HE-BREWS: A Better Blend
After sixteen months you and I have arrived at the final leg of our Hebrews journey together. From this point, we walk on separately, but we walk on in faith. The beauty of the Christ life is that you don’t need me to walk on with you. All you need is Jesus and I pray that I have shown Him to you in new portraits over the course of the study. I’ve sought to show you Jesus, the Better Sacrifice and Jesus, the Better Priest. Both portraits are so crucial to living under the Better Covenant, and ultimately, living in the Better Tabernacle.
I pray the words in this study have been God’s words, and not my own. My hope is that you have come to love Jesus a little more than you did before we began. Not because of my words, but because of the living and active Word of God. If you have a closer walk with Christ because of your time in this study, then I have done my job, and I raise my hands in praise to the One who called me to this task.
Praise. It is our focus finish this study, and rightly so. It is the only appropriate response for what Jesus has done for us and in us. If I could sing (I cannot), I would burst forth in songs of praise to my Jesus. I might sing:
“Praise Him, praise Him, Jesus our blessed Redeemer. For our sins He suffered and bled and died. He our Rock, our hope of eternal salvation. Hail Him! Hail Him! Jesus the crucified! (Fanny Crosby, 1869.)
Or perhaps I would sing this:
“Majesty, worship His majesty. Unto Jesus be all glory, honor and praise. So exalt, lift up on high, the name of Jesus. Magnify, come glorify, Christ Jesus the King. Majesty, worship His majesty. Jesus who died, now glorified, King of all Kings.” (Jack Hayford, 1977)
Chances are really good that I might sing this grand old hymn:
“Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but now I see.” (John Newton, 1779)
Don’t get me wrong, I love new contemporary praise and worship songs, but there is just something about the older songs that blesses my heart in wonderful ways. The song choice is less important than the heart attitude from which it springs forth. An attitude of praise and thanksgiving for what Jesus has done for me. Me! A woman who made so many poor choices in her teens and twenties that grace seems like a ridiculous thing to even hope for. Yet, God’s amazing grace was applied to my sins and they were washed clean.
Today, let’s ponder on reasons we have discovered in the book of Hebrews to praise our Jesus. Hebrews 13: 10-25 is a passage I’d love for you to read in your Bible. For now, I want us to consider verse 15:
Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise—the fruit of lips that openly profess his name.
In verse 15 we see the writer of Hebrews giving his congregation a final encouragement to offer praise to Jesus for His work on earth and in heaven. He knew that offering praise would necessitate a sacrifice from the Hebrew Christians because of their circumstances of persecution, yet he urged them to offer it anyway. Sacrifices were such a key part of Judaism and this wording (‘sacrifice of praise’) would have elicited deep emotion within their hearts.
Thus, he speaks to you and me as well. I can think of several reasons, based on our study of Hebrews, to offer praise today:
- Jesus gave His life to be the ultimate Sacrifice for our sins
- Jesus accepts us as we are, if we are willing to accept Him as our Savior
- Jesus sits at the right hand of the Father and intercedes for us as our Priest
- Jesus administers a New Covenant written on the fabric of our hearts, rather than on stone tablets
- Jesus’ death opened the way into the Holy of Holies so you and I can approach God any time we desire
- Jesus’ resurrection made possible for you and me to live eternally in heaven, the Better Tabernacle, with God
- When Jesus ascended to heaven, God sent the Holy Spirit to live in each of us and enable us to live the Christ-life on the dusty sod of earth.
Jesus is so worthy of our praise, dear friends. Let’s end our study by praising Him!
MEDITATION MOMENT: Choose a reason to offer praise to Jesus this moment and voice a prayer of praise to Him, either aloud if you can, or in the silence of your heart. You may choose one of the reasons I have listed above or you may have your own reason to praise Him. I would like to offer my own as a seed for you to begin.
Jesus, the Name above all names. The One who looked down at me through the ages and saw my deep need for a fresh start and a new heart. Jesus. The name that is so sweet to me. I praise you because you love me just as I am. I worship you because your holiness did not prevent you from laying aside your Godness and taking the form of a man who would ultimately die on the cross for me. For me! It slays me when I think of what you did for me. You left heaven and all the wonders of that place where God dwells to come to earth. You were born to die, and die you did. A horrendous death on the cross. Yet, the truly horrible part of it was that you became my sin. The perfect, holy, spotless Lamb of God took on every gross sin I would ever commit and gave me your holiness and cleanness. Oh, the absurdity of it all. The wonder of it. I praise you Jesus! I thank you! May I never get over it. May my trust in you and obedience to you bring you glory. In your name, Amen.
Thank you, friends, for walking with me on this journey through Hebrews. I pray it has been a blessing to you. I hope to have some exciting news to share with you soon about this Hebrews journey we have been on. I want to encourage you to continue studying God’s Word. It is life!!! Blessings to you as you walk with Jesus.
