"Greater Than Moses: The Faithful Son" Sermon: Hebrews 3:1-6

“Greater Than Moses:  The Faithful Son”

[Hebrews 3:1-6]

May 6, 2012 Second Reformed Church

            “Therefore,”

            Since God came to earth in the Person of Jesus and didn’t become less than God – either through the Incarnation itself, because God remained wholly God – possession of a sinless human body did not make God less than God – or through suffering and death, because the holy and innocent suffering of the God-Man was the only way for God to save His people.

            Since, being really human, Jesus died under the Wrath of God for our sin, and, being really God, He physically rose from the dead, victorious over death and the devil and the fear of death.

            Since, through His Life, Death, Resurrection, and Ascension, we are now brothers and sisters with Jesus in these ways:  we have the same type of physical body that Jesus has.  We are called to suffer in our physical body, just as Jesus did, for Jesus’ Sake and the Sake of the Gospel.  We are assured that just as Jesus physically rose from the dead, we shall physically rise from the dead.

            Since Jesus is now our Merciful and Faithful High Priest Who understands everything we endure – excepting sin.

            “Therefore, holy brothers,”

            Notice the author of Hebrews calls us “holy brothers.”  We are becoming holy through sanctification, as God the Holy Spirit works in and through us.  We are also seen as holy now – through the Work of Jesus on our behalf – in Jesus, we are holy now.  In fact, we are becoming holy as we progress until the Day of Christ Jesus.

“you who share in a heavenly calling,”

            Because we are “holy brothers” – because we are the elect of God – because we are the people God chose to save for Himself – for His Glory – to restore in His Image.  We are not only called to be brothers and sisters of Jesus, but we are called to a common “heavenly calling.”

            What have we been called to in Jesus?  We have been called to faithfulness and to obedience to God.  We are to keep the Moral Law of God – not for our salvation, but in thanksgiving for our salvation.  People ought to look at the way we live and see something different in us.  Also, we are to proclaim the Gospel; it is the job – the duty – the privileged of every Christian to be used by God to tell others the Gospel:  God came to earth in the Person of Jesus, lived, died for the sins of everyone who would ever believe, and then physically rose from the dead.  After which He ascended back to His Throne.

            We ought to encourage each other in the fulfillment of the Day of Christ Jesus, as Paul wrote, “But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words” (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, ESV).  And we ought to be calling the world to believe the Gospel and repent.

“consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession,”

As we encourage each other and proclaim the Gospel to the world, we are to encourage each other by considering Jesus and what He has done as the Chief Apostle – the One Who was Sent by the Father, and as High Priest – the fulfillment of the sacrificial system in which Jesus offered up Himself as the Final Sacrifice offered by the Only Holy High Priest.

We do this by pondering Jesus, by studying Him, by meditating on Him and His Word – and let us remember that meditation in a Christian sense is not the same as meditation in an Eastern sense.  When we talk about meditation in the Christian sense, we are talk about looking at the Word of God, studying it, taking it apart, making sense of it in its context and within the whole canon of Scripture and within the Plan of Salvation.  It’s looking at a text and asking what it says, what it has to do with Jesus, and how it fits in with the whole Plan of God – and then – what do we do with it?  It’s not very far from the preparation of a sermon – only you don’t need to prepare to speak it.

If you ever took a literature class – Christian meditation is like a literature class on the Bible – only we have God helping us to understand it!  And we can do this on our own with devotionals and other good Christian books alongside of our Bibles.  We can do it in Bible study and adult study and one-on-one or in groups with each other.  Christians ought to care to understand the Scripture – and to know Jesus – we do that through studying His Word – meditating – the Sacraments – and prayer.

Don’t you long to know Jesus better?  We do that through considering Him – as we find Him in the Bible, and through meeting with Him in preaching, praying, and receiving the Sacraments. 

“who was faithful to him who appointed him, just as Moses also was faithful in all God's house.”

            And here we have the unspoken objection that the author of Hebrews is addressing:  “What’s so great about Christianity?  Why shouldn’t we return to Judaism?  After all Moses gave us the Law – doesn’t that make him superior to Jesus?  Doesn’t that mean Moses was greater than Jesus?”

            No.  Moses was not greater than Jesus.  Why not?

            “For Jesus has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses—as much more glory as the builder of a house has more honor than the house itself.”

            The author asks us to consider our house or apartment:  who deserves more praise and glory and honor – the builder of the house or the house itself?

            Would you say, “Oh, what a beautiful house!  The builder was lucky the house let itself be built.”

            Or would you say, “Oh, what a beautiful house!  The builder really knew what she was doing.”

            When you have a house built, do you thank the builder or do you thank the house?

            If you follow that argument, the author of Hebrews says, Jesus is worthy of more glory than Moses.  Why?

“(For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God.)”

In other words, God is the Creator of everything that is.  Jesus is God.  Therefore, Jesus is the Creator of all things.  Paul confirms this:  “For by him [Jesus] all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him” (Colossians 1:16, ESV).

So, we can say that Jesus is the Creator of Moses and the Law.  Jesus is the Creator; Moses and the Law are creations.  Therefore, Jesus is greater than Moses and the Law.  (Jesus is the Builder; Moses and the Law are the house.)

“But doesn’t Moses’ faithfulness merit anything?”

“Now Moses was faithful in all God's house as a servant, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later,”

Moses was faithful – he testified to all the things God told him to speak.  He is to be revered for his faithfulness and all that he did – as a servant of God.

God said, “Not so with my servant Moses. He is faithful in all my house” (Numbers 12:7, ESV).

And it is written, “Israel saw the great power that the LORD used against the Egyptians, so the people feared the LORD, and they believed in the LORD and in his servant Moses” (Exodus 14:31, ESV).

Moses was faithful to God, and we ought to emulate Moses’ faithfulness.  However, Moses was faithful as a servant.

“but Christ is faithful over God's house as a son.”

Jesus said, “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love” (John 15:10, ESV).

Jesus faithfully carried out the Will of His Father – all that God sent Him to do.  Jesus is the Son of the Father – Jesus is the Son of God.  Jesus is the Heir to everything of the Father’s.  No matter how much you like the person who built your house, your son – your child – is the one who inherits the estate, not the builder of your house.  So, Jesus is greater than Moses, because Moses, though faithful, was merely a servant, whereas Jesus is God’s Son.

Moses and Jesus were both faithful.  But Moses was merely a servant, Jesus is the Son.  Moses was kept out of the land for his sin; Jesus inherits everything as God’s Son.  So, Jesus is greater than Moses.

 “And we are his house”

            The author of Hebrews returns to the previous metaphor and says that we – all those who believe in Jesus Alone for salvation – are God’s House.

Paul wrote, “Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you?” (1 Corinthians 3:16, ESV).

            And, “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own,” (1 Corinthians 6:19, ESV).

            And “What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, ‘I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people” (2 Corinthians 6:16, ESV).

            And “So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit” (Ephesians 2:19-22, ESV).

            And Peter wrote, “you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 2:5, ESV).

            God does not dwell in temples; God dwells in His people.  How is that possible?  We can only say three things:  God tells us that He indwells us.  God cannot be captured or contained in anything.  And God is omnipresent – He is everywhere at once.

            And we are also told that He is making us into a holy house – a beautiful house – a house worthy of Him and His Presence.  God is the Builder Who is making us into His house.

“if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.”

What is “our confidence and our boasting in our hope”?  It’s professing and living out the belief that there is only Salvation through Jesus Alone.  It’s confessing Jesus as our Lord and Savior and living out that confession by believing what is written in the Bible and doing what God has called us to do, including telling others about Him.

It is our hope, because it has not fully come.  Yet, it is our confidence and our boasting, because if our salvation is by God and for God and God Alone, it cannot fail to come to pass – and we have the historical proof of Jesus and what He did recorded for us in the Bible, as well as in other sources.

So, how can the author of Hebrews say “if”?  “And we are his house if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.”  Is the author of Hebrews saying that it is up to us to save ourselves?  Is he saying that we can lose our salvation is we don’t hold on fast enough?

Of course not.  Paul wrote, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” (Ephesians 2:8-10, ESV).

Salvation is God’s Work, God’s Choice, and God’s Gift.  You and I play no part in our salvation.  We respond to it, but God does it all by Himself with no help from us.

So, what is he saying?

The author of Hebrews is saying that we are God’s house – He lives in us – if we are actually Christians – if we have truly been saved.  He is alerting his readers to the same thing John wrote about:  “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us” (1 John 2:19, ESV).

John was explaining to a church why some people were leaving the Church – abandoning Christianity – and he explains that anyone who permanently leaves the Church was never a Christian in the first place.  As the author of Hebrews explains, if hard times come – or great times – and we give up our confidence and boasting in Jesus and His Gospel, we are not His house – we never were.

Jesus explained it this way:  “ He put another parable before them, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field, but while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared also. And the servants of the master of the house came and said to him, “Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have weeds?” He said to them, “An enemy has done this.” So the servants said to him, “Then do you want us to go and gather them?” But he said, “No, lest in gathering the weeds you root up the wheat along with them. Let both grow together until the harvest, and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn”’” (Matthew 13:24-30, ESV).

Do not be fooled:  there are non-Christians in the Church – taking part in the Church, supporting the Church.  They may be very nice people.  Their character is not in question here.  But do not be fooled, anyone who does not hold fast to the confidence and boasting about Jesus and His Gospel, is not a Christian.  There are non-Christians in every Church – even in the pulpit.

But those who have received the gift of faith and have believed savingly in Jesus Alone and do hold fast with confidence and boasting – we are the house  of God.

So let us be holy brothers to our Holy Brother, Jesus.

Let us acknowledge Him as the Creator of all and, thus, greater than Moses and the Law.

Let us glorify Jesus and strive to be faithful to God and God’s Will as Jesus is faithful in all things to His Father by studying and meditating on God’s Word and especially on Jesus.

Let us hold fast with confidence and boasting in the sure hope we have the Gospel of Jesus Christ and Him, our Savior, praying and working hard that our confession and our life would speak the same Gospel that Jesus would be praised.

Let us pray:

           Almighty God, keep us from thinking anything or anyone is greater than You.  Help us to see that You must be greater because You are the Creator.  Help us to follow after You wholeheartedly and in thanksgiving for Jesus and the Salvation that He gives us.  And may each one here that has not yet believed, be met by You this morning, that they would understand if they have believed or not, and may You be pleased to cause them to believe.  For it is in Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.