Radio Broadcast Monday 05/19/2025

Classic Christianity – Bob George – A Journey Through The Book Of Hebrews Part 1 (05-19-25)

A Journey Through The Book of Hebrews Resting in Jesus Part 1

~ Faith in Jesus is What’s Important, Not Faith in Ourselves

~ Let’s get down to where the rubber meets the road. God wants us to Rest in Him, and He wants us to stop our fleshly works. And folks, God does get angry with people. He gets angry when a person refuses to enter His rest, and continues to do works of their own flesh. That should be quite sobering to most people today, but that message is hardly ever taught in the pulpits. In fact, the exact opposite message is taught by the world, including the religious world. The world tells you you’ve got to work to sustain yourself. And the religious world simply follows suit. You’ve got to work to earn your salvation, or even more subtle is the lie that is taught that you’ve got to work to keep your salvation, as though you earned it to begin with. And because of pride in flesh, these people refuse to come and enter into His rest. So He says, “They will never enter into my rest.”

Pride keeps a person focused on their own flesh and the flesh of others instead of what Jesus did on the cross. And pride will even go a step further and call God a liar, because by their very actions (spoken of by their mouths), they are condemning themselves when they don’t believe forgiveness is Finished. For what comes out of a person’s mouth, shows what their heart believes. And Catholics and Protestants as well as ALL the other religions of the world are ALL guilty of the same unbelief. That’s the lie that ties them ALL together. And satan will promote it and promote and promote to keep the lie going on and on and on.

Now people don’t like to hear Truth, because they love their lies more than they love the TRUTH of the word of God. But the Holy Spirit wants us (those who are in Christ Jesus) to be bold in the proclamation of TRUTH. Don’t shirk back from telling Truth like it is, as we ought to.

Hebrews 4:1-4
“Therefore, while the promise of entering His rest still stands, let us be careful that none of you be deemed to have fallen short of it. For we also received the good news just as they did; but the message they heard was of no value to them, since they did not share the faith of those who comprehended it.

Now we who have believed enter that rest. As for the others, it is just as God has said:
“So I swore on oath in My anger,
‘They shall never enter My rest.’”

And yet His works have been finished since the foundation of the world. For somewhere He has spoken about the seventh day in this manner: “And on the seventh day God rested from all His works.” And again, as He says in the passage above: “They shall never enter My rest.”

…..

And a certain ruler asked Him, saying, “Good Teacher, having done what, will I inherit eternal life?”
And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good, except God alone.

~ “Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.” 1 John 5:12

~ Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life; the one believing in Me, even if he should die, he will live. And everyone living and believing in Me shall never die, to the age. Do you believe this?” John 11:25,26
—

Pray to God:

Do you really want to know the WHOLE Truth of what is going on today?

“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened to you.” Matthew 7:7

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, if we had the ability or the inclination to just the very moment we became born again, just to walk by total faith in everything, in God says, you probably wouldn’t even need the Scripture. You could just walk by faith. But I don’t think there’s too many of us in this room that could say that that’s been the history of your life, and certainly it’s not of mine. So we have to learn. And all of this is a big learning process that we go through in life. And most of the ways that we learn the error of leaning on our own understanding is when we lean on our own understanding and then experience the results of that, isn’t it? And we find out that didn’t work. How many of you ever experienced that that didn’t work? And so we find out that didn’t work, and then nine times out of 10, we’ll say, I’ll try something else that I can understand. I’ll lean on another area of my understanding and see if that will maybe work, until we ultimately, in life, come to the end of ourselves and are able to say, Lord, I give up on my own understanding, and I’m going to lean on you. Still that inclination is going to be there. Is it not to still revert back to your own understanding? Folks, is that unusual? That’s called life, and it’s reality, but the reality of it is that you’re never going to find truth to walk in apart from the truth of the Word of God.” ~ Bob George

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Welcome to Classic Christianity Radio with Bob George Bob’s clear, timeless teachings on the complete forgiveness and unconditional love of Jesus Christ will transform your life as you learn about God’s amazing grace. Let’s join Bob as he teaches us from God’s Word.

Bob George 0:29
What we’re going to do today is to journey through the book of Hebrews, because really, it’s known as the book of faith, and it’s kind of a an overview or a synopsis or a conclusion of the three weeks that we’ve been dealing with this subject, on faith. When you’re talking about faith, can you lean upon your own understanding and walk by faith at the same time? Now, that’s an impossibility, and that’s why the scripture says to lean not on our own understanding, but in all things, acknowledge Him and allow Him, therefore to direct our paths. So if you and I are going to live with a desire in our heart for God to direct our paths, then we’re going to have to realize we cannot accomplish that by leaning on our own understanding. There’s the world’s understanding about things, and then there’s God’s truth about things, and Faith says which one are you going to believe in? Because I also can have faith. Can I not in my own understanding? As a matter of fact, isn’t it true that most of most of us live that way. In other words, the most natural thing for you and me to rely upon is what? Our own understanding. And the most unnatural thing for us to rely upon is what? God’s understanding. Now, quite frankly, that’s why, as you break down mankind, it is broken down in the Bible as to natural and spiritual. You have natural man and you have spiritual man. And that means that, quite frankly, we have the ability do we not to respond to life naturally as well as to respond to it spiritually. And so this process that we are living in and going through called life is a learning process where we have to learn that not to lean on our own understanding, but in all things, to acknowledge him and let him direct our paths. And that is quite a learning experience for us.

Now, if we had the ability or the inclination to just the very moment we became born again, just to walk by total faith in everything, in God says, you probably wouldn’t even need the Scripture. You could just walk by faith. But I don’t think there’s too many of us in this room that could say that that’s been the history of your life, and certainly it’s not of mine. So we have to learn. And all of this is a big learning process that we go through in life. And most of the ways that we learn the error of leaning on our own understanding is when we lean on our own understanding and then experience the results of that, isn’t it? And we find out that didn’t work. How many of you ever experienced that that didn’t work? And so we find out that didn’t work, and then nine times out of 10, we’ll say, I’ll try something else that I can understand. I’ll lean on another area of my understanding and see if that will maybe work, until we ultimately, in life, come to the end of ourselves and are able to say, Lord, I give up on my own understanding, and I’m going to lean on you. Still that inclination is going to be there. Is it not to still revert back to your own understanding? Folks, is that unusual? That’s called life, and it’s reality, but the reality of it is that you’re never going to find truth to walk in apart from the truth of the Word of God.

Now we have discussed on numerous occasions that the the example that was given to us on living by faith and in dependency upon the Lord is Jesus Himself. And here was Jesus, who was never anything less than God. He was always God. He will always be God. He always has been God. In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God. The Word was God. He was in the beginning, all things created by Him, all things created for him. And yet, when he came to this earth and came and took upon himself our humanity, he walked on this earth not as God, but as a man. He never cease to be God, but he showed us how to live as a man. Had he shown us how to live as God, it would have meant nothing to you and me, because we can’t live as God. We are not God. We never will be God. I am a man indwelt by God. He was God clothed in humanity, a world of difference between Jesus and you and me. Jesus identity is God clothed in humanity. My identity is I am human indwelt by Jesus. And so we have to realize that. So even though Jesus was God in an earth suit, he said, I’m going to teach you how to live as a man, not as God, but as a man. But I’m going to teach you how to live as a man, as God intended a man to live, not as you have intended man to live, but as God intended man to live. And therefore, Jesus said, I do nothing unless the Father tells me to do it, I say nothing, unless the Father tells me to say it. I want to tell you something folks, he also prayed nothing, unless the Father told him to pray it. He lived his entire life in total dependency upon his Father, did he not? And that’s it’s not my will, Lord. It’s yours be done. If there’s any way to take this cup from me, if there’s any way to save humanity apart from me having to become sinm do it, however, not my will, but yours be done. And so the Lord Jesus Christ gave us a total example as to how you live as a human here on this earth. He entered into our humanity in order to show us how humanity is to live. That is as God intended man to live.

When you saw Adam in the Garden of Eden, prior to the fall, you saw a man not God, but a man indwelt by God, just like we are, who prior to the fall, lived in total dependency upon the Father, and so his actions would have been a total reflection of what the Father had instructed him to do. And that was true until what? The fall. At the very moment of the fall, what happened is Adam and Eve decided that, I think we can determine right from wrong and good from evil on our own. I don’t think we need God to do that. And so I will determine right from wrong and good from evil. And therefore I will become like God. And I’m kind of tired of thinking that he’s controlling everything. I think I can control some things. And so therefore I’m going to get rid of his control center, and I’m going to become the control center of my own life. And on the day that they ate thereof, which is merely a result of that attitude, because they had already fallen in their mind before they ever ate of the fruit, is the fact that on the moment that I did that, I’m going to be like God, I’m going to I’m going to control things, I’m going to determine what’s right and wrong and good from evil. I don’t need God to do that. All of us, from that day forth, born in Adam, dead spiritually, on our own, no longer, until being born again, able to draw upon the wisdom of God, because natural man cannot understand spiritual things. It’s foolish to him. So the only thing that we had to hang on to was our own understanding. A lost person has nothing to hang on to except their own understanding. You have no ability to plug in to the wisdom of God because you couldn’t understand it if you plugged into it. And so the only thing you have to rely upon is my own understanding. My input comes from the world, not from the Spirit. And so therefore I become very familiar with the world, and I become very familiar with how the world works, and I become comfortable with that, and that becomes the most comfort zone that I have, is the world and its wisdom, which God says is nothing but foolishness.

Now, when we come to Christ Jesus, we’re in a new realm, and that realm, new realm is I have now been indwelt by Christ Jesus. And therefore, because the Spirit of God is alive, living in me, I have the ability to understand the wisdom of God. Now you would think talking to any human being that had a brain in their head, and I’m talking about that if you got a brain in your head. Right? And you said to somebody, would you rather have God’s wisdom or yours? You would think if you had a brain in your head, you’d say God’s, wouldn’t you? Well, it proves that most of us don’t have a brain in our head, because people sit there dead as a hammer, and when they hear the word of God, don’t listen to it. It’s boring. You know, big deal. And still want to rely upon their own understanding. Instead of saying, here is the whole wisdom of the universe available to you and me, and we’re saying, who needs it? I can rely on my own understanding.

And so we have to understand guys that that we’re dealing in a realm whereby we have the ability, and what the scripture says literally, have the mind of Christ living in us. It’s there. It isn’t something we get if you’re born again, it’s there. And the issue is, are you going to participate in it? And that’s what the Scripture says, we have the ability to participate in the divine nature that lives in us. In other words, we have all of the wisdom of God himself available to you and me 24 hours a day. The Holy Spirit of God is called our what? Our counselor. He doesn’t even charge 100 bucks an hour. He did not get his wisdom from man. God is wisdom. Jesus is your wisdom, and you and I have the wisdom of God living inside of us. When we don’t exercise it, it’s because what? We’re not putting faith in it. What are we putting faith in? My own understanding. So there’s the conflict. Am I going to live putting my faith in my own understanding, or am I going to put my faith in the wisdom of God that’s available to us?

Now we have in the book of Hebrews again, talking some passages and so why don’t you turn to the book of Hebrews, and we’ll pick up in chapter four, and let’s just start in verses one and two. Therefore it’s talking about the rest that’s available to us, since the promise of entering his rest still stands. Let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it. Now, again, you’ll notice it didn’t say that. Therefore, since the promise of God’s hard work still stands. What’s it say? Rest. Now I want to ask you a question, do you think in accordance with God’s wisdom, He wants you to rest? Now, isn’t that tough news. I mean, isn’t that just the worst thing ever heard in your life, that God wants you and me to rest, wants us to take a vacation in Jesus. What’s the Christian world leaning on their own understanding say. Go. Work, work, work, work. God says, No, I called you to rest.

I will never, ever forget, as long as I live on a Sunday evening in the church that I used to belong to and be engaged in. I was evangelism director in that church. And I had had the privilege of leading a man, probably in his early 70s, to Christ, a man who had a number of clothing stores here in this Dallas area, and on this Sunday evening, why the pastor gave an altar call and and even though this gentleman had already accepted Christ, He came forth to make a public proclamation of that. And I was standing up on the altar, or whatever, the altar in that strange name. I thought the altar was in Jerusalem, but we have him here. But at any rate, we are standing there on a level next to the pastor, and here was this guy standing there, looking up into our faces, and the pastor calls me, and he says, Now, Bob, this man, he owns clothing stores. He’s a businessman. He’s got abilities. He’s got this you get him busy in Jesus. And went on and on, and I this elderly man looking up at me with tears streaming down his face, and he said, Pastor, I don’t need a job. I need the Lord. And I want to tell you guys, that was the day my life started changing. That was the day I began to see this is not of God.

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Bob George 15:31
Get people saved and exhausted. You know that song, He is exalted, He is exhausted. I am exhausted. Busy and barren. That unfortunately, folks, I think, is the condition of the majority of the Christian world, busy and barren, or else sitting there, not busy and guilty. God called us to rest, now that is not in accordance with my understanding, that’s in accordance with God’s wisdom. And so he said, There is a promise of rest that still stands. Let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it. In other words, don’t fall short of this. Enter into it. There’s a rest available to you. For you, we also have had the gospel preached to us, just as they did, but the message they heard was of no value to them. Why? Because those who heard it did not combine it with what? With faith. Now we who have believed enter that rest, just as God has said so, I declare on oath, in my anger, they shall never enter my rest. And yet his work has been finished since the creation of the world. And it goes ahead to talk about there still remains in verse six to enter that rest, some will enter that rest, and those who formerly had the gospel preached to them will not go in because of their disobedience. And what’s he talking about, disobedience? Unbelief.

Now, folks, when the HEBREWS and the Israelites were freed out of Egypt, they entered into the desert, did they not? There was a promised land waiting for them. From that day forth, they didn’t enter in and for 40 years, they wandered in their own works because of their unbelief that they would not enter into that rest. Moses, who led them out of Egypt, never did enter into that rest. Joshua had to cross them over into the rest. And Joshua is another name for Jesus, so it was a foreshadowing, a picture of Jesus entering you into the rest. Now I do not believe there is any Born Again Christian that leaves Egypt and immediately gets into the promised land. I think the desert is a necessary place for us, and the reason for that is this, all of us are saved as self sufficient people, aren’t we? All of us are saved, leaning on our own understanding, because we don’t have anything else to lean on. And so now we’re saved. And as I’ve said before, I was a very self sufficient lost person, and then I became a very self sufficient saved person, and that desert is what knocks the self sufficiency out of you, and that’s what it should do. Some people never get it knocked out of them. They remain self sufficient until the very day they die, saved, but sorry. They’re the kind of people and I can remember that in my own life, go share Jesus with somebody, and the deal is what for? Tell people come to Jesus, you can be miserable like me, and you get to the point where you say, I don’t know, outside of just eternal life, outside of getting somebody out of hell into heaven, why would you want to share him? I’m not experiencing any joy, not experiencing anything in my life. Seems to me, many of them are having more fun than I am, because I want to tell you something, folks, when you’re a Christian working for acceptance in Jesus, you’re much more miserable than a lost person. Well, the lost person isn’t trying to get acceptance in God. They don’t even know who he is, but a saved person trying to earn his acceptance by what he’s doing is the most miserable person on the face of the earth. Because in the first place, I am not only trying to do what I think say God wants me to do, but also have in mind what God wants you to do. And so I’m not only going to be trying to keep myself right with God, brother, I’m going to be trying to keep you right as well. And so there’s nothing more miserable on the face of the earth than a Christian living leaning on his own understanding, trying to please God to what he’s doing. And so he said, There is a Sabbath rest that is available to us.

Now let’s go down to verse 14. Verse 14 says, Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith that we profess. Profess, excuse me, yeah, just brush my teeth. Can’t do a thing with him. Now again, what were we talking about in regard to this thing, Faith? Who is their faith in? It’s in Christ. It’s in the Lord, isn’t it? Faith isn’t something that, because of my faith, I made something happen. It’s the fact that God has already made everything happen. Didn’t he just get through saying he’s already completed His work since the foundation of the earth? If God has already completed His work, how much more is there to complete? So if he’s already made everything happen, how much more is there to make happen? So you see, if we got the idea that faith is making something happen, we’re ridiculous. God has already made everything happen. That’s going to happen. Faith is, I’m going to enter into that by faith, he’s already done it. Has God already completed the work? As far as he’s concerned, already completed the work that he began in you? Absolutely. So what’s our role? Let him complete it. Isn’t that right? Let him complete it. And all that means in the completing of the work that he began in you, you started by faith right now, I want you to end by faith, and in the process, I’m going to be teaching you the faithfulness of the one that you have faith in, and that’s what faith is, is having faith in the faithfulness of the One in whom you say you have faith in.

Let’s go down, turn over to six, to chapter six. Chapter verse one. Excuse me, back. We’ll we’ll go back to verse 11 in chapter five, when he’s talking about the fact of how Jesus and talking about the source of living by faith. And he says, we have so much more to say about this, but it’s hard to explain, because you’re slow to learn. You, in fact. Look what he’s saying here, guys, in fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers. You need some would teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. So he’s talking about that by this particular time in your spiritual growth, you ought to be in a position of being able to communicate to others these truths. But he said, Instead of that, you’re still needing to be taught the elementary truths again, you’re still in your ABCs. You need milk, not solid food. Well, who do you give milk to? Babies. Anyone who lives on milk is still being still an infant is not acquainted with the teachings about righteousness, but solid food is for the mature who, by constant use, have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil. How do you learn to distinguish good from evil? Through constant use of the truth given to you by God, walking by faith in the truth and the wisdom given to you by God, not leaning on your own understanding. Now therefore, he said, Let us leave the elementary teachings about Christ and go on to maturity. Let’s get out of your ABCs and start getting into maturity. Let’s get out of the one plus one equals two and start into some multiplication. Let’s grow. It’s time to grow. And he says, not laying again the foundation of repentance from Acts that lead to death and faith in God. Instruction about baptisms and laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment, and God, permitting, will do so. Saying, Why do you need to go over these things again? You ought. They ought to be a part of your life by now. If someone in your in your life as an example, if someone comes up and says, Oh, you can lose your salvation, it shouldn’t even be something you need to deal with. It isn’t even something to think about anymore. That. Already settled. That is a settled issue. My faith is in the one who saves me completely. That’s whom my Faith is in. I don’t need to talk about that anymore. Whether you’re saved by baptism, or whether you’re saved by that issue isn’t even worth talking about. If you’re saved by baptism, then you can’t be saved by Jesus. You gotta make up your mind which one you’re going to be saved by.

And we have scripture after scripture in that regard. And as Peter talks about that the water, that when, when Noah was saved through the water, he wasn’t saved by the water. Water is an instrument of death when you’re out in the middle of it, you go out in the ocean with no life wrapped off and say, all this water is going to save me. You are deceived. It’s going to swallow you. So it says you were saved through that water, and that water is a symbol of the baptism that saves us. What’s the baptism that saves us? The baptism of the Holy Spirit of God. What did John the Baptist say? I baptize you with water, but one coming after me whose sandals I’m not worthy of tying will baptize you with what? The Holy Spirit of God. Now, what does that mean to roll around on the floor and babble in tongues? Is that what that means to be saved for the Holy Spirit, or be to be baptized by the Spirit? People come up and say, Have you been baptized in the Spirit, or by the Spirit? Meaning, or have you spoken or have you spoken in tongues? That’s ludicrous. The very moment that you were saved, you were indwelt by the Spirit of God. You couldn’t be saved apart from the Spirit of God coming to live in you. That’s what it means to be born again of the what? Of the Spirit. And that’s why it says in Romans that if the Spirit of God is not living in you, you don’t belong to Him. So how could you be born again today and receive the Spirit tomorrow? That is heretical teaching. It’s wrong, and it leads people down a primrose path to emotionalism.

Announcer 27:11
Thank you so much for tuning in to Classic Christianity with Bob George. We hope you’ve enjoyed today’s program. We truly hope that today’s message has inspired you to walk a life of faith in the Lord find more information online at BobGeorge.net. There you will also find available CDs, DVDs and Bible studies available for purchase. It’s through your help that we are able to spread the good word of Jesus Christ. Until next time, walk in faith be good to one another and praise the Lord. Amen.