Hebrews 3:7-19

Introduction

Text Read

7 Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, “Today, if you hear His voice, 8 do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness, 9 where your fathers put Me to the test and saw My works for forty years. 10 Therefore I was provoked with that generation,and said, ‘They always go astray in their heart; they have not known My ways.’ 11 As I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.’” 12 Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. 13 But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. 14 For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end. 15 As it is said, “Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.” 16 For who were those who heard and yet rebelled? Was it not all those who left Egypt led by Moses? 17 And with whom was He provoked 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 would not enter His rest, but to those who were disobedient? 19 So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief.

Text Explained

Let us start with verses 7-11. 7 Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, “Today, if you hear His voice, 8 do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness, 9 where your fathers put Me to the test and saw My works for forty years. 10 Therefore I was provoked with that generation,and said, ‘They always go astray in their heart; they have not known My ways.’ 11 As I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.’” As we come to today’s text we are blessed with a warning of comparison. Last week we saw Jesus compared to Moses and this week those who are reading the letter to the Hebrews are told to compare themselves with the Israelites who came out of Egypt but never entered the Land of Promised Rest. Now, the author of the Letter to the Hebrews brings up the failure of the nation of Israel by quoting from the second half of Psalm 95. The first half of Psalm 95 is a call to sing praises to the Lord Oh come, let us sing to the Lord; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation! Let us come into His presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to Him with songs of praise! For the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods. In His hand are the depths of the earth; the heights of the mountains are His also. The sea is His, for He made it, and His hands formed the dry land. Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker! For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture, and the sheep of His hand. This is Psalm 95:1-7a. Yet the second half of Psalm 95:7b-11 takes a very interesting/serious turn and this turn is where the writer of Hebrews draws our attention. Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at Massah in the wilderness, when your fathers put Me to the test and put Me to the proof, though they had seen My work. For forty years I loathed that generation and said, “They are a people who go astray in their heart, and they have not known My ways.” Therefore I swore in My wrath, “They shall not enter My rest.” Now the author of Hebrews once again credits the Holy Spirit with the writing of this OT Psalm b/c ultimately all of Scripture is given by the Lord. So the author quotes part of the second half of this Psalm to get his readers to self-reflect. This is interesting to me b/c the first 6 verses of chapter 3 are all about the greatness of Jesus, and the first half of Psalm 95 is describing the greatness of God. Then, the author of Hebrews much like the Psalmist calls for self-reflection. You see, God is able to do all sorts of miraculous things. Is anything too hard for the Lord? NO. This even seems to be the big idea in Psalm 95 and here in Hebrews 3 which makes the warnings seem so out of nowhere. Because God is so great, don’t harden your hearts. Because Jesus is so great, don’t harden your heart. So how does this warning fit in? It fits in when we consider the Israelites who came out of Egypt. This was the generation who were slaves and saw God, through Moses, bring plague after plague upon the Egyptians. This was the generation who saw the Red Sea divided in two and walked across on dry land. This is the generation who saw the dark cloud and the heard the thunderings. This was the generation who saw the earth swallow up the sons of Korah. This was the generation who were led by a Pillar of Cloud during the day and the Pillar of Fire at night. This was the generation who had seen the first hand the power of God time and time again, yet when they got to the edge of the Land of Promise, they made camp and sent in 12 spies. And as the children’s song reminds us 10 were bad and 2 were good. Numbers 13:27–33 “And they told him, “We came to the land to which you sent us. It flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. However, the people who dwell in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large. And besides, we saw the descendants of Anak there. The Amalekites dwell in the land of the Negeb. The Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the hill country. And the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and along the Jordan.” But Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, “Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.” Then the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are.” So they brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied out, saying, “The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people that we saw in it are of great height. And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.” So the Israelites, after having seen the power of God turned away because they did NOT believe. This is the reason the Psalmist AND the author of Hebrews calls for us to 12 Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. 13 But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. You see the unbelieving heart is the heart that leads people away from God. It is the unbelieving heart that sees the wonders of God and then when the trials appear too difficult, it is the unbelieving heart hardened by the deceitfulness of sin that leads a person away from God. Then we come to verse 14 which tells us that those who have come to share in Christ are not those who say “Lord Lord,” but rather those who persevere to the end. 14 For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end. You see, the Israelites who did not enter the Promised Land were those who did NOT persevere. This is the truth the the disciple whom Jesus Loved told us about in 1 John 2:19 “They went out from us, but they were not of us; they did not LOSE their salvation for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us.” Those who hear this letter being read are being called to self-reflect. For just as the physically circumcised Israelites saw God’s work, they never entered His rest because of their hardened hearts. Dear Christian, 15 As it is said, “Today, if you hear His voice, If you hear the reading of God’s word, if you hear the preaching of God’s word, if you hear the truth of it, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.” 16 For who were those who heard and yet rebelled? Was it not all those who left Egypt led by Moses? Those who saw the power of God. 17 And with whom was He/God provoked 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 would not enter His rest, but to those who were disobedient? And for clarity, the author of Hebrews points out how they were disobedient. 19 So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief. Their disobedience all stemmed from hearts that did NOT belief. They did not believe that God was able to give them victory. So today’s passage is to those who would claim to be Christian. To those who have heard the word of God and even claim to be part of the body of Christ. 12 Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. (Heb 3:12)

Text Applied

Today’s application is simple. There are many in the western world who claim to be Christian. There are many who would say they are a follower of Jesus. Yet when push comes to shove, when the difficulties of life arise, they do not hold to Christ as the final authority of their life. Oh yes, they have heard God’s voice, through preaching, teaching, reading of the word, even through podcasts, etc, and when it suits them they follow God’s teachings. Yet as soon as faith/trust in God is required, they come up with excuses as to why they can’t obey. They hear the word, but they harden their hearts against it. When a person says, I used to be a Christian, it demonstrates that they never actually were, and that their hearts had been hardened by sin. If that is you, then out of the abundance of the heart, your mouth will eventually speak. If there is an unbelieving heart then that heart will make itself known. For the one who hears the word, who has hardened their heart against it and thus does not believe, there will not enter God’s eternal rest. The illustration of Israel is clear. They did not enter God’s rest b/c they did NOT believe God could give them the land. Dear one, salvation is simple.John 3:16–17 “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him.” Or as the Apostle Paul put it in 1 Corinthians 15:3–8 “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.” Repent/Submit to Christ. Believe/Trust in Him. (It is simple, like jumping out of a plane and trusting the parachute to work. Notice I said simple, not easy. But it is an all in type thing.)