Believe!

# 13 2020 Dev. Heb.3:1. Believe! Read all of Ch. 3. The purpose of these devotionals is to draw closer to God and grow spiritually by applying His Word to our daily living. All passages are taken from the NIV.

Hebrews 3:1 “Therefore, holy brothers and sisters, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, whom we acknowledge as our apostle and high priest.”

Again, the author points back to what he wrote in chapter 2. Let’s review what he wrote about Christ’s humanity: “For this reason he had to be made like them, fully human in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people. ¹⁸ Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.” Christ is the living sacrifice, the final sacrifice foreshadowed in the sacrificial system of the Old Testament who makes atonement for us and for all those who have believed, all those who will believe. Salvation is a free gift of God’s grace, we can do nothing to earn it and our shortcomings do not negate it as long as we believe.

The author also gives us his second warning about unbelief: “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.” The only condition that negates God’s grace is: “a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God.” In our situation today we are tempted to ask: God where are you, how is it that a loving God allows this virus and economic devastation around the world? There may be a lot of different reasons. Does God want to get our attention, does God want us to call on Him, does God want us to turn back to Jesus, and to prayer? I am asking the question but I do not have a definitive answer.

God’s ways are not our ways, nor are His thought our thoughts but I know that if you hear His voice today: believe. I also know that in the situation we are in we do not how we should pray but “the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. ²⁷ And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.” (Ro. 8:26-27) Those who believe are in good hands, we are in the very hands of Jesus! Praise be to God.

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