Hebrews 12:14-29 Sermon. Audio here. Text below.
Mountains are often thought of as spiritual. A mountaintop experience is a spiritual experience. People say they often feel closer to God or closer to spiritual things when they’re on a mountain.
And the bible begins in Eden which is described in Ezekiel 28 as “the holy mountain of God.” Genesis 2 says that rivers flowed out of this mountain garden and down to the rest of the world. So humanity began on high. And the fall, was literally a descent down the mountain, away from God’s presence.
If anyone were to get back into God’s presence, not only would they have to get past the guardian cherubim, these angelic bouncers with their flaming swords barring the entrance. They would have to ascend the hill of the LORD (Psalm 24). And that’s just commonly the way the bible speaks.
The bible speaks of Jesus having descended from the heights. And as He lived among us He lived the perfect life. The life of other-centred love and sacrifice that you and I should live but don’t – Jesus did it. And then He died the perfect death as our sacrifice for sins. And then, when He arose, He ascended back into the Most Holy Place – heaven itself – and He went there as our perfect Priest. We have a Friend in very high places.
That’s the argument Hebrews has been making for the last 12 chapters. Jesus has come and lived our life for us. He’s entered into the depths of our suffering and struggle and He’s lived the faithful life we never could. But He did it FOR US.
And then He died the perfect sacrificial death on the cross. And He did it FOR US. You and I deserve to die in the depths because of our filth and uncleanness. But His godforsaken death in the depths is counted before God FOR US.
And then He has ascended as the perfect Priest into heaven FOR US. We don’t have the right to be in the holy presence of God, but He is there on our behalf. He represents us in the highest place imaginable.
If we trust Jesus then we get joined to Jesus. And His life is our life, His death is our death, His ascension to God is our ascension to God.
And after 12 chapters of this kind of argument, the writer says in this section: “Don’t you know where you are? Do you have any idea where Christ has brought you?”
You are on the mountaintop. You have reached the summit.
These verses are here to wake us up to our mountaintop experience with God. And once we realize where we are – where Christ has brought us – then this passage will tell us how to move out into the world from these height.
That’s how we’ll study this chapter. We’ll begin on the mountaintop. We’ll appreciate where we are – secure on the high ground. And then we’ll consider how we’re meant to walk out into the world
But first the mountaintop experience.
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