Hebrews 10:19-25
Some really great material today…
The author of Hebrews has argued for Jesus’ high priesthood, so now he tells us that we …have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus (v. 19) and that we …have a great priest over the house of God. (v. 21) He then provides us with three “let us” passages: …let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith… (v. 22a); Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering… (v. 23a); and …let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works (v. 24). My Study Bible added two more items as subsets of the third one that I have listed above: …not neglecting to meet together… (v. 25a) and …encouraging one another… (v. 25b). I daresay we could solve a lot of our personal problems if we were to actively pursue all five of those behaviors on a regular basis.
In addition, my Study Bible highlighted four conditions in verse 22 for drawing near to God: with a true heart; in full assurance of faith; with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience; and our bodies washed with pure water. (v. 22b) While the five items noted in the paragraph above are mostly our human behaviors, these four conditions in this paragraph are more internal – lived out, but not verbally or physically expressed. As above, if we have these internal conditions within ourselves, we could also solve a lot of our personal problems.
Today’s reading is an awesome lesson for life!
Slava Bohu!
Thanks for sharing!
I was struck by v. 25 about encouraging each other, ESPECIALLY as the day arrives (Christ’s return). My study guide says that persecution will increase in those days and we need each other more and more. How do we respond to the notion that worldwide persecution is coming? Some cry “wolf!” already? (I’m not speaking of the life-threatening persecution in other countries!)