Radio Broadcast Wednesday 07/10/2024

Classic Christianity – Book of Hebrews P130 (07-10-24)

Focus on Jesus, Christ in You, Your Hope of Glory

~ Today, people are focusing on everything but Jesus. They focus on movies, sports entertainment, music, news, tech stuff, religion, pretending they are good, pretending that some political figure is better than someone else, and have tons of idols on their idol pedestals, and without even realizing it, they placed Man (man and woman) above God and His word. Many listen to known deceivers all day long, and think nothing of it. For they would much rather listen to the teaching of Man (bringing to their itching ears) rather than listen to the Holy Spirit teach them the TRUTH about the word of God. And make no mistake about it, we have all fallen for the lies of Satan at one time or another and we all have had idols.

And today the body of Christ is not who most people think it is. The body of Christ does not reside in a building built by human hands. The true body of Christ is all of those who have the Holy Spirit living in them, when they became born of the Spirit of God. They were baptized by the HOLY SPIRIT into the body of Christ, and now represent Jesus. And the Spirit uses those that are truly His to be a representative as though God were making His appeal through us. And that is the true picture of the Lord’s supper, when it is Christ in us, our hope of Glory. We became one in Christ Jesus, and we ALL belong to one another. Yet even that has been perverted in meaning, taking things in the word of God, and changing the meaning of what is true, and made it a lie of Satan.

Bob goes into some details on today’s program about the Lord’s supper that are excellent points to consider. Take the time to listen carefully to the word of God today. Pay attention to the details, for the details matter in all things today. And allow the Holy Spirit to teach you all truth. And remember, All wisdom comes from God, NOT from Man.

“Now I rejoice in the sufferings for you, and I am filling up in my flesh that which is lacking of the tribulations of Christ for His body, which is the church, of which I became a minister according to the administration of God having been given me toward you, to complete the word of God, the mystery having been hidden from the ages and from the generations, but now having been manifested to His saints, to whom God has willed to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Nations, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory, whom we preach, admonishing every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, so that we may present every man perfect in Christ. Unto this also I toil, striving according to His energy, working in me in power.” ^{Colossians 1:24-29}

~ Continue in brotherly love. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it. Remember those in prison as if you were bound with them, and those who are mistreated as if you were suffering with them.

Marriage should be honored by all and the marriage bed kept undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterers.

Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, for God has said:

“Never will I leave you,

never will I forsake you.”

So we say with confidence:

“The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid.

What can man do to me?”

Remember your leaders who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.

Do not be carried away by all kinds of strange teachings, for it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace and not by foods of no value to those devoted to them. We have an altar from which those who serve at the tabernacle have no right to eat.

Although the high priest brings the blood of animals into the Holy Place as a sacrifice for sin, the bodies are burned outside the camp. And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate, to sanctify the people by His own blood. Therefore let us go to Him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace He bore. For here we do not have a permanent city, but we are looking for the city that is to come.

Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise, the fruit of lips that confess His name. And do not neglect to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased.

Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they watch over your souls as those who must give an account. To this end, allow them to lead with joy and not with grief, for that would be of no advantage to you.

Pray for us; we are convinced that we have a clear conscience and desire to live honorably in every way. And I especially urge you to pray that I may be restored to you soon.

Now may the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, equip you with every good thing to do His will. And may He accomplish in us what is pleasing in His sight through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.

I urge you, brothers, to bear with my word of exhortation, for I have only written to you briefly.

Be aware that our brother Timothy has been released. If he arrives soon, I will come with him to see you.

Greet all your leaders and all the saints.

Those from Italy send you greetings.

Grace be with all of you.^{Hebrews 13:1-25}

Pray to God:

“Lord Jesus, teach me the truth of the world today and give me the wisdom to know the truth and identify the lies of the devil. Thank you God.”

~ “Now let’s turn back to First Corinthians. In the 11th chapter of First Corinthians, you and I have gone over that, and we probably will need to be doing that again before too long. But the Lord was giving us a total picture of this whole thing that we’re talking about when he gave the Lord’s supper, which has been perverted in its meaning, probably more than anything that I know of in Christianity, where the entirety of the Lord’s Supper was a picture of this very unity that we’re talking about. It is not a time or a place when everyone sits around with the organ playing and the lights dim to confess your sins in order to get worthy so you don’t eat and drink damnation upon yourself. That is so contrary to what the Word of God is speaking about in the Lord’s Supper that it’s almost amusing when you see as to what we have done with that thing, when it’s as clear as a bell what it’s talking about. And the problem with the Corinthian heresy was the fact that the Corinthians were coming to that supper, and as gluttons, thinking of themselves more highly of themselves than they are ought, were eating up all the bread, drinking up all the wine before the rest the people got there. And when the people got there, there wasn’t anything left. And so you have a tendency to do what? Judge your body, Judge judge it. That’s why he’s saying, if you don’t judge yourself in the way you’re taking this supper, then they’re going to judge you the body’s going to judge you. Had nothing to do with God judging your sin. He’s already judged her sin. The verdict was guilty, the punishment was death, and Christ took it. There is no more condemnation or judgment for you and my sins. That’s what he did. But we will judge each other in the body, and we will also judge each other in the body when the body doesn’t judge its own actions, when we do not function in love, we will be judged by the body. And when the parts of the body think more highly themselves than they ought. It’s going to bring judgment, and it’s a tragedy when those things occur among the body of Christ, because many times we act before we think. So, he’s saying to us in this Lord’s supper that we’re a part of the same body, and therefore let this Lord’s supper be a picture of what this is.” ~ Bob George

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Join Bob George in this chapter by chapter exposition of the book of Hebrews. Available for download the complete series on the Book of Hebrews. The Book of Hebrews is key to understanding the New Covenant.

Announcer 0:12
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Bob George 0:29
And he said to do so with sober judgment, not in accordance, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. He’s going to tell you why that we should not be thinking more highly of ourselves than we ought. It’s because we all belong to the same body. And so he goes ahead. Each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function. So if you. Look at me. Stand up here, you see a head, and then underneath that head’s a body, and it’s one head, it’s one body, but the body is made up of many, many parts, and that’s what he’s saying here. And not all these parts have the same function. So it is when Christ we form one body, and each member belongs to the others. You and I and folks, this is where we’ve got to get this into our heads, because if we don’t, you’ll never see what submission is all about. You and I belong to one another if we are in Christ, Jesus, in this room today, do we understand that we belong to each other. We are attached to the body of Christ at the very moment that the Spirit of God came to live within you. And that’s what spiritual birth is. Spiritual birth is a point in time in history, in the life of every human being on the face of this earth, when a person either accepts or rejects the living Christ. It’s not going to church, it’s not being baptized, it’s not being good, or it’s not being bad. It is a time when a man sees his own emptiness and he hears the voice of God that I came to give you life, and a man responds to be able to say, Lord Jesus, I can’t, but you can, or even maybe you can, but if you can, I’m willing to ask you to come into my heart and to be my Lord and to be my savior.

Some people put it in this fashion that it’s like a throne, and on a person’s throne, either you’re sitting it in control of everything and Christ is outside the life, or else you’ve replaced Christ with yourself. In other words, you’ve moved out and moved Christ in. You could be like sitting in a dual Driver’s Education car with two steering wheels, and you’ve been bumping down the road as long as you want to bump. And Christ comes and sits in the car and says, first of all, do you want me in the car? And secondly, if you do, do you want me to drive the car? And we say, Lord, I am sick and tired of bumping down the road. Come in and take over.

Now that can manifest itself in many ways, but in a final analysis, to be born again of the Spirit is a time when a person realizes his death and accepts Christ’s life and is born again. Now at the very moment it says in the scripture in Romans, that if the Spirit of God does not live in you, then you do not belong to Him. So unless a man is born again of the Spirit, He will never see the kingdom of God. And so birth is life, and when you and I come into contact with life, the Spirit of God comes to live within us, and then it says that that Spirit baptizes, places you into the body of Christ. So those are that’s the two fold element of salvation, Christ in you and you in Christ. Christ’s Spirit comes to live in your body, and then places you into his body. We’ve equated that, as I mentioned, with a baby in a mother’s womb. The mother’s life is in that baby, and that baby is in the mother. So the baby’s in mom and mom’s in the baby. It’s a two fold operation. Now, each and every one of us who are in Christ have been placed into the Body of Christ, and therefore we have one head and we belong to one another, but each one of those parts have a different function, as placed into the Body by who? Christ, Jesus. We don’t elevate ourselves to the position of being a hand or decide I don’t want to be a toe any longer, so I think I’ll be a finger that God, uniquely in his wisdom, places you into that body as he sees fit. And there’s not a one of us that can change that. When we do, we become as ridiculous as a toe trying to act like a hand, or as ridiculous as a hand, trying to be a mouth and just flapping all over the place. If you are in Christ, then Christ, Jesus has come to live in you, and according to his wisdom and knowledge, placed you into the body exactly where he wanted you to be, and with the function that he wanted you to function in. Do we understand that we don’t have anything to do with that? I can’t make myself. A finger, or I can’t make myself a toe if I am God, put me there. Now it says wiggle. If that’s what you are, do what you do as a finger. Pick up something, do what I’ve made you to be.

Now this is what he’s saying. Then we all have different gifts we, all of us, are formed one body, each member belongs to the other. We have different gifts according to what? The grace that God has given us. So it says, If a man’s gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. If it’s serving, let him serve. If it’s teaching, let him teach. If it’s encouraging, let him encourage. We share more those. If it’s contributing to the needs of others, why let him give generously. If it’s leadership, let him govern diligently. If it’s showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully. In other words, whatever your gift is, act on it. Be free to act on it. And then he comes down to say, Love, however, which is behind all of these things must be sincere. We hate what is evil. We cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Why? We belong to each other and honor one another above yourselves.

Now folks that is looking out after the interest. I mean, I can sit there and say, Well, my body’s dirty and my hands say, yeah, that’s all right, I’m tired, and it’s saying, Don’t do that. Serve the body. Serve the body, serve one another in love, don’t look at yourself more highly than you are, but serve one another. When we see each other in marriage. A number of years ago, it came to me that my wife is, first and foremost, a sister in Christ, a part of the body of Christ. We’re going to be married as long as one of us are or both of us are alive here on this earth. But when one of us die, we’re not married anymore. And when both of us die, then we’re going to be brothers and sisters in heaven, which is what we are here on Earth. And so you begin to realize, how do what is your attitude toward your mate? You see, these things are pretty easy, to a degree when you think about the body, unless we’re rebelling against All authority, which some people do. But when it comes down to marriage, where it says, Submit yourself what? One to another. In other words, don’t think of yourselves more highly than yourselves than you ought. Now, a man has a position in a family that God said to fulfill, just like we’re going to see in a minute, as he has leaders in the church that he expects a position to be filled, but he said, Don’t think more highly in yourself than you ought. That doesn’t mean that you use that position to trample underneath somebody else. So a man’s position, even though he’s got the authority in that home and is supposed to exercise that leadership, it doesn’t mean he’s there to trample on people or on his wife any more than a minister or a teacher that has been sent by God into an assembly to teach is there to trample on people or to lord over people. The only time that is done is if somebody is thinking more highly of himself than he ought. And that does not just come from people in that position. That can come from people in any position. I mean, you could be a little toe and think more highly of yourself than you ought, or you could be a mouth and think more highly of yourself than you ought. And what it’s saying to the entire body of Christ, don’t any of you parts think more highly of yourself than you ought, because you’re a part of the body, I’m the head. So he’s saying to us, love must be sincere. Cling to what is good, hate what is evil, Be devoted to one another in brotherly love and honor each other above that of yourselves. Trust the Lord with your life, with the life of your family with the life of the body that you belong to. The Lord is the head of all of those things, and because he is the head, it says you can trust him.

Now let’s turn back to First Corinthians. In the 11th chapter of First Corinthians, you and I have gone over that, and we probably will need to be doing that again before too long. But the Lord was giving us a total picture of this whole thing that we’re talking about when he gave the Lord’s supper, which has been perverted in its meaning, probably more than anything that I know of in Christianity, where the entirety of the Lord’s Supper was a picture of this very unity that we’re talking about. It is not a time or a place when everyone sits around with the organ playing and the lights dim to confess your sins in order to get worthy so you don’t eat and drink damnation upon yourself. That is so contrary to what the Word of God is speaking about in the Lord’s Supper that it’s almost amusing when you see as to what we have done with that thing, when it’s as clear as a bell what it’s talking about. And the problem with the Corinthian heresy was the fact that the Corinthians were coming to that supper, and as gluttons, thinking of themselves more highly of themselves than they are ought, were eating up all the bread, drinking up all the wine before the rest the people got there. And when the people got there, there wasn’t anything left. And so you have a tendency to do what? Judge your body, Judge judge it. That’s why he’s saying, if you don’t judge yourself in the way you’re taking this supper, then they’re going to judge you the body’s going to judge you. Had nothing to do with God judging your sin. He’s already judged her sin. The verdict was guilty, the punishment was death, and Christ took it. There is no more condemnation or judgment for you and my sins. That’s what he did. But we will judge each other in the body, and we will also judge each other in the body when the body doesn’t judge its own actions, when we do not function in love, we will be judged by the body. And when the parts of the body think more highly themselves than they ought. It’s going to bring judgment, and it’s a tragedy when those things occur among the body of Christ, because many times we act before we think. So, he’s saying to us in this Lord’s supper that we’re a part of the same body, and therefore let this Lord’s supper be a picture of what this is.

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Bob George 13:23
So over in chapter 12, he picks up again, just adding to what we’re just talking about, chapter 12 of First Corinthians. Right after he talks about the Lord’s Supper, he again, he says the body’s a unit, and though it’s made up of many parts, and though its parts are many, they form one body. And so it is with Christ, for we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body. Now folks there again, when it talks about strange teachings, you will hear people and come up and say, Have you ever been baptized in the Holy Spirit? There is no such thing as being baptized in the Holy Spirit. You are baptized by the Holy Spirit in the body of Christ, not in the Holy Spirit. The Spirit of God comes to lives in you, and then places, which is what baptism means, places you into the body. So you are placed by the Spirit into the body of Christ. You’re not baptized in the Spirit, as evidenced by some manifestation that if you don’t have you’re not saved. There’s all kinds of strange teachings that have fallen upon the Christian world. When you and I come to Christ, you come to Christ by one way only, and that’s by faith. And if I need a sign, then it’s a repudiation of faith. You. The minute I need a sign. I’m repudiating faith. It’s the very thing that Jesus said to the very people he was talking to. He said, You’re an adulterous generation constantly looking for a sign. And he said, I’ll give you a sign. And that’s when he said, Just as Jonah was in the belly of the whale for three days and three nights. So I, the Son of Man, will be in the ground. In other words, if you need a sign over and above my resurrection, there’s something wrong with you, there’ll be no sign over and above my resurrection. You’re an adulterous generation. What is adulterous generation mean? Well, it means you’re playing around with two different people. You say you’re married to Jesus, but you’re over here playing around with something else, and you can’t be married to Jesus, and playing around with something else, if you’re going to play around with that’s with with signs and wonders, and that’s all you’re going to think about. Get married to it. But if you’re going to be married to the Lord Jesus Christ, then you’re going to have to understand something, that there’s nothing more than Jesus. When you and I have been made complete in Him, you don’t add to completeness, nor do you subtract from completeness. You have been made complete in Him.

Now, if God in the placement into his body places a gift, use that gift as God gave it to a person in the body. But don’t ever get into the mindset of thinking more highly of yourself than you ought, or buying this teaching that everybody is supposed to have that gift. If you’re a toe wiggle and quit trying to get the ears to be a toe, they don’t look good wiggly unless you’re a rabbit. And that’s what he’s saying to us. And people get all hung up on gifts instead of the giver. I mean, how intense would be for me to walk up to you and say, Hi, I’m Bob George. I have the gift of teaching. Do you have that gift of teaching? You don’t let me teach you. Hey, you got it. It’s idiocy, you see, it gets your mind off of you are onto you instead of onto him, and he is throughout Scripture warning the Christian body as to what that does to the body. It divides it. There is no super saint. There is no one person that has because of the gift, whatever it might be, that makes them more high than someone else, higher than someone else. There’s no such thing you’re in Christ period. And if you’re in Christ, you’re his son. If you don’t think your little toe’s important, let somebody cut it off and see how you like it. You realize how important that thing is.

Now it says we were all. We were all baptized by, not in by one Spirit. And that has nothing to do with water folks either. That’s That’s spiritual baptism. That baptism is identification. You have been identified by the Spirit of God with the body of Christ, Jesus. That’s who you are, the body of Christ, whether Jew or Greek slave or free. So you’ve got three categories of people. You got Jew, you had Gentile, and you got the church, the ecclesia, the children of God, who are the children of God, made up of? Both Jew and Gentile, both slave and free, are children of the living God. Now I as a Gentile when I come to Christ. Need if I was thinking about it, need to forget about being a Gentile, because that’s not who I am anymore. I’m a child of the living God, and if I was born of Jewish heritage, I need to forget about being a Jew, because I’m no longer, from God’s vantage point, a Jew. I’m a child of the living God. In Christ there is neither Jew or Gentile, slave or free. Now, if in Christ there’s neither one of those two, then why do we get so hung up on being either one of them? And we got that group of people just proud as punch of either being a gentile or being a Jew. Or being whatever they are. If you’re in Christ, forget about that stuff as we talked earlier. We’re not looking for an earthly city. We’re looking for the Heavenly Jerusalem that’s going to be made up of only children of God. So in Christ, you’re in the body of Christ, and in this body that you’ve been placed in, there’s no Jew, there’s no Gentile, there’s no slave, there’s no free, and we were all given that one Spirit to drink. So how many of us were given that spirit to drink? All of us, anyone who is in Christ, Jew, Gentile, slave or free, have all been placed into the Body of Christ. And who’s the head? It’s Christ Jesus.

Now goes ahead to say, the body is not made up of one part, but many. And if the foot should say, because I’m not a hand, I don’t belong to the body, it would not, for that reason, cease to be a part of the body. You may think that you’re not, but it wouldn’t cease to be. And if the ears should say, because I’m not an I, I don’t belong to the body, it would not, for that reason, cease to be a part of the body. You may say, I’m not a part of it, but you are. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? Just walk around one big eye. You got a head and just an eye. That’s all just big old eye staring at you. If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? Just big one, one ear? What’s a Christian world doing? Well, we got all the noses over here worshiping on Sunday, blowing up a storm, and got all the ears over here, just wiggling, just hearing up a storm. You got all the fingers over here and everything he said, Is that the way he meant the body to be, take the body out and just get all the ears over here, have the ear Church and the nose church and a tongue, church and a mind? What are you people thinking of? If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts but one body, the eye cannot say to the hand, I don’t need you. And the head cannot say to the feet, I don’t need you. On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and the parts that we think are less honorable, we treat with special honor. I think we can all figure that out. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with spatial modesty. While our presentable parts need no special treatment. There are parts of your body that you don’t really just don’t walk around exposing; vital but not up for public display.

In other parts of the body, it’s very acceptable for public display. So it’s saying you’re going to see some parts very visible, and some parts that aren’t so visible. But are they all a part of the same body? Absolutely. But God has combined, it says, the members of the body, and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in that body, but that all its parts should have equal concern for what? One another. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it. If one part is honored, every part rejoices with it. Well, I’m wondering if we do that. I wonder if that’s attitude has hit our hearts where we are rejoicing when there’s a time to rejoice, suffering, when a part of the body is hurting, trusting each other in our decisions. It says, now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.

Well, he goes ahead to say, and in the church, the ecclesia, God has appointed, first of all, apostles, second prophets. The apostles were first, then came prophets, then teachers and workers of miracles, those having gifts of healing, those able to help others, those with gifts of administration, those with speaking in different kinds of tongues, Are all apostles? No. Are all prophets? No. Are all teachers? No. Do all work miracles? No. Do all have gifts of healing? No. Do all speak in other languages? No. Do all interpret? No, but eagerly desire the greater gifts. And now he’s going to talk about the greater gift of all, and that’s love. Because, as he says, If I had all of these gifts that I could speak of the tongues of men and angels, but I don’t have love. I’m only a resounding gong and a clanging symbol. People come down, and some people say, if you don’t have this gift, you’re not spiritual. But if you do, you’re really spiritual. He’s, can you imagine calling someone that God thinks is spiritual, hello, though, there you spiritual noisy gong and resounding symbol has nothing at all to do. Our gifts and the exercise of our gifts have nothing to do with spirituality. Every spiritual gift mentioned here can be done in the energy of the flesh. Every single one of them. You can camouflage every gift. I can teach in the flesh. I’ve done it numerous times. You can have mercy in the flesh in order to draw attention unto yourself. You can, you can do all kinds. You can exercise administration in order to draw attention to yourself. You can exercise every spiritual gift in the energy of the flesh. So gifts aren’t evidence at all of where you’re walking. What’s evidence of where you’re walking is the fruit of the Spirit, not the gifts of the Spirit, because the fruit of the Spirit can only come from the Spirit. You see, a gift is like the law. As an example, the law is given by God, but it’s given to man, and so whose hands that law goes into depends on whether it’s going to be used in accordance with the way God intended it to be used, or whether it’s going to be used in accordance way man wants it to be used.

Announcer 27:11
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