We open our Bibles together to our text today
in Hebrews chapter 2 as we think about the good
gift of God in deliverance. In recent days drama
on the high seas has been captured on videotape
as nearly 600 passengers and crew of the Greek
cruise ship Oceania were rescued before the vessel
went down. As much as I've been able to read
in the news, apparently there was an explosion
in the boiler room which ruptured the hull, leaving
the vessel without power and taking on water
in waves that were driven by winds up to 80 miles
an hour. In a matter of a few hours, that majestic
vessel, which before had been a party, which
had been full of life, sank beneath the waves.
But before it did, a miraculous thing happened,
as some describe it. As boats came that were
near and far, and helicopters came from offshore
in South Africa to pluck one or two or three
at a time from this vessel that was listing badly,
and sinking into the waves. And before it went
down, they were all rescued. The drama captured
the world's attention as we focused on it. Most
of us cannot but sense the elation of those who
were rescued because we seemed to share in their
danger with them as we were aware of it through
the media. Our interest is naturally captivated
by suspenseful stories of rescue like that. One
of the programs that is very popular right now
on television is Rescue 911. It has spawned a
number of clones on other networks. We watch
over the shoulders of paramedics and firemen,
policemen and others as people are rescued from
life -threatening situations. If you're like
I am and you occasionally have the opportunity
to pick up Reader's Digest and you look down
the contents on that front cover you probably
look for drama in real life. You want to turn
to see what that story is about someone who experienced
danger and was rescued. With the entrance of
CNN on cable television We can be literally anywhere
in the world. Something like that is taking place
and we can watch it from near its beginning until
its culmination when deliverance is at hand.
Right now our society seems to be hooked on stories
where danger threatens and courageous people
intervene. I don't think there's anything wrong
with that because we certainly need our heroes
these days. We wake when heroes fail, and we
cheer when they applaud. We love to see people
delivered and rescued. I want to submit here
this morning that the greatest of all dramas,
a cosmic drama, is unfolding. It is the drama
of God intervening to spiritually deliver endangered
people who call upon Him. People who are endangered
by their own sin and the consequent condemnation
of God. One of God's good gifts to those who
call upon Jesus Christ in faith is deliverance.
The scriptures tell us of several ways in which
God delivers those who trust. in Him. The text
that we're looking at right now in Hebrews chapter
2 tells us one of those ways in which God delivers
those who believe. And we are told that God delivers
from the fear of death. Through death, He rendered
powerless Him who had the power of death, that
is the devil. and delivered those who through
fear of death were subject to slavery all their
lives. Fear is enslaving, isn't it? It is a controlling
emotion. To some extent, all of us know its presence,
at least at some times in our lives. Fear is
a stranger to no one, and when fear comes, It
comes to enslave and capture our minds and our
emotions. The ultimate fear is the fear of death.
Job referred to it as the king of terrors. The
fear of death is a bondage that robs one of the
joy of life. The fear of death is very, very
common. among those who know not God. Religious
people, without a living faith in Jesus Christ,
had a deep -seated fear of death. This is clear,
for example, in the inscriptions found on tombs
from the first century. And you see it still
today, not necessarily inscribed upon tombs,
but upon the philosophies of people. For today
there are some who say that there really is no
death That we merely pass out of this existence
into another form We are reincarnated as something
else they say but there really is no death Or
there are others that trivialize death and feel
it's of such No consequence that we ought to
help others commit suicide if they feel like
that's the thing they want to do. I submit to
you that behind all of these ideas there is a
deep -seated fear of death in the heart of every
person who knows not God. And Satan employs that
fear as a chain, really, to hold sinners in slavery
to do His will. In the beginning, Satan lied
to Eve when he said, you shall not surely die
if you disobey God. She believed the lie, she
disobeyed God, and death entered human experience.
Spiritual death at that instant physical death
later when Eve and Adam died, and all of us were
their descendants when we died. And now that
death is here, Satan employs it as a threat.
Initially he denied death, just like some people
today. But now he employs it as a weapon, as
a tool to enslave humanity. The Gospel of Jesus
Christ liberates and frees people from this inhibiting
fear. The Bible tells us in this text that the
Son of God became human, became flesh and blood,
in order that He might rescue sinners of flesh
and blood. It is interesting to notice the writer's
choice of words. He says, in flesh and blood.
He himself also partook of the same. Do you notice
the words share and partook? They're quite different
in their inference. The difference is captured
in a comment by John MacArthur in his commentary
when he says, share is from the Greek koinonia,
meaning to have fellowship, communion, or partnership.
It involves having something in common with others.
All human beings have flesh and blood. In this
we are all alike. It is our common nature. But
partook is a very different word, mateco, which
has to do with taking hold of something that
is not naturally one's own kind. We by nature
are flesh and blood. Christ was not. Yet he willingly
took hold of something which he did not naturally
belong to him. He added to himself our nature
in order that he might die in our place and that
we might take hold of the divine nature that
did not belong to us. The point is that the Son
of God, the eternal Son of God, partook of our
flesh and blood. something that was not naturally
his, so he created it. And he became human through
the incarnation, so that through his death on
behalf of humanity, and his resurrection from
the dead, he might be able to provide deliverance
to those who would believe in him. By his death,
he was thus able to give us life. And as part
of that work, the writer of Scripture tells us
that he also rendered powerless the devil. So
as to rob the devil of his ability to employ
the fear of death against the people of God.
For the people of God, Jesus Christ has annulled
the power of Satan to use the fear of death.
He has rendered that threat impotent by his saving
work, his death, and his resurrection. Most of
us would be quite frightened to meet a lion face
to face. But if you go down to the zoo, you can
be as close to a lion as a few feet and not have
to be afraid. Why is that? Has something about
the lion changed? Not really. Still the same
beast. He may be fed beefsteak, which is much
better, I suppose, than human flesh, and he's
satisfied, but he's still a beast. And given
the opportunity, he would attack you. But you
need not be afraid of the lion. Why? He has been
rendered impotent. He has been rendered without
power of threat against you by... bars of a cage
that are put up there. And so the beast is still
the same beast, but you're able to approach the
beast and not be afraid of it. You can look at
it. You can talk to it. You need not be afraid
because it has been neutralized in its ability
to frighten you by those bars. That perhaps is
something of an illustration of what has happened
between us and Satan, our former master. Before
he was able to well utilize the fear of death
to keep us in bondage to his evil desires and
ways. But by the resurrection of Jesus Christ,
he has been caged. And now we no longer need
to be fearful of death. or of Satan, because
of the victory of Jesus Christ over him. Someone
has pointed out that when your weapon is stronger
than your enemies, you render him powerless.
We only need to look back a few months to the
battle called Desert Storm to understand the
truth of that. Why were we able to defeat Iraq
in a hundred hours? Because our weapons were
so vastly superior to theirs. The weapons that
you and I have been given in Jesus Christ are
vastly superior to those of Satan, and because
of that he has been rendered powerless. If this
ultimate fear has now been dismissed, then why
should we allow any lesser fear to control our
lives? You and I have been given victory over
fear. God has delivered us from the king of terrors,
the ultimate fear. And if from that fear, why
not from all fears? The good gift of God is the
gift of deliverance. He has delivered us from
the fear of death that does not mean that we
are therefore anxious to die It doesn't mean
that we don't go to the doctor to try to stay
alive It doesn't mean that we're eager to go
through the experience of dying But it does mean
that if we belong to Jesus Christ the fear of
death and its results can no longer be used to
intimidate us. We have been delivered from the
fear of death. So much so that strangely, mysteriously,
the Apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians that life
and death belong to the Christian, along with
all things. I'm not exactly sure what he means
by that. But there is some sense in which even
death itself now belongs to us. Perhaps it is
in the sense that death has been now relegated
to a doorkeeper. We are not eager to meet death,
but when we do, all death will be able to do
is to open the gate to let us through into the
presence of our glorious Lord. We have been delivered
from the fear of death. Now if you will turn
with me in the scriptures to another passage
we'll see another way in which God has delivered
us as His people as Colossians 1 in verse 13.
Colossians 1 .13 Not only does God deliver us
from the fear of death, but God delivers us from
the domain of darkness. For He delivered us from
the domain of darkness and transferred us to
the kingdom of His beloved Son in whom we have
redemption, the forgiveness of sins. There are
many political kingdoms in our world, but there
are only two spiritual kingdoms. And every person
is a citizen of one or the other by birth and
relationship. Natural birth brings us into the
family of humanity. We are related to all people
who have ever lived through Adam and Eve, our
grandparents. Our birth naturally brings us into
this family of man, and we are identified with
Adam, who by his sin lost his kingship. and delivered
his domain over to Satan. It is that domain that
is called here the domain of darkness. Why darkness?
Well, it refers to moral and spiritual darkness.
Rebellion against God which was fomented by Satan
and caught by humanity. The motivation in the
realm of darkness is hatred of God, and there
is an active energy that works against God and
His purposes. This domain of darkness is populated
not only by fallen humanity, but by demons, by
spiritual beings that are called demons. You
and I, by the grace of God, have been delivered
from the domain of darkness. We still live in
the world, but we are not citizens any longer
of the domain of darkness. That has never been
dramatized to most of us, like it has been to
one young lady who comes to our church, a young
mother. Before she became a Christian, she was
involved in drugs and in some occultic things.
A few years ago, she was deeply depressed. And
someone gave her a Bible to read. On one particular
evening, she sat down in her room alone with
her Bible and began to read searching for God.
And the more she read, the darker the room became.
The light wasn't turned down, but the room began
to grow dark. And she began to hear voices speaking
to her associated with her past occultic practices.
And they told her, if you believe in God, we
will kill you. And there were other threats made
toward her. They began to bark and to yip like
wild animals at her. This was all very real.
I do not attribute it to any kind of mental illness.
We are talking about spiritual powers. that are
very real. The room got almost dark and her spirit
was oppressed when suddenly God gave her grace
to simply say in a moment of desperate cry, Oh
God, help me! And her testimony to me, I heard
this first hand, she told me this. Her testimony
to me was that immediately when she prayed and
cried out to God, the whole room burst with an
explosion of light. And immediately the voices
and the barking stopped. And tremendous peace
filled her soul. Now I don't know about you,
when I was saved it didn't quite happen like
that. Most of us have never seen or felt or heard
it dramatized in that way, but I want you to
know something. If you're a Christian here today,
your deliverance was just as real as that young
woman's. For you were a part of the domain of
darkness and God delivered you and transferred
your citizenship into another kingdom. You see,
by the supernatural birth, we are brought into
the family of God. We are identified with Jesus
Christ, the last Adam, who by His obedience gained
the right to rule over Adam's lost kingdom. And
right now, our Lord is in the process of claiming
what is His. He is establishing his kingdom and
one day will consummate it in the world. This
is the kingdom that is called here by Paul, the
kingdom of his beloved son. It is a kingdom characterized
by light, according to verse 12, not darkness.
It is moral and spiritual love of God and love
of good. And it seeks the advance of God's purpose.
This kingdom is populated by redeemed humanity,
but also by spiritual beings that are called
angels. This kingdom is referred to in Hebrews
12 as a kingdom which cannot be shaken. It is
called in James 2, the kingdom which God promised.
In 2 Peter 1, 11 it's called the eternal kingdom
of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And you
and I and Jesus Christ have been delivered from
the domain of darkness and transferred, translated,
given new identity with the Kingdom of God's
beloved Son. We've been delivered. And now we
are looking to a day when the kingdoms of this
world will become the Kingdom of God's Christ.
And He will reign forever and forever. One of
the good gifts of God is deliverance from the
fear of death. Deliverance from the domain of
darkness. Let me briefly just touch upon another
way in which we are delivered. 1 Thessalonians
1 and verse 10. We see here that God delivers
us from the wrath that is to come. We have turned
to God from idols to serve a living and true
God and to wait for his Son from heaven Whom
he raised from the dead that is Jesus who delivers
us from the wrath to come God's wrath is his
Just response towards sin It is God's only response
towards sin It is a deep seated anger with sin.
It is a wrath that is expressed, yes, in hell.
It is a wrath that is expressed also in this
world. And it is, I think, in this context, verse
10, a wrath that is eschatological. That is,
it is future. He mentions wrath to come. I believe
he's talking about that time when God will pour
out His wrath in this world, in what we sometimes
call the tribulation period. We are told here
that God delivers us from the wrath that is to
come, wrath that God will pour out upon a Christ
-rejecting world. It is a wrath that is imminent,
that may come at any moment in its fulfillment.
It is a wrath that is surely coming. There is
no question about it. Our government, as you
may have read a few weeks ago, is expending several
hundred thousand dollars on an astronomical search
for asteroids. The concern is that there may
be lurking out there in space somewhere an asteroid
large enough to do severe damage were it to strike
the Earth. And so our government is concerned
that we be able to locate such an asteroid well
in advance of any potential collision, lest there
be great loss of life in the world. Now if they
find one that's coming, I'm not exactly sure
what they're planning to do about it. But there
is this search on for that possibility. I want
you to know that the Bible says that we're already
on a collision course with the wrath of God.
I cannot tell you the moment that it's going
to come, but coming it is. And it will consume
sinners. Aren't you glad today that in Jesus
Christ, You, having trusted Him, have been delivered
from the wrath to come. That will not be your
experience. God has appointed us rather to salvation."
He says in chapter 5 of this same book. But I
want to rush ahead just to one more way in which
we are delivered. It is found in Galatians 1
-4, and it's such an important one. I don't want
to leave it out before closing. Galatians 1 -4.
The good gift of God is deliverance and it tells
us here that God delivers us from the evil now
present. Who gave Himself for our sins that He
might deliver us out of this present evil age
according to the will of our God and Father.
The age in which we live is evil. Time magazine
gave an essay to the subject of evil a few weeks
ago, in which the writer did a fair job evaluating
man's thinking about evil. But he could come
to no conclusions. He had no authority to come
to conclusions. The Bible tells us that evil
is very real. It is a force. It is also personified.
There is a Satan. There are evil beings in the
spirit realm. There is evil in the heart of man
by his own sin. And all of this is producing
evil in our world. I am almost to the point of
not listening to the news anymore. For not only
am I tired of what I hear, I am tired of the
explicitness with which it is reported on the
news. We live in an evil age. God delivers us
from the evil now present. We must live in this
world. But Jesus Christ delivered up Himself
on behalf of our sins so that He might rescue
us. I like the words of James Montgomery Boyce.
He says, the deliverance is conceived of here
not as a deliverance out of the present evil
world, though that will also be true eventually,
but as a deliverance from the power of evil and
the values of the present world system through
the power of the risen Christ within the Christian.
The deliverance here you see is not just the
deliverance eventually from the age, but it's
deliverance from its values even right now. Why
has Christ died for our sins? It is that He might
redeem to Himself a people living differently
than the people caught up in the evil now present.
The lifestyle that you and I live ought to be
a distinctive lifestyle. The things that we choose
to watch, the things that we choose to participate
in, the values that motivate our lives, those
ought to be in contradistinction to the world
around us. That's why Christ has died for us.
I wonder sometimes if we don't play with evil
because we don't realize the real threat that
it is. God is the Deliverer, and He will deliver
any who calls upon Him. But deliverance is predicated
upon our being willing to be rescued. Do you
remember when Mount St. Helens was nearing its
explosion back in 1980, wasn't it? 1981? They
were warning people around the base of the mountain
to get out, and there was a man, an old codger
by the name of Harry. You remember Harry? He
had lived in that mountain all of his life, and
he wasn't about to leave it. He didn't perceive
the threat as real, and he didn't need deliverance.
It was but hours after they left him for the
last time, pleading with him to leave. that the
mountain exploded, burying Harry and everything
that he owned beneath untold tons of ash. He
wasn't willing to be delivered. He could have
been. And so it is with sinners who play with
God, who don't take the threat of evil, the certainty
of wrath, seriously. They've lived in this world
a long time. They've gotten by so far without
God, and they don't understand how close judgment
is. The good gift of God is deliverance, and
God generously gives it, but only to those who
come to Him for it. If you've never done that,
I hope you will today. That you will place your
faith in Jesus Christ is the only possible rescue
that you will ever have from evil and from judgment.
Let's pray. Thank you, Lord, for making me whole.
Thank you, Lord, for giving to me thy great salvation
so rich and free. Dear Christian friend, I hope
that's a chorus that It means a lot to you, for
God has done so much that he might deliver us.
Let us not toy with the world and play with it.
Let us not participate in its evil. Let's let
Jesus Christ have his way in our lives. Let him
deliver us in every respect from the evil now
present. even as we thank God that He has delivered
us from the judgment that is coming. My friend
here without Christ today, if you cannot sing
that chorus, would you in your heart trust Jesus
right now, inviting Him in to be your Savior,
your Deliverer? I hope you would. Let's stand
together. Father, we give thanks to you today.
that you are the deliverer. We thank you that
those who call upon the Lord will be saved, will
be rescued from the danger that is present in
the evil and the darkness all around us. And
as we go from here, may our hearts be attuned
to the danger of friends and loved ones who are
outside of Christ and have no deliverance yet.
God, give us courage and give us words, give
us winsomeness in our witness to them, that they
also may come to know the Lord Jesus. May we
be the kind of a church, Father, where deliverance
is offered and people in the community know that
they can find the Savior here in this loving
fellowship. We pray this in the name of our Deliverer,
our Rock, Jesus Christ. Amen.