Take Care and Do Not Harden

0:00Good morning. We are back in Hebrews, so go ahead and turn there, chapter 3, verses 7 through 12. Hebrews chapter 3, verses 7 through 12. Remember back in week one of our walk through Hebrews, we talked about the reality that God spoke, right? Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke. We understand that God the Father spoke to and through various prophets, including Moses, to give his words, his laws, and his promises to his people. We also saw that God the Son, Jesus Christ, spoke. Christ spoke as both a prophet and God himself, as a man and as our Savior. He spoke and gave us a new covenant, one of everlasting grace. And he certainly also spoke loudly in his actions, specifically in his submission unto the cross. This morning we are faced with two specific commands from the text and a warning. The commands are this do not harden your hearts and take care. The warning is that a hard heart is a sign of unbelief. And an unbelieving heart will lead you to fall away from the living God. And given us these commands and a warning, the author completes the Trinity speaking by telling us that the Holy Spirit says. What we have before us this morning, then, are not words or commands or calls from the distant past. We are not combing the text to figure out what God said. No, we are tuning our ears and opening our hearts to hear God and all his triune fullness speak to us. 1 Thessalonians 2, 13. And we also thank God constantly for this. That when you received the Word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but as what it really was. The Word of God, which is at work in you, believers. I am doing something dangerously wrong if you are excited on Sunday morning to come hear me speak. Because I assure you that I have nothing worth listening to. We have a promise much greater and of far more value. And that is when you come to the house of the Lord, you come to hear from him. You come to have his living and active word pierce joints and marrow down to the very depths of your soul. I pray that our God moves me out of the way so that the power of his word accomplishes his purpose this morning. So we need to take care this morning. We need to hear his encouragement and his warnings as urgently and as powerfully as they were given directly to those who received this letter. Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. May it please the Lord to speak clearly to us today. So stand with me once more as we read chapter 3, starting in verse 7. Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your fathers put me to the test and saw my works for forty years. Therefore I was provoked with that generation and said, They always go astray in their heart. They have not known my ways. As I swore in my wrath, they shall not enter my rest. Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil and unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. This is the word of the Lord. Lord, I thank you again for your word. Please, Lord, speak for Christ's sake. It is in his name that I pray. Amen. The authority and the urgency of this message, as I have already alluded to. Our passage begins with the statement, as we just read, therefore, as the Holy Spirit says. When the author of Hebrews quotes Psalm 95 this morning, which is what he quoted and what we read, he doesn't say as the psalmist said, but rather brings it forward to the present tense and attributes the words not to the psalmist, but to the Spirit of God. And take care then not to miss what is happening. If the writer of Hebrews can pull forward a psalm written a thousand years previous and say that this is not something that was said, but that something that the Spirit of God is saying, do we assume that the same Spirit is still not speaking the same words for you today? These are not the author of the Hebrews' words, nor are they my words. They are the Spirit's words, God's words. And not in some strange new age or revelatory or prophetic way. Don't hear me say that, but nevertheless, when you open your Bible to read, or when you come to the service to hear the word expounded, you are hearing God speak to you. So please hear the authority in the text. Again, do not come to Sunday hoping that I have put something together throughout the week that is profound, because I promise I haven't, and it isn't. But what is profound is that you can arrive in hopeful expectation of being pierced by the very word of God. When you read during the week, humble yourself not before words on a page, but in the presence of the voice of God. Today, if you hear his voice. That is to say that the authority of God is speaking to you today. Not tomorrow, not next week, not when you get the job you were hoping for, not when you retire and finally have a little more time to study, not when you clean up your life. No, today he is speaking. 2 Corinthians 6, 1 to 2. Working together with him then, we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain. For he says, in a favorable time I listened to you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you. Behold, now is the favorable time. Behold, now is the day of salvation. The voice of God is speaking to you this morning. The Father and the Son and the Spirit are together speaking. Today is the day of salvation. Today is the day of forgiveness. Today is the day of restoration. Today is the day of sanctification. Today is the day of forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead. Today is the day to press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of Christ Jesus. Today is the day. The authority is here, and the urgency is here. So, what then is the message that is both urgent and authoritative? First, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. The people of God spent four hundred years enslaved in Egypt, forced into hard labor, with little reward, with little hope. And the grace of God sent Moses to deliver them from their bondage, right? And that same grace spared them from the death angel through the sprinkling of blood. That same grace parted the Red Sea so that they could escape. His grace led them with a pillar of fire and a pillar of smoke. He sent bread down from heaven to feed them, and water from a rock to quench their thirst. All of these things our God did for them in his grace. But how did they respond when their expectations were not met? And the whole congregation of the people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. And the people of Israel said to them, Would that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the meat pots and ate bread to the full. Not too long after that, John found himself in prison for preaching the good news and for telling the truth. It's quite evident that John's circumstances then did not align with his expectations. And when he heard about all the things that Jesus was doing, he sent word to Jesus and said, This are you the one who is to come? Or shall we look for another? Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. We look at such examples and we say, What fools these people were, right? But I say, if you were not prone to and guilty of the same error, the Spirit would have no need to say to you today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. Because he does say that to us today, it tells us that you and I are just as quick to turn against God. Over and over again, our gracious God has provided for you. He has. He has guided your steps and given you great joy. He has been with you and he's comforted you through dark days. He has sustained you when you weren't sure you had an ounce of strength left. He has kept you despite your wanderings. He has preserved your life in spite of all your irrational behavior. He has blessed you. He has cared for you. He has kept you. Let it not be said of you, then they always go astray in their heart. They have not known my ways. May it never be that the words of God apply to you. How long will this people despise me? And how long will they not believe in me in spite of all the signs that I have done among them? Trials come. Difficulty in exile is inevitable. But this must never be the cause of our hardened hearts. A.W. Pink says this: quote, testings reveal the state of our hearts. A crisis neither makes nor mars a man, but it does manifest him. While it's all smooth sailing, we appear to be getting along nicely, but are we? Are our minds stayed upon the Lord? Or are we instead complacently resting in his temporal mercies? When the storm breaks, it's not so much that we fail under it as that our habitual lack of leaning upon God, of daily walking in dependency upon him, is made evident. I contend that pink hits on the root of this hardening. We harden because we exchange dependency upon God for dependency upon ourselves. Our hearts are hardened in trials because the trials reveal that we haven't depended on God in the first place. More specifically, we have been resting in the temporal mercy of God as opposed to resting in God Himself. We cling to his gracious gifts as opposed to the gracious giver of the gifts. And you may say, okay, I get it, but what does that look like to depend on God? I want to show you the positive application of this. Jonathan Edwards experienced a very untimely death as a result of a smallpox inoculation gone wrong. And two weeks after his death, Sarah Edwards, his wife, wrote the following letter to their daughter. And I will try my best to read this without crying. I'll probably get through it. She wrote this, My very dear child, what shall I say? A holy and good God has covered us with a dark cloud. Oh, that we may kiss the rod and lay our hands on our mouths. The Lord has done it. He has made me adore his goodness that we had him so long, but my God lives, and he has my heart. Oh, what a legacy my husband and your father has left us. We are all given to God. And there I am in love to be. But that all of us could have half so much dependence on God. Surely we could then persevere in trials. And this surely doesn't mean that we don't grieve over loss or the call is to live in a mechanical or a robotic way, not at all. But it does mean that through seeking God in his word and prayer, we can become so thankful to him for his mercies, so dependent on him for his grace, that any and all circumstances become a greater and greater means by which we may love and give ourselves to him. Again, the Spirit says today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. The second command from our text is to take care. Take care of what is the question. Take care that our hearts are not unbelieving. Take care that our hearts are not unbelieving. With the previous references of the Israelites, right, in their rebellion, John the Baptist we talked about as context, we see that grumbling and complaining are the clearest indicators of a heart that is stricken with unbelief. Doug Wilson says this: complaint is the flag of ingratitude, and it waves above the center of unbelieving hearts. Romans 1, 21, for although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him. In a word, they were ungrateful. The root of ingratitude is unbelief. God says of Israel, they always go astray in their heart, they have not known my ways. How is it possible? How is it possible that after all of God, all that God did for Israel, they still did not know his ways? Right? How is it possible that the religious men of Jesus' day, who were supposed to be watching and waiting for the Messiah, could look God incarnate in the face and not see him? They didn't believe. They didn't believe. So stubborn to have their life and their God meet their own expectations, that when God sends bread down from heaven, their response is what? No meat? When the very one who formed them in their mother's womb stands in their presence, they say, crucify him. Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart. The heart is the issue, or perhaps the heart of the issue is failure to know, failure to believe, and failure to trust in God. Jesus in his high priestly prayer praised this: quote, this is eternal life. That they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. This is the high calling and command, and it's a very simple command. It's simple in statement. It's impossible without God. Know the only true God and Jesus Christ, whom He has sent. So often what happens is that we tether our belief and our trust in God in material blessings. The reality is this, that because our God is so good, he's so gracious, he pours out his blessings lavishly upon even those who hate him. He sends rain on both the just and the unjust. He causes the sun to rise on the good and on the evil. So blessings can't be the measure of a believing heart. They can't be. If it is, then you will only believe so long as the blessings continue. And when they slow or cease, the unbelieving heart is exposed, and you fall away from the living God. If you think that's not true, just read your Bible. Salvation that is true and sustaining belief has nothing to do with knowing blessings. Has everything to do with knowing God. Who blesses? And that's not even a subtle distinction, right? It's a clear and massive one. So the command is not to harden our hearts and to take care lest you have an evil and unbelieving heart. And those come with a warning. That if one doesn't heed those commands, there is no rest for them. And they risk falling away from the living God. I'll make it personal. If you do not heed those commands, there is no rest for you. And you risk falling away from the living God. I'm pouring a lot of guilt on you this morning, aren't I? That's okay. Hang with me. I think it's getting good now. Consider the temptations of Christ. There were three of them. He was tempted with food when he was hungry, with bread. And rather than grumble or complain over his hunger, he declared, Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. Where Israel failed to depend on God, Christ succeeded. He was tempted to test or try God, as our text alluded to this morning. And Christ replied, You shall not put the Lord your God to the test. Or Israel failed to obey God, Christ succeeded. He was tempted to turn from God and worship another. And Christ said, You shall worship the Lord your God and obey him only, and him only shall you serve. Or Israel hardened and rebelled, Christ worshiped and served. Where Israel wandered through the desert with an evil, hardened and unbelieving heart. Christ went through the wilderness in trust, obedience, perfect trust, and perfect obedience. And make no mistake, Israel's temptation is a hard and stark warning against failure.

24:32Okay?

24:33And their story should give us pause and cause us to think and evaluate. To ask, am I grumbling against God? Have I forsaken my dependence upon him in favor of some temporal mercy? Have I turned and worshiped another? Don't miss, though, that Christ's temptation, which was a near copy of Israel's, is a declaration of success. The glorious good news of the gospel is despite the fact that you are going to grumble and complain, you are going to try and test our God. You are going to exchange his glory for another. Christ has stood in your place to do that which you could not do. And give you a righteousness that you could never earn. And by that amazing grace, he has now given us the power to walk, that is, to believe, to depend, to obey according to this righteousness that he has so graciously given us. We can confess this morning with Paul, I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live, I now live in the flesh. I live now by the faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. You must not harden your hearts. And you will not harden your hearts. You must not have an evil and unbelieving heart, and you will not have an evil and unbelieving heart. Because it is no longer you who live, but Christ who lives in you. The remedy and the defense then is to trust in Christ. Trust through trial. Trust through success. Trust against self-righteousness or unmet expectations. Trust in all things at all times. Trust that we will make it through this exile. That he will provide for us and care for us if we would only trust in his provisions. Most importantly, among those provisions is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. So I ask you today, then, what have you trusted? In what have you been trusting? Are you listening to the authoritative and urgent message from your God? Today is a favorable time. Today is the day of salvation. Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. Take care, dear brothers and sisters, lest there be in any evil unbelieving heart. Instead, O come, let us sing to the Lord. Let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation. Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving. Let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise. For he is our God. And we are the sheep of his pasture and the sheep of his hand. Oh, come, let us adore him. Christ the Lord, amen. Let's pray. Lord, we believe. Help our unbelief. Help us to adore you. We thank you for Christ. We thank you for the mercy of Him, Lord, and what you have done for us through Christ. Help us to not harden our hearts, Lord, and in our circumstances and expectations, Lord. Soften our hearts, rather, to you. To your provision, to your care. Help us to take care that there is not an evil and unbelieving heart in us, Lord. Let us believe in you. I don't know if there is any here who hasn't, Lord. Please speak to them this morning. May we trust in you. We ask all these things in the name of Jesus. Amen.