Encourage One Another Daily

Hebrews 3:1-19

But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin's deceitfulness. (Hebrews 3:13)

I. The Heavenly Calling (1-6)

Look at verse 1: “Therefore, holy brothers, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, the apostle and high priest whom we confess.” This verse begins with the word, “Therefore...” This passage is the practical application of what we learned in chapters 1 and 2. In chapter 1, we learned that Jesus is far superior to the angles because he is God’s Son. Yet, in chapter 2, we learned that God made Jesus lower than the angels. Why? To save us. God made Jesus a man so that he could go through all of the sufferings we go through and die in our place. Chapter 2 is full of so many amazing and wonderful messages about what God has done for us. Today's passage s about how we should respond to what God has done for us through Jesus Christ. Verse 1 summarizes what God has done for us with the expression, "heavenly calling." This expression captures all that chapters 1 and 2 is getting at: God has given us a heavenly calling in Jesus Christ. Because we came to believe in Christ, we are called holy brothers [and sisters] because we have been saved by Jesus' blood and set on a new course--the course of God's calling. 

It is very important to understand what this means--the heavenly calling--because it gives us a clear idea of what the Christian life is about. Some people make the mistake of thinking that the Christian life is about believing in Jesus one time and then just going to church for the rest of their life. But the Christian life is not about one moment in my past--it is about one moment in my future. It is about the goal that I am aiming at--the heavenly calling that I have. When we hear that call as Christians, we believe in Jesus and repent of our sins and start heading in that direction. We need to understand that we are called to the kingdom of heaven, and we are not done until we are there. Our Christian life is like a pilgrimage to the kingdom of heaven. 

In The Pilgrim's Progress, John Bunyun describes what the Christian life is like through a story. He described the Christian life as a journey to the kingdom of heaven. Along that journey, the christian had to overcome all kinds of challenges and problems. It was very difficult for him to make it to the very end. In fact, he saw many people who started the journey but didn’t make it to the end. That is what this passage is talking about. 

We are holy brothers and sisters in Christ, and we have this calling, so the question is, “What should we do?” The answer is in verse 1: “fix your thoughts on Jesus, the author and high priest we confess.” The author of Hebrews summarizes what we should do in these words: “fix your thoughts on Jesus.” What does it mean to fix your thoughts on Jesus? Does it mean to think about Jesus with his long beard, robe, and sandals, walking through the streets and healing people? That might be helpful, but it is much more than that. The verse tells us what we are supposed to think about. Who is Jesus? He is the apostle and high priest whom we confess. 

What is an apostle? An apostle is someone who is sent out with a message to deliver. In  the old days, a king would send out an apostle to deliver a message to some people or someone. Jesus is God’s apostle. God chose his own son, Jesus, and sent him to us to give us the message--the calling to the kingdom of God. God gave us that calling through Jesus. Jesus made disciples, called them apostles, and sent them out with his message. They were Jesus’ apostles, but Jesus was God’s apostle. It’s good to listen to Peter and James, but they are Jesus’ apostle; Jesus is God’s apostle.

What about the high priest? The high priest mediates between God and man. He offers sacrifices to take care of the problem of sin so that the relationship between God and man can be restored. This is who Jesus is. 

Now, “fix your thoughts on Jesus who is the apostle and high priest we confess.” What it means is that we could not hear this heavenly calling if God had not sent Jesus, and we could not receive this calling if God had not sent Jesus. It is only in Jesus that the heavenly calling makes sense and is possible. So what should we do? We must fix our thoughts on Jesus. If you want to make it to the end of the journey and not get lost, what should you do? We should follow the one who knows the way; we should follow the one who went before us and made the way. That’s really what our Christian life is about. It is about this journey that we make to the kingdom of God that we do through Jesus. It is about the focus of our life, which is Jesus. 

In this passage, in verses 2-6, we see a practical example of what it means to think about Jesus and fix our thoughts on him. Look at verses 2-6: 

2He was faithful to the one who appointed him, just as Moses was faithful in all God's house. 3Jesus has been found worthy of greater honor than Moses, just as the builder of a house has greater honor than the house itself. 4For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything. 5Moses was faithful as a servant in all God's house, testifying to what would be said in the future. 6But Christ is faithful as a son over God's house.

The author of Hebrews emphasizes that Jesus is greater than Moses. I think he made this comparision because he was writing to Jewish Christians. As Jews, they grew up learning about Moses. They learned about the law of Moses. They knew that of all the servants of God in history, Moses was the greatest by far. If it was not for Moses, they would still be slaves in Egypt. They had a very high regard for Moses. But the author of Hebrews says that as great as Moses was, Jesus is greater. As worthy Moses is of listening to, Jesus is far more worthy. In fact, Moses is really a foreshadow of Jesus. What did Moses do? His mission was to bring the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt, through the desert, and into the Promised Land. What about God’s mission for Jesus? It is the same pattern. God sent Jesus to save us from slavery to sin and death, bring us through this barren world, and into the eternal kingdom of God. That’s why verse 5 says, “Moses was faithful as a servant in all God's house, testifying to what would be said in the future.” Moses gave the law of Moses, but in reality he was testifying to what would be said later on. He was setting up the message to come--the message that Jesus brought--the gospel. The Jewish Christians who were hearing this message should learn how important it was for them to fix their thoughts on Jesus. Many of them had the problem of legalism. They were focused on the law, but they didn’t know Jesus very well.

Not many of us have the problem of holding Moses in higher esteem than Jesus. In fact, before we met Jesus we used to hold so many worldly things in high esteem. But Jesus is greater than all these. Therefore, as Christians, we must see a transformation in our minds. It doesn’t make sense to confess Jesus as our high priest and God’s apostle but then have no room for him in our minds because our thoughts are full of worldly things. This calling that we have in Jesus gives us a completely different orientation for our lives; a completely different frame of mind. The thing is, however, that it doesn’t come automatically. We must make a choice: let us fix our thoughts on Jesus.

Look at verse 6: “And we are his house, if we hold on to our courage and the hope of which we boast.” This is another way of describing how wonderful God’s calling is. We believers are God’s house. This means more than just I am the wall, you are the sink. It means that we are God’s house; God’s house is made up of his children. We are God’s children. What a glorious thing to say: we are the children of God; we are the household of God. This is such a great calling. This is what Jesus did for us. But, there is a big IF. If what? If we hold on to our courage and the hope of which we boast. This tells us that, yes we are God’s children, but we haven’t made it there yet; there is still possibility of falling away. So we must hold on to courage and hope. 

On a daily basis, living by faith in Jesus requires courage to make tough choices. Think about the choice Jesus made--even the choice to die on the cross. This took courage, and Jesus’ courage was based on faith. What about hope? If you don’t have God’s hope, then what will happen when something in the world comes along and tempts you? It may lead you down a wrong path, far away from where you should be. So this is what the Christian life is. It is a life of heavenly calling and journey. It is a life that is center on Jesus and means living by faith with courage and hope. 

This is an encouraging and positive message, but we can’t stop here. The reality is that this issue is so serious and what is at stake is so important that we need to talk about this in more detail. So let’s think about the next point. 

II. The Problem (7-11) 

Look at verses 7-11: 

 7So, as the Holy Spirit says:

   "Today, if you hear his voice,

    8do not harden your hearts

   as you did in the rebellion,

      during the time of testing in the desert,

 9where your fathers tested and tried me

      and for forty years saw what I did.

 10That is why I was angry with that generation,

      and I said, 'Their hearts are always going astray,

      and they have not known my ways.'

 11So I declared on oath in my anger,

      'They shall never enter my rest.' "

These verses are from Psalm 95. The author of Hebrews uses this passage to help us understand the problem we face: the problem of unbelief. This is a problem that we might underestimate because we don’t really think about what it means to be unbelieving. It isn’t really talking about saying, “I don’t believe in Jesus any more.” It’s talking about unbelief that is evident in the choices we make in our lives. 

This passage refers to what happened after God used Moses to bring the Israelites out of Egypt. The plan was to make it into the land of promise. But along the way, they faced difficulties and hard situations. In the specific instance referred to in Psalm 95, they came to a certain place and there was no water. What did they do? They lost faith and complained. They said that it would have been better to be in Egypt. They totally forgot about what God had done for them and the promise God gave them. This unbelief made God so angry. God tried to help them, but they were persistent in their unbelief.

God called the Israelites out of Egypt with a mighty display of his power; ten plagues against Egypt; leading them with a pillar of fire and cloud. What more could you want to believe? Yet despite all this, they were constantly going astray. God summarized their problem in the words, “they have not known my ways.” They saw what God did, but they didn’t take it to heart. What was going on here was that though God was working, their hearts were only full of the things of this world. They could only think about food, drink, and being tired, and the long journey, and many more sinful things. They didn’t think about what God had done for them or God’s plan for them. Instead, whenever their sinful desire came up, they had the chance to choose between God and their sinful nature. What did they do? Consistently, they hardened their hearts to God so that they wouldn’t hear or think about anything that would prevent them from enjoying the pleasures of sin for a short time. God didn’t treat them like slaves--deriving obedience out of them with the threat of the whip. God wanted them to know his ways; to understand who he is and what he had in mind for them. But they wouldn’t do it. 

What was the result? Look at verse 11: So I declared on oath in my anger,'They shall never enter my rest.' "

What a shocking message! After God did so much to save them, God swore on oath and in anger that they would never enter his rest. These are the scariest words you can think of: “They shall never enter my rest.” From the beginning of creation, God planned to bring his children into his rest. But they would not let him; they wouldn’t listen. They continued to rebel until God finally said, “Enough!” This is a shocking message that shows us how serious and chronic the problem of unbelief is. Do you think that the Israelites were more corrupt than other human beings? No. They are not different from us. So, we shouldn’t think that we are good people and expect ourselves to do good things. No, we should expect that unless we do something about it, we will naturally go away from God. I am a sinner, and my sinful nature loves to sin and hates to hear what God is saying. My sinful nature will always harden my heart. This is the nature we all have in us. This is why the Israelites died in the desert. Out of about a million people, only two made it out of the desert. This is the problem. 

III. The Solution (12-19)

What, then, should we do? Look at verse 12: “See to it, brothers, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God.” The answer is obvious: see to it that you don’t have a sinful unbelieving heart. How do you know if you have a sinful, unbelieving heart? The author says that sinful unbelieving hearts “turn away from the living God.” That is the sign of a sinful, unbelieving heart: it is the heart that turns us away from the living God. So you face this choice daily. You are here, God is there, and the sinful thing is there. You hear God’s voice saying, “I have what’s good for you,” and the sinful thing says, “No, I have what’s good for you.” You have a choice to turn either to the living God or the dead idols. It is easy to think about this in terms of “bad” sins; but the reality is that is possible to look like a good, clean Christian and still have an unbelieving heart. For example, God may tell you that you need to come and have fellowship with him; at the same time, your sinful nature says, “No, let’s go online and read something interesting.” That is the moment that we make a choice. It may not seem like a big deal, but to make the wrong choice is very serious--it is to harden your heart and turn away from the living God. So often we think that it’s no big deal. We make excuses. We never say, “Oh, I’m going to harden my heart now.” No one says that, but it is what we do. We don’t notice it because we do it so much that we don’t even realize how serious it is to harden our heart to God’s voice.

How, then, can I keep myself from going astray? If I’m so prone to harden my heart and turn away from God, how can I not have a sinful, unbelieving heart? That is where the key verse comes into play. Look at verse 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.”

We are holy brothers and sisters; we share in the heavenly calling; we are God’s house. Therefore, we need each other. It is very hard to live the Christian life on our own. We are so sinful that we can’t rely on ourselves. But God has given us the fellowship of believers so that we can strengthen and encourage each other daily. As long as it is Today--and it is today--we need to help each other to overcome the problem of unbelief.

There are many ways we can encourage one another daily. If you are married, maybe you can encourage your husband or wife. Recently I experienced this kind of encouragement. Until recently, I wasn’t able to get up in the morning for personal fellowship with God. But about a month ago, one brother encouraged me and a few others to meet together in the morning for prayer and personal devotion.  This meeting has encouraged me a lot to come to Jesus in the morning and to listen to his voice. 

This morning, William called me to wake me up for the meeting. At first, I didn’t want to go. But because William called me, I knew I had to go; so I struggled to remember what I learned from this passage and fix my thoughts on Jesus. I remembered Jesus who got up early in the morning to pray. This helped me to go to the Center. When I arrived, I was greatly encouraged to see Charles, who has had a lot of trouble making it in the morning. I thought, “Good job, Charles, you heard the call and you didn’t harden your heart.” But there was one problem--Jason wasn’t there. William had called him, and Jason answered the call and made a good confession, “I’ll be there.” But he wasn’t there. Where was he? His body had fallen in the wasteland! But William didn’t give up. He called a second time and a third time--until Jason picked up the phone and came to the prayer meeting.  That’s the dynamic of how we can encourage one another daily. We need to struggle for ourselves, but when we have the encouragement of our brothers and sisters in Christ, we can be victorious. 

Let’s look at the conclusion of this passage. Look at verse 14: “We have come to share in Christ if we hold firmly till the end the confidence we had at first.” Remember what kind of confidence, zeal, and devotion you had when you first believed. If we aren’t careful, we will end up losing our confidence and end up worse off than we were at first. Look at verse 15: “As has just been said: "Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion."” This verse is repeated. It is very important. We must remember that Jesus is talking to us today; we must choose not to harden our hearts. The final warning is in verses 16-19: 

“16Who were they who heard and rebelled? Were they not all those Moses led out of Egypt? 17And with whom was he angry for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the desert? 18And to whom did God swear that they would never enter his rest if not to those who disobeyed[c]? 19So we see that they were not able to enter, because of their unbelief.” 

Remember the connection between unbelief and disobedience; belief and obedience. Those who were unbelieving were disobedient. It is not enough for us to believe in Jesus once. We must live by faith that what God has for us is better. God is calling us to obedience, not for the sake of obedience, but because he has what is truly good for us. We must trust in him and believe that what he is saying is true. May God help us to take warning from the Israelites. May God help us to be realistic about our sinful nature so that we would daily struggle not to harden our hearts, but to listen to God’s voice and obey by faith. 

One word: Encourage One Another Daily