Unbelief

Fix your eyes on Jesus

Hebrews 3:1-6 “Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of our confession; He was faithful to Him who appointed Him, as Moses also was in all His house. For He has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses, by just so much as the builder of the house has more honor than the house. For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God. Now Moses was faithful in all His house as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken later; 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.”

This is not a conditional statement, but a descriptive statement

“If we hold fast our confidence”

some take this to mean that we can lose our salvation

but that is not what it means. It is describing what believers look like not what could happen.

True faithfulness to God is demonstrated through time

Those who fall away never has the real thing to begin with

And Scripture teaches this over and over again

If salvation is a work of God through grace (which means we do nothing to earn it Eph 2:8 “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God;”

Then how could we ever do anything to lose it? If we are predestined to adoption, then how could we ever un-predestine ourselves?

God’s house is the dwelling place of God

Moses built the tabernacle

But he got the design from God

God dwelled in the tabernacle

Jesus built the church

God dwells in the people of the church

1 Pet 2:5 “you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”

God dwells on earth through His people!

John 14:20 “In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.”

Think about that!

God has built a house, and it tells the world what God is like.

Application

What is your life saying to the world?

Your private life, your home life, your hobbies, your words, your actions, your thoughts?

When the world sees you do they know you belong to Christ?

How do we remain faithful as part of God’s house?

Fix our thoughts on Jesus!

(v 1) “Therefore, holy brothers and sisters, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus”

Fix our minds of Jesus!

Don’t be distracted by this world and the pleasures of this world!

Do not spend your life chasing the things of this world! Chase Christ!

Listen to the voice of the Holy Spirit

Heb 3:7-11 Therefore, just as the Holy Spirit says, “Today if you hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts as when they provoked Me, As in the day of trial in the wilderness, Where your fathers tried Me by testing Me, And saw My works for forty years. “Therefore I was angry with this generation, And said, ‘They always go astray in their heart, And they did not know My ways’; As I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.’ ””

The Holy Spirit is the author of Scripture “just as the Holy Spirit says”

Have you ever thought about Scripture in that way? God is the author

It is tempting to think more along the lines of Paul wrote this or Matthew wrote this (they did)

The real author behind every verse in the Bible is the Holy Spirit of God.

When you read the Word of God, you are literally reading the spoken words of God.

And that should encourage each one of us to soak in His Word daily!

It’s not enough to hear others teach it!

Listen to what Peter says 1 Peter 2:2 “like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation,”

What do you think “the pure milk of the Word” is?

“if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts”

Do you know it is a gift from God to hear the voice of God?

To know right from wrong is a gift from God!

The ability to repent is a gift from God!

2 Tim 2:25 “with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth,”

Unfaithfulness to Christ begins when we harden our hearts to the voice of the Holy Spirit

There are times when we sin because of ignorance.

‘We simply do not realize what we are doing is sin

and there are times when we sin in rebellion against what God is telling us or has told us

When we hear God’s voice and harden our hearts to it, the voice become less and less noticeable

It becomes harder to hear God, and therefore easier to sin against Him

Example:

‘The children of Israel in the wilderness

They wandered for 40 years in turmoil and ultimately received judgement because they refused to listen to the voice of God

Does anyone know how God spoke to them?

through Moses

through Consequences

through supernatural things such as providing food, water, victory over enemies, and deliverance from slavery

Why did they go astray according to this Scripture?

They did not know the ways of God

Becuase thye did not understand the ways of God and so they grumbled against him. The wilderness was a place of testing that we all go through when we are delivered from sin. Undertsanding that we are tested and that we must learn to trust God is imperative to entering God’s rest.

Keep your heart pliable toward God

Heb 3:12-19 “Take care, brethren, that there not be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God. But encourage one another day after day, as long as it is still called “Today,” so that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end, while it is said, “Today if you hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts, as when they provoked Me.” For who provoked Him when they had heard? Indeed, did not all those who came out of Egypt led by Moses? And with whom was He angry for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? 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 not able to enter because of unbelief.”

The opposite of pliable is hardened

There are two words that define what it means to harden our hearts

rebellion (provoked)

An outright disobedience to what God has commanded whether in Scripture or in our hearts through His Spirit

testing (v 8)

This means to put God on trial

Make Him prove Himself to us

Both is these these stem from unbelief

The hardening of the heart is rooted in unbelief

What is the opposite of unbelief?

It is faith

What is faith?

Heb 11:1 “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”

The Christian walk is impossible apart from faith

We do all things by faith in God

And when we do not walk by faith, we walk in unbelief

And God will call us to walk by faith over and over because faith is a muscle that must continuously be exercised