We are going to turn again to the Epistle to the Hebrews, and we will read together in Hebrews 3.
In this passage, we are reminded that what we have in this epistle is for today. Today. “Today, if ye shall hear His voice.” So this message which we are considering in the Epistle to the Hebrews is for today.
Hebrews 3:1-4
Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of our confession;
Who was faithful to Him that appointed Him, as also was Moses in all His house.
For He hath been counted worthy of more glory than Moses, by so much as He that built the house hath more honour than the house.
For every house is builded by some one; but He that built all things is God.
Hebrews 3:5-6
Now Moses indeed was faithful in all His house as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were afterward to be spoken;
But Christ as a Son, over His house; whose house are we, if we hold fast our boldness and the glorying of our hope firm unto the end.
Hebrews 3:7-11
Therefore, even as the Holy Spirit saith,
Today if ye shall hear His voice,
Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation,
Like as in the day of the trial in the wilderness,
Where your fathers tried Me by proving Me,
And saw My works forty years.
Wherefore I was displeased with this generation,
And said, They do always err in their heart:
But they did not know My ways;
As I sware in My wrath,
They shall not enter into My rest.
Hebrews 3:12-19
Take heed, brethren, lest haply there shall be in any one of you an evil heart of unbelief, in falling away from the living God:
But exhort one another day by day, so long as it is called Today; lest any one of you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin:
For we are become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our confidence firm unto the end:
While it is said,
Today if ye shall hear His voice,
Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation.
For who, when they heard, did provoke? Nay, did not all they that came out of Egypt by Moses?
And with whom was He displeased forty years? Was it not with them that sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness?
And to whom sware He that they should not enter into His rest, but to them that were disobedient?
And we see that they were not able to enter in because of unbelief.
Hebrews 4:1
Let us fear therefore, lest, a promise being left of entering into His rest, any one of you should seem to have come short of it.
Shall we pray a moment?
Lord, our wisdom is foolishness; our knowledge is ignorance; our strength is weakness. We are altogether incapable of being what You want us to be, or understanding what You want us to learn, except it be according to Your promise: You teach us and lead us into all truth by Your Holy Spirit.
So, Lord, please lay Your hand upon us and breathe upon us. Give us the ear that is opened, and the tongue of the taught, that we may be able, with words, to encourage one another; to fulfil the ministry, one to the other, that will build us up and bring us on into maturity, that we may be ready and suitable to our high calling of which You are speaking to us.
O Lord, grant it, we pray, for Your name’s sake. Amen.
We began to look at the Epistle to the Hebrews last night, and those of you who were here will no doubt bear with me a little if I try to bring those who were not here up to date—somewhat, anyway.
We said that this is a unique epistle, of course. For one thing, there is so much Old Testament history here, recorded for our instruction. We are very slow to learn from history, but the Lord gives us opportunity, especially in His Word, from the history of the Old Testament, to learn important things for today. That is certainly evident in this Epistle to the Hebrews.
We have drawn attention to the fact that here in the Epistle to the Hebrews there are two churches. There is the church in the wilderness, the church of the Old Testament, failing. There is the church of the firstborn, which is a New Testament church, whose names are written in heaven.
There is the possibility, the danger, that we also may fail. Therefore, the Lord in His grace speaks to us here in this epistle.
We have concluded four things. First, the subject of this epistle. What is it? The world to come.
Hebrews 2:5
For not unto angels did He subject the world to come, whereof we speak.
So there we are told quite plainly what the subject of this epistle is. We might not so readily perceive, understand, or see it, but there it is, plainly stated: Hebrews 2:5. “The world to come, whereof we speak.” That is the subject.
But there is a theme running through too. What is that? Bringing many sons to glory.
Hebrews 2:10
For it became Him, for whom are all things, and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the Author of their salvation perfect through sufferings.
Bringing many sons to glory. What glory? The glory of the world to come, the age to come.
What is the glory of the age to come? It is the throne of the Lamb—the throne of the Lamb. His glory shall fill all the earth in that day, the age to come, the age of His glory, bringing many sons to that glory.
The Lord Jesus said in Revelation 3:21:
Revelation 3:21
He that overcometh, I will give to him to sit down with Me in My throne, as I also overcame, and sat down with My Father in His throne.
So there it is: bringing many sons to glory, the glory of His throne, to sit with Him, that He could say, “Behold, I and the children whom God hath given Me.” That is victory, is it not? Well, that is the theme of Hebrews.
The glory of the world to come—the holy place, the most holy place. Not about that here; the most holy place. What is it? It is the place that our Lord has. There is no holier place than that which He has, seated at the right hand of the Majesty on high. Having made purification for sins, He sat down there.
And then, to whom is this epistle addressed? First, the subject; second, the theme; and then those to whom it is addressed. You say, “The Epistle to the Hebrews—must be to the Hebrews.” Well, see in Hebrews 3:1 what it says: “Therefore, holy brethren.” Are you in that company? Then it is to you. It is to us.
Holy brethren. We saw last night that that clearly indicates progress—some progress. This letter is not written to the unbeliever. It is not merely to the babes there may be in Christ. It is to those who had progressed, to some extent, in Christian experience, that they can be called holy brethren.
So it is to you, if you fit in there, and to me, thank God. But there is still something more in this verse. What is it?
“Holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling.” Partakers of a heavenly calling.
Holy brethren—those in whom some sanctifying work of our Lord has been done—have a holy calling. That is referred to in 2 Timothy as a holy calling. Here it is referred to as a heavenly calling. In Philippians it is referred to as an on-high calling.
2 Thessalonians 2:14
Whereunto He called you through our gospel, unto the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Wonderful. Incredible. Unimaginable. I could not believe it if it were not written in the Word: called by the gospel, not just to receive the forgiveness of sins, not just to be cleansed by the precious blood of Christ, not just to have hope of heaven or assurance of heaven—called to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Partakers of a heavenly calling, consider—consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of our confession.
Why is there this exhortation to consider Jesus? Because though we may have covered some of the ground in the path of holiness, though we may have attained to some degree of sanctification—purifying of mind and heart and will—that does not mean we have finished the course.
There still remains progress to be made, dangers to avoid, obstacles to overcome, victories to be won. Consider Jesus.
Earth is not the end. Holiness is not the end. The glory is the end.
But we have to remember—and that is really what this message is all about—what is the message? The subject is the world to come. The theme is bringing many sons to glory. Those to whom it is addressed are holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling. What is the message?
The message may be put very simply, as we referred to last night in Hebrews 4:1:
Therefore, let us fear, lest, while a promise remains of entering into His rest, any one of you should seem to have come short of it.
Or Hebrews 6:1:
Hebrews 6:1
Wherefore leaving the doctrine of the first principles of Christ, let us press on unto perfection.
We still have to make progress. Whatever degree of sanctification we may have attained by His grace, we still have to press on. We have not reached the end, because the end is our high calling, our career in the world to come.
And so the apostle, in this verse—which might very easily be a starting point for us in our study—says in Hebrews 3:1, “Consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of our confession.”
Why is He put into this dual role: Apostle and High Priest? Very fitting. Who has written this Epistle to the Hebrews? Some Bibles may have “Paul’s Epistle to the Hebrews,” but that is wrong. Who is the Apostle of this epistle? It is our Lord Jesus Christ.
What is the function of the apostle? It is to come out and speak. That is the One who is speaking. He is the One who is speaking in this epistle.
Hebrews 1:1-2
God, having of old time spoken unto the fathers in the prophets by divers portions and in divers manners,
Hath at the end of these days spoken unto us in His Son.
He is the speaker—God speaking in His Son. He is the Apostle of this epistle, and that is what Hebrews 3:1 says, is it not? “Consider Jesus, the Apostle.”
There is no longer any controversy, surely, as to who is speaking in the Epistle to the Hebrews. It is the Son. And if it is the Son, that surely indicates how important the message must be. The greater in status and character the messenger, the greater the message must be.
If you want to send a message that is not very important, well, you will send it by one of your children. You will say, “Here, take this letter to so-and-so.” Unimportant messages you can trust to perhaps unreliable carriers. But important messages you do not entrust to uncertain carriers or couriers.
The messenger, the Apostle, here speaking to us, indicates how important the message is: none other than the Son.
And what does it say in Hebrews 12:25?
Hebrews 12:25
See that ye refuse not Him that speaketh. For if they escaped not when they refused Him that warned them on earth, much more shall not we escape who turn away from Him that warneth from heaven.
And what we read in our passage tonight: “Today, if ye shall hear His voice, harden not your hearts.” It is an important message. It is for today, and it is brought to us, spoken to us, by none other than the Son.
That is how our Lord came into the world, is it not? Unlikely from a natural point of view, of course, but what do we read in Hebrews 10? He comes into the world speaking.
Hebrews 10:5-7
Wherefore when He cometh into the world, He saith,
Sacrifice and offering Thou wouldest not,
But a body didst Thou prepare for Me;
In whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin Thou hadst no pleasure:
Then said I, Lo, I am come
(In the roll of the book it is written of Me)
To do Thy will, O God.
He came into the world—God incarnate—entered speaking.
How good it is. Hindu gods, they have mouths but they cannot speak; they have ears but they cannot hear; they have hands but they cannot do; they have feet but they cannot walk. But our Lord, entering the world, has full capacity and faculty. He came speaking.
Our attention is given a number of times to what He says. There are Bibles, or New Testaments, which print in red the words of the Lord. You know that, I suppose; you have sometimes seen that New Testament, in which all the words that the Lord spoke are in red. If you have such a New Testament, you say, “Oh, I never knew He did so much speaking.” But He has spoken.
See what we read in John 8:45:
John 8:45-46
But because I say the truth, ye believe Me not.
Which of you convicteth Me of sin? If I say truth, why do ye not believe Me?
Ah, He came speaking the truth. He speaks the truth.
And see John 7:45-46:
The officers therefore came to the chief priests and Pharisees; and they said unto them, Why did ye not bring Him?
The officers answered, Never man so spake.
His speech was distinguished from all others.
And in John 6:63:
John 6:63
It is the Spirit that giveth life; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I have spoken unto you are spirit, and are life.
Life-communicating words. Wonderful. I used to wonder how, by the foolishness of preaching, people got born again, or got new life. Well, here is the explanation: His words communicate life, because His words are spirit and life.
Here is the Apostle. He is the Apostle in this epistle, in this message that is for today. And if today you hear His voice, harden not your heart.
Wonderful that finally it should be in the person of God’s own Son, our Saviour and Redeemer, that we have the message. What is it? What is it all about?
John 14:2-3
I go to prepare a place for you.
And if I go and prepare a place for you, I come again, and will receive you unto Myself;
That where I am, there ye may be also.
Fantastic, is it not? Incredible. We should be where He is. And where is He? He is in the most holy place. That is the place to which He intends to bring us.
But we must give attention to the Speaker, the Apostle. Not only that: He is spoken of here as High Priest.
Now there is something more, surely, in that. “Holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of our confession.” What does that indicate? Why should He occupy this role of High Priest?
What was the function of the priest? The function of the priest was to come out and take in. To come out to the altar, and then to take in. So there were two movements of the priest: to come out and to go in. That is His function here.
Having come out and made one offering—to cover everything, to make every contingency, every need—having made one offering, He goes in with His own precious blood. Ah, that opens a way for us to go too.
As we read in Hebrews 10, is there access for you and me? Is there access for the church, a corporate body? Access to the most holy place? Is there any ground upon which we can stand within the veil, in the presence of the unveiled glory of God there?
Yes, there is ground of access. He has opened a way and taken us in. If you will enter, if you will appropriate—you listen to the Apostle; you appropriate the Priest—then we enter within the veil.
He is a wonderful Priest, a wonderful Priest. He is not like the priesthood of the Old Testament, which was subject to weakness and subject to death. He is One who ever liveth, liveth in the power of an endless life. He is the One after the order of Melchizedek.
Hebrews 5:5-6
So Christ also glorified not Himself to be made a high priest, but He that said unto Him,
Thou art My Son,
This day have I begotten Thee:
As He saith also in another place,
Thou art a priest for ever
After the order of Melchizedek.
Not according to the order of Aaron. Here is something much more in the person of Jesus as the High Priest—more than there ever was in the case of Aaron.
We are told that we have a Priest who is merciful and faithful. That comes to us at the end of Hebrews 2. Notice what it says in Hebrews 2:17-18:
Therefore He behooved in all things to be made like unto His brethren, that He might become a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.
For in that He Himself hath suffered being tempted, He is able to succour them that are tempted.
He is described—the Priest, our High Priest—is described in two ways: merciful and faithful.
Merciful toward our weaknesses. And we are a host of weaknesses, are we not? Have we not all a host of weaknesses? Merciful toward our weaknesses. Why? Because He Himself has suffered. He Himself has been tempted in all points as we are.
How good it is that He was. You can never say to the Lord, “You do not know, Lord. You have not been this way. You have not experienced this.” You can never say that.
He has in all points suffered, being tempted—exposed to temptation and feeling how awful it would be if He should yield to temptation. He suffered being tempted.
That is difficult for us to imagine, because we do not feel suffering merely by being tempted. But our Lord, in all His sinless perfection, suffered any suggestion that He should do this or that which might be following the heart of man, the disposition that is with us.
Merciful to our weaknesses. But then it says, “faithful.” Faithful. What does that mean? It means intolerant of any direction in which our wills may lead us astray.
I did not realise until recently that our will has so much to do with our Christian history. I read in Tozer that it is not the affections that we perhaps are betrayed by so much as it is our will.
Our will is a tremendous factor in progress or digression in our spiritual history. The heart acts upon the will.
Here in Hebrews 3 that we read, there is a very miserable portrait of God’s people. From verse 12:
Take heed, brethren, lest haply there shall be in any one of you an evil heart of unbelief, in falling away from the living God.
An evil, unbelieving heart. And then, in Hebrews 3:16-19, we read of those who provoked Him, those with whom He was angry for forty years, those whose bodies fell in the wilderness, and those who did not enter His rest because they were disobedient.
Here is a miserable portrait of God’s people—of you and me—who are prone to an erring heart, or an evil heart, or a hardened heart.
If we made a brief analysis of that portion, surely that is what we have there:
But that characterised those whom the Apostle here is warning and exhorting: that we can miss it all; we can fail to enter into that to which we are called, by a will that is influenced either by an erring heart, an evil heart, or a hardened heart.
And the faithful Priest—our High Priest, a faithful One—cannot tolerate any will that is not falling in line to move with Him in His purpose and thought for us.
Let us hear. Let us hear, if we will, what He is saying to us here tonight. “Today, if ye shall hear His voice, harden not your hearts.”
There is quite a bit about discipline, of course, in this letter, in this epistle. Why? Because we do not attain maturity without discipline. A child never becomes a son if there is no discipline. We never become partakers of God’s holiness without discipline. That is made so plain, is it not, in Hebrews 12?
Hebrews 12:2-6
Looking unto Jesus, the Author and Perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising shame, and hath sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
For consider Him that hath endured such gainsaying of sinners against Himself, that ye wax not weary, fainting in your souls.
Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin:
And ye have forgotten the exhortation which reasoneth with you as with sons,
My son, regard not lightly the chastening of the Lord,
Nor faint when thou art reproved of Him;
For whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth,
And scourgeth every son whom He receiveth.
How important spiritual maturity is. We should grow up into sonship.
There is a difference between the Jews and the Greeks. The Jews never referred to a male child as a son before he had passed what they call the bar mitzvah, that means the point where he passed from childhood into adulthood. In their case, it is in the early teens.
But the Greeks might refer to a male child as a son right from the beginning. Not so among the Jews. Son has the thought of maturity.
And what does it say here?
Hebrews 12:7-8
It is for chastening that ye endure; God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father chasteneth not?
But if ye are without chastening, whereof all have been made partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons.
Hebrews 12:10
For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed good to them; but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness.
Thank God for discipline. Do you? Do you? If you do, it is because you have realised He is treating you not as a child, but as a son, as one with infinite potential.
I remember so well a point in our life when Father treated us as sons. My brother and I are twins, and on one occasion a relative came in trouble to ask Father for a loan, or for help financially.
Dad was always cautious, and on this occasion he did not know what to do. So he took us aside and said, “Boys, what shall I do? Do you think I should help this cousin?”
Well, I remember saying—I did not mean to be pious—but I remember saying, “Dad, the Scripture says, ‘Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away.’”
But that was not the thing that impressed me: that I had an answer for Dad. The thing that impressed me was that Dad was now treating us as sons, coming to counsel with us, or share with us.
That is what it means to grow up. That is why God wants sons, not babies. That is what He says about the future: bringing many sons to glory.
Some people do not like us to differentiate, from the Scripture, between children and sons. “What manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called children of God; and such we are.” Yes, hallelujah. That is the beginning only, though; it is not the end.
Children is good, but sons—attaining to maturity, in which there can be sharing and partnership. That is what is before us here.
Growing up involves discipline. So do not complain when there is the discipline of God in your life, because He is faithful. Our High Priest is faithful, and He cannot tolerate any conflict between His will and our will.
So He wants, by all means, dealing patiently with us, to bring us into line, to agree with Him, so that we may progress. Progress.
Here it says, “They entered not in.” They entered not in.
What a chapter in human history, when the death rate was more than the birth rate. Present-day governments might be glad if it were so, that the death rate were more than the birth rate. But it was a tragedy in this case.
In the wilderness, in forty years, there were 1,820 fewer in the camp of Israel than there were at the beginning. How many more there should have been! But the death rate was overtaking the birth rate.
About forty-one were dying every day and forty were being born. So there was a discrepancy. You read it in the Book of Numbers: chapter 1 is the first census, and thirty-eight years later is the second census. That is why Numbers is called Numbers: numbering the people.
It is incredible to see that the death rate overtook the birth rate. That is what is brought before us here as a tragedy, provoking God’s anger, as He said, “You shall not go in. You shall not attain to that to which you are called.”
So Hebrews 6 opens with this second exhortation, or warning.
Hebrews 6:1-3
Wherefore leaving the doctrine of the first principles of Christ, let us press on unto perfection;
Not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God,
Of the teaching of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment.
And this will we do, if God permit.
That is not to be despised, not to be neglected; but go on from the foundation to the superstructure. Let us press on to maturity. We will not neglect the foundations, no; but we must go on.
Hebrews 6:4-6
For as touching those who were once enlightened and tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Spirit,
And tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the age to come,
And then fell away, it is impossible to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him to an open shame.
A very difficult passage. Do you think it is a reference to believers being lost? No. It is just reminding us of Israel’s history: those who had so much, and yet failed, fell short, did not enter to enjoy and possess their inheritance.
Five things are said about them, and all are true of the nation of Israel. You say, “This is New Testament language.” Yes, but it is truth that applied to the nation in the wilderness—Israel, who came out of Egypt.
It says, “enlightened.” Enlightened. Were they enlightened? Yes, they were. In Exodus 3:
Exodus 3:8
And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey; unto the place of the Canaanite, and the Hittite, and the Amorite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite.
To bring them up into that land. It is referred to more than once. This is that in which they saw their future. They were given, by the words of the Lord, to see their future. They were enlightened.
They knew their deliverance from Egypt was not to die in the wilderness, but it was to enter and possess the land. They were enlightened. They knew their destiny, given to them by the Lord.
Do we? Are we aware? Are we enlightened? Surely, by what we have been saying, if you have grasped anything, we know we are called to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. We are enlightened.
Then secondly, it says, “have tasted the heavenly gift.” What was that? That was the water, the water of life, in Exodus 17:6-7.
Exodus 17:6
Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in Horeb; and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water out of it, that the people may drink.
The water of life. You know how the apostle interprets that in 1 Corinthians 10:4:
And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of a spiritual rock that followed them: and the rock was Christ.
The gift—they tasted the heavenly gift—living water. Jesus referred to it when He met the woman at the well: “The water that I shall give you, ye shall never thirst; it shall be living water, a well of water springing up.”
And thirdly, “have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit.” You say, “Oh, that is New Testament.” No, no—Old Testament too. It was Israel’s experience: made partakers of the Holy Spirit.
Numbers 11:17
And I will come down and talk with thee there: and I will take of the Spirit which is upon thee, and will put Him upon them; and they shall bear the burden of the people with thee, that thou bear it not thyself alone.
Numbers 11:25
And the Lord came down in the cloud, and spake unto him, and took of the Spirit that was upon him, and put Him upon the seventy elders: and it came to pass, that, when the Spirit rested upon them, they prophesied, but they did so no more.
Here is a partaking of the Holy Spirit. That is confirmed in Isaiah 63:11:
Then He remembered the days of old, Moses and His people, saying, Where is He that brought them up out of the sea with the shepherds of His flock? Where is He that put His Holy Spirit in the midst of them?
So that nation had experience of the Holy Spirit. They were partakers of the Holy Spirit.
And then fourthly, it says, “have tasted the good word of God.” Now you can say, “Well, all these things belong to us.” Amen. I hope they do. But notice: they belonged to Israel too.
They tasted the good word of God in Exodus 24. When the Lord gave the word to Moses, and Moses brought it to the people, what did they say? “What He has said to us, we will do.”
Exodus 24:7
And he took the book of the covenant, and read in the audience of the people: and they said, All that the Lord hath spoken will we do, and be obedient.
Lovely, is it not? And what did Moses later say, speaking of this nation, in Deuteronomy 4:8?
And what great nation is there, that hath statutes and ordinances so righteous as all this law, which I set before you this day?
What a nation. What a privilege. They tasted the good word of God.
And finally, here in Hebrews 6, it says, “and the powers of the age to come.” Fivefold experience—wonderful, precious, unique to that nation:
So they had the earnest of the age to come. What are the powers of the age to come? Well, they are evident in supernatural evidence. That was wonderfully true for the nation of Israel, according to Exodus 8.
Exodus 8:22-23
And I will set apart in that day the land of Goshen, in which My people dwell, that no swarms of flies shall be there; to the end thou mayest know that I am the Lord in the midst of the earth.
And I will put a division between My people and thy people: by to-morrow shall this sign be.
The Lord was going to make a distinction—the distinction of redemption, the margin says. Redemption makes people distinct, but the distinction of redemption was going to be evident in that nation. God was separating them from Egypt.
See Exodus 9:4:
And the Lord shall make a distinction between the cattle of Israel and the cattle of Egypt: and there shall nothing die of all that belongeth to the children of Israel.
Incredible. The Lord made a distinction. The cattle of the Egyptians were judged, were cursed, but there was no damage to any of the Israelites’ cattle. That is only one of the things.
It says in Exodus 9:7 that Pharaoh sent, and behold, there was not even one of the livestock of Israel dead. But the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, and he did not let the people go.
Here is an experience of the supernatural. Here is an experience of the age to come, because that is going to be beyond this world, going to be in the realm of the supernatural.
You may go through these chapters. It is very exciting: when there was darkness in all the land, there was light in all the dwellings of His people. When the hail destroyed all the crops in Egypt, the land of Goshen was preserved. The Lord made a distinction.
They had evidence of the power of the world to come—the difference between that which is natural and that which is of God.
But why is all this said in Hebrews 6? To show how possible it is that, with all the advantages that God’s grace and God’s jealous activity give, we may fail. We may come short. We may miss the mark.
“And then have fallen away”—Hebrews 6:6. Having been enlightened, being gifted with life, and having tasted, or experienced, the Holy Spirit and the Word of God and the powers of the age to come, have fallen away.
Hebrews 6:7-8
For land which hath drunk the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them for whose sake it is also tilled, receiveth blessing from God:
But if it beareth thorns and thistles, it is rejected and nigh unto a curse; whose end is to be burned.
Beloved of God, He has been good to us, has He not? Has He not been gracious? Has not divine grace not only put within our reach, but given us experience of Himself in all those ways so vital to our growth and progress and preparation for the age to come?
The Lord has been so good to us. But we are exhorted by this tragedy, this failure, this falling short, to be on the watch and on the stretch, and to press on—not to take the end in something that we have experienced now. It is not the end; it is only part of the progress, our future career.
There are Pentecostals, people who are called Pentecostals. There are people who are called charismatics. There are churches that are called Pentecostal, and there are churches that are called charismatic.
The tragedy is that they can lose, and to some extent have lost, their spiritual edge, and have declined in their experience of the Lord, because they have not seen the end to which everything was to contribute.
Oh, it is so important that our destiny should be so clear to us that whatever we may receive of His grace and goodness, protection and deliverance, shall not lead us astray to a false security and imagination that that is all right—we are on the way.
No. The overcomers are going to sit with Him in the glory of the age to come. They who overcome.
I knew an Indian brother, and he said to me once, “All believers are overcomers, as you know, in the end.” I thought, “Are they? Would you say they are? Would you say all believers are overcomers in the end?” I do not think so.
I said, “No, brother, you are wrong. Otherwise, there is no reason why we should be exhorted, encouraged, admonished, and warned, if it was certain we were all going to overcome in the end.”
The apostle Paul said, “I have not attained, but I am pressing forward.” I mentioned it last night when he wrote to the Philippians: forgetting the things that are behind. Things that are behind—past history—can be a hindrance.
There are some things we should not forget, but there are some things we should forget. They can be a hindrance to our progress.
Philippians 3:13-14
Forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching forward to the things which are before,
I press on toward the goal unto the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
That is what we have to be concerned about: the end, attaining to that to which we have been called; the most holy place, which we have a right to enter and experience now to some extent, but which is going in fullness to come to us in the age to come.
Beloved of God, let us hear what the Apostle is saying to us in this epistle: warning, admonishing, inciting, encouraging, lifting, and providing. For we have a great High Priest, like unto Melchizedek. Amen.
O Lord, how foolish and weak are our words; how poor our conception, our understanding. But we thank You, Lord, if we have seen a little of the outskirts of Your ways, heard a whisper from You.
Oh, give us the ear that hears. Give us the heart that responds and the will that acts, that we may not fall short. May we not be satisfied with anything less than that which You propose and that for which You call us.
The apostle Peter said, “Give diligence to make your calling and election sure.” He left us in no doubt that there was that on our part which had to be done. Attention had to be given. Watchfulness had to be exercised. We must not slacken or be turned aside.
O Lord, we pray that we may see, that we may see; that we may be among those enlightened as to our destiny; that our destiny shall now influence our present behaviour; that we shall not miss the way or fail to attain unto that which You have called us for.
So, Lord, bless Your Word to us, and please add what we cannot add, what we cannot see yet. Add, Lord, by our meditation upon what You have said. We pray for Your name’s sake. Amen.