Hebrews Chapter Three, The Danger Of Sin's Deceit

 

Hebrews 3:12 Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God; [13] but exhort one another daily, while it is called “Today,” lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

 

The letter to the Hebrews began with, “God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in times past to the fathers by the prophets,” Hebrews 1:1. This verse would be most meaningful to the Jewish audience the author was writing to.

Let us never forget that Christianity sprang out of Judaism, the ethnic religion of Israel and its people, the Jews. The history of Judaism from Abraham onward was one of revelation and reception, as God spoke through His prophets to His people, creating His earthly citizens from one man. The church began entirely Jewish. The 120 people gathered together with one mind included Peter and the other apostles, Mary, James and Jesus’ family according to the flesh, and more, all Jewish. If we posit that Jesus died in 32 AD (just for a number to begin with), the Holy Spirit spent the next 68 years (giver or take) to 100 AD with the Revelation of Jesus Christ to conclude the canon of the New Testament. In these pages was the capstone to Judaism. In it were the windows that let in the light, to drive away the shadow of the Law and prophets, bringing in the substance, which was Christ.

 

But the Jewish mind, raised on Moses and the Torah and a legalism, or even elitism, born of slowly perverted teachings, was steeped in doing. The letter to the Hebrews is written as a remedy to demonstrate the sufficiency of Jesus’ person and purpose against anything that the human mind conjectures. In this instance especially, it is against anything the Jewish mind may object to. The new Christian church, founded on Pentecost when Peter gave his first sermon in Acts chapter 2, was a Jewish organism at the first. Of course the church is catholic, not in the false gospel, Roman Catholic sense, but in the purest definition of the word: all encompassing or universal. Jew or Gentile, all are included in the body of Christ. Peter stumbled at this point more than once, Acts 10:28, Galatians 2:11, as did other Jews. It was difficult for the Jewish mind to realize God’s love for the nations beyond Israel’s borders. But Jesus our Lord was clear that there were “other sheep” outside of Israel’s pail that He would call to salvation, John 10:16.

 

What is the point of this interlude? Just that Hebrews 1:2 goes on to declare that in the last days (for the final time) God spoke to us by His Son. The prophets spoke of Him, including Moses. What the Jewish Law could not accomplish through the weakness of sinful flesh, God did by sending His Son. In short: what we could not do because we possess a sin nature, God chose to do out of love, by giving His only Begotten Son to die on the cross, becoming a curse for us. Doubtless, the first century Jews found it scandalous indeed to think that Messiah the Prince died on a Roman cross, when God specifically said that everyone who is hanged from a tree is cursed. But that in fact was the point. Christ came to be cursed; He came to take our curse. He came to become sin so that the punishment for sin (separation from the Father forever) could be paid for on a just basis without forever excluding the sinner from God’s presence. No matter how obedient to the Law someone is, once we have infracted the Law once we are guilty of all, James 2:10.

 

No good deeds atone for a penal violation. They are separate matters, and the wrong committed must be redressed. No one can, in a court of law, after having murdered someone say, “Look how many people I didn’t kill! Isn’t that taken into consideration?” The short answer is no. Being a good citizen is only our moral obligation; you gain no reward for being “good.” Being good is what we are supposed to be to begin with. No traffic cop is going to hand you a medal or shake your hand for a job well done for all the times you didn’t speed; no, they pull you over and give you a ticket when you infract the law. The issues of obedience and penal violation are separate and what you may have seemingly in your favor garners you no good will with the judge. Since a sentence has been passed (you shall surely die, Genesis 2:17) justice cannot be perverted simply because the guilty party is sorry. God will not tolerate sin, so to separate sin from God without the sinner being cast into outer darkness, Christ came to take the punishment in our stead. He gave His righteousness, His sinless nature, and His innocence in exchange for our guilt, our corruption, and our sinful nature. His death gives us life, and by it He desires that we, motivated by love, live for Him, in His stead, who gave His life to set us free from the penalty sin demanded.

 

Back to the matter at hand, the church of the early first century was initially predominantly Jewish. Knowing this, it carried the kernel of Judaism and Law adherence with it, as we see demonstrated rather well in Acts chapter 15. The author of Hebrews cautioned Jewish believers to avoid falling back into the practice of legalism, thus far contrasting Jesus to angels and Moses, the Lawgiver. In Christ the saint can find what cannot be found in angelic majesties or the Law, which we will address further in due time. That is why Hebrews is rife with testimony out of the OT, leading up to and including the passage from Psalm 95.

 

Finally, the author warns us to, “Beware,” verse 12. The term is a merger of the words “be aware,” and translates as, “be cautious and alert to risks.” Be alert that our faith is grounded in Christ, or we will find ourselves turning back to the things we believed we abandoned for His name’s sake. For the Jews it would be their reliance on Moses, the Law and temple worship. The writer is concerned that his readership may possess an evil heart of unbelief. This evil heart is not only unbelieving, but hardened (verse 8), and goes astray, verse 10. The remedy is exhortation, verse 13. The evil heart of unbelief compels the professing saint to depart from the living God. Again, for the Jew, they cannot physically depart from Him no more than you or I can. But they (and we) can leave off fellowshipping with the saints, growing in the faith, and learning from God’s word as we seek to learn about and love our Savior more.

 

To exhort means to encourage one another, and the writer commends that we do so daily. The Hebrew Christians were to remind one another of Christ, who fulfilled their Law and the hundreds of prophecies concerning Him. There is a risen Savior that is in Heaven, as High Priest, interceding on our behalf before the Father on the merits of His blood. Verse 13 reminds us that “Today,” if we hear His voice, not to harden our hearts, and he diagnoses this hardness of heart to come from the deceitfulness of sin. Deceitfulness’s synonyms are “fraudulence or treachery.” Sin is a fraud; it misrepresents truth, and when we heed sin rather than God the result is a hardened heart, a heart that strays, and an evil heart because it is filled with sin rather than exhortations to remain grounded in Christ, the Author and Finisher of our faith.