The Price Has Been Paid- It’s Your Choice Hebrews 10:19-26

Throughout Christian history, the epistle to the Hebrews has been a topic of scholarly debate regarding its author.

One thing is for sure at the end of the day, only God knows who wrote “what appears to be a sermon prepared to be read aloud to the audience” (Allen, 2010). But despite the curtain of mystery that exist over this epistle, I believe that it is one of the most powerful presentations of Christology in the New Testament. So for a moment let’s unpack some verses with this wonderful book. Jesus through His death on the cross has given us the way to a new life which is eternal. (Vs 19-22) “Therefore, brethren, we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He inaugurated for us through the veil, that is, His flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. How wonderful that we are assured that our debt for our sin has been paid. Once we have heard the gospel we have a choice. God does not make us robots to automatically love and obey Him, he gave us personal choices. If we had no choice, what kind of love would that be?
There are those that would follow the belief of “predestination”. T Once we have heard we have a choice. God does not make us robots that have no personal choices.

Christ stands at our hearts door but gives us free will. Those who choose to go to be back to the house turn off the lights and hopes that the solicitor goes away will remain lost and there will be a judgment for rejecting Christ.

There would be some who would argue that we have no personal choice but to choose sin so God has predestined who will be saved and who will reject Him. This belief is seen in Calvinism.

The Calvinist would argue that, “man is completely a sinner who is incapable of understanding and coming to God and has a sinful free will capable only of rejecting God. Therefore, in order for salvation to occur, God must predestine. It can be no other way. If this is so, then there should be verses supporting it.”

This argument hangs its hat on a few Scriptures such as (Acts 13:48.John 1:12-13. Romans 8:29-30 and Philippians 1:29, Eph. 1, 5, 11). Four verses containing 175 words out of the over 180,000 in the New Testament and not one of them spoken by my Lord. I will simply say, I believe that the Bible teaches that we have a choice to accept or reject Christ.

Hebrews is telling us in (Vs. 22-23) to hold fast to our confession and draw near to Christ with the confidence in our faith. We are to draw near to one another and not fall away from coming together. (Vs 25) Friend that means that you cannot fully worship our Mighty Lord and God from your kitchen table or watching a sunset from a lawn chair. Yes, those are times of meditation and listening to the Holy Spirit but the Scriptures clearly teach us to join with a local church. It is through this fellowship we can accomplish (Vs. 25b) to encourage one another and “spur” them on.

The final portion of this scripture makes reference to “the day drawing near. There are two thought processes on this passage, “the day” is making reference to the destruction of Jerusalem if the author was writing prior to AD 70. The second, I would argue is the correct interpretation, to Christ return and the judgement.

You may be reading this and thinking I have sinned too bad to return. God has made promises of His faithfulness to excite, ignite, inflame and encourage us to be faithful, and we must depend more upon his promises than we do on our strength and worldly idols. We must set spiritual compass on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who went to the cross, conquered death, rose again and now sits at the right hand of the throne of God. So, the time have come to reach out to one another and love our fellow believers and share the Gospel of Christ.

We are called to plant, fertilize, and God will provide the harvest. This passage should inspire us to recommit, hold the line and seek Christ it all things.

May God give you strength to do His will. Eddie may be contact at new email address eddieturnerreachingout@ gmail.com or by phone (903-391-7656) References: Allen, D. L. (2010).

Hebrews, the new American commentary.

Nashville: B&H Publishing. MacArthur, J.

(2005). The macarthur bible commentary.

Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishing.

Eddie may be contact at new email address eddieturn-erreachin-gout@gmail.com or by phone (903-391-7656)