Hebrews 13:21 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

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Hebrews 13:21

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Now we come to the petition itself. It is a tremendous encouragement. We are not on our own - advance in righteousness and holiness are the work of God. If I were on my own and were exhorted to overcome my deficiencies and my sinful tendencies, that would be a hopeless task, but by the work of God in me all these things can be eradicated, and I can be improved. There can be no advance in character without the help of God. You need of course first to be saved. You need to have a new nature. You can cultivate a certain amount of righteousness without conversion, but it is very shallow. You can cultivate a generous manner and kindness and courtesy – not many people seem to – but not very much and not in many points of righteousness. It is not only a prayer, but it is an exhortation. The prayer contains this explanation of sanctification and how it works, and the order in which God goes about it within us. There is even a shaft of light in this inspired prayer concerning the effect of our conduct on God himself. ‘Working in you that, which is well pleasing in his sight.’ God is pleased with the reformation, which is being conducted in the life of his people. This word ‘perfect’ always alarms us. In this particular case, the word means ‘may he complete you thoroughly’ or ‘may he restore you’, ‘may he mend you’. The apostle Paul uses the word in Galatians 6 when he tells us ‘to restore’ the person who is wandering. This is our journey in life being constantly repaired, improved, completed so that we are well pleasing to the Lord. This is the lifelong task for us: ‘Make you perfect in every good work to do his will working in you that which is well pleasing in his sight’. In Philippians 2:13, ‘For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.’ Now this helps us, because it delivers us from the mistake of imagining that God will do it all. When it comes to my salvation, God must do it all. Christ had to come and suffer and die on Calvary taking away the punishment due to me for my sin; his perfect righteousness had to be imputed to my account; Christ did it all. But when it comes to the ongoing Christian life and my improvement in character and conduct, there is much for me to do. First he makes you willing, he convicts you of your sin, he puts the standard in your heart and the desire. He makes you determined to live a better life and to keep his law and to do good works. And then he helps you to do them. Well here is where it may break down. The breakdown is with me, I know the standard. I desire to improve in my life to be a better person and then there arises some temptation. I have been made willing and yet I abandon righteousness and I turn and I yield to sin. So God makes me willing again and moves my conscience so that I hunger and thirst after righteousness. Everything that is accomplished in our lives is accomplished through Jesus Christ: every prayer, every witness. everything must be done in the name of Jesus Christ. Whether I pray, whether I sing, whatever I do, I do everything giving thanks to God and the Father, by him. In my hymns, I will sing his name as a Christian believer. Everything must have his name attached to it, in some shape or some form.

Application

There are some people – and we cannot criticise this – who rejoice in doctrine, and there is even a movement among the churches which is re-emphasising good sound doctrines. And yet at the same time you see a flaw: conduct does not accompany the interest in doctrine. Something is badly wrong, because the great purpose of the Christian life and God’s training course is conduct. His great task within us is to ‘make you perfect in every good work to do his will’. Is he working in us? Is he changing us? There must be faith which works; we must be being formed so there is this exhortation.

Am I a disordered person? Are there broken parts in my life? Some just receive no attention at all, so that there is selfish ambition, or areas of unfaithfulness, or omission of certain Christian duties which I do not attempt. I may harbour ill-will, love some Christians, dislike others, and make no attempt to build bridges or repair breaches. There may be peevishness, unconquered sin, areas of laziness, prayerlessness. Is there inconsistency and disorder in the life?

The atheists insist that right living and good moral conduct can be achieved without religion. Of cause, it cannot be and the evidence for that is all around us. Even in our nation as religion has declined, so morality has declined: goodwill and the virtues of kindness and humility. We can compare nations that have no Christian tradition with those that do, and you can see the vast differences between them in these areas. If you try it without the power of God, you can achieve some good deeds, but as fast as you succeed in one thing, you will fail in another. We don’t want generosity without humility. We don't want to join the modern atheistic ideas that pride is alright, that greed is acceptable, that deceit is only a situational thing. You can even deceive, so they say, as long as you don't hurt anybody by it. And so they rewrite the code of righteous and vastly reduce it to a few things, and in God’s judgements they fail even in that.

The church in its community may have the truth, may preach true doctrines, and yet it is possible for a church to become little more than a club. Some churches have many social activities – church suppers, church banquets, mutual comfort, and fellowship, and there is nothing necessarily wrong with these things – but what a tragedy if the church has no impact on its community, no outreach, no work among the young. It is just existing for its own benefits, and yet it may revel in truth and doctrine.

Questions

If God wills that you should live a righteous life and you then depart from that and swerve aside, are you saying that God’s will can be frustrated? No, that is impossible. God’s will is not frustrated, because if I depart from that strong inclination he has given me and turn aside, then it becomes God's will that I should fall and suffer the consequences, and lose his blessing for a time. He will allow this in order to teach me some important lesson, and then he will bring me back to my senses again. So God's will is never frustrated, but we may in a sense frustrate that inclination that he has put within us.

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Hebrews 13:21 Commentary and Bible Study