It’s hard to preach and talk about church attendance without
it being seen as sending people on a guilt trip. We live in a time when there
is more and more pressure on time and fitting it all in is difficult. How do we
find time for all this stuff? In fact one commentator has coined the phrase “fastpeople”
and suggests we are no longer trying to keep up with the Jones, but rather just
trying to keep up with the gerbils, on the spinning wheel of life. Reflection,
awe and wonder, community are stuff for the slowpokes out of step with society.
The passage we had read to us from Hebrews chapter 10 come
at the end of the central core of the book, where the author had reflected on
the person and work of Christ mainly as a fulfilment of the Old Testament, and
with the word therefore, now turns to exhort people how to live that out; what
does it mean for us? As one commentator puts it this is the start of a great
rollicking exhortation that will take us to the end of the book. In this
passage he gives us three imperatives, three commands for our life, that go
beyond simply talking about public worship, but that I want to use to help us
explore public worship as a spiritual discipline. I was going to make a pun about
salads and green vegetables and nutrition for our spiritual life, because each
imperative starts with ‘let us’, but I thought that would be too corny. I don’t
like corn in my salads…
The first imperative is in verse 22… let us draw near to
God…In Christ we have access to the very presence of God. The writer to
Hebrews, uses temple worship in the Old Testament to illustrate this. People
would come to the temple to worship and draw near to God, but dependant on who
they were there was a limit to how close they could come. If you were an
invalid or unclean with certain illnesses, you couldn’t come in the gate.
That’s the background to the miracle in Acts 3. The gentiles could only go to
the outer court. You may remember in Acts 20 Paul is ironically accused of
taking a gentile with him into the temple. If you were a woman, there was only
so far that you could go, you were allowed into the court of the women, if you
were a Jewish man you could come closer, an inner court, if you were the priest you could go into the holy place, we had it
in our reading from psalm 134, which is a blessing on the priests at the end of
one of the major festivals for all their work, in the house of the Lord. Then there was the
Holy of holies, the place where God dwelt with his people, only the high priest
was able to go into that place, and only once a year on the day of atonement,
after many animal sacrifices for the forgiveness of sin. They used to go in
with great fear, a rope tied round their leg, just in case they had undeclared
sin and being confronted by the holiness of God would strike them dead, and
they could be hauled out.
But we, says the writer of Hebrews can draw near to God,
because of Christ’s blood, his death for the forgiveness of our sins. We can
all go right into the very presence of God, the holy place, not with shaking
and fear but with confidence, not because of who we are or who we are not, but
that Christ has made a way, a new and living way. Christ our great high priest
has paid the sacrifice for us to be clean before God and opened the curtain
that separated the holy of holies from the rest of the temple for us. The one
the gospel tells us was torn in two when Christ died. We’ve been welcomed in.
It’s not just coming to a place to encounter God, but its
everywhere in life, we have that wonderful privilege, in prayer, this core
section of Hebrews had started with a similar image of us being able to boldly
approach the throne of grace in our time of need. The throne of grace was seen
as where God sat and was the mercy seat the space on top of the ark of the
covenant between the two golden seraphim. Because of Jesus Christ we can get
that close In all of life… My son Isaac and I were walking along Bethells Beach and came upon these three empty pairs of
shoes right in the middle of nowhere. I couldn’t help but think of Moses in
Exodus 3 being told to take off his shoes for this is holy ground as he
encounters God in the burning bush. Mind you if you take off your shoes in the middle of bethels baeach in the middle of summer you encounter not the burning bush but the burning hot west coast iron sand... However, It’s a great image because we can encounter
and know that closeness of God and draw near anywhere. It’s all holy ground…On
a west coast beach, an Auckland school class room, our place of work, in the
wilderness and scorching iron sand of our own lives. But definitely as we
gather for public worship, we come to draw near to God. Douglas Bradley has
just moved from Glendowie to be the minister at Cromwell Presbyterian church
and he said he took this great photo on the day that all the linemen for chorus
used the church for a meeting, the photo was of all the work boots lined up
outside the church door. Take off you shoes this too is holy ground…
George Guthrie helps us understand this drawing near to God
as a spiritual discipline by asking the question ‘What is it you yearn for?”
when you come to church what is it that you are wanting that you are looking
for, do you come with an expectation of encountering and meeting with God, of
somehow being transformed by that encounter. Do you come with a sincere heart,
aware that we are able to come because we have been made clean through Jesus
Christ, and it’s a great privilege we have to worship God together as brothers
and sister with such intimacy and being so loved. At general assembly Graham
Redding a previous moderator of the PCANZ spoke on Isaiah chapter 6, the
calling of Isaiah, Isaiah was in the temple, worshipping, and suddenly it was
like his eyes were open and he saw the reality of what was going on… he saw the
Lord high and lifted up, the whole place was filled with the glory of the Lord,
he is aware of his sinfulness and receives a pardon from God and then is given
the word of God to take out with him into the world to be part of God’s kingdom
coming. That was a foretaste of what you and I have in Christ as we gather for
worship. Do you come to Church with an expectation of encountering God. ‘what
is it you yearn for?’ not yawn for but yearn for…
The second imperative is in verse 23 let us hold
unswervingly to the hope we profess. Our hope found in Jesus Christ, that
death and sin are conquered and on their way out because of Christ’s death and
resurrection, that things can change, that there is a better world coming,
because of who Jesus is and what he has done for us. Not because we simply believe
it but because God is faithful. God keeps his word, he keeps his promise.
Again George Guthrie helps us see this as a spiritual
discipline by asking the question What is it you are committed to? it’s
a whole life question, one of the biggies that defines us, but its helpful to
see that as it relates to public worship as well. By making it part of our
rhythm of life we are witnessing to our hope. Its part of our profession of
hope… Not wishful thinking like.. I hope howard doesn’t speak to long today… I
hope they don’t sing those songs again… But that the gospel of Jesus Christ
will make a difference, in me, and you through us in the society round us. In
the face of what’s going on in our lives, still I will come and give thanks and
hear the gospel proclaimed. It’s defiant and prophetic. I love Psalm 42 and 43,
as the psalmist laments that all he has
known is being stripped away and he or she is being dragged away into exile,
and it feels like the stormy waves Mediterranean sea and the turbulent rapids on the fast moving rivers that flow down from Mt Camel have
combined to smash and crash over them, the psalmist say why are you so down
cast O my soul yet I will still praise you my Lord and my king. Public worship
says we have hope of light when it seems the darkest, it says in the midst of
the business f life that there is time to stop and to contemplate something so
much more important. It says to the worries and sorrows of life, I have hope in
Jesus Christ, it says to the amusements and distractions of life, there is
something more solid and real. What are you committed to…
Finally in verse 24 “Let us spur one another on towards
love and good deeds” the writer from Hebrews carries that on by saying
don’t stop meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing… The Christian
faith is communal, its about being together and building one another up in the
faith. When we think of spiritual disciplines we usually thing of solo alone
stuff, of the hermit away in the wilderness, but its about being together in
community. To encourage each other in ur love and our good deeds, which are the
outworking of our relationship with Christ, we are loved so we love, we are
cared for and shown compassion, so we show compassion and care.
George Guthrie again helps us see this by asking the
question ‘who do we walk with?’ who we commit to journeying with. Whose
shoes are with ours on the beach. When it comes to public worship Paul in 2
Corinthians 14 says we should come to worship, not with the attitude of whats
in it for me, what do I want, but rather, what do I have to give, he says one
should bring a song, another a teaching, a word of encouragement. One of my
other favourite psalms, I think I have about 150 of them, is Psalm 107, which
is the story of peoples epic journeys from exile back to Jerusalem. Epic desert
journeys through stormy seas, from darkness to light, illnesses to health, even
one that seems to talk of God using going from rich pasture to brokenness and
want, but they each finish with people giving testimony to what God has done in
the assembly to build one another up. Are we willing to pray for each other,
Pauls letters to the churches were designed to be read in public worship and in
them he prays for the people he is writing to and asks them to write to him.
When we come together are we willing to use the gifts god has given us to build
each other up. Even the gift of prophecy and discernment, speaking straight,
spur one another on has an almost negative feel to it at one level, of pushing
and prodding each other. Who are you walking with, invites us to look at
worship as a chance to come and to contribute to others, not just to be a
consumer society.
We very often use the analogy of life as a journey even our
faith we speak of our spiritual journey and our spiritual disciplines maintain
us and keep us on that journey. Often its like how you pack your car for that
journey. With six people in our family how you pack a car is a big thing. How
am I going to fit everything into this small space? It’s three D tetras… if you
remember that game on your phone. But you start by putting the big things in
first, the important things and then fill in round them, you find you’ve got
space for the little things the extra things on top of those basics and
essentials. It’s harder to fit a big bag last… Can I suggest for the spiritual
journey we fit in those essential spiritual disciplines first and once they are
in place the rest of life seems to fit round them. Public worship is one of
those things.
… So let us draw near to God, let us hold fast to our hope,
let us consider how we will spur one another on in love and good deeds.
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