Today’s message is from Hebrews 13:8-16. Today’s passage overlaps last week’s passage slightly. I included verse 8 in both last week’s passage and today’s passage. Verse 8 says, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” That means that his purpose doesn’t change, his plans don’t change, his truth doesn’t change—that his truth is the actual, real truth, not what men may think is “truth”, but what is really true. Jesus is the Judge and he is the Redeemer. What he says brings glory and honor and immortality, does bring glory and honor and immortality. It still does and it still will. What Jesus says brings wrath and anger and condemnation, still brings wrath and anger and condemnation. Jesus is Judge and he is Savior.

Also, I encourage each of you to read your Bible every day. Study and meditate on the word of God. Make every effort to understand what God is telling you through his word. Pray. You need the word of God to sustain your life. If you stop reading it, you may not starve right away, but you will surely grow weak.

⁹Do not be carried away by all kinds of strange teachings. It is good for our hearts to be strengthened by grace, not by ceremonial foods, which are of no value to those who eat them. ¹⁰We have an altar from which those who minister at the tabernacle have no right to eat.

¹¹The high priest carries the blood of animals into the Most Holy Place as a sin offering, but the bodies are burned outside the camp. ¹²And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through his own blood. ¹³Let us, then, go to him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace he bore. ¹⁴For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come.

“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. Do not be carried away by all kinds of strange teachings.” The principles of Jesus’s teaching do not change. What he says we must do, we must do! What he says we must not do, we must not do! And Jesus’s teachings are not just what he is quoted as saying in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John (and a few other places). What the writer of Hebrews is telling us is also Jesus’s teaching—and all the word of God, as well.

What are the strange teachings that we must not be carried away by? What is strange? What does the word mean? (We talked about entertaining strangers last week. It’s the same root. It’s xenos in English.) Strange is foreign or alien. The strange teachings that the writer of Hebrews is talking about are teachings that are foreign or alien to the gospel.

Just what is the gospel by the way? [- - - - - anybody? - - - - -] Well, the word gospel means good message or good news. It’s used in various ways in the Bible, but the definition we usually use is from 1 Corinthians. Here’s what it says. This is the apostle Paul writing:

The writer of Hebrews has oriented his teaching—the Holy Spirit has oriented his teaching—toward Jewish believers. In this passage he is addressing the temptation of the Jewish believers to go back to trusting Old Testament ritual rather than Jesus Christ and the message of the gospel. I’ll say more about that in a minute, but first I want to point out how people may be carried away by foreign teachings today.

There are many foreign teachings these days. There are the world religions—Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam and so forth. There are religions where they worship spirits. These religions are all contrary to the word of God. And while they may have some teachings in common with Christianity—taking care of the needy, doing good works, being humble—they have one thing in common that is different from Christianity. They teach that we are not saved by God’s grace and mercy—that we are not saved because Jesus died for our sins and rose from the dead—but that we are saved by doing good works or by performing the right rituals. And the world religions don’t even agree on what salvation is. Most of them teach reincarnation. But we believe and teach what the word of God says—that we will be like Jesus. We will have imperishable bodies like his imperishable body. We will have eternal life. And we will be pure and Holy and righteous, just as he is pure and holy and righteous.

There are also religions that purport to be Christian but have teachings that are contrary to the word of God. The Jehovah Witnesses say that Jesus is a created being. The word of God says that he is without beginning of days or end of life. (“Without father or mother, without genealogy, without beginning of days or end of life, like the Son of God he remains a priest forever.” –Hebrews 7:3) The Jehovah Witnesses’ teachings depart from the word of God in other ways, too. They have a different teaching about the resurrection of the dead and eternal life. I believe they are exclusive, too. That is they believe that you have to join the Jehovah witnesses in order to be saved. I’ve had Jehovah Witnesses tell me that.

I think the appeal of this type of group is the exclusivity: “We have something that you don’t. We know something that you don’t know. We have salvation and you don’t. If you want to be saved, come and join us.” So beware of the appeal of having something special by joining a group. But, we do have something special. We do have eternal life. But we don’t have it because we’ve joined a group. We have it because we’ve trusted Jesus! I’ve had Jehovah Witnesses claim exclusivity, but I’ve also had Jehovah Witnesses tell me that they believe that we are saved by grace through faith, just as other Christians believe and are saved. (I think some of them are saved by grace, but most are not.)

Then there are also the Mormons. .I won’t go into any detail about them. They talk about Jesus, but I’m not sure whether or not they really believe he was here on earth as a man or that he even exists. They teach that God (not Jesus) was a man at one time and that we have the potential of becoming gods just as a man became God—not very much like what the word of God teaches. It appeals to pride.

Islam is also a religion that appeals to pride. Any religion that teaches that you can save yourself by doing enough good works appeals to pride. You want to be able to say that you did it yourself. “I am great! I saved myself! (And by the way, the ‘good works’ for some of them is killing as many Christians and Jews or any other non-Muslims as they can.)

Then there are teaching such as what we call “the gospel of health and wealth”. God wants you to be prosperous and to succeed in everything you do. He also wants you to have good health and long life, and if you are sick, he wants to heal you. If you live a good Christian life and help those who are in need, you’ll have all these things. I think this teaching is based on the Lord’s promise to Israel that he would give them good health and prosperity if they would keep his commands. But this was a promise to the nation of Israel as a whole and not to individual. (By the way, some of this teaching goes as far as to say that it doesn’t have anything to do with how you live. Just “name it and claim it!” Some preacher said a long time ago, “Just go down to the Cadillac store and put your hand on the Cadillac and claim it.”)

If all these things that I’ve just said are true, why do we have sickness and why aren’t we all rich. Jesus healed everyone who asked for healing as far as we know. He raised the dead. And people the apostles prayed for were also raised from the dead. Maybe we aren’t righteous enough. Or maybe we just aren’t “laying our hands on the Cadillac”. (Sometimes, before you do that—claim the Cadillac, you have to send money. Maybe that’s the problem.)

But, the apostles didn’t expect everyone to be healed. The apostle Paul himself wasn’t healed. He apparently had trouble with his eyes. And there was the thorn in his flesh. (Maybe it was the trouble with his eyes, but probably something different. He called it a “messenger from Satan”.) Jesus told Paul that he wasn’t going to take it away because his power was made complete through Paul’s weakness.

Then there’s the “word-faith” movement. When God created the heavens and the earth, he created each thing by speaking. We have that power, too. When we speak, our words have power in the spiritual realm. We can make things happen in the physical realm by what we say. So we have to be careful of what we say—say only positive things: “I am healed. I am healed. I am healed...” We may bring about a bad result if we say the wrong thing. That won’t happen either. Again, this is an appeal to pride and power. According to this teaching, God gives you power to cause things to happen, but you are more-or-less free to use that power for good or evil. Again, the Bible doesn’t give any hint that these things are true. So beware.

There’s another teaching that has been around for quite a while. The teaching is about setting “boundaries”. These are not physical boundaries or boundaries that you set in obedience to God or to keep from sin. They are boundaries that you set to keep yourself from being imposed upon too much by other people. They are self-protection boundaries.

There was a book with the title Boundaries published in 1992. On the front of the book jacket it says, “How to take control of your life.” That’s what the authors wanted to teach. But the word of God says, “You are not your own; you were bought at a price.” The teaching of scripture is certainly that you cannot take control of your life. It isn’t yours! Your life is under God’s control. We are told (by the word of God) that we must humble ourselves under God’s mighty hand. And that anyone who wants to save his own life will lose it, but anyone who loses his life for Jesus and for the gospel will keep it for eternal life. You are not humbling yourself if you are trying to take control of your life!

I could talk for at least a couple of hours about what is wrong with the Boundaries book, maybe much longer. The authors quote scripture all the way through the book, but what they quote almost never supports what they are teaching. I’ll give just one example. The authors make this statement: “The goal of this chapter is to enable you to define your intangible [as opposed to physical] boundaries and recognize them as an ever present reality that can increase your love and save your life. In reality, these boundaries define your soul, and they help you to guard it and maintain it.” (Notice save your life as opposed to losing it for Jesus and for the gospel.) The context of this quote (and the purpose of the entire book) is to promote the idea that you have to protect yourself from being imposed upon too much by others. The authors use Proverbs 4:23 to support this. Here’s what it says: “Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life.” This seems to support what they are teaching, doesn’t it? But if you look at the context, it says something different. I’m going to read it—Proverbs 4:20-27):

The Boundaries authors use Proverbs 4:23 to support the idea of saving your life from others being too much of a burden on you. But the entire context makes it clear that Proverbs 4:23 is about avoiding sin (put away perversity from your mouth—fix your gaze directly before you—do not swerve to the right or to the left) not about protecting youself from being burdened by others.

Now here’s the reason I’m making such a big deal about this. The reason I’m making such a big deal is that the Boundaries book appeals to selfishness. The ideas sound like they make great sense humanly speaking, but the appeal is to the flesh. And furthermore, we are told that the authors’ teachings are supported by Scripture! (Wouldn’t it be great if you could use Scripture to support being selfish? Actually, it wouldn’t, but the idea certainly has a lot of appeal.)

Now, do you want to know just how much appeal the idea that selfishness is supported by Scripture has? I’ll tell you. The Boundaries book was first published in 1992. Most new books are popular in the first few weeks after publication. They may even be on the “best seller” list. But after a few weeks their popularity dies down. The Boundaries book was published in 1992, but in the year 2000, eight years later, it was the number one best selling Christian book! And it’s still available in the latest CBD catalog (with study guides and CD’s, no less). So beware of teachings that appeal to the flesh—selfishness. Jesus was not selfish.

The author of Hebrews is comparing the gospel with the ceremonies that went with the Law of Moses. (By the way, most of what I have been saying and will say is about things to watch out for. But, if you really don’t have any problem with any of these things, you still need to understand them so that you will be able to warn others who may be drawn in by them.) In verse 9, the author of Hebrews is comparing the message of gospel with the ceremonies that went with the Law of Moses. The Jews were tempted to put their hope in observing the various rituals of the Law rather than in Jesus Christ. But I don’t think any of us have that temptation. So how does this apply to us? Well, we may acknowledge that we are not saved by rituals, but we can still be fooled by them.

I grew up in the Methodist Church. Our “order of worship” was more fixed and formal that what we do here at LHF. It was somewhat more liturgical. We recited the Lord’s Prayer and creeds as a regular part of the worship service. It was all very predictable and comfortable. I felt soothed and relaxed after a worship service, peaceful. We had communion quarterly. We went up front and knelt down to receive the bread and the grape juice. I felt close to God.

Much later, after I had understanding of the gospel, I decided that all this was false! The feelings of peace and closeness to God were false! We have to be careful not to be fooled by feelings. Tom, when he leads us in the Lord ’s Supper tries to vary what he says from week to week just so that we might avoid the false feeling induced by rituals. (I haven’t been so diligent, ether because I have been to busy and hurried or because I am too lazy. You choose.)

We used to vary the way we actually partook in the Lord ’s Supper, too. Sometimes we would serve each other. Sometimes deacons or elders would take the bread and the wine around to everyone. Sometimes we would go up and help ourselves as we do now. Anyway, be careful not to be fooled by feelings. It’s what you think and what you do that counts.

And speaking of what you think, verse 9 says that it’s good for our hearts to be strengthened by grace and not by ceremonial foods (by rituals, that is). The word that’s translated heart really means heart. But it doesn’t mean what we usually think heart means in this context. We usually think of the word heart as referring to emotions or feelings. (Remember beware of feelings?) The word translated heart actually means what we think of as mind. It’s what you use to think with—your mind. The word that’s translated mind, on the other hand, generally refers to your way of thinking or your mindset. When the apostle Paul said, “We have the mind of Christ,” what he was really saying was “We think as Christ does. (Can you say, “We think like Christ”? Do you think like Christ? Do you remember “What would Jesus do”? Anyway, if you don’t believe me about this, check out all the uses of the word heart in the New Testament—and all the uses of the word mind. There are places where the word heart make sense whether you are talking about your feelings or about your mind. And there are other places where mind clearly makes more sense. But I don’t think there are any places where only feelings makes sense. (If you find one, let me know.)

OK. What I just said isn’t quite right. There are three place where the word heart in the NIV refers to emotions or feelings. But the word that’s translated heart in the NIV (the translation we are using) in these places is not the same word that’s translated heart all the other place where heart is used. In the King James this word is translated bowels. It means insides. And besides being used to refer to your internal organs, it is used figuratively to refer to your feelings and emotions. The lexicons (those are dictionaries, for those of you who don’t know) say, “our heart, the seat of our affections and emotions”. So heart doesn’t mean heart. Insides means heart. Several places the word is translated as affection, tenderness, or compassion. In the NIV, it’s actually translated heart in three places, as I mentioned. (Did you all follow that?)

¹¹The high priest carries the blood of animals into the Most Holy Place as a sin offering, but the bodies are burned outside the camp. ¹²And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through his own blood.¹³Let us, then, go to him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace he bore. (Hebrews 13:10-13)

What is the altar that we have a right to that those who follow all the Jewish ceremonial laws—those who minister at the tabernacle—have no right to? And, in fact, just what is an altar? The root of the word for altar refers to slaughter or sacrifice. The altar is the place where you make sacrifices to God. The Jewish ritual required that the blood of the sacrificial animals be sprinkled on one of the altars as atonement for sin. But this is not our altar. What is our altar? Some people say that the altar that we have figuratively refers to Jesus. Others say that it refers to the cross. I don’t have the answer. But there is a heavenly altar by the heavenly tabernacle where Jesus offered his own blood to make atonement for our sin. Because of Jesus’s sacrifice, we can come to God directly without rituals that have to be performed by priests. Those who follow rituals have no right to that altar! It’s the altar of grace.

According to verse 12, Jesus suffered outside the city gate. That’s where he was crucified. The bodies of the sacrificial animals that were sacrificed by the priests were also taken out of the camp to be burned. If anyone brought a sacrificial animal to be sacrificed as a sin offering, he was to lay his hand on the animal’s head, presumably as a symbol of transferring the sin to the animal. After the blood was sprinkled on the altar, the body was burned. God the Father transferred our sin to Jesus when he was crucified. As the sacrificial animal was destroyed, so our sin is also destroyed.

The writer of Hebrews is telling his readers to also go outside the camp and bear the disgrace as Jesus did. Jesus took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows. He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. (I’m quoting from Isaiah chapter 53.) We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth. Jesus was completely humble. He was beaten and spat upon and disgraced. He said nothing. He died. But God raised him from the dead. When we are tempted to demand our rights, we need to think about Jesus—about his humility—about his trusting God. It was God that raised him from the dead. If Jesus had demanded and had received “his rights” we would all still be dead in our sins and transgression.

And I don’t mean to imply that we should just accept mistreatment. What I mean is that our attitudes should be the same as the attitude of Jesus. He made himself nothing and came down from heaven to be crucified for our sin. In reality, before God, we have no rights except the right to have eternal life through Jesus’s sacrifice. We have no rights, but we do have something better. We have God’s grace!

Lets look at verse 14: “For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come.” This how we should think. We are storing up treasure in heaven. All material things, all status and power in the world, will be gone. We need to look forward to our inheritance in heaven.

I’ve hardly scratched the surface in these teachings. If anyone thinks he can be saved by rituals, the blood of Jesus is of absolutely no value to him. That’s a serious situation. It means that you are lost and without hope. The word of God (written by the apostle Paul) says that in Galatians. Galatians is a warning to those who were teaching that you had to be circumcised to be saved. But I am confident that this warning applies to anyone who thinks he is saved by rituals. And circumcision is just one ritual. All it takes is thinking that there is just one ritual that you have to do in order to be saved—no other rituals—for Christ to be of no value to you. The apostle Paul says, “You who are trying to be justified by law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace.” Definitely not a good thing

Also, we are told in Galatians that one of the results of their believing that they were saved by works was that, instead of loving each other, they were “biting and devouring each other” and that if they kept it up they would destroy each other! It has to do with pride. The same thing happens to any group that tries to live by rules an regulations instead of by faith!

I’m going to close by reading Hebrews 13:20 and 21 (as I did last week and probably will again): “May the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.)