The last warning in the book of Hebrews is found in the final verses of Hebrew 12.
25 See that you do not refuse him who is speaking. For if they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape if we reject him who warns from heaven. 26 At that time his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised, “Yet once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.” 27 This phrase, “Yet once more,” indicates the removal of things that are shaken—that is, things that have been made—in order that the things that cannot be shaken may remain. 28 Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, 29 for our God is a consuming fire.
Today we are at the conclusion of this warning, to the writer’s exhortation as to how we are to respond to “him who is speaking” (which is God) and in the context of the fact that while the law of Moses came with shaking ground, this message through Jesus Christ (the New Covenant), involves “not only the earth but also the heavens” shaking. It is a pretty frightening picture. In light of that our author concludes:
28 Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, 29 for our God is a consuming fire.
The word “therefore” indicates that it is precisely because God will shake and purge and judge all that stands in opposition to him and precisely because only the unshakeable kingdom of Christ will stand immovable and unchanged that we should give thanks and praise God for the gift of saving grace.
Throughout this epistle, although he is dealing with some people who had professed belief in Jesus Christ only now to turn away from Him and His benefits and back to the law, our author includes himself as someone needing to “be grateful.” So he says, “let us be grateful.”
The kingdom we have received that “cannot be shaken” is the messianic kingdom. We “receive” this “kingdom” when we trust in Christ for our salvation. It is a kingdom that we New Covenant believers participate in partially, in the spiritual benefits of the New Covenant, but there is a greater, fuller kingdom that will be established on earth when Jesus returns, as predicted in the Old Testament and confirmed in Revelation 20. This kingdom will then continue throughout eternity in the new heavens and new earth.
In 12:28 he said that it is “a kingdom which cannot be shaken.” This means that it will outlast all earthly kingdoms. Because it is God’s kingdom, it will remain “forever and ever” (1:8). Every earthly kingdom that has been established has eventually fallen to other, more powerful, kingdoms. This is pictured for us in Daniel’s interpretation of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream in Daniel 2 when each kingdom is conquered by the other, first Babylon, then Medo-Persia, then Greece, then Rome, but then we read…
“And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever, just as you saw that a stone was cut from a mountain by no human hand, and that it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold. A great God has made known to the king what shall be after this. The dream is certain, and its interpretation sure.” (Daniel 2:44-45)
Spurgeon exclaims
“Glory be to God, our kingdom cannot be moved! Not even dynamite can touch our dominion: no power in the world, and no power in hell, can shake the kingdom which the Lord has given to his saints. With Jesus as our monarch we fear no revolution and no anarchy: for the Lord hath established this kingdom upon a rock, and it cannot be moved or removed.”
The idea of God’s kingdom is not a major theme in Hebrews. The author mentioned it in 1:8, citing Psalm 45:6, “But of the Son he says, ‘Your throne, O God, is forever and ever, the scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom.’” But while the word “kingdom” is not used, the concept is certainly behind his references to “Mount Zion,” “the city of the living God,” and “the heavenly Jerusalem” (12:22).
The word “receive” reinforces that we do not work to merit this kingdom. It is a gift that God freely bestows on all that believe.
Our response to receiving this kingdom, which will actually be the fulfillment of our greatest desires and dreams, should be gratitude. Our author is exhorting them to show gratitude for the gift they have received. Being grateful is so important to our spiritual lives. It is interesting that the nouns “grace” and “joy,” and the verb “give thanks,” all come from the same root word (Char-). I believe that these three terms are vitally related, so that when God shows us grace, as He does so often, we need to give thanks for that grace. If we do, we will experience greater joy, while we will forfeit that joy if we fail to give thanks.
If we have experienced God’s grace, we should be thankful. Our service to God is never an attempt to “pay Him back” for His grace, which would be impossible. Rather, it is the overflow of a heart that is so grateful that it gives thanks “for His indescribable gift” (2 Cor. 9:15).
The failure to give thanks in itself is an evidence of lack of belief in God. In the book of Romans Paul declares
18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. 19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. (Romans 1:18-21)
To fail to give thanks is to dishonor God and leads to great spiritual ruin.
In addition to giving thanks, we must “offer to God acceptable worship.” Our worship is to be offered “to God” first of all, not to any other so-called god or idol. He alone desires and deserves our worship.
But what is worship? The Greek word here is latreuo, and has the idea of serving God through worship. Our English word “worship” has the idea of proclaiming one’s worth and value (worth-ship). We show God His value by serving Him.
In the Scriptures, latreuo is continuously used in reference to religious rituals, and in every single use of the word, worshipers direct their service toward God or something considered a god or divine. The most precise and consistent definition of this word is “sacrificial service.”
The word latreuo indicates a kind of worship, but latreuo is not completely synonymous with the term “worship.”
Our text says that we must offer to God “acceptable worship.” Obviously this means there is unacceptable worship, something God charged Israel with many times, usually because of idolatry or social sins like taking advantage of the poor.
Romans 12 speaks of acceptable worship. There, in verse 1, Paul commands us “to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.”
David Guzik points out some ways that our worship can be acceptable to God in this context. He says…
- Our acceptable service begins with our being receivers of grace (since we are receiving a kingdom).
- Our acceptable service is marked by gratitude (let us have thanks).
- Our acceptable service is marked by reverence (with reverence).
- Our acceptable service is marked by the spirit of happy reverence (with godly fear).
- Our acceptable service is marked by a profound sense of the divine holiness (for our God is a consuming fire).
Let’s dive a little deeper into these conditions of acceptable worship, “with reverence and awe.” These words are used in view of the serious consequences of refusing God who is speaking to them through the blood of Jesus Christ and the fact the coming statement that “our God is a consuming fire.” Of course, you should worship “with reverence and awe.” The unfortunate reality in our day is that we see far too little reverence and awe. Jesus is treated as a “Friend” and “Lover.” There is little thought to God being our “Judge,” for example.
“Reverence” (eulabeia) is “a cautious taking hold and careful and respectful handling: hence piety of a devout and circumspect character.” This is joined with another word, “awe” (NIV, NRSV) or “godly fear” (KJV, deos), “fear, awe” … “apprehension of danger,” as in a strange forest.
But this does not mean we live in terror or dread of God, as if in the next moment He might strike us dead with a bolt of lightning. F. F. Bruce (Commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews [Eerdmans], p. 385) comments, “Reverence and awe before His holiness are not incompatible with grateful trust and love in response to His mercy.”
Greg Morse, in his article “Casual Church,” asks “What happened to reverence? When did it become an endangered species? Has God not the right to ask many professing Christians today, as he did the negligent priests of Israel, ‘A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If then I am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is my fear?’” (Malachi 1:6)
He goes on to say: “I sigh that I don’t often have this fear or due reverence in the worship of God. In his presence, Isaiah cried, “Woe is me! For I am lost” (Isaiah 6:5). Job cried, “Now my eye sees you; therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes” (Job 42:5-6). Peter cried, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord” (Luke 5:8). The beloved disciple writes, “When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead” (Revelation 1:17).
God is our loving Father to whom we are invited to draw near (Heb. 4:16), but He is also “a consuming fire” (12:29). Probably most Christians in our day err on the side of being too chummy and casual with God, not on the side of reverence and awe. It is important that we hold these truths in balance.
As Sam Storms recommends:
There are times when what we hear and learn of God leads to dancing, and other times when what we hear and learn of him leads to trembling. Worship that is acceptable to God can and should be both humble and happy, and should often lead us not only to leap with joy but also to lie prostrate on the ground in reverential awe.
Verse 29 gives us the reason why our worship of God must be “with reverence and awe” and that is because “our God is a consuming fire.” It’s not that he “was” a consuming fire in the Old Testament, a God of wrath now replaced by a God of love who wouldn’t dare judge us for our sins. No, He is still a consuming fire.
Jerry Bridges reminds us…
“We must not lose sight of the fact that God’s wrath is very real and very justified. We have all sinned incessantly against a holy, righteous God. We have rebelled willfully against His commands, defied His moral law, and acted in total defiance of His known will for us. Because of these actions were justly objects of His wrath” (Trusting God, 1988, p. 139).
That fire is the fire of His wrath against sin. Yes, God’s holiness and righteousness requires Him to respond to our sins with righteous anger. That fire is also the fire of jealousy. Because God loves us so much He will brook no rivals for our affections.
The reason that we should be thankful for what we have received from God and the reason we should worship him with reverence and awe and joy and gladness is precisely because our God is a jealous God who burns with passion for us.
The first reference to God’s jealousy is found in God’s words to Israel at Mount Sinai:
“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments” (Exodus 20:4-6)
He said, “Don’t do this ‘for I the Lord your God am a jealous God.’”
And Exodus 34:14 says, “For you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.”
Now, God is not jealous like we are. God is a holy God and is never sinfully jealous. He is never jealous because he is needy, greedy, or covetous, or because he is lazy and unwilling to put forth the effort necessary to accomplish his purposes. God is not jealous because he takes a petty dislike to certain individuals and begrudges their achievements, or because he is frustrated with his position in the universe.
All this reminds us that worship is “not safe.” We are not to treat it with lightness. Annie Dillard described the seriousness of our worship in these words:
Why do people in church seem like cheerful, brainless tourists on a packaged tour of the Absolute? … Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of power we blithely invoke? Or, as I suspect, does no one believe a word of it? The churches are children playing on the floor with their chemistry sets, mixing up a batch of TNT to kill a Sunday morning. It is madness to wear ladies’ straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. Ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares; they should lash us to our pews. For the sleeping god may wake someday and take offense, or the waking god may draw us to where we can never return” (Annie Dillard, Teaching a Stone to Talk: Expeditions and Encounters (New York: Harper & Row, 1982), pp. 40-41).
How would our worship services change if the Nadabs and Abihus of our day were struck dead and carried out through the aisles of our churches?
If wails of horror resounded and scorched sermons read,
Here, O Christian churches, are two corpses of those who trifled with the Consuming Fire of heaven and earth. Two men of high rank, two men of great promise, two sons of Aaron himself, consumed in judgment. Behold them. Wail for them. Learn from them.
Read the sermon text written upon their lifeless frames:
“Among those who are near me I will be sanctified, and before all the people I will be glorified” (Leviticus 10:3).
Ministers, you who draw near to God in service today, behold them drunk upon my wrath. Will you dare toy with the shepherd’s crook? Will you wander before me with the strange fire of false teaching? Have you not been warned of stricter judgment? Have you not been commanded to watch over yourself and your doctrine and my sheep carefully? Have you not been charged — in my presence — to preach my word, not your own? The pulpit is a false hope for protection.
Or to those strolling into worship every Sunday with an irreverence, a negligence, a fatal familiarity that I did not command: Behold the bodies of my chosen servants. If I treat these with righteous impartiality, shall you escape? (https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/casual-church)
As Matthew Henry soberly comments, “If God be not sanctified and glorified by us, he will be sanctified and glorified upon us. He will take vengeance on those that profane his sacred name by trifling with him.” Let us beware of trifling with God and treating Him lightly.
As Steve Cole concludes:
Everything hinges on knowing who God is and what He has done for us by His grace in Christ. He has given us great privileges, by speaking to us from heaven through Jesus’ blood, and by giving us a kingdom that cannot be shaken. He is the great God, whose voice will shake both earth and heaven. He is a consuming fire. So we have great responsibilities: we should take heed to serve Him with obedient, grateful, and reverent hearts.
Grace Still Amazes 