Sometimes we get to capture some of the classes in our Asian Bible Institutes.

Even though the audio is not up to par, this class was such a blessing to teach.

Here are the ten class videos of the amazing Book of Hebrews.

Why Trust the Bible?

Because the Bible is the Revelation of: “All that God wants us to know”, about “Everything we need to know”.

Remember: If He hasn’t revealed it in His Word either it is a secret (Dt. 29:29) or it is unimportant to us now.

So the more of God's Word you TRUST, the more you know about all that really matters in life.

Why Study the Bible?

If you would turn with me to John 17.17 we will find the first reason we need to trust and study God's Word:

“Sanctify them through Thy Truth, THY WORD IS TRUTH”!

God says His Word is Truth; and God says that ONLY that true Word can sanctify us (set us apart as useful and pleasing to Him).

So our walk with God can only BEGIN with a settled conviction of the TRUTHFULNESS OF THE BIBLE (Romans 10:17).

The Bible says what it means, and means what it says.

Transcript

God, thank You for a new week. It started on the Lord's Day, the first day of the week. We gave that to You. Yesterday, we had the joy of catching up and doing lots of work. Now today, I ask for Your blessing. Only You can bless Your word to our hearts. Only You can open our eyes to behold wonderful things in Your word and we invite You to do that today in this classroom. Help us not to merely just hear Your word. But I pray You would stir our hearts to do it today. In Jesus' name, Amen.

Okay, we're studying what book? Hebrews. Oxana. Oxana. I'm just practicing the names. So, we're studying Hebrews, and Hebrews is one of the most life-changing books. I'll just give you my personal testimony. I was a truck driver in America, driving a big truck, and I had grown up in a Christian home, very sheltered. I was kept miles from every sin, other than being selfish and lazy and proud, I had been kept away from wickedness, my parents were really good at that. I never kissed the girls. I'd never seen anybody with their clothes off. I'd never done anything bad, never been near alcohol, drugs, or anything. Then I became a truck driver, and I backed my truck up to the first loading dock, put my clipboard under my arm, and came running up to have them sign the paperwork so I could deliver my stuff. As I handed my clipboard to the man at the desk, I glanced up, and behind him was an entire wall of life-size pornography. Life-size, as big as people. The whole wall was just covered. I just looked away and got my paper signed, and I unloaded the truck, and I went in to wash my hands in the men's room. That was worse. It not only had wall-to-wall posters, there were magazines and everything else everywhere. It was my introduction to the real world, to the world my parents weren't guarding me from.

One of the problems is our minds are even better than the iPhone 7 camera. The new iPhone 7 has a camera better than most 35 millimeters. It is an unbelievable camera with dual lenses and high mega pixelation. The problem is, that each of our minds has enough space, we have three octillion video clips. Octillion? That's a number with so many zeros it's hard to know how much that is. There are more synaptic connections in your mind than we know of stars that have been calculated. There are 600 quadrillion stars and there are more connections in your brain, synapses. All that to say you have unlimited storage in your mind. Every video clip you watch, every Super Bowl you watch, every video game you play is recorded in your mind. All of it. Not just the memory. It's recorded. Your mind has almost limitless recording. God has made it so everything we think, see, hear, and do is recorded. Everything; our feelings, our thoughts, the sounds. It's all up here. Guess what got recorded on my first day as the truck driver? That stuff, it's recorded in your mind.

The book of Hebrews is the clearest description of how Jesus Christ can transform our minds, of any book in the Bible, and liberate us from any sinful past. How much have I said about my dad? I teach so much, how much have I said about my dad? Did I say he's a boxer, knocked out my mom, and all that? Did I tell you how he disciplined me? He spanked and everything. Do you know how my dad disciplined me? He was huge, muscular, prize fighter. If I did anything wrong, he would walk up to me and he would put his hand around my neck, right here, and he would push me to the wall. Lift me up so my feet were off the floor, and then start squeezing. My face would turn, I don't see anything that red in here. That red, right there. Yeah, absolutely red. He would squeeze, and then he'd look me right in the eye and he'd say, if you do that one more time, I will break your neck. That's how I was raised. So, in American descriptions, I was abused as a child. That's what they call abuse. When someone physically harms you; chokes you, throws you down, whatever. That's called abuse. There's also emotional abuse, there's mental abuse, there's verbal abuse. I should have grown up needing pills. In America, if you're abused, you have to take pills. You need to take things to help you because you're depressed, and you're anxious, and you're fearful, and all this other stuff.

What's interesting is, that my mother taught me, she made me memorize the Bible when I was little. I couldn't watch cartoons. Do you know what cartoons are? On television, all the anime, all the little Pokémon, and all that stuff. We didn't watch that stuff, but we watched Woody Woodpecker. I wanted to watch television, but I couldn't watch television until I had written verses out on paper. I had to learn 10 verses a week. How many of you guys learn verses? How many a week? Four. Four. I had to learn ten every week when I was little. Every week. She made me write them on paper before I could watch television. Boy was that a motivator. I wrote them out every Saturday morning first thing so I could watch the cartoons. Do you know what that did to me? It put the word of God in my heart. That overcame the abuse, the fear, the anger. I got so angry at my dad once when he was beating up my mother, that I went over and got a baseball bat, a big baseball bat like to play baseball. He was pounding on my mother, and I came up behind him and I actually lifted the bat. I was going to hit him to make him stop. Do you know what I thought? If I would've done that, you know where I'd be today? Jail. Probably still, for permanently disabling your father. In the Bible, I would've been killed, right? Moses said, if you dishonor your parents, don't do it. So, the Lord prevented me from doing that. Part of it was a verse that came to my mind about being angry and don't sin. I was angry at my dad but would be sinful to hit him. So, I'm saying all that to say this book and the 303 verses in it are the most powerful mind-altering portions I know in the scripture.

Okay, so today what we're going to look at is God's inspiration is the word of the Bible, and here's the lesson of Hebrews one. By the way, our final exam is going to be a fun little paper like this. It's actually going to be like this. I'm not going to be here to grade your essays, because I leave for China on Friday at the end of our class time. So, I'm going to have just a plain old fill-in-the-blank, mash-up, that kind of exam like you're used to. One of the things that I'm going to teach you is the theme of each chapter of Hebrews. You're going to have one of these, the heroes of the faith. What chapter would that be? There we go. Say it louder, Cynthia. Hebrews 11. So, if you see anything about heroes of faith or faith, what chapter do you think of? Eleven. Eleven. Everyone say eleven. Eleven. Or say eleven in Korean. There we go. That's what you should think of, okay?

Here are the classes we're going through. Chapter 1 is all about God has spoken. This is the only book in the Bible that the first word of the book is God, of all 66. Isn't that interesting? There are many other ways books start. This is the only one that the opening word is God, and this book is about God has spoken. Do you know what the question is for us? Are you listening? Here you go. You just reminded me. Can you help me? You do that side, and I'll do this side. Wendy, on behalf of the Wendy Appreciation Society, and David, on behalf of the Dave Appreciation Job, you are a blessing. Rebecca, your father, your mother, and I appreciate you. Nate, you are a blessing. Edwin, there you go. Did we run out? Enoch, Daniel, Dan, or whatever you want to be called—John, from North Carolina. There, now you have a lot, fill in the blanks. It's everything that I didn't give you last week, okay?

This is so interesting. Class 2, Hebrews 2, is the danger of drifting. Does anybody know what drifting is? One of your dads is a, who told me their dad is a fisherman? Emma, your dad's a fisherman. If his motor goes off, his boat drifts. Did you know the Bible says one of the biggest dangers we face as Christians are right here, drifting? Have any of you ever canoed on a river? How many of you know what canoeing is? How many of you don't know what canoeing is? Okay, canoeing is fun. A little light boat in a river. When you go with a church group, what they do is they drive you upstream. They put all the canoes in, and the river is flowing that way. So, if you don't paddle, it doesn't matter. You're going that way. The river just pushes you that way. Salvation is when you and I were drifting down the river this way and Jesus Christ stopped our canoe, handed us a paddle, and said, Heaven is that way.

Everyone else in life is floating this way and we're paddling against them and we're going upstream. They're all stopping us and saying, we're all going that way. What are you doing going that way? Come on. There's something wrong with you, come on. They'll try to turn your canoe around because the whole world is going this way. They were born, and every one of us was born, headed down the broad road, Matthew 5, 6, and 7, that leads to destruction. The wide gate, the broad way, and everyone's going that way. Jesus stops canoes. Edwin was in a canoe. How long ago did He stop you and save you? When were you born again? You told me. Three, three years ago? Last year, okay. So, Jesus stopped Edwin, turned his canoe around, and said, that way is Heaven. Edwin is paddling upstream and when he runs into old friends, they'll go, why are you going that way? There's something wrong with you. Come on, we're all going this way. You're crazy. You make us feel bad going that way.

Do you know what the danger is in a Christian life? Not paddling. Not saying no to sin, not saying yes to Christ, not reading the word of God, not praying, not memorizing scripture, not meditating, not focusing your heart every day on the Lord. Every day that we don't paddle against the world, we're drifting. The whole second chapter of Hebrews is built around the dangers of drifting. Then in the third class, we're going to see what it means to partake of Christ. It says we're supposed to be partaking of Christ. It's like you have a water bottle you're carrying around, but you never drink from it. See a lot of people know everything about the Lord, they just don't apply it. They know. See most people have a gap of about 18 inches. Before you're saved, it's the gap of believing in your mind but not receiving in your heart. You're not saved. After you're saved, it's being a hearer of the word, but not a what? Doer. See, we have to take what we hear and believe in our hearts and do it. So that's what chapter 3 is about in Hebrews.

See how exciting this book is? This is an amazing book. Hebrews 4 is about how to enter boldly, coming to the throne of grace. Hebrews 5 and 6 are about how to be exercised. How many of you go out in that smelly, awful tent and work out? Daniel, you don't? Man, you look like Mr. Athol. Paul, you don't? Marines don't work out anymore? What's wrong with you? Bad knees, okay. Samuel, you don't work out? In the room. Okay, you don't like the smelly tent. You sleep and work out in bed. Did you know Christians are supposed to be constantly exercising themselves? And we're going to talk about exercises.

Did you know that not only are you supposed to be doing exercises, but you're supposed to walk up to each other and say, are you doing your exercises? Are you doing your exercises? Did you know we're supposed to be exhorting and encouraging all the believers around us? We are not supposed to say, leave me alone, and I'm going to leave you alone and don't talk to you. We're supposed to say, hey Evan, do you remember last week's verse? I love that verse. Do you still know that verse? Are you working on it? How are we doing? See, we're supposed to be exercising personally and talking to the people around us. The reason we go to church, it's not to see what everybody's wearing, not to bump into old friends. It's to encourage and exhort and stir them up to love the Lord more. That's what 5 is about.

Then this anchored living is about how to have assurance and security. Hebrews 7 and 8 are about our endless life. It says in Hebrews 7:14, we live after the power of an endless life. Isn't that amazing to think about? I'm going to watch the Milky Way, the galaxy we live in is called the Milky Way, right? Whatever they call it in Korean, this is the big galaxy, okay? We're going to watch it wear out. The stars are all going to supernova, blow up, and go away and we'll still be around. It actually says that in the Bible, that we have an endless life. The universe doesn't. Every star has a finite life. Stars are consuming like 90 million tons, or is it a billion tons, per second of their mass exploding into thermonuclear fusion? If you're blowing up 90 billion tons per second, there's a limited amount of time you're going to blow up all that and then you're done. The stars are ending. We're not. We have an endless life. We're forever forgiven, that's what Hebrews 8 is about.

Then, this is my favorite, remember I told you I was a truck driver? I'll never forget the moment. I was in seminary, and I was pacing the floor memorizing the book of Hebrews, all 303 verses. I was memorizing it for a class. You guys have it easy here. To pass one of my classes, I had to memorize all 303 verses of Hebrews and take a test about what was in there. How many verses a week are you guys learning? In the old days, they used to treat us harder. It was really tough. I was pacing there memorizing this chapter right there, Hebrews 9 and I was on verse 14. It says, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit, offer himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works? I started to think of what I was memorizing, and when I got to seminary I thought, how could you ever be a pastor? Because from time to time, that wall of posters that I saw as a truck driver would come back to my mind, and I thought, that is wicked in my mind. I used to think, someday I'll be preaching, and I'll forget what I'm supposed to preach because I have some bad memory of that. All of a sudden, Hebrews 9:14 says, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works, from things of the past, from sins, from things that displease God. I just stopped pacing right at that moment and I said, I would like that, please. I said I would like you to purge my conscience from hateful thoughts I had toward my dad, from, all kinds of stuff. From wicked things I've seen and heard and done. It works. The Christ-cleansed mind is one of the greatest treasures we have. Then, it ties into chapter 10 to His sacrifice for us.

Then, what's in chapter 11? Heroes of the Faith. That's going to be on your final exam so everybody gets one point for sure. Okay? Without looking up there, what chapter is the Heroes of the Faith? Hebrews 11. What's Hebrews 11 about? The heroes of the faith. There, you all have one question for sure. So, everybody's going to get an A if you listen. Now you know in chapter 12, the opening of chapter 12 says, Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. Let us run the race looking unto Jesus. It's one of those beautiful passages in the Bible. It shows the Christian life is running a race with Jesus being the finish line. Isn't that neat? That's the way to live. Not your wife, not your husband, not your career, not your ministry, not your family, but Christ is the goal. That's the finish line. So, we're supposed to run the race looking to Jesus. Then Hebrews 13 says, life is about living for the Great Shepherd of the sheep. So that's the outline, you got it.

Now, this is another outline. Boy, it's that hard to read, but you have it in front of you. This is what Hebrews is about, and you're going to see this on the final exam too. I'll show you what I mean. Jesus Christ is shown to be perfect in chapters 1 through 4. He's the perfect priest in 4 to 10. He's the perfect one who provides salvation in 10 to 12. Then He gives us this perfect life described in chapter 13. So, if I said Jesus is the perfect priest, what chapters would that be, Kevin? 4 to 10. Okay, we have one A, Paul. If I said Jesus is the perfect priest, right here, see the perfect priesthood Christ performs, what chapters would that be in? 4 to 10. Okay, we have three that have gotten it so far. John, what chapters would that be in? If I say Jesus is the perfect priest, that's Hebrews 4 to Hebrews what? 10. Got it? Perfect priest, 4 to 10. Got it? Rebecca, do you have that? Good. Joy, are you ready for that? Where in Hebrews does it talk about Jesus being a perfect priest? In chapters 4 to 10. Actually, it's primarily in chapter 5. But that's alright, it's in that range. Okay? Daniel, you have all this down, don't you? You've been forced to learn this your whole life, living in such a home. Okay. So, we'll go through that every day.

Oh, by the way, there's my website. I have been slowly after I talked to you long enough, John, I have to finish talking to you and I'll give you one of these flash drives. This is a 128-gigabyte flash drive. For all your ladies, Bonnie gives them out to you. I don't, so I can't give out any to any ladies. But this is our gift to you. Actually, I'm giving this to the doctors I'm going to serve when I leave here. I told you, didn't I, where I'm going? Not where. Not where, but this is the second half. I've already met with the first 700 and they are all the doctors of the Middle East, Africa, and the whole Muslim world. These are the doctors of the whole, this part of the world, the Eastern world. But this is my home website. This has every message I've ever preached and every book and video. On YouTube, I love these. These are all the questions and answers. It's called DTBM Online Teaching Videos. Facebook is just my name. I'm already friends with Enoch and someone else, who else did I get? Yeah, Nate, I got Nate. So, I'd love to become friends with you, okay? Are any of you on Facebook or is that passé? Is it still popular? Keep going on because my son works there, okay? We want to see him employed.

By the way, my son says, when he goes to a meeting, he sits at a table. He says he calls the people this: Niners, Tenners, and Eleveners. What does that mean? A Niner has one billion dollars. A Tenner has ten billion dollars. There's one he calls the Elevener and, of course, that's this upper group because his is just going up like this. But he sits at the table with people who have billions and billions of dollars. He says, I don't know why I'm here, because all of them went to Ivy League schools, they all played polo, and they all wintered in the Hamptons or summered in the Hamptons, and he went to a Christian school. He went to Bob Jones University, but they have him there because they said he understands normal people. None of them do. All of them live a life like none of us will ever live. So, keep going on Facebook so my son can have a job because he's not a billionaire.

Here we go. This is the church that I serve. It's called Calvary Bible and here's a website called Sermon Audio that is really a fun website. If you're interested that's the same thing. I have lots of Facebook pages and Vimeo, lots of Vimeo movies, and YouTube, I already said that. Oh, this one is really neat. This is a Facebook page called Biblical Counseling and Discipleship. For two years, I taught 150 people how to become Biblical counselors and you put it online. The Biblical Counselors is where you know how to use the Bible to counsel people. You listen to people and as they're talking, you'll hear them talking about anxiety, so immediately you think of Philippians 4. They talk about fear, and immediately you think of 1 Timothy 1. Then they talk about abuse and immediately you think about Genesis 41. As you're listening, you're writing down what they're talking about, maybe that they're struggling with sexual temptations, with that one I think of Genesis 39. You go through all those, and then you talk to them and you say, you know what the Bible says about your anxiety or your abuse or whatever? In biblical counseling, the Greek word for it is noutheteí, which is a Greek word. Nou is the Greek word for mind. This is the word for mind, and teí means to place upon. What biblical counseling is, that you place upon people's minds the appropriate scripture. This morning in the newspaper in America, I think it was the Boston Globe or the New York Times, said that meditation is more powerful than drugs for calming anxiety. Isn't that interesting that they would say that? That's what biblical counseling is about. God can transform any part of our life through His word by His Spirit and there's a whole website on that.

Now let's get our Bibles and we're going to go through Hebrews chapter 1 and I'm going to show you the key parts of this book. The first thing I already told you is, what's the first word of the book? God. God. It's unique. God. In verse 2, it says, God has spoken by His Son. The Bible is God speaking. So, when we look at Hebrews, it reminds us that every day God wants to talk to us. Now, Nate, if we were friends, and every day I came up to you and said, hey Nate, can I talk to you? You'd go, uh huh, but I'm busy right now. I have other things to do, but maybe later. If I was your friend, Daniel, and I did that to you day after day, and Daniel came up and asked to talk to me, and I said, not yet. Would you really think I'm your friend, Daniel? If I won't listen to you and talk to you, would you really think I'm your friend? Enoch? Cynthia? If someone kept putting you off that was talking to you? Joseph's washing dishes and I'm standing next to him washing dishes and saying, Joseph, I want to talk to you, and he says, I don't have time. What is that a clear declaration of? The Bible says if you want to have friends, you show yourself friendly.

How do you show yourself friendly? If they want to talk, you talk. If they need help, you help. If they're having trouble, you try and encourage them. Do you know what it says here? God has spoken, verse 2. God has spoken to us, and in verse 2, He is speaking to us through the one through whom He made the world. Who created the universe? God, the Son, Jesus Christ is the Creator. That's what the Bible says through and through. It says it right there. He made the world. Jesus is the Creator. He is God, the Son, the Creator. Look at verse 3. This is one of the most beautiful verses about Christ. Who is the brightness of God's glory and the express image of His person? What does God look like? Just like Jesus Christ. The only God you will ever see is Jesus Christ because God the Father is invisible. Jesus is the exact representation of God.

Now that's really important. Do you know why? What do people say about the Old Testament? That the God of the Old Testament, the one that had them kill everybody in Jericho, and the one that had them kill all the Canaanites, and the one that told Israel to stone people that were doing sins. Do you know what people say? The God of the Old Testament is a warmonger, hateful, hard, God. But Jesus in the New Testament is so gentle and sweet. Is there a difference between the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament? No. How do you know that? Right here. Right here, verse 3. He is the brightness of God's glory. He is the express image of God's person. Jesus upholds all things.

Do you know why the whole universe doesn't blow up? Did you know that like charges in the nucleus of an atom repel? You all took physics enough to know that, right? If you have two positively charged protons, what should they do? Have you ever taken magnets and pulled the similar charged ends together? You can't push them together. There's a resistance, like charges repel in physics. We all know that, right? Why does every atom hold together? Why? Yeah. Jesus upholds all things by the word of His power. Colossians chapter 1 says that everything consists because of Him. Jesus actually is holding matter together. As God, He's causing it. He has exerted the power to hold together the universe. Did you know there's a chapter in the Bible where He lets go? What chapter is that? 2 Peter 3. It says He withdraws His power and the entire universe dissolves with an explosion, and He makes everything new. Remember I said we're all going to see the Milky Way wear out? We are and everything else. So, He is the upholder of all things, and the same one that made the world, that reflects God's glory, and upholds everything, purged our sins and sat down.

Now I never showed you the complete tabernacle but let me give you a little quiz. Are there any chairs in the tabernacle? On top of the ark? On top of the ark, but that was the mercy seat. Yeah, and people couldn't sit on it. Were there any chairs for people to sit on in there? No. How about in the temple? No. Why were there no chairs? No benches, no seats? Because the work was never done. People were constantly sinning. They had to keep offering sacrifices. But look what the Bible says in chapter 3. When He had by Himself purged our sins, what did Jesus do? He sat down. What does that mean? If someone sits down, it means, yeah, it's finished, it's done, the work's done.

Chapter 1 gives us one of the most complete theologies of Jesus Christ. It is amazing. It says that You are My Son, which speaks of His exaltation. In verse 6, let all the angels of God worship Him, Jesus is the focal point of the whole universe. That's why when we stand in front of His judgment seat, all of those angels, those billions of them, are going to be all standing there looking at us. Everything in Heaven focuses on that throne because He is the focal point of the universe. Verse 8, His throne is righteousness. Verse 9, He loves righteousness. Verse 10, He is the designer of the Earth. He laid the foundations of the Earth. The heavens are the works of His hands. Isn't that beautiful? They will perish, verse 11. They will grow old. Wow, we never will. I like verse 14. What are angels in verse 14? Ministering spirits. Wow. Angels are ministering spirits. God made all the angels to accomplish His glory.

Okay, now, boom. Let's back up. Let's go forward. Let's go forward. I have a question for you. What Bible did Jesus use? Now this is back into your normal notes. The front of them. Your big thick ones. There we go. Paul, you get the award for always being in the right spot at the right time. This guy is amazing. What Bible did Jesus use? Have you ever thought about that?

This is the Bible Jesus used. You say, what do you mean? Hold up your Bible. Here, Joseph. How do you know the Bible that Joseph's holding is the right Bible? How do you know Paul's Bible is right? Have you ever thought about that? There are all different versions of the Bible, and yours is in Korean, and English, and Chinese. How do you know you have the right one? What kind of Bible did Jesus use?

Primarily, we know that approximately 80 percent of the time, Jesus, 20 percent of the time, He used the Hebrew Old Testament. 80 percent of the time, He used the most popular translation of the Hebrew into Greek. What's that called? Have you guys had that class yet? This is what theologians call LXX, which is Roman numerals for 70, or in English we call it the Septuagint. Jesus did not use the Hebrew Bible. Rarely. Almost never. Almost always, He used a popular translation.

A translation is where you have a Hebrew word, and they match up. This is a Hebrew word, and they match up a Greek word for a Hebrew word so you're not getting the original. This is the original. This is the translation. Do you know what Jesus said? He said the translation is just as powerful as the original. Isn't that amazing? The word of God is so powerful. Now, you have to have a translation. The problem we have in America, I don't know what's going on in other countries, but now people don't like the Bible for what it says, so they are starting to change the words. We now have a NIV. You've heard of NIV, you Americans? There's a TNIV, Today's NIV, which changes God from being masculine and makes Him feminine because women don't like God being masculine. Even though the Bible in Hebrew has a clear word for female and a clear word for male, and God clearly reveals Himself using the male word. They don't like that, so the new translation is making God female. A lot of other things they're changing and that is not powerful. That's wicked. God has revealed Himself, and the translation, if it's faithful, is good. So, Jesus primarily used the translation. Jesus and the Apostles studied, memorized, used, quoted, and read most often from the Bible of their day, the Septuagint. Less than 20 percent of the time did Jesus use the Hebrew Bible.

What are the benefits, though, of trusting God's Word? The reason this is so important is that I want you to realize that being in Bible school for a whole year is so beneficial. Now let me give you an example. The book of Hebrews, all 303 verses, is probably written by Paul or someone else. Now how do we know that? Number one, we believe that if we trust God's word, we believe what it says. So let me show you what it says. Look at Hebrews 2:3 first, okay? Someone, I need a volunteer to read Hebrews 2:3. Samuel is so excited, front row, he'll read it for us. How shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation? This declaration, which was first announced by the Lord, was confronted to us by those who are hearing. Now, what does it sound like the person writing that is saying? That they didn't directly hear from the Lord. What Samuel read is that it was confirmed to us by the people who heard it. Now that would be saying, I didn't. That's the primary reason why people think Paul didn't write this. Paul personally met with Jesus Christ on the road to Damascus and then in the Arabian desert. Jesus, he claimed over and over again, personally taught him. Hebrews 2:3 gives the indication that this person writing it didn't face-to-face with Jesus. So that's the key reason why people believe Paul didn't write it.

But there are three reasons why people think Paul did. Okay? The first one is in chapter 10, verse 34. Notice what it says there. It says You have compassion on me, what? In verse 34. In my chains. What do we know about Paul? He spent more time in jail than he did out. He was always a prisoner, and at this point when this book is written, which is in the mid to late 60s, Paul was on death row awaiting execution. So that's the first thing, the chains.

Secondly, someone read 10:38 to us. But my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him. My righteous one shall live by faith. Now that's a famous verse, that's the verse Martin Luther got saved through. The just shall live by faith. Now, let me ask you, where is it from? Does anybody have a center column reference that shows you where that's quoted from? Anybody? You have a little letter by it, and it points to some Old Testament reference? What does it say? Habakkuk. Habakkuk? Very good. So that's an Old Testament quotation of Habakkuk. How many times is that in the New Testament? Three times. Okay. Now watch. Hebrews 10:38 says, The just shall live by faith and it defines what is faith. The whole book of Hebrews defines what is faith.

Now, right there by chapter 10 verse 38, I've written in my Bible Romans 1:17. Someone read Romans 1:17 for us. I also have written in my Bible Galatians 3:11. Someone else look up Galatians 3. Okay, so who has Romans 1:17? Daniel's almost there, getting closer. John has it, good. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, "The righteous shall live by faith." oh, so it's the same verse. It's quoted in Romans 17. It's a quotation of that Habakkuk verse, but the book of Hebrews, when it quotes this verse, the book of Hebrews is all about what is faith. The book of Romans is all about what is righteousness or justification. Actually, the word is the word for justified. So, Romans describes who's justified. Hebrews describes what's faith. Galatians 3:11, who has that one? Nate. Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, but the righteous shall be justified. Oh, there's the verse again. The verse, Habakkuk 2: 3-4, is quoted three times in the Bible, in the New Testament. The first time in Galatians it's describing how to live. We're supposed to live justified, not by works. In Romans, it's what it means to be justified. This is what it means to live in Galatians. In Romans, it's what it means to be justified. In Hebrews, what faith means. Who wrote Galatians? Paul. Who wrote Romans? Paul. So, who do people think wrote Hebrews? Paul. Because of this cute little three times quoting, three times describing the elements. Faith, justification, life. All three use the same verse. So that's the second reason.

Now someone read Hebrews 13:23. This is the last reason why people think Paul wrote this. You should know that our brother Timothy has been released with whom I shall see you if he comes soon. Who traveled around with Timothy all the time? Paul. Where was Paul? Look at verse 24. Those from where greet you? Italy. Where did Paul spend his last years in imprisonment? Italy. So, there are three reasons why historically people have thought Paul wrote this book. There's one reason why historically we feel he didn't. Did you know that doesn't matter? It's an inspired book. Both of them have a lot of evidence.

What we do know is, that it's addressed to, because it says those of Italy greet you, most likely, it's from a group of believers in Italy. Very possibly, now this is what's fascinating about Hebrews, it's to Jews. Jews were expelled from Rome, the city, and were living on the outskirts. Claudius drove the Jews out, he didn't like them. Some of the most powerful commentators on this believe the book of Hebrews was written to a struggling, small, Jewish congregation. They were just starting to face Nero's persecution, and they were living, most likely, surrounding Rome. Boy, does that make this book different. Because what did Nero do to Christians in Rome? Do you remember from Church History? Yeah, he burned some. He let animals eat them up. Have you all been watching what ISIS has done in the last two years? That's what Nero did. Same thing. Drowning, burning, cutting, horrible, mutilating. Nero.

What do you need if you're facing a hostile world? Everything you need is in the book of Hebrews. How can you make it through that? The eternal benefits.

Jesus believed the Bible. Jesus totally showed by His usage that He believed and trusted the Bible and He believed every word of the Bible was true.

In Matthew 5:18, it's in your notes, that He believed in the inerrancy of the word of God. He says not one bit of it will be broken. Jesus said when He read the Bible, God was speaking.