When Jesus died on the cross, he tore down the barrier between us and God. Before that moment, only the high priest of Israel could go past the curtain in the temple to enter God’s presence, and only once a year. But Jesus ripped that curtain down. As a result, the author of Hebrews says there’s one goal for each of us to pursue: drawing near to God.
Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.” (Hebrews 10:19-22)
If you read through the whole book of Hebrews, you’ll hear him say the same thing seven times. Draw near … Draw near! … DRAW NEAR!!! Don’t just settle for an intellectual relationship with God, where you know a lot of things ABOUT him, but you never really get near to him. You can have 1000 Bible verses memorized, and still be a million miles away from God. And don’t just settle for a legalistic relationship with God, where you do a lot of stuff FOR him, but you never get near to him. You can volunteer for 100 different ministries, and do it all so you don’t have to actually spend time with God. You can avoid him by serving him. And don’t just settle for a mystical relationship with God, where you have a lot of touchy-feely experiences inspired by God, but you never actually get near to him in his holiness and glory. If you go right back into all the same sins you had before the experience, that’s not drawing near. Don’t settle for it.
Instead, Hebrews gives us three paths to take in our journey toward God:
1. Seriously confront sin.
“Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water” (Hebrews 10:22). Now, he doesn’t say you’ll draw near by sprinkling your own heart clean, or by washing your own body. It’s clear that your heart and body need to be cleaned by Jesus alone. But you have to be willing to let him cleanse your sin.
Many people want to be close to Jesus, but still have a number of things in their lives that they don’t want to change. They’ll say, “That’s just who I am. I’m a sinner. And I confess my sin to God, and then I’ll confess it again tomorrow, and the next day,
and the next week, and the next year, and God will forgive me. That’s his job!”
But just because the curtain is torn, doesn’t mean God is any less holy. It doesn’t mean he hates sin any less. It says just four verses later, “If we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries” (Hebrews 10:26-27). Jesus’ death does nothing for us, if we use it as an excuse to keep on sinning. We’ll never draw near to God that way.
2. Hope in God’s promises.
“Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful” (Hebrews 10:23). Later on in this chapter, he says the promise is the reward that’s coming. So the promise that he’s talking about is heaven. One day you’re going to be with God, face-to-face. Forever.
So the question is, is that your hope? What’s coming in the future? Or are you putting your hope in what you have right now? Does your joy come from the fact that God loves you, and that you’ll spend eternity with him in the future? Or from the fact that your boss thinks you’re doing a good job right now? That your mutual fund is on fire right now? That you’re getting a Christmas bonus next week? That you’re leaving for a trip the week after that?
Those are all blessings from God, but they’re not God! When our ultimate hope is in those things rather than God, we’re not going to draw near to God. That’s why Jesus said, “Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”
3. Draw near to other believers.
“And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near” (Hebrews 10:24-25). If you want to draw near to God, you’ve gotta draw near to the body of Christ. The church! Part of that means coming to church on Sunday mornings, but that’s not all. There’s so much more.
Maybe you come to church to hear the Word. Or maybe you come to sing and praise and worship. But Hebrews challenges us to go far beyond that:
- “Not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some.”
- “Encouraging one another.”
- “Stirring up one another to love and good deeds.”
You can’t do all that in an hour and a half on Sunday morning. It’s impossible. When people tell me that they feel like they’ve plateaued in their relationship with God, I ask them two questions: 1) Are you seriously fellowshipping with other believers? 2) Are you seriously ministering to other believers, and alongside other believers to the world? Most of the time, they have to answer “no” to one of those questions. But drawing near to God means developing a committed, interdependent relationship with his body, the church.
I heard someone say that drawing near to God is like climbing up a slide: you have to work hard and hold on tight the whole way, or else you’ll slide back down. But when we keep climbing the slide by the Spirit’s power, the promise is clear: “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you” (James 4:8). God can’t wait to be close to you. Start climbing!