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you one other wonderful things about Palm Springs churches you never know all
when somebody from your past is just going to pop up
in front of view and so I was so so happy to meet
again are Gary and Julie Wade I think he took his grandchild out right now but
anyway from days
a long ago and up Wallowa Valley Academy and
wall all university I but it's a little love
interesting I should say to meet people from your past
because a sometimes we like to think
that we have moved on
or change or grown
or progressed or
something and sometimes when we think of our past we think
home and why don't have to live through that again or
arm I can't believe how I was
back then because sought by the time I graduated from high school
I knew I had all the answers they've ever had that experience
if you have you know it's a very fleeting
experience but there's that moment in time
at least in my experience when I graduated from
a high school and I thought you know I may not have
literally all the answers but at least all the important ones
and I think life experience
after that including college and many other things
a is God's Way over undoing
all of that arrogance and
a perhaps teaching you
humility and undoing all those things you learned in high school
a high school important I you
you know learn a lot of the basics then a knife I think Cove
some other wonderful teachers I had I am
and I don't know if Gary and Julie know this gentleman but I remember a favorite
Bible teacher
we called him uncle eddie idiots from and
up it he was was a smart fellow
and he he not only taught Bible but he popped
our geometry and french and
he claimed that he could sometimes do all three simultaneously which is
pretty amazing but I he
taught me among other things that I could
study for myself and that
it was all fair just waiting to be learnt
and to me that was exciting
the problem was by the time
I graduated I kinda had this
unconscious conviction I don't think I would have ever said it like this
but it was kind of an unconscious thing that well we'll be better off if they
thought like me
are and it's that kind of
arrogance that actually prevents
learning and I think it's one of the things that are scripture this morning
is talking about
when it talks about flow learners our scripture reading
that was so presented to us this morning talks about
people who are slow learners who prefer
male like babies over
solid food I
in fact the the text in Hebrews 511
says this quite bluntly we have much to say about this
but it is hard to explain because you are slow though
to learn and so
our message this morning
is in
in an authentic way
confessions of a slow learner I realize
I am a slow learner and the reason I'm a slow learners because
I
love to think that I've already found the answers
and this is probably no more true
van in my early experience
I remember being baptized
I was in fifth grade at the time
and I suppose ever since then I've always felt like I could catch on
quickly so I never thought that I would come to the place where I realized I was
a slow learner
I always thought I was a fast learner
and if you can at all identify with my experience you will know
why the gospel of Jesus
Christ is
in truth our only refuge
because it is the only
way period the only way
its not by our intellectual greatness
it is not even by our superior supposedly knowledge of Scripture
it is by the person Jesus
Christ that we have any hope
Hebrews 6 123
spells it out a little more clearly even when it says
therefore lettuce leave
the elementary teachings about Christ
and go on the maturity not laying again the foundation repentance from
acts that lead to death and a faith in God
instruction about baptisms the laying on of hands the resurrection of the dead
and eternal judgment and got permitting
we will do so okay here's the problem
many times in life
especially in our religious lives
what we think is the advanced course
is only the beginning course and what we think is the beginning course
is really the advanced course
it may be one reason why churches let them
why there are critics and why their *** controversies
along the way because it's not but we disagree about what's in the Bible
it's perhaps what we think is most important
that drives many of our
personal struggles as well as our corporate
struggles together
but this text is is fascinating to me
because it spills out what the beginning courses are
spells it up let's take these wanna one by one
%uh we should have a a slight on the screen that will
give us the elementary teachings about Christ
now these are good things
but through overemphasis
or by being stock
or perhaps even by
concentrating so intensely that we become fanatical
in these areas
it means we really need to move on and what are these things well
number one repentance from acts that lead to death now how can that be wrong
it's not real Hebrews is not telling us that
its wrong to repent in fact it's it's necessary
but that's in the beginning course thats
that's stuff that we can take for granted now
I'll the acts that lead to death in
many Bible translations are called dead works
these are works that we sometimes perform
thinking that we're impressing God
and some of those works are even what we think are our
superior abilities to study Scripture
I can tell you when I was a a high school student
ice to walk around with my didn't carry my Bible everywhere on campus but
to at least on Sabbath site I carried around
you know she'd serve of Ellen White quotes
tucked in my Bible and I was ready to argue with anybody
over quite a number of topics but especially things like perfection
nature of Christ I
sanctification all those things that were
so dear to my young hard because I had learned these and I had the answer for
people
dead works in this context
in Hebrews these dead works or works that lead to death can
can have kind of a dual application to that culture at that time it can refer
to pagan
rituals that some of the Christians had come out %uh they can also refer
to many of the practices %uh judy is on
bowl all as Paul had so
eloquently explained didn't save anyone
it was only Jesus Christ the law
Paul would hasten to say it was like a schoolmaster
its the beginning course it's not
the advanced course but sometimes we get stuck there we get stuck in
are discussions in our arguments about the law and about
works then and about all those things but number two
is also part love the beginning course according to Hebrews
and that faith in God but how could that be wrong of course it's not wrong
but is just the beginning
faith in God
in in my experience has been taken apart and dissected we've had
arguments about right just missed by faith arguments and formulas
and we finally have to come to the point where we realize that it's not faith
that we have faith in
were not saved by faith itself
were safe by Pete person
we have faith in
number three that Hebrews lists is baptisms and been laying on
up hands you'll notice that in this church we've started
a a tradition where when someone is baptized
we have a little service at the end of the service where we have the laying on
of hands and we prayed for the promised Holy Spirit
it's a biblical pattern because the
the the ceremony if you wanna call it that
of baptism and the laying on of hands always went together
the Holy Spirit was promised to be poured out on people
at their baptism thats
the biblical model
love baptism
yeah I I remember when I was baptized
one of the unfortunate
I think attitudes that has developed
over the years is that
you need more than one baptism
but one baptism may not be enough
I it it is true that as I look back
all the way to the fifth grade
and that's a long time ago for for me
a maybe not so much for some love you but
up you know fifth-graders a long time but I learned a lot since then
I'm the gospel is in a sense brand new to me he compared to
the way I understood it back in the fifth grade
and yet it was part of the
beginning course it was a legitimate
step it was a conscious choice
to put myself on God's side and to accept
his acceptance if you want to call it that now I still had some confusion
about the role of the ten commandments I
in my mind they were kinda like a mental checklist
okay I guess yeah I did that I
I must be okay then okay I can be baptized
I had we had a wonderful a Bible worker
if I remember right her name with miss miss Farnsworth
she came into our class a
every day for a while and taught us about
the sanctuary we had she had this
wonderful little model above above the sanctuary
and she place at all out there on the table and then she
tell us all about it
look at hebrew says the even the sanctuary service
is the beginning course
but one other problems with
the a practice that has kind of crappy and over the years up being really
baptized
is that it's not always used for people who really need it
in other words sometimes I think being really baptized
disrespect the first baptism
because the Bible never says that
a big believer has to be re baptize now there's one
there's there's one example in in the Bible
where up Paul runs into some
a whole group of men who were baptized into the baptism of John
and didn't even know there was a Holy Spirit and that case
Paul thought it necessary for them to be read baptized
so that they were baptized now into Christ
and receive the Holy Spirit but that's entirely different
from the person who maybe is now twenty years old and says
well I was baptized when I was 16 and I really didn't mean anything
well then really mean anything then why did you do it and
you know you know was there you know a pastor or someone who was
studying with you at the time and perhaps it didn't mean
as much as it means now but that doesn't mean
that a bad doesn't has to be repeated a baptism
is by definition according to Hebrews part of the beginning course
it's not something that has to be repeated over and over again
that's what our foot washing at the communion services for by the way
number four and in here square
it starts to hit really close to home anybody
who loves to talk about in time events in the final judgment and
and all that one of my favorite areas of study
a is of course the origin up believe in hell
because I think hell was one of the worst ideas ever invented
but that's part of the beginning course the resurrection of the dead an eternal
judgment
unfortunately we get stuck a lot of times thinking
oh this is the advanced course this is where you know this is why the real
media this is where we want to spend all our time
you know talkin growing and you know when we start to
many Aversa making time calculations about when
geez this is going to come in and we're always very careful you know
well Bible says we we don't know the day or the hour but
you know maybe it's in this generation maybe it's
you know if you count the Jew believes or some crazy calculation like that
up you know maybe Bay and there's been all kinds of theories and and you've
probably heard many more of them
than I have well there's discussions about who the 144 thousand are in those
discussions about health and the
God's wrath and all of that and all that the book of Hebrews reminds us
pay that stuff is settled okay
you know your you learn it and you move on
but then we have to understand are we asked the question
what do we move onto I mean if this is just the beginning course and
and many arrests may be looking at this list
and saying on a loan fund there yet
you know maybe I maybe I really do need to go back to the basics because I don't
understand all of this
and Hebrews is not saying that we should never talk about this stuff
Hebrews is not saying that we shouldn't even have classes and
and regular instruction in the basics
but what Hebrews really is saying
is that there's a point to all this that it's going somewhere
that the teaching about repentance even faith in God baptism resurrection of the
dead
all that are not truth but just you know
sit out here and isolation and are
you no good for their own sake
they describe something and they're moving toward something
there's something progress save about all of this
truth there something to look forward to
there's there's a future and there's a past
that tie together in the person
a Jesus Christ thats the point
up all of this in fact the entire book of Hebrews
is built around the one central thought
that Jesus is superior to all of this
that's the point of Hebrews you go to
he even even Hebrews idea of perfection
is something that Christ did even something
like be perfection I love
the Saints is something the Christ third over in Hebrews 10
it says the by by the one sacrifice
we are made perfect forever
one other things that I have learned along the way
is that not everybody has to express this the same way
we we use different words different phrases
we have slightly different views on quite a variety of topics and I've
learned that okay
not everybody has to see things the way I
see them but there's one non-negotiable
the person and the Salvation
through Jesus Christ are lowered
that's the advanced course that's the one non
negotiable unfortunately has been
so easy
in my experience and may be in yours I don't know
but it's been the easy to kind of isolate part
love the Bible or part love
the message or however you want to define it
specialize in that area and then
assume that you have the advanced course
that this is what everybody else ought to be shooting for
and it's the source that much fanaticism and it's the source that much criticism
criticism among Christians criticism
within the church and from those outside the church
towards the church I recently read a book
by a man by the name of James Rafferty you may have heard him
it's a book called foale circle
how my religion almost destroyed
my face published by Pacific press in 2001
it's the its few years ago by now but
James Rafferty was was a zealous
young Adventist Christian
who in his zeal
for the Lord discovered that there were imperfections
in the church
and you know I'm I'm
I'm reminded a little bit of that theme where
a Jesus is
basically saving the woman caught in adultery
from all of her accusers and you remember that scene where he bends over
any starts writing in the dust
and you know what he was writing their you writing the
the syrians above the accusers
and the intriguing thing about that scene
is the Bible says they all start to believe
beginning with the older ones first
and you have to ask yourself why did it happen that way
well my answer which is certainly not an infallible answer but
my answer is that apparently experience
had talked some other these teachers of the law
that they were not so perfect
that they were not going to win this argument with Jesus
and that was the young upstarts who wanted to hang in there and
you know make a name for themselves and in all
be courageous and stand up for the truth and
you know reveal Jesus for the apostate that they knew he was
the older ones however new the jig was up long before everybody else and they
just quietly started to
paid into the
fade into the edges up the crowd
and James Rafferty recounts
in his book how he went from a
right-wing Conservative critic of the church
to 8 grace have Christ preacher
now supported up the church
it doesn't mean that he changed his mind on
every little minute issue
but it does mean that he gain some perspective
and I think like myself
in many ways realized that in his pride
he had been a slow learner not a fast learner
and it's difficult to realize sometimes when you're a slow learner
its not but you learn that new information
necessarily it's that you learned what is
most important its that you learned that but for the grace
of God
fill in the blank but for the grace of God
none of us have any hope none of us have
any reason to go along to be here in this wonderful place
to to even hold our heads up
without the grace but God
through Jesus Christ Hebrews 6:19 a twenty expresses that this way
we have this whole as an anchor
for the soul firm and secure
and by the way this text is not talking about the second coming
let's read on yet what is yet
our hope its enters
the inner sanctuary behind it
the curtain where Jesus who went before us
has entered on our be happy
he Jesus has become
a high priest or ever
in the order a vmail cuz the deck now let's not trip over now cuz the deck
here because that's another one of these basics that we can get hung up on him
fanatical about
a in the next chapter chapter 7 Hebrews explains
that mel has a decade because he is from salem is called a keen eye
peace he's he's describing the Bible without
lifting any father or mother without a genealogy without a beginning
five days or in in the life now doesn't mean that he wasn't normal human being
it just means that he appears in biblical history without all that stuff
in other words milk has a record
was who he was and like no one else
and that's the model but Hebrews uses for Jesus
as our High Priest the good news here is
Jesus is who he is
our one and only unique
only begotten Son of God
our save your and
we dare not take Hebrews
and go backwards you see what he brings does is it takes all of the Jewish
traditions including the sanctuary service
and shows how they are fulfilled and superseded by Jesus
and sometimes we've we've taken that process
and gone backwards with it would say okay we believe in Jesus
now let's go on the advanced course and learn the sanctuary
no with the other way around because we
know about the sanctuary we now
have this assurance in
Jesus one of the signs that we've been stuck
in the elementary principles of the gospel one of the signs that we've
become
either fanatical or just plain slow
is that we lack assurance
we lacked the assurance that we are accepted by God
now someday by and by but right here
right now a lack of assurance
is a sin that we have been stuck in the elementary principles and we haven't
moved on yet
fully all to the gospel
up Jesus Christ this is the advanced teaching
that Jesus is who he is and that he
has reconciled us
to guide the with
in K
I
yeah
build