{"id":22215,"date":"2024-07-05T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-07-05T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mailchi.mp\/urc\/daily-devotion-friday-5th-july-2024"},"modified":"2024-07-05T06:00:00","modified_gmt":"2024-07-05T05:00:00","slug":"daily-devotion-friday-5th-july-2024","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.trinitywimbledon.org\/index.php\/daily-devotion-friday-5th-july-2024\/","title":{"rendered":"Daily Devotion Friday 5th July 2024"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hebrews 3 <\/strong>(with OT quotes in italics)
 
1 <\/sup><\/strong>Therefore, brothers and sisters, holy partners in a heavenly calling, consider that Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession, 2 <\/sup><\/strong>was faithful to the one who appointed him, just as Moses also \u2018was faithful in all God\u2019s house.\u2019<\/em> 3 <\/sup><\/strong>Yet Jesus is worthy of more glory than Moses, just as the builder of a house has more honour than the house itself. 4 <\/sup><\/strong>(For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God.) 5 <\/sup><\/strong>Now Moses was faithful in all God\u2019s house as a servant, to testify to the things that would be spoken later. 6 <\/sup><\/strong>Christ, however, was faithful over God\u2019s house as a son, and we are his house if we hold firm the confidence and the pride that belong to hope.<\/p>\n

7 <\/sup><\/strong>Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says,
      \u2018Today, if you hear his voice,<\/em>
8<\/sup><\/strong>     do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion,
      as on the day of testing in the wilderness,
9<\/sup><\/strong>     where your ancestors put me to the test,
      though they had seen my works 10 <\/sup><\/strong>for forty years.
      Therefore I was angry with that generation,
      and I said, \u201cThey always go astray in their hearts,
      and they have not known my ways.\u201d
11<\/sup><\/strong>    As in my anger I swore,
      \u201cThey will not enter my rest.\u201d\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n

12 <\/sup><\/strong>Take care, brothers and sisters, that none of you may have an evil, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. 13 <\/sup><\/strong>But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called \u2018today\u2019, so that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. 14 <\/sup><\/strong>For we have become partners of Christ, if only we hold our first confidence firm to the end. 15 <\/sup><\/strong>As it is said,
      \u2018Today, if you hear his voice,<\/em>
      do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.\u2019<\/em>
16 <\/sup><\/strong>Now who were they who heard and yet were rebellious? Was it not all those who left Egypt under the leadership of Moses? 17 <\/sup><\/strong>But with whom was he angry for forty years? Was it not those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? 18 <\/sup><\/strong>And to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest, if not to those who were disobedient? 19 <\/sup><\/strong>So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief.
 
Reflection<\/strong><\/p>\n

Two images inform this third chapter of Hebrews. The church is a house, and life is a journey. Both take the reader back to Moses.
 
Moses was \u2018faithful as a servant in all God\u2019s house\u2019 (vv.2, 5). This line in Numbers 12:7 emerged during a crisis on the Exodus journey. The people\u2019s resolve was wavering. There were challenges and anxieties in the company, rather than the confidence of pilgrims. But God still backed Moses as leader. Now Hebrews takes up this text and calls Jesus \u2018faithful as a son\u2019 (v.6) \u2013 not cancelling or erasing the role that Moses had taken, but fulfilling and completing it.
 
For Hebrews calls the church \u2018God\u2019s house\u2019 \u2013 made of living stones, we might say. But this is a mobile home. To live in it is a calling and a challenge. The Exodus image speaks of pilgrimage and persistence, in partnership with Christ the pioneer and prototype (vv.1, 14). Stay confident, says the letter (vv.6, 14). Keep believing (vv.12, 19). Press on.
 
The long quotation, in verses 7-11 and 15, is from Psalm 95. This psalm includes a solemn warning, not to repeat the mistakes that many of the Exodus people made. And Hebrews takes up this warning, to urge the readers to maintain their commitment to Jesus. There is a \u2018rest\u2019 ahead \u2013 promised land for the Exodus generation, heaven for the readers of Hebrews \u2013 if they will only keep going and stay faithful. Indeed this theme of \u2018rest\u2019 will be a major focus of chapter 4.
 
A home and a journey. Christian living involves two kinds of faithfulness, which belong together: personal companionship, with one another as a holy community; and persevering commitment, on the rocky road of pilgrim discipleship. We are in this mobile home together, called to help one another travel forward.
 
Prayer<\/strong><\/p>\n

God of this day\u2019s journey,
    with its companions and its obstacles,
    please help us
    to support one another on the Christian way,
    to lift each other when we are weary,
    to look steadily forward,
    and to persist in walking with Jesus.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hebrews 3 (with OT quotes in italics) 1 Therefore, brothers and sisters, holy partners in a heavenly calling, consider that Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession, 2 was faithful to the one who appointed him, just as Moses also \u2018was faithful in all God\u2019s house.\u2019 3 Yet Jesus is worthy of more glory than Moses, just as the … <\/p>\n

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