Can We Come Boldly to God?

There are times when approaching God does not feel easy. We know what we have done. We remember our failures. We know how weak we can be. Sometimes we may even wonder why a holy God would want to hear from us at all.

Then Hebrews gives us an amazing invitation. Hebrews 4:16 tells believers to “draw near with confidence to the throne of grace.”

That raises an important question. Why can we come to God with confidence? Certainly not because we have earned the right. It is not because we have lived perfectly, prayed enough, given enough, worked hard enough, or somehow made ourselves worthy.

The answer is found in the verses immediately before it. Hebrews 4:14 tells us that we have “a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God.”

Under the Old Testament system, the high priest represented the people before God. The people did not simply walk into the Most Holy Place whenever they pleased. Access was limited. But Jesus Christ became our great High Priest, and because of Him the believer has access to God.

We do not need another human being to stand between us and God. Paul wrote in 1 Timothy 2:5 that there is “one mediator also between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus.”

That means I do not need a preacher to get me closer to God. I do not need a priest to carry my prayers to Him. I do not need a special object, ceremony, offering, or spiritual experience to gain His attention. I need Christ, and if I belong to Christ, I may come to God.

Hebrews tells us something else about Jesus that makes this invitation even more comforting. Hebrews 4:15 says that we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses.

Jesus understands weakness. That does not mean Jesus sinned. The verse makes that clear. He was tempted as we are, yet without sin. But He knows what it is to be tired, hungry, rejected, betrayed, sorrowful, and in pain. He knows what temptation feels like.

So when a believer comes before God struggling, hurting, afraid, or tempted, Jesus is not distant from what we are facing. He understands, and that is part of what makes this invitation so remarkable.

Hebrews 4:16 does not say we should stay away until we have ourselves straightened out. It tells us to draw near to “the throne of grace.”

A throne speaks of authority. God is still God, and we do not approach Him carelessly or without reverence. But it is also called a throne of grace, and the verse tells us what we find there: mercy and grace to help in time of need.

Notice when we are invited to come. We come in our time of need, not after the need is over. We do not have to solve the problem first, become strong again, or prove that we can handle things on our own.

That is often where we get things backward. When we fail, we may pull away from God. When we are ashamed, we may stop praying. When we struggle with temptation, we may feel too dirty to approach Him. When life becomes difficult, we may begin to think that God has become distant.

But those are the very times Scripture tells us to draw near. The answer to weakness is not to run away from God. It is to go to Him.

There is also an important difference between confidence and arrogance. We do not come before God demanding that He give us whatever we want. We do not come because we believe God owes us something.

Our confidence is not confidence in ourselves. It is confidence in Christ. A child who walks into his father’s house does not do so because he owns the house. He enters because he belongs there as part of the family. In a far greater way, the believer approaches God because Christ has opened the way.

Jesus said in John 14:6, “No one comes to the Father except through Me.” That verse is often used when speaking about salvation, and rightly so, but it also reminds us that our entire relationship with the Father is through Christ.

We come through Christ. We pray through Christ. We are forgiven through Christ. We receive grace through Christ. Our hope is in Christ.

This should change the way we think about prayer. Prayer is not trying to convince God to notice us. It is not shouting loudly enough for God to hear. It is not finding someone we believe has more spiritual power and asking that person to gain God’s attention for us.

If you belong to Jesus Christ, you already have access to the Father. You can pray in a hospital room, while working, when you are alone, when you are afraid, or when you do not know what to say. You can even come after you have failed, because Jesus Christ is your High Priest.

Maybe the most surprising word in Hebrews 4:16 is simply the invitation itself. God knows our weakness and still tells us to come. He knows our need, our failure, our fear, and what we are facing tomorrow, yet the throne before us is still called a throne of grace.

We should never confuse that invitation with permission to treat sin lightly. Christ did not die so that we could become comfortable with sin. But neither should a believer allow shame to drive him away from the very One who offers mercy and grace.

When we need mercy, we come. When we need grace, we come. When we need strength to obey or wisdom to know what to do next, we come.

We do not approach God because we are worthy. We approach Him because Jesus is.

That is why the believer can come boldly to God.

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“What I write is not for everyone, but what I write is meant for someone.” – Dean Butler

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