Hebrews 3:7-19 - Don’t Harden Your Heart Against Jesus

We’re working our way through the book of Hebrews, and we’ve been looking at how Jesus is the best messenger, better than the angels and better than the best messenger in the Old Testament, Moses.

Our passage this morning is a warning of what happened to the Israelites when they disregarded Moses’ message because of their fear, when they doubted God’s character because their circumstances were scary.

And the same or worse consequences await us if we also doubt Jesus’ character by hardening our heart against him.

I’m not talking about doubting his character because of our own weakness, but doubting his character because we forget or ignore his faithfulness.

Sometimes we are fearful because we are weak, but we have no reason to think that Jesus isn’t strong enough or good enough to take care of us.

This is a tendency we all have to greater or lesser degrees.

We tend to abandon Jesus when we need him the most when our fear is bigger than our faith.

Think about it.

If you were to lose your job, or your financial security, or you’re evicted from your home, or if you were to lose a loved one or your spouse leaves you, or your child walks away from the faith.

If any of those tragedies were to happen, what would be your first response?

Gold star if you said that you’d run to Jesus in prayer and ask him to help you figure it out.

But I think most of us, if we’re honest, we would worry about it and try to fix it on our own and only when we’ve exhausted all other options do we cry out in prayer or ask others to pray or help.

We save prayer for last when it should be the very first thing we do.

And if the tragedy is overwhelmingly fearful, then we can be tempted to doubt God’s character and blame him for our difficulties and abandon him in our hearts.

And God knows this, he knows we have this tendency.

That’s why he’s given us this warning in Hebrews 3:7-19.

It’s a warning to prevent us from running away from him in fear of our circumstances.

A warning that’s based on an Old Testament example.

A warning that’s given through urgent exhortation.

A warning whose danger is vividly explained.

And we’re going to work through each of those steps one at a time.

First, the author of Hebrews gives us an example from the Old Testament, in verses 7-11, that will anchor the rest of this warning.

Hebrews 3:7–9 ESV

Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your fathers put me to the test and saw my works for forty years.

Hebrews 3:10–11 ESV

Therefore I was provoked with that generation, and said, ‘They always go astray in their heart; they have not known my ways.’ As I swore in my wrath, ‘They shall not enter my rest.’ ”

Here we have…

An Example of Unbelief (7-11)

The very first word is an important transition word, “therefore.”

This is the logical next step from what came before.

The last sentence of the previous passage says that we are Jesus’ house, we’re a part of his household IF we hold fast our confidence in him and our boasting in our hope in him.

This is a conditional phrase that basically says that we’ve got to hold on to our confidence in Jesus if we want to be a part of his household.

And the logical next step after making that statement is a warning about what happens if we don’t hold fast to our confidence in Jesus.

What happens if we give in to the fear of our circumstances?

What happens if we harden our heart against Jesus?

What happens if we doubt him in unbelief?

This example of unbelief we have in our passage is a quote of Psalm 95 which we read earlier in the service.

A Psalm that isn’t attributed to a particular Psalmist.

At the beginning of lot of the Psalms they say that they’re “a Psalm of David” or “a Psalm of the sons of Korah” or “a Psalm of Asaph.”

But this one doesn’t have anything like that; it’s anonymous.

The author of Hebrews says that the Holy Spirit wrote it.

Really, the Holy Spirit wrote all of the Bible through different people.

Peter wrote in 2 Peter 1:21 “For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.”

And later in Hebrews chapter 4, the author says that the Holy Spirit wrote Psalm 95 through David.

Hebrews 4:7 “again he (the Holy Spirit) appoints a certain day, “Today,” saying through David so long afterward, in the words already quoted, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.””

Now, the first bit of Psalm 95 is a call to worship, but the rest of it, from the last line of verse 7 to the end of verse 11, is a warning.

The Holy Spirit, through David, gave a warning to the people of Israel looking to the warning Moses originally gave, and the author of Hebrews, also carried along by the Holy Spirit, continues the same warning.

This warning looks back at what the people of Israel did just after the Exodus under the guidance of Moses.

Remember, we just looked at how Jesus is a better messenger than Moses last week.

And the specific incidents referred to in Psalm 95 are found in Exodus 17 and Numbers 14.

Moses primarily wrote all of the Torah, the first five books of the Old Testament, as an explanation and warning for the generation of Israel that would enter the promised land 40 years after their parents messed up.

Don’t do what they did!

David knew this story from reading his Bible, the Torah, about 400 years after Moses wrote it, and the Holy Spirit wrote through him the exact same warning Moses gave to that second generation.

Don’t do what they did!

Now, each of the Psalms were compiled into the book of Psalms we know today after the return from exile about 450 years after David wrote Psalm 95, and the compilers recognized the Holy Spirit’s hand in writing this Psalm and the importance of this very same warning for the people coming out of exile.

Don’t do what they did!

And then the author of Hebrews, writing about 500 years after the return from exile, he also picked up on the importance of this warning, and he reiterated it for his original audience, for the Jewish Christians who were tempted to do exactly what the people of Israel did back in Exodus 17 and Numbers 14.

Don’t do what they did!

And now, almost 2000 years after Hebrews was written, we’re looking at this very same warning in Hebrews 3, Psalm 95, and Exodus and Numbers because we also need to hear this warning.

Don’t do what they did!

So, let’s look at what exactly they did so that we can avoid it.

Verses 7-9 are a reference to Exodus 17:1–7 “All the congregation of the people of Israel moved on from the wilderness of Sin by stages, according to the commandment of the Lord, and camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” And Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord?” But the people thirsted there for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?” So Moses cried to the Lord, “What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me.” And the Lord said to Moses, “Pass on before the people, taking with you some of the elders of Israel, and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb, and you shall strike the rock, and water shall come out of it, and the people will drink.” And Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel. And he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah, because of the quarreling of the people of Israel, and because they tested the Lord by saying, “Is the Lord among us or not?””

So, how did the people of Israel mess up here?

Moses wrote that they rebelled or quarreled with him and with the Lord and they tested the Lord.

That’s what the names Massah and Meribah mean, rebellion and testing.

They were thirsty, they had a legitimate need, so why was their request for water called rebellion and testing the Lord?

Well, it wasn’t their request, it was their heart.

Their request was legitimate, that’s why God gave them water from the rock there.

But their hearts were hardened by their fears.

Their fear was bigger than their faith and they doubted God’s character.

Notice the fear in their question, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?”

Also notice that their fear made them doubt God’s goodness.

They wrongly concluded that their thirst meant that God was against them and wanted to kill them.

They also wrongly concluded that if their needs weren’t met, then God had abandoned them as their last question indicated, “Is the Lord among us or not?”

That’s a heart of doubt, a heart of unbelief, a hard heart, a heart that wrongly tests the Lord rather than believing him.

That’s where they went wrong.

They should have believed, but they didn’t because they were more focused on their fearful circumstances than they were on the one who had provided everything for them.

Verses 10 and 11 are a reference to Numbers chapter 14.

It’s a long chapter, so I’ll just hop to the critical verses to see how the people messed up here.

This is after the spies had returned from the promised land and fearfully reported the massive size of the people there and their doubt that they would be able to conquer them.

Numbers 14:1–4 “Then all the congregation raised a loud cry, and the people wept that night. And all the people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron. The whole congregation said to them, “Would that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or would that we had died in this wilderness! Why is the Lord bringing us into this land, to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will become a prey. Would it not be better for us to go back to Egypt?” And they said to one another, “Let us choose a leader and go back to Egypt.””

The Lord heard their grumbling and responded in anger.

Numbers 14:11–12 “And the Lord said to Moses, “How long will this people despise me? And how long will they not believe in me, in spite of all the signs that I have done among them? I will strike them with the pestilence and disinherit them, and I will make of you a nation greater and mightier than they.””

But Moses interceded for the people and the Lord didn’t wipe them out, instead he gave the privilege of entering the promised land to the following generation.

Numbers 14:20–23 “Then the Lord said, “I have pardoned, according to your word. But truly, as I live, and as all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord, none of the men who have seen my glory and my signs that I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and yet have put me to the test these ten times and have not obeyed my voice, shall see the land that I swore to give to their fathers. And none of those who despised me shall see it.”

So, how did the people of Israel mess up here?

It’s pretty much the same as when they were thirsty, but now instead of being afraid of dying from thirst, they were afraid of dying by the sword of these massive inhabitants of Canaan.

God had promised, and he had been faithful, but they were more focused on their fearful circumstances than they were on the faithfulness and goodness and power of God.

They cried out and wept all night in their fear.

They doubted God’s goodness with their question, “Why is the Lord bringing us into this land, to fall by the sword?”

They hardened their hearts in unbelief with their statement, “Our wives and our little ones will become a prey.”

They sinned and tested the Lord rather than believing him with their question, “Would it not be better for us to go back to Egypt?”

They messed up, and God got angry with them, in fact he said that they always go astray and they haven’t know his ways.

Time after time they went astray, suggesting that they return back to Egypt instead of remaining with God.

They quickly forgot God’s power, and provision, and protection, not knowing his ways, his love, his faithfulness, his sovereignty.

And God said that he would wipe them out and start over with Moses.

This wasn’t the first time that God suggested this.

But because of Moses’ intercession, God relaxed his judgment and had mercy.

Instead of wiping them out, he allowed them to wander in the wilderness for 40 years until they all died out and the next generation had the opportunity to enter the promised land.

So, we just looked at an example of unbelief from the Old Testament.

How the Israelites doubted God’s goodness and power on these two occasions and he was angry with them and refused to let them enter the promised land because of it.

Next, the author of Hebrews is going apply this example and draw a parallel between it and our own unbelief in an exhortation to each of us in verses 12-15.

Hebrews 3:12–13 ESV

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, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

Hebrews 3:14–15 ESV

For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end. As it is said, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.”

So, in light of the example we just looked at, we have here…

An Exhortation to Avoid Unbelief (12-15)

Before we get into this exhortation, I want to clarify exactly what we are warned against.

Throughout our passage the thing we are warned against is described in a lot of different ways.

We are warned against…

Hardening our heart

Putting God to the test

Going astray in our heart

Not knowing God’s ways

Having an evil, unbelieving heart

Falling away from God

Rebelling against God

Disobeying God

To me, this sounds like someone who is refusing salvation after the gospel has been clearly presented to them or after they have experienced God’s goodness and faithfulness their whole lives.

Theologians and pastors all throughout church history have been on all sides of this issue.

Some say that this is a warning for people who are not yet true believers, others say this is a warning for true believers to stay true.

I think that the belief spoken of here is better understood as trust in Jesus’ goodness and sovereignty in the midst of your circumstances.

Like the man who subtly doubted Jesus’ ability to save his son from an oppressive demon in Mark 9:24 “Immediately the father of the child cried out and said, “I believe; help my unbelief!””

Or the faith Jesus referred to in Matthew 17:20 “if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.””

Or even the faith the apostles asked Jesus to increase in them after he told them how much and how often they ought to forgive as a matter of duty in Luke 17:5 “The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!””

But that faith should culminate in saving faith, belief in Jesus’ identity as Lord and his work at the manger, the cross, and the empty tomb as Paul wrote in Romans 10:9 “because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

And I think that the rest spoken of here and throughout chapter 4 is not only salvation but the peace and assurance that comes from trusting Jesus to provide exactly what you need in any and every circumstance.

Now, because of this, I take the author’s address to “brothers” here in verse 12 to be fellow believers, not fellow Jews.

And I take this warning like all the warnings in Hebrews, as I mentioned a few Sundays ago, as a preventative warning, not as a statement of possibility.

Are there people who can lose their salvation?

No because your salvation isn’t dependent on you.

Are there people who are saved who need to be warned of the very real consequences of unbelief so that they won’t go down that road?

Absolutely.

So, this warning is addressed to fellow believers, brothers and sisters in Christ.

This is the primary application of Psalm 95:7-11 to the original audience of Hebrews, and the same application is for us as well.

And it falls in two categories, personal and interpersonal.

Personally in verse 12, avoid unbelief by taking care that you don’t have an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God.

There are a lot of different ways we can do this, but all of them take careful self-examination and searching the Scriptures to see God’s faithfulness and goodness and sovereignty and love on every page.

Ask yourself often, “Do I really believe that God is able to take care of me?”

As long as the answer is yes, then you’re fine.

But as soon as the answer becomes maybe, or I’m not sure anymore, or I don’t know this time it might be more than God can handle.

As soon as the answer is anything less than yes, look to God’s Word to remind yourself of who he is and what he’s done for you.

And look back at your life and recognize God’s faithfulness to care for you.

Now, interpersonally we are to avoid unbelief, in verse 13, by exhorting each other every day so that none of us would become hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

We’ve got to encourage each other to live and love like Jesus.

We’ve got to remind each other daily about the love of Jesus in the gospel.

We’ve got to be in each others’ lives every day of the week, not just Sundays, so that we can help each other fight against sin.

If you don’t have at least one other believer speaking the truth of the gospel into your life, then you are a prime target for the devil’s lies.

If you are alone in your “personal relationship with Jesus” and you refuse to let anyone else in, then sin will deceive you, the gospel will eventually be forgotten, and you’ll start living more like the world than like Jesus.

You’ll start drifting away from him, you’ll begin to doubt his goodness and his power and his sovereignty, you’ll begin to fall away from the living God.

Again, this is not strictly about salvation, this is about your peace and rest in the sufficiency of Christ.

Your sin as a believer is already paid for by Christ, but it still affects your relationship with him.

Isaiah 59:1–2 “Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear; but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear.”

And the remedy when our relationship with God is strained by our sin is confession and repentance.

1 John 1:9 “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Very often our sin is deceitful so that we don’t even realize we’re sinning unless another believer points it out to us and encourages us to confess it and repent of it and to keep fighting against sin by remembering Jesus.

And make no mistake, doubting Jesus’ goodness and sovereignty in your life is a sin as deceitful as all the rest.

Verses 14 and 15 directly link this exhortation with the end of the previous passage.

Its another conditional phrase that says almost the same thing as back in verse 6.

Hebrews 3:6 “but 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 3:14 “For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end.”

Coming to share in or participating with Christ and being a part of the household of Christ are essentially the same thing.

Ephesians 2:4–6 describes the same thing this way: “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.”

Basically, you are saved if you truly believe and confess your submission to Jesus as Lord as we already saw in Romans 10:9.

But in order for that faith to prove true and not just lip service, it’s got to endure.

You’ve got to hold onto your confidence in Christ.

Now, your salvation isn’t dependent on your grip on Jesus, if you’re saved then he’s got you no matter what.

But at the same time, you are saved by faith, and if your faith wasn’t genuine in the first place, then you will very likely be tempted to abandon him when the going gets tough.

Jesus gave a parable in Matthew 13:3–9, and he explained it in verses 18-23.

You may be familiar with the parable, so I won’t go into to much detail.

It’s the parable of the sower, and in this parable Jesus depicts four different states of peoples’ hearts as they receive God’s Word.

For some, God’s Word doesn’t take root because it’s snatched away by the enemy… it goes in one ear and out the other.

For some, God’s Word takes very shallow root on rocky ground, but when difficulties arise it get’s abandoned.

For some, God’s Word takes fairly good root on thorny ground, but other things choke it out and it withers.

For some, God’s Word takes very good root, and it flourishes by reproducing.

The warning we have in Hebrews 3:7-19 is primarily a warning about the rocky ground.

Those who fall away from Jesus and his Word because their fear is bigger than their faith when difficulties come.

Kind of like the Israelites when they were afraid of dying of thirst or afraid of the giants in the promised land.

Through the preaching of God’s Word, the gospel, we have come to have faith in Jesus, we’ve come to share in Christ, to be a part of his household

But we’ve got to take care that our faith isn’t shallow, rocky-ground faith or we’ll end up falling away from Jesus.

And it takes other believers speaking into our lives to make sure that the deceitfulness of sin doesn’t make us think we’re saved when we really aren’t.

So, how do you know if you’re saved?

How do you know if you have shallow faith or deep faith?

How can you know?

Remember the self-examination I talked about earlier?

Do that, but also, check your response to this warning.

If you hear this warning and think, “blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,” then you haven’t heard Jesus’ voice in your heart, and I pray that the Lord would open your heart and mind to hear and understand his Word and be saved.

If you hear this warning and think, “that sounds nice, but surely my problems are more than Jesus can handle,” then your faith is shallow, and you need to be reminded more often and more forcefully about Jesus’ sufficiency.

If you hear this warning and think, “that doesn’t apply to me, I’ve got faith in spades,” then think again because that’s the deceitfulness of sin talking, and you have hardened your heart against Jesus.

If you hear this warning and think, “absolutely, I’ll make sure I don’t do what they did and I’ll hold on even tighter to Jesus,” then congratulations, the warning has done its job in your heart.

As the Holy Spirit wrote in Psalm 95:7–8 “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.”

So, we saw the example of unbelief from the Israelites.

And we were just exhorted to avoid their same mistake, to avoid unbelief by careful self-examination and encouraging each other to believe and to fight against sin by reminding each other of Jesus’ goodness and his power and his love for us.

Finally, the author of Hebrews is going to explain the danger in verses 16-19 so that we’ll be compelled to heed this warning.

Hebrews 3:16–17 ESV

For who were those who heard and yet rebelled? Was it not all those who left Egypt led by Moses? And with whom was he provoked for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness?

Hebrews 3:18–19 ESV

And to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest, but to those who were disobedient? So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief.

So, in light of the example and exhortation we’ve been looking at, we have here…

An Explanation of the Danger of Unbelief (16-19)

The author of Hebrews uses 3 rhetorical questions and answers to show us the danger of unbelief and to show us that we’re not immune to those dangers.

The first rhetorical question asks who the warning passage in Psalm 95 is about.

Who were those who heard and yet rebelled?

Who were those who saw God’s works, felt his love and care, heard his covenant promises, and yet…

Who were those who rebelled against God in spite of all they had seen and experienced and heard?

It was the Israelites, God’s chosen people, those he had just saved from slavery in Egypt by afflicting Egypt with 10 miraculous plagues.

The Israelites who he rescued from the violent pursuit of Pharaoh by miraculously parting the Red Sea.

The Israelites who he provided with mana and quail for food, and water to drink both from a bitter stream and from a lifeless rock.

The Israelites who he entered into a covenant with and promised, he PROMISED to give them the land of Canaan and that he would go before them and defeat their enemies for them if they would only trust and obey him.

They had everything they needed to trust God, to trust that he would make good on his promise to sustain them and protect them and give them the promised land.

But they still rebelled, they still doubted God’s power and goodness and faithfulness.

If they had all that evidence right before their eyes, and they still doubted, how much easier is it for us to doubt when our faith is not based on sight.

We look back on their fearful doubt of God, and all too often we think, “how could they do that?”

And we don’t realize that we are in a much more precarious situation.

Hear this account of the Israelite’s fearful doubt of God, and hold on all the tighter to Jesus knowing that you are prone to doubt and sin and prone to abandon Jesus just as much as they were, if not more so.

You are not immune to doubt, you are not above this warning.

The next rhetorical question also asks who the warning is about, but in the context it narrows in on God’s view of their doubt.

What does God think of our doubt?

How does God respond when we don’t trust his goodness, his power, his sovereignty, his faithfulness, his love for us?

How does he respond?

He’s provoked, he’s angered.

He sees our doubt, our unbelief, our distrust.

He sees it as what it really is, sin against him, sin worthy of death like all sin is.

With whom was God provoked for 40 years?

Those who disbelieved him in sin, and who ultimately died in the wilderness because of it.

With whom is God provoked today?

Those who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, who will ultimately die for their sin for rejecting Jesus.

Romans 1:18 “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.”

Now, if you’ve already put your faith in Jesus, then you don’t have to worry about provoking God to wrath because Jesus has already taken God’s wrath for all of your sin including your disbelief in the fear of your circumstances.

But your sin while you are saved, including doubting his character, still provokes him, but not to wrath… it provokes him to grief.

Ephesians 4:30 “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.”

Think of a child whose dad has provided for him and protected him and been faithful and loving to him his whole life.

He turns 16 and gets his drivers license and his first car, and he goes out driving and gets in a wreck and totals the car.

The fear of his circumstances and the influence of the world and the sin in his heart may cause him to try and hide it or to think, “I hope my dad doesn’t find out.”

And if he lies about it or tries to hide it from his dad who has only ever been loving and protective of him, how would that make his dad feel?

I’d be grieved, confused, possibly angry, wondering what I did wrong that he would hide this from me.

But if he remembers his dad’s love and provision and faithfulness, then instead of trying to hide it, he’ll ask his dad for help.

Where the world says, “I hope my dad doesn’t find out,” we ought to say, “I’ve got to call my dad for help.”

Because our dad, our heavenly Father and his Son and our Savior, Jesus Christ are more loving and more faithful than any earthly father.

So, don’t grieve him, don’t provoke him, don’t run from him in fear, but run to him in faith.

The last rhetorical question is again who the warning is about, but this time the context is about the consequences.

What were the consequences of their unbelief?

What are the consequences for our unbelief?

God promised that because of their unbelief, because of their sin, because of their disobedience, they would not enter his rest in the promised land.

The very first sin back in Genesis 3 started out as doubting God’s character, which led to disobedience, eating the fruit they were told not to eat.

The sin of God’s people in Numbers 14 started out as doubting God’s character all the way back in Exodus 17, which led to more doubt and disobedience, refusing to take the promised land like God told them to.

Willful sin, whatever it may be, starts out doubting God’s character, then that doubt leads to disobedience.

Now, sometimes we sin unintentionally, not realizing it’s sin in the moment either for lack of knowledge or lack of perception or being overwhelmed in the moment so we can’t think straight.

Those sins don’t start out as doubt.

But the willful sins, the high-handed disobedience when you know it’s wrong and you think about how it’s wrong in the moment, but you do it anyway.

Those sins start out as doubt, and its those sins that provoke the Lord because we legitimately ought to know better.

And those sins are what we are warned against throughout the book of Hebrews because deliberate, high-handed sin that comes from doubting God’s character from a hard heart is met with severe consequences.

Being barred from entering God’s rest.

The Israelites were unable to enter God’s rest in the promised land because of their unbelief.

You also will be unable to enter God’s rest in Christ if you don’t believe.

So, let this warning sink in, let it do it’s work, let it compel you to hold on even tighter to Jesus.

And if you don’t have a grip on Jesus yet, then let this warning compel you to reach out to him in faith, so that he will hold you fast.

Conclusion

So, we were given an example of unbelief in the Israelites so that we will learn from their mistake and not do what they did.

We were given an exhortation, specifically to avoid their mistake of unbelief by carefully examining our own hearts and by encouraging each other to remember the truth of gospel to avoid the deceitfulness of sin.

And we were given an explanation of the danger of unbelief, knowing that we are in a much more precarious situation than the Israelites, our unbelief provokes God’s wrath and grief, and the consequences are being unable to enter God’s rest.

The main application is as David said in Psalm 95:8 “do not harden your hearts.”

Don’t do what they did!

Don’t fall back in fear, step forward in faith because God is faithful and all good and all powerful and he loves you.

Don’t doubt God, believe him, rely on him because he’s the only one truly worthy to be relied upon.

Get your eyes off of your fearful circumstances, and fixed on the only one who is sovereign over our every circumstance.

So, what happens if we don’t hold on to Jesus?

We doubt his goodness and his power and the fear of our circumstances becomes bigger than our faith in him, and we provoke him by doubting his goodness or his power over our circumstances, and we are unable to enter the peace and assurance of his rest.

Don’t harden your heart against Jesus.

And if you have yet to put your faith in Jesus in the first place, then I beg you to do so right now.

Today, if you hear his voice, calling you to faith in him, to salvation from sin and death, then listen and do it, don’t harden your heart.

Jesus is God, the Son of God who became a human, died in your place, and then rose from the dead so that by putting your faith in him, you could be saved from your sin and the just penalty for your sin, death.

Jesus did all of that so you could be forgiven and enter his rest.

Don’t doubt him, don’t disobey, don’t harden your heart against Jesus.

Pray

Father, thank you for this warning.

Thank you for loving us so much that you would tell us where there is danger so that we will be careful and cling to you all the more.

Help us to do this every day, and help us to encourage each other in this every day.

Please impress upon our hearts and minds the goodness and faithfulness and sufficiency of your Son, Jesus.

Help us remember him in the midst of our fearful circumstances so that we will run to him in faith rather than away from him in fear.

I pray all of this in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Communion

Normally, we celebrate communion on the first Sunday of the month.

But this month, because of circumstances, we are celebrating it on the third Sunday, today.

Now, if you are visiting with us then you are welcome to join us in this celebration as long as you are a baptized believer not under church discipline.

We want to make sure that the assurance of salvation this celebration brings doesn’t give anyone who may not be saved a false sense of security.

So, as the men pass out the elements, if you are participating with us then just hold on to the elements and we will eat and drink together once everyone has them.

One of the things mentioned in the passage we just looked at was the exhortation to encourage each other with the truth of the gospel every day.

Hebrews 3:13 “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.”

This passage brings up the daily need to encourage each other with the truth of the gospel, and this communion celebration is exactly that, an encouragement of the truth of the gospel.

It’s a reminder of the truth of our salvation, the truth of Jesus’ love and power and faithfulness to save us from sin and death by giving his body and shedding his blood on the cross.

It’s a reminder of his sufficiency.

And we remind each other in this specific way, through this bread and cup… once a month.

I’ve got a question for you all, and I’d like to hear your answer to this question at some point, so feel free to chat with me after the service or give me a call or drop a text or an email.

My question for you is this:

How often do you think we should be specifically remembering the truth of gospel through communion?

How often?

Right now we celebrate once a month, but there are plenty of churches who celebrate at different frequencies.

Some celebrate once a year, some once a quarter, some like us once a month, and some once a week.

So, how often do you think we at GBC should be doing this?

I’ll leave you with that question to think on and let me know your answer later.

For now, let me read how Paul conveyed Jesus’ instructions about communion, then I’ll pray and then we’ll eat the bread and drink the cup together.

1 Corinthians 11:23–26 “For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.”

Pray

Father, thank you for this celebration of Jesus’ death on our behalf.

Thank you for this reminder of how much you love us.

I pray that you would help us to remember Jesus’ death, and to live and love like him as we are reconciled to you and adopted into your family because of him.

Please bless us now as we remember together.

It’s in Jesus’ precious name that we pray this. Amen.

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