“Where morning dawns and evening fades, He calls forth songs of joy.”
Hebrews 3:5-19
Jesus Our High Priest
5 Now Moses was faithful in all His house as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken later;
6 but Christ was faithful as a Son over His house whose house we are, if we hold fast our confidence and the boast of our hope firm until the end.
7 ‘Therefore, just as the Holy Spirit says, “TODAY IF YOU HEAR HIS VOICE,
8 DO NOT HARDEN YOUR HEARTS AS WHEN THEY PROVOKED ME,
AS IN THE DAY OF TRIAL IN THE WILDERNESS,
9 WHERE YOUR FATHERS TRIED ME BY TESTING ME,
AND SAW MY WORKS FOR FORTY YEARS.
10 “THEREFORE I WAS ANGRY WITH THIS GENERATION,
AND SAID, ‘ THEY ALWAYS GO ASTRAY IN THEIR HEART;
AND THEY DID NOT KNOW MY WAYS’;
11 AS I SWORE IN MY WRATH,
‘ THEY SHALL NOT ENTER MY REST.’ ”
The Peril of Unbelief
12 Take care, brethren, lest there should be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart, in falling away from the living God.
13 But encourage one another day after day, as long as it is still called “Today,” lest any one of you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.
14 For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end;
15 while it is said,
“TODAY IF YOU HEAR HIS VOICE, DO NOT HARDEN
YOUR HEARTS, AS WHEN THEY PROVOKED ME.”
16 For who provoked Him when they had heard? Indeed, did not all those who came out of Egypt led by Moses?
17 And with whom was He angry for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness?
18 And to whom did He swear that they should not enter His rest, but to those who were disobedient?
19 And so we see that they were not able to enter because of unbelief.
[The Israelites who had been freed from slavery doubted God’s promise to sustain them in their struggles in the desert; thus they were disobedient because of their unbelief.]
Hebrews 5:9
9 And having been made perfect, He became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal salvation,
[Born again Christians who doubt God’s promise to sustain them in their struggles against sin are also disobedient because of their unbelief.]
Just as the Lord, after saving the Israelites out of the land of Egypt, subsequently destroyed those who did not believe, He will also destroy those of the spiritual Israel who don’t hold fast their confidence and the boast of their hope firm until the end. We must therefore be diligent to press through each fiery trial of our faith, learning endurance and obedience, in order that we may glorify God and partake of the inheritance of the saints. (See Hebrews 3:6; Jude 5; Hebrews 6:11; 1 Corinthians 10:13; 1 Corinthians 6:20.)
Jon David Banks, God’s most unworthy servant
Please weigh everything I say on the scales of the word of God.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. www.lockman.org
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