Why Christians Don’t Need Holy Shrines

Audio Transcript

On Monday, we celebrated the wonderful depths of Hebrews 10:19–20. We now have “confidence to enter the holy places” — we go suitable into the existence of God — “by the blood of Jesus, by the new and residing way that he opened for us by way of the curtain, that is, by his flesh.” And that signifies, according to verse 22, we must now “draw close to [to God] with a accurate coronary heart in complete assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clear from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.” It’s an extraordinary invitation.

And as Pastor John explained on Monday’s episode, we are not able to repeat these statements way too often — that all our communion with God is completed by direct obtain to him, an accessibility that Christ procured for us by way of his torn body, torn like the temple curtain from top to base. Thus, we pray instantly to God. Christ is our mediator, our only mediator. Our prayers do not call for angels, or clergymen, or saints, or even Mary or Hail Marys. For your prayers to be listened to, you really don’t have to be on your knees or inside a cathedral or at a temple or in the vicinity of a holy shrine or even standing at a holy place in the Holy Land. We require none of that to draw in the vicinity of to God.

The whole ebook of Hebrews is offered to us to rejoice this new entry that we have been provided to God as a result of Christ. There, the phrase “draw near” is utilised more than and over. “Draw near” is truly 1 Greek phrase — proserchomai — and that term seems 7 occasions during the book of Hebrews (4:16 7:19, 25 10:1, 22, 25 11:6). It’s a profound term, as Pastor John explains in this 1997 sermon clip.

This term “draw near” is a beloved phrase in Hebrews. In simple fact, I would argue that pretty much (probably not quite) the primary stage of the writing of the e book of Hebrews is this phrase, to support you draw in the vicinity of to God without the need of being consumed by his wrath as a sinner, and with no being hindered by an evil conscience and a perception of unworthiness.

Attract In the vicinity of to What?

So to answer the dilemma “Draw near to what?” he works by using the term 7 situations. Let us just search at a single or two of the some others. Just one is Hebrews 4:16, where by he states, “Let us attract around with self-assurance to the throne of grace.” So that is what he’s talking about right here — the throne of grace, God’s throne. Or go to Hebrews 7:25, where by he suggests, “He is equipped to help you save to the uttermost individuals who draw in the vicinity of to God as a result of him.” So we’re drawing in the vicinity of to God, drawing near to the throne of grace, and if you go to Hebrews 11:6, it suggests, “He who attracts in close proximity to to God should consider that he exists and that he rewards those people who find him.” You have 3 strategies of indicating it now: (1) Draw around to a throne of grace. (2) Attract close to to God. (3) Attract close to to a rewarder.

“We have accessibility to, and we’re to come boldly into, that holy position to satisfy with God.”

If you come again to the textual content then and say, “Yes, but is that what is meant right here?” would not it be verified by on the lookout at Hebrews 10:19, the place it says that “we have assurance to enter the holy places”? You know the graphic if you have been listed here for a handful of months. You know that the graphic of the tabernacle in the Outdated Testomony — with its court and then its internal sanctuary and then its most holy area, the place God achieved after a yr with the substantial priest and the glory came down — that is the word in this article. We have entry to, and we’re to occur boldly into, that holy put to meet with God. So the response to the first issue, “Draw around to whom?” is God. God, the gracious king on his throne. God, the bountiful rewarder with his palms total of blessing. “Draw around — attract close to to me,” he says.

How We Attract Close to

Here’s the next problem: Which way do you head when you are executing this? Do you go west, east, north, south, altar, knees, to an enemy to get reconciled? The response is you never shift a muscle mass. You never move the muscle of your tongue. This is a spiritual act, not a actual physical one particular. When he claims, “Draw in close proximity to to God, attract in close proximity to to the throne, attract in close proximity to to the rewarder,” it is one thing you can do standing rock good. It is one thing you can do flat on your back again in a medical center bed, and it is anything that you can do sitting down in a church on a Sunday morning at 11:12 listening to a sermon. And I plead with you right now, in the identify of Jesus, to do it. You do not have to wait around right until this sermon is around — to go property and get on your knees, or to get in a quiet put someplace following this church service — to do this. This is a little something that I commend for the accomplishing of appropriate now.

By indicating in your heart, intellect, will, with eyes open or eyes closed, “God, I occur. I attract in the vicinity of. I want to listen to the rest of this sermon in your presence. I want a hand on my shoulder. I want a hand of blessing on my head. I want assist beneath my again. I want the priest at your correct hand cleansing my coronary heart. I really don’t want to go by means of the relaxation of this provider appropriate now distant from you like I felt when I walked into this room.” You don’t have to have to bow 1 millimeter to do that. Beware, lest you assume coming to God is coming to church. Beware, lest you consider coming to God is coming to an altar. Beware, lest you feel it is heading to modest group tonight. It could be all of all those and it may well not be. It is a spiritual act of the heart, with out a movement of a muscle.

Coronary heart of Christianity

When I assume about this and meditate on this central command in Hebrews, recurring 7 periods, I was struck this week how this is the centre of the gospel. This is the New Testament. This is Christianity. Just believe about this for a instant. What is the heart of Christianity? What’s the vital message? So if anyone at get the job done this 7 days suggests, “You’re a person of individuals born-once more-form, Baptist-sort, Christian-sort, evangelical-kind persons. What’s that?” If you preferred to start at the center, what would you say? Acquire a couple of verses.

Acquire 1 Peter 2:24 3:18: “[Christ] bore our sins in his human body on the tree . . . that he may possibly provide us to God.” Is that drawing around? Which is the gospel. Or choose Ephesians 2:18: “Through him we both have obtain in 1 Spirit to the Father.” That is the gospel. Or just take Romans 5:11: “We rejoice in God by means of our Lord Jesus Christ, by means of whom we have now acquired reconciliation” — residence with God, no for a longer period estranged or enemies.

Or consider the prodigal son. Almost most people appreciates the tale of the prodigal son, but not every person remembers the context of the story of the prodigal son in Luke 15, which commences with Jesus feeding on with tax collectors and sinners (the poor folks) and the Pharisees saying, “Why do you take in with tax collectors and sinners?”

“Draw close to to God by the blood. Attract around to God through the flesh. Draw near to me.”

Jesus says, “Let me convey to you a story. There was a lady who lost a coin. There was a male, a shepherd, who shed a sheep. There was a father who missing a son. And when he took his inheritance and turned dissolute and obtained exhausted of eating pig food stuff in the planet, he remembered there was food. ‘Ho, everyone who thirsts, come.’ And he headed residence. And this father, outdated and dignified, pulled up his robes concerning his legs when he observed this dirty, rascally, no excellent, inheritance-throwing away son coming home, and ran into his arms and kissed him and set a gown on him and a ring on his finger and killed the fatted calf and threw a party and said, ‘My son who was dead is alive.’ Which is why I’m feeding on with tax collectors and sinners. That is the indicating of my ministry. Which is why I came, to open up a way house to the Father. Draw around.”

Would you concur with me, I question? Are we at the heart of the gospel here? Draw close to to God by the blood. Draw in the vicinity of to God by way of the flesh. Attract in the vicinity of to me. The entire place of Christianity is to glance on a shed globe moving in the reverse route, toward destruction, and to quit them and say, “God has manufactured a way dwelling.”