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4:1 Psalm 95 recalls a pivotal moment in Jewish history as recounted in the Old Testament. After their deliverance from slavery in Egypt, the people complain of thirst. In response to their doubts and questions, Moses strikes a rock, and God causes water to gush forth from it (Exodus 17). The author recalls this story in order to urge his readers to faithfulness: we must not lose heart, lest we fail to reach the promised land, like those who questioned God in the desert.
4:4 In the creation account in the book of Genesis, God rests on the seventh day. The sabbath—from a Hebrew word meaning “resting”— became a day of rest, a gift of God to the Jewish people. In Hebrews, the sabbath rest is identi ed with the eternal rest of heaven.
4:9 “Oh, what the joy and the glory must be, Those endless Sabbaths the blessed ones see! Crown for the valiant, to weary ones rest; God shall be all, and in all ever blest.” Peter Abelard, 12th century (translated John Mason Neale, 1854)
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f. [3:14] Rom 8:17.
g. [3:15] Ps 95:7–8.
h. [3:16–19] Nm 14:1–38; Dt 1:19–40.
i. [3:17] Nm 14:29.
j. [3:18] Nm 14:22–23; Dt 1:35.
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a. [4:3] 3:11; Ps 95:11.
b. [4:4] Gn 2:2.
c. [4:5] Ps 95:11.
d. [4:7] 3:7–8, 15; Ps 95:7–8.
e. [4:8] Dt 31:7; Jos 22:4.
f. [4:12] Wis 18:15–16; Is 49:2; Eph 6:17; Rev 1:16; 2:12.
g. [4:13] Jb 34:21–22; Ps 90:8; 139:2–4.
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HEBREWS -
12Take care, brothers, that none of you may have an evil and unfaithful heart, so as to forsake the living God. 13Encourage yourselves daily while it is still “today,” so that none of you may grow hardened by the deceit of sin. 14We have become partners of Christ if only we hold the beginning of the reality rm until the end,f 15for it is said:
“Oh, that today you would hear his voice: ‘Harden not your hearts as at the rebellion.’”g
16h Who were those who rebelled when they heard? Was it not all those who came out of Egypt under Moses? 17With whom was he “provoked for forty years”? Was it not those who had sinned, whose corpses fell inthedesert?i 18Andtowhomdidhe“swearthattheyshouldnotenter into his rest,” if not to those who were disobedient?j 19And we see that they could not enter for lack of faith.
4The Sabbath Rest.
1Therefore, let us be on our guard while the promise of entering
intohisrestremains,thatnoneofyouseemtohavefailed. Forin fact we have received the good news just as they did. But the word that they heard did not pro t them, for they were not united in faith with those who listened. 3For we who believed enter into [that] rest, just as he has said:a
“As I swore in my wrath,
‘They shall not enter into my rest,’”
and yet his works were accomplished at the foundation of the world. 4For he has spoken somewhere about the seventh day in this manner, “And God rested on the seventh day from all his works”;b 5and again, in the previously mentioned place, “They shall not enter into my rest.”c 6Therefore, since it remains that some will enter into it, and those who formerly received the good news did not enter because of disobedience, 7he once more set a day, “today,” when long afterwards he spoke through David, as already quoted:d
“Oh, that today you would hear his voice: ‘Harden not your hearts.’”
8Now if Joshua had given them rest, he would not have spoken afterwards of another day.e 9Therefore, a sabbath rest still remains for the people of God. 10And whoever enters into God’s rest, rests from his own works as God did from his. 11Therefore, let us strive to enter into that rest, so that no one may fall after the same example of disobedience.
12Indeed, the word of God is living and e ective, sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating even between soul and spirit, joints and marrow, and able to discern re ections and thoughts of the heart.f 13No creature is concealed from him, but everything is naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must render an account.g
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