Sermon Cloud

Go to Him and Bear His Reproach 1

Hebrews 13:13-14

Grace Fellowship Church

04/19/2009

Series 3 Sermon 78

13 Therefore let us go to him outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured. 14 For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come.

Introduction

There is a great debate going on in the church today over the issue of culture.  How does the Christian individually and the church corporately effectively engage the culture in which God has sovereignly placed us?  After all if you believe as I do in the overarching sovereignty of God in all things then you understand that God chose your parents, the time of your birth, the number of siblings you would have, how long your parents would live, the economic situation that you would be brought up in, the type of family you would have, and the very place you would grow up in.  And He also chose you for salvation in the midst of all the other sovereign things the Lord did besides choosing your hair, eye, and skin color. 

So how does God expect us to effectively engage culture?  Jesus Christ lived in a culture and so do you and I.  So we must look to His example and His Word in rightly relating to the culture.  It is so easy for us to get sucked into the culture.  Times have not changed so much and Christians have become so strong that we can simply be absorbed into the culture and everything will be fine. 

But in many ways we have been drawn in and captured by our culture.  And these are fleshed out in our desires and affections.  What is it that you get passionate about?  What is it that we desire?  We are Americans and therefore we desire the American dream.  We want middle class to upper class status.  We want the right house. We want the right cars.  We are working toward retirement so we can put our feet up and live out the rest of our days in comfort and ease.  We desire the same for our children.  We want them to not just to be educated but to be really well educated.  A degree from a prestigious university is the goal for many of us.  Or for our daughters we want a husband with that kind of education and money making ability. We want our children to have more and better things than we had and have.  We want them to be as much a part of the culture as they possibly can be and yet remain attached to the church. 

This is the acceptable normal life in our culture.  We live in a culture of status symbols that ultimately will mean nothing in eternity.  But many times we can not see past these symbols to see what the Word of God has for us. 

Is this true in your life?  Is the culture so ingrained in you that you think that achieving these status symbols is the correct way to live?  Are you so entrenched as an American chasing the American dream that you have accepted this lifestyle as the normal Christian lifestyle that all Christians have lived throughout the age of the church? 

These Christians who lived in the first century and read the words of this epistle that we have been studying had a very similar outlook on life.  There was security in the culture.  Many early Christians were saved inside the synagogues and for a while synagogue Christians were tolerated.  In Roman culture there was such a broad spectrum of religions that anyone who could show a running history of their faith could practice their faith unmolested.  But if you had a new faith then you were subject to the worst kind of treatments.  So as long as the early Christians towed the cultural lines they were fine.  But the minute they parted ways with the synagogues they were in trouble.  Or when the synagogues parted ways with them.  Which is usually what happened first. 

Times have not changed much.  As long as you flow with the stream of culture the culture has no problem with you.  You can keep your job and you can live in their neighborhoods and go to their schools and shop in their markets.  But the minute you or they decide that you can no longer, with a good conscience, live according to their ways then you become an outcast. 

The reformers understood this.  As long as they stayed in the Catholic church they were fine.  Catholic theology has a broad enough theological umbrella to accept almost anything as long as the boat is not rocked.  But the minute that Luther started preaching against papal abuses and church sins the wrath of the Papal bull came down on him and those who followed him.  All of a sudden they were in trouble.  No longer were they accepted and their lives were in danger.  John Calvin had to flee France because of his stand against the errors of the established church.  There were many others who died a martyr’s death because of their stand.  All through church history there have been times when individuals and churches have had to say that they could no longer be a part of a culture that has denied the Lord, the Word of God, and the ways of God and could no longer put their stamp of approval on it.  They have seen the need to separate themselves and their families from just such a culture. 

The debate in our day is over how we are to relate to the culture. Most in the church have no problem with the large part of our culture save a few key issues.  Others in the church want to become as familiar with the culture as they can in order to mold their lives to fit in with the larger culture so that they will be accepted by the culture and possibly evangelize them.  They call it redeeming culture.  Then there are others who have separated themselves almost totally from culture. 

So who is right?  How are we as Christians supposed to react and interact with the culture?  What is it about being Christian that even causes this tension?  The pagans just go into the culture and live out their values.  Let me provide you a definition of culture.  It is according to the dictionary “the customary beliefs, social forms, and material traits of a racial, religious, or social group.”  In other words it is what one believes lived out in the world.  If you were to nail down what American culture believes you will not find much left of the Christian principles upon which this nation began.  What you will find is a culture that has its priorities in self fulfillment, material wealth, and many other things that shall remain unmentioned. 

What I want you to understand is that American culture simply reflects the sinfulness of humanity.  So does Chinese culture and European culture and South American culture and African culture.  The culture develops with the priorities of the people.  So if the priorities of the people are rebellion you get heavy metal music.  If the priorities are wealth you get Wall Street and bail outs.  If the priorities are to see what government can do for you then you get what we have today. 

But what are Christian priorities?  What is the Christian supposed to do with the culture that we live in?  Simply stated, Christianity is a humble defiance of the culture.  We are called to live in the world but not be of the world.  We rub shoulders with pagans on a daily basis but we are called by God to be different from them and to be a light shining in a dark place and salt in a tasteless society.  Being absorbed into the culture in which we live and becoming a part of that culture completely is to extinguish the light that we have been called to be and to let our salt become tasteless. 

But when you live a life of humble defiance against the culture at large be sure there are going to be some problems.  This truth has proven itself over and over again.  Let me give you some examples.  Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego, the Lord Jesus Christ, Paul, Peter, Stephen and the rest of the early church.  Then you have the Christians throughout the ages who have suffered, bled, and died for their faith and their refusal to acquiesce to the culture at large.  Look back at Hebrews 11:32-38.

32 And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets— 33 who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, 34 quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. 35 Women received back their dead by resurrection. Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life. 36 Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. 37 They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated— 38 of whom the world was not worthy—wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.       

So how do you rightly relate to the culture?  By humble defiance.  How do we get to this point where we could be called men and women and teenagers and children of whom the world is not worthy?  By understanding the truths that are found in Hebrews 13:13-14.

PNP

From Hebrews 13:13-14 I want you to see two cultural mandates for the Christian.   

This week I want us to see that:

1.  We are called to separate ourselves from the culture. 

Next week we will see that:

2.  We are called to endure whatever hardship comes our way because of this separation. 

Purpose

My purpose this morning is to shake you out of the slumber that living in this culture will put you in.  My purpose is to show you that you are not called to be an American but are called to radical Christianity that shakes the very foundations of this world and lives a life that no one apart from Christ is able to explain.

What do you want your life marked out by?  Compromise?  Bowing down to the gods of this age?  Or do you want your children and grandchildren and later generations to know without a shadow of a doubt that you were a Christian and you were a man or woman whom the world was not worthy of?  After all, you are going to be remembered for something.  

RPNP

So look with me at the first of these two cultural mandates for the Christian.  

1.  We are called to separate ourselves from the culture. 

Look at verse 13. 

13 Therefore let us go to him outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured.

Notice the first word of the verse, therefore.  This word is pointing us back to what we saw last week.  Remember verse 12?

12 So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood.

Because Christ was crucified you have been sanctified or set apart not only for Heaven but also for service to God here on earth.  Listen to Hebrews 9:13-14.

13 For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, 14 how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.

As Christians, we have been set free.  We have been cleansed from sin and therefore we are now purified in order to do all our Lord has called us to do.  And in verse 13 we are called to do something.  Look at the first part of verse 13. 

13 Therefore let us go to him…

Him of course is our Great Prophet, our Great King, our Great High Priest, our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ.  But notice the three words in the text, “let us go.”  Your translation may say “let us go forth therefore unto Him” or “let us go out to Him” or “Let us, then, go to him.”  The Greek word is “exerchomai.”  It means to come out or go to.  I think in the sense of verse 13 it means to come out of something and go to something.  Let me illustrate that. 

The word “exerchomai” is used to describe what Judas Iscariot did on the night he betrayed the Lord.  John records the event for us in John 13:21-31.

²¹ When Jesus had said this, He became troubled in spirit, and testified and said, "Truly, truly, I say to you, that one of you will betray Me." ²² The disciples began looking at one another, at a loss to know of which one He was speaking. ²³ There was reclining on Jesus' bosom one of His disciples, whom Jesus loved. ²⁴ So Simon Peter gestured* to him, and said* to him, "Tell us who it is of whom He is speaking." ²⁵ He, leaning back thus on Jesus' bosom, said* to Him, "Lord, who is it?" ²⁶ Jesus then answered* , "That is the one for whom I shall dip the morsel and give it to him." So when He had dipped the morsel, He took* and gave* it to Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot. ²⁷ After the morsel, Satan then entered into him. Therefore Jesus said* to him, "What you do, do quickly." ²⁸ Now no one of those reclining at the table knew for what purpose He had said this to him. ²⁹ For some were supposing, because Judas had the money box, that Jesus was saying to him, "Buy the things we have need of for the feast"; or else, that he should give something to the poor. ³⁰ So after receiving the morsel he went out (exerchomai) immediately; and it was night.
³¹ Therefore when he had gone out (exerchomai), Jesus said* , "Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in Him;

Judas did not just leave the room.  Judas left what the room symbolized and that was fellowship with Christ and access to the Father.  He left that for money.  When he went out he was finished with the fellowship he had with the Lord Jesus and instead became His enemy and betrayer. 

Let me give you another illustration.  This is from John 19:16 and 17.

¹⁶ So he then handed Him over to them to be crucified.
¹⁷ They took Jesus, therefore, and He went out (exerchomai) bearing His own cross, to the place called the Place of a Skull, which is called in Hebrew, Golgotha.

When the Lord took up His cross there was a twofold meaning.  First the cross represented the rejection of Christ by Jerusalem.  They took the Lord outside the gates to crucify Him showing that He had been rejected.  But at the same time when the Lord left Jerusalem He did so willingly because He was at that point parting ways with Old Testament Judaism and dealing specifically with the Jews.  Now He was outside the camp and by His going outside the camp He rejected those who had rejected Him. 

Now go back to Hebrews 13:13.  Look at the first part of the verse again. 

13 Therefore let us go to him…

We know what we have to do here.  We are called to go to Christ.  This is not a call for salvation because the writer is dealing with professing believers in this epistle.  Rather this is a call to radical Christian service and sacrifice.  This is a call to further sanctification.  This is a call for you as a believer to come out of the world and the culture and the comfort and protection that it offers and to go to Christ.  

So where is He?  Where do we go?  Look at verse 13 again.

13 Therefore let us go to him outside the camp…

Last week we saw what happened outside the camp.  Remember?  The lepers went there. The ceremonial unclean went there.  The stonings happened there.  The remains of the sacrificial animals went there to be burned up.  All of the outcasts of society were sent outside the camp.

But there was also something very important that happened in the book of Exodus outside the camp.  When Moses went up on the mountain to receive the Ten Commandments what did the Israelites do?  Aaron and the Israelites made and worshipped a Golden Calf.  By doing this they rejected the Lord who brought them up out of the land of Egypt.  After that when Moses met with the Lord he set up the tent of meeting outside the camp.  And anyone who wanted to meet with the Lord had to do so outside the camp.  And for us to have the intimate fellowship with the Lord that we all should desire is to do what verse 13 says and go to Jesus outside the camp. 

We have to leave the camp to get outside the camp.  The camp represents the culture that you live in.  It is what you were raised in. It is what you are familiar with.  It is where you will find the most affirmation for living a sinful lifestyle.  And it is exactly what our Lord has called us away from. 

The problem is our minds and our hearts have been conditioned to desire the things of the culture.  They place them on the television screen.  They scroll across the top and the sides of websites.  The radio blasts these cultural imperatives to us constantly.  So the draw and the pull toward the culture for us is so strong that we are like moths going toward the flame. 

But verse 13 is very clear.  As a matter of fact the writer of Hebrews uses a verb form that would get the attention of the original reader and I want to call your attention to that verb form as well. 

It is in the present tense which tells us to do it now and continuously.  It is also in the subjunctive mood which normally is the mood of possibility.  But this is a special case.  It is also plural and in the first person.  That is why your translation says, “let us.”  This is the Greek way to give a command to yourself and a group of others.  The technical term is a hortatory subjunctive and it is a command for us to follow. 

We must as a part of the call of God on our lives for salvation make a clean break with the world that we live in.  It is not a choice for us. We are to be in the world but not of the world.  The principles that we are called to live by as a Christian will soon come into great conflict with the principles of the culture in which we live.  That is why I said that Christianity is humble defiance to the culture.  When you come to Christ you are saying by your confession and baptism that you are making a break with the world and its system and are now living for the Kingdom of God.  It’s not half world and half kingdom.  With Christ it is all or nothing. 

The problem that we have in our culture is that most of us have been conditioned to think of our nation as somehow part of the Kingdom.  Let me say publicly and on record that the United States of America will fall as will all other nations either before or when the Kingdom of God is fulfilled.  Listen to 1 John 2:15-17.

¹⁵ Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. ¹⁶ For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world. ¹⁷ The world is passing away, and also its lusts; but the one who does the will of God lives forever.

So the first cultural mandate for the Christian is to separate your heart from the culture.  Whatever your lost friends or your carnal friends who are believers are involved in that is contrary to the will of God you can not be involved in. 

I said earlier that this has to do with your affections or what you are passionate about.  So let me ask you this morning Christian, have you left the camp?  Have you forsaken the mandates of the culture in which we live to go to Christ outside the camp?  What kind of break have you made with this present world in order to pursue the world that is to come?  Or have you made very minimal breaks.  Sure, we can handle the easy stuff.  We know the places that we must stay away from and the words that we should not say.  But what is it that draws you away from Christ and back toward the culture?  What is it that overpowers your desire to seek the Lord?  What is it that pulls you away from your devotional life?  What pulls you away from evangelizing? 

Tom and I had a conversation about this just a couple of weeks ago.  The world is so much in the church that we have a very difficult time seeing that these things are indeed pulling us away from our Lord.  And the minute someone stands up and points these things out to us or the church they are dismissed as a legalist.  Before I attempt to apply this to us this morning let me give you the definition of a legalist.  A legalist seeks to be saved through the keeping of laws. 

Let me say to you this morning I believe that there is only one way of salvation and that is by God’s grace, through faith, in Christ Jesus alone.  But in that faith there is also repentance.  They go hand in hand.  The problem that most people in the church have is that they have not repented.  Sure they have claimed belief in Christ and now salvation is an addendum to their already wonderful life but they have not repented.  True repentance is to hate sin and the ways of the world and to love God and His righteousness.  I am not lobbying for perfectionism here because the Bible clearly states that our flesh wars against our spirit so that we are not perfect.  But let me ask you, in your own heart and mind is there even a battle raging?  Do you really war against the desires of your flesh and truly desire the things of God?  How easy is it for you to be pulled into sin? 

We should not just be students of the Bible we should also be students of our own hearts.  What does your heart desire?  Are you like Lot’s wife who so longed for Sodom that she could not and would not obey the command of God not even to look back at that wicked city? 

Allow me to be very specific with you this morning.  I would ask that you examine your own heart just as I have had to examine my own this very morning and see what has our hearts captured.  Is it Christ or is it the camp?  Does the culture have your undivided attention or does Christ have it? 

What do you get passionate about?  What I have noticed especially this week is that many people are very passionate about politics.  There have been demonstrations and there is nothing wrong with that in our society but has that overshadowed Christ in your heart this week?  Has what a depraved and passing president and a depraved and passing congress done for this depraved and decaying society so caught your affections this week that you have forgotten your Lord?  Are you that passionate about the Gospel?  After all Tea Parties are not the hope for lost and perishing people.  Politics has never saved anyone’s eternal soul. 

What has been the topics of conversation at your homes this week?  Has it been what is happening on the latest sitcom or movie or whatever else holds your attention?  When is the last time you had a conversation about the Lord with your family?  When is the last time you talked to your children about Christ and the Gospel?  What are your priorities?  What do you want your children to know if you were to die this afternoon? 

You see a call to go to Christ outside the camp is to no longer be that concerned with what is happening inside the camp.  Inside the camp there is defilement and death and sin and unrighteousness and the people who live according to the prince and power of the air who are captured to do his will.  But we Christians are called to not live in the camp where all that is happening we are called to be outside the camp.  Sure we are aware of what is going on.  We don’t have our heads buried but we have to have the right priorities. 

Let me take this a little closer to home this morning.  What will be the topic of conversations over lunch today?  Will we as we continue in worship this morning over a fellowship meal and a time of mutual edification spend that time in godly Christ centered edifying conversation or will we pretend that we are not still worshipping and speak of everything other than the things of God? 

I want you to listen to what our confession says about the Sabbath or the Lord’s Day and how our time should be spent. 

8._____ The sabbath is then kept holy unto the Lord, when men, after a due preparing of their hearts, and ordering their common affairs aforehand, do not only observe an holy rest all day, from their own works, words and thoughts, about their worldly employment and recreations, but are also taken up the whole time in the public and private exercises of his worship, and in the duties of necessity and mercy.

What will you talk about over lunch?  What will you do when you get home this afternoon?  Will we continue in the worship of God or will we turn on the television and see what is on?  Or will you fire up the internet and see what is happening?  How many of you will actually go home and consider anything that has been said this morning? 

The Lord has called us to a higher standard.  We are sanctified or set apart from the world and even though we are in the world we are not to be like those who are still a prisoner to this present age.  We are called to be a light shining in a dark place.  And a light does not have to flaunt itself for people to pay attention to it.  Salt does not have to scream for people to know its there.  It is in the actions and the affections that Christ is either Lord of our lives or a nice addendum to our agendas. 

How will you spend your time this week?  Will it be as one who has left the camp and gone to Christ or will you spend your time very similarly to the rest of the world. 

Lord teach us to number our days.  Next week we will look at the second cultural mandate for the Christian.  I pray that you will consider these things as I have had to consider them and order your life appropriately. 

Let’s pray.