Confession & Encouragement

Introduction

If you will direct your attention to Hebrews chapter 10, Hebrews 10 and verse 19. I’m going to read, beginning there in just a few moments. Appreciate Stephen’s good work this morning and picking songs that really go pretty well with what I want to talk about this morning, particularly the last song about our steps being worship and our thoughts being praise. It just kind of really goes hand in hand with this concept from Hebrews chapter 10, 19 through 25, especially, where as a church or as groups of people, as individuals, we are called to live our faith with confidence and hope and unity.

And all of this connects even earlier to places like Hebrews chapter 4 about Jesus Christ being a great high priest. So there’s a lot of continuity to what’s going on here in the letter, as we would expect from an inspired writer, that brings us to this point in Hebrews chapter 10 and verse 19. Begin reading with me there. Hebrews 10 19 says, Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh. And since we have a great high priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart and full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day drawing near. For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. How much worse punishment do you think will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the spirit of grace.

For we know him who said, Vengeance is mine, I will repay. And again, the Lord will judge his people. It is a fearful thing to fall in the hands of the living God. But recall the former days, when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with suffering, sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated. For you had compassion on them in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one. Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God, you may receive what is promised.

For yet a little while, and the coming one will come and will not delay. But my unrighteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him. But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls. Just like in the time of the Hebrew writer, in our day and age, there are things that separate the people of God from the people who are not God’s people. From those who have submitted to the will of God, to those who are obedient to the will of God. There’s a difference between those people and those who reject God, who are obstinate, who refuse to listen, who have allowed themselves to go a different direction.

And I really want to hang the thoughts this morning on two pegs. The first one I think we’re very familiar with, and I would want to spend a few minutes on it talking about it. And the second, maybe is a bit more problematic sometimes for people among our people. Not because we don’t think it’s important, but in practice, maybe we struggle a bit more with it at times. And that is the testimony of truth and the testimony of unity. These two elements are what separate the people of God from the people of the world. Just look at the world, thinking about the second, and how divisive the world is, how angry people are at each other, and how everything is built to divide and to destroy, to pin one person against the other.

And there’s an absence of the idea of truth and substantive truth, and the idea of something we can have confidence in, but God’s people see the world differently and they live in the world differently. And so we have these two ideas, the testimony of truth and the testimony of unity, that manifest to the world that illustrate that there’s something different about God’s people. Now, I think these ideas are all throughout scripture, and I want to use Hebrews 10, 19 through 25 in particular, just sort of as a launching place. We’re going to spend a lot of our time here, but then I want to kind of peruse other passages throughout the New Testament to show some of these ideas. And there are many more we can look at than what we’re going to look at this morning.

But basically, I want us to understand the importance of the idea of truth and the importance of the idea of relationships or the unity that we have as God’s people together. All of these I think are found in a pretty concise way within this text in Hebrews 10, 19 through 25. And so we’re going to work through these phrases using maybe the language of the Hebrew writer to understand what God’s people are like and what we are to be like. And so we think of the importance of how truth is vital to us and how it bears witness to the reality that we’re a God’s people. In practice, this is a huge way in which the world sees that we are devoted to God. It is our loyalty, our faithfulness to the things of God, and even recognizing what God has done in our lives.

1. Find Confidence in God's Plan

And so I want to spend just a few minutes, moments sort of exegeting this first part of the text, working through these phrases about confidence and confession. And so the first two of these really fall under the testimony of truth how important truth is, how we must hang on to truth, hold fast to truth. And so it all falls really underneath that umbrella of our witness to the world. And so the first of these is that as God’s people, we should find confidence in God’s plan.

Am I worthy for God’s forgiveness? And that is a common problem that some face in some realms of Christianity, maybe even with in our tradition, that’s a struggle for many. But I want us to look at what the Hebrew writer has to say here about this confidence that we should have. He actually mentions it a number of times in the book of Hebrews. But here, the way he mentions this and the way he talks about it is pretty profound. He starts out saying, since we have confidence, he just assumes it really, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh. Now, in the context of the point he’s making here, he’s already talked about Christ being the better sacrifice, a single sacrifice for all time, that he is a great high priest who goes before the throne of God, and even as far back as Hebrews 4, he’s talked about how we can boldly come before the throne of grace to seek mercy in time of need.

So he already understands this and he’s working his way back to this point. But I don’t want us to miss the image of what’s going on here.

There’s no mistake here that he is taking the two elements, these two ideas about what happens with Jesus Christ and what he’s done in his new and better way. And this involves both blood, which has to do with forgiveness. And so the priest would take the sacrificial lamb or the bull or whatever was going to be offered, whether it was daily sacrifices or on the day of atonement, which is probably more precise what’s going on in this text, and they would slaughter that animal, and the blood would be sprinkled on the altar, sometimes on various other vessels within the holy place for the purpose of purification. Now, within this text, we find a number of things that have to do with purification and cleanness and all this, and we’re sort of going somewhere with this.

It has to do with the idea of confidence here in just a moment. But it’s the blood of Jesus that causes sins to be remembered no more. Now, in the argumentation of the Hebrew writer, it works like this. The yearly sacrifice, particularly the day of atonement, is actually a reminder of sin year after year after year. So when the priest every year takes that animal and slaughters it and then goes in and sprinkles it on the altar, and every single year, this is a reminder of the sinfulness of God’s people. And at least in the way that the Hebrew writer is making this argument here in Hebrews 10, Christ is one sacrifice for all time. And this results in the end in verse 17 of Hebrews chapter 10.

I’ll remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more. They’re done away with.

Now, again, understand the imagery. I know we’re doing some deep work here, but the temple, there’s a physical reminder at all times within the temple that you have no access to God. There is restricted access to the presence and to the glory of God. There’s only one person who once a year could bring an offering and sprinkle blood on the mercy seat and do all the things that are talked about in Leviticus 18 and various other places that had to do with sacrifices only one time per year that one person has access. And Christ’s plan and God’s plan and the confidence that we have in God’s plan is that now this access has been opened to everyone. Now we live in an age that is very emotionally focused.

And so I want to balance what I’m doing here with this reality that we are really drawn toward emotion. But we should understand that first century people, they were emotional as well, and they’re emotional about these truths. Emotion is based on the reality of truth. And that’s why from time to time, Paul he just bursts into doxology right in the middle of stating truths about God and about his glory and his grace and his mercy and the plan that God has made for us. And so this fundamental truth that Christ has made away is that no longer are we restricted, are we kept back as the reveil covering, but now we all have open access to the presence and the glory of God. What a marvelous and powerful thought.

That is something that should give us immense confidence and assurance that at any time and in any place, any one of us can approach God. We’ll talk about how that works here in just a moment. We can come before his throne, and he is open to that. Because we have a great high priest who is there by his side interceding for us. We don’t have to wait until the right time of year for the right person to go in there once. We have open access now through his body, his body that is broken. It has done this for us. It has removed this curtain. And so now we have access to the Holy of Holies. But there’s a manner in which this is to be done.

So he says, let us draw near with a true heart or a sincere heart, it might say in some of your translations, and full assurance, that’s confidence, full assurance of faith. So when you have faith in God’s plan, you have confidence that this works. So if you believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that He has sacrificed Himself for the sins of all humanity, if you believe that and you believe that now you have access to the throne of grace to receive mercy in time of need, there’s no reason to not have assurance and confidence. These things they go hand in hand. They go together. But there’s a manner in which this is to happen. Now, in your English translations, it may come through in a way that doesn’t quite give us the right perspective.

So mine says, with our hearts, it uses this word with to try to indicate the fact that this has already happened. But I’m going to explain a little bit more about what this is here in just a moment. With our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. So in Greek, this is what is called a participle construction. You don’t have to know what that means, other than it’s kind of a continuing action, right? And even more so here, this is a perfect participle. So my English majors here are starting to grasp what’s going on here. This is something that has been done. Right? So it’s really the idea, the word with is kind of carrying a lot of weight in this sentence, is what I’m trying to say.

It’s like you’re doing this with something already having happened. Okay. So it could be more precisely if we wanted to give kind of a wooden translation or a longer translation, which is a little bit more difficult to pronounce and work our way through. It’s our hearts having been sprinkled clean from an evil conscience, and our bodies having been washed with pure water. So the manner in which we approach the throne of grace to find mercy in time of need is actually just like the priests did in the Old Testament. They didn’t just walk into the Holy of Holies casually.

Just going to bust in that curtain and bring some blood and throw it on there. No, they had to go through a process, and part of that process was actually washing and cleansing. You don’t get to come into the presence of God if you’re not consecrated, if you’re not holy, if you’ve not been cleansed. And the idea of the sprinkling of blood, this cleansing of the conscience. So right, so it’s both mind and body that are being taken care of, even under the old system. The sprinkling of the blood is the idea of forgiveness and atonement, that the sins that we’ve committed are now being atoned for. And our evil conscience now is being cleansed from the sprinkling of blood. But also our bodies are being washed with pure water before we come into the presence of God.

No one in antiquity would have any issue or idea with the concept that you would wash your body before being able to come into the presence of God. That is just normal. It’s even normal in pagan religion. There’s something important about cleansing. And so today it’s the same way. We come with a true heart, a sincere heart and full faith. And we do this having had our bodies washed and our consciences cleaned and sprinkled clean with the blood of Christ, to now come into the presence of God and we can do that anytime. Maybe right now you’re thinking of things in your life that have not been right, that you’ve struggled with sins you’ve committed. And one of the reasons we do what we’re doing in a time like this morning is to help us work through some of those things sometimes, where we can come before the throne of grace and seek mercy in time of need.

And it may even be right now that you’re realizing that, and God is available. If you’ve washed your body, if you’ve been cleansed with the blood of Christ, He is available to hear your cares and your concerns. He is sympathetic to the things that you go through as a human. And the early part of Hebrews talks all about how he experienced that himself without sin. So he understands what it’s like. And it’s this amazing plan that God has put in place that demonstrates both his love and his care and his concern and his justice over his creation. And so, in all of that, if we are coming with sincere faith, if we’re coming with a true heart, if we’re going about things the way God has told us to go about them, we can have immense confidence that God is there and he is listening and he’s ready to show mercy.

2. Boldly Confess the Hope Without Wavering

And then the second part of this, which goes with the idea again of truth, is that as God’s people who realize this truth or this reality, we should be confessing this. We should be boldly confessing. That’s really the idea of being unwavering, right? As he talks about this in the deck, let us hold fast the confession of our hope. So, right, we’re confessing the hope. We’re confessing the hope that we have because of what I just went through. The whole story of God and his plan and how he is bringing people back to himself and he’s redeeming a lost humanity. Because of that, now we have this hope. And he says, Let us confess that hope and let us do it without wavering. Why would people waver?

I think in the setting of the letter of Hebrews, clearly there’s some persecution. Clearly, people are being ostracized for their faith. And the temptation when we’re in that setting is to sort of keep quiet. You know, we just quietly do our thing and try to stay out of the mess. And maybe we have that temptation today as well. The way our world is anti-God and anti-Christ, anti-morals, anti-almost everything that is good and worthwhile. It is tempting to just stay quiet. Or maybe even in the presence of people in the world to abandon what we actually think is true and right. And it seems like, based on the context here in Hebrews 10, that some people were just making a habit of no longer meeting with God’s people.

Probably because of the pressure of their world. A pressure that honestly we probably can’t really understand because their world is fully pagan. And the Christians in that Hellenized world would have been blamed for all sorts of things that happened, natural disasters, you know, the judgments that came down from other rulers. It’s your fault because you don’t serve the gods. You don’t go about the things the way we do, and so this is you’re to blame for this. Certainly within Roman cities, that would have been the case. And so it’s easy to see why they would be ostracized for their behavior and the things that they’re doing. They seem to be a threat even to Rome. And at times the emperor looks at them with disdain. And so our world may not be quite like that at the moment.

But there certainly are times in which we are tempted to just be quiet. And to not stand up for what is true and right. And what the Hebrew writer is saying is don’t do that. Boldly confess truth. This truth that we just talked about. And in the part we read here toward the end of this chapter, he says, hey, remember what it was like at the very beginning. A lot of times we start off really strong, don’t we? And as humans, it’s it’s tough. You’ve probably experienced this. Maybe those of you who’ve worked out or you started running or dieting or whatever the thing is that you’re trying to do, we start really strong a lot of times, don’t we? But then over time it gets a little bit harder and more difficult, and we our commitment starts to wane.

Remember the former days. He said, remember back when you were willing to even suffer reproach and affliction. And even if it wasn’t you had fellowship with those who were treated this way. That’s what that idea of partner is there. It’s still a form of the word koinonia to have fellowship with those who are being mistreated. Who of us wants to do that? If someone’s being mistreated or they’re being canceled in our culture, the temptation there is to get as far away as possible. And what the Hebrew writer here is telling them is remember how you stood up for those people. You stood by their side, you had fellowship with them in the midst of their trial and difficulty and suffering. And so boldly confess truth.

And of course, the reason for this is pretty simple for he who promised is faithful. Now there’s elements of this I want to come back to as I kind of get to the rest of where I want to go this morning, which is the second part of this. But he is prom he who has promised is faithful, and also judgment is coming. So these two elements sort of go together. Toward the end of the chapter, yet a little while, and the coming one will come and will not delay, but my righteous one shall live by faith. He’s sort of joining a couple different Old Testament passages together here to take this quote. But basically, the point is, God is going to do the things he said he’s going to do.

3. Stir Up One Another to Love and Good Works

And he is trustworthy and faithful. And so boldly confess your hope because it’s going to come about, it’s going to happen. It’s not going to be something that God abandons. But then there’s this next part of the text, which is really ultimately where I wanted to spend a lot of time this morning, because I think the truth part, probably nothing I’ve said this morning any of you have disagreed with. I think that’s probably fair.

A commitment to God to love the Lord your God with all your heart, your soul, your mind, and your strength, and love your neighbor as yourself is really combining the idea of truth and relationship together in one. And of course, this is everything hangs on this, Jesus says. These two elements together. And I’ll just be honest with you, where I was thinking through a lot of this is yesterday, if you’re visiting with us, sorry, you’re just gonna have to catch up to what’s going on, and that’s okay. But yesterday we had a pig roast at the walker’s house. you know, these are just great things. This is something great to do. And we should see the importance of something like this, not just as a fun time to get together and hang out, but as God’s people in this place living life together, and the spiritual elements of what matters with mind and body, it is so significant that God’s people know each other and love each other and spend time together and have occasions like that where we are built up, where we are encouraged, where we are stirred up to love and to good works.

This is the sort of point that’s being made here in Hebrews chapter 10. Yes, there is the truth element of this which cannot be abandoned. And so, you know, this idea of truth and unity. I hope you understand that there is no unity if we don’t found it on truth. And so you’ve got to have truth, but that truth then should pull people together as one. And this is where he’s heading here, and he actually does this a few times within the letter, he’ll do it again in chapter 12, saying that we need to strengthen each other and we need to find those who are weak and build them up. But in this text here, he says, let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works.

So let me just first point out that this is not just something that just happens randomly. You know, it’s like I’m gonna live my life, and then just randomly I’m gonna think about how to encourage somebody. That is in opposition to the idea of consideration. It takes consideration, it takes thought and forethought to think about how we’re gonna go about doing this in our culture as well. It’s not just about receiving encouragement and being stirred up, which is great. I mean, we all want to do that, but it’s also about giving encouragement, purposely setting out to encourage and to stir up and go about things in my life in such a way that my brethren are built up by my presence. That they’re built up at least in these two ways, very broadly speaking, in love, that they’re growing in love, right?

This elements he has here, that they’re growing in love and in works and deeds, and there’s sort of like a cyclical nature to this, right? Because love is not just a thought or an idea or an emotion, it’s it’s it’s substantive based on action. And so we know there’s love when we act in a loving way or we sacrifice or whatever it might be. There’s a there’s a connection there to behavior that actually matters. And so something like yesterday or various other events that present themselves where God’s people are going to be together, are opportunities beyond just what happens here. And this is an exceptional opportunity, and something that I probably is specifically what the writer’s talking about, at least in this situation, about those who are neglecting the assembling, right?

Local assembling is really the idea of that term there. But you know, the Hebrew writer actually talks about things beyond this. and their life is quite a bit different than ours, and I think we have to recognize that. They live in closer quarters, they’re they’re around each other, they it’s easier for them to interact. And you can even see this in some of the language of how this works. For example, back in Hebrews chapter 3, he’s dealing with some other things here about Moses and Jesus and how Christ is a better over his house, he’s the builder of the house, and we are God’s house, and there’s a lot of really neat things going on there. But verse 12, he says, Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God, but exhort one another every day as long as it’s called today.

Why? That none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. And he goes on, for if we’ve come to share or have fellowship in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end. So there’s the idea of confidence again. This confidence that we should have in the plan of God, the Hebrew writer very specifically says is bolstered or encouraged or prodded on by the reality that we are together exhorting each other daily.

Or who are you exhorting every day? And how is that happening? What’s the functional process by which that’s taking place? Are we able to accomplish that if we’re just doing this Sunday morning? Sunday morning only, or Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday? Are we accomplishing what the Hebrew writer is saying here about avoiding the deceitfulness, being hardened by the deceitfulness of sin, if our interaction is really just limited to two days a week and a few hours?

I would say the obvious answer is no. And in ancient culture, they didn’t, we talk about secular and spiritual. Like we have this kind of divide. Your life is your life, and secular and spiritual go together. And so they don’t see this great divide between I’m going to have my secular life over here where I do my work and go to every day and do the things every day, and then over here I’m going to do the spiritual stuff. I mean, certainly in reality, in functionality, there are spiritual things. There are what they would call cultic practices where you go to the temple or you do something very specific in worship, and then there are day-to-day activities, but let my steps be worship, right? Let my thoughts be praise.

We just sang that. It is an attitude or an idea that is ever present, not just in the days of local assembly. And there’s a functional purpose to this in which it helped us helps us not be hardened to sin. Right? We are supposed to be living life together. And if you’re from some from somewhere else, you’re supposed to be living life together with your people at your local place. That’s the intention. That’s God’s purpose and God’s wisdom behind local churches. It’s not just to come together every once in a while and worship, it’s that we live life together and that we’re exhorting each other daily, that we’re finding ways to spend time together and to uplift and build up. How did the first century church go about doing this?

4. Living Life Together Like the First Century Church

You know, we want to, we always talk about we want to be like the first century church. Well, we see some ways that they did this. We can go back to the very beginning in Acts chapter 2.

In Acts chapter 2, we sort of have the summaries that Luke gives, which interestingly, he gives these summaries that are kind of a take even verbally on Plato’s Republic. So Plato’s Republic would have been well understood and well known. Kind of the ideal community is discussed in specific ways. And those specific ways is commonality and shared resources. So Plato talks about this fourth century, well before the time of Christ. Now, Luke is not trying to endear adherence to Plato. That’s not really his purpose, but he lives in a culture and a time that understands what an ideal community is supposedly supposed to look like. And so he pulls on those thoughts and those ideas and says, Hey, this is it. This is the ideal community. You found it.

It’s in Jesus Christ. They devoted themselves, it says to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers, and all came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs are being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all as any had need. And day by day attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received to their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having saved. Now there’s a lot there. My specific focus where I wanted to look is really those last two verses, 46 and 47. Day by day they’re in the temple.

And they’re breaking bread in their homes. They’re receiving that food with glad and generous hearts, praising God in the process, and notice having favor with all the people. It sets them apart. The testimony of truth and the testimony of unity. Right? Every day they’re in the temple and they’re speaking truth and they’re preaching the resurrection of Jesus. They’re doing wonders and signs. They’re also having all things in common, and they’re sharing meals together. And they’re praising God for the things that are happening, and everyone around them is looking at them in favor for what’s happening. It’s pretty powerful stuff. At least the people around them thought so. They were drawn to this. Well, let’s look at another one. Acts chapter 4. Acts chapter 4, verse 32.

Now the full number of those who believed were of one heart and soul. And no one said that any of the things that belonged to him was his own, but they had everything in common. And with great power the apostles were giving their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. There was not a needy person among them. For as many as were owners of lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold, and laid at the apostles’ feet, and were distributing to each as any had need. Again, the commonality, the power of the preaching of the truth of the resurrection of Jesus, combined with a united force of people who are in common, who are a community of people who believe and come together in this belief in Jesus Christ.

5. Table Fellowship Relates to Gospel Truth

But you know, it’s interesting, even in the negative stories about some of these things, we see the importance of what I think we would call the social interaction of God’s people. There’s warnings, apostolic concern about such social situations, and this kind of shows their importance to the life of God’s people. These situations are somewhat assumed, but they should also be in keeping with the truth. So I’m thinking specifically here of Galatians 2. Galatians 2 is a text where the message of the gospel has spread. It is spread to Gentile territory. And you may remember in Acts 10 that Peter is kind of this important figure in all of this. You know, the whole story says, Rise, kill, and eat, and he says, I’ve never eaten anything that’s unclean, and all of this whole thing.

And then Peter goes to the circumcision and says, Hey, God said to do this, the Holy Spirit fell on people. We can’t deny that. And they are all silent, and they say, You’re right. You know, we can’t. We have to go along with what God says. And so truth, we’ve got truth here, but then truth isn’t always backed up in practice. It’s not always backed up in relationship. And unfortunately, we find Peter struggling with this, and fortunately, we find Paul willing to confront him to his face.

For before certain men came from James, he was eating with the Gentiles. But when they came, he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party. And the rest of the Jews acted hypocritically along with him, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy. But when I saw that their conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas, before them all, if you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how could you force the Gentiles to live like Jews? Now there’s a whole logical sequence we’re not going to get into there with what Paul’s doing, but I just want to point out what’s happening here. God’s people are eating together. And some Jews show up, and suddenly Peter changes his behavior.

Peter’s an influential figure, and when he does that, it even pulls Barnabas away, who is typically one who is encouraging to others. And yet that behavior in that social circumstance where people are eating together is so significant that Paul confronts Peter to his face and says, This is not in keeping with the truth of the gospel. And so something even like table fellowship can relate to gospel truth. It’s that significant. Who we’ll eat with or who we won’t, or who we will associate with, or who we won’t. Those things matter when it comes to the truth of the gospel, because the gospel is for all who believe. To the Jew first, and even to the Greek equally, Paul argues in various places. The influence can be damaging.

Right, so let me stop for just a moment before you think I’m riding you this morning and just say one of the reasons I feel really comfortable preaching this morning is because I love how this church does this. Right? We have times where people have people to their homes and we get together, inviting everyone and others who want to come. And so I’m not harping on you this morning. I’m encouraged by what we do in a huge way, but I want us to understand the importance of it. And the importance of it, just it goes beyond just a nice social event. There’s more to it than that. There’s more significant things happening than just hanging out and talking for a few minutes. There are relationships being built, we’re getting to know one another.

There’s encouragement that’s happening, the stirring up that’s taking place. And so these things matter. And on the other side of that, if they’re not done well, if they’re not done properly, they can actually be damaging. And so there’s a few places in scripture that talk about this. Galatians 2 is one of them. But it shows that the influence, even of a good person like Peter, in a moment where he’s not going about this the right way, can be damaging to other people. And so Jude even gets deeper about this. Jude warns about those who he says have crept in unnoticed, hidden reefs at your love feast as they feast with you. These are grumblers, malcontents, following their own sinful desires. They are loudmouth boasters showing favoritism to gain advantage.

That’s quite the list. I just have to ask myself and think about when I’m in these moments where I’m sharing meals with you, with some of you. Am I a complainer? Am I a grumbler? Am I a malcontent? If I am I just looking out for my own interest and the things I’m thinking and saying. And of course, Paul talks about this in Philippians 2 as well. We consider one another’s interests, and we put others’ interests before our own. And so, like I said, there’s many other passages we go to talk about these sorts of ideas, but I just want us to see the significance of what happens in something like when we share a meal together. Well, what about 1 Corinthians 5? Remember that text?

1 Corinthians 5, let’s go there and look at it. Paul is warning them about certain types of behavior and people to be weary of. And there’s some egregious sin going on in the first part of this text. And then the end is a little bit more general. He says in verse 9, I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with the sexually immoral people. Not at all, meaning the sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and swindlers or idolaters. Since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I’m writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother, if he is guilty of sexual morality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler, not even to eat with such a one.

Wow. Why does he say that?

Because who we eat with matters. Table fellowship is important. And God’s wisdom is profound. And even though it is hard for us to accept sometimes, there are times when some should not be included in things that are happening. We don’t like that. We don’t like to exclude. But God in his wisdom has said that’s a means of pulling somebody back to, remember we started, truth. And so there’s something that is shared by those who have common belief, who have sincere hearts and true faith. There’s something that’s shared by those people that goes beyond even just worship that goes into our social lives, the ways we interact. And he says, you don’t have that with someone who claims to be this and yet lives in sin.

You shouldn’t even share a meal with them. Because those things matter. They’re important.

6. Not Neglecting to Meet Together

And so the Hebrew writer says, not neglecting to meet together. As is the habit of some. Don’t miss opportunities. If at all possible, don’t miss these great opportunities, both to worship with brethren and to spend time with brethren, to find opportunities to stir up and to encourage. Don’t underestimate the value of events like a pig roast like we had yesterday. Or other times we get together to participate together in a meal and to encourage and to grow in our knowledge and love for one another.

Conclusion

So if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another. And if we are, if we’re holding fast to truth, if we have a sincere heart, if we have true faith, that then he’s saying is going to bring us into partnership, into fellowship with others who are doing the same. We’re going to live life together. And we’re going to be an encouragement and we’re going to build each other up. And when we genuinely care for and build each other up, we show the world the reality of the gospel’s transforming power. Not just through truth, which is extremely important. It is the foundation, but also through the power of the relationships that we all have, which is something the world desperately wants.

All the things that happen around us in the world, things that we look at with whatever our morals are in comparison, then we look down on some of these events, the things that people rally together for. It’s because they so desperately want a community of people to be with. It’s in their nature. It’s how we’re created. From the very beginning, the fundamentals of God’s truth are centered around really three ideas. The cross, everything leads to the cross and proceeds from the cross. Community or God’s people coming together to do God’s things and new creation. Creation and new creation. That God has the power to create and to recreate. And ultimately, he’s going to create a new heavens and a new earth. And that’s where everything is headed.

And so don’t underestimate the power of community and what that means for God’s people. And the impact it can have in the world that God has created. So that’s my encouragement for you this morning to see the good things that you’re doing by being with one another, by stirring up one another, by taking part, having fellowship with fellow believers. And see the impact you have on each other, and that you can have favor with all the people around you as they see this testimony of truth and the testimony of unity that makes you different from the other things they see in the world. Maybe you need to be a part of God’s people this morning and you aren’t yet. We ran through how that works, at least in a very general way, that you come with a heart or a mind that is sprinkled clean from an evil conscience, and that your body, your body matters to God, and it’s washed with pure water.

That you enter the water full of sin, but you come out of the water purified, forgiven. And those sins can be remembered no more, and you become part of God’s people. You’re not just individually forgiven. It’s not just that it’s about you, but it’s that you become part of God’s kingdom and his people. And we want to help you do that this morning. Come now as we stand and we sing.