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Wednesday September 11 - Stand firm... hold tight We are his house, if we hold on to our courage and the hope of which we boast. Hebrews 3:6
My friend was surprised when I said I enjoyed watching good defending under pressure in sport. I guess that’s why I love those Old Testament passages in which God’s people have ‘their backs to the wall’ and he urges them, through his spokesmen, to stand firm. Both Moses and King Jehoshaphat, centuries apart, called upon their beleaguered and vulnerable people to “stand firm and see the deliverance the Lord will bring you” (Exodus 14:13; 2 Chronicles 20:17). Now the pressurised Hebrew Christians are urged to hold on to courage and solid hope firmly ‘to the end’ (v 14). Paul says something similar in Colossians 1:23: “...continue in your faith (in Christ), established and firm, not moved from the hope held out in the gospel” – hope both sure as an anchor and a permanently valid passport into God’s presence now and forever.
Persevere! That’s what the writer is telling his readers as a central theme of this book and as a message to grasp. Remember the parable of the sower and the people whom Jesus compares to rocky soil, receiving the seed of the gospel with joyful enthusiasm; but when troubles come, their lack of rootedness means “they last only a short time” and “quickly fall away” (Mark 4:5-6, 16-17). No, we must apply ourselves to the daily task of faith and discipleship, for true disciples of Christ are those who persevere to the end.
Father, by your Word and your Spirit help me stand firm for you – to the end. Amen.
Thurs September 12 - Learning today from yesterday
“Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts...” Hebrews 3:7-8
“Go on with Jesus, don’t look back to Moses” sums up our writer’s teaching. Yet we can learn by reflecting on Moses and his time! Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 10:1-11 that the Israelites’ behaviour and fate are warnings, and our writer agrees. Indeed, a later generation of Old Testament Israelites were likewise warned through the words of Psalm 95, quoted here.
Our writer refers to Moses’ followers experiencing God’s mighty deeds: deliverance from Egypt, opening the Red Sea, giving the Law. Yet when problems arose, like food and water shortages and powerful enemies ahead, they soon turned against Moses and God, hardened their hearts in unbelief and disobedience, and tested the Lord’s patience. They were doing something more serious than breaking rules; they were rejecting a Person, their own true God. As a result, God shut the door to the Promised Land.
Now our writer brings this up to date as a warning to the Hebrew Christians: ‘See to it that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God’ (v 12). When the going is hard, don’t let your hearts be hard too, and don’t let sin deceive you (v 13). When we listen to Satan’s tempting and slip into sin, Jesus drifts far from our minds and our hearts grow harder.
Remember and stand firm! Persevere – and keep on persevering!
“Oh that today you would listen to his voice” (v 7). Help me, Lord, to listen and obey. Amen.
PRAYER FOR TODAY
PRAYER FOR TODAY
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