Please turn with me in the Word of God to the book of Hebrews, chapter 2, taking up the reading at verse 17. Hebrews, chapter 2, we'll read verses 17 through chapter 3, verse 6, and then skip down to chapter 4, verse 11, to the end of the chapter. So beginning our reading at Hebrews chapter 2, verse 17. Let us hear God's own word. For this reason, he, that is Jesus, had to be made like his brothers in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people. Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted. Therefore, holy brothers who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, the apostle and high priest whom we confess. He was faithful to the one who appointed him, just as Moses was faithful in all God's house. Jesus has been found worthy of greater honor than Moses, just as the builder of a house has greater honor than the house itself. For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything. Moses was faithful as a servant in all God's house, testifying to what would be said in the future. But Christ is faithful as a son over God's house, and we are his house if we hold on to our courage and the hope of which we boast. And then down to chapter 4, verse 11. Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest so that no one will fall by following their example, that is, Israel's example of disobedience. For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any double-edged sword. It penetrates even to the dividing of soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account. Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses. But we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are, yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. So far, the reading of God's Word. Since this is Reformation Sunday, I usually try to find an anniversary that we might take note of. And there's a particularly important anniversary relative to the Reformation that we should celebrate this year. And that is that this year is the 450th anniversary of the publication of the Belgic Confession. The Belgic Confession, of course, is one of the three doctrinal standards of our church. And it has been a doctrinal standard of the Dutch Reformed churches almost from the time in which it first appeared. And so for nearly 450 years, those various denominations descending from the Reformation in the Netherlands have looked back to the Belgic Confession as the summary, the confession, the public declaration before the world of what it is we believe. And this year I've had opportunity to speak in a couple of parts of the country where there seems to be a relatively large concentration of people of the Dutch Persuasion and Grand Rapids, Michigan and Pella, Iowa. And I was shocked to discover there have been no parades through the streets of Pella, Iowa. There have been no parades in Grand Rapids celebrating the 450th anniversary of the Belgic Confession. Now, why is that? There's been no parade, as far as I know, even along Vista here in Escondido. Why is that? Well, the truth is, if we could be truthful for a moment, that although the Dutch Reformed churches have honored the Belgic Confession and believed the Belgic Confession, we've never really quite loved the Belgic Confession the way we've loved the Heidelberg Catechism. Maybe that's because the Belgic Confession has not been regularly preached among us. Maybe it's because the Belgic Confession is a little more objective in the way in which it presents the truth. Maybe it's because we perceive the Belgic Confession as not having always the pastoral warmth that the Heidelberg Catechism has. But it is a great confession and it is appropriate on this 450th anniversary to pause just for a moment to think a little bit about it and about its author and about its content. It's one of the few, relatively few, Reformation confessions that was just written by one man. Often they were a work of a committee of a church. Guido de Bray, a faithful pastor, pastoring primarily in the southern part of the Low Countries, wrote this confession to declare to the world what the Reformed churches actually believed, since many rumors and many lies were being circulated. And he wanted to be clear, to make clear to the world what it was that the Reformed churches believed. He'd been a faithful pastor and a faithful evangelist. He'd served the Lord at great risk to his own life. Again and again, he had been forced into exile, once to England, once to Germany, once to Switzerland, running for his life, but always returning to preach, to preach in very difficult circumstances. Most of the time when he was pastoring a flock, they could not meet together in numbers larger than 12 at a time for fear of being betrayed to the authorities. And so it was an arduous kind of work, constantly in danger, constantly trying to find ways of communicating the gospel. And he proved to be remarkably successful. When he took the French confession that John Calvin had written and revised it and expanded it, making it almost twice as long, he distributed it in 1561 and accompanied it with these words of commitment on the part of those belonging to the Reformed churches. He declared that rather than abandon their faith, which they confessed, They would rather offer their backs to stripes, their tongues to knives, their mouths to gags, and their whole bodies to the fire, well knowing that those who follow Christ must take his cross and deny themselves. This was not just a rhetorical flourish. Debray knew many who had been arrested, who had been beaten, who had had their tongues cut out, and who had been murdered for the cause of Christ. And yet, he determined to serve Christ. Only a few years, only five years after this confession was distributed, an amazing occurrence took place in the Low Countries in 1566. There was a rage of protests that swept through the people that came to be known as the storm against the images. And throughout the low countries, crowds of people went and tore down images of saints and tore images out of the churches as a statement of their opposition to what they thought was contrary to the word of God. At that time, Debray was ministering as a pastor in a church in a city called Valenciennes in the southern part of the Low Countries, a city of about 30,000 people, and in that year, that church swelled to 20,000 members. Two-thirds of the people of that city identified with the reformed cause in that year. Now, the governing authorities bitterly opposed the Reformation and they began to persecute in a severe way, an even more severe way, the church. Particularly, they began to hunt for de Bray, and in May, in March of 1567, he was found and arrested, held in a filthy prison, until on May 31st, 1567, he was publicly hanged as a martyr for the Reformed faith. The Belgic Confession is the only major Reformation confession whose author sealed his confession with his own blood. And so this 450th anniversary is a remarkable date that we should not allow to pass without thanking God for such faithful, such courageous, such godly, and such learned leaders who gave their all for the cause of Christ. In reviewing the Belgic Confession and what I might preach from it as a theme this morning, there are the obvious things. The Belgic Confession has a rich teaching on the Bible as the Word of God. The Belgic Confession has rich teaching on the work of Christ in saving sinners. It has wonderful teaching on the church and on the sacraments. But as I was reviewing the Confession, one of the things that struck me that I had never noticed before, is that it has a wonderful teaching on Christ as our advocate and intercessor. I don't know that often when we think about the Reformation, we think about the Reformation of prayer. But the Reformation was a great occasion for the reforming of the prayer life of the church according to the word of God. And it struck me as amazing that the second longest article in the Belgic Confession, article 26, is the article on Christ's prayer. For de Bray, clearly, this was a vital issue, a central issue to what the Reformation was all about. And I suppose this was reinforced in me because my wife and I had an opportunity in September, as some of you know, to travel in Italy. And one of the things that really struck me being there was how surrounded we were almost everywhere we went and looked by images of the Virgin Mary. And as I pondered that and thought about that, Then I was further struck by how relatively few images, especially in public places outside of churches, there were of Jesus. Mary is the object of prayer and intercession. Mary there is the one to whom people turn when they have a need. Mary is the sympathetic mother. And it really struck me how the proper role of Jesus had been really overthrown in such a religious economy. And that the Reformation had really come to set that right, to reform that practice according to the word of God. And that's what led me this morning to this passage in Hebrews. Because the Hebrew Christians to whom this letter were addressed were also being tempted to think that they could do better than Jesus. It appears that they had begun to think that maybe they had had it better when they were Jews than they had it now as Christians. They seem to have been tempted to think we had this beautiful temple and we had these elegant priests and we had a high priest covered with jewels and how splendid it all was. And now we're just Christians. When Hebrews was written, Christians didn't have a single church building publicly anywhere. Almost like the days of the Reformation, they were frequently persecuted. It often had to meet in small groups. They didn't have a splendid high priest that they could see, that they could go to Jerusalem and observe. What they could see is apostles like Paul, who when he arrived was profoundly disappointing, short, not so good looking. What's impressive about this? Probably looking rather beat up after a long journey. And this letter is written to say, now, beloved, as we have it here in chapter 3, verse 1, fix your thoughts on Jesus. Really think about who our Jesus is. And what this letter has been doing is saying, Jesus, you know, is greater and better than the apostles. Greater and better than the prophets. He's greater and better than the angels. He's greater and better than Moses. He's greater and better than any high priest in Jerusalem. Wherever you consider Jesus, wherever you think your thoughts on him, he's better. And when it comes to the question of who can pray for you, who can help you, who can carry your burdens and your case before the Father to deliver you, the answer is it's Jesus. Jesus is better. And this is what that closing section of chapter 4, in particular, is presenting to us. Chapter 4, verse 14. Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens. Think about those words for a minute. The greatness of Jesus. Jesus has gone through the heavens for us. He's ascended. He's glorified. He hasn't just arisen to heaven or even to the heaven of heavens. He has passed right through all the layers of heaven, if you will, to the very throne of God where he's enthroned. That's where he is. That's his greatness. That's his exaltation. Why would you trade him for another? Why would you trade him for another? He's enthroned there in the highest glory as the great high priest. Not just a high priest. I mean, it was a pretty big deal to be a high priest. It was that high priest that was head of the whole priestly system of Israel. It was that high priest who supervised all the life and work of the temple. And, of course, it was the high priest who alone, once a year, who could enter the Holy of Holies. But in spite of that importance, he was just one high priest among many. Everyone knew that high priests, sort of like presidents of the United States, come and go. There are better and worse ones. If you don't like this one, wait for the next. They come and go. But here we're told, Jesus is the great high priest. He's supreme and irreplaceable. He is the glorious one, the great one, the triumphant one. And so, fix your mind on him, because you could not hope for a greater advocate. You remember that the work of priests was twofold. Priests did two things for the people. First of all, they offered sacrifice for the people, and secondly, they prayed for the people. And here the letter to the Hebrews is reminding us that although Christ's great work as high priest in offering sacrifice is completed, and Hebrews says that again and again, once for all done on the cross, no more sacrifice ever need be offered. No more sacrifice is imaginable because Christ, the great high priest, has offered the once for all sacrifice for all the sins of all his people. That's done, finished, completed. yet there is a work that Christ continues to do for his people. And that's the work he does in heaven, enthroned as the great high priest. He prays for us. He remembers us. He cares for us. And he bears all of our burdens to the Father for us. And he does that because he's not only a great high priest, But he's an understanding high priest. He's a sympathetic high priest. Now this letter makes that point after chapters 3 and 4 in which the Christian community is addressed in this letter pretty severely. Chapters 3 and 4 are words of very serious warning. don't give up don't let go don't fail to believe don't disobey chapters 3 and 4 are warning the Christian community that there are real threats to us as Christians that we may lose our connection to the Christian community if we look away from Jesus it happened at times to Israel in the Old Testament, it can happen to Christian churches. And so it's a very passionate, at times almost stern, kind of warning. And it concludes, you see, with these very serious words about how the Word of God is going to judge us. And you can't hide from the Word of God. The Word of God is so sharp, it will divide even between soul and spirit between bone and marrow. No one can hide from God, these passages say. Verse 13 of chapter 14. Nothing in all creation is hid from God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of Him to whom we must give account. That's serious stuff, isn't it? One day we're going to have to stand before God. He's going to look at us. He's going to know everything about us and we're going to have to give account to him. But the passage goes on to say we don't have to be afraid in that situation. We don't have to despair in that situation because we have a great high priest who understands us. He understands all of our sins because he's been tempted in every way as we've been tempted. Sometimes there are Christians, you know, who feel they have sins that no one else can understand, or they have sins so serious, God could never understand how they could have such a temptation or such a sin. And after warning the Christian community not to deviate from their faith in Jesus Christ, now comes this wonderful promise and encouragement. You don't ever have to feel you're alone, because Jesus understands. He understands every kind of temptation because he underwent them all in his earthly life. We have only summaries in the Gospels of the temptations that Jesus faced, but he faced them all. Now, I think sometimes we're tempted to say, yes, but he didn't sin, so he doesn't understand me. He may have been tempted, but, you know, those temptations were kind of easy for him. He was God. Come on. And he didn't sin, so he can't understand me. Well, a great theologian commented on that and said, And if we think that way, we fundamentally misunderstand what Jesus' temptations were. He faced temptation, although he was always God. He faced them particularly as a man, as a human being. And his struggle with temptation, I think this theologian rightly said, was more intense, more real than anything we have ever experienced or could imagine. The theologian said, in effect, how hard does the devil have to work to get you to sin? The sad truth is not all that hard. We have never faced the level of temptation that Jesus faced in his purity. The full assault of the evil went against him. He knew temptation in a way we'll never understand temptation. And although he resisted and never sinned, he is a sympathetic high priest. He knows what we're going through. He understands us. And therefore, when he says, as this passage does, come to me for help, when he says that to us, he says that out of his sympathy, out of his understanding. And Guido Dupre captured this magnificently in the Belgic Confession, Article 26. When he wrote there, no other creature loves us more than Jesus. Now the whole Belgic Confession may not be as wonderfully pastoral as that line. But isn't that marvelous? You ought to memorize that. You ought to take that home. You ought to think about it regularly. No other creature loves us more than Jesus. he is filled with love for his people. He's the great high priest who died on the cross for his people. And so, if we fail to come to him in our need, if we look for someone else in his place in our need, as Debray wrote, we distrust him and we dishonor him. that's what happened in the Middle Ages. Jesus became a fearful, removed, judgmental figure that people felt they could not approach and so they needed Mary to be the go-between. And what Debray is saying, what the Scripture is saying is however wonderful Mary was, however noble Mary was, we don't need her because Jesus loves us more than Mary loves us. I don't think actually Mary knows us, but that's a whole other issue. Jesus loves us more than anyone else could, and not to recognize that is to fail to trust him and to fail to honor him. So, Jesus is great, and Jesus is understanding, and Jesus is calling to us. That's what we see here in this passage, isn't it? Verse 16, chapter 4 of Hebrews. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. We don't have to come to Jesus shyly. We don't have to come to Jesus wonderingly. We don't have to come to Jesus fearfully. He says, come to me confidently. You're my people. You know me? I died for you? Come with confidence, whatever your need, whatever your concern, whatever your burden. And we'll find mercy. Mercy looking particularly at our past. Whatever's come before. Whatever needs to be removed, covered, forgotten. Come to me. And you'll find mercy. And come to me. And you'll find grace to help. That's for the present and for the future. Now sometimes we pray and we don't get the answer we want. Has Jesus not heard? Has Jesus broken his promise to provide grace to help? No. he's telling us sometimes that what we've asked for is not in his timing. But he's also telling us there will be grace. There will be mercy. There will be help. He will be with us. And he'll come at just the right time. He'll come at just the right time. What a beautiful picture that is of who our Jesus is. What a wonderful thing it is to celebrate on Reformation Sunday that there was a reformation of prayer that people who thought they could not come to Jesus because he was too removed now are reminded that they must come to Jesus. Did you notice in the reading of the preparatory form that the form excommunicates those who pray to saints? Why is that? Because to pray to saints is to say, I can't pray to Jesus. It's to say, I can't come to Jesus on my own. I need someone else to carry my prayers. And as Debray rightly wrote, that's distrusting Jesus and dishonoring Jesus. He loved us from eternity. He died for us on the cross. He ascended into glory to be our great high priest. And if he says, come, come boldly, come confidently, come with this promise that you'll find mercy and grace to help in time of need, If we say to him, thanks very much, but I'd rather have someone else. That's shocking. It's wrong. It's terrible. Jesus loves us more than any other creature. And so whatever the burden, whether we have a burden today or we'll have a burden tomorrow, the wonderful promise of God's word is, come. And we have a Jesus who loves us and will hear us. May God grant that each one of us trust him and honor him and come to him. Amen. Let us pray. O Lord, our God, how we do thank and praise you that you have given to us your own dear son, Whom you have loved and known from all eternity. And that you have given him to be our sacrifice, our substitute, but also our intercessor and advocate. And we pray that we might all, in whatever the struggles of our lives might be, might find in him mercy and grace in time of need. Hear us, for we pray in Jesus' name, amen.