Some time ago, I began blogging on our Sunday sermons to help myself review; today, I’m continuing that by covering our Aug. 23 sermon, on Hebrews 10:19-25.

As usual, I won’t summarize the sermon, since you can stream it if you want to hear yourself, but will focus on what I take away from it. One key idea was this part of Heb. 20:22

…let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings

We spent most of our time in this sermon focusing on this idea and this point – to draw near to God, to come into his presence. In the Old Testament, the tabernacle had helped the Jews to take seriously the idea of God’s holiness, and how important it was to take this seriously and not come into his presence casually. But now, through Jesus, a way is opened for us to come – and not just to come, but to come with confidence. So now we can draw near to God.

But to really draw near, we need a sense of urgency, of importance – to recognize our urgent need of God, and how we need his presence with us. Isaiah 29:13 rebuked the people for drawing near with their lips, not their hearts, pointing to what I truly need – not to superficially come, but to truly draw near to God and receive his forgiveness, his comfort, his help, his equipping. P. Peter highlighted our need to not admire Jesus, or God, from a distance, but to really come.

So, the big challenge to me was to recognize what a great privilege it is to be able to come into his presence, to see my need of it, and to take advantage of this privilege by coming to God.