New Salem Baptist Church

The Apostle

May 5, 2024

Read Hebrews 3:1-6

Observe that the author addresses his readers as “holy brothers.” This proves beyond question that this letter was written to and for saved people. The reason we ought to keep this in mind is because the epistle to the Hebrews has many warnings along with consequences for those who fail to heed the warnings. Some of these consequences are dire and there are many Christians who simply cannot take the thought that there could be any retribution from the Lord once this life is over. 

Because the entire New Testament is filled with such potential consequences, they cannot deny that they are there, but they will simply assert that all those passages refer to the lost, not to believers. Of course, there are warnings for the lost, too. But the warnings in Hebrews are for the follower of Christ. They are for us!

Not only are they called holy brothers but they share in a heavenly calling. The saints of the Old Testament had an earthly calling. The promises to Abraham and to his descendants, the Israelites, had to do with the earth.[1] They were promised the good land as well as material blessings if they held to faith. But under the new covenant we have a heavenly calling.

• We have been called to a heavenly Christ. He is sitting at the right hand of the Father right now (1:3b; 9:24) and we belong to him.
• We have a heavenly enrollment. Our names are enrolled in heaven! (12:23)
• We have tasted the heavenly gift (6:4). This gift is the living water (John 4:10).
• We have come to the heavenly Jerusalem (12:22), not the earthly city.
• We are partakers of the Holy Spirit (6:4)!

What a calling we have!

Verse one calls Jesus the apostle and high priest. An apostle is one who is sent by another. Jesus was sent to us from God the Father. Just as Jesus then sent his own apostles to us, such as Matthew, John, Peter, and Paul, so was he sent to the earth by the Father. He was sent with God in order to share God with us that we might partake of his divine life, nature, and fullness.

He is the apostle and high priest of our confession. The word confession is stronger and more meaningful than the word profession. To profess just means to affirm something. You could profess something just in your heart. But to confess implies saying something, usually important, before others. This is how the word is used elsewhere in the NT:

            8          “And I say to you, everyone who confesses Me before men, the Son of Man will confess him also before the angels of God;^[2]

¹³ I charge you in the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, ^[3]

Jesus is whom we confess. We confess him before others. Are you making a good confession? Or do you only talk about politics, sports, your job, your chores, anything else besides who Christ is? Let us make the good confession before Pontius Pilate. Of course, I don’t mean Pilate himself. Jesus did that already. By Pontius Pilate I mean anyone who doesn’t know who Jesus is. And, by know, I mean really know, not just acknowledge.

The Lord very much desires that you to make the good confession before Pontius Pilate!

We already read Luke 12:8. But let’s read verse 9 too:

⁹ but the one who denies me before men will be denied before the angels of God.^[4]

How do you deny something? You can disaffirm something verbally. You can say, as President Clinton did, “I did not have sex with that woman.” But you can also deny something by ignoring it. If you were expecting a dinner invitation from your friend and he didn’t invite you, you might say, “Don’t deny me the pleasure of your company.” Your friend didn’t say, “I am not inviting you to dinner.” He just didn’t invite you.

We can deny Jesus just by never speaking about him. This is what you would call a de facto denial. That is a fancy latin phrase that just means “in fact” or “of fact.” This would be opposed to lucutus sum, another fancy latin phrase meaning “to speak.” The point is that we do not have to say the words, “I deny that Jesus is my Lord,” to deny him. We can deny him by ignoring him in all our conversations.

Let me try to make my point another way. At the judgment seat of Christ, if the Lord said to you, “You did not confess me before men. In your eyes I was not worthy to confess,” would you have the boldness to reply, “Well, Lord, I didn’t deny you.” Do you think the Lord would be happy with that response? I can only speak for myself, but if the Lord said to me, “Craig, you seldom confessed me before men (because I do confess him, yet I know I do not do so enough),” I would never have the courage to say, “But, Lord, I didn’t deny you.” Maybe you have more hutzpah than me!

Jesus is the apostle of our confession! Is he the apostle of your confession?

When Jesus was here in the flesh he was faithful to the Father. We can follow his example. Just as Jesus was faithful to the one who sent him, we can be faithful to the one who sent us.

Maybe someone is thinking, “Well, that was Jesus. He is the Son of God, of course he is faithful. I’m just a sinner. I can’t really be very faithful.” Keep reading the rest of verse 2:

² who was faithful to him who appointed him, just as Moses also was faithful in all God’s house. ^[5]

Moses had no divinity. He was a human being just as we are. He even lacked confidence. When Yahweh instructed him to go to Pharaoh and free his people, he made excuse after excuse not to go. God revealed to him how he would be with him in miraculous ways in order to support him completely. Even after those revelations, we read this:

¹⁰ But Moses said to the Lord, “Oh, my Lord, I am not eloquent, either in the past or since you have spoken to your servant, but I am slow of speech and of tongue.” ¹¹ Then the Lord said to him, “Who has made man’s mouth? Who makes him mute, or deaf, or seeing, or blind? Is it not I, the Lord? ¹² Now therefore go, and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall speak.” ¹³ But he said, “Oh, my Lord, please send someone else.”^[6]

See how reluctant he was? Yet, the author of Hebrews says that Moses was faithful! This is because once he stepped out and actually started doing what the Lord directed him to do, the Lord was with him and he accomplished his mission. So it will be with you! You too can be faithful!

Modern self-help proponents and so-called “faith-movement” preachers highly promote verbal affirmations of positive things that, they say, will change your thinking. I am sure they over-emphasize this. The faith movement preachers even teach that your words create reality. That is just non-sense and false teaching. But there is some truth that affirming things out loud does change your outlook, your attitude, even increases your faith. Since that is so, let us affirm, out loud, that we can be faithful. The reason that we can affirm this is because our Apostle will empower us to be faithful!

Let’s say four words. Let’s say, “I can be faithful.”

“I can be faithful.”

“I can be faithful!”

“I can be faithful!!”

It’s true! You can be!

³ 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. ⁴ (For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God.)^[7]

Moses received glory even when he was on the earth. Recall that when he came down from the mountain his face was shining (Ex. 34:29-35). That was a glory for him. He had further glory after his death when he appeared on the mount of transfiguration with Elijah and the Lord Jesus (Matthew 17:1-9).

Jesus has more glory. Why? Because the builder of a house has more glory than the house he builds. Think of a beautiful house. It’s a house that you can neither afford or find but you wish you could. If the house is really beautiful there is a glory to it. You admire it. Home and Garden Television (HGTV.com) gives away a two million dollar house every year. They call it the HGTV Dream Home. They used to be a million dollars but now they are worth more. [show pictures of some of these houses] You can enter for free. So, I’ve been entering every year for the last twenty years or so. I’m sorry to report that I never won! Of course, nowadays teams of workers build a house. But we can imagine, and it has happened, that just one man created the architectural plans for the house and built it all by himself. Maybe it took him a year or more but he did it all alone. If you met this man, you would admire him more than the house!

Many years ago there was a brother in the Lord that went to the same church that I did. He was friendly but kind of nerdy. He was tall and thin and his hair seemed to be unmanageable. He was married with one daughter. He invited me over for dinner one night. His wife made a delicious dinner and afterwards we had pleasant conversation. He told me a story that amazed me. A few years before he came to our church he owned a small yacht and he had sailed around the whole world with only he and his wife. When I learned that he had singlehandedly sailed around the world my whole image of him changed. I no longer saw him as a nerd but as a very capable man! He became glorious to me. Great accomplishments bring glory.

Jesus has done the greatest things. He created Moses! Do you see that in the verse? Jesus is the builder of the house. Moses is the house. Then verse four goes on to say that the builder of all things is God. Thus, this passage again affirms that Jesus is God! We saw in chapter one that the author of the book proved that Jesus is God. Now he affirms it yet again.

 ⁵ Now Moses was faithful in all God’s house as a servant, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later,^[8]

Moses, as faithful as he was, was still only a servant. How did he testify? And, how are they spoken later? He testified by being faithful to what God directed him to do. This may surprise you, but the phrase, “that were to be spoken later,” all comes from one word in Greek. It takes six words in English to translate just one word in Greek in this instance. This is because each verb and participle in Greek has a different form expressing tense, voice, and mood. Whereas in English we have to add additional words to identify those characteristics. (If all that seems to be mumbo jumbo to you, it’s ok.)

This participle is in the future tense, so possibly, “were to be spoken later,” is not the best translation.  But how are they spoken later? It’s not easy to tell.  I’ll give you three possibilities:

1. It could be that the author is simply saying that Moses did these things and said them afterwards. He “spoke” them by writing them in Exodus through Deuteronomy.
2. Or, he testified to these things by doing them and writing them, and then God’s people have spoken of them ever since.
3. Or, he testified to these things by doing them and writing them and now Paul (or whomever wrote Hebrews) is going to relate them later in this epistle.

Robert Govett, a very able expositor, favors the last option and points out that Paul does indeed use the deeds of Moses, or what Moses had written, later in the book several times.[9]

Moses was faithful “in all God’s house.” By house, the author means household, that is, God’s people in those ancient times.

⁶ but Christ is faithful over God’s house as a son. And we are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.^[10]

In verse 6 we see that, whereas Moses was only a servant, Christ is God’s son.  Christ is faithful over God’s house today. We are that house! We are God’s house in a greater way than the saints of old. Contrary to what some teach, the Holy Spirit did indwell[11] the OT saints. But it is also clear that the indwelling we have today is deeper and greater than what they had under the old covenant.

We end with an important teaching by the author in verse six. He states that we are God’s house if we meet a certain condition. We need to know this!

The second half of verse six is full of meaning! It is rich. We must consider two words in this verse and we ought to understand what the author intends by these words. They may be easy to misunderstand. The two words are house and hope.

I have already said that the word house means household. But how are we God’s household or house? In one sense each one of us is a dwelling place of God and our individual bodies are called a temple of God (I Cor. 6:19). But in another sense, and more often, the church is called the house of God. The more pronounced view in the NT is that God’s people together are God’s house. God dwells among his people corporately. And this is the way the author has been using the term in verse 2 and 5. So, the word house here refers to the church, not to individuals.

What about the word, hope? We have more than one hope. We have the hope of eternal life. We have the hope of the gospel. (These two are nearly the same.) And we have the hope of the Lord’s return to the earth attended by inheriting the kingdom to come. To understand to what hope the author refers we can see how he uses it elsewhere in this epistle:

¹¹ And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end, ¹² so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. ^[12]

So, we see in chapter six that the author is using the word hope to refer to inheriting the promises. Our hope is that when the Lord returns we will inherit the promises of the kingdom.

Now we can better understand verse six. We are God’s house if we have confidence and we boast in the hope that we have.

As individuals, God will never leave us or forsake us. But as a church we see that Christ, who is God, can either dwell there or not dwell there.  Remember the church at Laodicea:

²⁰ Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.^[13]

Christ is outside the church! And, just because the author of Hebrews is referring to the church doesn’t mean that there isn’t an element of truth in how the Lord dwells in us as individuals. There are degrees of dwelling! This is why we are told to be filled with the Spirit! He never will completely leave the one who has been regenerated. But for Him to have intimate fellowship with us – to eat with us – we need to overcome (Rev. 3:21; 3:5).

See what Hebrews 3:6 is saying:

 ⁶ but Christ is faithful over God’s house as a son. And we are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.^[14]

For us to be God’s house we must keep our confidence and we must boast! How do you boast? Do you boast to yourself? Of course not! You boast to others! If you are not boasting of the Lord to others then you are not God’s house! Isn’t that what the verse says? If that is not what it says, tell me what it says!

I’m not saying that you are not a Christian or you are not saved if you do not boast about the Lord. I am saying that you are not God’s dwelling place in fullness if you are not confessing him to others. And I am only saying what Paul (because I think he is the author) is saying.

Being God’s house is conditional. It is not a one-time experience.

[Conclusion and Application] Jesus is the Apostle for this age. He is the Apostle of our confession. This means that we confess him before others. If we don’t confess him then he is not the Apostle of our confession.

He is worthy of more glory and honor than Moses. As such, we ought to boast about it. If we boast about Jesus then we are his house!

So, what ought we to do differently? It’s obvious, is it not? We must confess him and boast of him to others. If you desire to be God’s house, to have the Lord dine with you, then you must open your mouth.

“Lord, help us by your divine power, and by what remains in us, to hold to our confidence and to boast in you! Amen!”