You're listening to audio from Hardin Baptist Church. For more audio content or other information about our church, please visit hardinbadness.org. Let's go to Hebrews, chapter 2. That's from me at Hebrews, chapter 2.
And as we, I got ready to start, I went yesterday to a FFA horse show. So I was put on by a new covenant. And so my mom's over. FFA.
All my kids are in it. So I should probably go to it. So I go there to the show and it was awesome watching these kids bring their horses in and they're all competing basically for ribbons and sort of chasing a little bit of glory. Like I want my horse to be the glorious.
I want the ribbon, first place, second place, third place. And what I really was excited for was barrel racing. Barrel racing, all those. As a motocross cam, I go to horse show.
I want to see barrel racing. That's like the fun part, right? You're going to see these horses go incredible speeds, go around barrels. And what I was amazed at is, you know, at the FFA horse show, you've got mainly girls who are in their teens and you've got these giant horses, right?
With all the power, all the might. I mean, it could take any of us and these girls are telling this horse where to go, how to turn. And when they say go, I mean, the amount of just velocity, speed, power going around one barrel, going around the other, going down the other barrel, just to watch girl after girl compete in the barrels was absolutely incredible. And so I wanted to stay for the very end because one of my friends, Anita Washburn, a sour trailer command, a sour get a horse out of it up and I knew that she was going to ride barrels.
Now, if you know Anita, I'll just say she's not 20. I'll just leave it at that, okay? So most of you guys know Anita. She used to race barrels.
She's won national championship barrel racing. She used to be a phenomenal. So like, I can only imagine her glory days of barrel racing. And so I'm here to kind of see this legend who's, you know, a little bit older than these girls.
And I'm anticipating her getting out there. I mean, just to quote one of my kids, they say that Anita's almost as old as minishes. A little bit of context. She's not as old as me.
Okay? But you know, that's a little context. Anita, I'm anticipating her to just sort of try it around the barrels and, you know, reflect on days gone past, right? Old glory days.
That's what I'm expecting. And so I'm watching all this is cool. This is neat. And so she comes in the ring, does kind of a little circle, does a little circle, and then all of a sudden just boom, be lines to the first barrel faster than anybody I've seen do it all night.
And then she's not believe, I'm like, is she going to make it like this? Like, this is unbelievable. And all of a sudden she rounds that barrel. She goes to the next barrel, rounds it.
I mean, this horse and her just in complete oneness, it was unbelievable to watch the speed and then she's trekking down to the last barrel. She lives around it and then she sends that horse home with zero fear full of courage, taking that horse home. And she ended up winning the entire barrel race coming in just over 18 seconds. It was unbelievable.
I literally was like, did that just happen? Like, it was so just wild. She was unbelievable. Her and this horse.
And I walked away thinking, man, what would Anita and that horse be like in their glory days? Like, could you imagine? I'm probably going to be in a couple of seconds quicker. But it was unbelievable right now just to see that, to see the glory of her and that horse and reflect on it.
What would that have been like maybe 20 years ago? What would that have seen have even been like? But it was absolutely incredible. See, a lot of us can reflect on our glory days, right?
Some of us are still going to them. Some of them are, some of us are Adam. If you're Adam, enjoy. It's going, right?
For the rest of us, it's all going down. We are going away from our glory days. Our glory days are the thing of the past that we go to the gym. We try to keep it up and it just ain't happening, right?
It's just going down. Everything tells us our glory days are past. And you know what I think the preacher in Hebrews does. In Hebrews chapter 2, I think he's going to remind a little Hebrew congregation that's tempted to go back because of all the pressure.
They're suffering. The world is ruling over them. They have no glory. They're forgotten.
They're downtrodden. They are nobodies. And I think what the preacher does is he takes them back to their glory days. He uses psalm 8 to say, hey, I want to show you how you were created.
I want to show you the beauty of your creation, how you were. And then what I think he does is he's going to take them into what they're going to experience. They're glory days to come which is brought by the cross of Jesus Christ. And here's what I think he wants them to do.
Hey, a little church who's being ruled by the world. It's not going to be like that forever. One day you are going to rule the world in the world to come and you're going to do so because of the cross of Jesus Christ. He died to save you, but he also rose to restore your humanity to remake you in how you are always made to be.
So right now, I know I don't feel like it. Right now, I know it doesn't feel like your glory days. I know it feels like you're losing. You're forgotten.
You're not winning. Your circumstance is overcoming you. I know it doesn't feel like that. But here's what the preacher wants to say.
It's how it was and it's how it will be. Therefore, live into your glory right now, pursuing the glory of Christ. If everybody wants to go to Hebrews, chapter 2, and let's see how this preacher gets us to these places, Hebrews, chapter 2. And if you stand out of reverence for the Word of God, we're going to read verses 5 through 10.
We're only going to preach 5 through 9. We'll get 10 next week, but I do want to allude to it because it talks about glory. Here's what we see. 4.
It was not angels that God subjected the world to come, of which we are speaking. It has been testified somewhere, what is man that you're mindful of him or the son of man that you care for him. You made him for a little while lower than angels. You have crowned him with glory and honor, putting everything in subjection under his feet.
Now, in putting everything in subjection to him, he left nothing outside his control. At present, we do not see everything in subjection to him, but we see him, who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus Christ, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death so that by the grace of God, he might taste death for everyone, for it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist and bring many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering. Let's pray together. Father, I pray you would help us to get a glimpse of who you made us in the garden.
We would get a glimpse of who we will be in new creation. And right now, we would see those visions and we would live right now for who we're going to be into the future. We pray this in Christ's good name. Amen.
You guys may be seated. So we're going to walk through these kind of three movements throughout this passage. The first movement is going to be our glorious humanity. We're going to see that in Psalm 8.
The preacher's going to say, hey, remember who you are, this glorious humanity that God made you to be. And we're going to see our shared tragedy. This ain't the way the world is. This ain't the way we feel the world now.
And then he's going to get to what Christ has done and Christ restores our glorious restoration. That Christ brings us back to that perfect humanity that we once had, once lost, but the redeemed people of God will get back into the future. And because of those things, live right now in light of those glories. So that's what he's going to do through the movement of this passage.
So first we're going to deal again with angels. And he says, angels don't rule the world to come. Now, why does he have to tell this church about angels? Well, they seem to be obsessed with angels.
Does anybody got that so far? They seem to be really into angels. Now, for instance, in chapter one, in case you haven't been here, the preacher has to say Jesus, he's better than all of the prophets because he's the full and final revelation of God. He's also better than all the angels because he's God, Lord and Savior.
Jesus ain't no angel, right? He's way better than the angels. And then he has this little punchline of, hey, now what she told us last week, don't neglect salvation, don't drift from it, hold on to it. And now he goes right back in angels.
And he says this, for it was not to angels that God's objected the world to come of which we are speaking. So why does he go back to angels? What seems like they're obsessed with angels? It seems like a lot of their relationship with the Lord is trying to be through angels and for angels and they want to power by angels.
And I'm just glad that we're not like that anymore. I'm glad that we're modern people that have science and reason and we don't fill our times with angels and supernatural and speculation and things like that. Or at least I thought so until I heard about Etsy witches. I'm not familiar with Etsy witches or not, but read an article just five days ago in a Time magazine and it says this about Etsy witches.
It's called The Rise of Etsy Witches. Now, I'll catch you on Etsy is it's like an online place where you go and get like homemade stuff, right? You want a T-shirt maybe with your name on it or you want like a little pot made for your love when you go to Etsy and you can smell what you want and somebody will personally make you something. That's how Etsy was created.
But now there's this new market for Etsy witches. And so for instance, here's what the article said. Jazz Smith, a New York City based influencer hired an Etsy witch to ensure she had good weather on her wedding day. And then went on to tell all the services that Etsy witches bring.
Did you know that like if you like that guy and he don't like you, you can hire an Etsy witch and she'll put a voodoo spell on that guy and then he will like you. Like there's love spells. If you haven't got over your loved one, well you can curse spell on them. You can make them like you're like getting ideas here.
But you have all these things for if you need good weather, if you need that new job, you can have an Etsy witch that will put a spell on you that will give you a potion that will give you something that will help you win the day. And so I bring that up to say we haven't got over this. Why in the world in the 21st century would we have Etsy witches? It's because we know we're not in control.
We know something has went wrong. We know that we've lost control of this whole thing. How do we get control back? How do we get powered back?
How do I make him like me or if he doesn't like me? How do I make sure nobody else likes him? Well, maybe an Etsy witch. Maybe an angel.
Maybe an angel. Maybe an supernatural will go after them. So their obsession with angels is no different than our obsessions today. We all want power.
We all want control. And the reason is because we once had some of it and we've lost it and we don't know what to do now. And so generally you see what the preacher is saying, hey, little church, here's my first point. Angels aren't going to rule the world to come.
That would have been shocking to them because they would have believed the angels under God rule the world right now and we're sort of under them. And he's saying, that's not how it is right now and that's not how it's going to be forever. Because guess who? So here's the question.
Okay, if angels don't rule the world to come, then who does? Who does rule the new heavens and the new earth? And you might be shocked by the answer. It's you and it's me.
We as the redeemed people of God are the ones who rule the world to come. We're the ones who judge the angels. We're the ones who are over them. We're the ones that God is going to put again in control of all that he has made.
So it's giving them a glimpse of, I know it doesn't feel like you rule the world. It feels like the world rules over you. But here's what he's going to do. That's not how it was in the creation and that's not how it's going to be a new creation.
So why not live that out right now in this moment in time? So first of all, hey, angels don't rule. Well, who does rule? Then there's the question.
He's going to argue they're going to. And notice how he does this. He goes to our glorious humanity. So Hebrews chapter 2 verse 6 says this, it has been testified somewhere.
I love that. The preacher's like, somewhere in the Bible it says this and then he just gives it to him. I just find that funny. So if I ever quote a verse, no one is, he didn't either.
Right? So just somewhere in the Bible it says this and when he starts quoting it, everybody knows what Psalm he's quoting. Everybody knows it's the eighth Psalm of David. So when he starts quoting this, they all knew the context of this.
Here's what he says. What is man that you're mindful of him or the son of man that you care for? He made him for a little lower than the angels. You have crowned him with glory and honor putting everything in subjection under his feet.
So that's a Psalm. It's actually Psalm 8. So I want to go into our Bibles. Let's go to Psalm 8.
So if you want to go there, it is a beautiful Psalm. It's one that if you haven't memorized like a passage of scripture, this would be a great one to memorize just to tell you who God is and who you are. But here's Psalm 8. Here's what it says.
Oh Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth? You have set your glory above the heavens. Like what a way to start out. God, you're God.
You're glorious. You're majestic. Your name is above the heavens. You are exalted.
You are God and we are not. So he is celebrating who God is. Which by the way is a really good practice for you. It's a really good practice to daily celebrate who God is and remember who God is.
He's the glorious one. He's above the heavens. He's majestic. You are not.
So to think about who God is and then he keeps going and he says out of the mouth of babies and infants, you have established strength because of your foes, just still the enemy and the avenger. I mean, we just showed a little baby. She doesn't have any strength. She can't do anything.
She's out of babies. I can be strong. I don't need your help, humanity. I can do whatever I want is what God is trying to get in our minds.
But then he says this. I love David. He says this. When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have set in place.
So he goes to creation, namely heaven and the stars and the heavenly bodies. He says, man, when I look up, what I see is your glory. Then you guys see the moon last night. It was fantastic.
Some of you missed it because you're staring at your little shiny thing and you need to get off that sum and look up some because it was fantastic. You almost couldn't miss the moon. I pulled out the horse and I was like, boom. Oh, hey, moon.
What's up? You're big. And it's like you kind of stare at it and you're like, wow, that's incredible. Like God can do a moon, right?
It's wonderful to look at. But then we often miss the stars because we're just quick. We go and we turn on football and we forget all the stars. But here is David who's out in a field.
Doesn't ESPN. So he's looking up at the moon. He's looking at the stars. He's thinking about how good God is.
And you know what David had? He had his eyeballs. You know what? We have telescopes.
We have vast equipment that can let us look into the stars. We have all of this knowledge. If you just go on Google and just do a deep dive this afternoon on the stars and it will blow your mind to the stars and the galaxies. And God threw them out to shout his glory.
And so David is saying, when I look at the stars, when I look at the moon, I can see your goal. I can see that you are so much above me. And we need to do that. Look at God's creation and see how greedy he is.
If he made that, how good is him? And so now, based on that, looking up, now he looks with the enemy, says this, what is man that you're mindful of him and the son of man that you care for him? In other words, if that's who you are, God, then who am I? Who in the world am I?
I'm just this little being on planet Earth. Like, since I'm nothing, I'm nobody. I'm little. I'm trivial.
I don't matter. Is the obvious connection between those two? Like nobody, but just try this. Tonight, look at the stars and be like, man, I'm awesome.
You're going to feel really dumb. The point is, hey, I'm better than all of you. That's kind of the point of the stars. Like God wants to shout that.
I'm glorious. I'm majestic. You're not. You're feeling this, this tiniest, this insignificant, which is probably what those Hebrews people are feeling, persecuted by Nero, dying, getting cut down, getting torn up.
They're feeling insignificant. Like, nobody cares. Yeah, look at the stars. God doesn't know me.
Who am I? And maybe you're asking that question this morning. Who am I? Do I matter?
Does my life matter? Does anybody know me? Does my circumstance? Does my story?
Is it going anywhere? That's the question we all ask. And I want you to see the next line in the song because I love it. There's a yet.
And there's the shouldn't be so, but there's a yet in the song. Check it out with me. This man that you're mindful and the Son of Man, you care for them, yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor. You've given him dominion over the works of your hand.
You have put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen and also beasts of the field, the birds of heaven, the fish of the sea, whoever passes along the pass of the sea. Oh Lord, oh Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. I want you to see what David is doing here. There is this tension in his soul.
I know that I'm nothing. I'm insignificant. I'm a nobody, but wait. I'm a creation of God.
And all of a sudden David gives commentary on Genesis 1, 26 to 30. And his commentary on Genesis 1 is that God made us humanity a little lower than the angels. Now, what does that mean, a little of the angels? Does that mean we have less value less dignity than the angels?
I don't think that's what it means. I think it's just like obvious. We don't fly. We're not invisible.
We can't take out armies and we can't destroy cities. Right? In other words, if you stood up with an angel and tried to fight it, who would win? The angel.
Don't try. He would die quickly. Right? So we're made a little of the angels.
We're made from dust. We're made from dirt. We're not just the breath of life. But when we became a living being, what God said about us set us apart from the angels.
You know what he said about us? You were made in my image. The only ones in all creation made in God's image. That's you.
And that's me. We bear the very image of God. Notice we're made a little lower than the angels, but we are crowned with glory and honor. Think about that work.
We put on a crown, Adam and Eve, King and Queen of the universe. Now there are kings and queens under who? God. God's in control.
But God gave his creation over to humanity for humanity to rule it under his good ways. What does that give us? It makes us have glory and honor. We have crowns and not only that, but check it out.
With crowns and with glory and honor, you have given him dominion over the works of your hands. God made it all and then he handed it to us and said, now you take care of it. Now you roll over it. I'm giving it to you as a gift.
Can you imagine when God said that what the angels might have muttered to each other? What? God's doing. What?
He made all this. It's all and make that guy of dirt. That's who he's putting in charge of the earth. That's who he's giving his creation over to.
It would make way more sense for angels to rule, right? But they don't. We do. Humans do.
Humanity was given that privilege. Notice we're giving dominion. And not only that, but he's put all things under his feet. What's the his?
It's humanity. That all things are under the feet of humanity. The sheep, the birds, the goats, all the stuff. We rule over God's good creation.
So what's the Hebrew writer trying to do? He's trying to pull them and remember who they were. Those glory days, Genesis chapter one, go back and remember who you are. Hey, angels don't rule the world to come.
But I want you to remind you of what you used to do. You used to rule the world under God's good word. He gave you that privilege. He made you, he crowned you, and he gave you dominion.
Those are three really cool things. Like for you to think about what does it mean for me to be human, I'm made by God. I'm crowned with glory and honor. And I've been given dominion over all things.
Wow, that's a pretty cool thing to speak about humanity. Like we're trying to figure out what does it mean to be man in our culture. We're very confused on that. One of the things is, hey, we've been made by God.
And we've been made with honor and glory. And we've been made to rule his world under his good word. That's what it means to be human. And anything outside of anything other than that is to be less than human.
And so here we see this glorious start. And so I think what he's trying to do is say, hey, remember who he once were. And I know some of you like this little church of protesting saying, that ain't the way the world is. You just said that all things are supposed to be under our feet, like animals and my dog doesn't even obey me.
Like I can't even get my dog to jump. He does whatever he wants. I can't even get my horse. I can't get anybody, my kids, my job.
Nothing obeys me. I have no control over anything. And you're telling me, God gave me a crown and he let me rule. No, no, no, that is not the way my life is.
And that's probably this little church of Hebrew people. No, I'm pretty sure Niro rules us. I'm pretty sure the world rules over us. We don't rule over the world.
And so now what the preacher's going to say is there's actually been a tragic fall. We've all went through this shared tragedy together. Let's look at what we see in Hebrews about this shared tragedy. Hebrews chapter 2, look with me in verse 8.
Here's what it says. Now, in putting everything in subjection to him. So when did that happen? Well, if we go to Psalm 8, it was Adam at the beginning.
He put everything in subjection to him. And then he says, he left nothing outside his control. So we have a question to, OK, is this the he, Jesus, or is the he humanity? That's a question we've got to sort of tease out.
At first, I thought it was, of course, Jesus, because Jesus has everything under his control. But now it's saying not everything's in control. So it's like, hold on, is Jesus in control and not in control. So I got really confused on the first reading.
But the more I read through it, the more I dove into it, I don't think that he is talking about Jesus here. I think that he is still us. That he is still humanity. He's dealing with what's happened.
Because he just said, God made man to rule over the world. We ain't in control of this place. Like, have you tried to calm a storm? Have you tried to be cancer?
Have you tried to forget your own life? It's all out of control. We don't control hardly anything. So I think you're wrong, right?
Or I think you're wrong, Psalm 8. I'm not sure you know what Jesus is one really said. And so now he's saying, now I'm putting everything in subjection to him. And I'm against humanity.
He left nothing outside his control. Nothing was outside of humanity's control in this creation, because God gave us that privilege. And in Psalm 8, it spells it out, that sheep, that's goats, that fish, that's birds, that's every single thing in all creation, I've put it in your charge. So we got to answer the question, well, why is it not that way anymore?
Well, he says, at present. OK, so now let's talk about right now. Look, at present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him. Who's the him there?
I think the him is us, you and me, humanity. We don't see the world in our control anymore. We were made to rule over the world. Now the world rules over us.
Have you felt that? Do you feel that in your life? Do you feel like most of the time the world, in every circumstance, has more control over you than you have over it? Do you feel the world is broken?
Do you feel everything is not quite the way it was supposed to be? It's because we have went through a tragic fall, and at this present time, we don't quite see what Psalm 8 told us, that humanity, as image bearers of God, ruled over the world under God. We don't quite see that anymore. The world often rules over us.
I love this quote from Peter O'Brien. He says this, there's a great disparity between man position as ruler and his present lack of control over creation. There's a huge disparity. There's a huge chasm.
God created us to rule. Guess what? We are out of control. It's this huge disparity.
That's the present world that we live in. That's where these Hebrews found themselves in. So why in the world is the writer saying, hey, remember you once. We're given dominion over the world.
I'm sure they're like, well, thanks. That's good. I'm glad we can go back to our glory days. I'm glad we can look back to, man, my old days.
Some of you reflect on your glory days. Glad we can go back there. But guess what? They're over.
It's all downhill. It's all sliding. I don't have glory days to come. Here's the difference with this little Hebrew congregation.
Their past glory days are not their best glory days. There's actually better glory days coming. Because Jesus Christ restores our glory. Jesus Christ by what he did, by becoming a man and dying on a cross and raising from the dead.
I want you to see this. He didn't just save you. He did that. But he also restored your very humanity.
He remakes you into the person you were always created to be. And in the new world, in the coming world, which is what the writer is dealing with, he says, in this new world, you're going to have that glory back. That you are going to rule as sons and daughters over God's new creation under his good word, like you're supposed to in the beginning. Jesus Christ becomes a man to restore our humanity.
Notice what he says. I love this text about Jesus restoring our glory. It says this. But so notice, we don't see now everything in subjection to him.
That too, humanity. But we see him. Now I think that him has changed. I think the pronoun has changed now.
Now the him is not humanity. Now the him is Jesus Christ. How do I know that? Because the writer says, namely Jesus.
He tells us. I'm doing something here. I'm showing you humanity. Had it.
Lost it. But now we see Jesus who has it, who gets it back, and who gets it to us forever. That's where this whole thing is going. I love it.
Check it out. But we see him. Notice this. Who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus Christ, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God, he might taste death for everyone.
I love this little turn of grace. And I want you to hold onto this. Right now, we don't see the world under our control. Right now, you don't see your circumstances under your control.
Right now, your family is not in your control. Right now, your health is not in your control. Right now, tomorrow is not in your control. Right now, your dog does not obey you.
All things are spinning out of control. Right now, we don't see how things were. But check this out. But we see Jesus.
So right now, you don't have all control. But you do see Jesus who does. And you rest in Jesus who does. And you rest to Jesus who is making all things new, so that it will be like it was in garden when it's going to be in the new city.
So we're going to see this. So right now, we see Jesus. So what exactly did Jesus do? How did he bring back our restored humanity?
Well, we're going to see who, for a little while, was made lower than the angels. Now, this is kind of wild to tell this little church, because Hebrews chapter 1 is, Jesus is better than angels. That's all Hebrews 1. God tells the angels to worship Jesus, Jesus, God, Lord, and Savior.
And then now he's saying, but for a little while, just a little bit, Jesus was made lower than angels. What's that referring to? It's referring to the incarnation where Jesus became a man. And you know what's really cool?
The word Jesus, the name Jesus, this is the first time it appears in Hebrews. He hasn't spoke of Jesus yet. He's spoken of the Son, the Son, who is God, Lord, and Savior, the Son became a man, Jesus Christ, so that he could taste death for everyone, so that we could have a restored humanity and live out who we're always meant to be. So we're going to see this happen.
So what he became a little lower than the angels, I think Paul gives us the best commentary on what this means when it comes to the incarnation. Here's what says in Philippians 2, verses 5 to 11, it says, Christ Jesus. But though he's in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped or held onto, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of man and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God is highly exalted, him, and must own him in the name of every name, so that at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow and heaven and on earth and under earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of the Father.
That's the incarnation. Jesus, who is fully God, became fully man. He humbled himself. He took on the form of humanity.
He took on the form of a servant. Why? So that he could live the life he couldn't and die the death you deserve. Why did he take on humanity?
So that he could live out Psalm eight because you did not. See, Psalm eight is what we're supposed to do. We're supposed to be crowned with glory and honor and rule and have dominion over God's creation, under God's good word. Adam didn't do that.
Adam ruled the world under his own simple desires and the fall came. You were supposed to be crowned with glory and honor and rule the world under God's good word, yet you have not. I have not. We have straight away from God.
We have rebelled against God. We have used his creation. We have broke things and the whole thing is broken and now it rules over us. We all have not lived up to Psalm eight or Genesis one.
So who's Jesus? He became a man to fulfill Psalm eight and fulfill Genesis one. To do what all of us were supposed to do and that's actually rule the world under God's good word. Perfectly obedient to his father.
He did that for us. He humbled himself. He became a man so that you can become full humanity again. Our humanity's broken.
Jesus became a man to restore your humanity so that you can be fully human again. What does it look like to be full human? Look to Jesus. That's what it looks like to be fully alive.
To be fully human is to live your life like the Lord Jesus Christ. Notice, namely Jesus. What is it? He was crowned with glory and honor.
You remember Psalm eight? We were crowned with glory and honor, but you know what happened? We traded our glory and honor for shame and death. We traded our crown.
We traded our glory. We traded our place because we wanted sin. We wanted death. We wanted self.
And now we are in shame, not glory. But Jesus Christ now gets crowned with glory and honor. We got it at creation. We're gonna see Jesus gets it at the cross and his resurrection.
At the cross, Jesus receives a crown that he now wants to give to you to restore your glory and honor as the human being you were supposed to be before you were built against God. So notice what it says. He's crowned with glory and honor. How?
When did this happen? Because of the suffering of death. So he suffered to restore you. He suffered your sin and your death.
You lost your honor. Jesus got it back by living for you and then trading places with you so that now when you come to him he can give you that honor back. That you can be forgiven. You can become now a son or a daughter of the high king.
Not a slave to sin and death. But you can become a son. He's bringing back our honor and notice why did he suffer? Why did he go to the cross so that he might taste death for everyone?
That he might taste death. Now, so on the cross he tasted death. What does that mean? So in English it sort of sounds like he went to a buffet and tasted it a few things.
If you ask me to taste something, what am I doing? I'm taking a spoonful. I'm not eating the whole thing, right? When Hebrew, to taste death, it meant to experience the whole thing.
To plunge into it. To experience it fully. So what's the preacher saying? Jesus Christ fully experienced your death and your sin so that he could fully forgive you before God.
That's what I'm on the cross. And it was noticed by the grace of God. It's not because you earned it, it's not because you earned it, it's not because you're good enough. You don't deserve salvation.
You don't deserve grace. You don't deserve heaven. I don't deserve heaven. Jesus Christ does, and Jesus tasted death for us so that we could get heaven.
So that we could get into creation. He, by God's grace, died for us. And so who did he taste death for? Well, the preacher says everyone.
He tasted death for everyone. So what does that mean in a room like this? It means Jesus tasted death for you. That Jesus tasted death for me.
So if Jesus has tasted death for you, have you by faith traded places with Jesus. And this is like the heart of the gospel. Hey, guess what? You have not lived up to your humanity.
You just haven't, neither have I. We've been sinned and shame and guilt, and we deserve death. Jesus Christ lived the humanity you should have lived. Perfect before his heavenly Father.
Always doing what's right. You blew it, he didn't. And he died for your sin and for your death. So that by faith, if you believe in him and receive him, he'll trade places with you.
That he'll take your sin and death and he'll give you his righteousness in life so that you can now live forever with him. That is the glory of the gospel. So how does this apply to this little church? Why does he do this?
Why does the preacher say, okay, I know the world's not under your control right now. I know things aren't going well. I know your own appreciation. I know you want to go back.
I know it's our chip. I know things aren't going. But he sort of zooms out and says, but don't you remember Psalm 8? Why does he tell them about Psalm 8?
Because I want you to go back to your glory days. I want you to feel your glory days. To see what Adam and Eve were like and all of their splendor as perfect creatures before God without sin. Can you imagine what that was like?
Go back and think about it for a moment. Adam and Eve with a dawn of Eden on their backs. As you did in Peterson would say, what does that look like? What does that feel like?
That ain't you now. You're somewhere mixed in the middle of sin and gospel and wagering us and getting it right and playing with mud and playing with dirt and just trying to live out life and meek out life. And so what's he trying to say? Hey, look at who you were.
You weren't meant for this. And not only that, but look at what you're going to. You are going towards glory. We're through Jesus living out your humanity, his death and resurrection, he restores humanity.
He's gonna give it back to you. And in the kingdom of come, angels aren't gonna rule it. You as the children of God are gonna rule the new creation under God's good word. So it's like he's trying to say, if you could just see for a second, your glory self.
Like if you could just for one moment see who you are when you bear the image of the man of heaven, not the man of dirt, when you bear the image of Jesus and you truly get transferred into a new creation when you look like Jesus. If you could just for a moment see that. Then it would change every single thing you do right now. Like when you get ready to grab that thing or touch that thing or do that thing that's dirty and shameful in the old you, if you could just see who you're gonna be and who you were.
Would you not throw that down? Can say right now, I want to live that glorious reality because that's what Jesus bought for me. That's what Jesus gives to me. It's who I was and it's where I'm going.
So right now I can live that reality because that's what Christ has won for me. I'm asked the band to come back up and we're gonna respond by singing a song. You know, as I watched Anita round those barrels, I was not expecting that. And what I thought was man, if only I could rewind the clock 30 years and see her and her horse in her glory days.
You know the truth is, Anita's glory days, the band y'all can come out. Anita's glory days, they've yet to come. Those aren't her best days. These aren't our best days.
Our best days are yet to come because our glory days are coming when Christ returns. And if we can get a glimpse of that, if we can hold on to that, if we can see that, it will help us right now. Live not for the muck and not for the mire, but to live that new creation, to walk into that image of Christ that he bought us to be. Let's pray together.
Father, we love you so much. God, I pray to you in this song that we had contemplated on who we were, who we're gonna be. And right now, how we can live more in light of those two things. Not just how we feel, but who you tell us we are.
So God, give us more of Jesus during this moment. We don't see everything under our control anymore, but we see Jesus who does control everything. So let us get a bigger vision of him and let us change us where we look more like him. We pray this in Christ's good name, Amen.
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