San Diego, California, United States First Church of the Nazarene Sunday School Lesson from Come and Go with Dr. Frank Carver Dr. Herb Prince for Sunday, 27 June 2014
GOD HAS SPOKEN
Priming the Pump!
(Hebrews
Eighteen) (The following
outline is that of Kevin L. Anderson, Hebrews: A Commentary In The Wesleyan
Tradition, New Beacon Bible Commentary (Kansas City: Beacon Hill Press, 2013),
5-6.
I. Hearing
the Apostle and High Priest of Our Confession: Hebrews 1:1—4:13
II. Jesus’ Superior High Priesthood: Hebrews
4:14—10:18
A. The
Qualifications of the Great High Priest (4:14—5:10).
1. The
Great High Priest (4:14-16).
2. Qualifications
of Ordinary High Priests (5:1-4)
3. Qualifications
of the High Priest like Melchizedek (5:5-10)
B. Preparing
for Advanced Teaching on Christ’s High Priesthood (5:11—6:20)
1. Reproof Concerning Arrested Spiritual Development
(5:11-14)
2. Exhortation to Go On to Maturity (6:1—3)
3.Warning About Irreversible Apostasy (6:4-8)
4.Words of Reassurance (6:9-12)
5. Powerful Encouragement Based on God’s
Trustworthiness (6:13-20)
C. The
High Priest like Melchizedek: The Son Perfected Forever (7:1-28).
D. The
Superior Ministry of the Son’s High Priesthood (8:1—10:18)
III. Call to Persevering Faith and Acceptable
Worship: Hebrews 10:19--13:25)
Hebrews 5: Re-Crucifying
Jesus
11-14 I have a
lot more to say about this, but it is hard to get it across to you since you’ve
picked up this bad habit of not listening. By this time you ought to be
teachers yourselves, yet here I find you need someone to sit down with you and
go over the basics on God again, starting from square one—baby’s milk, when you
should have been on solid food long ago! Milk is for beginners, inexperienced
in God’s ways; solid food is for the mature, who have some practice in telling
right from wrong.
6:1-3 So come
on, let’s leave the preschool fingerpainting exercises on Christ and get on
with the grand work of art. Grow up in Christ. The basic foundational truths
are in place: turning your back on “salvation by self-help” and turning in
trust toward God; baptismal instructions; laying on of hands; resurrection of
the dead; eternal judgment. God helping us, we’ll stay true to all that. But there’s
so much more. Let’s get on with it!
4-8 Once people
have seen the light, gotten a taste of heaven and been part of the work of the
Holy Spirit, once they’ve personally experienced the sheer goodness of God’s
Word and the powers breaking in on us—if then they turn their backs on it,
washing their hands of the whole thing, well, they can’t start over as if
nothing happened. That’s impossible. Why, they’ve re-crucified Jesus! They’ve
repudiated him in public! Parched ground that soaks up the rain and then
produces an abundance of carrots and corn for its gardener gets God’s “Well
done!” But if it produces weeds and thistles, it’s more likely to get cussed
out. Fields like that are burned, not harvested.
9-12 I’m sure
that won’t happen to you, friends. I have better things in mind for
you—salvation things! God doesn’t miss anything. He knows perfectly well all
the love you’ve shown him by helping needy Christians, and that you keep at it.
And now I want each of you to extend that same intensity toward a full-bodied
hope, and keep at it till the finish. Don’t drag your feet. Be like those who
stay the course with committed faith and then get everything promised to them.
God Gave His
Word
13-18 When God
made his promise to Abraham, he backed it to the hilt, putting his own
reputation on the line. He said, “I promise that I’ll bless you with everything
I have—bless and bless and bless!” Abraham stuck it out and got everything that
had been promised to him. When people make promises, they guarantee them by
appeal to some authority above them so that if there is any question that
they’ll make good on the promise, the authority will back them up. When God
wanted to guarantee his promises, he gave his word, a rock-solid guarantee—God
can’t break his word. And because his word cannot change, the promise is
likewise unchangeable.
18-20 We who
have run for our very lives to God have every reason to grab the promised hope
with both hands and never let go. It’s an unbreakable spiritual lifeline,
reaching past all appearances right to the very presence of God where Jesus,
running on ahead of us, has taken up his permanent post as high priest for us,
in the order of Melchizedek.
Hebrews 5:12a;
6:1a: “For though by this time
you ought to be teachers, you need
someone to teach you again the basic elements of the oracles of God.
. . . Therefore let us go on toward perfection, leaving behind the basic
teaching about Christ, and not laying again the foundation . . .”
With the exception of Christ, no
one attains perfection in this life.( Saint
Augustine as quoted by Herbert L. Prince, “Long Ago God Spoke: Part 16:
Overseers of the Faith,” (July 20, 2014), 2.)
Therefore let us go on toward
perfection.(Hebrews 6:1)
Introduction
Today, we prime the pump!
Hebrews 1:1—4:16 has been concerned
to identify Jesus in his person
as the Son of God and
to present Jesus in his work
as the Christian’s Great High Priest.
With Hebrews 5:1 the author is ready to
expand on who the Son is in his work as a high “priest forever, after the order of Melchizedek.” He begins with a lengthy exhortation, at
first subtly implicit, then boldly explicit. The Hebrew writer restates his
intent first by setting up a comparison with the Levitical priesthood (vv. 1-4)
followed by introducing Jesus’ priesthood in a slightly ambiguous development
(vv. 5-10). These verses took us two lessons to present under the title “The
Education of Jesus”( The first of the two
was given the title of “The Education of Jesus” in retrospect in my files!)
5So also
Christ did not glorify himself in becoming a high priest, but was appointed by
the one who said to him, “You are my Son, today I have begotten you”; 6as
he says also in another place, “You are a priest forever, according to the
order of Melchizedek.” 7In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up
prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to the one who was able
to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission. 8Although
he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered; 9and having been made perfect,
he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him, 10having
been designated by God a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.
As the consequence of 5:5-10, today we begin
to wonder if we can talk about “The Education of the Christian,” or would a
title like “Christian Perfection” be more appropriate in the light of 6:1: “Therefore let us go on toward perfection.” So today I am asking for your help, not
primarily for an appropriate title, but also for the writing of the coming lessons
on a significant, and at points, difficult passage (5:11—6:20). As we read
through 5:11—6:20 helped only by Kevin Anderson’s out line, what are your
Comments? What do you see?
Questions? What is difficult?
What don’t you understand?
Preparing for Advanced
Teaching on Christ’s High Priesthood
(5:11—6:20)
Reproof Concerning Arrested
Spiritual Development
(5:11-14)
11About this we have much to say that is hard to explain, since you
have become dull in understanding. 12For though by this time you
ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic elements of
the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food; 13for everyone
who lives on milk, being still an infant, is unskilled in the word of
righteousness. 14But solid food is for the mature (perfect( So NASB,
KJV. Greek teleiōn)), for those whose faculties have been trained
by practice to distinguish good from evil.
Exhortation to Go On to
Maturity
(6:1—3)
1Therefore let us go on toward perfection,( Greek
teleiotēta.) leaving behind the basic teaching about Christ, and
not laying again the foundation: repentance from dead works and faith toward
God, 2instruction about baptisms, laying on of hands, resurrection
of the dead, and eternal judgment. 3And we will do this, if God
permits.
Warning About Irreversible
Apostasy
(6:4-8)
4For it is impossible to restore again to repentance those who have
once been enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in
the Holy Spirit, 5and have tasted the goodness of the word of God
and the powers of the age to come, 6and then have fallen away, since
on their own they are crucifying again the Son of God and are holding him up to
contempt. 7Ground that drinks up the rain falling on it repeatedly,
and that produces a crop useful to those for whom it is cultivated, receives a
blessing from God. 8But if it produces thorns and thistles, it is
worthless and on the verge of being cursed; its end is to be burned over.
Words of Reassurance
(6:9-12)
9Even though we speak in this way, beloved, we are confident of
better things in your case, things that belong to salvation. 10For
God is not unjust; he will not overlook your work and the love that you showed
for his sake in serving the saints, as you still do. 11And we want
each one of you to show the same diligence so as to realize the full assurance
of hope to the very end, 12so that you may not become sluggish, but
imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.
Powerful Encouragement Based
on God’s Trustworthiness
(6:13-20)
13When God made a promise to Abraham, because he had no one greater by
whom to swear, he swore by himself, 14saying, “I will surely bless
you and multiply you.” 15And thus Abraham, having patiently endured,
obtained the promise. 16Human beings, of course, swear by someone
greater than themselves, and an oath given as confirmation puts an end to all
dispute. 17In the same way, when God desired to show even more
clearly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose,
he guaranteed it by an oath, 18so that through two unchangeable
things, in which it is impossible that God would prove false, we who have taken
refuge might be strongly encouraged to seize the hope set before us. 19We
have this hope, a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters the
inner shrine behind the curtain, 20where Jesus, a forerunner
on our behalf, has entered, having become a high priest forever according to
the order of Melchizedek.
Conclusion
??
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First Church of the Nazarene
3901 Lomaland Drive
San Diego, California, United States
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