Iowa Falls Evangelical Free Church Sermon Podcast

What's the good word? Have you ever been greeted in this way? How do we answer? In a world filled with words that beat us down and tear us apart, we need to hear a good word. Today we conclude our series in the Christ-exalting book of Hebrews with a benediction a good (bene) word (diction). The first audience needed to hear this good word and so do we.

What if the days ahead for Christians are going to be harder than the days behind us? When suffering comes will we turn on our leaders and turn our backs on Jesus? Or will we follow faithful leaders as we together follow our unchanging Savior into suffering? These are questions that believers in the 1st Century needed to wrestle with and they're questions we'll wrestle with today as we near the end of our series in the book of Hebrews.

The book of Hebrews has been good and rich but often challenging to relate to or even understand. As 21st century Christians living in relative prosperity and comfort we struggle to identify with 1st century Jews who have become Christians but are seeing persecution and suffering rise around them. In chapter 13, though, the commands (and promises) to the 1st century audience seem remarkably applicable for us in our day.

How do we approach God? Under the Old Covenant there was a clear barrier between the holy God and unholy people. In today's passage, the audience is reminded that they have now come to God through Jesus, mediator of the New Covenant. So does that mean we can now approach God casually?

Hail the Incarnate Deity!

Undeserving people often experience God-given success by His hand. While God clearly gave this to Gideon and His people in chapter 7, their response to this God-given success in chapter 8 is far from flattering. Today we'll finish up our advent series by looking at the end of Gideon's account which will serve as a warning for us to beware of the danger of sinful responses to God-given success. We'll also make sure to take note of how this reminds us to put all of our hope in Jesus, the sinless, eternal King.

What kinds of things have you accomplished with your hands? While God gives us work to do and hands to do it, we all face limitations. There are things that simply can't be done by our own hands. As we continue our Advent sermon series taking us from Gideon to Jesus we will hear a lot about hands today in Judges 7. This passage is rich with gospel-centered application for us. We are small and weak but we worship and obey the LORD who saves by His hand.

Last week we started our Advent sermon series in which we'll walk through Judges 6-8. Our tradition of preparing for Christmas by walking through a portion of the Old Testament helps us to see how all of Scripture points to Jesus. If you missed last week's sermon, you'll want to go back and watch that for some helpful context.

Today we pick up where we left off. What must happen before Gideon heads off to set Israel free by fighting the Midianites? And what does any of this have to do with us? How does it point us to Jesus?