GROUP FELLOWSHIP

AUTUMN 2001

December 4 / 6

STUDIES IN HEBREWS

WHAT SORT OF PEOPLE OUGHT WE TO BE?

HEBREWS 13: A PEOPLE CONSISTENT IN GOODNESS OF LIFE

A HEALTH CHECK! Nat. West. Is currently offering clients a free ‘wealth check’! This week we give ourselves a free spiritual health check! The letter to the Hebrews ends with a practical, down to earth chapter on authentic Christian behaviour (Chapters 1 – 11 have been almost exclusively doctrinal with only the occasional exhortation to be faithful and persevere). But here we have clear, detailed instructions on the behaviour of healthy Christians. So, why not give yourself a ‘health check’? (Mark yourself out of 5 for each area of behaviour! With 6 areas, that’s a total of 30 marks! How’s your spiritual life and behaviour?)

1st check:

• 13.1-3 : SUSTAINED LOVE
• What is said about Christian love here?
• To what categories are we to show love and concern? Are they just Christians or others too? (see Gal 6.10)
• Why might Christians be in prison? (See 10. 32-34) And why was visitation so very vital in those days?
• A real love and affection for fellow Christians: Why is the presence of this so telling an indicator of the level of my spiritual health? - See John 13.15

See 1 John 3.14 - See 1 John 4. 7-21

HOW IS YOUR ‘LOVE LIFE’?? (Marks out of 5)

2nd check:

• 13. 4-6: NOT SLAVES TO DESIRE

The drive to sexuality:

• ‘Marriage should be honoured by all’. Is marriage held in high honour today?
• How does our society regard marriage?
• Why is marriage often decried, shunned, ignored?
• What is needed to elevate it again in society’s eyes?

(What sort of behaviour from married people?)

• How does Scripture here enforce the importance of right behaviour in sexual matters?

The desire for money:

• ‘Keep your lives free from the love of money’. Why does money exercise such incredible power over people?
• Do you struggle with this? C H Spurgeon said although he’d heard people confess to all sorts of sins, ‘In all my life I have never heard anyone confess the sin of covetousness to me.’ Why was that, do you think?
• What is the antidote to covetousness, according to 13.5?
• Why, according to 13.5, should Christians be free from a wrongful love of money? What is our treasure?
• Money can be sought for security: What is the Christian’s security?

ARE YOU IN CONTROL OF YOUR DESIRES – OR DO THEY CONTROL YOU?

3rd check

• 13.7 –9: STAYING LOYAL TO THE TRUTH

Every generation of Christians including our own, has felt various pressures to modify or reshape Christian truth in some way or another. The Hebrew Christians were under intense pressures to do so.

• For the Hebrew Christians the pressure to modify the gospel came from the Jews. Where does it come from today in the 21st century? Are there particularly acute pressures? What parts of the Christian message are under pressure to be altered or abandoned?
• How according to the passage, can a conscious recollection of both faithful leaders and of the Lord Jesus help us in this respect?
• Why does the writer emphasise in this context that Jesus never changes?

IS THE MESSAGE MOULDING ME OR AM I MOULDING THE MESSAGE?

4th check:

• 13.10-14 : WILLING TO BE ‘AN OUTSIDER’

(The thoughts and argument of the author in 13. 9-12 are quite complex, involving a great familiarity with Jewish law about sacrifices. So, for today, we’ll not try to unravel this, but we’ll concentrate on the point to which his thoughts lead him in 13.12.) The author’s reasoning leads him to speak of Jesus as an ‘outsider’, suffering death ‘outside’. He encourages Christians to be willing to identify with Jesus in this.

• ‘Let’s go to him outside…..’
• In what ways does being a Christian make you an’ outsider’? Is this inevitable?
• How hard and costly is it to be an ‘outsider’? Is it harder today in our modern world?
• What thoughts can both console and motivate us if we are made to feel that we ‘don’t belong’? (13.14)

HOW WILLING AM I TO FACE JESUS’ REJECTION?

5th check:

• 13. 13-17 : OFFERING DAILY SACRIFICES
• Worship of the day (Jewish and pagan) all involved the literal offering of sacrifices. But there were none for the Christians to offer – or were there?
• What spiritual sacrifices are we urged to continually offer to God?

DOES EVERY DAY SEE ME OFFERING THE SACRIFICES THAT PLEASE GOD?

6th check:

6. 13.17-19 : A RIGHT HEART TOWARDS LEADERS

• What is said about the job of Christian leaders?
• What is the right attitude to Christian leaders?
• And what reasons are given for this?
• Why, according to these verses, is this so important?
• What must we do to help our leaders? 13. 18-19?

WHAT IS IN MY HEART TOWARDS MY SPIRITUAL LEADERS?

13. 20 – 21: ENJOY THE CLOSING BENEDICTION, and take consolation in its words whether you did well or badly in the spiritual health check!