Now we must look out for another warning. In our last study we were warned – what?
Hebrews 2:1 We must pay the most careful attention, therefore, to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away.
Look out for today’s warning, much of which was copied from Psalm 95:8-11.
Read Hebrews 3:7-19
7 So, as the Holy Spirit says:
‘Today, if you hear his voice, 8 do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion,
during the time of testing in the wilderness,
9 where your ancestors tested and tried me, though for forty years they saw what I did.
10 That is why I was angry with that generation;
I said, “Their hearts are always going astray, and they have not known my ways.”
11 So I declared on oath in my anger,
“They shall never enter my rest.”’
12 See to it, brothers and sisters, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. 13 But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called ‘Today’, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness. 14 We have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original conviction firmly to the very end. 15 As has just been said:
‘Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion.’
16 Who were they who heard and rebelled? Were they not all those Moses led out of Egypt? 17 And with whom was he angry for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies perished in the wilderness? 18 And to whom did God swear that they would never enter his rest if not to those who disobeyed? 19 So we see that they were not able to enter, because of their unbelief.
What was the sin that prevented a whole generation from entering the Promised Land? (V19)
Let’s look at Numbers chapters 13 and14.
The Lord had rescued his people from slavery in Egypt, had brought them through the Red Sea, had provided food to eat and water to drink, and was now leading them by the most direct route into the Promised Land.
In chapter 13, spies were sent into the land.
Let’s read Numbers 13:30-33 and 14:1-4
30 Then Caleb silenced the people before Moses and said, ‘We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it.’
31 But the men who had gone up with him said, ‘We can’t attack those people; they are stronger than we are.’ 32 And they spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. They said, ‘The land we explored devours those living in it. All the people we saw there are of great size. 33 We saw the Nephilim there (the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim). We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them.’
14:1 That night all the members of the community raised their voices and wept aloud. 2 All the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and the whole assembly said to them, ‘If only we had died in Egypt! Or in this wilderness! 3 Why is the Lord bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword? Our wives and children will be taken as plunder. Wouldn’t it be better for us to go back to Egypt?’ 4 And they said to each other, ‘We should choose a leader and go back to Egypt.’
How did the Lord respond to this (Numbers 14:11-12)?
He would send a plague and kill them all.
How did Moses respond to that (Numbers 14:19)?
So the Lord relented, but they would not go unpunished:
Read Numbers 14:26-35
26 The Lord said to Moses and Aaron: 27 ‘How long will this wicked community grumble against me? I have heard the complaints of these grumbling Israelites. 28 So tell them, “As surely as I live, declares the Lord, I will do to you the very thing I heard you say: 29 in this wilderness your bodies will fall – every one of you twenty years old or more who was counted in the census and who has grumbled against me. 30 Not one of you will enter the land I swore with uplifted hand to make your home, except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun.
31 As for your children that you said would be taken as plunder, I will bring them in to enjoy the land you have rejected. 32 But you – your bodies will fall in this wilderness. 33 Your children will be shepherds here for forty years, suffering for your unfaithfulness, until the last of your bodies lies in the wilderness. 34 For forty years – one year for each of the forty days you explored the land – you will suffer for your sins and know what it is like to have me against you.” 35 I, the Lord, have spoken, and I will surely do these things to this whole wicked community, which has banded together against me. They will meet their end in this wilderness; here they will die.’
The whole problem is that we think we know what’s good for us. The Israelites had seen the strength of the opposition and knew that it would be madness to just march in and try to take their land.
Look again at today’s passage:
Hebrews 3:12-13
12 See to it, brothers and sisters, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. 13 But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called ‘Today’, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.
Two words stand out – ‘unbelieving deceitfulness’
The dictionary definition of ‘deceit’ is ‘the action or practice of deceiving someone by concealing or misrepresenting the truth.’
But it’s even easier to deceive ourselves. We believe we know what’s good for us and we naturally bend the truth to suit our beliefs.
But believing what’s good for us can bring us into direct conflict with God, because he actually knows what’s best for us.
The Israelites had seen the obstacles. They knew their capabilities and they simply hardened their hearts to any suggestion that their obstacles could be overcome.
God also knew they were incapable by themselves, but that didn’t concern him at all. He was prepared to fight their battles for them if they would only put their trust in him.
But another word also stands out in verse 13; it is ‘today’.
‘Unbelieving deceitfulness’ was the problem in Moses’ day; it was a ‘today’ problem when Psalm 65 was being written. It was still a ‘today’ problem, two thousand years ago, when these words were copied by the writer to the Hebrews. Is ‘unbelieving deceitfulness’ still a problem today?
Is it possible for us to maintain areas of unbelief that we are convinced are ok?
Do we go along with the songwriter – ‘the things we are liable to read in the Bible, it ain’t necessarily so.’
Have we convinced ourselves that passages in Genesis should be read as myth or legend? Are we certain that miracles recorded in the Acts of the Apostles cannot really happen today?
As soon as we doubt God’s word, we can then go on to doubt God’s abilities; and we end up deceiving ourselves and sinning against God.
No, you say, I don’t doubt God’s abilities – theoretically.
Neither did the Israelites until they were instructed to put faith into action.
So are there any insurmountable difficulties we face ‘today’ that God is asking us to trust him to overcome?
I once went on a training course and was told ‘there are no problems, only possibilities and opportunities’. The call is not just to trust God when there are battles to be fought. ‘Today’ holds many possibilities and opportunities.
There is more in verse 13. We are not in this alone: ‘encourage one another daily’.
Today there will be others in our fellowship or community who will be happy to help us; but we must also look out for those who themselves will be facing possibilities and opportunities, and who would be able to face them much better with our encouragement and support as they trust the Lord for the solution.
We are now going to look at Hebrews 4 where we will find the author has thought some more about the Children of Israel finally entering a land flowing with milk and honey. Where towns, villages and houses were already built, and where fields, orchards and vineyards were ready to harvest.
Where they could enjoy a period of rest.
But the rest in the ‘Promised Land’ that we are looking forward to will be much greater even than that.
Read Hebrews 4:1-11
1 Therefore, since the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it. 2 For we also have had the good news proclaimed to us, just as they did; but the message they heard was of no value to them, because they did not share the faith of those who obeyed. 3 Now we who have believed enter that rest, just as God has said,
‘So I declared on oath in my anger,
“They shall never enter my rest.”’
And yet his works have been finished since the creation of the world. 4 For somewhere he has spoken about the seventh day in these words: ‘On the seventh day God rested from all his works.’ 5 And again in the passage above he says, ‘They shall never enter my rest.’
6 Therefore since it still remains for some to enter that rest, and since those who formerly had the good news proclaimed to them did not go in because of their disobedience, 7 God again set a certain day, calling it ‘Today’. This he did when a long time later he spoke through David, as in the passage already quoted:
‘Today, if you hear his voice,
do not harden your hearts.’
8 For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken later about another day. 9 There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; 10 for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from their works, just as God did from his. 11 Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will perish by following their example of disobedience.
In verses 2 and 6 we see that the Children of Israel heard the ‘good news’ but their lack of faith meant they never entered the ‘rest’ that had been offered to them.
The writer goes on to explain in verses 8-11 that there is another day of ‘rest’ that we can all look forward to. But there is a warning in verse 7 – there is a danger that our own lack of faith could become such a regular habit that our hearts become hardened – and so we too could miss out on the best God has prepared for us.
Verse 11: So how do we make every effort to rest?
Trust and obey, for there's no other way
To be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey
