S11 || Rest in Jesus, Not in Rules || Hebrews 4:12-15 || Session 11

Ever feel the tug to retreat to what feels safe and familiar when life gets hard? We sit with a community that knew that pull well—Jewish believers near Jerusalem, pressured to trade the risk of following Jesus for the predictability of rituals and rules. Hebrews chapter 4 offers a bracing alternative: not more striving, but a living Word that cuts through our defenses and a Great High Priest who turns exposure into healing.

We start with the scalpel. “The word of God is living and active,” sharper than any two-edged sword. When Scripture lays us bare, it separates what we can’t—thoughts from intentions, appearances from motives—so God can remove what harms and restore what’s healthy. Then comes the pivot that changes everything: the One who sees everything is the same One who welcomes us. Jesus has “passed through the heavens” as our Great High Priest, not standing in endless effort like the priests of old, but seated because the sacrifice is complete.

From there we explore how Jesus’s sympathy becomes our courage. Tempted in every way we are, yet without sin, He knows the weight we carry and the cracks where we break. That sympathy is strong enough to help us in real time. We also unpack the role of priest versus prophet and why it matters that Jesus, from the tribe of Judah and not Levi, represents us before the Father according to a higher order Hebrews will soon reveal. The takeaway is practical and personal: hold fast your confession because Jesus is better—better than angels, Moses, and any system that promises peace through performance.

The invitation lands with urgency and comfort: draw near with confidence to the throne of grace to receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. If striving to please yourself or some religious organization has left you tired, come close to Jesus. If hidden motives keep sabotaging your peace, let the Word do its careful work. And if you’re tempted to go back to what once felt safe, look again at the One who knows you, stands for you, and never stops interceding. Subscribe, share with a friend who needs rest, and leave a review to help others find a better way forward.

Chapters

• 0:19 Welcome And Series Context
• 1:06 Audience, Setting, And Persecution
• 5:36 Rest In Christ Versus Law Keeping
• 6:31 The Word Of God: Living And Active
• 12:01 God Sees All: Laid Bare Before Him
• 15:29 Jesus Our Great High Priest
• 21:06 Tempted In All Things, Without Sin
• 24:24 Priest Vs Prophet And Tribe Question
• 28:56 From Judah To Melchizedek
• 32:26 Closing And Next Steps

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:19

Hello and welcome to Reasoning Through the Bible. My name's Glenn. I'm here with Steve. We have a ministry where we go verse by verse through the Word of God, often phrase by phrase, sentence by sentence. We believe that if you deal with all of the text, then all of the topical issues will come up. You should go to our website, reasoningthruthebible.com. There you'll find all of our books that we've taught. You'll find resources, our teacher materials that we offer free of charge, so that you can teach in your small group or that your church can do proper teacher training. Everything we do there is available to you. Again, go to reasoningthruthebible.com. You'll find lesson materials, audio, video, and student guides. We are now currently going through Hebrews. So if you have your copy of the Bible, open it to Hebrews chapter 4. A little bit of review before we get started. The book of Hebrews, of course, is written to Jewish Christians that have decided to follow Christ. The writer here is intimately familiar with Jewish background. He quotes the Old Testament extensively. In the first chapter, he taught that Jesus was God, and then he also taught that Jesus was man. As such, he experienced all things just as we are. He explains how Jesus is better. He is a better sacrifice. He is better than the Mosaic law. He is superior to the angels. So we've been learning a great deal of theology about the person and the being of Jesus Christ. Not only who he is and his being is far above all the created world, but he is also superior in his position as high priest, as we're going to see today and throughout the book. Steve, it's just a wonderful section. What else can we know about these Jewish believers here that this book was written to?

SPEAKER_00: 2:21

That's what we should always keep in the forefront as we go through here. There's so much things in Hebrews that we can make application to our lives today, and we'll continue to do that as we go through the book. But let's keep in mind that as you stated, these are Jewish believers. As we established in our overview, they were probably living somewhere in the Judea-Samaria area. They're close to the city of Jerusalem and the temple. We know that there is persecution of these Jewish believers taking place through the story of Saul. We see that in Acts of what he's doing, and he often refers to it as well as to him that was out persecuting these. And in fact, it says that when he first started his ministry, that there were Jewish believers that were kind of skeptical of him because he had such a reputation of going out and persecuting the newly Jewish believers. This is what the author is addressing here, in that he's doing just what you've talked about. Jesus is above everything, above the angels, above Moses. He's going to talk here in a little bit about Jesus being above the Levitical priesthood system. When we get into chapter 10, we'll see a little bit more of this reason of persecution. But what's the easiest way to relieve the persecution from the Jewish leadership? Well, it's to go back under Judaism, to go back and start following the law and do all of the sacrifices and rules and of the law in order to relieve this pressure. That's what the thing we should keep in mind as we go through here. The author is writing to them in encouragement by saying that Jesus is better than all of these areas of Judaism, that they have selected and chosen the right way to go, and that they should stay on that path and not go back under Judaism. He's been using the example of the Jewish people, Israelites at Kadesh Barnia, as far as going into the land, that they faltered and fell short, and they didn't stay true in belief that God was going to get them into the promised land and protect them. And because of that, that generation was not able to go into the promised land. They fell short. So the author is encouraging these believers, don't make that same sort of a decision. Stay with Jesus Christ. The way you have chosen is the correct way. Don't falter, keep going, and you'll be able to enter into this rest that he's been talking about of the life of faith. And then he just got through talking at the end of our last session, Glenn, of this Sabbath rest. And we went into quite detail on that. That this is something that's going to happen in the future for all of us who are believers. That's the background that we want to keep in mind as we go through here and make application to our lives today of what this author is addressing to these Jewish believers.

SPEAKER_01: 5:36

The last part of chapter three and the first part of chapter four talked extensively cautioning these Hebrew believers about don't miss this opportunity for rest. The reason is if you go back into Judaism to keeping commands and doing deeds in order to prove yourself righteous, then therefore you won't have any rest. There's no rest in law keeping. There is rest in Christ. That was the message. The question then before us that naturally arises is how? It's one thing to say, well, take advantage of this rest. It's something else entirely to say, How do I enjoy Christ? How in my weak flesh am I to rest in Christ? Well, the next section tells us how it's through the Word of God. Steve, can you start at Hebrews chapter 4, starting at verse 12 and going to verse 16?

SPEAKER_00: 6:31

For the word of God is living and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart, and there is no creature hidden from his sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of him with whom we have to do. Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession, for we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore, let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

SPEAKER_01: 7:29

Verse 12 talks about the Word of God. The question is, how powerful is the Word of God? What is it capable of doing in our lives?

SPEAKER_00: 7:38

Well, the first thing to realize here is that it's number one, living. The second thing is it's active. That means that it is something that is not dormant. It's not something that is inert. The word of God is something that will take action and conviction on a person's life. Then there's some illustrations that he gives here, sharper than any two-edged sword, as he talks about the piercing of the division of the soul and both joints and marrow. I think we get a picture of a sword that can pierce through any type of protection that a warrior might have, or through any type of a shield that some warrior might put up. He's saying that the word of God can pierce through any type of defenses that we might put up in order to avoid what the word of God is convicting us of. I think that's one thing to keep in mind. The word of God is active and it's alive, and it's something that will pierce into a person's soul and spirit and bring up to light the things that he is doing against God, convicting that man of knowing what I need to do is I need to trust in the Lord Jesus Christ who has paid the death penalty for my sins. I can believe and trust in him.

SPEAKER_01: 9:07

Verse 12 says, the word of God is alive, it's living, and it will cut us to the core. I'm reminded of a surgeon with a very sharp scalpel, and a skilled surgeon will open you up, lay you bare, go inside to your core and do work that needs to be done. He'll take out things that need to be removed. He will open you up and do what needs to be done because he is a skilled surgeon with a sharp scalpel. That is the word of God. The Holy Spirit can take the word of God and do surgery on your soul. He will cut you to your core. It also tells us here that it is powerful enough to separate things that we cannot separate. He gives three or four examples here. He says, division of soul and spirit, joints and marrow, and able to discern the thoughts and intentions of the heart. Now, this passage here is often used to make a hard distinction between human soul and spirit. I've even heard some Bible teachers make a whole little area of theology around humans having both a soul and a spirit. However, this passage tends to suggest that these are inseparable, that we cannot distinguish or separate between them. For example, the discerning between joints and marrow, the word there is really the joining and the marrow. It's impossible to take a knife or a sword and have the marrow in one hand and the joint or the joining in the other. No, the marrow makes up the joint. The thoughts and intentions, you really can't have one without the other. You can't have intention without a thought, and you can't really have a thought about something without having an intention. To separate things that are inseparable is what it's saying. So it would seem that soul and spirit cannot be separated either. Now, Steve, there's a verse in Thessalonians, is there not that would seem to indicate some more information on this?

SPEAKER_00: 11:16

Yeah, we have a verse in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, verse 23, that says, Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely, and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Through that cross-reference, it seems like there is a division of at least a body, soul, and spirit.

SPEAKER_01: 11:44

Interesting fact to consider. This passage, I think, would be one of the passages that would lead to draw conclusions from that. Nevertheless, the main point of this section, if we move on, if we look at specifically verses 12 and 13, it talks about how much God knows. Steve, what does it say there in those two verses, 12 and 13, about how much God knows?

SPEAKER_00: 12:06

It says there's no creature that is hidden from his sight, that all things are laid bare to his eyes. That's a very clear picture that you're not going to be able to hide any type of ungodly acts or sinful acts from God, that he's going to know everything that we do. Now, that's also going to include godly things that we do. We can take rest in knowing that God can see everything and knows everything. There's nothing that even says there's no creature. So it's not just human beings, but it's everything. He has oversight and wisdom and knowledge about everything, all of creation itself, of what's going on.

SPEAKER_01: 12:52

This analogy here, this uh language here, the word of God is living and active and sharper than a two-edged sword. A two-edged sword cuts both ways. Oftentimes we find out that when we try to learn the word of God so that we can advise other people or maybe teach other people or help other people, oftentimes the sword cuts both ways. If we often even chastise other people for their sin, then it will cut against us as well. The wielder of the word of God needs to be quite careful with it because it does cut both ways. The good news is that the Holy Spirit is the expert surgeon and he will do surgery with his sharp scalpel. It says here, God lays everything bare. So we should be open and honest and confess to him. That's the good thing about the word of God and about our Lord is that we can be completely open and honest before him. He knows everything anyway. So why are we trying to hide? Since God already knows us better than we know ourselves, we should be humble and confess ourselves before him and be honest with him. Oftentimes we don't even admit the truth to ourselves, yet, here it says that God knows the thoughts and intentions of our heart. You know, the psychologist and the psychiatrist make a pretty good living of trying to figure out what are the thoughts and intentions of a heart. Oftentimes I have a suspicion that they really don't learn too much about what's down in there because the word of God tells us that the heart is desperately wicked. Who can know it? Well, the one that can know it is the Lord God, because he lays everything bare. He knows us better than we know ourselves. We don't even know our own thoughts and intentions. We don't know what motivates ourselves, yet the word of God does. He is the one that can help us. If a person needs surgery, they go to a surgeon. If a person needs surgery on their soul, they need to go to the word of God, because that is the path forward for improving your soul. A patient merely needs to submit to the surgeon in order to for the surgeon to do his work and to heal them. When we are sick in our soul, all we have to do is submit to the Lord God and submit to the Word of God, and it will do its work on us. Verse 14 really starts another section of the book, another major section. It says, Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. So here it says Jesus is not merely a high priest, but he says he is a great high priest. The first part of Hebrews, Jesus is presented as great in his person. Now Hebrews is presenting Jesus as great in his position. Jesus is superior in every way. Steve, what can we know about this high priest? What is this section telling us about Jesus being our priest?

SPEAKER_00: 16:06

As we mentioned in the first chapter, it depicts Jesus as sitting at the right hand of the one on high. We talked at that time in those sessions that the priests did not sit, that they were ones who were always working. There were no chairs in the tabernacle or the temple, and that the high priest would only go back into the Holy of Holies once a year on behalf of all the people. With Jesus, we have somebody who has is seated at the right hand. The work is finished. There's nothing else that he has left to do. A second thing is he's present with God the Father all the time. So he's not going behind the veil just one time a year. He's there to advocate for us always. That's what he's getting at in verse 14. He's a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, the Son of God. He says, Let's hold fast to our confession. He then goes on to say that this high priest, Jesus, can sympathize with our weaknesses because he's been tempted in all things. Glenn, what that brings to my mind is 1 John 2.16, that says, For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the boastful pride of life is not from the Father, but is from the world. I'm thinking back to when Jesus was tempted in his forty days of separation. At the end of it, Satan came to him and he said, After 40 days of fasting, turn these rocks into bread. That would have been the lust of the flesh. Jesus would have been very hungry in his fully manned state. And Jesus resisted that. And then the Satan took him and said, Bow yourself to me, and I will give you all these kingdoms of the world. Jesus resisted that. That would have been a temptation of the lust of the eyes in order to be king of all the nations. But of course, Jesus is going to be king of all the nations in the future. It wasn't his time to be king of all the nations. And finally, Satan took him up to the pinnacle of the temple and said, Throw yourself off, and the angels will come and protect you. Show who you are, because they'll protect you because your time is not yet come. Jesus resisted that, and that would have been the pride of life. He could have showed off to Satan and proved to him who he was, but he resisted that. That's what I think of, Glenn, whenever the author is talking about that Jesus has been tempted in all ways of us. All sin, I think, can be boiled down to this lust of the eyes, lust of the flesh, and the pride of life. I think the author is telling us Jesus has been tempted in those ways, therefore he knows how we feel, and he can be a great advocate for us. He can be a high priest in the heavenly heavens in front of God the Father because he has been tempted in those ways as well.

SPEAKER_01: 19:26

We've already seen in this book of Hebrews that Jesus is mentioned to be our high priest. Here in 414, it really starts a section that lasts for another three or four chapters where it goes into quite a bit of detail about the high priest being Jesus. Before we really get into that, we need to grasp the importance and significance of it. I think our perception of modern-day religions that have priests are confusing and even messing up our understanding of Hebrews because you see, in the Old Testament, priest was out of the congregation that was supposed to represent the congregation to God. The priest would go into the temple where God's spirit was, his glory was in the temple, and the priest would come out of the congregation and go represent the people to God. The speaking for God to the people was a different job. That was the job of the prophet. If you remember when we went through Ezekiel, oftentimes Ezekiel as a prophet would speak for God. He would act out as if he were God. He would go through activities as if he were God. So the job of the prophet was to take God's word and represent God to the people. The job of a priest was just the opposite. He was to represent the people before God. When it says here, therefore, since we have a great high priest, namely Jesus, Jesus is the one who would go and represent us before God. That's the picture here. We have a great high priest. The first question we have in the Old Testament, which tribe of Israel did the priest come from?

SPEAKER_00: 21:15

They came from the tribe of Levi or Levi, which was the tribe that Moses and Aaron came from. They were the ones that were set apart in order to do the priestly activities. They were even set apart that when there were divisions into the land, they didn't have any division on their own. There were pockets that they were put into throughout the land so that they could serve the people, but their main purpose was to operate in the temple. And the high priest was to come from the line of Aaron himself. Those were the ones who were to serve as high priest. So they were set apart and separated in order to be this representation for the people to God. By contrast, which tribe did Jesus come from? Jesus came from the tribe of Judah. And that's the one that he came from. And there were prophecies that the Messiah would come from the tribe of Judah.

SPEAKER_01: 22:14

In the Old Testament, it was quite clear to be a priest, you had to be the tribe of Levi, son of Aaron. Jesus was not from that tribe. He was from Judah. As the gospels demonstrate, he was in the kingly line, and the kings were prevented from being a priest. That presents a question or a bit of a conundrum. How could Jesus be our great high priest when he was from the wrong tribe? We're going to see this book of Hebrews is going to explain to us in future chapters. Jesus was a great high priest, but he was not from the Aaronic priesthood from Aaron. He was from a different order. He was from a special class of priests, namely from the order of Melchizedek. And we'll get into that when the text explains it here coming up in the future chapters. We're told here in this section that Jesus, our high priest, passed through the heavens, is the language that says Jesus pre-existed. He existed prior to when he became a man, when he became a human. Jesus is God, therefore he is eternal and passed through the heavens to lower himself to our level. Our high priest was better than the high priest that was in all of the years of the Jewish religion, simply because the regular high priest could never be said to have gone through the heavens. Our high priest can. He is a better high priest. Every step along the way, Jesus is presented as better. He is a better than the angels. He is better than any created being. Here, he is our great high priest that has passed through the heavens. Steve, how worthy is Jesus?

SPEAKER_00: 24:09

Oh, he's worthy of everything. We've talked about that in our other sessions. That Jesus is a prophet, priest, and king. That's why the author is presenting him as being above the angels, above Moses. Now getting into a little bit more detail of being above the Levitical priesthood. He's presenting this case to these believers, Hebrew believers, stay on course and stay fast with your confession, because you have chosen the right way. Here's the reasons why you have chosen the right way. Jesus Christ, Jesus, the Messiah, is above all.

SPEAKER_01: 24:51

At the end of verse 14, it tells us, therefore, because Jesus is our high priest, which means he's going to represent us before the Father, we have a great high priest that is representing us before the Father. Therefore, let us hold fast our confession. Steve, why should we hold fast to our testimony, our confession, our belief about Jesus Christ? What it's saying here is this confession is really like a doctrinal confession. What has he been saying for all these chapters now in the book? Who is Jesus Christ? Our confession is, of course, is who is Jesus? Why is he here telling us to hold fast to our confession?

SPEAKER_00: 25:36

I think it's because if they were to go back under Judaism, they would in a way be recanting the confession. Now, what was the confession? The confession was that Jesus was the Messiah. In the Old Testament prophets, it gave all of these prophecies of the Messiah was going to be a king, was going to be a conqueror, was going to be a protector and ruler of all the nations, all of these things, and that they have put their faith and trust in him as the Messiah, and that through that they have salvation. They have the promise of eternal life. And that hope is made fast because of his resurrection. If they go back under Judaism, in a way, they are not really renouncing the confession, but they're expressing maybe doubt in the confession. They're giving in to the pressure of the Judaizers of who they believe that Jesus Christ is and who he actually is. I think in our case, whenever we go back and start living a carnal life, meaning a worldly life, then we are distancing ourselves from our confession of our belief and trust in Jesus Christ. I think the author here is just encouraging them, hold fast to this confession that you have made. This is the one that's going to get you through. This is the one that's going to give you the rest that God has promised. Don't let go of that confession. Hold fast to it. That's what's going to get you through.

SPEAKER_01: 27:08

Verse 15 here says, For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. The high priest in the Old Testament had to cleanse himself from his own sins before he could then go in and represent the people before God. Here, our high priest, Jesus, what has he been saying so far in the book? He is God, he is man, he is a better than the angels, he is better than Moses, he is able to provide more than Joshua, he is our great high priest. But it says not only all those things, but now he can sympathize with our weaknesses. Think of it. He's close to us, close as our own skin, because he was human, just like you and just like me. Our high priest that goes into the temple to plead our case before the Father is a high priest that has experienced life like we had. He was tempted in all things we are, yet he did not fail. He withheld the pressure of temptation, but he never gave in. Steve, what comfort does it give us to know that Jesus was tempted in all things we are, yet without sin?

SPEAKER_00: 28:40

I think that it's a glorious thing for us to take comfort in and rest, if I can use that word, that the creator of everything, the universe, the earth, and the creator of ourselves took on the form of a human being so that he could know firsthand the things that we go through. There's that old story of a man that knew that there was going to be a field that was going to be flooded. And there had been some ants that he had been following because he was interested in insects. He knew this field was going to be flooded. With the flooding of the field, the ants were going to get wiped out. He thought to himself, if there was only some way that I could go and communicate to those ants, let them know that this danger was coming so that they might move their colony somewhere else to higher ground to seek safety from the coming flood. If there was only some way that maybe possibly I could become an ant and go there myself and communicate to them. Now that's a simple story, but it's one that connects with what actually happened. Jesus Christ fully humiliated. Human, fully God, came himself so that he might die and pay for the penalty of our sin. And it's through his death, burial, and resurrection is that we have the promise of eternal life. He came to communicate to his creation, and we have that communication through this word of God that we just spoke about that is sharper than any two-edged sword. Today is the day of salvation, as we talked about in our last session. If you're hearing this and the two-edged sword of God's word is convicting you, place your belief and trust in Jesus Christ today, and you might have salvation.

SPEAKER_01: 30:44

We have something in Christianity that no other religion on earth has, and that is the person of Jesus Christ that knows us and has experienced humanity. The God of the universe was human and he knows all things like we do, yet he was without sin. There's no issue that we would have that Jesus is not intimately familiar with because he experienced it. It's comforting to know that Jesus can identify with our human condition. He lived as a human, he experienced all the human tragedies and even more than us. He knows us because he became a man. Jesus is without sin. He is the pure one, the clean one, the human that is unstained by sin. He felt the full pull and draw and pressure of temptation, but he never gave in. He is the one that is our high priest that will go represent us before the Father and plead our case before him. He is fully human, fully tempted, but pure, clean, and without sin. How glorious is our Lord Jesus! Because of that, we can draw near to the throne of grace. And Steve, I just love the way we can worship our Lord Jesus.

SPEAKER_00: 32:08

Yeah, isn't it great that we can go before the throne of God because we have such a great advocate?

SPEAKER_01: 32:14

And we're going to learn more about that next time because there's a significance to being able to go into the throne room, the very throne room of God, and we'll reason through that next time on reasoning through the Bible.

SPEAKER_00: 32:26

Thank you so much for watching and listening. And always, may God bless you.