Beautiful. Would you take God's Word tonight, please, and open to the book of Hebrews, chapter 12, as we continue our study in Hebrews 12. And we're going to look tonight at verse 14 down to verse 17. And the title of the sermon tonight is, The Tragedy of Missing God's Grace. Now the book of Hebrews is a book of exhortation. All the way through the book, great emphasis is placed on being all that you can be for the glory of God. I think a key verse is Hebrews 6.1, let us go on unto perfection. And that doesn't mean that we can be sinlessly perfect, but rather perfection there has the idea of full maturity in Christ. We can be all that God called us to be. And the way that happens is through the work of God and his grace that is in our life. The power that works in our lives that makes us all that we can be is the grace of God. That's why the writer of Hebrews gives us a warning. Look at verse number 14. Follow peace with all men and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. Looking diligently lest any man fail the grace of God. Lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you and thereby many be defiled. Now some people read the expression fail the grace of God and take the mistaken idea that from this verse it teaches that a believer can fall away from God's grace and lose their salvation. They're halfway right. First, a believer can never lose their salvation. Let's make that pretty clear. I don't understand how anyone can study Romans chapter 8 and walk away believing that a believer can lose their salvation. It starts out in Romans 8, 1, there is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus. No condemnation. When God says that, he means it. God, the grace that saves us is the grace that keeps us. You know, when my children were learning to walk, they would hold on to my hand, they would lose their grip and fall. But when I held on to their hands, they did not fall. My grip was stronger. My security in Christ is not based on me holding on to God, but it's God holding on to me. My security is in His power. 1 Peter 1.5, talking about believers who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time. We in our own strength could never hold on to what we could never attain to begin with in our own strength. We could never keep what we could never gain. And so, you're in God's hands. It is God's grace that saves you, it is God's grace that Jesus said it like this, my sheep hear my voice, I know them and they follow me. I give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My father which gave them me is greater than all and no man is able to pluck them out of my father's hand. I mean, that's pretty clear. God is holding on to you and no one, there's no power that can pluck you out of the Father's hand. And so Hebrews 12 verse 14 and verse 15 is not about losing your salvation, but rather it is about losing out on your salvation. There's a sense in which a believer can fall of the grace of God or fail of the grace of God in a way that we miss out on God's grace working in our lives. Many times that we think of the grace of God, we think of salvation, and so we should. We know that we're saved by God's grace alone. But that's not where...that doesn't end there. God's grace in our life begins there. It doesn't end there. God's grace continues to work in us all throughout our life. It carries us through this pilgrim journey, this journey that is filled with all kind of trials, all kind of heartaches, all kind of dangers. The grace that saves us is the grace that keeps us and the grace that will deliver us safely home to heaven. John Newton understood this well when he wrote in his song that we sung this morning through many dangerous toils and snares, right? "'Twas grace that brought me safe thus far, and grace will lead me home." And we can identify with that. There's nobody who hasn't experienced dangerous toils and snares to some degree or another in their life. So it's important to understand this mighty resource that we have as Christians. We need God's grace. We need it every day. We need this power in our life to sustain us. Now, in the New Testament, the Greek word grace is charis, and the root of it means gift. It is the same word used to describe spiritual gifts in the New Testament, but it also carries with it the idea of love and kindness or favor. Because, you know, you give away gifts to those that you love, to those that you favor. It was also used in connection with God as it means of undeserved love and favor and kindness. But Louis Burkhoff, in his systematic theology, had something interesting to say. He said this, in most of the passages, however, in which the word charis is used in the New Testament, it signifies the unmerited operation of God in the heart of man affected through the agency of the Holy Spirit. And I want to kind of focus in where he says, it's the unmerited operation of God in the heart of man through the power of the Holy Spirit. It is God working in our heart. It is God giving us what we need. Jonathan Edwards, the great theologian, said this, he said, it's diverse kinds of influence of God's spirit on the hearts of men, or diverse fruits and effects of that influence. And then Spiros Doriathes commented on grace. He said, grace is like God's power generator, and we are like the conduits which carry his power to its intended purposes by the Holy Spirit. And I like those definitions of grace. We could say that grace is that dynamic quality of God that gives us the desire, ability, and power to do His will, to obey Him. It is God granting us enablement. It is God granting us desire. Write down Philippians 2.13, for it is God who works in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure. So we are saved by God's grace. We know that, for by grace we are saved through faith. But we are strengthened by grace. 2 Corinthians 12, 9, and he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee. My strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly, therefore, will I glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. but also we are sanctified by God's grace. Titus 2.11, for the grace of God that bringeth salvation has appeared to all men. Listen to verse 12, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world. The same grace that saves us is the grace that is teaching us to do what? To deny ungodly lusts, to deny the things of the world. So we're sanctified by grace, but also we serve by grace. 1 Peter 4.10, as every man has received the gift, even so minister the same one to another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. God's grace gives us that ability to use the gift that God has given us to serve. Anything good in us is all because God's grace is working in us. Paul said it, 1 Corinthians 15.10, but by the grace of God, I am what I am. And his grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain, but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace which was with me. And so we can see how much we are dependent on God's grace working in our life. be a shame for any believer to miss out on God's grace working in their life, or to look lightly upon the grace of God that is working in our life. And so in verse 15, when it says fail, this word is a verb that means to come short of, to fail to reach the goal. It's the same word used in Romans 3.23, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Hebrews 12, 15 warns us that a believer can come short of God's grace in their life. So he's not talking to unbelievers here. I think he's talking to believers. If you're not careful, you can miss the mighty working of God's grace in your life. We fail to be what we need to be. if we miss God's grace working in us. What a tragedy that would be for any one of us. To come to the end of your Christian life and to look back and realize that there have been missed blessings, there have been missed opportunities for growth, missed opportunities for service, missed opportunities for victory, to miss out on all that God has for us in this wonderful thing called salvation. We don't want to miss anything, right? I heard about a man who was on an ocean liner. He wanted to come to America. He saved all he had for a ticket. He had no more money after that. He boarded the ship and he went to his cabin and he pretty much stayed in his cabin. He brought some cheese and crackers with him that he thought he would need to eat to sustain him during the whole trip. He saw people on deck just eating lavish dinners and, you know, just really having a good time. But since he didn't have any money or any other resources, he just decided to stay in his cabin and eat his cheese and crackers. And it was a long voyage. And by the time he got to America, he almost starved to death. And when it came time to get off the ship, the captain looked at him and said, man, you don't look so good. He said, well, you know, I couldn't afford to pay for the food on the ship. I took all I had just to buy the ticket. And the captain said, look, don't you realize that when you bought that ticket, it made all of this available to you for free? This was all yours for free. You missed out on it. You see, friend, when you get saved, you get on board the good ship Grace, and God has all of this available for you. We don't want to miss out on any of the opportunities or the blessings that accompany salvation. So while you can't lose your salvation, you can miss out on some of the blessings and the things that God has for you in your salvation. I want all of God's grace. I need all of God's grace every minute of my life. And so the warning of the writer to all of us is, look, don't miss out. Don't miss the grace of God working in your life. So there are three dangers that we need to avoid in order to not miss or to make sure that we don't miss out on God's grace. And the first one is the danger of a wrong direction. Look at verse 14, follow peace with all men and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. To avoid failure, we are warned to give careful attention to the direction of our life. I can tell you the condition of your spiritual life by your direction. What is the direction of your life? The book of Hebrews is all about going in the right direction. Chapter 11 was all about following the same direction as those cloud of witnesses that were paraded before us as we studied each of those people that live by faith. We're to run the race the way they ran that race. And that means we have to run in the right direction. at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. The University of California was playing Georgia Tech. Both schools were undefeated. It was late in the second quarter. Georgia Tech had the ball, was pressing hard on their own 30. Thompson was given the ball, but he fumbled. Roy Regal of the University of California saw his golden chance. He grabbed the ball and he took off running. The sad thing is he got confused. He got spun around and he began running the wrong way. He ran 67 yards for the opposing team. Actually, it was the opposing team saw he was running in the wrong direction. They started blocking for him. They were hoping he would make it all the way to the end zone. Finally, one of his teammates tackled him on the one-yard line. Imagine the embarrassment. He sat on the bench with his head down and forever he was known after that as wrong way regal. Many people are running hard in the race of life. The only problem is they're running in the wrong direction and the devil is blocking for you as you're running in the wrong direction. Now, Hebrews is all about going in the race of life in the right direction, pursuing the right things. The key illustration in the book of Hebrews is the Jews that came out of Egypt, and where were they headed? They were headed toward the Promised Land. But when they got off track, what happened? They started going around in circles in the middle of the wilderness. They were headed in the right direction, but they got sidetracked, and they ended up losing their way. And several times, the writer of Hebrews warns us, look, you don't wanna make that mistake. Your direction is determined by the things that you pursue. So the question is, what are you pursuing in your life? Look at verse 14, follow peace. Follow is the Greek word here that means pursue. It's a strong word that indicates intensity. We are to give our total attention and concentration to pursue the right things. This is what Jesus meant when he referred to the eye. If the eye be evil, the whole body is full of darkness. Whatever you set your eyes upon to follow after, that's what your heart attends to. So the question is, what are you following after? What are you pursuing in this life? Our focus determines our direction. Some people are wasting their lives pursuing the wrong things. They're driven by the wrong focus. And so God gives us two things here that is worthy of our pursuit. First of all, there's peace. Follow peace with all men in verse 14. This focuses on my human relationships. It should be your desire as a believer to be a source of peace, never a source of conflict. Jesus said, blessed are the peacemakers for they should be called the children of God. We ought to be peacemakers, not peacebreakers. As believers, we must strive to live peaceably with all men. And beloved, there's never any reason to be rude or unkind or tactless in our relationship to others. I've seen Christians be rude or unkind to other believers. I've seen it in church. I've seen it in public places, and there's no reason for that. The Bible says we're to live peaceably. Some people are not easy to be at peace with. They make it very difficult. That's why the Bible says, as much as lies in you, seek to live peaceably with all men. For some people, it's harder than others. And for some, it may not even be possible. You say, what do you do with those types of people? I saturate them with my absence. Stay away from them. If people are just kind and unrude, just love them. The Bible says, not rendering evil for evil or railing for railing, but contrary wise. blessing. I'm sure you heard the story of the British aristocrat, Lady Asher, when she didn't like Winston Churchill very much, and she said to him one time, if I were your wife, I would put arsenic in your tea. And Winston Churchill said, if I were your husband, I would drink it. The Bible says, don't return evil for evil. Pursue peace. But then the other thing is holiness. Again, verse 14, follow peace with all men and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. Holiness has to do with our relationships towards God. How important is holiness? Well, the Bible says in verse 14 that without which no man shall see the Lord. Now, the Hebrews knew how important this was because of the Old Testament book of Leviticus, which emphasizes this very principle, sinful people cannot approach into the presence of a holy God. That's the whole idea there. And this is a problem. You know why? Because none of us is holy. How are we going to go into God's presence if none of us is holy? And so salvation, of course, we know makes us holy. That's one of the great blessings of salvation. That's what it's all about. God sent his holy son and his holy sacrifice on Calvary. He shed his holy blood for unholy sinners like me and you, so that we could be cleansed from our sins, so that we can be made holy before God. This is what we have called positional holiness, right? The moment we put our faith in Christ, all of the holiness and righteousness of Christ is put on our account. God takes the ledger sheet of Jesus with his name on the top of it and has on it written nothing but righteousness and goodness and good works. And he looks at my ledger sheet and sees nothing but sin. And what God does is he takes my name off of my ledger sheet, puts it on Jesus' account, takes Jesus and puts it on my account. All of my sins are placed on Jesus. All of his righteousness is given to me. That's called the imputed righteousness of Christ. What an incredible blessing that is. Jesus took my sins and gave me his holiness. And of course, that's true for every believer that puts their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. My sins not in part, but the whole, is what nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more." And so that is the holiness that we get when we get saved. But however, there's a sense in which we now have to bring our practice up to our position. We have been declared holy, but practically now we need to bring up our life in harmony with what God has already legally declared of us. I often tell married couples, you know, at the altar, I can legally pronounce you husband and wife. At that point, you're legally one. But all the rest of your life, you need to live out that oneness. You need to learn how to be one in every way. And as you grow older and older in your marriage relationship, you should become more and more one. And that's the way it is in the Christian life. God has declared us righteous. But as we grow in Christ, we bring our practice up to that position, what has been declared of us. That's practical holiness. We need to live out what God has declared. It's just like I talked about this morning. God calls us light. We need to walk as children of light. We need to live up to what we have been called. And so we perfect holiness in the fear of the Lord. So there's a danger of a wrong direction. But here's number two, the danger of a wrong disposition. Look at verse number 15. Looking diligently, lest any man fail of the grace of God, lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled. Now here's a warning about the danger of bitterness. Bitterness is a matter of one's disposition. Have you ever met anyone that's just filled with bitterness? Someone said one cup of sweet water will never spill out bitterness no matter how hard it's jostled. Whatever is in us is gonna come out. And the Bible says, we saw this in our study of Ephesians, let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and evil speaking be put away from you. Just put it out of your life. And bitterness is harmful in two areas. First of all, to ourselves. In verse 15 it says, trouble you. Let's that root of bitterness springing up trouble you. Bitterness will hurt you. It's like drinking poison and expecting your enemy to die. The bitterness that you have is not going to hurt anyone else except you, and you make yourself more miserable. There's an ancient Roman story that's told about the soldiers of Caesar who became dissatisfied with everything that was happening, their regiment and their rations, and they got so angry, they knew that they couldn't pour out their anger on Caesar, so they decided to show their anger against the gods. And they took their arrows and fired them up into heaven as if they're firing toward their gods. and then only to have those arrows turn around and come right back down on them and kill many of the men that were in that regiment. That's the way bitterness is. It comes back on us with high velocity, but also it'll hurt others. Again, look at verse 15. It says, springing up in trouble you, and thereby what? Many be defiled, defiled, stained, or soiled. God doesn't use defiled vessels. One person can defile many. It can spread and defile a whole church. One little bit of leaven leavens the whole lump. Someone said, no matter how long you nurse a grudge, it won't get better. And so notice that our bitterness is compared to a root. And what do roots do? Well, they're constantly seeking nourishment. They're constantly growing and constantly stretching out. And that's what happens with bitterness. It seeks nourishment. It seeks to get bigger. It spreads through dirt. That's the idea. And so roots always will also bear fruit. And so we don't want to hurt others, and so we have to root out all of the bitterness in our life. You know why? Because we don't wanna fall short of God's grace working in our life. And if we have this bitterness, if we have this disposition, then it's only gonna hurt us. And I talked about this on Sunday morning about forgiveness not too long ago, but you remember that the one verse in scripture that I referred to is, In 1 Peter where it says love covers what? Multitude of sins. We just keep on forgiving. That is what we do. That is our default mode. Our normal pattern of forgiveness is unconditional, non-confrontational, I just forgive. Now we know that there are certain times in scripture that the Bible makes it very clear where I have to confront. I have to approach a person. And the Bible is specific about that. For that person's good or maybe the good of others. Or maybe when the sin is very, very scandalous or public. But other than that, the Bible, I think the default mode of the believer is just to forgive unconditionally. Just let it go. If a person offends you, just let it go. If they say something to harm you, just let it go. You know, we just automatically forgive. That's love covering a multitude of And I'm not saying it's always easy, but that's what I think God is commanding us to do, forbearing one another, forgiving one another. And that's how we prevent bitterness from growing in us. We just learn to let it go. But then here's number three. We talked about the danger of a wrong direction. and the danger of a wrong disposition. But here's the third thing, the danger of a wrong decision. Look at verse 16. Lest there be any fornicator or profane person as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright. And you know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected. For he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears. The decisions we make have a great deal to do with whether or not the grace of God will work in our lives the way it should. When you think of it, the sum total of our life is made up of all of the decisions that we make, decisions that we make on a daily basis. That is the sum total of our life, our decisions. And some decisions we make cause us to lose out on the grace of God in our lives. And so this is a warning, again, from the writer of Hebrews, using an Old Testament character, Esau, as an illustration of making sure we don't make wrong decisions. Esau is an example of a man who made a wrong decision and he missed out on the grace of God in his life. He's a man who chose the fleshly over the spiritual. Now, you might remember Esau, who was the twin brother of Jacob, the son of Isaac and Rebekah. Esau voluntarily surrendered every privilege and blessing which he was heir to as a son of the covenant. The Bible uses two words to describe him. First of all, profane, and then it uses the word fornicator. First of all, profane. Look again at verse 16. Lest there be any fornicator or profane person. Let's look at the word profane here. First, this was a word that actually the English word profane means outside the temple. It means a life without God. It has the idea that Esau had no place for God in his life. He had no time for God or the things of God in his life. We would call this a secular mindset. That's our society today. No time for God, no place for God, pursuing all the fleshly things of the world. That's the desire, that's the pursuit of the world. Talk about a wrong direction, to live your whole life looking for the things of this world, the material things, the fleshly things. But then he also calls them a fornicator. This is because he chose to gratify his fleshly lust and appetite at the expense of spiritual blessing. He sold his birthright. Notice the birthright that he sold in verse 16, where it says, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright. Now, this story is recorded in Genesis 25, and I'm sure you've read the story. One day, Esau was out hunting, and he came home. He was absolutely famished. And by the way, Esau was more of Isaac's boy. Jacob was more of his mother's boy. You might call him a mama's boy. He didn't really hunt much, but he liked to stay home and cook. And so he'd been cooking a bowl of stew. The Bible calls it red pottage. That's why I think it was chili, because it was red. And actually, chili can actually make you want to sell your birthright if it's good enough. So, and Jacob won all the contests for the best chili cook-offs, you know. Esau comes home from hunting. Esau says to Jacob, man, give me something to eat before I die. And Jacob said, I just made some chili. And this is in the Hebrew, you have to look this up. And Jacob said, look, I'll give you some of this in exchange for something. Well, what is it? Well, your birthright. So you would think that Esau would say, my birthright? Are you kidding? For one bowl of chili? Forget that. I'm not going to give you my birthright. But Esau didn't say that. His attitude was, what good is this birthright, especially if I'm starving to death? You got a deal. So he sold his birthright for one bowl of stew or chili, however you want to interpret that. In the Old Testament, you have to remember a man's birthright carried not only temporal earthly blessings, but it also carried with it spiritual privilege. It was kind of a spiritual role in the family. But Esau didn't care about any of that. He didn't value any of that. None of that meant anything to him. He was a godless man, and he made his decision based on present, immediate gratification rather than future satisfaction and future blessing. He sold his future on the altar of the immediate. And people do this all the time when they choose to indulge the flesh or engage in sin that will bring eventual ruin in their life. And so Esau sold his birthright for one bowl of chili and missed the grace of God in his life. And he regretted it later. Jesus said this, what shall it profit a man if he gained the whole world? and lose his own soul. So there was the birthright that he sold. And then I want you to see the blessing that he sought. Look at verse 17. For you know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected. For he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears. Later, when Isaac was given the blessings to the firstborn, Esau wanted it. He wanted it back. He wanted all the blessings that came with the birthright. But it was too late. He had already sold that. And Jacob went a step further and secured the blessing of the firstborn by trickery. He made sure that he secured that. Esau was trying to get back all that he had lost with a bad decision that he had made. And he was unable to get any of it back. He wanted Isaac to change his mind. And Isaac would not. He could not reverse his action. He had given the blessing to Jacob and that's who was going to get it. And when it says place of repentance, it means that Isaac would not change his mind. It didn't matter how much Esau cried about it. It didn't matter how much Esau wanted it or how much he regretted it. He was not going to change his mind. He found no place of repentance, even though he sought it with tears. It was over. He had missed the grace of God in his life. You know, tears in adulthood cannot undo the foolish choices of youth. That's why it's important to make the right decisions all throughout your life. Don't miss out on the grace of God in your life by wrong decisions. Don't miss his grace. That's such a tragedy. Spurgeon told of an evening when he was riding home after a heavy day's work. And he felt weary and depressed. And suddenly, as a lightning flash, he thought of 2 Corinthians 12.9, my grace is sufficient for thee. And then he said, quote, I should think it is, Lord. And he burst out laughing. And he said that it seemed to make unbelief so absurd. He held on to that idea, my grace is sufficient for thee. And he said, man, how could we not believe that? Unbelief is so absurd. And he went on to say this, it is as though some little fish were very thirsty, was troubled about drinking the river dry. And the river would say, drink away little fish, my stream is sufficient for thee. Fish can't drink the stream dry and you can't drain God's grace dry, the river of God's grace. And then he said, or it seemed that after seven years of plenty, a mouse feared that it might die of famine. And Joseph might say, cheer up little mouse, my granaries are sufficient for thee. A little mouse can't eat all the granaries of Egypt. It's too much grain for our little mouse to drain the granaries dry. And then he said this, or a man away up on a mountain saying to himself, I fear I shall exhaust all the oxygen in the atmosphere. But the earth might say, breathe away, oh man, and fill thy lungs ever. My atmosphere is sufficient for thee. And his whole point was God's grace will never run out. God has enough grace for all of his children, for all the needs of our life. But you know what? God's grace is in full supply, but we want to make sure we don't miss it, that we don't miss out on that sufficient grace that God has given us, He wants to give us in our life. And so be careful of this. This is the warning of the writer of Hebrews. We need God's grace for each day of our life. Let's bow for prayer together tonight. And with your heads bowed and eyes closed, would you just say, to God, would you ask God to pour out his grace onto you today, to give you the grace that you need for whatever you're going through right now? I don't know what it is, but God does. Maybe you're going through a certain trial, certain difficulty, a certain heartache. Ask God to give you the grace that you need. Maybe you need a course direction. Maybe God has spoken to you tonight and said, you know, you're running in the wrong direction. You're pursuing after the wrong things. You're coming short of grace. Turn. Pursue peace. Pursue holiness. Run the race in the right direction. or the danger of a wrong disposition. Maybe there's some bitterness or unforgiveness that you need to deal with. Let it go. Don't let it trouble you or anyone else. Don't fall short of God's grace or a wrong decision. We need the grace of God. I can't make it without it, neither can you. So ask God to pour out his grace on you to help you through the problems and the heartaches that you're dealing with. Father, thank you for your sufficient grace. May we listen to this warning, take heed to this warning. And Lord, may we deal thoroughly in our own heart to make sure that we're not doing any of these things that would cause us to fall short in any way of your wonderful grace in our life. And we pray all this in Jesus' wonderful name, amen.