Christ Memorial Lutheran Church - Houston TX
CMLC 2024-10-06 Sermon (Contemporary)
Howdy, you know, we're going to be looking at for about seven weeks the book of Hebrews. There are going to be some things that come out in the book of Hebrews that might seem a little bit obvious, but each one of the parts we're going to look at is meant to be speaking to a different group that might have been looking for something that they thought maybe was more important than Jesus. But in reality, coming back to who Jesus is and what he's done is always the foundation. See, that's why it is that we're going to be looking today that Jesus is the foundation of our salvation and that as obvious as that sounds, oftentimes we as the people of God, sometimes we may lose sight of that as well. I wanted to tell you the story from back when I went over to China. I was living in China for a year and when I was there and I was trying to learn the language and I learned just enough to be like, I want to eat this, I want to buy that and you need to keep going straight in the taxi. But some Westerners had gotten really good and were fluent in Mandarin Chinese. And what I heard was that there was this man who had gone up to a train teller and he was trying to buy a train ticket at the train teller and he was telling the teller in fluent Mandarin Chinese, I want a train ticket to go from here to this place over here. And the teller kept saying, I'm sorry sir, I do not speak English. And the man would pause and he kept saying, but he would come back to it in Mandarin Chinese, I need a train ticket to get from here to this place over here. I'm speaking to you in Chinese now. And the person from behind the counter would keep saying, I don't know English. Please sir, you need to step aside. And finally, a local Chinese citizen from behind the man had to lean around and say to the teller, hey, stop it. He is speaking to you in Mandarin. All right, just listen. And finally, the man again says what he is saying again in Chinese. And finally, the teller snapped out of it and realized that he was communicating to him in his own language. And what was so fascinating about it is that the reason that teller couldn't understand wasn't because the message wasn't right and it wasn't clear, but because it wasn't coming from a person that that teller was expecting to receive it from. And that's one of the things that we realize is how often it is that the message we're receiving is good and true. But sometimes we don't want to hear it from the person that it's coming from. How many times is it that we do that is maybe we're not listening to something because of a person's skin color or their gender or what political party they're from or even sometimes our spouse. And it may be the best right thing in the world, but because of who it's coming from, it somehow just does not come through. And that's what it is that we end up seeing with much of the message coming across to the Hebrew people, the Jewish community at that time. And one of the things that they were looking for in many ways was they were wanting God to speak through some amazing supernatural otherworldly angelic presence. They were looking for something that they had seen in the stories throughout scripture of times whenever there would be some angel host that was there to proclaim and speak something amazing. Granted, they ignored the times whenever God's presence was there in a very clearly human form, but not incarnate in the way that Jesus was. And that's the thing about who Jesus was is that they weren't necessarily expecting God to be doing his work or speaking his word through a guy with brunette hair and calloused hands and a penchant for good wine. But the thing with it is that who Jesus is, is who he's meant to be. The thing is is that oftentimes we may be even looking for God to be speaking through some sort of amazing presence, something that is otherworldly. We might be expecting it to be a hitchhiker going down some highway or a woman with the Scottish accent and long red hair, but oftentimes we just keep wishing and hoping that maybe some angel would be speaking to us in some way that makes us feel belonging and that we connect. But even that desire is sometimes only one step away from a obsession with a supernatural instead of just coming back to God, even to the point where I find myself putting my hand over somebody that thought they were communicating with their guardian angel through a Ouija board, only to realize that the voice that they kept hearing was a demon. Because so often it is that in our world today, the desire to hear something supernatural can sometimes lead us down dark paths that take us away from the true message. See that's the thing is that the message has already been clear. The actions have already been done. Everything is already finished by Christ. Everything is finished by what has already been shown in Christ Jesus. And that's the thing with this is that God the Father can already spoken to the people when Jesus is here on this earth multiple times and saying, "This is my son in whom I am well pleased. Listen to him, follow him." Or even the disciples who walked alongside him, they were already there seeing observing, but being a part of this ministry that he's already done and that they were able to partake in it and then tell everybody else or the miracles that occurred. So many amazing things that were happening all around and even in the early church, the things that they were able to do in Christ's name, but especially being led by the Holy Spirit. How many times is it that we can end up recognizing and realizing, "Do I wish to follow after Jesus?" How many things in our lives are shaped and changed because we want to be like Jesus. We want to follow after God. God's Spirit is there speaking, leading, guiding. Why isn't that enough? See, the thing is that oftentimes we don't want to see God in the normal. Whenever something seems a little too mundane, a little too average. See, even though everything had already been affirmed in Jesus, what's difficult for us as people is to realize that Jesus is also human. See, Jesus had lowered himself to earth. God the Son had come to walk among us, to be among us, to be human. But it was so difficult for us to grasp this idea that in the early church, there were times where they even thought that Jesus must have somehow lost some of his godness, his divinity, his deity. They called it the "tapey nauticon" that somehow he just kind of put the God side of them to the side because they couldn't comprehend that somehow Jesus could be both man and God fully, both together at the same time, because people have a hard time taking seriously someone in human form. But you see, the humanity did not diminish the divinity. That's also something that we have to be careful about when we read Hebrews. You may not know this, but in the early times where the Bible was being established, which books to affirm are the canon of Scripture, there were about 13 books that were being debated. They were debated mostly because of, you know, well, the authorship, are they the original 12 disciples? Are these things okay to include? How do we feel about this in Hebrews? As you may or may not know, people aren't sure who actually wrote it. The thing with it is even looking at the book itself, it does sound a little different from others. But the reason to include it is because of reading it in the context of the rest of Scripture because at times, if you were to take Hebrews out of context, there are parts of it that might sound like Jesus is somehow not really God for a while there. But the rest of Scripture shows us that He truly is. So what is Hebrews really getting at is just to show that He was willing to be humbled, but He didn't change who He actually was, who He actually is. And that's a thing about completing, completion of what Jesus did, is that this didn't somehow make Him now the God-man, the perfect person who is supposed to be bringing our salvation, but rather is completing the action itself. It's sort of like if you were to look back at the 2017 Astros, you know, when they actually do get through the division series, and to be able to say, when were they the champions, when were they the best team in the MLB? Was it only after winning the World Series? Well, no, they were the same team, the ones who were going to reveal themselves to be the world champions, but they were that same team the whole time. And that's the thing about Jesus is that it was completing the work that would bring that crown. It wasn't because He was somehow flawed or incomplete in the beginning. But you see, we, we struggle with the idea that perfect God in all of His omnipotence would somehow be in a human form because we struggle with weakness, we struggle with humility. See, we don't like the idea that someone being humble is the one we're supposed to lead. We like loud, we like forceful, we like aggressive. We like things that make you agree with them whether you like it or not. You're going to eat those vegetables and you're going to like them. But the thing is, is that that's not where the honor actually comes from. See, the honor, the honor is in the suffering. See, that's the thing with this is that we want our faith, we want Christianity to be bold and forceful and to hit hard, but that's not what Christ has brought us because the glory came in sacrificing Himself on the cross for us. You know, I always find it fascinating whenever there are times where somebody says, you know, these these sermons, they just, they don't hit the way that they used to back in the day. You know, I really want the, you know, the fire and brimstone, you know, the hell and damnation. And I really want to be able to hear all that stuff. If you go back and you listen to my sermons, I promise you, there's plenty of law in those sermons. You will have somebody telling you, y'all, you really got to shape up. But the reason it doesn't feel the same is because there's also a lot of grace in there as well. It's meant to be because that's what it is that Jesus has actually shown us and given us. See, I always find it funny when the very people who are like, I really want people to be more convicted and it's like, they're not in the pews and it's like, if those actually worked and you were actually convicted, then you would be here whether you like hearing the sermon or you don't. And yet they're not here. Isn't an ironic, don't you think? A little too ironic. And yeah, I really do think. I know, I know, I know, for those of you who didn't quite get that, you could Google Landis Morissette or maybe you shouldn't. But with it though, is that who Christ is is meant to shape who we are and what we do. And with that is to realize that we're never going to overcome death or all the struggles of this world by trying to be the loudest. It only happens by the one who is willing to give of himself. See, that's the thing about this is that instead of the high priest coming up to the altar to put an animal or another person on that altar, instead the high priest walked up and put himself on. See, that's the thing about this is that we as Christians, we're actually called that we're going to have to be the ones to suffer and we're the ones who have to sacrifice. We don't want that. We don't like that. But that's still the only way that the world is actually going to be changed. That's the thing about this is that the only way that we can actually overcome this world is by being the ones to struggle and to give of ourselves. It means that there will be the times whenever you wish that someone would just listen to you, but you have to realize that maybe you just have to live it and they may not be willing to listen, at least not yet. There may be the times whenever you may be struggling because you really feel frustrated and angry at what you see around, but you know that if you yell and you force and you push, that you're just going to drive people away from Jesus. But there's also knowing that the struggles, the suffering are still things that God can and will use. So I don't know what it is that there may be that you're struggling with, but I do know that we have a Messiah who is taken on human form. He knows what it's like to be where you are. He knows what it's like to suffer, but also is to realize that suffering is where we end up seeing grace and mercy the most. So with we ourselves and what we claim as our faith, as our salvation, it has to be founded on Christ's sacrifice, and that's going to have to be where we find ourselves as well. Because it's never going to be going forth with aggression, it'll only be by going forth with confession. Because that's the only place that God can truly do His work and His Spirit can lead and the only hope that we can ever truly bring to the world around us. Thanks be to God. [BLANK_AUDIO]