Participants: James Rafferty, Ty Gibson
Series Code: BOTB
Program Code: BOTB00012A
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00:21 Hello friends, I am your co-host James Rafferty with Ty Gibson
00:24 and this is Books Of the Book. 00:26 We are in Hebrews Chapter 12, and we want to invite you to 00:30 open your Bible and have a listening ear and join us in 00:34 Hebrews Chapter 12. 00:35 Hebrews chapter 12, like many of the chapters in Hebrews 00:39 James, begins with the word therefore, 00:42 so we need some context. 00:43 What we are about to launch into in Chapter 12, is referring 00:48 back for its context to chapter 11. 00:51 We have a whole list of individuals who have 00:54 been mentioned, who's faith accomplished 00:57 great exploits and now, having concluded 01:01 that list we come to chapter 12. 01:03 Paul says therefore, we also since we are surrounded by so 01:07 great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and 01:12 sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance 01:16 the race that is set before us. 01:18 Looking unto Jesus, now I really like this, because this is 01:22 pointing out TY, it there is a besetting sin. 01:24 All of us have sins, all of us have weaknesses, 01:26 all of us have problems that we are dealing with in our walk 01:31 in our Christian experience. 01:32 But there is a besetting sin, I believe, of human nature, 01:36 now this besetting sin began 01:38 right at the very inception right at the very fall, 01:41 right at the very beginning, and that besetting sin, 01:44 I believe, is the inclination that we have to find fault to 01:48 look at our failures and our imperfections, either 01:51 in others or in ourselves. 01:52 You know when Adam was confronted by God with partaking 01:55 of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil he pointed to Eve. 01:58 and Eve pointed to the serpent, and we have been 02:00 pointing ever since. 02:01 Paul is saying here, you are surrounded with a great cloud of 02:04 witnesses, you know, the only way that we can overcome this 02:08 besetting sin of finding fault is by recognizing God's 02:12 perspective on our lives. 02:15 All of the witnesses of Hebrews 11 have one thing in common. 02:20 The record of their lives is minus any failure any sin any 02:25 record of where they came short of God's glory. 02:29 Have you noticed that? Well yeah! 02:30 The chapter just gives a glowing report about each one of them 02:34 and there is no mention of any of their failures which we have 02:37 in the biblical record. 02:39 I mean, we know that these were human beings who 02:41 were weak and faltering. 02:42 Noah built an ark, but he also got drunk. 02:44 Abraham and Sarah were faithful, but he lied about his wife. 02:48 Sarah, she laughed about the idea of having a child. 02:51 Moses he fled Egypt, but he also killed an Egyptian. 02:53 Smote the rock of impatience. 02:55 They are not mentioned there. 02:57 We're surrounded with witnesses, who from God perspective, 03:00 are seen perfect and complete in Jesus Christ by faith. 03:04 We also have need of this prospective and see people 03:07 as they are in Jesus, lay aside the inclination 03:10 we have to judge, criticize and condemn others. 03:13 One of the great truths of the gospel is that love covers a 03:18 multitude of sin. 03:19 That doesn't mean that love becomes deceived, I mean, God 03:23 knows our failures. 03:25 He sees those things in us that are out of harmony with His 03:28 will and are contrary to His love. 03:30 But God looks upon us and exercises confidence He instills 03:36 faith in us by exercising faith. 03:39 Yes, you know, it's interesting because Paul and first 39 of 11 03:43 is calling us to the better thing, the better experience 03:47 something better the essence then of what Paul is saying is 03:51 keep positive keep to the affirmative. 03:53 Jesus does not dwell upon our sins upon our failures. 03:56 So why should we? Amen! Amen! 03:59 I want to connect to verses 1 and 2 now James, 04:02 because we have this cloud of witnesses the faithful of 04:06 all ages that are delineated in chapter 11 and 04:09 then in the light of their faith, we are encouraged to lay 04:13 aside sin to run the race that is set before us with 04:16 endurance, but at the end of verse 1 there is a comma, it's 04:20 not the end of his thought. 04:21 He's not saying hey, you need to overcome sin. 04:24 You need to run this race, he's not imposing 04:27 responsibility in a vacuum here. 04:30 He's saying to us, run this race 04:33 lay aside your sin, looking unto Jesus the author and 04:39 finisher of our faith. 04:41 In other words, the means by which the 04:44 way in which we lay aside sin and run this race with endurance 04:49 is by looking to Jesus. 04:51 I really like this verse, I really like this context. 04:53 Basically what we are saying here is not only 04:56 do we need to keep positive, 04:57 not only do we need to keep our positive focus, but we also 05:01 need to keep our focus on Jesus not on man. 05:05 You see with Christ, we will not grow weary. 05:08 We will not faint. 05:09 When we focus on men will refocus on ourselves. 05:11 We were going to grow weary, we are going to feel overwhelmed. 05:15 But when we keep our focus on Christ who is the author and the 05:18 finisher of our faith, were going to find He will finish the 05:21 work He has begun in us 05:22 This is amazing that it said He has authored our faith. 05:27 Now we know an author is someone who writes a book. 05:31 Someone who originate something so Jesus is the 05:35 originator of our faith. 05:38 He is the one who has produced it, He's the One who's worked 05:41 it out in His own human experience as our 05:44 representative and having authored that faith then 05:47 The apostle Paul says He finished, He originated it, 05:51 and He finished our faith. 05:54 Now that's vital. 05:55 Because many times we think Jesus started it, but He is 05:57 asking us to finish He begun it. 05:59 but we have to do the rest NO! Hebrews is telling us very 06:02 clearly He began it and He will finish it. 06:05 And that is very encouraging. 06:06 So He has authored our faith. 06:08 He has originated and He has finished our faith 06:11 so at that point, some one may be thinking, 06:15 I've wondered at times, if He authored it if, He finished it, 06:20 is there anything at all involved in my own experience. 06:24 Well, there is the faith that He's authored and finished 06:27 is a living vibrant faith. 06:30 That is clearly referring back to the experience of all these 06:34 faithful who we noticed in our previous time together, who 06:37 when they had faith, when they experienced faith, they 06:41 accomplished great things by that faith. 06:43 Faith is active, it's aggressive, it moves it, 06:46 it accomplishes things, faith without works is dead. 06:50 Be it alone as a very context of Hebrews 12 is tell us lay 06:54 aside every weight that sin does so easily beset us look to 06:57 Jesus consider Him that endured such contradiction of sin 07:01 against himself, lest you be wary faint 07:04 in your mind verse four. 07:05 You have not yet resisted unto blood striving against sin. 07:10 So there is this active faith. 07:12 Faith that is motivated by love that strives against sin. 07:16 that resists unto blood. 07:18 Now in this context, we might want to point back to the 07:21 experience of Jesus in Gethsemane because frankly, 07:24 there is nowhere in the Bible that I find where anyone 07:26 ever resisted unto blood striving against sin, 07:29 but Christ, and I think that 07:31 Paul here is speaking metaphorically, 07:33 in a very real sense of an experience he wants us to have. 07:37 When you look at Matthew Chapter 26, 07:40 you look at the experience that Christ had as He 07:42 entered Gethsemane you see an outline of the way in which we 07:46 can strive, we can resist sin. 07:48 There are basically about eight points here that you can 07:51 consider that I would like to go through very quickly. 07:53 They are powerful, because what you have here is you have 07:56 Jesus Christ seeking to maintain His connection 07:59 with the Father. 08:00 What does He do, first of all, He sings a hymn. 08:02 We are admonished in the new testament to sing hymns and 08:05 spiritual songs. 08:06 Then as He goes out with His disciples. 08:08 He preaches the word He shares with them prophecies about 08:12 what's going to happen to Himself. 08:13 So He places His faith in the word. 08:14 Then He asks His disciples to pray for Him. 08:17 And then He Himself seeks help from the Father. 08:21 He goes off and He prays as He asked disciples to 08:23 pray for Him. 08:24 And then finally He confesses His unwillingness to go in the 08:28 direction that God wants Him to go but He says not my will, 08:31 though, but thine be done. 08:32 In this agony of separation He submits 08:36 His will to the Father He says. 08:38 You know My will wants to in this direction, but I submit 08:40 My will to you Father, and He prays that three times. 08:43 I believe that Jesus is outlining for us, 08:46 as Paul points to resisting in the blood. 08:49 Jesus is outlined for us what He would ask us to do, to have 08:52 hope to sing, to trust in the word of God. 08:55 To pray and have others pray for us. 08:56 And finally to submit our will and our way to God's will, 09:00 and God's way and to commit ourselves to Him. 09:02 We look to Jesus as Hebrews Chapter 12, Verse 1 and 2 09:08 It admonishes us to do. 09:09 We see in incredible things for example, Paul says here and 09:13 verse 2, that when we look to Jesus, one of the things we 09:17 are going to see James, is that He authored our faith. 09:20 He finished our faith for the joy that was set before Him. 09:24 He endured the cross. 09:25 The joy that was set before Him. 09:27 I think wow, what is it that Jesus is looking forward to as 09:32 the joy that will be the result of His sacrifice, and I am 09:37 reminded of His prayer in John 17 where He expressed what His 09:42 desire was and what He was looking forward to Himself 09:44 after His sacrifice. 09:46 In Chapter 17 of the Gospel of John and verse 24, He says 09:50 Father, I desire that they also whom You have given Me 09:55 may be with Me where I am that they may behold My glory, which 10:00 You have given Me for You loved Me before the foundation 10:05 of the world. 10:06 So, Jesus basically says, here I am going to endure the cross. 10:09 I'm going to move straight through with this infinite self- 10:13 sacrifice and endure this pain and suffering because I am 10:16 looking forward to eternity future living in fellowship 10:22 with my sons and daughters, with those who have 10:25 been redeemed by life virtue of this sacrifice. 10:28 He is looking forward with joy to spending eternity with us. 10:32 Amen! and you know, it's interesting because as you move 10:35 through this Ty, you have in verse five and onward, you have 10:38 this exhortation to not forget that God educates 10:45 us through trial. 10:46 Now there are times when it becomes difficult for us to 10:49 accept and understand that when we are tested, 10:53 when we're tried, when we, as the old King James say, 10:56 are chastened by the Lord that 10:58 we tend to chide under it and think, 11:01 Oh, you know, have I done something wrong? 11:04 Does God not like me, is He displeased with me? 11:05 NO! He loves us. 11:07 He loves, I disciplined my son, I educate my son because 11:10 I love him. 11:11 I discipline, my daughter, I educate my daughter 11:13 because I love her. 11:14 God loves us and we don't want to forget that we don't want to 11:17 lose sight of the fact that what God is doing is He is, 11:21 working through these trials to bring good out of them, for us. 11:25 He's not seeking to chide us in a negative but a positive way 11:29 Well, Jesus told a parable. 11:30 The parable of the vine in the branches in which He indicated 11:34 that when a branch brings forth fruit. 11:38 God prunes it so that it will bring forth more fruit. 11:42 So God actually sees potential James He looks into our lives 11:46 and into our hearts and yes, He sees our weaknesses. 11:49 He sees our failures is He sees our sins, but God sees the 11:53 potential of our lives, and so He labors with us. 11:57 He works with us in infinite wisdom, He knows exactly what to 12:02 allow at what to forbid from taking place in our lives that 12:07 will move and navigate us through our experience in life 12:12 to the best yielding of fruit in our Christian experience. 12:15 So we need to keep positive. 12:16 We need to keep focused, and we need to keep perspective. 12:19 We need to understand why these things are happening to us. 12:22 We need to know as Manasseh probably learn and 12:24 Nebuchadnezzar learned, that even though we go through 12:27 some of these trials. 12:28 I'm sure you have been through them and I have been through 12:30 them, that God is working to bring good out of them. 12:34 I can look back on my life and say some of the greatest trials 12:37 I faced were turning points in my Christian experience. 12:40 Were areas where I needed to grow and where God was pruning 12:43 in order more fruit would come forth. 12:45 Often times people when they experience trials and suffering 12:51 they make the assumption that God is manufacturing these 12:56 trials for them. 12:57 But in fact, the sin problem has imposed great suffering 13:02 and trials upon the human race. 13:04 And God is not the manufacturer of the evil things. 13:08 I mean, we need to be very careful here because there are 13:10 people who have experienced very difficult things 13:14 in this life. 13:15 There are people who have been abused by their parents, there 13:17 are people who have experienced tragedy. 13:19 There are people who have gone through things that are just 13:22 unthinkable and we don't want to give the impression, and 13:25 Scripture does not want to give the impression, that God is 13:29 the author in source of terrible deeds that are 13:32 committed against us. 13:33 But what we do know for certainty is that all things 13:37 work together for the good for those who love the Lord and are 13:40 called according to His purpose. 13:42 Meaning that God, while He does not manufacture, 13:46 horrible things in our lives. 13:48 God does guide us through those things in order to bring 13:53 good out of them. 13:54 Absolutely, and there may be many of our listeners or 13:56 viewers who are going through some trials and 13:58 tragedies right now. 14:00 I know that each one of us, none of us are immune to that. 14:04 And if you are, please remember this that God is working to 14:07 bring good out of it. 14:08 God is going to over rule that evil, that tragedy, that trial. 14:13 He's going to overrule it for good. 14:14 He is going to bring something good out of it that can be 14:17 a turning point in your experience. 14:19 Don't go away, we will be right back |
Revised 2014-12-17