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Hebrews 3:16

Hebrews 3:16 Wh has heard and rebelled? Let’s just review the background to this verse. The Israelites had been slaves in Egypt ,and they cried out to the Lord for deliverance. Their dilemma seemed to be impossible to resolve, there was no way that the Egyptians were going to allow this expanding meal ticket to leave their land! God sent Moses to negotiate with Pharaoh, and the negotiating tools were 10 plagues, some of which did not affect the area of Goshen where the Hebrew slaves dwelt. After a catastrophic night when the firstborn of the Egyptians were slayed, the slaves hustled their way out of Egypt towards the Red Sea. Now they faced another dilemma, with the clouds of dust from the Egyptian chariots on the horizon, the people found themselves trapped on the shore of the Sea until the Lord miraculously heaped up the waters for a night and allowed the fleeing Israelites to pass through. The waters returned as soon as the Egyptian army attempted to follow, and they were drowned! T...
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Hebrews 3:15

Hebrews 3:15 Do not harden your hearts  This statement must be important; it is a word for word repeat of what has already been clearly set out in verses 7-8. The same words are also used in Psalm 95:7-8 which were obviously fresh in the Hebrews writer’s mind. In Psalm 95 the warning is not related to Israel’s refusal to believe that God would make it possible to claim the Promised Land, rather it refers to separate rebellions whilst the people were on their wilderness journey. Two places are mentioned; Meribah and Massah where they grumbled and complained because there was no water, and Moses was commanded to strike a rock. Meribah means rebellion or quarrelling and Massah means testing. (Exodus 17:7) There appears to be a separate incident at another Meribah, 40 years later, which is described in Numbers 20. On this occasion, after a wonderful experience of the Lord’s glory, Moses was instructed to speak to the rock, however, in frustration and anger he disobeyed and struck it ag...
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Hebrews 3:14

Hebrews 3:14 Our original conviction Jesus Christ is so gracious and generous in His willingness to share Himself with all those who accept him and believe in Him. He is open and available to all of us, He makes Himself fully accessible no matter who we are; every true follower has immediate and complete access to His wisdom, His comfort and His power. One of the exciting things about travelling is to meet other believers and to instinctively form a bond with them, it is as if we had known them all our lives! We share the same hopes, similar experiences and we love the same Lord and even though they are strangers, these people quickly become our friends. No other religions can make these claims! Now we need to ask ourselves some important questions: - What was our original conviction? What drove us to faith? What changed, the day we surrendered to Christ? What did we see about ourselves that led us to believe that Jesus Christ was the only solution and the one who could save us? Think ...
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Hebrews 3:13

Hebrews 3:13 Today! There will come a date in history, when the Lord God will judge this world and all who have ever lived in it. There are grounds to believe that all true followers of Messiah will face His judgement in the sense that we will be made accountable for our lives and at that time various rewards will be handed out. The catastrophic Judgement Day that the whole unbelieving world will have to face is described in Revelation 20 where it is referred to as “the great white throne.” On that day the dead will be judged and those whose names are not found in the Book of Life will be thrown into the lake of fire. That terminal moment in Scripture is often referred to as “the Day “or “Judgement Day” or the “Day of the Lord.” The period of time leading up to this is called collectively, “the last days”.  It follows that when the expression “Today” is used it is not speaking of the end times but the present day, the day when we all still have the opportunity to hear God’s voice a...
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Hebrews 3:12

Hebrews 3:12 See to it, brothers and sisters The author of this epistle to the Hebrews suddenly changes his focus, he has used Israel as an example and a lesson as to what can go wrong in our relationship with the Lord God and now, he changes the point of his argument and puts the onus on us -  the church, early believers and in 21 st  Century, in other words, you and me. We are the brothers and sisters that need to take these lessons on board. If we have sinful, unbelieving hearts then we too risk losing our claim to the Promised Land, we too may waste our lives wandering in the wilderness instead of finding fulfilment in the promises of God.  I have struggled for many years to understand the context of what now follows. Does Hebrews teach us that we can lose our salvation? Does it claim that there are many who have been delivered from slavery to sin, but who actually never make it to the eternal rest that God has prepared? Listen carefully to the description given ...
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Hebrews 3:11

Hebrews 3:11 They will never enter my rest! None of us are capable of putting ourselves in God’s shoes! But many of us have been, or are, parents. We know what it is like to have the very best hopes and ambitions for our children, we can see their potential and encourage them to take steps to fulfil it, but rarely does it go exactly as we planned! There is rebellion implanted in the hearts of all human beings, even our kids, and we are all born with an inclination to ignore advice and to do things our way.  God did so much for those ancient Israelites, He used miracles to deliver them from Egypt, He parted the Red Sea and calmly drowned the Egyptian soldiers who were in pursuit. He fed and watered them on their journey and led them to Mount Sinai where, for the first time in human history, He revealed His heart and the means by which those people could honour and obey Him. He was not a merciless tyrant, who insisted on unquestioning subservience, He was a compassionate Father who w...
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Hebrews 3:10

Hebrews 3:10 Their hearts are always going astray The unbelief of the Israelites and their insolence in questioning God’s ways led to Him being exceedingly angry with them. He accuses their  “Hearts of always going astray .” What does this mean? Are there lesson here for us? Firstly, our hearts go astray when we adamantly refuse to listen to God’s voice. They also go astray when we realise He has spoken but we question His judgement! Our hearts also go astray when we look at situations and problems and evaluate them with human wisdom rather than through the eyes of God. There must be countless occasions in all our lives when the Lord has issued instructions for us to proceed with his plans, but we see the obstacles, we look at our own in abilities, we measure the risks and fail to trust Him to carry us through. What an indictment of our faith it is when we spend years “in the wilderness in disobedience” and someone else has to come along and pick up the reigns and carry out the tas...
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