This passage was the Daily Manna in my inbox this morning, and I'm just trying to get my mind around what's being said here:

It still remains that some will enter that rest, and those who formerly had the gospel preached to them did not go in, because of their disobedience. Therefore God again set a certain day, calling it Today, when a long time later he spoke through David, as was said before: 'Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.' For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken later about another day. There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience. (Hebrews 4:6-11 NIV)

With all of the emphasis on "evangelism" in my world right now, I can feel something like compassion for "those who formerly heard the gospel [and] did not go in" to this sabbath rest.

TODAY. That's the "special day" set aside in the "future" for anyone needing to make things right to do so, for anyone to 'fess up and repent and seek after Christ. Are our churches giving people a false sense of "rest" that doesn't require repentance & obedience? Then TODAY would be the day to get that right... right? How deceived are we when we think we're saved - only to find out that this place of rest isn't open to us, isn't available to us, isn't being prepared for us because we've chosen to continue in lives of disobedience and rebellion?


- posted by Rick @ 13:47