PRAYING BEFORE THE THRONE III
HEBREWS 4:16
This past week I had an opportunity to substitute for XXXXX who is a 4th grade teacher at Milford. One thing you learn real quick when you substitute teach is that the kids will test you. Then will find out just how far you will go. They like to test you to see how gullible you are. “Mr. XXXXX always lets us have an extra hour recess when it’s the forth Wednesday of the month.” “Mr. XXXXX always let’s us compare answers on the spelling test to make corrections before turning in our papers.” It never ceases to amaze me some of the things these kids will tell that there teacher allows. I think when you wear that name tag that they make you wear that says substitute many children misread it to read “stupid”. But there is always that little girl, (in my experience it has never been a boy), who is always on your side. She will raise her hand and “Mr. XXXX doesn’t let us to that, or whatever.” Much to the great annoyance to the rest of the class. (That little girl by the way was my wife when she was in school).
The reason I bring that up is that I began to realize that these children have come to realize that from a substitute they will get grace, from the regular teacher then are going to get justice. When they go to the regular teacher they go to the desk of law. They know what the requirements are to receive what it is they are asking for. However when they go to the substitute they go to the desk of grace. Because they know that they well receive things they really do not deserve.
Know while the desk of grace in the Milford 4th grade class is grace based on ignorance, the throne of grace that we are called before, the throne of God, is grace based on undeserved love, undeserved love that the Father has for us.
Please turn with me to our passage today, which is Heb 4:16, that is on page 1037 in your pew Bibles. This will be the last of the three messages that we have heard on this verse. Heb. 4:16 “Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”
As I have stated before this is one of my favorite passages in Scripture. It is one of my favorites because of the fact it commands me to come to the throne of God. It commands me to come boldly to the throne of Grace and mercy that I might obtain mercy and find grace in my time of need.
Let me ask you this, is there ever time when we are not in need of God’s mercy and grace? I know for me I am in need of my Savior’s grace and mercy every second of every day of my life. I praise God that I have been the call to go to my Lord and King’s throne constantly to obtain such a wonderful gift of grace and mercy.
In our past sermons we talked of how we are called to a throne. We are called to the throne in which the hosts of heaven stand before praising God night and day. It is a throne because on that throne sits royalty, on that throne sits the King of kings and Lord of lords.
We are told in God’s Word to approach that throne boldly yet with humility, we are to approach it respectfully, we are to approach it with a sense of overwhelming joy and confidence. We are to approach it with sincerity.
Last week we focused on the fact that it was a throne of grace. Not a throne of law or works but a throne of grace. Because it is a throne of grace, a throne by which our petitions are sprinkled with the blood of the lamb of God, we need not worry that our prayers may be faulty prayers. We need to worry that we cannot pray with eloquent words, or that sin may enter in to our prayers. Our prayers our washed in the blood at that the throne of Grace.
Because it is a throne of grace we need to worry about our own faults. Because when we approach the throne of Grace and mercy through the blood of Christ we too are washed, we to our looked at as being holy and righteous. Not because we are in and of ourselves holy and righteous, but because we have imputed upon the holiness and righteousness of Jesus Christ. You see it is by our Lord Jesus and by Him alone that we can even approach this wonderful throne on whom sits the King of heaven and earth.
Today I want to combine those two thoughts. As we see from our verse that it conveys the idea of “grace enthroned”. The Scripture is clear that the one who sit on this throne is “grace personified”. The true concept of grace can only be found by looking to the One and only true God of the Holy Scriptures.
When one looks at the OT and reads the Pentateuch, Isaiah, Ezikiel, and the other prophets, the one attributes that is predominate above the others is the Holiness of God. Throughout the OT the what is focused on is the perfection and Holiness of God.
Through that holiness we see over and over again how mankind fails to measure up to that holiness.
That is the purpose of the Law. The law first and foremost was there to bring us to Christ, Gal. 3:24; “Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith.”
How does that law do that? By showing us what sin, by showing us how Holy God is, and how much we fall short of the glory of God.
As the Holy Spirit writes in Rom. 7:7 “What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! On the contrary, I would not have known sin except through the law. For I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said, "You shall not covet.”
So the predominate attribute in the OT is the Holiness of God. Now in the NT with the Gospel of Jesus Christ we see that the predominant attribute of God is grace.
As John 1:17 tells us; “For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”
Therefore in the OT as we noted last week we had the throne of law, which pointed to the Holiness of God, now we go to a throne of Grace which points to the wonderful grace that we have through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Now we have grace enthroned!
In the history of mankind we see that kings and queens ascend to their thrones in two different ways. First we see them take their thrones by conquest. I think of Alexander the Great. All that he had he took by conquest. He was not ruler of the known world through being elected or by birthright, he conquered the nations that he ruled.
Grace also has been enthroned by conquest. Grace came down from heaven in the form of the God man Jesus Christ and it meant the enemy sin. Sin which brought death, both physical and spiritual. But our Lord Jesus Christ conquered sin and death.
Our Lord Jesus through His perfect life, through His perfect atonement for our sin, through the power of His resurrection He has conquered death, as 1 Cor. 15 tells us; “So when this corruptible has put on incorruption, and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written: "Death is swallowed up in victory. O Death, where is your sting? O Hades, where is your victory?" The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Christ as conquered death along with who had that power of death, that devil. Heb. 2:14-15 tell us; “Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.”
Our Lord Jesus has conquered sin, and now is enthroned on the throne of grace. Our Lord Jesus has overcome sin, crushed sin that we may not have to live as slaves to sin any longer; Heb. 9:26; “He then would have had to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now, once at the end of the ages, He (Jesus) has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.”
Sin has been dealt with, it was been conquered on the cross through the sacrifice of the Lamb of God, our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
So we see that the grace is enthroned by conquest. The was another way in which a king or queen could come to the throne and that was “by right”.
Think of prince Charles over in England. Some day he will be the king of England. He will become king by right. He is the first born male of queen Elizabeth, and by his birthright he will become king.
Grace is also enthroned by right. Once more that right comes through the work of Jesus Christ on the cross. You see there is no injustice in the throne of Grace. There is no injustice in the grace of God. Now it is obvious that not all receive God’s grace in the same measure as others, but there is no injustice in God.
We cannot say that God is unjust for giving a blessing to one and not the other. We cannot say that God is unjust in blessing one with nice car, yet we have an old used model. We cannot say that God is unjust and saving one and not another.
You see none of us deserves the blessings that come from the grace of God, that is what makes it grace to begin with. In fact none of us deserves anything that we have, it all comes to us by God’s grace.
We should understand that God is absolutely just in imputing the righteousness of Christ on those who profess Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour. And God is also absolutely just in condemning those who reject His Son and refuse the gift of salvation. There is no injustice on the throne of grace.
We can see that grace has a throne by conquest and by right, we can also see from the word of God that Grace is enthroned in power!
When our Lord hung on that cross He utter three words of power, “It is finished!” Christ had finished the work of salvation, nothing more need be done, nothing more need be added to salvation, not by Him, His work was complete, and not by us, again His work is complete.
Because His work is finished, because His work is complete, it is a work of unlimited power. While the ancient kings were only as powerful as the army, the King who sits on the throne of grace, who is grace, is the almighty, and all power belongs to HIM. He certainly has the most powerful army in the universe, as all the host of heaven are at His call, but that is not why has unlimited power.
Grace enthroned has all power and authority because it has been granted to Him by the Father. Matt. 28:18; “And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.”
Because grace is enthroned in power there is no sin that is greater then the grace of God. As that beautiful hymn tell us, “Grace, grace, God’s grace, grace that will pardon and cleanse within, Grace, grace, God’s grace, grace that is greater then all our sin.”
What a wonderful truth is found in those words. The Word of God reminds us in 1 John 1:7; “But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.”
There is no sin beyond the all powerful reach of the grace of God. No sin to big, to sin to small, no sin to hideous, no sin to perverse, the blood of Christ is able to cleanse any sin, because it flows from the throne of Grace, grace enthroned in almighty power of God.
There is no person alive who is more evil then the grace of God is good. Jesus Christ is able to save us to the utmost.
As we are reminded in Heb 7:25; “Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.”
We have complete and absolute salvation in the blood of Christ, we have the guarantee of salvation, the guarantee of eternal life, why? Because grace is enthroned through power, the all mighty power of God.
The last item I want to talk about in regards to grace enthroned is that fact that it is enthroned under the sovereign hand of God. The mercy seat of God is a throne, though it is a throne of grace, it is none the less a throne. Grace we must understand does not displace sovereignty.
In human terms we see a degree of sovereignty when a king or queens sits on the throne. In fact we note that when approached by their subjects there are often called “my sovereign”.
But grace enthroned, that is God enthroned, is absolutely, totally and beyond question sovereign. That is to say that He is in control, and that He controls all things.
Because God is sovereign in all things, ultimately all that God wills to come to pass, will come to pass. Isa. 14:27; “For the LORD of hosts has purposed, And who will annul it? His hand is stretched out, And who will turn it back?” Job tells the Lord in 42:2; “I know that You can do everything, And that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You.”
Because God is sovereign in all things, He must be sovereign in the dispensing of His grace. That is to say that God is not obligated to give anyone grace, (again that is what makes it grace). God gives grace according to His good pleasure. And for His glory.
None can complain that they do not God does not give grace in the manner that we believe he ought to. Again God will grant grace to whom He will and withhold it to whom he will.
In Rom. 9:15-16 we read; “For He says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whomever I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whomever I will have compassion." So then it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy.”
Further along in vs. 20-21 Paul writes, “But indeed, O man, who are you to reply against God? Will the thing formed say to him who formed it, "Why have you made me like this?" Does not the potter have power over the clay, from the same lump to make one vessel for honor and another for dishonor?”
The point is, is that God will give grace to whom ever it pleases Him it to give grace to. There is nothing in us the earns it, nothing in us persuades God to give it us, it is given by the sovereign hand of God. If there is anything in us that warrens grace, then it is no longer grace.
We ought to understand that while God is sovereign, God’s sovereignty is dictated by His nature. Look at the kings and emperors of times past. Men like Calagula, Nero, and Henry VIII, these men were sovereign in there own nations. But their sovereignty was based on lust, greed and selfishness. There nature dictated the kind of sovereign they would be.
So it is with God, the sovereignty of God is not some terrible thing, it is in fact a wonderful thing, because it is based on love, on holiness, on all that is good and righteous.
The throne of grace sovereignty had placed itself under the bonds of love. God will do as He wills, He will have mercy on whom He will have mercy, but He will do it all under the bonds of love, under the bonds of holiness, under the bonds of His own nature.
The word of God states that “God is love”, thus the grace of God, the sovereign grace of God, is one of love.
We have seen how grace is enthroned today. It is enthroned by conquest and by right. It is enthroned in power, and it is enthroned in sovereignty. The throne of Grace is such a wonderful place. Yet it is a place for many they just don’t want to go to. To tell you the truth I simply do not understand why.
If we were told that we had to go to our favorite restaurant and that the food there would be free we won’t miss it. We would go there. We would go because we would want to go, because we knew we were going to be blessed.
Yet in Heb. 4:16 we have a call to go to a place were grace and mercy are freely given, two things that we need so very much of, yet we don’t go. We have a call to go the place from which ALL BLESSING FLOW. Yet we don’t go. We come up with all kinds of reasons why. No time, to tired, just don’t feel like it.
One thing I do not want to do is to make you feel guilty so that you will pray. Because that is not the reason you need to pray, to get rid of your guilt. You need to pray, because YOU NEED TO PRAY!
Please take advantage of times God gives you to prayer. Pray at home, pray in your car, pray as lay in your bed, pray with us after the church service.
Take the opportunities to pray.
LET US JOIN TOGETHER IN PRAYER.
