Slides: Hold Fast!

Hold Fast!
By David Feddes

¹⁹ Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, ²⁰ by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, ²¹ and since we have a great priest over the house of God, ²² 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. ²³ Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. ²⁴ And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, ²⁵ 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 10:19-25)

Respond

• Draw near
• Hold fast
• Stir up

Hold fast

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. (Hebrews 10:23)

Therefore, holy brothers, you who share in a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession… Christ is faithful over God’s house as a son. And we are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope. (Hebrews 3:1,6)

Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day… For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end. (Hebrews 3:12-14)

For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword… Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. (Hebrews 4:12,14)

God guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul. (Hebrews 6:17-19)

Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. Do not be led away by diverse and strange teachings. (Hebrews 13:7-9)

As for the seed in the good soil, they are those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with perseverance. (Luke 8:15)

Hold fast what is good. Abstain from every form of evil. (1 Thessalonians 5:21-22)

Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. (1 Corinthians 15:1-2)

Now I commend you because you … hold fast the traditions even as I delivered them to you.  (1 Corinthians 11:2)

Stand firm and hold to the traditions that you were taught by us, either by our word or by our letter. (2 Thessalonians 2:15)

Confession (ὁμολογία)

They will glorify God because of your submission that comes from your confession of the gospel of Christ. (2 Cor 9:13)

Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you confessed the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. (1 Timothy 6:12)

Doctrine
If you put these things before the brothers, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, being trained in the words of the faith and of the good doctrine that you have followed… Keep a close watch on yourself and on the doctrine. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers. (1 Timothy 4:6,16)

Deposit
Guard the deposit entrusted to you.  Avoid the irreverent babble and contradictions of what is falsely called “knowledge,” for by professing it some have swerved from the faith. (1 Timothy 6:20)

Hold fast

You hold fast my name… But you have some there who hold the teaching of Balaam [and] eat food sacrificed to idols and practice sexual immorality. So also you have some who hold the teaching of the Nicolaitans. Therefore repent. If not, I will come to you soon and war against them with the sword of my mouth. (Revelation 2:13-16)

You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess and is teaching and seducing my servants to practice sexual immorality and to eat food sacrificed to idols. I gave her time to repent, but she refuses to repent of her sexual immorality. I will throw her onto a sickbed, and those who commit adultery with her I will throw into great tribulation, unless they repent of her works, and I will strike her children dead. But to the rest of you who do not hold this teaching… I do not lay on you any other burden. Only hold fast what you have until I come. (Revelation 2:20-25)

Hold fast
Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. (Hebrews 10:23)

Hold fast the confession of our hope

• Unchanging Christ
• Unerring Bible
• Unstoppable future
• Unwavering witness

Hold fast in spite of:

• Urges and concerns
• Family and friends
• Church leaders
• Societal pressures

Hold fast while striving to:

• Reinforce saints
• Restore strugglers
• Rescue perishing
• Repel attackers

Hold fast
Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. (Hebrews 10:23)