A Rebellious Generation, Part 2 (Numbers 13-14; Psalm 95)

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The Twin Pillars of a Godly Marriage - “The Role of a Wife” (Part 3) | Adult Sunday School

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Father you are a great God the king above all gods and above the nations You rule by your sovereignty and by your

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Providence You rule over all things and it is the joy of your people to delight in your word

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We thank you that though you have though you are so transcendent You are so awesome and glorious that you stoop to meet with your people and to speak to your people through your word

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Pray that that would be the case today As we read your word and think upon it and study it that you would be glorified and honored

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Through our time here through our study and through our meditation Help us to understand these difficult things.

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We pray in Christ's name You'll notice you came in this morning that there is in your bulletin and insert is

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Psalm 95 if you didn't get that then you're going to be needing to flip back and forth between Psalm 95 and Hebrews chapter 3

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We put that in the insert so that you wouldn't have to be flipping back and forth between those two passages Because there are some translation differences between Psalm 95 and Hebrews Chapter 3 that I want to draw your attention to as we're working our way through that this morning

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Turn your Bibles to Hebrews 3 I'm gonna be looking today at verses 7 through verse 11 last week

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We took a chapter through a couple a tour through a couple chapters of the Old Testament Numbers 13 and 14 and Psalm 95 and we kind of got an overview of the account of the wilderness generation the children of Israel who wandered in the wilderness how

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God brought them out of Egypt through Moses delivered them through signs and wonders and brought them right to the edge of the promised land the land that he had promised to their forefathers the land that he had promised to Abraham and to his descendants and that generation of wicked people rebelled against God and Tried him there complained against him would not believe that God was actually going to fulfill his word to them and That is a stunning example of unbelief and rebellion and it is an example that is referenced a number of times throughout

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Scripture that generation and that incident is kind of kind of a It's a cautionary tale and it is used as an illustration of inexcusable unbelief and rebellion all the way through Scripture I'll give you a few examples of it later on Just one generation later

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Moses in Deuteronomy chapter 1 reminds that next generation of the rebellion of the previous generation

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He says in Deuteronomy chapter 1 remember your forefathers how they were brought out of the land of Egypt and yet they rebelled and would not enter the land and then

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Moses appeals with that new generation to not be like them in their rebellion and in their disobedience in 1st

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Corinthians chapter 10 Paul points to that generation of people as an Example of something that is written for our benefit 1st

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Corinthians 10 6 these things happened as examples for us and Paul points to that says this is something that we as believers are to learn from 1st

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Corinthians 10 verse 11 now these things happen to them as an example and they were written for our instruction upon whom The ends of the ages has come in Psalm 106 verses 24 through 27 the psalmist describes the history of Israel's rebellion and he writes this then they

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Despised the pleasant land. They did not believe in his word, but grumbled in their tents They did not listen to the voice of the

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Lord therefore he swore to them that he would cast them down in the wilderness that He would cast their seed among the nations and scatter them in the lands the prophet

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Ezekiel Ezekiel chapter 20 He says this but I acted this is God speaking through Ezekiel But I acted for the sake of my name that it should not be profaned in the sight of the nations before whose sight

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I had Brought them out saying I brought them out of Egypt Also, I swore to them in the wilderness that I would not bring them into the land

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Which I had given them flowing with milk and honey Which is the glory of all the lands and then in the New Testament in Jude chapter 5

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Jude Recounts that rebellion and he says in verse 5 I desire to remind you though, you know all things once for all that the

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Lord after saving the people out of the land of Egypt Stubborn a subsequently destroyed those who did not believe so often

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It's referenced Ezekiel and the Psalms and New Testament Paul mentions that Jude mentions it They are held up as this example of a generation of people a group of unbelievers who rebelled against God Who were subsequently and justly punished and then of course it is referenced again in Psalm 95 which is the background for our text here in Hebrews chapter 3 and in Psalm 95

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David quotes that example in his own generation and and David says Applying that to his generation that there were lessons to be learned there from that previous generation and David says don't harden your heart

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Like they hardened their heart don't rebel against God like they rebelled against God don't miss his rest like they missed his rest and instead we have to worship and honor and serve the

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Lord in faithfulness and and and gratitude for what he has done because he is a great God a king above all the nations and David references the that generation and the signs that accompanied them coming out of Egypt and then he applies the lessons of that to Him and his generation

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Hebrews now quotes David applying the same lesson or finding the same lessons in that example

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So what are those lessons? This brings us to Hebrews chapter 3 and you'll notice that we come to now to verse 7 and last week

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We just looked at that phrase just as the Holy Spirit says and we're looking today at that quotation from Psalm 95

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Which is verses 7 through 11 and we're gonna see that there are three particular things from this passage three lessons

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The wilderness generation is an example to us of three things the danger of a hard heart

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It is an example of inexcusable unbelief and they are an example of just divine justice just divine justice or divine wrath, which is just an example of a hardened heart a warning to us of the danger of a hardened heart an example of inexcusable unbelief and Then an example of God's divine justice.

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So let's look as we work our way through verses 7 through 11 We'll look at all three of those We're starting verse 7 and we'll read let's read together verses 7 through 11 kind of catch the whole quotation again

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We read this in Psalm 95 at the beginning of our of our time here today therefore just as the Holy Spirit says today if you hear his voice do not harden your hearts as when they provoked me as in The day of trial in the wilderness where your father's tried me by testing me and saw my works for 40 years

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Therefore I was angry with this generation and said they always go astray in their heart and they did not know my ways as I swore in my wrath.

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They shall not enter my rest That's the entire rest of Psalm 95 there and you'll notice in the insert that I gave you that the last part of that is

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I Increased the font size on that so you can easily see that and we're going to be going back and forth a little bit here

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In a few moments between those two passages Hebrews 3 and Psalm 95 What I want to remind you of is two things before we jump into the passage

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Number one. I want to remind you that of the audience to whom the author of Hebrews is writing

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He is writing or he's actually More likely probably speaking something that was later written down or was written down at the time that he spoke it but this is likely a

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Transcript of an oral address that is given to an audience of people and the author of Hebrews Seems to speak in those terms

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He speaks of them hearing something hearing something today hearing the voice of God as you have heard as I am saying unto you

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He doesn't use the terms that might might describe somebody who is writing something But somebody who is speaking something and so as anybody who speaks in front of a large mixed audience

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The author of Hebrews would be uncertain as to exactly the eternal destiny or the spiritual commitments of everybody in his audience

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Now I know the names of most everybody who is here. I know some of you really well I don't know some of you hardly at all

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I've only spoken to some of you a couple of times So in any group of this size or in any group of really any size that would be significant like this

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It is difficult for the person who speaks or preaches from this pulpit or teaches Sunday school. I For them to know the heart condition of everybody in their audience some of you

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I am absolutely certain our believers in Jesus Christ and Trust him you leave upon him and a regenerated

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Some of you I am uncertain as to what your eternal destiny is Some of you I think you might be a believer, but I would be terrified to be handcuffed to you when you die not knowing exactly for sure what the condition of your heart is and So for anybody who's speaking to an audience of people there are people there that I know that they're believers and yet I know that there are people who whose eternal destiny.

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I'm not sure of I don't know what their spiritual commitments are and So in in such a situation he uses language that is intended to be an encouragement to Christians And he uses language and warnings that are intended to warn those in his audience

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Who may think that they are Christians who others may believe that they are Christians? But in fact, they are not believers in Jesus Christ at all

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In fact, he is addressing this passage and the warning passages This is whom I believe the warning passages are addressing that group of people who was amongst the people of God But they really were not the people of God.

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They were not saved They looked like they were saved. They acted like they were saved they even talked like they were saved and you've run across these people who you worship with for a long period of time and then something happens and they go off the beam and They fall away and they make no profession of faith and they completely apostatized from the faith

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He is addressing that group of people who is amongst the people of God but whose eternal salvation

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He was not certain of and so there is a warning here to those and that's who the warning passage is addressed to the example that he gives is an example of unbelievers from the

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Old Testament who rebelled against God and rebelled against what they knew to be true and this is key to remember who it is that serves as the warning for us in In this warning passage of Hebrews who does he cite?

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The example that he quotes from the Old Testament is not an example of believers who turned away from God But of rank unbelievers who rebelled against God's revealed will now that's key to keep in mind now

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If you are someone who believes that is possible for you to lose your salvation, then you have to answer this question

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How is it then that the author of Hebrews or why does the author of Hebrews cite a group of people who were?

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Obviously rank unbelievers they were rebels they were unbelievers In fact, they wanted to stone those who believed

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God's Word Caleb and Joshua we saw that last week their reaction to the truth and to believers was to persecute them and God calls them an evil and wicked generation a rebellious people who do not know his ways

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Who did not walk in his ways and who were under the wrath of God? That is how that generation is described

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Now if you want to make the point that a genuine true believer can lose their salvation It seems odd to me that the author of Hebrews would quote an example of a generation of rank unbelievers pagans in rebellion to God who turned away from God entirely and walked away from him if the if the

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Issue is to try and show that Christians can lose their salvation. Why does he cite an example of unbelievers rebelling against God?

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What do you expect unbelievers to do? To rebel against God and so that's the example that he gives

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So you can't prove that Christians can lose their salvation by giving an example of unbelievers rebelling against the revealed will of God That doesn't that doesn't mesh

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Who he is writing to is that group of people who is very similar to the old this Old Testament Wilderness generation a group of people who heard the truth who understood the truth who saw the truth and said no

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I don't want that and walked away. That is the person to whom he is addressing So now let's work start our way through verse 7

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He says at the beginning of that quotation today if you hear his voice and the fact that he says the Holy Spirit says and he says

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Today and he is talking there about her. He is referencing there the fact that there is a contemporary relevance to what he is describing here

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He is quoting from Scripture But he is saying that this warning applies just as much today in the first century as it did to David who lived a thousand years ago and I would say to you that this warning applies just as much to you and I as it

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Did to the first century Christians who lived in? 60 AD and just as much as the illustration applies to those who lived in David's day

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Just like it was an example a cautionary tale to those who lived prior to David in the wilderness generations day

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There's something contemporary about the illustration itself Because there are unbelievers who insinuate themselves into the company of the people of God in every generation who hear the truth and who turn and walk away from it and Therefore to every gathering of people who are believers and to some who think they are believers

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This warning is completely relevant and he describes a group of people who hear his voice today

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If you hear his voice and he's not talking there about people who think that they're hearing

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God speak to them through a still small voice or a whisper or an impression or a nudge or some sort of private revelation

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He's quoting Scripture And he says if you hear his voice and this describes the wilderness generation they had heard the voice of God They heard

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God speak on the mountaintop they saw the fire and the cloud of smoke and they saw the angels and And all of the signs that accompanied them coming out of the land of Egypt They had heard the voice of God and they knew

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Clearly what God wanted them to do go into the land and take it send 12 men in they'll do a reconnaissance mission

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Come back and give a report and then you are to enter into the land and take control of the land that I've given to your forefathers

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They knew what the will of God was but that is in fact what they turned away from and He says in verse 7 or verse 8 do not harden your hearts is when they provoked me in the day of trial in the wilderness

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And the danger here is the danger of a hardened heart The danger of a hardened heart is something that can affect

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Christians Now the question we're gonna be dealing with as we work our way through here. Is it possible for a

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Christian To harden their heart to the point where they are no longer saved Is it possible for a

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Christian To to through sin and disobedience to reach a point where they turn and walk away and fall away from the

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Living God So as to having once had salvation They no longer have salvation That's the question we're gonna deal with at the end after we work our way through all

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Four of these verses through the end of verse 11. That's a question. We're gonna answer then I want you to kind of keep that in the back of your mind because again he is addressing here a group of people who are not believers rebels unbelievers who turned and walked away from God and What is it that hardens the heart of both the believer and the unbeliever?

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You know what hardens the heart? Sin hardens the heart That seems straightforward enough.

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You'll notice in verse 12 He speaks of having an evil and unbelieving heart take care brethren and not be any among you

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With an evil and unbelieving heart that falls away from the Living God. You'll notice in verse 13 He speaks of being hardened by the deceitfulness of sin in verse 18

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He speaks of those who were disobedient and in verse 18 those who were not able to enter because of unbelief He is describing a generation of people who are unbelieving

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Disobedient and hardened in their heart and had been hardened by the deceitfulness of sin There's the warning to Christians can

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Christians hearts be hardened through sin. Yes sin can harden your heart you walk out of here and you go out this week and you commit a sin and You've refused to repent of that sin and to deal with that sin and to mortify that sin before God as you know

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You should and you fall temptation to that you fail to do that and you fail to handle sin as the Bible tells us to Handle sin the effect of it is that it begins to harden the heart our conscience becomes seared as with a hot iron

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You get to the point where we don't even feel the twinge of conscience anymore and we can go ahead and sin with impunity and without even thinking about it and without even feeling the

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Sensitivity that we ought to have over our sin and grieving over it like we should and so over the course of time it is

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Possible for a Christian's heart to be slowly hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. And so there's a good warning here

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We do not want to get to that point The question is can we as Christians have our hearts hardened to the point? Where we lose a salvation that we had at some point for the

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Christian. I don't believe that that is possible but the unbeliever The unbeliever can sit and and hear the

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Word of God preached and proclaimed and explained and then walk away and turn away and every Time they come and they hear the

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Word of God preached or proclaimed and then walk away without Trusting in Jesus Christ and by disobeying and through deceitfulness of sin their hearts become harder and harder and harder and harder

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Listen, nobody walks away from hearing the gospel or from hearing the Word of God unchanged

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Everybody is always changed by it Your heart is either softened by the preaching of the Word or your heart is hardened by the preaching of the

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Word but nobody ever walks away unchanged and an unbeliever whose heart is on a trajectory of being hardened and come in and hear the gospel and every time they hear it and Every time they reject it the rejecting of that word becomes easier and easier and they do it with impunity and their conscience becomes hardened

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To it and they continue to become even more and more Incalcitrant and impenitent to the point where their heart is just hardened to it

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But the Word of God always either hardens the heart or softens the heart Depending on how it is that you respond to that And so the warning is not to harden your hearts and then he gives an example

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He gives an example of those who who tested God verse 8 Harden your hearts as when they provoked me in the day of trial and in the wilderness

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Verse 9 where your father's tried me by testing me and saw my works for 40 years Now you'll notice this is the first place where we have a bit of a translation difference between Hebrews 3 and Psalm 95

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You'll notice if you have your insert of Psalm 95 the Psalm 95 verse 8 says do not harden your hearts as at Meribah as In the day of Masa in the wilderness when your father's tested me.

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They tried me though. They had seen my works for 40 years Now this the words that are translated

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Meribah and Masa here Here's the reason for the translation difference the word Meribah means strife or contention Masa means a test or a trial those weren't actually place names like the city of Meribah or the place of Masa or the rock of Masa those were sort of nicknames given to designate these places in the wilderness where the children of Israel tried and Tested God where they complained against him

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So that both of the places where the water came out of the rock both of them received that nickname that's sort of that that moniker because of what happened there the children of Israel rebelled against God and provoked him and tested him and And tried

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God there in the wilderness It was a place of conflict and strife and so in in retrospect those two places were both given that nickname

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So they're not these are not actual distinct place names They're sort of names used to describe a place where the children of Israel Tried or tempted and provoked

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God in his anger and so that since that's what those words Literally mean those names literally mean place of testing or place of strife the author to Hebrews Doesn't use the word

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Meribah or Masa. He says did not harden your hearts when they provoked me That's the word for Meribah when they provoked me in the day of trial in the wilderness

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We the father's tried me by testing me the place of testing or strife Masa So he just uses the sort of translates it the the actual meaning of those place names rather than citing the names

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I just point that out in case some of you are wondering what was going on there Why did he get his quotation of Scripture wrong? There's another place later on where he gets his quotation of Scripture wrong.

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We'll deal with that in just a second Now the wilderness generation incurred God's anger by turning away and they expressed their unbelief

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This was their act of unbelief Came right up to what God has promised and all they had to do was obey and step in to his blessing and instead they turned

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And walked away from that and as a result of disobeying their hearts were hardened. They willfully

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Participated in the hardening of their hearts in the wilderness by walking away from what God had given to them and they are an example of the danger of a hardened heart and how disobedience and unbelief can end up end up making our hearts in calcitrin and Hardening it and searing the conscience and this is why when we hear

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Scripture and we Feel in our hearts that we need to deal with something and God is dealing with us that we need to deal with it right away otherwise disobeying that we are hardening our hearts and As believers we never want to get into we never want to follow that example of disobedience in the hardening of the heart as an unbeliever or a fake believer

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You never want to get to the point Where you are so convinced that you are part of God's people and that you have received his blessing that you turn around and walk in disobedience

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With impenitence thinking that you still have secured the blessing of God Even though you have no reason in your life or in your heart to think that you're actually a

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Christian or a believer This is the danger of a hard heart that it provokes God unbelief provokes

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God and disobedience provokes him You do not want to provoke God the unbelieving generation of wilderness did

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They saw the signs of God and they provoked him to anger You can walk away from Christ today and you will not be the first person and you will not be the last person

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But you will end up just like all the rest to do That I can promise you Walk away from him.

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You walk you can turn away from the gracious offer of God's salvation And you will end up just like the rest who have done that you will not enter into rest

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You will have God as your enemy for all of eternity. You do not want that so the wilderness generation is an example of a hardened heart a warning to us of the danger of a hardened heart and second an example of inexcusable unbelief

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Look at verse 9 where your father's tested me tried me by testing me and they saw my works for 40 years

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Therefore I was angry with this generation and said they always go astray in their heart and they do not know my ways

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The wilderness generation did not sin in ignorance They knew exactly what it was that God had commanded them to do it's not as if they they had no clue what

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God's expectation was when he pulled him out of Egypt and took him out into Toward the promised land. It's not as if they had no concept of that He had he had been preparing for them for that He had told them at at Sinai and the giving of the covenant and all the explanation there what it was going to happen that They were going to come into the land that God had promised them

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They knew exactly what God was taking them toward knew exactly what he was preparing them for He had set up the priesthood and the tabernacle and the worship and given him the law and set up this theocratic

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Kingdom for them where he was their king and they were to worship and obey him and and established all the religious worship of the nation of Israel and then they were to walk into the land and begin to immediately practice that and enjoy all the

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Blessings and they knew full well what it was that God had called him to do and consider what it was that they knew This generation knew of all the signs in Egypt.

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They had seen them with their own eyes This was not a hundred years later. This was not a group of people who had just heard of the miracles

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They had seen the hailstones of fire. They had seen the frogs and the lice. They had seen the water turn to blood

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They had watched the darkness come They had watched the firstborn of all of the land of Egypt cattle and beasts and people fall in one night

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They had watched all of that. They've seen God deliver them. They had walked through the Red Sea They had seen in Pharaoh the results of hardening your heart what happens when you disobey what

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God says They had watched that and they had seen the complete destruction of the entire nation of Egypt and their military and their economy and their

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Agriculture they'd watched all of God's judgment upon his enemies They would saw what what

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God provide water from a rock and how he produced quail out of nothing He produced manna from heaven for them every morning.

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He had done this for years They saw the thunder and the angels in the smoke on Mount Sinai and received the law

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How did they respond to that? when Moses came down from the mountain, what did he find an adulterous wicked generation of people

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And God forgave them for that He gave them the law again after Moses broke those tablets

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Brought them right up to the entrance to the promised land and said now you can step into the rest. Here it is just believe what

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I have told you I'm going to do and trust me and They would not do it So all of their sin is not against not in a state of ignorance.

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It couldn't plead ignorance They had seen more than anybody would need to see in order to know that they should trust

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God This is where this translation issue comes in a little bit differently here in verse 9 when your father's tested me and tried me

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Well, your father's tried me by testing me and saw my works for 40 years now. You'll notice in verse chapter.

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I'm sorry Psalm 95 It says in verse 10 for 40 years I loathed that generation

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Here's it. Here's it's a curious translation difference The 40 years in Hebrews 3 is connected to them seeing

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God's works for 40 years But in Psalm 95 God says I loathed that generation for 40 years in other words both passages mentioned the 40 years but in Hebrews the 40 years is connected to Them seeing his works seeing

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God's works for 40 years in Psalm 95 The the 40 years is connected to them being loathed or despised by God for that 40 years

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So that is a that is a complete translation difference In the in Psalm 95 in the

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Hebrews the 40 years is connected with God's anger his wrath I loathed that generation for 40 years in the

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Septuagint Which we've been able to blame some of our various translation differences on the Septuagint in passages past Remember that Septuagint was the

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Greek translation of the Hebrew Testament that this author was familiar with so he quotes from the from the Greek Translation of the

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Hebrew Testament and that accounts for some of the translation differences But the Septuagint here also connects the 40 years to the time of God's anger in the wilderness

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Why does the author of Hebrews connect the 40 years to the time of seeing God's works instead of the time of his anger?

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Nobody knows the answer to that question What we do know that he is not necessarily following the

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Septuagint translation And we do know that he is not necessarily quoting the Hebrew translation Why does the author of Hebrews Step back or pull back from following either the

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Hebrew or the Septuagint and offer here Really what amounts to his own paraphrase or his own translation of that passage and connect the 40 years

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To seeing God's works instead of God's anger Why is that? Nobody knows why that is

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But I can offer you some sanctified Speculation if you would if you would like me to go out on a limb and I don't own this myself

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I'm borrowing this from somebody else. So if you don't like this, you're gonna not blame me. I'm just passing on I'm just the messenger.

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Don't shoot the messenger. Here's what it here's what is possible If the book of Hebrews was written in the late 19 and 1960s

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It wasn't written in the late 1960s If the book of Hebrews was written in the late 60s AD which it was sometime prior to 70

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AD Then it had been roughly 40 years since what? since Jesus had started his earthly ministry and rejected by the

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Nation of Israel done all of his signs and wonders and died on a cross and rose again and For about roughly 40 years the

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Apostles had been doing signs and wonders in the name of Christ The church had spread they had ample witness and testimony

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If Hebrews is written in the late 60s You have about 40 years in which the Nation of Israel and these

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Jewish people would have seen the works of God Displayed in the Apostles and in the person of Jesus Christ So here is what?

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Some suspect that the author is doing he is tying the 40 years to the children of Israel seeing the hand of God and The blessing in the land of Egypt or sorry in the in the wilderness during the 40 years

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He ties the 40 years to them seeing the works of God So as to cause in the Hebrews a little bit of sober reflection

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It is almost as if they would step back and say for 40 years We have known of this person named

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Jesus. We saw the works of God displayed in him We have seen it in the Apostles. We know of his goodness

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We have seen it testified and so here we sit 40 years later having seen everything

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We need to see just like the wilderness generation saw everything that they needed to see We have seen this for 40 years now and we are on the cusp of doing the same thing that they did turning and rejecting

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God That seems to be that I think the best explanation that I have read as to why the author of Hebrews Changes the translation and translates it a little bit differently

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He kind of gives an entirely different flavor to the quotation in order to cause in the hearers a little bit of self -reflection

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They had seen the hand of God and the Hebrews would say well for 40 years. We've seen it. That's right We are just as without excuse as the wilderness generation

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If signs or miracles could cause people to believe the entire wilderness generation would have believed

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But they didn't know why that is because miracles do not create faith

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Miracles do not create belief if signs or miracles could create faith or belief in some people the

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Pharisees would have believed They saw the man who was who was crippled for 38 years at the pool of Bethesda healed there

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They saw the man who was born blind whom they knew one day He could not see and the next day he could see and he was walking around Speaking of this one who had healed him outside the temple they had watched as Jesus raised

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Lazarus from the dead and after seeing the the man who had crippled for 38 years be healed and The man who was born blind be healed and Lazarus raised from the dead as well as all the other miracles that Jesus did

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How did they respond? Did they fall down on their knees and say you're right you have convinced us the miracles and the signs have convinced us that what?

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You have said is true. They replied that did respond that way No, they said we better kill him or the whole nation is going to believe on him if we don't that was their response

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Miracles cannot create belief because we as we saw in the gospel of John The reason for unbelief is not a lack of evidence

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It's what a love for darkness you heard that a thousand times if you heard it once Because that's what we saw in the gospel of John the cause of unbelief is not a lack of evidence

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No unbeliever lacks evidence to believe the cause of unbelief is the wickedness and the darkness of the human heart

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Look what he says in verse 10 Therefore I was angry with this generation and said they always go astray in their heart and they did not know my ways

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That's the issue. They always go astray in their heart When he says that they did not know my ways He's not saying that they were ignorant of what

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God wanted He is saying that they did not know in the sense of having walked in and loved and obeyed the path that God had laid

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Out for them These are not people who are walking in belief one day and know the way of God and turn from it

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These are people who have never walked in belief. They have never walked in faith and The the testing or trial in the wilderness just revealed the unbelief of their hearts having seen all of those signs

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They still walked away because they had never walked in God's paths and they had never known them intimately though They knew intellectually exactly what

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God demanded of them They turned away from that walked away from that and instead walked in their own paths

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These were people who always go astray in their hearts. This is God's designation of them So I ask you again, does this describe this wilderness generation?

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do these words describe a genuine true believer who has known the ways of God and walked in the ways of God and been regenerated and Known a season or a time of obedience who then just falls away and slips away after a period of time or just describe a people

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Group who have never known God's ways They're completely ignorant of his truth because they've never walked in obedience

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This is describing a people group who have never walked in obedience They do not know his ways and they always go astray in their heart.

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It's not that they were ignorant It's that they erred at the very center and core of their being their hearts were wicked and corrupt

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Men refused to believe not because there is not enough evidence, but because men love darkness rather than light

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That's the diagnosis of unbelief Because we are so in love with darkness that it wouldn't matter what type of evidence was presented before an unbeliever

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No amount of evidence would be sufficient Some unbelievers will say well if God were to appear to me and speak to me then

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I would believe No, you wouldn't you would go to a psychiatrist Because you'd be so convinced that what you had seen was a vision or the delusion

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You'd be so convinced that it was a the perversion of your own mind. No amount of evidence will make an unbeliever into a believer

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Only the sovereign grace of God can change the heart. This is a group of people who err in their hearts so it has example of the danger of unbelief of Inexcusable sorry the danger of a hard heart inexcusable unbelief and then third it is an example of God's just divine justice

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This is verse 11 as I swore in my wrath. They shall not enter my rest When God swears to do something he's going to do it.

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He said of this generation. They're not going to enter my rest now We didn't cover what happened last week. We didn't cover what happened after God pronounced his judgment upon them

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But here's what happened later on in Numbers chapter 14 after God said you're not going to enter my rest and this entire generation is

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Gonna fall like flies in the wilderness. Do you remember you know what happened next the next day a group of people said

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All right, we'll go in. We'll go in We'll take up arms and we'll go in and a group of them said we're gonna go up and we're gonna take the land

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Ourself they decided to march into it and God said no you're gonna die and they were routed and they died and that was the judgment of God because God swore that they will not enter they said

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Oh, if we just had died in the wilderness and God said you want to die in the wilderness your wishes my command You're granted you're gonna be careful what you asked for You're gonna get exactly what you asked for and then they dropped dead in the wilderness

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And even though a group of them said no, we'll go up. Anyway, we realized we did the wrong thing. It was a bad call We don't want to wander out here for another 40 years

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We're just gonna go ahead and go in anyway God said nope, you're not going to you're gonna die out here in the wilderness for 40 years

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And that was the justice of God. It was an example of God's wrath I want you to notice that the author of Hebrews a

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New Testament authors speaks of God's wrath as being something that is still for today Some people have this idea

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We've talked about in the past that the God of the Old Testament had it all wrong God of the New Testament got it much better God of the

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Old Testament was God of wrath and anger and you someone have to ever have to deal with him Thankfully, he was just the result of the misunderstanding of a lot of misguided people a long time ago before we got more enlightened

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Like we are today and the God of the New Testament is a good God is a loving God, etc No, it's the same God and the author of Hebrews here speaks of God's wrath in an appropriate sense

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The New Testament is full of talking about God's wrath, by the way The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and righteousness of men who suppress the truth and unrighteousness

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Because that which can be known about God from creation They reject that in exchange the glory of the incorruptible

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God for an image like the corruptible man and beasts and four -footed things And so the wrath of God is still a thing today and men who are in unbelief are still under the wrath of God That's why

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Paul in Ephesians 2 says we were children of wrath even as the rest In 1st Thessalonians chapter 4

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Paul speaks of God delivering us from the wrath that is to come There is a current wrath over which the entire world is

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Under and they're under that wrath because of their unbelief and there is a wrath that is to be revealed that is being revealed

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Now in God's judgment upon this world and there is a wrath that is to be revealed in the future and eschatological wrath

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Where God is going to pour out his wrath upon the nations and upon unbelievers and upon those who come against the nation of Israel There is an eschatological or a wrath that is to come and those who are unbelievers even today are children of wrath

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New Testament talks a lot about wrath and here the author is describing God who swears something in his wrath

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The idea of God being wrathful or angry and wrath by the way is not It's not sort of an anger that just boils up within somebody and overflows at some point.

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It is the settled Disposition and hostility against sin and unbelief. It is a settled characteristic of God It is

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God's anger towards sin that burns and burns continually It's not the kind of wrath that is your friend one day and the next day completely unpredictable just explodes on everybody

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That's that's not the idea of wrath. It is a settled opposition to sin and unbelief

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That's God's wrath this burning anger that God has and it's just It's just the longer

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I live and the more I look at what goes on in this world The more settled I become and the more comfortable

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I become with the fact that God is going to judge sin And every unbeliever and all righteousness and all wickedness will have its day in court beginning to Maybe I'm just becoming to get off my lawn old man in my mid -40s

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But I'm beginning to become much more comfortable with that idea And sometimes I just think the wrath of God is a good thing

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His justice will be satisfied not that I want to see that happen to my loved ones But that I want to see that happen so that God's name and his glory can be vindicated

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Because wrath and God's wrath is a good thing And so he swears in his wrath that they shall not enter into the rest and this was the promised land

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He denied them entrance into that promised land numbers chapter 14 I the Lord have spoken surely this

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I will do to all this evil Congregation who are gathered together against me in this wilderness. They shall be destroyed and there they will die.

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That's what God swore This is what he promised you will be destroyed and here you will die. Now again,

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I ask you this question Does this sound like God is describing here a group of believers Christians people men of faith?

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And who knew God's ways and had responded to him in belief when he calls them an evil generation

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And says that they are gathered together against him. There is enemies. That's who this group of people were. They're not believers

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They're not friends of God. They're not even children of God. They're enemies of God Deuteronomy 12 verse 9

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Describes the land of Israel as a place of rest for you have not yet come to the resting place in the inheritance Which the Lord your God is giving you

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Deuteronomy 12 verse 10 when you cross the Jordan and live in the land Which the Lord your God is giving you to inherit and he gives you rest from all your enemies around you

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So that you live in security. This was the promise to the nation of Israel. You wandered here You've been in Egypt brought them out of that.

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I'm gonna bring you into a land and there you shall have rest rest from your enemies They were to obey

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God and trust him and worship him and God would protect them from their from their enemies And what happened when they disobeyed him and violated the terms of the

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Covenant? Guess what happened all their enemies came in and oppressed him and they ended up working and serving the

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Philistines and and all of the Other nations that surrounded them. That was the result of God's judgment upon them

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But if they had obeyed him and walked in his ways God promised them rest rest from your enemies rest from your wanderings rest from your slavery in Egypt It's to be a land of rest

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But because they rejected that and responded with unbelief God promised them. You'll never enter that rest

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You will not have it and as much as they later on Relented or regretted that decision that they made that action of theirs

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God promised them that he would judge them in the wilderness and they all would die and they did now here's the question

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How does this relate to believers? Is this something that a believer can do some people say yes, of course a believer can sin

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I grant that believers can sin and Believers can sin grievously on occasion But a believer always responds to truth and to the working of the

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Holy Spirit in their life and a believer will always Turn away from that sin and desire holiness and righteousness again and desire to be restored to fellowship that is the work of God in our lives and Of course a believer can get a hardened heart which the

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Spirit of God will deal with and God will discipline the believer For the hardened heart and for our disobedience

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But can a believer? Harden their heart to the point where they walk away from fall away from God and no longer enjoy eternal life

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This is really how the question would need to be asked. Is it possible that somebody who has been genuinely born again?

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Given a new heart a new life new affections who is indwelt by the Spirit of God Whose sin has been completely propitiated and satisfied by the death of Christ on the cross whose

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Who for whom a complete atonement has been made so that there is no longer any sin debt that remains that they must pay

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Somebody who has been given entirely the pure Undefiled perfect and infinite righteousness of Jesus Christ and has been completely justified

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Declared righteous free acquitted and and without guilt innocent in the courtroom of God and That that person has having turned from their sin and received the indwelling of the

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Spirit of God and has been given eternal life Can that person fall away and lose eternal life and reverse all of those?

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Truths regarding him. Is that possible? The answer that question is no that is not possible

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Can a Christian respond to God the way that the wilderness generation did it cannot because the very definition of a

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Christian is that you have not responded to God's truth the way that the wilderness generation did a Christian is one who has heard the truth and responded to it and embraced it and humbled themselves and and bowed the knee before Jesus Christ and been saved because of what they know to be true and By the grace of God.

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So the very definition of a Christian precludes this as a possibility This is not something that this whole description of this generation that they're hard -hearted that they provoked

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God they tested God They rejected his goodness. They disobeyed his word. They refused to believe they rejected his promises.

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They face his angers They always go astray. They did not know his ways. They are under his wrath and they would not enter

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God's rest There is no world in which Those phrases can be used to describe a true genuine believer in Jesus Christ It is impossible.

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Those phrases do not describe true and genuine believers They do describe people who make believe in Jesus Christ and think that they are believers

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But in fact who are not believers They do describe those type of people but those phrases cannot and never would describe a true child of God It describes somebody whose heart has never been changed who has never known the way of God Somebody who is close to and even amongst the people of God, but has never truly been saved or regenerated

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Christians are not under the wrath of God If you're a believer, you're not under God's wrath. These people were under God's wrath

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If you are a Christian, you are no there's no condemnation to you If you're in Jesus Christ none You never ever have to worry about seeing the face of God and having him frown upon you

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Never because he doesn't see us because of what we do or what we are in our sin He sees us because of what we are in his son and that's the difference.

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So there's no condemnation to the believer in Jesus Christ What does how does God deal with our sin?

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He disciplines us, but he doesn't discipline us out of his anger. He disciplines us out of his love It's the son whom he loves that he disciplines and if we are without discipline that we are without his love

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We are without that familial love We're not sons God doesn't deal with Christians in their sin by swearing in his wrath that they shall not enter into his rest

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He deals with unbelievers who turn away from his truth that way But he deals with Christians who sin by disciplining us and the motivation behind that is not condemnation

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It is not anger. It is not God's wrath. It is God's love. He wants us in fellowship with him That is how he handles his children discipline not swearing that they will never enter his rest

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That is something that God does towards unbelievers the unbelievers who turn away from him So if you are an unbeliever here today, and you turn away from Jesus Christ, you will not enter his rest

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That rest is standing right in front of you in the person of Christ You walk away from that.

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He will be God's enemy for eternity And he has sworn He has sworn in his wrath that if you do not embrace

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Jesus Christ, you will never enter his rest To the Christian to the believer God has sworn by his righteousness

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That because Jesus Christ is righteous and you are in him. There is no condemnation to those of you who are in Christ Jesus the difference between the believer and the unbeliever in these terms is as stark and as wide and as glorious as it could possibly be

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Everything that was true of us as unbelievers is different because of what Christ has done so we get

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God's grace and The unbeliever gets God's wrath It's a just wrath and the wilderness generation is an example of the danger of a hard heart the danger of inexcusable unbelief

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And of God's justice which justly falls upon those who refuse to repent and believe

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For the wilderness generation the rest was the land that God had promised For us in our day.

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The rest is salvation in Jesus Christ and the author of Hebrews spends all of chapter 4 Talking about that rest and making that point

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We can have rest today There remains a rest for us and it's in Christ And if you turn away from God and he swears you will never enter into that you harden your heart and disobey

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God promises you his wrath You will not enter into that rest but instead you will enter into a state where God will be your enemy for all of eternity

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There's good news in Jesus Christ. You turn away from him It is an example another example of inexcusable unbelief of a hardened heart

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You will get God's justice. I Beg of you if you are not a believer today, you would trust

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Jesus Christ examine yourselves. See if you even be in the faith You can walk away from the grace of God and sin

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With impenitence and sin with impunity Sin to the point with your your conscience is hardened and your heart is hardened and you don't even feel that the pains of conscience

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Anymore, you have no reason to think at all spite of your baptism It's by the fact that you're here You're born in a

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Christian family grew up in Sunday School and water Whatever it is No matter what your background is if you can stand in unbelief and hardness of heart today

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You have no reason to think that you are actually in God's rest You have every reason to think that God has sworn in his wrath that you will not enter that rest

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But instead you will suffer his wrath for all of eternity Let's bow our heads together father.

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We thank you for a salvation that is so gracious and undeserved That even we who are in Jesus Christ were at one time children of your wrath

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Undeserving of any grace that you have bestowed upon us or given to us in your son Thank you for the mercy that you have shown us and the mercy of Jesus Christ and his work on our behalf

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We thank you for those of us who are in Jesus Christ that We never have to worry about you dealing with our sin in terms of suffering eternal torment

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But in discipline, we pray that if we are those who are in Jesus Christ We're here today if we are sinning that you would not harden our hearts

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That you would deal with us in discipline in a loving fashion to bring us back to that cross of Christ Bring us back to sweet fellowship with you.

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We pray that you would continue to make our conscience sensitive to Working of the Spirit of God and the truth of the

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Word of God as it is preached and read and proclaimed Continue to do that work in the hearts of those who are yours that we may have soft hearts obedient hearts and hearts willing to Turn from sin and to believe and to trust and to obey and to mortify sin

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Do that work in the hearts of your people we pray And any who are here who do not know Jesus Christ Or convict them of their sin show them the hardness of their hearts

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Show them the wrath that is to come so that they may believe upon Jesus Christ and be saved everlastingly

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May you be glorified by doing this glorify the name of Christ for all that he has done May you be honored in the lives and the hearts of your people press these truths deep upon us.