“Therefore, just as the Holy Spirit says, “Today if you hear His voice, 8 Do not harden your hearts as when they provoked Me, As in the day of trial in the wilderness, 9 Where your fathers tried Me by testing Me, And saw My works for forty years. 10 “Therefore I was angry with this generation, And said, ‘They always go astray in their heart, And they did not know My ways’; 11 As I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.’ Take care, brethren, that there not be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God. 13 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. 14 For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end, 15 while it is said, “TODAY IF YOU HEAR HIS VOICE, DO NOT HARDEN YOUR HEARTS, AS WHEN THEY PROVOKED ME.” 16 For who provoked Him when they had heard? Indeed, did not all those who came out of Egypt led by Moses? 17 And with whom was He angry 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 not able to enter because of unbelief.” NASB
“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 desert, 9 where your fathers tested and tried me and for forty years saw what I did. 10 That is why I was angry with that generation, and 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.’ See to it, brothers, 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 we hold firmly till the end the confidence we had at first. 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 fell in the desert? 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.” NIV
As we begin today it will be helpful for us to go to the Psalm that is being quoted in these first five verses of our text. We go there so that we can get a glimpse of the history behind these words, but also that we might observe a point of irony.
Let’s read Psalm 95
“O come, let us sing for joy to the LORD, Let us shout joyfully to the rock of our salvation. 2 Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving, Let us shout joyfully to Him with psalms. 3 For the LORD is a great God And a great King above all gods, 4 In whose hand are the depths of the earth, The peaks of the mountains are His also. 5 The sea is His, for it was He who made it, And His hands formed the dry land. 6 Come, let us worship and bow down, Let us kneel before the LORD our Maker. 7 For He is our God, And we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand. Today, if you would hear His voice, 8 Do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah, As in the day of Massah in the wilderness, 9 “When your fathers tested Me, They tried Me, though they had seen My work. 10 “For forty years I loathed that generation, And said they are a people who err in their heart, And they do not know My ways. 11 “Therefore I swore in My anger, Truly they shall not enter into My rest.”
Doesn’t it strike you as ironic – I hope it’s not just my twisted little mind – that we in the modern church sing a worship chorus from verse 6 and the first part of verse 7 of this Psalm, declaring Him as our Shepherd and Maker and calling for the hearer to come and bow down in His presence, yet the words which immediately follow in this song of the Bible warn against the very unbelief and disobedience that we all know is so often present in our own lives?
And that is a truth, Christ-followers, otherwise the writer to the HEBREWS would not have seen a need to give warning; the Holy Spirit would not have recorded these words for us here.
They were given to us in the Psalm to explain why God was angry with His people in the wilderness and why they were not allowed to enter His rest. But repeated here in our text they become a warning for and yes, even an indictment against us. For we too, easily forget the goodness of our God; we too, soon stray from His presence while taking selfish advantage of His provision and His mercies; we too, often neglect to consider Jesus, who should be the focus of our heart; like they, we also far too often think and act in unbelief.
SOME HISTORY
To understand the significance of God’s complaint against the people, recorded in the Psalm and quoted in our text, we go to Exodus 17 and read the first 7 verses.
“The whole Israelite community set out from the Desert of Sin, traveling from place to place as the LORD commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. 2 So they quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” Moses replied, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you put the LORD to the test?” 3 But the people were thirsty for water there, and they grumbled against Moses. They said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?” 4 Then Moses cried out to the LORD, “What am I to do with these people? They are almost ready to stone me.” 5 The LORD answered Moses, “Walk on ahead of the people. Take with you some of the elders of Israel and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. 6 I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink.” So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel. 7 And he called the place Massah and Meribah because the Israelites quarreled and because they tested the LORD saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?”
Meribah means quarrel, Massah means test.
Therefore in the Psalm we see the phrase, ‘as in the day of Massah in the wilderness’. It was a day of testing. God tested the people and they failed the test by testing Him in return.
Now what we need to do today is focus in on this incident with the children of Israel in the wilderness and determine precisely what it was that resulted in God being angry with them. We need to do this because our text in Hebrews 3 admonishes us to “Take care” to avoid their error. That is a very solemn warning and we must not take it lightly and skip on into the fourth chapter. Although, if you glance down at the first verse of chapter four you will see that it wouldn’t be much of an escape. So we may as well stay here and get the message.
THE DECEITFULNESS OF SIN
The first thing we have to make clear then, is that they sinned. It will not suffice to use vaguer labels; to say ‘they were deceived’ or ‘they were hardened’ or ‘they forgot’ or ‘they failed the test of their trial’.
These things are all true. The Bible says all of these things about them. But let’s just dig down to the root of this and admit that they sinned.
These people had recently watched as God did mighty miracles against their enemy and ultimately delivered them out of the hands and out of the lands of the Egyptians.
They had crossed the Red Sea on dry ground and then stood and watched as God drowned their enemy and their enemy’s horses and chariots in that same sea.
So when they find themselves in need of water, rather than trusting the God who commands the seas and the seas obey, they grumble against Him and quarrel against His chosen leader, and they even express a desire to go back to their old life.
This is sin. So we say that sin hardens and sin deceives, but let’s not go there until we first acknowledge that sin manifests in acts of the human will and determination.
Christians, this letter is written to believers, not to unbelievers, but to followers of Christ, and it warns against sinning. That is what is at the root of these warnings in Hebrews.
Let me tell you what Albert Barnes wrote in his Notes on Hebrews.
“Sin is always deceitful. It promises more than it performs. It assures us of pleasure which it never imparts. It leads us on beyond what was anticipated when we began to indulge in it. The man who commits sin is always under a delusion; and sin if he indulges it, will lead him on from one step to another until his heart becomes entirely hardened. Sin puts on plausible appearances and pretences; it assumes the name of virtue; it offers excuses and sugarcoating, until the victim is ensnared and then, spellbound, he is hurried on to every excess.” Barne’s Notes on the Old and New Testaments – Hebrews, Baker Book House, 1949
The people countenanced sin in their lives and their hearts were hardened and they were deceived into failing to trust God in the day of testing.
Christians, even as believers, we must be always prepared to examine ourselves, our intentions, our contemplations, our daily decisions, and take care not to countenance sin in our lives and in our hearts. Because as the days go by a veil will grow between us and the Spirit who leads us and it will thicken in our deception until we no longer hear His voice. Then, when the trial comes, we will not believe God and will not trust God and we will find ourselves caught fast in a mire of disobedience.
THE EVIL UNBELIEVING HEART
Let’s go back up to verse 12 of our text now, and talk about this thing we are warned to avoid; ‘an evil, unbelieving heart’.
Here there is another thing we must be clear on. I said it earlier but I will repeat with more strength now. This is a letter to believers in Christ. There is no language in this letter to imply that the writer was assuming some percentage of the audience was not part of the true church.
This has presented a great deal of difficulty over the years and will continue to do so, as much of the language, especially in the various warnings the writer gives throughout the letter, speaks of actions and attitudes that we would normally only attribute to an unsaved person.
So on the one hand a Bible teacher may teach the perseverance of the saints – what we commonly call ‘eternal security’ – then he comes here and hardly knows how to approach these difficult statements.
Now I want to assure you here and now that I do believe in the eternal security of the believer, and I can not teach anything less; the Scriptures compel me. I’ll ask you to remember this as we go along and do not begin to think that I am contradicting my past teaching or Biblical doctrine.
While the true, Spirit-filled believer in Christ is eternally secure by the grace and keeping of God, who cannot change, the believer still struggles against the sin nature. When you believed, if you are a Christian, your sin nature did not die. Sin did not die. You, in Christ, died to sin’s mastery and power. That is the very reason God can justly command you with the things that are said in Hebrews and the warnings against sinful behavior that we find in other books of the New Testament.
The sinner without Christ can only sin. The person in Christ can say ‘no’ to sin because of the power of the risen Christ which now gives him life and because of the Helper who has come to dwell in him.
So when the author of this letter says that we should take care – and notice he once again says, ‘brethren’, so there can be no misunderstanding about who he addresses – take care lest there should be in any one of us an evil, unbelieving heart, in falling away from the living God, we can clearly understand from this Holy Spirit-inspired admonition that in each one of us is the potential for the sin nature to be nourished by our neglect, empowered by our disobedience and served by our unbelief.
Christians, we came at some point in history and believed the proclamation of the Gospel for salvation. But I think that in very many Christian hearts and lives that was the last time some people ever believed or trusted God for anything.
Until there is absolute surrender of the human will and heart and mind to the fact that God has purchased us with a price and now Masters us, and until we come to the place of understanding and believing what Jesus meant when he likened us to branches of the Vine that can do nothing – accomplish nothing – apart from Him, until then, we will never live and behave in obedience that derives from belief in His goodness toward us and His power to complete the work He has begun, keeping us all the while in His divine hand.
Many, many, Christians active in the church and sincere in their fundamental belief of the Gospel, will refuse prayer for their circumstances and go on refusing to pray for themselves, because down inside they just don’t believe God will hear and answer.
I have heard it somewhere said that, ‘Unbelief never has enough proof’.
And I am afraid that is the condition of many Christian hearts. They want proof before they’ll completely trust in the Christ who saved them. And Christians, when we grumble about our lot in life and when we quarrel and rail against church leadership over petty issues that have nothing to do with anything but our lust to have our own way, and when our behavior is governed and driven solely by the flesh fueled by our fallen nature, we are as the children of Israel in the wilderness, who challenged and tested and disbelieved God until His anger burned against them, and He said, “They always go astray in their heart”!
The nation in the wilderness finally stepped over the point of no return, when they wanted to go back to the place they had been delivered from.
“We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost—also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic. But now we have lost our appetite; we never see anything but this manna!” Numbers 11:5-6
We never see anything but this manna. The bread from heaven. God’s provision for their sustenance
They preferred the fish and the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic of Egypt, forgetting the whips of the taskmasters and the burden of the bricks and the sun’s burning heat on their necks.
Christians, don’t forget the sinfulness of sin. Never forget what you were delivered from. Never let the lures of Egypt make you want to turn your back on God’s provision for your eternal life.
Don’t despise the Bread!
“Jesus then said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it is not Moses who has given you the bread out of heaven, but it is My Father who gives you the true bread out of heaven. 33 “For the bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven, and gives life to the world.” 34 Then they said to Him, “Lord, always give us this bread.” 35 Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst.” Jn 6:31-35
What made God angry? What makes God angry?
Unbelief! Unbelief that brings a man or woman to turn their back on the cross of Christ, heart-hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.
The Apostle Paul issued a more pointed warning using these same people as his example.
“For I do not want you to be unaware, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea; 2 and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea; 3 and all ate the same spiritual food; 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock which followed them; and the rock was Christ. 5 Nevertheless, with most of them God was not well-pleased; for they were laid low in the wilderness. 6 Now these things happened as examples for us, so that we would not crave evil things as they also craved. 7 Do not be idolaters, as some of them were; as it is written, “THE PEOPLE SAT DOWN TO EAT AND DRINK, AND STOOD UP TO PLAY.” 8 Nor let us act immorally, as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in one day. 9 Nor let us try the Lord, as some of them did, and were destroyed by the serpents. 10 Nor grumble, as some of them did, and were destroyed by the destroyer. 11 Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of the ages have come. 12 Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed that he does not fall.” 1 Cor 10:1-12
This is the Apostle from whom we get our doctrines of grace, folks, and he is warning against falling. Not out of salvation, but out of fellowship with the Lord who saves!
GOING BACK TO THE ‘THEREFORE’
Now I want to take us all the way back to the beginning of our text verses. Look at verse 7.
“Therefore, just as the Holy Spirit says, ‘Today if you hear His voice…’”
Do you see what we’re being offered here? We believe that all Scripture is God-breathed, do we not? And we believe that when we say ‘Scripture’, we’re talking about the Old and New Testaments of the Bible, do we not?
So look here. The Holy Spirit has inspired this author of the New Testament book, to confirm that the Holy Spirit speaks, and He inspires the writer to refer back to an Old Testament passage that also confirms that the Holy Spirit of God speaks.
Do you see it? Scripture confirming Scripture – the Holy Spirit confirming His own Word. This is powerful! This is compelling!
To you and to me today, the Holy Spirit speaks to our hearts and says, ‘This is what I am saying to you, as I have said in the ancient past, there is a ‘Today’ for you…there is a ‘now’ for you…but you do not know when that ‘today’, when that ‘now’ will end. I am speaking and I am repeating what I have spoken, for your good and for your protection and for your safekeeping… DO NOT HARDEN YOUR HEARTS!”
This is not the harping preacher, Christians. This is not the doting mother or the encouraging uncle or the faithful Sunday School teacher. This is God in and through His inspired Word, pleading, warning.
This is the very heart of your Creator, crying out to you from the pages of Scripture – because if you can read these words, if you can hear them being spoken to you, then you have not gone too far. “TODAY”, He says, “Today”, he implores, “Today, if you hear His voice”, today, if you hear these words, DO NOT HARDEN YOUR HEARTS IN UNBELIEF!
Look what happened to these people in the wilderness, whose bodies fell there through disobedience and unbelief. Look at them because they are given to us as an example. Take care! Take care!
Can it be said strongly enough? I wonder.
When I think about the relative ineffectiveness of the church in 21st century America, I have to wonder if this is not the message we all should have been screaming from the pulpits of our land for the last 50 years.
At least.
Well, this entire portion we are studying today is for warning and exhortation, and it sheds very unpleasant light on the heart condition of that generation that came out of Egypt, with the exception of a small handful.
But there is a bright ray of light right in the middle of it all and I want to spend the remainder of our time focusing there. Next week, as we go into chapter 4 we will come to talk about what the text means when it refers to God’s rest. We’ll talk about those who miss it and those who enter into it.
For now though, look at verse 14 of chapter 3
PARTAKERS OF CHRIST
“For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end,”
In order to get the full impact of what is said here we need to have the wording of it smoothed out for us a bit.
The Holman translation says it like this:
“For we have become companions of the Messiah if we hold firmly until the end the reality that we had at the start.”
The word that most of our translations render ‘partakers’, has to do with partnership; with sharing.
You may remember that it was used in verse 1 when we were called, ‘partakers of a heavenly calling’ – and might I also remind you at this point that the admonition there was to consider Jesus.
So as those called of God we are sharers with Christ, we are partners and fellow partakers in a heavenly calling.
The encouragement here, is the reminder that we have all come to a reality of God and Heaven through our union with Christ; an assurance of things to come to which we hold fast as to an anchor in a storm.
Don’t let the English rendering of the verse throw you when it says ‘if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end.’
Some have made much of this, trying to assert that this verse proves that the believer can be lost.
What is being conveyed here, is that the evidence of saving faith and true union with Christ is the continuance of the obedience of faith. The true believer stays with Christ.
We’ve known of people who seemed to be believers for a while, then they fell away completely. There are people in history who have been written about for their infamous failures of faith.
We have a two-sided coin here. Jesus said, “If you abide in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine” Jn 8:31
How do they know if they are truly His disciples? By their continuance of faith and belief in His word, which, of course, is evidenced in obedience.
On the other hand John, in his first letter to the church, chapter 2:19, talks about those who, “…went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, in order that it might be shown that they all are not of us.”
And we have Biblical examples of this in Demas, whom Paul said loved the world too much so he deserted the faith, and Ananias and Sapphira, who lied to the Holy Spirit, and Paul mentions to Timothy some unnamed but multiple deserters who did not stand with him in his defense.
So what is our lesson in this and how do we end on a positive note?
Christians, we are sharers with Christ. We are partners with Christ, the Creator, the Heir of all things, the Son of God who shed His blood and died for our sins and rose from the grave for our life.
We have in us the Helper, the Holy Spirit who leads us always to Jesus, and our confidence, our assurance to which we cling dearly, is that He is here to help us truly believe, truly trust, truly obey.
It all goes back to the beginning of the chapter. Consider Jesus. Make Jesus the focus of your heart. You know, we all shake our head in wonder at people who idolize celebrities and famous politicians or scientists or authors and so on, when they are so eaten up with these people that they study their lives and talk about them constantly and just drive thinking people from the room with their gushing adoration for this heroic figure of their life focus.
But that is precisely what would be proper for us to be like for Jesus. Go ahead. Consider Him your hero. Consider Jesus the One to talk about and emulate and adore. He is worthy.
And by the way, people might shake their heads in wonder that you’re so ‘eaten up’ with this Jesus. That’s ok. You just tell them you are a sharer with Him in a Heavenly calling, and invite them to come along.
Today, while it is still called ‘today’, don’t let your heart be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin that comes out of unbelief and manifests in disobedience. Instead, believe He can do anything. Trust Him to care for you and bring you through to the end. Give Him the obedience that comes from a firm assurance that He has made you a partaker with Christ, and glory is your future and Heaven your home.
