1 (17s): Going to see You take what the enemy meant? 1 (2m 13s): Can you turn it? You turn it. 3 (7m 1s): It says in Psalm 119, it's the swing wide. You heavenly gates. The people that the Lord may answer in and bring him praises, sing that that's all I do is doing and why the gates of heaven let the praise as the walls. again, swing wide. Here we go. 0 (7m 41s): jeez, his jeans. 1 (10m 24s): God....
1 (17s): Going to see You take what the enemy meant? 1 (2m 13s): Can you turn it? You turn it. 3 (7m 1s): It says in Psalm 119, it's the swing wide. You heavenly gates. The people that the Lord may answer in and bring him praises, sing that that's all I do is doing and why the gates of heaven let the praise as the walls. again, swing wide. Here we go. 0 (7m 41s): jeez, his jeans. 1 (10m 24s): God. Through your holy spirit. Conceiving Christ. Jesus. Leaving. God. 1 (10m 49s): I believe in, I believe in the same. 1 (13m 26s): 4 (14m 32s): Thank you, Lord. For times in our corporate gathering, we can just sing with everything. We've got Lord and praise and honor, and adoration to our king, to our savior, our Redeemer. Thank you so much, Lord God, we just invite your presence. I think we've already done that Lord, but we will continue to invite your presence. We need your presence, Lord, in our corporate gatherings Lord, but we need your presence in our daily walk and just in everything that we experienced and encountering go through in life. Lord God. So fill us with your presence, your spirit, to overflowing God that we might live out of that reality, Lord God. 4 (15m 15s): So for those who are just kind of worn out today, Lord, I pray blessings and grace, Lord God of filling in Jesus name for those who are discouraged. God, we just ask God that you would encourage them in the spirit, in the natural, in every way possible, or build them up in their most holy faith in Jesus' name, Lord God, for those who need a physical touch of healing, we just pray in Jesus' name God that you would work a miracle in the lives of your saints here, gather all over and for anybody tuned in Lord God, we pray healing, power and healing grace upon their lives as well. We're thankful, Lord God, for what you're doing in our lives. We're thankful that Ken's back and healed up and do them better. Lord God, we just pray God. 4 (15m 56s): For all of those, he represents so many have gone through the fire and gone through sickness and all kinds of stuff. Floor beaches, pray Lord that you would just continue to work and minister and just do wonderful and profound things. God, we love you. We thank you for what you will do as you teach us through your scripture today. Anoint me. I pray, speak through me. I pray. I don't want to do it without you Lord. So anointed speak through me and then prepare our hearts and our ears. Lord God, to receive your message. We love you. We praise you in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Hey, turn around. Sail out to someone that you never have met before. 4 (18m 14s): To get some water. Come on. I had to get some water and a something to help my throat because I was singing sing. First service preach for a servicing. Second service, try to preach second service. Welcome. We're in Hebrews chapter nine and we're going to get through about halfway through it. I was thinking about my sermon yesterday as I was spraying Roundup, this weed killer. I sprayed up, I sprayed like 12 gallons of, yeah, maybe that's the deal. I should have wore a mask or something, but yeah, maybe that's the deal got to get out and get in on that class action lawsuit. 4 (18m 55s): That's going on anyway. Nevermind another story. But I was spraying that thing and I'm like, you know what? I'm going to have to come out and do this in about two more months because it's like soon as I spray it, it kills it, it rains, it suns comes out and I got an eight shines and everything just grows right back. I thought, I'm glad God's grace. Isn't like that. I'm so grateful for the atonement. Once for all time, Christ died for us interred that holy of holy places offered himself as our atonement, our forever sacrifice and died. And we don't, we don't have to go through all of that. 4 (19m 38s): Again. We're saved by grace, through faith once and for all time, God made atonement for us. And we're going to be talking about that today. God's ability through Christ to cleanse our sins, but also to cleanse our conscience. Because sometimes we, we realize that God on some level has cleansed our sins, but it hasn't allowed us to walk with a clear conscience. And so it's, it's like condemnation, heaviness, guilt. We're carrying around things that God never intended for us to carry. Jesus said, come to me, all you who are labor and heavy Laden, I will give you rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light, but some of us feel guilty about everything. 4 (20m 27s): We recount past mistakes, reliving past conversations, rehashing past relationships, reviving past decisions. And we kind of rehearse over and over again our past. And maybe, maybe that past was yesterday. Maybe that past was 10 years ago or 50 years, but we're constantly rehashing the past, right? Christ has the power to cleanse us from our sins and this conscience that is constantly getting worn out by pass, by thinking about the past, by regretting the past, by wishing we could go back and change the past and what I've realized. 4 (21m 9s): Cause I, I I've been there and there are still some things I wish I could go back and change. But what I've realized is that God uses all of those past experiences, all of that past brokenness, all of those past mistakes, he uses it in such a beautiful way to equip us for the incredible work that he's got for us today. So now, because of those mistakes and all of those imperfections, we have greater capacity to empathize with people, to feel the pain of others and what they're going through to identify with people and to pray with real sincerity, for those who are going through hard stuff. 4 (21m 58s): I tell you what, after COVID I prayed on a different level for people going through it because I had empathy. I was like, holy cow, I wouldn't wish this on anybody. Right? Those experiences in life, relational, spiritual, whatever they may be, God is in his wonderful and supernatural way. He is putting all of those ingredients together with his grace, his love and that transformational work that he accomplishes in us. And then he prepares us through all of those ingredients to go do the wonderful things that God has called us to do. So sometimes we think our past failures disqualify us. 4 (22m 40s): I think in so many ways they qualify us. They have prepared us. They prepared us for what God wants to do in us and with us and through us, I felt called to the ministry when I was about 17. And I thought, for sure, God was just going to usher me right in and blah, blah, blah. But he had a whole different path for my life. Put me into the business world for about 10 years before going into vocational ministry. And man, I learned so much through those experiences in sales and marketing and just doing business in the world. And, and those things have helped me. They've they've I said this recently, as much as Bible college and seminary has helped me, I would say that my business experience in the, in the marketplace has helped me in all of the things that God taught me about. 4 (23m 29s): People, about working with people about being reliable. So whatever God's got you going through right now, or whatever you're experiencing, just trust that what the enemy, if it's bad stuff, it's trust that if what's what the enemies is used for evil, God will use it for good. If it's just experiential stuff and your God is using all of those things to equip you for your incredible work and through all of that, he's wanting to use you anyway, no matter what your station in life is. So quit recounting past mistakes with such regret, quit reliving, past conversations and real past relationships and quit reviving past decisions and just trust the Lord moving forward in Jesus name. 4 (24m 12s): So we're going to be in Hebrews chapter nine today and Hebrews chapter nine talks about our conscience. And hopefully we fix the points. We had the word conscious instead of the word conscience. There's a difference. I don't know if you know that, but there's a difference. So somebody pointed that out, thankfully. So hopefully we got the points fixed, but we're talking about conscience and not conscious today. So as we wrapped up Hebrews eight last week, I love what Hebrews eight 13 says. It says this when God speaks of a new covenant, it means he has made the first one obsolete. It's now out of date and will soon disappear. 4 (24m 56s): It's a beautiful statement. The old covenant did not have the power to do what the new covenant has the power to do God through this second covenant, this new covenant that it's been designed by Christ and upheld by Christ has the power to transform our lives. The new covenant in Christ has the power to cleanse people of their sins and therefore cleanse our conscience so that we no longer carry the burden of our sin. The first covenant was a shadow of things to come. The first covenant points to our desperate need for God, for his grace, it points out the reality of our sin. 4 (25m 40s): That's why the, the law was given so that we would recognize our desperate need for his grace. It wasn't given so that we'd somehow measure up. It was given so that we would realize, holy cow, I can never measure up and I need God's grace. So the first covenant was a shadow of things to come. The earthly tabernacle is a shadow of things to come. I just ask you, please don't get left in the shadow. Let's move into the marvelous lights of our glorious God and move in our understanding and grow in our understanding of his incredible grace. Let's examine the first covenant in light of the second covenant, Hebrews nine one talks about the first covenant. And this is kind of the theme, the priesthood of Christ it be the theme kind of through about halfway through chapter 10. 4 (26m 23s): So it's a bit redundant maybe, but I found whenever there's redundancy in scripture, it's meant to enhance and highlight and remind us because I don't know about you, but I need redundancy. I can read the same passage over and over again. And Mike, oh, that's right. I've read that a thousand times, but I needed a and one, right? They really get it to really have it sink in Hebrews nine one says the first covenant between God and Israel had regulations for worship and a place of worship here on earth, there were two rooms. And so now we're going to describe the earthly tabernacle. It's basically a tent and many say it was just kind of like the tents that the Israelites would carry and that they would live in. 4 (27m 6s): But these tents were, this tent was designed to as a place of worship and a place of offering sacrifice. So there are two rooms in this tabernacle in the first room were a lampstand, a table and sacred loaves of bread on the table in this room was called the holy place. So this is where the priests would go in and offer sacrifices for the sins of the people. Then there was a curtain behind this first room that took you as you go through that first curtain, you go into the second room and it says here there was a curtain. And behind the curtain was the second room called the most holy place in that room. We're a gold incense alter and a wooden chest called the Ark of the covenant. 4 (27m 49s): And we'll unpack the arc here. Just a moment. The Ark of the covenant, which was covered with gold and all sides inside the Ark were a gold jar containing Manoj errands staff, that sprouted leaves and the stone tablets of the covenant. So again, there's three things inside the Ark of the covenant. We're going to unpack those three things because they help us understand the purpose of the old covenant, the purpose of the old Testament. They help us to understand God's heart in the old covenant, hoping to point us to the new. So everything in the arc pointed to Israel's desperate need for God's grace, the manna manna, by the way means, what is it? 4 (28m 32s): So when the people of Israel woke up the first day that man has settled on the ground, there was all of this like Dew and they was sparkling and the people are like, what is it? So that's what the man is. And so the people would go out and they picked it up and they gathered under the instruction from the Lord gathered. I think it was two quarts per person per day. And don't gather anymore. Well, like most of us might be thinking, why not? If two quarts is enough, why not get three chords? We got a little extra for midnight snack or in the morning or whatever. Right. But what happened is whatever they gathered over, what was instructed, turned into maggots and had a wretched smell. 4 (29m 16s): And really it's a picture of what our disobedience looks like in our faithlessness looks like before God, they gathered extra because they were afraid they wouldn't have any for the next day. So God spoke to them about it. The provision of the man represented the provision of the Lord. And that reminder was also a reminder of Israel's fearlessness and belief. And so they've got manna in there to remind the people through the generations of Israel's disbelief in fearfulness, but also the Lord's provision. Exodus 16 says that the man was like quarry ant white coriander seed. 4 (29m 58s): And it tasted like honey wafers exited a 1633 sounds like good stuff. You know, kind of make a little breakfast and can make man of bread, ManTech, Kati, Manoj, whatever you want. I know, I know it's Keith Green, some are old enough in the room to know my reference though. The people of Israel complained to God out of fear that he had forgotten about them. And, and that's what the man represented. Aaron staff represent the represented the rebellion of God's people in the judgment of God. You can read about that story in number 16 and 17, go back and re read number 16 and 17 because it talks about God's judgment against those who rebelled against him. 4 (30m 49s): It says the earth opened up and swallowed the people and close back up and they were just gone judgment. Aaron staff represented the rebellion of God's people in the judgment of God, Aaron staff sprouted. This is interesting. So imagine I've got a staff in my office that somebody made for me, it's this tall eucalyptus staff and it's dead, right? Nobody expects it to do anything, but stand in the corner and I'll take it on a walks with me from time to time, but errands staff, because God was speaking his truth, administering his revelation is his staff sprouted and budded and blossomed and produced ripe almonds. 4 (31m 31s): Isn't that awesome. You see that number 17, eight. So Aaron staff representative rebellion of God's people and the judgment of God, the stone tablets represented God's law. And Israel's inability to keep the law, the stone tablets inscribed, what the terms of the covenant were written with the very finger of God. We know that from Exodus 31, 8 and a few other verses. So we look at the contents of the Ark of the covenant and everything in the, within this cut, this box represented Israels and humanity's desperate need for the grace of God. 4 (32m 12s): There are things in our lives today that remind us of our desperate need for God's grace. My wife will often tell me, you desperately need the grace of God. And I said, I know you've been telling me no, she never says that, but I know what she's thinking, but mistakes. And so she's actually never said that before to be clear, sorry, mistakes and sins from our past and our present, remind us of our need for God's grace. So the new covenant is God's response to that desperate need. The old covenant was good in that it was a shadow of things to come, but it was, it was incomplete to the old covenant, teaches us about sin and our need for God's grace and the old covenant points. 4 (33m 2s): Us. The old Testament points us to a promised new covenant. He would come through that would come through Christ Jesus, the Lord, Hebrews eight references. This passage in Jeremiah 31 that I'm going to read. So it will sound familiar to you because we just went through it a couple of weeks ago. It says this in Jeremiah 31 33 through 34, the day is coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel. So this is a six, 700 years before the time of Christ. The Jeremiah is writing this day is coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah, this covenant will not be like the one I made with their ancestors. When I took them by the hand and brought them out of the land of Egypt. 4 (33m 46s): They broke that covenant though. I love them. As a husband, loves his wife, says the Lord verse 33, but this is the new covenant. This is the new covenant I will make with the people of Israel. After those days says the Lord, I will put my instructions deep within them. I will write them on their hearts and I will be their God. And they will be my people and they will not need to teach their neighbors nor will they need to teach their relatives saying you should know the Lord for everyone from the least to the greatest will know me already says the Lord and listen, this, I love this last part. And I will forgive their wickedness and will never again remember their sins. 4 (34m 29s): That's the promise of God that was fulfilled in Christ. I will forgive their wickedness and will never again remember their sins. So God has the capacity and the grace to forgive our sins and to cleanse our conscience. They should go hand in hand, but sometimes we get hung up and we feel guilty about stuff that we've already confessed, that God has already forgiven. And we're just thinking about it and rehashing it. And the enemy is using it to distract us and to wear us out and to wear us down and discourage our progress. Our forward progress as followers of the Lord, Jesus Christ. So the Ark representing the old covenant is filled with reminders of Israel's failures, reminders of humanity's failures. 4 (35m 13s): The cross representing the new covenant is a wonderful reminder of God's grace, his love and his forgiveness, the arcs cover. There was a car cover over the arch and it was called the place of atonement or the mercy seat. And it's a picture of what is needed to cover or a tone for the sins represented inside the arc. So inside the arc is reminders of our sin, Israel sin, the arc, the arts cover. The mercy seat is a picture of the atonement that is needed. In other words, as one writer puts it, the arc by its contents, declare the divine holiness by which all stand condemned and by its form, especially the atonement cover declared the divine, redeeming mercy through the shed, blood old covenant, the shed blood of animals, new covenant once for all time, the shed blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, our great high priest who is our mediator. 4 (36m 14s): The one who is forever interceding for us, the one who loves us unconditionally above the arc, above the arch, where the cherubim of divine glory, whose wings stretched out over the arch cover the place of atonement. But we cannot explain these things in detail. Now the author says, I think he kind of already did, but maybe there's more. Anyway, the arc is a picture. It's an illustration declaring for humanity. God's holiness, man's sinfulness, and God's plan to redeem humanity through the shed blood of Christ on the cross. The old Testament speaks clearly about our need for God's grace. 4 (36m 54s): The old Testament also tells us, tells God's people of God's answer to our need in the person and finished work of Jesus, the Messiah. So in the old Testament, we have roughly 300 prophecies speaking about the coming Messiah hundreds, and even thousands of years before Jesus was born and Jesus was on the scene profits, God spoke to profits and they spoke about the coming Messiah. So they knew their desperate need for God's grace. And they were all, all of Israel and Judah were waiting for their Messiah. Why? Because they had read the prophets, they understood God's plan and they had been waiting. 4 (37m 37s): So it's perplexing to realize that when Jesus shows up on the scene and he's fulfilling the prophecies, that the people of Israel and Judah still mostly refused to believe, things changed as time went on and people in Israel are still believing to this day, putting their faith in the mercy and the grace of the Lord, Jesus Christ, and an article written by Mary Fairchild. She writes the book of the old Testament. The books of the old Testament contain many passages about the Messiah, all prophecies, Jesus Christ fulfill. For instance, the crucifixion of Jesus was foretold in Psalm 22, 1 6 through 18, approximately a thousand years before Christ was born long before this method of execution was even practice. 4 (38m 30s): So this method of execution through crucifixion was not practiced when this was written after Christ resurrection preachers of the new Testament church began to declare officially that Jesus was the Messiah by divine appointment. We see that in Paul's writings in Romans one, one through four, Paul is servant of Christ. Jesus called to be an apostle set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures concerning his son who was descended from David, according to the flesh and was declared to be the son of God in power, according to the spirit of holiness by his resurrection, from the dead Jesus Christ, our Lord. 4 (39m 11s): So the apostle Paul who wrote two thirds of the new Testament pointing back to the prophetic words that were uttered in the old Testament, pointing to what Jesus accomplished in his earthly life and ministry. So again, some Bible scholars suggest that there are more than 300 old Testament, prophetic scriptures completed in the life of Jesus Christ, such as his birthplace prophecies about his birthplace, his lineage method of execution. These things were all beyond tryst control and could not have been accidentally or deliberately fulfilled. This is God's divine plan unfolding in the universe on a macro scale. 4 (39m 56s): If God can pull all of that together on a macro scale, we can trust him on a micro scale with our lives. We need to understand that God has a plan that is unfolding. We can trust his plan to bring it to fruition. He is completely capable, completely desiring to bring those plans to fruition in our lives. Let's talk about statistical probability or in probability concerning the fulfillment of these prophecies that were spoken in the old Testament fulfilled in the new Testament of the person and work of the Lord. Jesus Christ. The chance of just eight. 4 (40m 38s): So there's about 300, the chance of just eight prophecies being fulfilled. This is the kind of the math. It's one in the 10th, one in 10 in this two in the 17th power, one in 10 to the 17th power. So this is kind of what that looks like if you ever been to Texas. So I was driving back from Louisiana years and years ago, and we're driving long, long days. It took us two full days to get through Texas driving all day long. We thought we're never going to make it to the other side of taxes. 4 (41m 21s): This place is eternal, right? So it's a huge state. So imagine taking silver dollars and covering the whole state of Texas two feet deep, two feet deep. That's a lot, a lot of silver dollars. Now imagine marking one of those silver dollars and shucking it somewhere in the state of Texas, mixing them all together, and then imagine blindfolding someone and telling them they can travel anywhere in the state of Texas, but they have to grab that one silver dollar that has been marked and declared. 4 (42m 5s): This is the one, one the 10th 17 happened. I was saying that right, Jim, one in 10 to the 17th power. There we go. One to 10th to the 17th power. That is the probability of eight prophecies coming true. There were 300. This is evidence of the divinity, the Messiah ship. The reality of who Jesus was and is that he is the Messiah. He is the Messiah. So the mathematical probability of 300 or 47, or even just eight fulfilled prophecies of Jesus stands as evidence of his messiahship prophecies about him being born of a woman Genesis three 15, that he would be born of a Virgin Isaiah seven, 14, that he would come from the tribe of Judah. 4 (43m 11s): We talked about that in our Hebrew study, Genesis 49, 10, that his throne would be anointed and eternal Psalm 45, Daniel chapter two, there's a bunch of your Messiah would be rejected by his own people, Psalm 69, Isaiah 53, that he'd be a prophet that he'd be proceeded by Elijah, that he would be declared the son of God. That he'd be called a Nazareen. It goes on and on and on that Messiah would be a priest. After the order of Melchizedek. We studied that as in our study of Hebrews chapter seven, that he would be called king Psalm two, that he would enter Jerusalem on a donkey Zachariah 11, that Messiah would be praised by little children, Psalm eight, verse two, all of these specific things were spoken of the Messiah hundreds and even thousands of years prior to his arrival that he would resurrect from the dead Psalm 16 and Psalm 49, that he'd be seated at God's right hand, that the Messiah would be a sacrifice for sin, that he would return a second time and on and on and on these and many other old Testament verses about Israel's Messiah or fulfilled in the new Testament, in the new covenant, in the new Testament life of Jesus Christ collectively, they form the leading proof of his deity of Christ deity. 4 (44m 49s): As Jesus went about his ministry, he knew he knew that he was fulfilling these prophecies and he pointed, especially the religious leaders. You understood the prophetic writings, the Sadducees and the Pharisees. He pointed them to the old covenant, the old Testament, the writings of the prophets. And this is what he said in Luke 24, 25 through 27. And then Jesus said to them, you foolish people. You find it so hard to believe all that the prophets wrote in the scriptures. Wasn't a clearly predicted that the Messiah would have to suffer all these things before entering his glory. Then Jesus took them through the writings of Moses and all the profits explaining from all the scriptures, the things concerning himself. 4 (45m 37s): He said in John 5 39 through 40 says you search the scripture, speaking to the religious leaders. And when he's talking about scripture, he's talking about the old Testament. You search the scriptures because you think they give you eternal life. But the scriptures point to me, Jesus said, yet you refuse to come to me to receive this life. Some of us have had so much evidence pointing to the reality and the goodness and the sufficiency of Christ. And yet we still refuse to believe what is it going to take for us to finally believe some of us have believed on the salvation, but a lot of us are struggling to believe that God is good in our day-to-day lives that God can sufficiently provide for us in our day-to-day lives. 4 (46m 25s): That God wants to cleanse our conscience so that we can move forward with peace and power and confidence, not in who we are, but in who Jesus is. When we understand who Jesus is, we can move forward with greater confidence, greater passion, with greater compassion because of what Jesus has revealed to us and has accomplished in our lives. Let's move out of the shadows and believe that God is capable. That he's all powerful. That he's omnipresent. That he's very good. And his love is unconditional. Let's move forward in our faith as followers of the Lord, Jesus Christ, where in your life do you need to move forward as a, as a follower of the Lord, Jesus Christ. 4 (47m 12s): Where's your faith life struggling, dry. Where do you need to invite God in so that you might walk with greater enthusiasm, greater confidence, greater surety, invite God in and watch what he will do. It will be supernatural, just like all of the works of God through the old and the new Testament, watch what God will do. What you got to invite him in, invite him in and watch what he will do. Let's get back to Hebrews nine. And we've got a few things to talk about before we wrap up here in the next few minutes, when these things were all in place, Hebrews nine, six, speaking of the tabernacle, the priest regularly entered the first room as they perform their religious duties, but only the high priest Everett entered the most holy place and only once a year. 4 (48m 3s): And he always offered blood for his own sins. And for the sins, the people had committed and ignorance. Isn't that interesting? So we all sin and word thought or deed daily, but then there are things that we do in ignorance and isn't it good that the grace of God is sufficient for those things that we've done in ignorance, a thought, a word, an action. God's grace is sufficient to cover all of those things by these regulations. The holy spirit revealed that the entrance to the most holy place was not freely open. As long as the tabernacle and the system at represented were still in use. This is an illustration. 4 (48m 43s): The writer says pointing to the present time then, and now first century and 21st century for the gifts and sacrifices that the priests offer are not able to cleanse the conscience of the people who bring them. So there was a covering, but it was incomplete. Christ has the power to cleanse your sins and your conscience. Our conscience is as you know, that inner feeling or voice, it's the guide to the rightness or wrongness of our behavior. Our conscience gives us a sense of right or wrong. 4 (49m 25s): And so we've got to be careful to guard our conscience because as we think about our conscience, the scripture tells us that we can be in a good place or bad place. First Timothy four, two, number one, our conscience can be dead or seared. Do we fix this? Oh, we fixed it. Good. He used to say conscious. Now it says conscience, here we go. Now we can move forward. Here we go. Hopefully the rest of the points are fixed as well. Our conscience can be dead or seared. First Timothy four two says now the holy spirit tells us clearly that in the last times, some will turn away from the true faith. They will follow deceptive spirits and teachings that come from demons. 4 (50m 9s): These people are hypocrites and liars and their conscience is, are dead. So we can have a dead conscience and that we don't, we no longer feel what we used to feel regarding right and wrong. Maybe it's been seared or killed because we've ignored our conscience. One too many times, we've been rebellious against God when too many times we've allowed that same sin or the same, whatever in our lives over and over and over again, we've justified this somehow we've just seared our conscience. So we don't feel any anxiety, any approval. We don't feel anything around areas of our lives. So we need to be careful that our consciouses aren't dead or seared. 4 (50m 50s): And how do we fix it? We simply, we go to the Lord and say, God, my, I feel like my conscience in this area, or maybe just my conscience in general is seared. I, I, I barely feel anything anymore around my decision-making. I just don't understand right and wrong. And so Lord, I need you to restore my conscience. It's God's gift to us that we, that we use, that we have, that we operate with so that we can know the difference between right and wrong. And it works in collaboration with the holy spirit, through the word, as we understand truth and are filled with the power of God. And so we understand right and wrong, but sometimes we were so seared and dead in our conscience that we don't have the perspective and the capacity. 4 (51m 30s): So just ask God to heal your conscience, ask God to come in and just cleanse you. And to set you free in whatever area you need to be set free. Number one, our conscious can be dead or sear. Number two, our conscience can be defiled, right? Titus one 15 says everything is pure to those whose hearts are pure, but nothing is pure to those who are corrupt and unbelieving because their minds and consciousnesses are corrupted. If you ever hung around somebody and you tell them a story, and they always coming up with the perverted, that perverted a part of the story, they're always trying to take it down a dark path, a dirty path. They're always trying to tell dirty jokes or tell dirty stories or, or their everything about their life has got this filter of uncleanliness there. 4 (52m 19s): They've got a polluted mind, a polluted conscience it's defiled. And so everything that comes through their filter is broken. We've. We've got to be careful that we hang around. People who build us up in our most holy faith, that Titus one 15 in the new king James version is not on the screen, but it says this to the pure, all things are pure. But to those who are defiled or corrupted and unbelieving, nothing is pure. But even their mind and conscious conscience are defiled. Titus. One 16 says they, the corrupted and defiled, they profess to know God, but in works. 4 (52m 59s): They deny him being a balm, Annabelle, this obedient and disqualified for every good works we got, we've got to be careful that we're not allowing our conscience to be defiled through the things that we watch read encounters that we have close friends, that we keep, we need to be careful, bad company, corrupts, good character. So the people you spend time with that we spend time with either help our character or our character they're their, their help, our conscience, or corrupt our conscience. So our continents can be dead defiled. And number three, our consciousness can be guilty. And this is really what the whole message is all about. Hebrews 10, 21 and 22 talks about the conscience. It says in, since we have a high, a great high priest who rules over God's house, let us go right into the presence of God. 4 (53m 45s): With sincere hearts, fully trusting him for our guilty conscience is have been sprinkled with Christ's blood to make us clean. And our bodies have been washed with pure water. Listen, Christ has the power to cleanse our sins and to cleanse our conscience. The new system set up by God has the power to set us free from a guilty conscience. You guys believe in this stuff. It is absolutely true. Let's look at the last few verses. As we wrap up here, Hebrews nine 10 says for that old system deals only with food and drink and various cleansing ceremonies, physical regulations that were in effect only until a better system could be established. 4 (54m 27s): So Christ has now become the high priest over all the good things that have come. He has entered the greater more perfect tabernacle in heaven, which is not made by human hands. It is not part of the created world with his own blood, not with the blood of goats and calves. He entered the most holy place once for all time and secured our redemption forever. Under the old system, the blood of goats and bowls and the ashes of the heifer could cleanse people's bodies from ceremonial impurities. Just think verse 14, just think how much more the blood of Christ will purify. Our conscience is from sinful deeds so that we can worship the living God for, by the power of the eternal spirit. 4 (55m 12s): Christ offered himself to God as a sacrifice for our sins. That is why verse 15. That is why he is the one who mediates a new covenant between God and people. So that all who are called can receive the eternal inheritance. God has promised them for Christ died to set them free from the penalty of the sins. They had committed under that first covenant. Isn't it great to know that Christ has the power to cleanse our sins and to cleanse our conscience with that. As we invite the worship team up, we're going to worship some more. I just encourage you to think about areas of your life, that need attention areas of your life, where there's confession needed, brokenness needed, contrition needed, and just invite God to work in your heart, to cleanse your sin and to cleanse your conscience. 4 (56m 7s): If you're here for, and you don't know anything about Christ, but you know that you've made mistakes. The Bible calls those mistakes sin and outlines it in the old and the new Testament. If you're here today and you want to be forgiven for your sins, Jesus will forgive your sins. If you confess your sins, he is faithful. And just to forgive you and to cleanse you from all unrighteousness. So you simply let's close our eyes and prayers. We stand up. We simply say, Lord, forgive my sins. Go ahead and stand up, Lord, forgive my sins. I need your grace. I need your love. I don't understand who you are and what you're all about, but I know that I need to grace from you, the great high priest. 4 (56m 51s): So forgive me for my sin. Fill me with your spirits and show me your love. And as you pray, those things, what will happen is the holy spirit will come into your life. Your sins will be forgiven. And then you get adopted into God's family. You become a son or a daughter within the family of God, and you've just begun a new walk with God. The Bible calls it being born again. So you've got a new life and you're now going to follow Jesus. That's the goal. That's the plan that we recognize our need for him. We give ourselves to him. We follow him all the days of our lives. 4 (57m 32s): So Lord, as we do our best to follow you all the days of our lives, be glorified Lord. As we sing, help us to worship in spirit and in truth with great honesty and humility, we ask in Jesus name, amen, amen. Let's worship 3 (57m 46s): And mentioned it. So we're actually, we're going to do a new song as we close up and kind of how pastor Steve is talking about that. Just the confidence that we have in that new covenant is the confidence that we also have that, you know, we have a eternity to spend with our Lord and our savior. And this one, this song is called him of heaven. And it, it speaks to that. It speaks to, you know, just declaring our excitement about being with the Lord and just being surrounded by his glory. So yeah, the same listings one together guys. 3 (1h 2m 41s): Amen. Amen. Let's pray. Heavenly father, Lord, we thank you. That, that is our declaration this morning, father, Lord, we long to sing that with you father. We long to be in your presence and in worship alongside you, Lord Jesus, the spend eternity by your side, but whilst we're here on earth, father, Lord, we just pray for your, your protection loading for you for your goodness, just to be alongside of us Lord this week as we leave this, this place, Lord, you would just come alongside of each and every one of us, but give us confidence to be bold in your presence, to be bold in your name. Jesus Lord, we thank you. And where we, where should be father. Maybe you never forget that. Especially as we walk through our day-to-day lives father, when we just cling to the hope that we have in you, Jesus, we love you father. 3 (1h 3m 24s): We lift up your name and praising me. Where, why should we pray these things in your precious name, father? Amen.
