Sunday Hebrews: Explanatory Notes on Hebrews 3:7-19

3:7 Therefore, just as the Holy Spirit says,
The author is about to introduce the first long quote from a single passage, Psalm 95. As is typical, he does not introduce the psalm as the words of David but as a vehicle for the voice of the Holy Spirit.

3:7b-11 "Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts, as in the rebellion, like the day of testing in the desert, when your fathers tested [Me] with a test, and they saw my works forty years. Therefore, I was angry with that generation and said, 'They always go astray in heart. They have not known my ways, as I swore in my wrath, "They will never enter into my rest."'"

Just as 3:1-6 has contrasted Jesus with Moses. Psalm 95 recounts the people of Israel in the wilderness. This generation left Egypt. They had the promise of rest in Canaan. But the Lord rejected them because of their lack of faith.

The comparison with the audience of Hebrews is obvious. They, like the wilderness generation, have embarked on a journey to a land of promise. Also like the wilderness generation, they are in danger of failing to inherit the promise. We remember that just previous to the quotation, the author said that "we are His household if indeed we hold fast the confidence and the boasting of hope" (3:6).

We should read these verses in remembrance of the contrast of punishment between Jesus and Moses. Those who violated the first covenant were punished; those who disregard the second will experience even worse consequences. So the consequences of disbelief of this new promise will be worse than what happened to the wilderness generation.

3:12 Look, brothers [and sisters], lest at some time there would be in someone of you an evil heart of unbelief in turning from the living God.
Now the comparison between the audience and the wilderness generation is made explicit. The wilderness generation stopped believing in the promise of Canaan. The audience is in danger of stopping believing in the salvation offered in Christ.

The mention of "turning from the living God" would be particularly appropriate if the audience consisted of Gentile converts to Christian Judaism. Jews sometimes referred to the idols of the Gentiles as "dead idols."

3:13 But encourage yourselves each day while it is called “Today,” so that no one of you is hardened by the deceit of sin.
The author plays on the word "Today" that leads off the quote from Psalm 95. It is today every day. Accordingly, every day is a day that we must continue in faith toward the promised land.

The deceit of sin here likely refers especially to the sin of disbelief and faithlessness. Hardening is the increasing inability to have faith and believe. At some point any glimmer of faith is gone and one thoroughly disbelieves.

3:14 For we have become partakers of the Christ, if indeed we hold fast the beginning of substance firm until the end.
This verse reiterates what was said in 3:6. There we are God's household if we hold fast confidence and boasting in the hope of salvation. Here we are partakers of Christ if we hold fast till the end. The word "partaker" will come up again in 6:4. The use here shows that to be a partaker is not a light matter to the author but to be a full stakeholder.

That these passages strongly contradict the notion of eternal security is clear. It is only those who hold the substance of their beginning in faith to the end who will make it. The use of the perfect tense here is striking--"have become." The connotation is of someone who became a partaker of Christ in the past and yet who has continued as a partaker into the present. The author says that that completed action of becoming a partaker is not guaranteed to last no matter what. Holding fast in endurance is required.

3:15-16 When it says, "Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion," for who rebelled after they heard? But [was it not] all who went out from Egypt through Moses?
As we will see the author do again later, he recapitulates the part of the quote that he is most interested in. Now he engages in midrash, in interpretation of the passage.

Here the author continues the comparison. They heard; you've heard. They left Egypt, so you have embarked on the journey of faith. They rebelled after they heard. But here the author aims to head off a parallel.

3:17 And with whom was He angry for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the desert?
Here is a stark, implicit warning. When they rebelled, when they disbelieved, when they sinned by disbelief, their corpses fell in the desert. Don't be like them.

3:18 And to whom did He swear that they would not enter into His rest if not those who disobeyed?
Again the implicit comparison. After they had come so far, after God had done so much for them, God still blocked their final entrance into Canaan. The audience faces the same potential fate.

3:19 And we see that they were not able to enter because of unbelief.
The sin in question is the sin of disbelief, the sin of disbelieving the promise God has made of salvation on the basis of Christ, disbelief in the return of Christ and the sufficiency of his atonement.

Again, the clear implication of Hebrews is that there is no Christian who is guaranteed eternal life regardless of what he or she might do for the rest of their pilgrimage in this world. We have become and remain partakers of the Christ only if we hold fast in faith until the end.