Hebrews 4:14-16
“Now that we know what we have—Jesus, this great High Priest with ready access to God—let’s not let it slip through our fingers. We don’t have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let’s walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help.”
“So then, since we have a great High Priest who has entered heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to what we believe. This High Priest of our understands our weaknesses, for faced all of the same testings we do yet he did not sin. So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.”
Eating has entirely too much focus in my life. It has become idolatrous. It is easy to think of Jesus resisting sexual sin, pride, or self-interest. But gluttony? According to this verse in Hebrews the answer is yes indeed. He understands the siren call of a flavor. He knows the longing for comfort I choose to get from food instead of him.
Believers are called to walk right up to the Creator and accept the help he offers. Absurd. Yet this is the transaction he calls us to, his grace for our sins. It is ultimate reality, the world a mere shadow. For every human, all of creation and time comes down to this one bold exchange of eternal consequence.
Lord, I sense the hold of food weakening in me, but I am still in its power. Thank you for this small victory. Please set me free from this sin’s remaining bondage. Give me the desire and courage to walk right up to you and take the help you freely offer.
Hebrews 4:6-7
“Those earlier ones never did get to the place of rest because they were disobedient. God keeps renewing the promise and setting the date as today, just as he did in David’s psalm, centuries later than the original invitation: Today, please listen, don’t turn a deaf ear…”
“So God’s rest is there for people to enter, but those who first heard this good news failed to enter because they disobeyed God. So God set another time for entering his rest, and that time is today. God announced this through David much later in the words already quoted: ‘Today when you hear his voice, don’t harden your hearts.’”
We must pay attention to today. The past reminds us, and the future calls, but the only time we really have is this moment. When we leave good undone that particular opportunity will never come again. It is this moment’s sin that defiles us. Though eternal, God stands firmly in the middle of today. So should we.
Lord, time washes over me when I am ill. It happens so often now. I cannot understand how to live each moment more fully when my mind and body are so handicapped. Please, show me how.
Hebrews 4:2-3
“We received the same promises as those people in the wilderness, but the promises didn’t do them a bit of good because they didn’t receive the promises with faith. If we believe, though, we’ll experience that state of resting. But not if we don’t have faith.”
“For this good news- that God has prepared this rest- has been announced to us just as it was to them. But it did them no good because they didn’t share the faith of those who listened to God. For only we who believe can enter his rest.”
Hebrews equates belief and rest. When we believe, we rest from self-effort. Instead, we trust God, relaxing into his control. Unfortunately, we tend to smother our understanding of belief with our own cultural expectations. Rest evaporates into rules. We lose sight of the expressive diversity God placed within us. As always, the answer is Christ. Rest grows as we allow him to expand into us. There is no need for rules. He takes their place.
Lord, open my eyes to the rules of my life. Take their place. Grace me with growth into the freedom you give. Make me more myself, more responsive to your purpose for me.
Hebrews 3:19
“They never got there because they never listened, never believed.”
“So we see that because of their unbelief they were not able to enter his rest.”
Belief is an essential part of the religious experience. But listening? Listening is rarely mentioned yet receives equal billing here in Hebrews. What is listening and how do I develop a listening frame of mind? Listening is waiting upon God, being silent in one’s heart apart from physical circumstances. It should be our perpetual attitude before the father. The ability to listen grows with our knowledge of him, of his personhood and with experience of his voice. It is a position before the Father, being comfortable with silence. Gradually we sense a conversation with God developing. It is what we were made for.
Lord, give me grace to choose silence more often!
Hebrews 3:12-14
“So watch your step, friends. Make sure there’s no evil unbelief lying around that will trip you up and throw you off course, diverting you from the living God. For as long as God’s still calling it Today, keep each other on your toes so sin doesn’t slow down your reflexes. If we can only keep our grip on the sure thing we started out with, we’re in this with Christ for the long haul.”
“Be careful then, dear brothers and sisters. Make sure that your own hearts are not evil and unbelieving, turning you away from the living God. You must warn each other every day, while it is still ‘today,’ so that none of you will be deceived by sin and hardened against God. For if we are faithful to the end, trusting God just as firmly as when we first believed, we will share in all that belongs to Christ.”
Every day God gives to live must contain vigilance. The world dulls our senses so we’re likely to trip and fall. Only in Christ can we stay alert. When young, with children, my heart yearned for him though I had little time. Now I have the time of the aged and he calls me daily. Since he is outside of time the yearning of earlier years and the devotion of today are stacked up before him as one piece. It is as if the act of today is retroactively applied to the yearning of yesterday. It his grace, keeping me sure footed and upright whatever my circumstance.
Hebrews 3:6-11
“Today, please listen; don’t turn a deaf ear as in ‘the bitter uprising,’ that time of wilderness testing! Even though they watched me at work for forty years, your ancestors refused to let me do it my way; over and over they tried my patience. And I was provoked, oh, so provoked! I said, ‘They’ll never keep their minds on God; they refuse to walk down my road.’ Exasperated, I vowed, ‘They’ll never get where they’re going, never be able to sit down and rest.’”
“Today when you hear his voice, don’t harden your hearts as Israel did when they rebelled, when they tested me in the wilderness. There you ancestors tested and tried my patience, even though they saw my miracles for forty years. So I was angry with them, and I said, Their ‘Their hearts always turn away from me. They refuse to do what I tell them.’ So in my anger I took an oath: ‘They will never enter my place of rest.’”
Israel saw God’s miracles for many years in the desert and still they rebelled. Miracles don’t draw men to faith, they endorse God’s messenger. Faith comes from the desire of our heart and God’s Spirit. Some wonder why we don’t see more miracles today. At the Enlightenment we gave up the mystical for the scientific. Miracles today are merely things we don’t yet understand. But for those who walk by faith, miracles are everywhere.
The NLT and other translations read, “…never enter my rest.” I’d always read that as a spiritual rest or rest from material need. The Message says, “…sit down and rest.” A longing to cease physical labor, sit down and rest, is very familiar to me. I look forward to leaving this body of sin behind and enter an eternity free of striving against sin, ultimate physical and spiritual rest.
Lord, I feel fatigued, washed out and disconnected. Please continue to show me your miracles and give me rest.
Hebrews 3:1-2
“So, my dear Christian friends, companions in following this call to the heights, take a good hard look at Jesus. He’s the centerpiece of everything we believe, faithful in everything God gave him to do.”
“And so, dear brothers and sisters who belong to God and are partners with those called to heaven, think carefully about this Jesus whom we declare to be God’s messenger and High Priest. For he was faithful to God…”
It’s all about Jesus. His preexistence, his work, his words, his sacrifice and his resurrection unto glory. This more closely I look at him and the longer I walk with him the more I long to be faithful to what he has given me to do.
Lord, I have failed miserably at many things. But I believe you have redeemed much of my failure in that hidden way of yours. Some things I have done well, but only by your power and grace. I trust your goodness to bring fruit out of my lifes. I trust you for everything.
Hebrews 2:8
“What we do see is Jesus, made ‘not quite as high as angels,’ and then, through the experience of death, crowned so much higher than any angel, with a glory “bright with Eden’s dawn light.” In that death, by God’s grace, he fully experienced death in every person’s place.”
“What we do see is Jesus, who for a little while was given a position ‘a little lower than the angels’; and because he suffered death for us, he is now “crowned with glory and honor.” Yes, by God’s grace, Jesus tasted death for everyone.”
How can it be Jesus fully experienced the spiritual death we all deserve? Logically this extends to the penalty for my personal sins. Not only me but every individual who lives, has lived and will live in the future. The text does not say he suffered a death for generic sin but for individual sin. Almighty God is a wonder. He sustains the physical universe yet knows the secrets of every person’s heart.
Oh Lord! You are a mighty God. I cannot comprehend your reach, nor you love. You know my heart better than I. It is a comfort knowing you oversee the smallest details of my existence. I can trust you to lead me in the best way, along the only path to you, the focus of eternal bliss.
Hebrews 1:3-14
In this section the writer (The NLT lists a woman among possible authors!) uses many OT references to teach us of Christ. Five come from the Psalms, one from Deuteronomy. The scripture of the first century church was the Old Testament. They must have sifted through it like a chicken turning over garden soil looking for bugs, finding their Lord Jesus everywhere. These discoveries added to their excitement as they shared and waited for the Lord’s return.
I’ve had times like that in my life, a big change with emotional high, sure I knew where God was taking me. I found, as they did while waiting for his return, his purpose led in a different direction. What I thought would be simple turned out to be complex. I’ve learned to treat these kinds of emotionally charged events carefully. God does not follow human agendas. Ideally, we listen and follow his lead. Only prolonged, prayer gives us a fighting chance of getting it right.
Lord, like the early church, may I ever expect your coming. Remind me to pray before allowing my emotions to carry me away. Keep me always turned to you, my focus, my hope, my Lord.
Hebrews 1:1-3
“Going through a long line of prophets, God has been addressing our ancestors in different ways for centuries. Recently he spoke to us directly through his Son. By his Son, God created the world in the beginning, and it will all belong to the Son at the end. This Son perfectly mirrors God and is stamped with God’s nature. He holds everything together by what he says—powerful words!”
“Long ago God spoke many times and in man ways to our ancestors through the prophets. And now is these final days, he has spoken to us through his Son. God promised everything to the Son as an inheritance and through the Son he created the universe. The Son radiates God’s own glory and expresses the very character of God, and he sustains everything by the mighty power of his command.”
Somehow the preincarnate Christ organized the energy radiating from the father into apparently immutable matter. The closer science looks at subatomic parts the more apparent the entire universe consists of nothing but energy. I rejoice that those who were among the first to lead moderns away from God may be the first to lead them back. The Lord is performing his signature ‘inside out’ maneuver before our eyes. As science changes from pride to awe and wonder, research points ever more clearly to a creator. We must continue pointing to Jesus as that creator.
I love that God speaks to us in different ways. Hearing him speak into my personal existence is a kind of freedom. His voice is not bound by this law or that procedure. It is not confined to a person or institution. In my life it has come from some surprising directions.
Lord, I praise your ever-presence, creativity and love. I am amazed at your care for the mundane parts of my life. You are the solid rock I lean on as I navigate every moment of the day. Thank you Jesus for giving me a way into God’s heart.
Lamentations 4:6
“The evil guilt of my dear people was worse than the sin of Sodom— The city was destroyed in a flash, and no one around to help.”
“The guilt of my people is greater than that of Sodom, whose utter disaster struck in a moment and no hand offered help.”
Israel was sent into exile because they abused the poor and turned their backs on God. This verse says this abuse (love of money) trumps sex with the same gender. Money love is so insidious. Christians must look carefully into their own heart before dogmatically condemning same sex sex. That prohibition is meant for believers and church government. God alone knows the journey each person undertakes as they navigate this world’s brokenness. Let’s leave judgement to him and focus on learning to live together in love regardless our differences.
Lamentations 3:28-33
“When life is heavy and hard to take, go off by yourself. Enter the silence. Bow in prayer. Don’t ask questions: Wait for hope to appear. Don’t run from trouble. Take it full-face. The “worst” is never the worst. Why? Because the Master won’t ever walk out and fail to return. If he works severely, he also works tenderly. His stockpiles of loyal love are immense. He takes no pleasure in making life hard, in throwing roadblocks in the way.”
“Let them sit alone in silence beneath the Lord’s demands. Let them lie face down in the dust, for there may be hope at last. Let them turn the other cheek to those who strike them and accept the insults of their enemies. For no one is abandoned by the Lord forever. Though he brings grief, he also shows compassion because of the greatness of his unfailing love. For he does not enjoy hurting people or causing them sorrow.”
Anyone who suffers will find it validated in Lamentations. There are instructions for endurance too. Always the key is knowing God. A suffer in the walk of faith knows God hates his sin but loves his soul. This is the bedrock. Interpret everything else through it. Suffering is allowed out of love. We don’t understand and must trust God is carrying us in ways we cannot see but through hindsight. Feelings say otherwise, but we trust he lovingly surrounds and indwells us during tough times because he is who he is.
Lord, thank you for suffering, what you have done through it in my life. Its fruit is sweet. Let me not fear to go there again with you.