Hebrews 3:7

Wherefore, even as the Holy Spirit saith, Today, if ye shall hear his voice, Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, Like as in the day of the trial in the wilderness, Where your fathers tried me by proving me, And saw my works forty years. Wherefore, I was displeased with this generation, And said, They do always err in their heart: But they did not know my ways; As I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest.

THE SECOND EXHORTATION

The quotation here is from Psalms 95:7ff and introduces the second of a series of exhortations designed to bolster the lagging faith of the Hebrew Christians and to warn them against apostasy, the warning being strongly reinforced by the appeal to the analogous falling away which took place in that generation which entered the wilderness after their deliverance from Egypt but were cut off from entering the promised land. Note the attribution of this Psalm of the Holy Spirit. David, as the human instrument through whom the words came, is not mentioned; and thus the author of this epistle takes his place alongside other New Testament writers in making God the author of the Old Testament (2 Peter 1:21).

The experience of Israel in the wilderness of wanderings was indelibly engraved upon the conscience of all the Jews, especially regarding the failure to enter the promised land, the shameful record of which was outlined expressly in their scriptures (Exodus 17; Numbers 13-14; Deuteronomy 9:10). Thus the warning in this place is dramatically intensified by an appeal to the historic disaster that prevented a whole generation from entering Canaan.

Today, if ye shall hear his voice is an appeal for action NOW. The consequences of failure are so supremely tragic, and the tendency to procrastination so universal, that action is demanded now, today. One steals who presumes upon tomorrow; tomorrow belongs to God; "Behold now is the acceptable time; behold now is the day of salvation" (2 Corinthians 6:2). The statement of Paul underlines the fact that life does not come to people a day at a time, but a moment at a time; hence, NOW is the day of salvation. And why today? (1) People have waited long enough already. (2) There may never be a tomorrow for any man. (3) The difficulty of obedience is only multiplied and compounded by delay. (4) God has commanded obedience NOW. (5) The impulse to respond or obey may diminish or disappear. (6) Subsequent obedience (even if it comes) may not be as effectual and fruitful. (7) There is no better time than NOW to do the Father's will.

If you hear his voice raises the question of how God's voice may be heard today; and following are some suggested answers: (1) the voice of God through the holy scriptures as read or preached; (2) the admonitions of faithful loved ones and friends; (3) through conscience which, however depraved, must inevitably retain some vestiges of regard for duty toward God; (4) through the message of God as revealed by consideration of the creation in the light of reason; (5) through God's providential blessings upon every man; and (6) through the spiritual hunger that rises in every heart and which instinctively reaches for a knowledge of God and longs for his approval.

Harden not your hearts is another admonition that affixes the responsibility and blame for hardness of heart upon the hardened himself. Only in the sense of his permitting it, is it ever correct to believe that God hardens hearts. True, the Old Testament states that God "hardened Pharaoh's heart" (Exo.7:13); but the next verse declares that Pharaoh was STUBBORN. The same sunshine melts butter and hardens concrete; and the same gospel saves some and destroys others (2 Corinthians 2:12). People's hearts are hardened by continuing in sin, procrastination, and by the gradual atrophy of spiritual perception brought on by the practice of disobedience. People may go a little at a time, further and further into sin, until finally they become hardened and confirmed in their rebellion against God. Even in such a state, one may, if he will permit it, be softened and healed by the word of God. How may the stony heart be broken? "Is not my word like a fire, saith the Lord; and like a hammer that breaketh the rock into pieces?" (Jeremiah 23:29).

Hebrews 3:8 has been an interesting example of a couple of Hebrew proper names being translated as common nouns, Meribah and Massah, being rendered "provocation and temptation." This is due to the fact that the proper names given by Moses to the places where those sad episodes took place came, in time, to have a broader meaning (Exodus 1:7). There are many examples in all languages where such has occurred. For example, Quisling is the name of a Norwegian collaborator with the Nazi invaders which came to signify "traitor."[7]

Forty years, as mentioned in Hebrews 3:9 and Hebrews 3:17, would seem to be a delicate hint of the fact that when this author wrote, just about the same length of time, that is, forty years, had passed since the resurrection of Christ, and suggesting that the ancient defection of that generation of Israelites might be typical of what was threatening among the generation addressed in Hebrews. The word "works" in this place should be rendered in the singular, according to Westcott who observed that

The Hebrew is singular. The many works of God in the wilderness were all one work, one in essence and aim, whether they were works of deliverance or chastisement. Under this aspect acts of righteous judgment and of mercy were parts of the same counsel of loving discipline.[8]

The "generation" mentioned in Hebrews 3:10 is that of the Israelites who provoked God and were prohibited from entering the promised land. The question rises as to how their defection was applicable to the situation confronting the Christians to whom Hebrews was addressed. To be sure, all the things that happened to ancient Israel were ensamples for them that believe (1 Corinthians 10:1-11); but even more is apparently intended here. The whole typical structure of Israel corresponds to many facts and events in Christianity. The death of Christ is called "an exodus" (founded on Luke 9:31); Christ is the true Passover sacrifice for his people (1 Corinthians 5:7); he is the lamb without blemish and without spot (1 Peter 1:19); Christians during their probation are said to be, like Israel of old, "the church in the wilderness" (Acts 7:38); and, as Bruce pointed out:

Their (the Christians') baptism is the antitype of Israel's passage through the Red Sea (1 Corinthians 10:1ff); their sacrificial feeding on him (Christ) by faith is the antitype of Israel's nourishment with manna and the water from the rock (1 Corinthians 10:3ff); Christ, the living Rock, is their guide through the wilderness (1 Corinthians 10:4); the heavenly rest that lies before them is the counterpart to the earthly Canaan which was the goal of the Israelites.[9]

They do always err in their hearts; but they did not know my ways. These two statements seem, at first, not to belong together; but the reason of their being connected was clearly explained by T. Brooks who wrote:

The proper remedy for crime is, therefore, the knowledge of God's ways. But we must not fall into the mistake of supposing that the knowledge of the ways of God signifies the being informed as to the purport of those laws. Here, as in many other parts of scripture, the word denotes approval by experience, as well as knowledge in the ordinary sense.[10]

The physical death which overtook the lost generation in the wilderness was but a physical penalty for their rebellion against God; and, although they were never allowed to reacquire the lost advantage in the physical sense of entering Canaan, it may rightfully be supposed that all of them who repented and brought themselves into harmony with God's purpose still retained the hope of eternal life, Moses himself being a prime example of this. Far more dreadful, therefore, was the danger threatening the Hebrew Christians who, if they fell away, stood to suffer the loss of even "all spiritual blessings" that are in Christ.

I sware in my wrath calls attention to God's making an oath; and although mentioned elsewhere by Zacharias (Luke 1:73), Peter (Acts 2:30), and Stephen (Acts 7:17), it is in Hebrews that this fact receives the greatest attention, there being no less than six references to it, the others being Hebrews 3:18; 4:3; 6:13; 6:16; 7:21. Swearing on the part of God should be thought of in an accommodative sense; and such a concept is introduced here for the sake of emphasizing the absolutely eternal and irrevocable nature of God's judgments; and yet it cannot be accepted that God's oath is any stronger than his word, the thought being altogether anthropomorphic, since in the case of man, their swearing is said to increase the respect due their words.

They shall not enter into my rest refers to the prohibition by which God refused admittance of Israel to Canaan and immediately loomed in the author's mind as a type of that rest the Hebrew Christians were in danger of forfeiting, a thought that he at once developed and made the basis of the remainder of this second admonition. The Greek margin (English Revised Version (1885)) shows these words to be literally, "if they shall enter into my rest"; but the context demands a translation of such an idiomatic phrase in words that cannot be mistaken. The common versions are therefore correct.

[7] Encyclopedia Britannica, 1961Edition, Vol. 18, p. 885.

[8] Brooke Foss Westcott, op. cit., p. 81.

[9] F. F. Bruce, op. cit., p. 62.

[10] T. Brooks, The Biblical Illustrator (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1967), Hebrews, Vol. I, p. 245.