Complete In Christ

Hebrews 10:1-18

Every year at about this time of year, our horses come up to the gate at night with manes and tails full of burdock. Most of us call them “burrs” – those prickly little brown seed pods of burdock plants. That’s how the plants spread like wildfire – they’ll latch onto anything that rubs up against a plant full of them – including the mane and tail of a grazing horse, only to be deposited somewhere else when the horse rolls, or when they fall out of our hands as we slowly and carefully remove them from matted up tangles of horse hair.

Every year in late spring I go out into the pasture and pull them. And I dig out the related but much more sinister thistle plants. Those things will jab your hands and make you bleed right through leather work gloves. Those plants have a bad attitude. But even though I go out there each year and pull the plants, our horses come in each fall covered in burrs. No matter how hard we try, we can’t seem to get rid of them. They come up somewhere else each year. I saw a bunch just this week when I went out to close the pasture gate. Drives me nuts.

You know, there are things in our lives that – no matter how hard we try – we just can’t seem to get rid of. Those unique ways that sin shows up in each of our lives. Maybe it’s a tendency toward pride and arrogance. Or selfishness. Or an addiction. Or envy and jealousy. Maybe it’s a struggle to overcome anger and a tendency to blow your stack. Or to lie and cheat. Maybe it’s a tendency to hold on to bitterness and not forgive, or to gossip. Whatever it looks like in your life, we all have those burrs and thistles, those obnoxious expressions of sin that we tend to struggle with.

If Christ really is our all-sufficient savior … if we really are complete in Christ and fully forgiven for our sin AND if the Holy Spirit really is at work in our lives, why is it so hard to get some of those burrs and thistle out of our lives? Why is it so easy for us to relate to St. Paul’s cry in Romans 7: “For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate … For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.” Boy can we relate to that one! If we really are complete in Christ and Christ is our all-sufficient savior, what gives? As we continue our journey through the sermon that is the New Testament book of Hebrews, turn with me to Hebrews 10:1-18. We’re going to start with Vv. 1-9.

There’s something deep inside us as human beings that resists being told what to do. One of the first words every toddler learns is the word “no.” And they aren’t typically using the word to establish healthy boundaries, and it CAN be used for that. No, for the most part, they’re using it to resist parental direction or instruction. When I went from toddler to early elementary age, my “no” became “You’re not the boss of me.” My brother and I used that one a lot on each other. I never used it with mom or dad. I was plenty disobedient, but I was more sneaky about it than overt and blatant.

But even if we’ve learned a healthy and good respect for legitimate authority, we still have a “You’re not the boss of me” attitude as adults. The speed limit is posted as 55, what are you driving? Not 55, I can tell you that! The government says,  okay, drive 65. What do we do? We don’t drive 65, I can tell you that.

If you hear your spouse yell “Come here for a minute” from the other room, do you go running or do you take a “just a second” attitude? Even if you don’t say it out loud. We’ll argue that we’re just waiting until we finish the paragraph we’re reading or for the next commercial break, but come on – we can literally pause any TV show and pick up right where we left off, even live broadcasts.

There is something about us that really resists being told what to do. We resent it, even when we consent, and we’ll often try to find a sneaky way to do what we want to do anyway. When Zeke was about 4, we were at a Wednesday night church dinner. And he wanted to go outside and play on the playground. And we told him that we were going to eat first, and then he could go play. Now, I was a pastor at that church and I was doing what pastors are supposed to do – I was talking to people. Now, I looked up to see where the kids were every once in a while, but I was a bit distracted talking to people.

After about 15 minutes, one of the men helping to serve the dinner came up to me with a big grin on his face and said, “Just so you know, Zeke’s outside on the playground. He’s been out there for five minutes.” He’d heard what I’d said to Zeke about eating first and then playing, and then he watched. Now Zeke was about as compliant a kid as has ever been born. He certainly had opinions and ideas about what he wanted to do, but he was almost never blatantly disobedient. He was very sensitive.

But on this day, he wanted to play outside. But he didn’t just run outside in a blatantly disobedient way. The man who’d watched him said he went about halfway to the door and then glued his eyes on me, facing me, and whenever I was distracted, I took a sidestep toward the door. Whenever I looked up, he was standing still, and his slow movement toward the door never registered with me. But he slowly, over ten minutes, worked his way to the door and then went out. I kinda had to give him props for his patience, that’s for sure. And he didn’t get in trouble. I just went to the door and said “Zeke” and he looked at me and his shoulders slumped and he said “Aw man” and came back inside.

The Old Testament Law, the Law of Moses, was God’s prescription for life in HIS kingdom for HIS people. It was an overt description of what life in God’s kingdom is supposed to look like. But God never intended the law to be a permanent salvation for us as human beings. He knew that we wouldn’t be able to keep the law.

Humanity had been breaking God’s law almost from the beginning, and when the law was given, we continued to break that law. We continued to fall short. Yes, the prescribed rituals and sacrifices made us ceremonially clean, fit for worship and participation in the community, but it couldn’t transform the human heart. It brought into stark relief our propensity to break fellowship with God and go our own way over and over again. It shone heaven’s spotlight on the depth of sin in our hearts. Because no matter how many sacrifices were offered, more were always needed. Everything was repeated. Day after day. Month after month. Year after year.

So what’s our typical response to our inability to keep the burrs and thistle out of our lives, like I can’t keep them out of our horse pastures? How do we typically deal with it? The first way we tend to deal with it is by justifying it. “Everyone makes mistakes.” “I’m only human.” “Nobody’s perfect.” Yes, those things are true. But they represent the problem, not a solution to the problem.

We justify it. If we can’t justify it, we either try to hide it or hide from it. We put on a mask and pretend we’re okay, that everything is okay. We hide the skeletons in the closet, not only from others but from ourselves. The problem is that we can’t hide them from God.

We justify it. If we can’t justify it, with hide from it. And if we can’t hide from it, we fall into shame. Shame is different than guilt. Guilt is “I did something wrong.” Shame is “I am something wrong.” As both a therapist and a pastor, I deal with shame every day. Why? Because people mess up, and many of us, when we mess up, we view it as more evidence that we aren’t worth anything. That we’re good for nothing. That we’re trash.

Willie Carson was a famous British jockey, and he was racing one day at Pontefract Racetrack in England. He was in the lead, and running his horse on the rails. A furlong and a half from home he thought he heard something behind him and, glancing round, he saw the shadow of a horse coming up behind him. He didn’t want to get passed right before the finish line, so he spurred his horse on and won the race. As he crossed the finish line, he looked round again and saw that the nearest horse was fifteen lengths behind – he had been racing his own shadow for the last part of the race.

Sometimes we are haunted by the memory of a mistake, a regret from our past. It is as if there is a shadow looming over us, preventing us from going forward. God has forgiven our past and calls us to move forward into his future.[i]

Guilt is a healthy thing. It encourages us to own our mistakes and make things right. Shame is not healthy. We are – each one of us – deeply flawed and broken. Our lives are marred by sin. We fall short over and over again. But we are created in the image of God, deeply loved by God. That means that we are – each one of us – loveable and valuable. There is no human being, no matter how broken they may be, who is trash.

The Old Covenant emphasized the ever-present nature of sin. It also provided a model, a way for us to understand what God would eventually do once and for all in Christ. It all pointed forward to Christ. Look at Vv. 5-9. Our pastor is quoting Psalm 40:6-8 here. And he places those words firmly in the mouth of Jesus. Because his self-offered sacrifice was the once-for-all sacrifice that the Law of Moses and the writings of the prophets had been pointing forward toward.

Later this morning, when we come to Christ’s table for the sacrament of communion, we’ll remember the words “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood” (Lk. 22:20). A NEW covenant assumes that there was an OLD covenant that wasn’t just abolished – it was fulfilled. He lived under the law, willfully obedient at every step to the will of the Father and then, having become the once and for all perfect sacrificial lamb through that obedience, he willingly offered himself one the cross.

Now, look at Vv. 10-13. The priests were always moving, always doing something. They always stood, or were moving, when they were on duty. Why? First, because the attendants of a sovereign king typically stand in the king’s presence, when they are working. The only one who sits is the king or the queen.

But there is another reason, and it is the reason our pastor emphasizes here. A priest’s work was never done. There was always another sacrifice to make, another ritual to prescribe, another offering to receive or make. They were constantly at work, because sin was constantly present.

But when Christ offered himself as the perfect, once-for-all sacrifice, he SAT DOWN at the Father’s right hand. He SAT DOWN. That was something no priest, no mediator between God and humanity, had ever done before. Not while on duty. He sat down because no more sacrifices were needed. Nothing else needed to be done.

But if that’s the case, why do I still so often struggle to get the weeds – the thistle and burdock – out of our lives? Look at Vv. 14-18. Both because of and through Christ’s work on the cross, because the inherent barrier between God and humanity … the barrier between sin and holiness … has been removed by Christ and we can come boldly into God’s presence – the Holy Spirit goes to work in us. He writes the law of God on our hearts. Not so that we’ll legalistically obey a bunch of rules. It’s not about the rules. It’s about our hearts beating in tune with God’s heart.

We begin to follow Jesus. To live like Jesus. To love like Jesus. We are transformed from the inside out. And inside-out transformation takes time. It isn’t outward, grudging acceptance of a list of rules. Rules that we tend to break anyway. That was life under the Old Covenant. In Christ, it’s about hearts transformed. It’s about a DESIRE to love and please God because God loves us first.

The brokenness and sin in this world is so deep that we’ll never escape it completely in this life. Sin runs deep, but grace runs deeper. Christ’s victory over sin, now … in the time between his resurrection and his return … means that sin no longer defines us. Jesus defines us. We BECOME Christ-followers. And we are free to not sin in any given moment. Yes, sometimes we still will. We will still fall short. And that’s when the depth of God’s grace comes shining through. The forgiveness we have in Christ gives us the strength to admit our failure, get back up, and keep on following Jesus.

Shortly after World War I ended, the great preacher Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse visited the devastating battlefields of Belgium. In the first year of the Great War, the area around the city of Mons was the scene of the great British retreat. In the last year of the war, it was the scene of an even greater enemy retreat. For miles west of the city the roads were lined with artillery, tanks, trucks, and other materials of war that the enemy had abandoned as they retreated.

The day Dr. Barnhouse was there was a gorgeous spring day. The sun was shining. There wasn’t even a breath of wind blowing. As he walked the road, looking at the remains of the war and the devastation of the land, he noticed that leaves were falling from the huge trees that lined the road that had managed to survive the war. One leaf brushed against his chest as it fell and he grabbed it. And as he grabbed it, it disintegrated in his hand. He looked up and saw several other leaves falling from the trees.

It wasn’t fall. It was spring. And there wasn’t even a trace of a breeze. And yet … the old leaves were falling. Leaves that had managed to stay on the trees through the windy days of fall and the ice cold days of Belgium’s winter. And now they were falling, seemingly without any cause. But there was a cause. The most potent force of all was causing them to fall. Not the wind or the cold. It was spring – the sap inside the tree was beginning to flow, and new buds – new life – was pushing from the inside out. From down beneath the earth, unseen by human eyes, roots were sending new life up through the trunk to each branch and twig connected to the trunk. And as that new life flowed, it expelled every bit of death that remained from the previous year.[ii]

When you place your faith in Christ, you become complete in Christ. His once-and-for-all sacrifice is applied on your behalf. Christ’s saving work for you is done. But his transforming work is just beginning. So when the burdock and thistle seem overwhelming, and you don’t think you’re ever going to get them out, remember that he is still at work deep inside you. So put on your gloves and keep pulling. Let’s pray.

[i] Ian St. John, Saint and Greavsie’s Funny Old Games (Little Brown, 2008), p. 24

[ii] As referenced in R. Kent Hughes, Hebrews: An Anchor for the Soul.