So a good morning and a Happy New Year. I say it’s amazing alright we are now into 2021. As usual, I’d like to begin each year by giving to you what I call a New Year message alright. Now please turn with me to Hebrews (Hebrews chapter 2). Alright Hebrews chapter 2, I’m going to look at the first four verses of this chapter for our meditation this morning.

Alright, Hebrews 2, beginning in verse 1: “Therefore we must give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest we drift away. For if the word spoken through angels proved steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just reward, how shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation, which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed to us by those who heard Him, God also bearing witness both with signs and wonders, with various miracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit, according to His own will?”. Now let us commit this time to God in prayer.

“Our dear Father in heaven, we want to thank You for today as we begin the first Lord’s day of the year to be found in Your house as well as those with us online. We know that again we live in an unusual time. But we want to thank You that throughout this period of the pandemic You have shown Yourself faithful and good to us. Help us to take time to meditate on Your goodness and Your mercy towards us, for You have preserved us not just physically but also spiritually, that You have protected us from harms and danger and from the evil one.

Lord, we come together this morning to offer our praise and adoration and worship that is due to Your name. Lord, help us to come with the sense of awe. Help us come now as we come to Your Word and to remember that indeed this is the very Word of God. Help us to humble ourselves. And we pray that the Spirit may open our eyes to this wondrous Truth, for this, we pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.”

Now, this morning I want to look at this passage and consider this question: Now why we must go on listening to God’s Word? Why we must go on listening to God’s Word? And I believe that this passage deals with this all-important question. I’ll like to focus our mind on this matter because that as we have been coming week after week throughout the past year and despite this time of lockdown, I think we are very thankful that the Lord has given us that heart, the desire to want to come and hear His Truth. But have we ever asked why? Have we ever think about whether the reason as to why we ought to come?

And my exaltation to you is that we should know the reason so that this year as we begin a new year that we would have you know that zeal and that motivation to want to come again and again and again and again alright to hear the Word of God. And here’s a passage that tells us the reason why. It showed to us the importance of listening and paying heed to the Word of God. In fact, as we begin this chapter, you see that it begins with what we call an imperative. Now here the writer is actually not just giving us a suggestion and say, “well good to come”. But he’s saying that we ought to come and we must come and give attention, pay attention and listen to the Word of God.

And so that is what we are talking about here, and that’s what this writer is talking about here that in our Christian life we must go on and listen and listen and listen to the Word of God. Now that begs the question again: But why? Let me give you the reasons as we find here in this text as to why we should do so. And reason number one is this. We ought and we must come with zeal and earnestness to listen to the Word of God because this is the Word of God. Because this is the Word of God. Have you ever actually come to hear the Word of God with that kind of understanding that this morning as we open up what? We are opening up the very Word of God.

Now that is how this writer, this is where he is coming from. This the first thing he wants to draw our attention to. And so in verse 1, he says “therefore”, that is how the NKJV begins. I mean even in ESV alright you see “therefore” alright, it’s mentioned there, which means that the writer is linking this passage to the previous passage. In other words, when he says “therefore”, he is giving a reason. A reason. So it connects chapter 2 to chapter 1, and chapter 1 is the reason. And so the connection is very important, and that’s what he’s saying here. So I say chapter 1 is the reason why we should go on listening to the preaching of the Bible, why listen to the Bible.

Now, this is how he puts it in chapter 1 alright and look at chapter 1 and verse 1. And so the writer begins this way that “God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets”. Now, so you see that the writer is saying that the reason we should go on is because this is the Word of God. God has revealed His Truth to us. He has revealed His Truth to us. And as we come and read the Bible, remember that we are not reading words of men. And remember when we hear someone preaching from the Bible that we are listening to the very Word of God. That is the first thing.

Now question is: Now we know that the Bible is the revelation of God. It’s God revealing His Truth or His will to us. But how did He do so? How did He reveal His Word to us? And so we find that this very first verse alright of this letter alright to the Hebrews actually tells us that, that God not only tells us that He has revealed His Word to us but He has also told us how He did it alright- how He revealed His Word to us. And it tells us that He did it in two phases alright- in two phases here. First, He says that it’s in time pass alright. So that’s why it begins in various times, in time pass, and in various ways.

So that refers to phase one of God’s revelation, and that is a reference to the Old Testament that God in time pass and in various ways He has revealed His will, His Word to us. And then there is phase two of His revelation, and phase two is here, we find in the second verse: “has in these last days spoken to us by His Son”. And so these are the two phases. So in the Old Testament various ways and various times; and then in this second phase (the last days) through His Son, and that is the New Testament. Now that is what the author here has in mind. In other words, today when we talk about the Word of God or the revelation of God, we are talking about the Holy Bible- the Old and the New Testament.

And the thing to point out here is that there is no phase three of God’s revelation. So when we think of God’s revelation, there is only phase one and phase two- in times pass and now in this last day. There is no phase three. In other words, beyond what is being revealed in the Old and the New Testament, there is no other fresh revelation from God. There’s no other fresh revelation of God. Jesus is the final Word. When Jesus came on earth, He gave His teaching and is being inscriptuated through the writing of the Apostles, and that is the final revelation of God.

And so that is what the author is saying that we must therefore give attention to this Holy Scripture, to the Bible, and to the preaching of the Holy Scripture because this is the complete Word of God. All that God wants to say to us is all here. Do you want to know the will of God? Do you know what God wants to say to you? Now don’t sit under the tree and wait for Him and see whether God will say something else to you. No! If you want to know, this is it. That’s what the Bible says. That’s what this author is saying. So we have in our hand the complete Word of God, and that is in other words, he’s saying here.

That is the reason why we ought to pay heed, pay earnest heed, pay attention to, and listen to the Bible and read the Bible. Now the people who say that they want to know God, they want to know the will of God but they never read the Bible. Now that is the way we can know the will of God. That is the way we can know what God wants us to do. That is the way to know how we may please Him. It’s all here in the Holy Scripture. And so here is a command therefore that we all need to hear desperately alright. We all need to hear desperately that is to listen to God’s Word.

Now we know that in our life we listen to all kinds of things and listen to all kind of people, and that is evident as you look at people every day you know in the train alright in the LRT or somewhere sitting by the park, you see people just listening to something right. The earphone is just stuck here. Now people are listening, and they indeed pay earnest heed alright to what they are listening. But what the Scripture is telling us here this morning in this passage is that above all alright it’s not that you cannot listen to any of these things but how much of your attention is given to this very important thing.

And I say, I urge you he says to give heed because this is the very Word of God. And therefore we ought to examine ourselves and compare our listening to all these other things to the listening to God’s Word. And God’s Word is the voice of His Son, the teaching of the Lord Jesus Christ. In fact, all our spiritual life, changes as it were, come from this. If you want any progress, any change in your Christian life, in your spiritual life, there is no other way except to come to the Word of God.

Now Paul makes notes of this in his letter to the Ephesians in Ephesians chapter 4 (in Ephesians 4:20). And verse 20, he said: “But you have not so learned Christ, if indeed (verse 21) you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus”. Here Paul in this chapter is exalting the Christian to live out their new life. They ought not to be like the Gentiles or in the old ways but to be the new man in Christ. But that cannot happen. You cannot live the new life. There can be no change in your Christian life except by he says what? That by learning Jesus Christ, by paying attention to His Word and that is the Holy Scripture.

So that is what the writer here to the Hebrews is exalting us to do. He is telling us we ought to pay attention to the Bible because the Bible is the Word of God. It is the revelation of God. Now reason number two alright, you see why must we or why we must listen and listen to the Word of God. He said we ought to listen not only because this is the Word of God, but he said we ought to listen also because so that you do not neglect such a great salvation. We are to go on listening because what Jesus has to say to us. Now this is the Word of Jesus because this is the Word of God. And what God has to say to us is a very great salvation.

Now listen to verse 3 of Hebrews 2. He said: “how shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation”. In other words, what the writer here is trying to tell us is this: That this is what the Christian faith is about. This is what the Christian message, this is what the Word of God is about. The Christian faith or the Christian life as it were- the Christian truth is not given to us simply to provide us with some golden rules. So we go get a Bible and we think that it’s just a great philosophy of life. Or maybe we think that the Bible is about how to live a healthy and wealthy life. Well, we think that the Bible is a kind of a recipe for success.

And so we want to be successful in our life, we want to live a healthy or whatever kind of life, and we come to our Bible. We think that that is what the Bible is about. But that is not what the Bible is about. That’s what he’s saying here that the main thing about the Christian faith as it were, the Christian religion, about the Word of God is that it is a way of escape. It is a way of escape from the wrath of God because of our sin. In other words, this is what the Bible is about. It is about the means appointed by God whereby men and women, boys and girls may come to know salvation. It is about the great salvation.

The Bible is the revelation of God’s redemption plan. It is about how to be saved. It is about answering that question: What must I do to be saved? What must I do to inherit eternal life? What must I do to get right with God? That is what the Bible primarily and essentially is about. It’s a book of salvation. And so it is, therefore, the greatest news and the greatest message in the world. It is the greatest thing that we can tell the world and that is how men and women may get right with God.

Now you see if you have not come to that conviction about the Christian message, about what the Scripture is, we are not excited about it. We think that is about recipe just for success. Now there are many such books in the bookshop, many of these great writings in the bookshop but none of these can compare with the Bible because none of this tells us how to be right with God. And so this is a book about salvation, the greatest news for mankind. And that is therefore what we do Sunday after Sunday as we gather together and as the Word of God is being proclaimed. Now what are we doing, what are we telling you?

We are telling you what Jesus is telling you and that is this in chapter 3 alright- Hebrews 3:7- “Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says: “Today, if you will hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, in the day of trial in the wilderness”. Now that is the Christian message. Today if you hear His voice; today, if you are listening and you hear and you hear God speaking to you, do not resist. Now there are many people who come and they hear. Maybe they like the preaching of the Word of God, but their hearts are resistant. They never respond. They don’t respond to the Word of God, and that’s what Hebrews is saying.

Today if you hear His voice, do not harden your heart as your forefathers in the past. That is what we are doing as we come and hear the Word of God or this is what we are doing on Sunday as we open up the Bible, we are telling you this message. Listen to what the Bible is saying to you. Listen to what Jesus is saying. This is the Word of Jesus in Matthew 11:28-29: “Come to Me, all you who labour and are heavy laden, I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.”. You will find rest for your soul. Come to Me, and that’s what we are doing as we open up the Word of God.

That is what the Word of God is about. It’s about urging you to come to Jesus to find rest and find peace in Him. Listen to what the Word of God said. Listen to what Jesus says in Luke chapter 13. Luke 13:3, now Jesus says: “I tell you, no; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish.”. Now that is the message of the Bible, that unless you repent, the Bible here tells you of your greatest problem and that is your problem of rebellion against God, your problem of sin that unless you repent there is no hope for you. Now that is the Christian message.

Or in John 14:6. John 14:6, I’m reading to you the words of our Lord Jesus Christ where He says in John 14:6- “And Jesus said to him, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.”. Now again you see when we open the Scripture each Lord’s Day, Sunday after Sunday, week after week; as we read the Bible, what is the message of the Bible? Now that is a question. And to the author to the Hebrews, he draws attention to this fact that when I urge you to listen to the Word of God, I’m saying that this is the Word of God and that the Word of God is about above all, about salvation. Such a great salvation.

And therefore if you neglect the listening to the Word of God, if you neglect paying attention to the Word of God, you are neglecting that great message. You are neglecting such a great salvation, and that is what he’s saying to us here. You see, many people miss heaven not because they hate heaven or reject heaven but because they neglect the Word of God. They do not know. They do not know the way to heaven. They do not know that Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. So listen, he says, because if you don’t, you are neglecting such a great salvation. And then thirdly, listen so that you do not drift into destruction. So that you do not drift into destruction.

Now back again to Hebrews chapter 2, and read verse 1 again. He said: “Therefore we must give the more earnest heed to the things we have heard”. Give heed to this Book which is the revelation of God, the complete Word of God, which is about such a great salvation. And I said if you neglect it; if you do not take heed or pay attention to it, it said you will drift away. You will drift away. “Lest we drift away”, he says. And consider first of all the word ‘drift’, and it’s a word that has chosen carefully to help us understand the danger of neglecting the Word of God. The danger if you neglect the Word of God.

Now the word ‘drift’ of course in the original consists of two words which is basically ‘float’ and ‘by’. Floating by, and that is the compound word in Greek. The picture here is that of a piece of dead wood in the river. They’ve been carried along by the current or even the dead fish being carried along by the current, floating by. And when you observe this piece of dead wood floating by, you see that it takes no effort for that piece of wood to move. It’s moving, but it takes no effort for it to do so. The only thing that dead wood has to do is to do nothing. You see, drift or drifting is not intentional. It is basically (some people say) inattention alright. It’s not intentional, but it’s inattention.

Now drifting means that someone is just simply unconcerned. Now drifting means that that person is basically, it’s a picture of neglect. It is as I say simply doing nothing. Now that is a great danger for many people. I’m thinking about this in fact, this whole period of the lockdown alright- the pandemic. And what a great danger is complacency where people begin to retreat to their cosy comfort zone and then they become comfortable with a certain routine. And when they come to their Christian life especially, they just do nothing. They just like the piece of dead wood being carried along by whatever circumstances of life. And that is the picture here. And this is the certainty alright- this is the certainty.

So how shall we escape? And that we will drift away, you see. Now you see if we do not listen, if we neglect the Word of God, if we do not pay attention, we do not make any effort, now it says here that there’s this great danger of us slowly being drifting away. Now you are not the one setting the direction. You are not the one determining where you want to go. It is the circumstances of life that is pushing you, the current that is pushing you and further and further away to somewhere else. Now that is drifting. It comes about when there is no sense of urgency; when there is no focus listening and paying attention to the Word of God; when there is no effort to come and hear God’s Word, when there is…

It simply means this: That you don’t pay earnest heed. You are not focused. You are simply floating by. You are being drifted away from God and from His will. And it happens in a rather unconscious way as it were without you knowing. One day when you find yourself, you know when you come to the realisation you are so far away. Now that is the great danger that the writer here is pointing out. And so what is the remedy to that? What is the remedy to that? Well, it is simply this. Back to verse 1, it said it is simply therefore we must give the more earnest heed to the things we have heard. We must pay attention to the Word of God. It means that the remedy is that we must not neglect listening to God’s voice which is here because the consequence is great.

Like I say, the issue here that the writer is talking about is not about you rejecting the Word of God. Maybe you don’t reject the Word of God. The issue here you know the writer is concerned about is not that you don’t listen at all. You listen every now and then according to your convenience. Now it happened. The reason? It is not that you don’t have the Bible. In fact, most of us probably have more than one copy of the Bible.

Now, this is not what the writer is talking about. It’s not saying that you just don’t like it, you never come, and you don’t have the Bible and you reject the Bible. The issue here is simply that we neglect. It’s simply that we neglect the Word of God. Do not neglect listening to the Word of God because that is the way of progress. That is the way forward. That’s the way to make a difference in our Christian life. And most of all, that is the way to avoid destruction. You see, it says that we drift away and drift away to destruction. And that is a stern you know, a serious warning because that destruction could be the destruction in our own Christian lives.

One day we see our spiritual life is such a mess. But worse still if that goes on. In fact, you read the epistles alright. It talks about this right through in his epistles. The warning comes, again and again, the danger of neglecting, the danger of drifting away, the danger of being unconcerned about own spiritual life. So you drift away and away and away. One day, it may be just damnation that you are proven actually you are not a believer at all. But watch against that. And the way to do so, it says we must continue to listen and pay attention to the preaching of the Word of God. Let us pray.

“Our Father in heaven, we want to thank You for Your precious Word that You have lovingly given to us in the past through various ways and various means, at different times and that You have finally given the complete Word of God when Your Son came. Lord, we want to thank You despite the fact that the devil has through the ages tried to destroy the Holy Scripture, but You have preserved for our benefit in order, O Lord that today people may hear, they get to hear the Truth of God. We pray that You’ll help us to understand something of the importance of Your Word, for it is by Your Word that people come to faith.

It is by Your Word that we are built up in our spiritual life. It is by Your Word that the church is established. And the neglect of it, O Lord, is to neglect such a great salvation, such a great message. And to neglect it, it is to be in danger of being drifted into destruction. And so we pray that as we begin another year, help us indeed to begin right, to begin with this right attitude and right spirit towards Your Holy Scripture. And grant to us the great desire, the great earnestness, and great understanding and the importance of taking heed to the Word that You have given to us, for this, we pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.”

This transcript has been lightly edited for readability.