. I'm
a preacher, I'm trying to do the work of God. Wait a minute,
this thing isn't about what I deserve, is it? Not about what I've earned. I made the statement in the funeral.
I said, if the Lord had come to me and Debbie and said, we're
gonna give you the gift of a son, but I'm only gonna let you have
him 38 years, would you have taken him? I said, well, sure
I would. We had 38 wonderful years with him. And most of all,
God blessed him and blessed us with the greatest gift of all,
salvation by his grace, righteousness through Christ. So he says, the sin which does
so easily beset us and let us run with patience, that's endurance,
The race that is set before us. Run with endurance. That's the
Christian race. Now, how are we to run? Well,
the sin is unbelief. The problem is sin, isn't it?
You know, we still suffer the consequences of sin, but not
the damnation that comes with it. Let me show you that. Here's
the remedy. Look at verse two. Looking unto
Jesus. Salvation. Jehovah, our salvation. Looking unto Jesus. the author,
the beginner, the originator, and the finisher of our faith. Christ began it. Christ finished
it. It's done. Settled. What did he begin and finish?
My salvation. My whole salvation. It's not
conditioned on me. It's not determined by me. Righteousness, he originated
it and he finished it. What is righteousness? It's that
which can only be found in the glorious person and the finished
work of Christ, the God-man, the righteousness of God revealed
in the gospel. And it says, who for the joy
that was set before him endured the cross. What was the joy that
was set before him? It was the father's glory and
the salvation of his people and his own exaltation. Despising
the shame and is set down at the right hand of the throne
of God. Set down means it is finished. That's what he cried
in John 19 30 on the cross. It's finished. You see, the gospel
is the proclamation of not what you must do for God, but what
God has done for His people in Christ. It's a finished work.
It's nothing that Christ began and must be completed or sealed
by you. My justification, my right relationship
with God, the forgiveness of sins, every blessing of salvation,
right here. looking unto Jesus, the author
and finisher of my faith. And he says in verse three, for
consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against
himself, such agony, such hatred. I read it this morning, Romans
five. When we were enemies, Christ died for the ungodly. Lest you
be wearied and faint in your minds. Aren't you glad that Christ
didn't faint, he didn't quit? But he set his face, the scripture
says he set his face like a flint. To do what? To go to the cross. Do you know Satan tried to hinder
him? But he couldn't do it. And look,
his disciples tried to hinder him. Remember when he said to
Peter, get thee behind me, Satan? That's right. He said, this is
the reason I came into the world, to die. He didn't come into the
world so that you could celebrate Christmas. We do celebrate His birth. Aren't
you glad that God was manifest in the flesh? Amen. But why was
He manifest in the flesh? to go to the cross and pay the
debt, to redeem his people, to satisfy justice, to reconcile
us to God, to bring forth every blessing of salvation. And look
at verse three, that such contradiction, lest you be wearied and faint
in your minds. Verse four, he says, you've not resisted unto
blood, striving against sin. He said, you've not yet been
murdered, you've not yet been martyred. You're going through
some trials. These Hebrew believers, they
were being enticed to forsake the gospel and go back to the
law, go back to the ceremonies, which would be a denial of Christ.
They were being tortured. They were being arrested. Some say Paul wrote Hebrews,
but it's the Lord's word and the writer of Hebrews. He says,
you've not yet resisted unto blood. And then in verse five,
here's what he does. Now from verse five on, he puts
things in perspective for God's people concerning the troubles
and the trials that we have to endure in this life. You know,
the problems that we have in this life are in essence the
consequences of sin. Like for example, the aging process. You remember when Adam fell,
remember what God said, dying you shall die, literally. And
he lost spiritual life. We fell in Adam into sin and
death. We're born spiritually dead in
trespasses and sins. And the aging process that leads
unto physical death, that's the consequence of sin. Friction between each other,
all of this is the consequence of sin. But for believers, for
believers now, for those who are righteous in Christ, who
have life from Christ, it is in no way to any degree the wrath
of God or the condemnation of sin. The Bible says in Romans chapter
8, 10, it says, if Christ be in you, this body is dead because
of sin, our son's body is lying in a
grave now. But it goes on to say, but the
Spirit, the Holy Spirit is life because of righteousness, because
of Christ. Cancer destroyed his body, but
it did not touch his soul. It did not touch his spirit. Sin is destroying our bodies.
That's why we're growing old. That's why we get sick. That's
why we have aches and pains. But if we're in Christ and Christ
is in us, the spirit is life, spiritual life, eternal life. because of righteousness, because
of Christ, the author and finisher of our faith. Therefore, how
are we to look at it when we go through troubles and trials
and testings? I mean, you know this. If you're
a believer, if you're a child of God, trials are part of the
story. Troubles. Well, how are we to
look at it? Well, here's what he says, look
at verse five. You have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh
unto you as unto children. My son, despise not thou the
chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him.
Spoken from Proverbs. We're to view all these trials,
these testings, these troubles, though they are the consequences
of sin, they do not condemn us. Sin is not charged to us. We have a Savior, we have righteousness
in Christ, and they are the chastisements. That means they're not the wrath
of God. They're not condemnation. They're
not eternal damnation. The dominion of sin is gone.
They're the loving chastisements of our loving Heavenly Father. Now what is chastening? What
is chastisement? Chastisement is not punishment
for payment. You see, we cannot pay for our
sins. There's only one who could and
did pay for the sins of his people, and that's Christ. He paid for
them on Calvary. And the reason that his suffering
unto death was such a payment, such a valuable, powerful payment,
is because of who he is. He's God in human flesh without
sin. You and I could never pay for
our sin. I've heard people say about King David that all the
troubles that he had in his household because of his sin with Bathsheba.
So, oh, but David was paying for his sins. Oh, no, friend.
He suffered the consequences of his sin. But he didn't pay for them, Christ
already paid for them. Didn't the prophet Nathan look
at David and said, but God has forgiven you? And God doesn't
forgive except upon a just ground. These chastisements are the workings
of our Father in heaven correcting us, teaching us, and causing
us to look more and more. to Christ for our peace, our
comfort, our assurance, our righteousness. That's what he does. He says
in verse 6, for whom the Lord loveth he chastens. We go through these trials, they
don't feel good, but they're expressions of God's love for
his children, for his children, believers.
He scourges every son whom he receiveth. Somebody says, well,
you've got to trace your suffering to some particular sin. Sometimes
you may be able to do that, but I want to tell you something.
We better leave that alone. Think about Job's three friends, those
miserable comforters. Now, Job, let's figure out why
God's doing this to you. Sometimes we suffer for particular
sins. If I go out here and run a stop
sign and there's a policeman there, I'm going to get a ticket. And that's because of God's law. But sometimes we suffer not for
any particular sin, it's just the wisdom of God. In fact, Peter
said we should call that a gift. Boy. He says in verse 7, well he says
in verse 6, and scourges every son whom he received. It's an
expression of God's love and it's a proof of our sonship.
He says in verse 7, if you endure chastening, God dealeth with
you as with sons. Do you ever punish your children?
Look at it. He said, for what son is he whom the father chasteneth
not? If you be without chastisement,
whereof all are partakers, all God's children, then you're bastards,
illegitimate, and not sons. Furthermore, he says in verse
nine, we've had fathers of our flesh which corrected us and
gave them reverence. We respect our fathers. Shall
we not as much rather be in subjection unto the father of spirits, the
father who gives life and live? For they verily for a few days
chastened us after their own pleasure. That doesn't mean they
got pleasure out of the punishment. It means they did it as they
saw fit, as is needed. But he for our prophet. that
we might be partakers of his holiness. Verse 11, now no chastening
for the present seemeth to be joyous but grievous. Now let's
not lie. Going through these last three
months with my dear son, it was not joyous for me. It was very
grievous, very burdensome. What happened in this cancer
that he had is basically Debbie and I and Alyssa and his children
and his grandmother literally watched him starve to death.
The last time I picked him up to shift him in the bed, it was
just like picking up a skeleton with skin on it. Now don't get me wrong, there
were times of joy when we would read the scripture and pray together,
read the devotionals. But it was a heavy, heavy trial,
folks. And I didn't enjoy it, didn't
like it. And I began at the end there
to pray, Lord, if you're not going to heal my son, please
let him sleep out. And that's what happened. He
went to sleep. And it's amazing to me that through
all this trial, you know he didn't have any pain from this cancer.
He had pain from being hungry, just hunger pains, and discomfort
from lack, but no pain from the cancer. We still had to give
him some morphine at the end, but it wasn't much, just enough
to keep him relaxed where he could sleep. And he slept, and
then Thursday morning on December 20th, he went to sleep permanently. That afterward, nevertheless
afterward, it yielded the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them
which are exercised thereby. I know. that God didn't make
a mistake here. He wasn't punishing me for some
particular sin or punishing Aaron for some particular sin. We were
both sinners saved by grace. But I know that our son Aaron
had a good hope, a hope of righteousness in Christ and the Lord took him
home. And so he says in verse 12, wherefore, for this reason,
lift up the hands which hang down in the feeble knees. Make
straight paths for your feet, lest that which is lame be turned
out of the way, but let it rather be healed. I will grieve and
I will sorrow over the loss of my son. But there's joy too,
like David said of his infant son who was taken out of the
world. He said, he will not come to
me, But I'll go to him. And that's the way I feel about
my son Aaron, our son Aaron. I know that the Lord blessed
us, blessed him. And I'll forever be thankful.
I'll forever be grateful to God for saving his soul and bringing
him into glory. And I trust that one day, As
the Lord brings us to glory, we'll see Christ face-to-face,
all together, singing, worthy is the Lamb that was slain.