The reason Paul is making this so explicit to these Hebrews was that this was their dilemma. They still had not entered into Paul’s saving Gospel, just as untold millions have not sense. They were still holding to Judaism, and they were still holding to their works and external religion. And that’s why we’ve got all these terms of conditions in this letter that scares people half to death. Listen, never do these verses that list conditions deal with the believer. That unless he does this, and unless he does that, he’s going to be back out there lost. No, that’s not what it’s talking about. It’s talking to those people who were and are on the fence. Unless you make a break with that religious system of their past and step into that finished work of the cross, we’re all in danger, and this is what we have to let people know. Listen, you cannot drag one foot in legalism. You cannot leave one foot in a religion based on self or self efforts, works, of whatever sort it is and have the other foot in the Grace of God and be accepted. It won’t work. Because what does it say? "Well God you didn’t really finish it." God won’t have it. No little puny mortal man is going to tell God that he didn’t quite finish the job.
And so, here is the purpose of this letter. It’s to bring those people out of that position of being on the fence. That’s exactly what he meant when he said in Hebrews chapter 6. Hey that doesn’t mean if you’ve been saved and you’re lost again. No way. All these verses in Hebrews are dealing with the same scenario. Steeped in religion and can’t make the break into Grace. But listen, God’s doing it. He’s breaking the shackles of more and more people who are coming out of that kind of a background and mentality into the Grace of God. Alright, let’s come back to chapter 4, and let’s come on down to verse 6.
Hebrews 4:6
"Seeing therefore it remains that some must enter therein, and they to whom it was first preached entered not in because of unbelief:"
Now you’re going to get sick and tired of us referring to it, but we can’t help it. What are we talking about? Those to whom it was first preached? Well, we’re talking about Israel at Kadesh. They were the first prime example of God giving such a glorious offer that all they had to do was take it by trusting, but rejected it. That’s what it means, unto whom it was first preached. It doesn’t mean that anybody before that never had an opportunity of salvation, but this is the first prime example of God offering something that was so perfect, so complete. Not an Israelite would have been killed by a Canaanite. Not a single Israelite would have gone to bed hungry. Not a single Israelite would have gone to bed cold and out in the elements. God had had those Canaanites working 400 years like bees getting everything ready. 400 years he told Abraham the Canaanites would be given every opportunity to come out of their iniquity and wickedness. But instead of coming out it, what did they do? They went deeper and deeper and deeper until they were so morally filthy, God said it’s time to move them out and let Israel have all the fruits of their labor. And so it just became a primary example of God’s offering them a rest, existence without having to fight and work. They could have had it. But why did they miss it? Unbelief.!
Look at the world around you. Look at our beloved America. We have Bibles in every home, in every hospital room, in every motel room, everywhere. How many people ever look at them? Almost nobody. We make it a practice - every motel room, we go and look and find that Bible. Has it been used? No. It’s just as new as in the day that the Gideons put it in there. Look at the multitudes around us, even here in the Bible belt. How many of them, we're not judging, we don’t’ know, but we’ve got a pretty good idea. How many of our run of the mill people going up and down the highways of life ever, for 30 seconds, think about eternity? Not many. Precious few. Why? Because we’re no better than Israel. We’re a nation tonight of total unbelief and in ignorance of what God has said. That’s our problem.
We’ve said, our problem isn’t Democrats or Republicans, the economy, our defense posture, the drug business or teenage pregnancy. Now those are all the result of our problem, but what’s our problem? Unbelief. America no longer believes this Book. America scoffs at everything this Book says anymore. And consequently, America is headed for the same kind of a downfall that other empires have experienced, that other nations have experienced. Because there comes a time when God says, "I’ve had it!" and so, here’s the text. Why did they not enter in? Because of their unbelief! Even our churches practice witchcraft and all manor of evil, they blatantly in the name of religion under the guise of Christ's name and the raising of Christ, use names that hide or mask over the true meanings of their feast-days and rituals of men. Now verse 7.
Hebrews 4:7a
"Again, he limited a certain day saying in David,…"
Now we made reference to Felix as Paul dealt with that political leader. But what did Felix do? Hardened his own heart. God didn’t harden it. He hardened it with his constant refusal until finally it gets to the place that that hardened heart never does respond. Now we also said God never gives up, of course not. But nevertheless, the warning here is, do not harden your hearts. Alright now then verse 8.
Hebrews 4:8a
"For if Jesus…"
We know your King James says Jesus in this verse, but we think most of our newer translations and our commentaries and our margins will call it Joshua as that is the Hebrew meaning for Jesus or Yeshua, who had taken Moses’ place of leadership. Joshua is going to lead them into the land of rest as Moses could have done at Kadesh. Joshua now is going to bring the Nation of Israel in from the East of Jordan. And as Joshua leads the nation into Canaan, what’s the scenario? War. They’re going to have to fight every inch of the way. Now God’s going to give them the victory, but they’re going to lose a lot of blood in the process. And so we do not like to use Joshua’s taking the children of Israel across Jordan into the Land of Canaan as a picture except when we enter into our Christian life in this world of sin under the curse and influence of Satan. Is it a life of ease and rest like Canaan would have been? No. It’s a warfare. And so there is an analogy that yes, we’ve entered into that complete rest because of the work that’s finished. Christ becomes to us the Canaan land of promise. But on the other hand, we can look at Joshua’s occupying, that in this life, hey, there’s no easy row to hoe. God requires us to gain knowledge of Him by His revealed word in order to grow into His perfection as a spiritual being. Able to rightly divide (delineate, drop a plumb line by it to check its straightness or to see if it is true) the word.
You know, we’ve so often used the illustration. The Christian life today is like paddling a canoe in a river with a pretty good current. Now we don’t think we could make a canoe go upstream. We suppose a good professional could, but we don’t think we could, but even if we could paddle that canoe up against stream, which is a good picture of the Christian life, what happens the minute we take the paddle out of the water? Down stream we go. So what is the Christian life? It’s a constant battle. It’s a constant working to maintain our Christian experience. So we’ve got these two aspects. We’ve got the land of Canaan pictured as a place of total rest, a finished work, and Christ sat down because it was finished. But on the other hand, we have to look at Joshua because that’s the real world. We’re not living in a world where we can just sit down and not worry about anything. But positionally, in our salvation experience, yes, we’re in the land of Canaan at rest. But experientially, maybe we can put it that way. Positionally, we’re in the place of rest, experientially, we’re in a constant battle. Many have twisted this Gospel into a feel good, God bless me I deserve it religion, or a works religion clinging to Israel's history or blinding the whole thing up because we've slide downward. Why? And How? No one seeks God or have a fear of God. Alright let’s go on with verse 8 repeating.
Hebrews 4:8
"For if Joshua had given them rest, then would he not afterward have spoken of another day."
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