Sunday Morning Service 10:30AM- Be Faithful - Hebrews 3:7-19 -Pastor Ryan Nichols

Good morning, church family. It's really good to see you guys. I'm really glad you're here. I want to invite you to stand with us. We'll pray and we'll get started.

Lord, we just come before you this morning. We thank you again for another day. Thank you for allowing us to be here. Lord, as we enter in this time of worship, Lord, I just pray that we would sit everything that's going on in our lives aside to focus on you and to lavish praise upon you, Lord, to give you all honor and glory this morning. We ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen.

We sing to the God who owns. Then he rose up from that grave. My God's still rolling stone.

Now we're unforgiven, accepted, redeemed by his grace. Let the house of the Lord be quiet. We shout out and have a seat if you'd like.

In the land that is plentiful, where your streams of abundance flow, blessed be your name. Blessed be your name. When I'm found in the desert place, though I walk through the wilderness, blessed be your name. Every blessing you pour out, I'll turn back to praise. When the darkness comes, I'll turn back to praise. When the darkness comes, I'll turn back to praise.

When the sun's shining down on me, as it should be, blessed be your name. Every blessing you pour out, I'll turn back to praise. When the darkness comes, I'll turn back to praise. When the darkness comes, I'll turn back to praise. You washed in His, He did for me. I trusted my Savior, my song.

And He answered, that's why I trust Him. That's why I trust Him. I sought the Lord and He heard. I sought the Lord and He heard. And He answered, I sought the Lord and He heard. That's why I trust Him. That's why I trust Him.

the lord trusted that's why i answered i sought the answer that's why i saved my sorrow when dead your love made a way to let mercy come when death was arrested and my life began ash was redeemed only my feet broke when death was arrested and my life began god we just thank you for the new life that we have in you lord for a new beginning god that we can reckon the old man to be dead you give us new life free from our old one lord god and we just thank you so much and we give you praise this morning and now as pastor ryan comes lord i just pray that you would move mightily by the power of your holy spirit this morning you give him the focus the wisdom and the words that he needs give us an ear to hear and a heart to

receive it we love you lord god and we praise you in jesus name all god's people said amen let's take some time and greet one another good morning if you could begin to locate your seat grab a bulletin we'll get ready to go over some announcements welcome to calvary chapel i'm glad that you have joined us this morning a handful of things to take note of over on the left hand side are the things that go on the left hand side are the things that go on the right hand side are the things that go on throughout the week as always over in the middle section a reminder that tonight is our intercessory prayer time at six o'clock down at the other end of the hallway if you're able to make it to that and then a reminder about our march madness event that is

coming up on march the 21st and one thing to be aware of is that there's a table set up out there remember we mentioned that there's going to be like art that some kids can do that are going to be part of the fundraiser as well so out on the table out there are some five by seven and some eight by ten boards that are available to be picked up that kids can do some artwork on and so if you have an artistic child have them uh do a little work on that we'll we'll uh pledge some money towards that i i'm not an artistic human being but i did think about something i thought i should make a drawing and put it on one of those boards and then you can be like oh look that's what what one of the kids did i'll pledge money towards that only it won't be as

good as the kids i've kind of thought about that like oh yeah i'll buy that guy i'm going to buy that guy's art that's pretty good all right so those are the things that are going on if you would make sure that your mobile device is silenced and for our responsive reading this morning we are going to be in psalm one looking at the new american standard if you need a copy of that there should be one in a row around you and as you are turning to psalm one if you are able please stand in the honor of the reading of god's word i will read the odd verses if you will follow along with pastor allen and the even verses psalm one how blessed is the man who does not walk in the council of the wicked nor stand in the path

of sinners nor sit in the seat of scoffers but his delight is in the law of the lord and in his law he meditates day and night he will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water which yields its fruit and its season and its leaf does not wither and in whatever he does he prospers the wicked are not so but they are like the chaff which the wind drives away therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous for the lord knows the way of the righteous but the way of the wicked will perish and so father this morning we would like to spend some time meditating in your word and so i just ask that your holy spirit would minister to our hearts in your word as you see fit but lord i pray

also that you would be with our world right now lord be with our nation give our leaders wisdom father be with jerusalem we pray for you and we pray for you and we pray for you and we pray for you and we pray for the peace of jerusalem and lord i ask god that you would be with your church throughout the world that is caught in the middle of conflicts that you would keep them close to you and that you would keep them safe and so father move through this time we pray in jesus name amen you may be seated if you would open up in your bibles to the book of hebrews chapter 3 hebrews chapter 3 well as i mentioned in prayer chaos has sort of ensued in the world again and there's a

world right now and i got to thinking i wonder how many times i've had to say this at the beginning of a service over the last six years i feel like more often than not uh i have to say well chaos has ensued uh in in the world again i suppose it's just sort of the world we live in at some point in time but we all kind of know what's taken place with uh with the attack on iran and um and we just have to know that all of the all of the pieces keep lining up according to scripture all of the players from the ezekiel 38 39 battle are in play right now you've got iran uh you've got russia who has already pledged their support of iran and all of these things of

course syria will at some point in time i'm sure want to be involved in this too because they seem to always be involved so all the players are are lining up and so you just need to be aware of that be aware of the fact that biblical prophecy is playing out right in front of us but that's not a reason for us to be concerned it's actually a reason for us to be very excited because we know that god is in control of these things and and so i can't think of a better thing to talk about this than being faithful because the same sort of chaos was ensuing in the world that the writer to the book of hebrews was writing to at this point in time there was there was chaos as far as the

persecution that was taking place and and the church was dealing with a great deal of things and he is going to tell them this exact same thing to to be faithful because when everything else is falling apart the best thing to do is to look to the one who is not and that's jesus amen and so we start in chapter three we look at verse seven and it says this spirit says today if you hear his voice do not harden your hearts as when they provoked me as in the day of the trial in the wilderness where your fathers tried me by testing me and saw my works for 40 years therefore i was angry with this generation and said they always go astray in their hearts and they did not know my ways as i swore in my wrath they shall not enter my rest

take care brethren that there not be in any of you an evil unbelieving heart that falls away from the living god but occur it but encourage one another day after day as long as it is still called today so that none of you will be heartened by the deceitfulness of sin for we have become partakers of christ if we hold fast the beginning of the confidence of our assurance firm until the end while it is said today if you hear his voice do not harden your heart as when they provoked me for who provoked him when they had heard indeed not all those who came did not all those who came out of egypt led by moses and with whom was he angry for 40 years was it not with those

who sinned whose bodies fell in the wilderness and to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest but to those who were disobedient so we see that they were not able to enter because of unbelief and so as the writer to the hebrews gives this exhortation to these hebrew believers there's four things that we want to look at this morning four portions of this exhortation to be faithful that we want to look at this morning and the first one comes in that first set of verses the number one he says do not harden your heart do not harden your heart now i find it important we give just a little bit of a background on this psalm that he quotes from here he's going to quote from psalm 95 verses 7 through 11 but i think it's

important to give a little bit of background as to what he's talking about when he quotes from this psalm the writer to the hebrews had been telling them that jesus was so much better than moses moses somebody who was somebody who they all looked to because he was the one through whom came the law he was the one that was known as the prophet he was a great man within the nation of israel and as he was thinking about moses he was reminded of a story that came out of numbers chapters 13 and 14 you might just write that in the margin of your bible or in your notes go back and read it later but i'm going to tell you a little bit about the story that took place in numbers 13 and 14.

chapter 13 god had brought the children of israel they escaped from egypt they crossed the red sea god gives them the law on mount sinai and he gives them the not only the tablets of commandment but teaches them what it looks like to build the tabernacle they build the tabernacle while they're there at mount sinai and then they depart through the wilderness and as they go through the wilderness god does miraculous things he defeats the amalekites in front of him uh he uh he provides bread every single day what they call manna he provides water for them in the wilderness and leads them but with a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night and they had seen his

provision all through the wilderness through a couple of years of of experience in the wilderness well they come to the edge of the promised land and as they come to the edge of the promised land moses sends in 12 spies right we've all heard this song before and if you haven't it goes like this 12 went down to spy on canaan 10 were bad and two were good right we'll sing that later it's okay i'll teach you the tune later um we'll all have to do the hand motions if you don't do the hand motions you can't stay that's all there is to it um but so we know that story right and so that's what happens 10 of them come back and they're like listen here's the here's the thing

it's a beautiful land it's full of milk and honey there's grapes like you've never seen before the produce of the land is amazing it's everything that god said it would be but there's giants in the land and there's fortified cities and they have huge armies and they have chariots for their armies and they have chariots for their armies and they have chariots for their armies and they have there's no way we can go take the land there's absolutely no way this is impossible and they refuse to believe well there were two guys the two that were good uh who who said no no it's true everything was beautiful it's also true that there's giants it's true that there's fortified

cities it's true that there's chariots with their armies but it's also true that we serve a living god and he is able to give us the land because he has promised the land to us and we need to believe it nobody would listen to joshua and caleb the two good spies instead they believe the 10 bad spies and they would not go in and we find that they would not enter in because of unbelief they would not enter the land because of that and so as we read in psalm 95 verses 7 through uh uh 7 through 11 which is quoted here in hebrews chapter 3 verses 7 through 11 it says this therefore just as the holy spirit says today if you hear his voice just like they did do not harden your heart as when they provoked me as in the day of trial in the wilderness

where they tried me and tested me and saw my works for 40 years therefore i was angry with this generation they said and said they always go astray in their heart they did not know my ways and i swore in my wrath they shall not enter my rest god says don't act like them because their hearts were hardened through unbelief and it's fascinating because they saw all of the powerful things of god and in spite of all the things that they did they did not go astray in their heart all of the miracles that god had done in the 10 plagues to set them free from the land of egypt in spite of hearing the voice of god at mount sinai as he gave the law so powerful by the way

that they said moses you go talk to god we'll hang out down here they saw the hand of god deliver the very law to them they saw food produced every single morning they walked out there was manna sitting out there they watched god provide water miraculously over and over again and defeat enemies that were greater than them over and over again and have a pillar of cloud that they followed by day and a pillar of fire that they followed by night and god proved himself over and over and over again and promised i will go with you i will go before you i will deliver them into your hand and they still said no why because their heart had been hardened to the truth of god because they refused to see the god that was in front of them and they could only see the

inability that stood before them and they refused to go in he says their hearts were hardened they go astray in their hearts therefore they shall not enter my rest and there's a warning there for us brothers and sisters beware of your heart being hardened to god beware of your heart being hardened against the things of god hardness of heart comes about when we hear what god says but we don't obey it when we hear the truth but we don't act on it when we hear the truth and know the truth but refuse to believe it and we have to beware we have to pay attention that we do not harden our heart against the things of god but that we keep ourselves soft and pliable and willing to be bent to the things

of god instead of trying to bend god to our own will he says today if you hear his voice do not harden your heart number two he says beware of unbelief notice what he says verse 12 take care that there not be in any of you an evil unbelieving heart that falls away from the living god he says take care that word take care means to beware it means to take heed constantly to keep an ever watchful eye upon now i find this interesting we'll talk about unbelief in just a minute we'll talk about what that means in just a minute but i find it interesting that he tells them that they have to beware in other words you have to be aware of the things of god and you have to be aware of the things of god

danger that sits in front of you you know what the best way to be aware of danger is turn on the lights right let me tell you a little bit of a story so we have these two tiny little dogs in our house carl and macy and in carl and macy listen i don't know if you own little dogs or not but little dogs love to go find places and houses to go to the bathroom you ever notice that about little dogs they're great i'd love to drop kick them across the house i do not do that nobody call anyone on me but that's what i want to do sometimes so if we want the dogs to run around we have to gate off the parts of that house and we have to get them out of the house and we have to

get them out of the house where we don't want them to go to the bathroom i see some head nods you know exactly what i'm talking about so in between our living room and the hallway that leads to the rest of the bedrooms we put this little baby gate that stands about this tall now i'm pretty short but i can step over that thing i felt pretty good about it right and so so i step over that thing no problem as long as i remember it's there so usually we put the dogs in the laundry room at night and they got plenty of room to run around do a little business in there and so and so usually when i go to bed i i take the gate down so that i don't trip over it well every time i go to bed i take the

gate down every now and then i forget you used to step it over the thing all the time kind of becomes part of your life and so so one night i left the gate up and all the lights were off in the house and i got up in the morning and i'm usually focused on two things in the morning going to the bathroom and making coffee in that order actually not always in that order those are the two most important things in me in the moment in the morning and it's dark because it's early and so i'm walking through the house swiftly because i'm not happy about being up and i have to go to the bathroom and i need to make coffee so i'm moving swiftly through the house again the

lights are not on and i am not aware of the lights and i'm not aware of the lights and i'm not aware of the danger in front of me and it was just a few weeks ago and i'm moving quickly through the house and i hit the gate and i completely just topple over my knees hurt because i've hit everything in the world that i could possibly hit my body against as i land on the floor and i was like man if only if only the lights would have been on i could have seen the danger in front of me brothers and sisters that's the way we are if we are not aware if the light is not on if we are not walking in the light then we will trip over the hazards in our lives because there are hazards

everywhere and when the light is on when we walk in the light of god and his word then we can be aware of the hazards that are in front of us and so he says beware pay attention to the fact that this is going to be an issue for you and what does he tell them to beware of he says to beware of unbelief he says take care brethren that there not be in any of you an evil unbelieving heart that word unbelief means to refuse to trust and rely upon the lord to refuse to trust and rely upon the lord we need to understand something about unbelief unbelief as i wrote down here is not a weakness of faith unbelief is an opposition to faith listen everybody struggles with some doubts that's normal that's natural that's who we are

as human beings that's not unbelief unbelief is when you put yourself in opposition to the truth of god doubts are willing to be proven wrong unbelief is not william newell put it this way he said unbelief is not an inability to understand but an unwillingness to trust it's a matter of the will not the intelligence in other words the truth is presented to you but you still refuse to believe it let me let me put it to you this way satan knows the truth because he knows the word he can quote the word to us satan knows the truth and yet he is not a believer he is still in unbelief because it's not a matter of the intelligence a lot of people can know the truth it's a matter

of the will have i surrendered myself to the truth it's a matter of the will have i surrendered myself to the truth and so he says beware of this unbelieving heart only i want you to notice the identifying word he uses for unbelief did you take note of it let me read it to you again take care brethren that there not be in any of you an evil unbelieving heart that word evil means active opposition to god active opposition to god again this is the truth in front of you and the refusal to put your trust in it the truth in front of you and your refusal refusal to act upon it, because that's what trust is, right? Trust is acting upon what you know to be true. Every one of you put trust in something the moment that you walked in this room this

morning. The moment that you walked in this room this morning, you looked at that chair, and you were like, I bet that chair's going to hold me up. And you put your faith in that chair the moment that you sat in that chair, right? You trusted that chair. You acted on your belief by sitting down on the chair. You know how I would know that you are unbelieving in your trust in the chair?

Is if you stood right next to it. Hey, you know, you could always sit down in that chair. Uh-uh, not getting me twice. I have fallen out of chairs before, and that thing is not going to hold me up, right? That would be unbelief. And that's what too many people do when it comes to the promises of God. They say, not only am I not going to believe it, but I'm not going to act on it.

I don't intellectually say that it's true, but I also willfully say that's not true, and they don't act on it. And did you notice that he tells us, beware of this. Beware of this. Brethren, that should tell you something. If he has warned us about hardness of heart, and he has warned us about an unbelieving evil heart, what does that mean you and I, as believers in Jesus Christ, are capable of? We are capable of the hardness of heart,

and we are capable of unbelief. So we have to beware of these things in our life. Therefore, we have to walk in the light so that we don't give in to these things. Because brothers and sisters, the world around us is in chaos, and you have a choice to make. You're going to believe, and rest in the truth of God, or you're going to give in to the chaos of the world and say,

this isn't worth it. I'm going to go do my own thing. Let's eat, drink, and be merry, because tomorrow we're going to die. Those are the two directions you can go. He says, beware of these things. Why? Lest you fall away from the living God. Beware of an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God. That word fall away literally means to beware of these things. That word fall away literally means to beware of an evil,

to depart. I never in my life have ever preached that you can lose your salvation. I don't plan on starting today, but this is a warning we should pay attention to. Because when the Bible says, beware or you'll depart, then you need to beware. Listen, I believe in the security of the believer, but these are not unbelievers he's writing to. I even heard one commentator try to say,

we have to understand who he's talking to is the unbelieving Jew, the one who's put his intellectual assent in the Lord. He's talking to the unbelieving Jew. He's talking to the unbelieving But not his real trust in the Lord. I disagree with that statement. You know why? Because notice what it says again. Take care, what? What's that next word? Brethren. He refers to them as brothers

and sisters in Christ. And he tells them to beware of an evil, unbelieving heart so that you don't depart from the faith. I've known too many that I've ministered to over the years that have departed from the faith. And there's nothing that prepares you for that. There's no Bible college class that prepares you for that. There's no word from a mentor that prepares you for that.

You just have to endure it. And it's the hardest thing you'll ever endure as a believer in Jesus Christ, is to know somebody that you have shared truth with and you've watched them depart from the faith. Are they still a believer? Oh, that's between them and Jesus. I can't answer that question. But what I see in front of me right now is they departed from the faith. And it didn't

happen quick and it didn't happen easy. It came from a period of time of not walking in the light. And when they refused to walk in the light, they were unaware of the hazards in front of them. And they tripped over the gate and they hit the floor and they departed. It's a heavy statement, I know. But Hebrews is full of some heavy statements because he loves

these believers so much that he wants them to pay attention and he wants them to stay close. Number one, do not harden your heart. Number two, beware of unbelief. Number three, encourage one another. Notice what he says. But encourage one another day after day as long as it is still called today so that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. So there's an action that

we now need to take because there is a danger that we could harden our hearts against the things of God. Because there is a danger of us falling away into unbelief. Because there's a danger of those things. He tells us as the body of Christ to do something. He says, therefore, encourage one another. That word encourage can also be translated exhort. But at its root, it means to call to one's side. To call to one's side. And to call to one's side

carries with it both a positive and a negative aspect. Let's take the negative first. So first of all, to call to one's side means I'm going to take note of what's going on in someone's life. And if I see sin begin to happen, then I need to call that person to my side and say, I see a sin issue arising in your life. I see a problem that's arising in your life. I see sin

beginning to rear its ugly head. Whether it be the sins of the flesh. Whether it be the sins of giving into religious rituals that you're putting your trust in more than God. Whether it be legalism. Whatever it is, we have got to, as the body of Christ, be able to exhort one another and say, this is what I see arising in your life. We are watching an absolute,

slaughter of church leaders right now. And the slaughter of church leaders is because of their own doing. Because they lived lives of sin and no one ever exhorted them. No one came along. Either they kept it so well hidden. Or no one was willing to stand up and say, I don't care what your position is. I don't care how important you are. I don't care what your following is. This is sin

and you have to deal with it. Because it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how important a person is. It doesn't matter what platform a person has. We have got to be able to exhort one another when it comes to sin in our lives. Because that's how we keep from being hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. That's how we keep from falling into unbelief. That's how we

keep our hearts from getting hard. Is that we act like that sandpaper in each other's lives who are willing to say, this is sin and you've got to deal with it. I'll be there with you 100%. I am right by your side. And if it weren't for the grace of God, I'd be doing the same thing. But we have to deal with this. We need to understand something about speaking truth.

You have to be willing to speak truth in love. If you cannot speak truth in love, in other words, if the truth that you speak is not for the purpose of restoration, then you need to not speak it. Let somebody else do it. But we need to be able to speak the truth to one another in love. That's what the body of Christ is for. That's why we gather together as the body of Christ.

It's so that we can mutually exhort one another. But not only is it for the negative of pointing out sin in our lives, but he says to encourage one another. That's for the positive. In other words, give each other words of encouragement. And brothers and sisters, in a world that is tearing us down, with an enemy that is tearing us down, we have got to be able to encourage one another. We have got to be able to speak

words of life into each other. Because no one else is going to do it. You can never, overestimate, you can't imagine how important words of encouragement are in the body of Christ. The other day, it's been two or three weeks ago now, there was a note that was left on my desk. And it said, do not open until February 27th. I didn't. I obeyed that note, right? I didn't even

know who it was from. I think it sat there for a really long time. Well, I came into my office first thing this morning, sat down on my desk, got ready to start printing my stuff off. And I looked over and I was like, it's March 1st. I can read that note. So I opened this thing up. It was probably one of the most encouraging notes I've read in a very long time. I sat there and cried because I was just like,

I needed to hear that. I needed to hear what that person wrote in that note, because it's going to give me strength to do a difficult job. Because sometimes you just need strength to do a difficult job. And you just cannot begin to understand what words of encouragement do for each other. And that's part of why we gather as the body of Christ, is so that you can

speak words of life into the body of Christ. And that's part of why we gather as the body of Christ, to the people that are around you so that you can speak words of encouragement to the person that's sitting next to you or the person that's sitting across the sanctuary from you because that's what's necessary within the body of Christ. That's what the body of Christ is supposed to do for each other is we are supposed to point out sin when we see sin, but we are supposed to encourage when there needs to be encouragement and don't let the enemy tell you, that's dumb, don't say that. No, say the weird thing, okay?

Like tell people around you that you love them and make it weird because we need to hear it. Make it awkward sometimes because we need to hear how important we are in the body of Christ. It's part of what the body's made for. And if I may pull out a little bit of exhortation here, this is why you need to show up to church on a Sunday morning. It's why you need to show up to a small group.

It's because you need that in fellowship. And listen, I'm talking to all of you watching online right now. If you don't have a church, find one. I love that you wanna watch me online. It makes me feel really good. But at the end of the day, I don't care about you watching. I don't care about you watching me online. I want you in a church where you are surrounded by other believers.

Because listen, there is no substitute for sitting next to people that know your business and people should know your business. There's no substitute for sitting next to people that know your business and then the pastor puts you on blast on accident. It's always on accident, I promise. I've had people come up to me afterwards just mad at me. They're like, why on earth?

Who told you? And I'm like, I don't even know what you're talking about. And they're just angry because I put them on. I was like, that's extra. I'm talking about somebody else. I'm just kidding. But to have somebody sit next to you, looks at you and go, right? Like when that word of exhortation that you needed to hear got spoken and they look at you and they're like,

pretty sure that was for you. I love seeing that look on people. Look, I know I'm not supposed to make eye contact with y'all. Like that's what other pastors, like look over their heads. I can't do that. I like looking at you people. I like to see looks on your faces. I like to see looks in your eyes. And I love to watch you look at your neighbor, wives with husbands, husbands with wives,

parents with kids, kids with parents. My favorite thing is when a kid looks at their parent and they're like,

all I'm saying is, I think that was for you. But there's no substitute for that. There's a sharpening that takes place that cannot take place any other way. And the same with the encouragement. He says, encourage one another. How often should we encourage one another? Day after day, as long as it's called today. In other words, make this a habit of your life

because listen, you don't know if you have tomorrow. Again, I will tell you in my line of work, you learn, you may not have tomorrow. You may not have tomorrow. And so say the thing today. Say the word of encouragement today because today's the day when you need to do it. Obey God today in these things. Don't say, well, I'll call him tomorrow. No, no, do it in that moment

because as long as you have time, you need to do that. Live your life with zero regrets. Live your life with no unsaid business. Get it all dealt with as long as it's called today. Why? Why do we need this? So that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. So that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. I believe it was the Amplified Bible

that translated it this way. So that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness, the cleverness, the delusion, the purpose of glamour or the sophistication of sin. It's amazing how deceitful sin is in our life, isn't it? And how easily we can justify it because sin is deceptive. Sin will lie to you and tell you, well, it's not that big of a deal. I mean, just don't worry about it.

No one's ever gonna know. You can get away with it. And we can become hardened by that because you know what happens to us is the longer that we live in sin, the easier we can become hardened to sin. And pretty soon, sin's never enough. We always need a little bit, we need that next dopamine hit, right? And so sin is deceptive and that's why we need each other

is so that we will not be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. And so he says, brothers and sisters, you need to encourage one another. And again, I'll tell you, the necessity of fellowship, I wrote this in my notes, I've said it already, but I'm gonna say it again. It does three things for us. Fellowship and gathering as the body of Christ does three things.

Number one, the fellowship of the brethren warns us. It warns us against the sin that happens in our lives, which is usually why, and I just want you to know this, when you wanna quit coming to church, it's probably because there's sin. I think we just need to own that in our lives. When we don't wanna be in fellowship, it's usually because there's something we don't want someone to find out.

And so deal with it. Deal with it. The greatest thing that the cross does is the cross brings transparency. The cross strips away our shame. The cross strips away our guilt. And it gives us transparency where we can stand up and we can say, this is the business I deal with, and I'm not gonna live in the darkness anymore. I'm not gonna live in the shame anymore

because it's been covered by the blood of Jesus, and the rest of us as the body will go, we get it, us too. Because we're all dealing with the same stuff. But gathering as the body warns us. Number two, gathering as the body encourages us because we're all dealing with the same stuff. We are encouraged to know that there's other people just like us. We're encouraged to know

that there's somebody else alongside of us, and we're speaking words of encouragement to each other. But number three, the fellowship of the brethren, the encouragement of the brethren, sharpens us. It brings a sharpness to us, right? It helps you keep your skills up. Because as you discuss things that you maybe mildly disagree on or you're not sure about it,

it begins to sharpen you, and you wanna get better, and you wanna get stronger. So he says, encourage one another. So, if we're gonna be faithful, number one, don't harden your heart. Don't allow sin to bring hardness into your heart like the children of Israel did in the wilderness. Number two, beware of unbelief. Understand that this is an issue. This opposition to God is an issue

that we all struggle with. We need to beware of it so that we don't depart from the living God. Number three, we're going to encourage one another because we need the encouragement of the brethren to truly live as God has called for us to live. But number four, we need to hold fast to the end. We need to hold fast to the end. Notice what he says. For we have become partakers of Christ

if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end. He starts off by reminding us of who we are in Christ, that we have become partakers of Christ. The idea of becoming a partaker there means that we have a share of Christ. We have a share of Christ. We have a share of Christ. We share in Christ. We share in all the things that the Messiah has for us.

We're partakers of it because we are a part of it, right? We're told in the book of Colossians that the mystery of godliness is this, Christ in you, the hope of glory, right? That we are in Christ because we're abiding in him, but he is in us because he now dwells in us through faith by the power of the Holy Spirit. And there's this mystery that takes place that can only be explained as a mystery of Christ in us as the Holy Spirit.

That's the hope of glory. That's what it means to be a partaker of Christ, that the divine now dwells within us and we are a partaker of everything that he has for us. And since we are partakers of Christ, we are that if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end. He tells us that we have to hold firm. We have to hold firm to who Christ is.

We have to hold firm to our confession, to our confession of faith. Again, I think it was the Amplified Bible that translates it like this, that we would hold fast to our newborn confidence which originally led us to him. To hold fast to our newborn confidence which originally led us to him. It's kind of fascinating. Those of you that are reading through the Old Testament with us,

throughout the Old Testament, there is one thing that's always referenced. One thing that they are always to go back to is their confidence. I am the God who set you free from Egypt. The entire Old Testament continues to reference that moment in time. Because that moment in time was the newborn confidence for the nation of Israel. And that confidence is what they responded to

or were supposed to respond to in obedience and everything else that they did. As a matter of fact, when God gave the law, he said, I am the Lord your God who delivered you from Egypt. Therefore, you shall have no other gods before me. Well, as New Testament believers, we don't look back to our deliverance from a physical Egypt. We now are continually led back to

the beginning of our faith when we were set free from the penalty of sin. When you were made alive, when you were born again, and we have spent our lives now responding to that. It's so important to go back and remember what Jesus has done in our lives. As a matter of fact, I believe it was the Ephesian church in the book of Revelation that was told, I have this one thing against you that you have left your first love.

So go back and do the first works. Go back and remember the first works. Remember your first love and go back and do that again. There's something so important to remember about that newborn confidence in Christ. I remember my mom talking to me about this when I really started growing up in the faith and learning more about Jesus and going through my own struggles in faith.

And I remember her saying, the first year or so that I was saved, she said, I felt invincible. Like I'm a believer in Jesus Christ. God won't let anything bad happen to me. And she said, but after I had my sister, her oldest daughter, she said, after I had her, I started realizing that bad things happen to Christians too. And I was like, oh no, maybe I'm not invincible.

What's gonna happen? And she said, I started living in some fear because of that. She said, but as I have grown in my walk, I've realized that yes, bad things happen to good people, but they're first filtered through the hands of a loving God. And so I can rest in God because I know that he is still in control. And if it's bad, he will bring it for my good.

And if it's good, he will make it for my good. And that's what we have to be like in our confidence in the Lord. That newborn confidence is so important because that confidence is what continues to carry us. And we have to begin to really hold firm to the confidence that we have in Jesus Christ, to hold firm in the confidence of who we are in him. I watched a fantastic testimony the other day.

I can't think of the guy's name, but he was a U.S. soldier that was in Mogadishu, Somalia when, well, the movie Black Hawk Down was about his company. And matter of fact, it makes me want to go back and watch that movie. That movie has a lot of bad language and a lot of violence in it, so I'm not recommending anyone go watch it. Anyways, neither here nor there.

But he was talking about being there, on the streets of Mogadishu that night. He said, I remember sitting in the back of a Humvee and guys are dying around me. And he said, I had to once and for all deal with my fear of death. He said, I remember in that moment, I had enough clarity of mind to go, okay, God, I'm scared to die right now and I need some confidence.

And he said, as I started praying through it, God began to give me confidence because in that moment, I had to realize my life is in God's hands. He said, I realized one of two things was going to happen that night. Either one, I'm going to survive this and I'm going to go home and I'm going to be with my family in Atlanta, Georgia and everything is going to be amazing and it's going to be beautiful because I will have survived one of the nastiest experiences I could have ever imagined. He said, or I die in this battle tonight and I go home to be with the God who created me.

I go home to be with my father and I spend eternity with him and I wait for my family to join me. He said, in that moment, I realized I can't lose. And he said, I had a confidence that I could have never imagined. And he said, the fascinating thing is when we got back the next day to our base, he said, I was overwhelmed. He said, I wasn't overwhelmed by the blood and the bullets.

I'm used to seeing all that sort of thing. I was a soldier in a bad part of the world. He said, what I was overwhelmed by was the number of men who came up to me. He said, the most elite warriors, the best soldiers in the world were coming up to me and saying, I don't have the confidence that you have and I need to have that. What did you do? What was different about you last night than me?

And he said, I got to tell soldiers about Jesus for hours because they were lined up to hear my story of how God gave me confidence because my confidence was in him. Brothers and sisters, hold firm. Hold firm to your confidence. Hold firm to your confidence. Listen, and don't turn this into a work, right? Like faith is still the root. Endurance is the fruit.

David Guzik said that in his commentary. I thought it was fascinating. Faith is the root of our confidence. Endurance is the fruit that is produced by our confidence. But it all comes from holding on tight to Jesus. Listen, at the end of the day, you have one job and one job only and that's to hold on to your Savior. That's to hold as firmly as you possibly can

to Jesus. So that he can keep doing in you what he wants to do. Because brothers and sisters, the fact of the matter is, whatever happens in our world, you can rest in a sovereign God because he takes bad things and makes them good. And he takes good things and makes them even better because nothing can come into your life that's not first been filtered through the hands of a loving God that he's not going to use for your absolute good and for his absolute glory.

Brothers and sisters, that's confidence. And if you can live in that confidence in a world that has none right now, if you can live in that hope in a world that has none right now, you become just like that soldier, you become just like that man who people are going to line up and say, how can you be confident when the world is on fire? Because I don't know if you've noticed, but the world is on fire. And you can say, let me tell you about Jesus.

Because I'm here to tell you right now I'd be a basket case without him. That's my testimony in life right now. If it weren't for Jesus, I don't have much going. He's the only thing I have to hold on to.

He says, we have become partakers of Christ if we hold fast to him. If we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm. I didn't point this out first service, but I feel like I'm supposed to point this out second service. Do you notice how long we're supposed to hold firm till? Till the end. Listen, you need to understand something. That means that there's not a day on top side of planet earth

when you can stop holding firm to Jesus. You can't be like, well, it's Tuesday. Tuesday's my day off, right? Nope, every day. You got to hold on to him every day until the end. Until the end. Because that's how long you're going to be holding firm to him. But it needs you to know something. While you're holding firm to him, understand something. He's holding on to you.

Do you know what we're told in 1 Peter? In 1 Peter, we are told that we are kept by the power of God through faith. That word kept means garrisoned about. And the idea is that God builds a stronghold around you. That the enemy can't have you. You are kept by the power of God through faith. That means that as I'm holding on to him, he's holding on to me, and we can rest in that.

Don't turn this into some, like, you got to be the strong warrior guy. Turn this into, I just have to hold on to the only one that's holding on to me. Firm until the end.

Then he, he gives a warning. And in this warning, he asks three questions. He says, first of all, he starts off with a statement. He says, It's interesting because he goes back to the same story from Psalm 95, from Psalm 95, from Numbers 13 and 14. Today, if you will hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as when they provoked me. And then he asks three questions.

Verse 16. For who provoked him when they had heard? Indeed, not all those who, was it not all those who came? Out of Egypt, led by Moses? Who were the ones who provoked him? All the people that saw all the great things that he did in Egypt. They came out of the wilderness, and they provoked him to wrath because they wouldn't believe that he was the same God in the wilderness

that he was in Egypt. He asks the second question. And with whom was he angry for 40 years? Was it not those who sinned, whose body fell in the wilderness, who gave in to all of the sin of the culture around them? And to who did he swear? Question three. That they would not enter his rest, but to those who are disobedient. And then he closes with this one statement.

So we see that they were not able to enter because of unbelief.

So clearly, what he points out here is that unbelief is a problem that we need to pay really close attention to. It's so important that we shouldn't harden our hearts to it. It's so important that we should beware of it. It's so important that we need the encouragement of each other to deal with it. And it's so important that you have to hold fast to Jesus so that you don't give in to it.

So I ask myself two questions. The first question I ask myself is, what causes unbelief? The second question I ask myself is, how can we protect our hearts against it? So our last few minutes here, I want to wrap up by answering these two questions. Number one, what causes unbelief? Well, so as I was thinking through this, I was thinking about all these different things,

I thought about the parable of the sower again. Now, if you know anything about the book of Matthew and the parables in the book of Matthew, you know that when Jesus told the parable of the sower, he said something really interesting. He said, if you don't understand this parable, how can I teach you anything else? Indicating that the principle in the parable of the sower is foundational for our understanding of a whole lot of other things that Jesus is going to teach us.

And so I believe that when we look at a heart that gives in to unbelief, we need to pay attention to the parable of the sower. Let me remind you what the parable is. A sower goes out to sow seed. Of course, the sower is the Lord and the seed is the word of God. And it falls on four different types of soil. The first type of soil it falls on is the path. That's the hard ground.

And when the seed falls on the path, the birds of the air come and eat it. That's the enemy doing away with the work of God's word in your life. Before it can ever take root, the enemy just swoops it up. Can't have any of it. The second type of soil it falls on is the rocky soil. And in the rocky soil, it starts to put down roots, but there's rocks down there,

so it can't develop deep roots. So when the pressures of the world come in, it ends up withering because it doesn't have a deep enough root system. And then the third type of soil is the soil that has thorny, it's the thorny ground that also has other thorns growing up. Again, puts down roots, but it gets choked out in what Jesus calls the pleasures of this world, chokes out what the word of God does.

But then there's a fourth type of soil. The fourth type of soil is the type of soil that is fertile, and when the seed is planted, it produces much fruit because it puts down really good roots. Well, I think those three types of soil that were listed first are why sometimes we fall into unbelief. So number one, the first cause of unbelief is the deception of the enemy.

The deception of the enemy. Listen, we need to understand something about this enemy that we face. He is not benign in nature. He wants to destroy you. And he wants to destroy any work that God would potentially do in your life. And the greatest way that he can do that is by telling you lies. Do you remember the very first thing that he said to Eve? Did God say...

And that's what he does with all of us, is he tells us lies. He will tell you lies through the media that you take in. He will tell you lies through the music that you listen to. He will tell you lies through the friends that you have that don't love Jesus. He will tell you lies through the philosophy of this world. He will tell you lies, listen, with your feelings and emotions.

He is always telling you lies. And if we are not careful, those deceptive lies begin to become our understanding of truth. And you have to pay attention to that because the deception is all around us. And if you're going to combat the lies, you have to have the truth. Listen, we live in a world where truth is very hard to find, right? Go to the internet, right?

As Abraham Lincoln said, don't believe everything you read on the internet, right? Five of you caught that, but it's okay. The rest of you will get it later. Because there's all kinds of lies out there and we have to pay attention to it. And as the enemy deceives us, it can end up hardening our heart. You ever talk to somebody that mixes a little bit of every world religion

and Jesus together, and you're like, wait a second. So you're a Buddha Muslim Christian? Like, I'm struggling to find out. I don't know if all of you, and I think I heard a little Hare Krishna in there too. Like, let me see your hair. So everything just gets kind of muddled up because they're told all these different lies and they mix them all together. I guess those are my favorite spiritual mutts

because I can talk to them about Jesus at that point in time and be like, well, let me square some things away. But the deception of the enemy is always creating an unbelief in our hearts. And you have to be aware of the deception around you. The second thing that will create unbelief is pressure from the world. Pressure from the world. Brothers and sisters,

I feel like our world is a pressure cooker all the time right now, right? Like, you have the pressure of your job. You have the pressure. I'm going to make this happy in a minute, I promise. You have the pressure of your family. You have the pressure of the opinions of the people around you. You have the pressure of how you're supposed to look, how you're supposed to present yourself,

what your physique is supposed to look like. If you don't believe me that there's pressure in the world about all of that, ask yourself why Ozempic is as popular as it is. It's because of the pressure in the world for everybody to look perfect. And who's it always the worst on? You ladies. I am so, so sorry what our world has done to you ladies. Truly, I apologize

because I hate what the world has done to you. I hate the pressure that the world has put on you. But sometimes the pressure to look good causes unbelief in your heart and pretty soon you think the opinions of a whole bunch of people around you are more important than the opinion of the one who created you. But then you add on top of all of that the fact that we know everything going on in every city in the world at any given moment through all of the news apps that we have, which I will never believe God ever intended for us.

Because we were never intended to bear the burden of everything going on in the world at the same time. And as that begins to happen, as that pressure begins to build on us, we start to check out. I just don't care. I'm just going to eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we die. And that pressure from the world leads to unbelief. Leads to that evil, unbelieving heart.

Number three, not only is it deception from the enemy and pressure of the world, but the third thing is the pleasures of this world. The pleasures of this world that are creating unbelievers left and right. We live in a culture today that is dying from pleasure. That is enslaved by pleasure. And we are told if you're not happy in the moment, there must be something wrong

and you need to change it right now. Because we are dying of pleasure in this world. And you know what the problem is? Pleasure becomes like a drug. Whether it's actually drugs, like drugs and alcohol, or whether it's sex, or whether it's video games, or whether it's movies, whatever it is, we always need something bigger. We always need something better. We need more of a dopamine hit, right?

Why does that need to be? Well, because the movement, the movie needs to be a little more exciting. The movie needs to be a little bit more violent. The experience needs to be a little bit better. The alcohol needs to be a little bit stronger. The drug needs to be a little bit more powerful. The video game needs to be more realistic. Meanwhile, we're dying of pleasure,

not having relationships with each other, never getting out to enjoy nature, which by the way, reveals the invisible attributes of God because we're dying in this world right now. Meanwhile, our hearts are becoming hardened to spiritual sensitivities because all we can think about is the next hit. And those things create unbelief inside of us. Those things are creating unbelief in the culture around us.

So, knowing that that's what causes unbelief, what do we do? What do we do to protect our hearts? How do we become people that protect our hearts? This is the happy part of the message, I promise. There's two things that we need to do to protect our hearts from the things that are around us. Number one, I don't get creative with these. I tell you what I know to be true.

Number one is that abiding relationship with Jesus Christ. You have to be abiding in him because as you abide in the Lord, as you maintain an active and living relationship with Jesus, he resets what the truth is in your mind. He resets what the truth is in your heart because as you combat the lies, you have to use what the truth of God's word has to say against it. I told first services too.

I said, you know what anxiety is? Anxiety is continually believing a lie that your emotions have made up. It's continuing to believe a lie that your feelings have made and then you give into that lie over and over again. And that's not to condemn you because I have battled anxiety massively in my life. And you know what the biggest thing I've learned to battle anxiety?

You have to choose to believe the truth. This is what my anxiety says is true. This is what the Bible says is true. I'm gonna keep believing what the Bible says is true. And that's how you fight. You overcome anxiety. It won't happen all in one day. It won't happen in five minutes. It is from a continual pursuit of truth. I was talking to somebody recently and they were sharing with me about a panic attack.

And I said, listen, when the dust settles, this is what you need to do. You need to think backwards because something led you to this point. Whether it was you decided you have to be busier than everybody else. You're giving into the pressure of the world to be busy all the time. Whatever it is, there's a lie you've believed and you need to, combat that lie with what the truth

of the word of God says. Because that's what's necessary if you're gonna overcome that anxiety in your life. And that's what we have to do. That's why you have to abide in Christ because as you abide in Christ and choose to believe the truth, it literally changes the way your mind works. And it literally changes the way that you think. Not only that, but as you abide in Christ,

you learn that the pressures of the world are not yours to bear. I'm reminded of Hezekiah in the Old Testament in the book of, I believe, the second king. Hezekiah is the king of Judah and the Assyrian army has already taken over the northern kingdom and they're coming after Jerusalem now and they surround Jerusalem and he writes this letter and he says, Hezekiah, your God can't save you because no God's been able to save anyone. Your people are gonna abandon you.

We're gonna come in. We're gonna put hooks in your jaws. We're taking you guys over and there's nothing you can do to stop us. And you know what Hezekiah thought? He's kinda right. No army's been able to stop him. No God has been able to stop him. We're just here. And so he takes this letter that Sennacherib wrote and he lays it before the Lord. And he says, Lord, this is what he's saying.

But our eyes are on you. See, that's what an abiding relationship with Jesus Christ does. But not only do we need an abiding relationship with Jesus Christ, you need the fellowship of the believers. You need the fellowship of the believers. It starts here, right now on Sunday morning. These are your people, right? And if you people over here don't know these people over here,

then you don't know these people over here. You guys need to talk to each other after church, right? Like, you should start meeting people. And if you, listen, I'm just gonna tell you, I'm just gonna be really harsh about this, okay? If you show up on Sunday and you leave the second I say amen, you are missing a really important part of church. You really are.

Because there's a lot of people around you that really need to hear from you and you need to hear from. I love that sometimes by a certain point in the afternoon, I'm like, okay, I'm gonna go eat lunch now. Doors are locked. You guys can leave whenever you need to. But I'm really hungry. It's 1.30 in the afternoon. I wanna go eat. Because people are still talking.

I love that. That's a healthy church to me, is when people are still fellowshipping with each other. Because that's what we need in the body of Christ. So we need fellowship. Because that encouragement begins here and it carries on throughout the rest of your week. As you get to know each other, then you follow up with each other on the things going on. The things going on in your lives.

And so, if you're gonna protect your heart, you need fellowship with Jesus and you need fellowship with each other. Because brothers and sisters, we need to be faithful. Because the world needs to see a faithful church. And quite frankly, Jesus is all you have to hold on to. Amen? Well, this morning is Communion Sunday and I see a sea of tiny people gathered out there.

So if you could, bring them on in, if you could keep an eye, on the doors for when your child pops through that door and looks around, wondering where you are. And when they, everybody finds their place, we'll have communion. And if I could go and have the worship team come on up. All right. Well, this morning's Communion Sunday. And as always, I'd like to take a minute

to explain what we do here before we partake together. Inside of each of these trays, there's a couple of cups, they're stacked together. Top one has the juice, bottom one has the cracker. Again, that's just a housekeeping note so that you know what's going on. In and of themselves, pretty mundane, pretty benign, but what they represent for us is incredibly powerful.

Because what they declare for us is the hope that we have in Jesus. And that's the body of Jesus that was broken for us and the blood of Jesus that was shed for us. As always, I like to point out that on that last night of the feast, Jesus took the bread and he broke it. And he said, it's my body, which is broken for you, take and eat. And in some ways, this is us being a partaker with Christ.

A partaker of Christ is while we're not actually eating the body of Jesus, it very much shows in a physical way what we did through faith when we accepted Jesus into our hearts, when we put our faith in him. Then on the last night of the feast, he took the cup, the last cup, the cup of redemption. He said, this is the cup of the new covenant of my blood, which is shed for you. So every time we partake, we tell the entire world and each other that we are made one with Jesus through his body that was broken for us and his blood that was shed for us.

We're made one with each other by this same sacrifice. And so we're told to make sure that we partake in a worthy manner. And that means a handful of things. Number one, that we understand what we're doing, which is why I take the time to explain it. Number two, to make sure that you're a part of the body of Christ. And so if you're here this morning and you're not a member of the body of Christ,

then today's the day for that to happen. Because this is a meal for believers. But again, if you wanna become a part of the body of Christ, it's as simple as you confessing your sin, and accepting what Jesus did for you on the cross, believing him. No magic words you say, it's the condition of your heart. If you're a believer here this morning, it's a good time to make sure

that your heart's right before the Lord. Make sure that there's nothing between you and him. So that as you partake, you do so with a clear conscience. And so as the worship team plays this last song, allow the Lord to do the work in your heart that needs to be done. Allow the Lord to soften you, to convict you, and to cleanse you. And as you receive the elements, if you'd stand,

and we'll partake together. All the joy to be, joy to know, it's when I decrease. You fill up my soul, what a joy to see. Joy to hold, it's when you want nothing more.

Watch me, you'll kiss my heart, my heart to hear. If you'd bow with me. Father, we come before you. And Lord, I just wanna thank you for the sacrifice of Jesus for us. Lord, I thank you for his body that was broken for us. Lord, as it says in Isaiah 53, that he was wounded for our transgressions, bruised. Bruised for us, Lord, and the chastisement of our peace

was laid upon him, and by his stripes, we are healed. And so Lord, I thank you for the body of Jesus that was broken for us. Father, I thank you for the blood of Jesus Christ that was shed for us that is more than enough to not only cover our sins, Lord, but to make us brand new, white as snow. And so Lord, I pray that as we partake of this now, that you would keep us ever mindful of the great sacrifice that you made for us.

And Lord, may we hold on to that confidence in our lives. In Jesus' name, amen. Let's partake. And if you'd bow with me one last time. Father, we come to you now, and I just ask that as we go out from here, that your Holy Spirit would be a work in our hearts. Father, that the truth of your word would sink deeply into us, that you would fashion in us the hearts of the men and women of God

that you want for us to be. And Lord, that we would hold tight to you. Father, we just thank you and we praise you. In Jesus' name, amen. Be blessed.