Now, we've been doing the same scripture reading for a couple of weeks. We're going to move a little differently. Your notes will have the old scripture reading that we've done a few times. And what we're going to do today is Hebrews chapter 3, verse 1, and we're going to read to chapter 4, verse 2. We'll get a larger context here. Won't be able to explain all those verses, but we're going to get in, get started, and get some good context, I think. But Hebrews chapter 3, starting with verse 1. Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the apostle and high priest of our profession, Christ Jesus, who was faithful to him that appointed him, as also Moses was faithful in all his house. For this man was counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as he who hath builded the house hath more honor than the house." For every house is built by some man, but he that built all things is God. And Moses verily was faithful in all his house as a servant for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken after. But Christ, as a son over his own house, whose house are we, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end. Wherefore, as the Holy Ghost saith, today if you will hear his voice, harden not your hearts as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness, when your fathers tempted me and proved me and saw my works 40 years. Wherefore, I was grieved with that generation and said, they do all way err in their heart, and they have not known my ways. So I swear in my wrath that they shall not enter into my rest. Take heed, brethren. lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God. But exhort one another daily while it is called today, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. For we are made partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end. While it is said today, if you will hear his voice, Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation. For some, when they had heard, did provoke, howbeit not all that came out of Egypt by Moses. But with whom was he grieved forty years? Was it not with them that had sinned, whose carcasses fell in the wilderness? And to whom swear he that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that believed not? So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief. Let us therefore fear, lest a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it. For unto us was the gospel preached as well as unto them, but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it." And there ends our scripture reading. And we are ever mindful of this overwhelming project, the book of Hebrews. I call it a project because it's got some very important, overwhelming themes. Using a lot of the Old Testament, it was addressed to Hebrews in particular, though we all benefit from this. But the superiority of Christ and the new covenant, the gospel, and the work of the Spirit to the old covenant, and the workings there. And as it told us carefully, Moses spoke of things, revealed things that would be actually spoken of later. What he did was often symbolic, the things in the tabernacle and the sacrifices, and they were only indicating and illustrating the perfect and permanent work of Christ. And so the superiority of Christ, The word better keeps popping up in this book. And when we look at when this book was written, and I don't know what everybody says, but all the people I've studied have told me it was around 70, well, excuse me, around 68, AD 68. And just a couple of years before the besiegement of Jerusalem, that utter destruction of that place, there goes the temple, there goes the festivals and feasts, and all the props are gonna be kicked out And you have people who were Hebrew people, and they profess faith in Christ, but they were still clinging to the old things. They were trying to have the best of two worlds. Jewish Christians back then would worship both on the seventh day of the week and the first day of the week. They didn't impose that on the Gentiles, but there was a way of kind of hanging on to base here. And they had all these beautiful things, and it was a part of their culture and a part of their heritage. and God was getting them ready for a lot of props to be kicked out. As well, he might have to prepare us if suddenly we lost our freedoms, and we couldn't have our nice church buildings, and we couldn't have our nice baptistries, and our nice stuff, and I could go on and on about all the nice things we can have, Christian schools and so forth. If government ever became a thing that was going to try to obliterate those great comfortable freedoms we've had. And I shouldn't say comfortable, because I don't think, it's funny, God likes the word comfort, but not comfortable. He even calls himself the comforter. but comfortable is sort of a dangerous word, but we might do well to remember what it is to worship God in spirit and in truth, and to cling on to the eternal truths and the realities, Christ in us, in our faith working powerfully. And so everybody can benefit from the book of Hebrews, but in so doing, there's an overwhelming theme, and it's aimed specifically at the Hebrew people, but we can all apply it, and that is don't turn back. Don't turn back. The first New Testament book written was the book of James, and James had to deal with a similar thing. His Jewish Christians were getting it from both sides. They already knew what it was like to be persecuted as Jews from the non-believing Gentiles, but now... confessing Christ, they had also the persecution of the other Jews who didn't believe. And so they were getting it from both ends. And so James had to do a lot of work about all these trials, all these things, count it all joy, and blessed is the man that endures temptation. There's some very important things. And he's been likened unto the New Testament version of the book of Proverbs. Like, don't throw out the baby with the bathwater here. There's all these things that you have learned that are not undone just because you're saved by grace without works. It doesn't mean that you now toss out your values, your character. Oh, I'm saved by grace so I don't have to worry about stuff. James gets hard-hitting. And he brings down powerful teachings about how to control the tongue and how to look at the heart and to do things right and treating one another and very carefully. And a lot of his teachings resemble the Proverbs and they also resemble things in the Sermon on the Mount. You'll find nice corollaries between all of those. But all that to say that James had a similar project in mind is keeping people from turning back and that they must go forward. Hebrews is telling us, here's the heritage you were given. Here is beautifully illustrated the sacrifices, the temple, the animals that were sacrificed, the priesthood. But Jesus is the better way. Jesus is the perfect high priest. Jesus has perfected forever them that are sanctified. And by one offering, not the multiple offerings. And so this is given layer by layer throughout this book. And what I've done, I'm not going to teach verse by verse through the whole book of Hebrews, but I'm looking for this theme. Now, originally I've been calling up the gospel a perpetual need. Because we have looked at how the gospel is to be ministered to believers, not just to new people who are unbelievers. Gospel truth sanctifies us, sharpens us, gives us momentum and motive and many things we need. It's powerful to the believer, not simply to unbelievers who need to believe. And when I was putting this series up online, I had a problem with spacing. They only allow me so much room to put a title, and sometimes I don't feel like my titles are getting the point across. And so on Sermon Audio, I've changed the title to Warnings from Hebrews. Warnings from Hebrews. And I offer that to you today. You see it in the bulletin. Warnings from the book of Hebrews. And two basic categories we've tried to help people understand is that the same scriptures, whether it be Hebrews or some other places in the scriptures that are very powerfully doing this, those scriptures can, number one, be taking a person who professes to know Christ, but really doesn't have that relationship, and to wake them up out of their formal Christianity. whether it be legalistic or whether it just be sort of a carnal adherence to things and just having a good time. There's lots of ways to try to look like a Christian and try to hang out with Christians, but you're not a Christian. I kind of gave up on that saying. It says, if it looks like a duck and acts like a duck and hangs out with other ducks, it's probably a duck. That does not apply to Christianity. Just trying to look like them, hang out with them, do what they do. You may not be born again. So that's constant warning. And so certain people had to be brought to a place of reality and urgency to receive Christ in the true sense and be born again and get out of the patterns of just imitating Christianity. On the other hand, the same scriptures are designed to take sleepy Christians, careless Christians, distracted Christians, maybe they haven't been well-taught, or maybe they've been well-taught but haven't paid much attention, haven't applied it, and to shake them up out of their lethargy, shake them up out of the error of their ways, and put light on their path, and alert them. And in their case, like with others, they've got to repent. And if the Holy Spirit's in it, they're going to come back to the path that they perhaps started out on, or they've been lopsided walking it, haven't been walking straightly on it. And so this leads to why we have so many divisions in Christendom today, where people think, oh, a person was saved and they lost their salvation. They got to get saved again. That's not actually what the Bible's teaching. One true work of grace is all we need. By grace are we saved through faith, and that not of ourselves. It's a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast." But then he goes on to say, for we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has before ordained that we should walk in them. And sometimes we stop at verse 9 and we don't get on to verse 10 the way we should. These scriptures need to scare the sinfulness out of us, scare the carelessness out of us. Would I get in trouble if I said scare the hell out of us? Because I think we kind of need to have the hell scared out of us. Hell has a doctrine. The demons believe and tremble. And sometimes the doctrines of demons cause people to believe intellectually, but they don't tremble. They don't tremble. Or if they do tremble, it's a legalistic fear. And they're going to try to do what some call legal works. Not out of love, not out of gratitude, not out of the resources of Christ and the Holy Spirit. They're doing this because, I've got to keep earning my way, I've got to do stuff, I've got to perform. Okay, yeah, that's so much for my light introduction of that first page. But those two things will assist us as we look at tough passages in Hebrews. Are they talking to believers? Or are they talking to non-believers? Are they talking to believers who are no longer believers? And questions could rise up. Those two categories, I think, will help us. Now, last week, we focused on Hebrews 2 and how people let things slip. or drift away. And they need to give more earnest heed, pay much closer and careful attention to the things that we have heard. So that was Hebrews 2, 1 through 3. Today, I want to focus on chapter 3, best I can. I want us to see the need to hold fast and firmly to our confidence. Now, the heading at the top of this second part of the second page is looking at the book of Hebrews, let's examine some dangerous things people do. Now, verse 6 and 14 have some things in common. Christ as a son over his own house. Now, compared to Moses who was a servant over his house. They want you to understand the higher rank of Christ. Moses was a servant and he was faithful. Not perfect, but he was faithful. And he had a household. He had a covenant. He had a following, a congregation. But Jesus is the son of this household. And here's the catch. It says, whose house are we if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end. Now, this does not mean that we have to keep working and performing to be the household of Christ. Or if you want to put it another way, his church, he says he's building as a spiritual house, or it's called a temple in the New Testament. We are not a part of Christ's house as we perform and in again, off again. This is showing us a picture of what it looks like if you're one of those true living stones built on Christ, and part of that spiritual house, here's what you do. You are one who holds fast. You are rejoicing, or glorying, or boasting of your hope in Christ. And you're clinging to that. Now some people start to receive the word with joy, as the one parable says, but then persecution, the sun comes up, everything withers. We need to, and you understand these multiple slashes I make with these quotes, I'm gleaning from different translations in case you have a different one out there. We're told to rejoice, or glory, or boast of our hope in Christ. Now the fact is, if we do not celebrate our faith, we will be unable to live our faith. Okay? Celebrating is an active part of being able to do what the will of the Lord is. Because our confidence is in Christ and not in the flesh. Not in works. Not in forms of religious things. It's in Christ himself. So we celebrate it. And it energizes us and gives us momentum. Now, the example throughout chapter three, verse one, all the way to chapter four, verse 11, we didn't read that far today, but they're going back to make us look at Israel coming out of Egypt and getting into the promised land. The promised land is the rest. Some of our old hymns try to describe Canaan land as going to heaven, but I think there's some problems with that because in heaven, we don't have to fight any more wars. Someday I'm going to lay my Bible down, down by the riverside, down by the riverside, down by the riverside. Someday I'll lay my Bible down, down by the riverside, and study war no more. And the Bible being the sword of the Spirit, you will not get rid of the Word of God when you go to heaven, but you won't need it as a weapon to fight sin anymore. And Canaan was full of battles. Canaan was full of cities to conquer. Somewhere around 33 different kings are mentioned. I have a little booklet and it tries to cite 33 things that are the battles we have as Christians to actually take a settlement of that country. These things have to go down. Different areas of weakness, different areas of temptation, different areas of false teaching. And so sanctification, of the believer. And there comes this point, and I'm not trying to get into a second work of grace where now all of a sudden you have no things to do, you're sinless. Some have gotten off on that error. But the place of rest, the place in which I am His and He is mine. I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me, and the life that I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. I'm able to rid myself of fleshly trust, of fleshly efforts, and I'm learning to walk in the Spirit now. In conquering these particular things, we're seeking to take settlement of the land that God has given us. So it's talking about in this life. But now, this example of Israel as a nation, they were all brought out of Egypt, and they all passed through that water, and that's likened in 1 Corinthians 10 to a baptism. But then, as they only needed about three weeks to get to Canaan, because of unbelief, because of rebellion, because of murmuring and complaining, They actually got 40 years to walk and walk, and the longest funeral procession in all history took place in the wilderness. Oddly enough, it's called the Wilderness of Sin. People who did not have faith to enter the promised land did not. And another generation went in. But the picture of the nation as a whole is they had to go through some terrible times until they finally could get it in harmony with God that, yes, by faith we can have this. We sometimes just say, oh, it's too hard a battle. God doesn't expect that much of us, and we don't want to fight. God says, fight, and I'll be with you. Don't fight, and you're going to wander in the wilderness of sin. And so some of the individual Jewish people, actually a lot of them, were not real believers. They were a picture of the believer coming out of Egypt, but they were also, as individuals, pictures of religious people who really don't love God, don't trust God, don't want to walk with God. And so they have to walk in circles. Their life ends up being a big zero. They're just placeholders. It's their children that are going to get to go in, except for Joshua and Caleb. The rest of them just had to die out there. Big zeros, placeholders till the other generation could go in. That's why Moses had to give the law twice. Deuteronomy is the restating of the law with more to help the next generation be faithful and go in. So there's this great big picture. And I just put as a recommendation the chapter 3 verse 1 through 4, 11. Consult commentaries like John MacArthur or Warren Worsby, and I certainly have others I could recommend to you. But you could do some real study here and get the closer parallels with Israel coming out of Egypt, going through the wilderness, into the promised land, and what's being said here in this chapter. that we need to learn from their examples. Because we're no better than them if we just hear the Word of God and don't take it to heart, don't do anything with it, don't trust and obey. We could be just like them. So it's a firm warning, isn't it? So when we hear the gospel, we need to hold fast to everything Jesus said. Now verse 14. is of the same stripe here. For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end. Again, that's a picture of what it looks like. This is what you're like if you're one of Christ's true people. You will hold firm that steadfastness. And a believer might read this who has been getting sloppy. losing their joy, not practicing the things that make the promises of God important and powerful. And they might say, hey, wait a minute. That's what Christ's people are supposed to be like. I better wake up. And somebody else might say, I never even had this. I didn't know you could know you're saved. I didn't know that you could have this kind of power in your life. I just thought, well, I started here. Now I got to duke my way out. And basically, as legalistic as an Old Testament saint might be, And if that word partaker gets your attention, it's because over a year ago, I did a series called Partakers of Christ, where we delved into this more heavily. But I must move on now. And Hebrews 3 verses 8 through 13 deal with the subject of hardening your hearts. What are some of the dangerous things that people do? They let things slip and drift away. They do not hold fast and firmly to our confidence in Christ. But here, the warning is that people harden their hearts. They don't take care of them. Allow me to read verses 8 through 13 again. Harden not your hearts as in the provocation, referring to how Israel would not trust God and they murmured and complained and wouldn't go into the promised land. That's the provocation. In the day of temptation in the wilderness, when your fathers tempted me, proved me and saw my works 40 years, wherefore I was grieved with that generation and said, they do all way err in their hearts. We're going to deal with that word in a big way. and they have not known my ways." Have not known. Not, oh, they knew and they forgot, or they knew and they changed their mind. In reality, they never knew. When Jesus warns in Matthew 7 about those false professors of faith, even some of them were teachers and preachers, and, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied thy name and cast out demons and done many wonderful works? And he says, depart unto me ye that work iniquity. I never knew you. They are workers of iniquity, even though they're professing to be Christian ministers. And he says, I never knew you. And there is the rub, and some people don't get it. You ask a person, do you know the Lord? And they say, yes, it's because they know about him. They know about the Lord. They don't actually know Him in an intimate, relational way. But Jesus here says, I never knew you. Does the Lord know you? How can I tell if the Lord knows me or not? Because doesn't He know everything? We're talking about a relationship kind of knowing. And you know that the Lord knows you when he speaks to you through the word, when he touches your heart and convicts you of things, when he changes your mind or gives you encouragement when there's no natural way to be encouraged, when the word of God speaks, when the worship and the fellowship of the saints blesses you and you come to hunger for Christian fellowship, scriptural fellowship, time privately with God, time corporately with God and his people. And when you're getting blessed and when God intervenes, He changes you, sometimes He's correcting us, sometimes He's encouraging us, but that's where I want to make sure I am known of Him to keep me from becoming a worker of iniquity because I know so much Christian doctrine and I know so much Christian technique and procedure. I have heard of people in the ministry, and they've served God all their lives. And at the end of their lives, they were so busy. They've learned so many things. They had so many talents. And at the end of their ministries, they were deciding, you know, I'm done that work now, but I'm just going to read my Bible for fun. And they realized they hadn't been following the Lord's teachings. In the end, they said, I don't even agree with what I was saying and doing. That's a tragedy. Some people in the middle of their ministries have actually said, wait a minute, I was never born again. I've talked about it. Others even may have come to faith. I am not really that person. Strange things have happened like that. So books like this try to help us. They are good for us. And so we have to learn about these things. And here in Hebrews 3 is this warning. about not having hard hearts, not letting our hearts harden. We're told to beware, or take heed, or take care, so that we do not have an evil, sinful, hardened, unbelieving heart. In the middle of saying you're a believer, you could actually be unbelieving. It's only superficial what you believe. And God has to test us on that, and he invites us to invite him into the testing. Search me, O God, and know my heart. Try me, O Lord, and know my ways, and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in a way everlasting. Psalm 139, 23, 24. We've been singing it a little bit lately. And if we do allow our hearts to become hardened, evil, sinful, unbelieving. It can cause us to depart, to fall away, turn away from the opportunity to have a vibrant, interactive relationship with the living God. Now, one word Theological word that can be used here is apostasy. Apostasy. You've perhaps heard people refer to backsliding, and that's a mixed up terminology because most people today think of backsliding as getting off track, getting distracted, getting careless, and waking up and getting back and revitalized, revived, and that's important. But in the Old Testament, the word backslide was used harshly as the equivalent of the New Testament apostasy. It's not just, oh, I'm off base a little bit, it's you are not with me at all. And so apostasy is turning away from the true God and the true gospel. Apostasy is not the loss of salvation, it is the outcome of a person who has professed a relationship with God but did not really possess such a relationship. profess or possess. That's the point. This is defecting from the teaching of the faith and going the way of the world. I have two passages here I'd like to emphasize. They are like marking the ditches on both sides of the road. Galatians 5.4. If you go with me, please. Galatians 5.4. Now, in Galatians, it's another one of those books that's trying to keep us from getting off base, going back. Paul had taught to a whole region of Galatia, and in those churches, after he left, and he had spent a long time with them, false teachers came in, false brethren, unaware, as it's referred to, I think, in the book of Acts. They come in, and they start teaching, oh, yeah, believe in Jesus, but you've got to get circumcised and get back to the law of Moses and do this and do that and keep all the festivals. And so Paul Couldn't go back and revisit all those churches, so he wrote this letter to be passed around to all those churches, and thankfully for all of us for the rest of time, is that you can't start by grace and then go back to the works of the flesh. You can start with the Holy Spirit and try to perfect yourselves in the flesh. That's an overall idea of what Galatians is seeking to do. You can see right there in chapter 5 verse 1, "...stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage." And so he says here in verse 4, if you go back to the Mosaic law to perfect yourselves, Christ has become of no effect unto you. whosoever of you are justified by the law." That is so-called justified by the law. You are fallen from grace. Now that phrase has been misused to try to teach, oh, you lost your salvation. Here you are up on the grace road, you fell off, so you had salvation, now you lost it. That's not the idea here. What this is, it's falling from the teaching of grace. Falling from the teaching of grace and turned to legalism. You have fallen from the platform of true doctrine. And true Christians can get messed up in this area. Paul says that as much in the fourth chapter as I believe you have truly known God, or rather you are known of God, that's in 4.9. But I hope I haven't labored in vain, verse 11 of chapter four. And so he's trying to warn them as believers not to get caught up in this unbelieving kind of doctrine. Along the way, there could be people who were wrong from the beginning and need to be completely corrected. Others are starting to go astray. They've got to be turned back. And so, falling from grace here is referring to falling from the proper teaching of grace. And part of that is that you can't start with Christ and then try to go back to fleshly things that couldn't save you before and try to use them to perfect yourself. But there's another ditch on the other side of the road. And for that, we go to Jude chapter one. Now, there is only one chapter of Jude, but if you do search engines, you find that you gotta put chapter one and verse four to get where I want you to go. But you've got a real Bible there, I hope. Some of you may be using a device, and that's fine, but Jude, In verse 4 of the one and only chapter, and Jude was warning us in verse 3, to earnestly contend for the faith which was once and for all delivered to the saints. And here's why. Verse 4, for there are certain men crept in unawares. who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness." There's a $5 word. You may not have it in your Bible, but just give me a moment here. They've turned the grace of our God. Now, they didn't actually change God's grace, but they changed the teaching of grace. They changed the gospel of grace. And as Paul would say in the Galatian epistle in the first chapter, they're preaching another gospel. It's not really another gospel that can save you, but they perverted the gospel. And they call it gospel, and it is really not. And Jude is warning us in a similar way. They have turned the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and they are denying the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ. So this word, lasciviousness, okay? They're changing the teaching of grace into a license to sin. Lasciviousness, lewdness, immorality, sensuality, And they're saying, grace makes you free now to do what you want. Jesus paid it all, so I got nothing to worry about. And that's never the objective of the true gospel. Now, we learn to love God, fear God, and enjoy God in a way that the law could never bring to us. For the law came by Moses, John said in John 117. But grace and truth come to us by Jesus Christ. Grace and truth come by Jesus Christ. Grace means ability. Now that's not a dictionary definition, but grace has to do with unmerited favor. It has to do with a gift. Many times the word for grace is translated gift. But the idea is the gift gives us the power to truly believe, the ability to believe and obey and to rise up and to follow him. You know, if you're worried about your free will, understand it operates, it's free in a sense, but it's actually bound up like a bird put in a cage. It's got wings and all, but it can't fly because it's stuck in a cage and that cage is our fallen nature. Jesus has to come with his power of regeneration, the new birth. And it opens up the cage door and then we can fly out and do the right thing. Otherwise, we're just bashing against the cage. And our nature won't let us be true followers of Jesus. We might try to act like it, look like it, smell like it, but we have to be born again. And there's a gospel out there that teaches it's all God's work and Jesus paid it all. But that means now you're okay. You got a license now to sin as much as you want. And you'll go to heaven because it's all of grace and not of works. That's incomplete teaching. That's the rudiments of the world. Okay, so we now come to the matter of what it means to err or go astray. But before I get there, let's just take a little quick look. 1 Timothy 4, verse 1. 1 Timothy 4, verse 1. Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, or explicitly, Or very clearly, that in the latter times, some shall depart from the faith, the true teaching of faith and grace, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils, demons. And we studied 1 John 2 a while back. And there were some things that he said in verses 15 on to about 27. And he says, these things I write unto you concerning them that seduce you. A seduction, a deception, a luring away. Well, the latter days doesn't mean just some time just before Jesus comes. The latter days, according to Hebrews chapter one, the first couple of verses, Ever since Jesus came, we're in the last days. This age of grace, this church age, this gospel age we're in, is a time called the last days. Everything that's been talked about previously in Scripture, it's come into a climax. The climax is yet to come, the complete end of all things, the climax, the completion of all things. But we're in this time where there's spiritual war going on. and there's false teachers, and demonically inspired doctrines, and they can have powerful influences. 2 Timothy 4, verses 3 and 4, it says, for the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own lusts shall they heap up to themselves teachers having itching ears. Now, you could say the teachers have the itching ears, like, what do they want to hear? That's what I'll give them. What will lock me into a good position where I'll be popular and I'll have money and so forth, lots of influence? Well, I'm itching to hear that. But it really, I think, talks about the ones who are doing the heaping. They're looking for teachers. Oh, I like what he says. Mm, that makes me feel good. Ooh, ooh, yeah, that's just what I always thought. That's just what I want. And just going around with a shopping cart in a grocery store, just picking up the things that please you visually and please you in your sweet tooth or something, you know, not the true diet. And so in either case, there is a warning. And as Paul's telling Timothy in the earlier verses, make sure you preach the word. and be true about it. There's a day coming when people won't hear this. And I dare say it's not just dealing with a certain time period, but it's on and on, seasons of this, where people get tired of hearing the hard work of truth. I mean, truth is hard work. Even Solomon said, much study is weariness of the flesh. But here they come, they're heaping up teachers, and there's itching ears here getting their scratch. And verse 4 says, and they shall turn away their ears from the truth and shall be turned unto fables. Now, if you know a little grammar here, the they shall turn away their ears is active. They're doing that. But something kind of passive, it's like they've opened the door. And now what comes in, they can't control. And as they want to turn away from hearing the truth, then they get turned. This is more passive now, but they open the door to it. Kind of like having a screen door in a submarine. You might filter out some chunks coming in, but basically that water coming out of the submarine is not a good thing. And as people open themselves up to other teaching because they're tired of hearing the truth, then they get turned and influenced and seduced by other kinds of teaching that, hey, there's a big crowd. Hey, we're all together. This many people can't be wrong. So it's a thing to watch out for. And in 1 John 4, just want to look at verses 5 and 6. 1 John 4, verses 5 and 6. They are of the world, therefore speak they of the world, and the world hears them." Can I just stop there a second? People who are of the world, which is in essence saying they're not of God, they're not of the things of God, they're not in league with spiritual truth and pure doctrine, They haven't been born again. Jesus could look at certain Pharisees and say, I know you are not of God. God is not your father. And you have no place in your hearts for his word. Now, he could say that clearly because he's the son of God and he knows all things. But we're being warned, some people out there are like this. They're of the world. Therefore, they speak of the world. They try to make everything logical and pleasurable and agreeable and easy to accept. And then the world hears them. Ah, ooh, I like that. Now, the next verse, verse 6, says, we are of God. Now, we, I'd like to think, here's John, an apostle, and he's referring to other apostles, the writers of the New Testament, particularly. We are of God. He that knows God hears us. He that is not of God hears not us. That's kind of simple. The Berean spirit, we see in the book of Acts. They went home and searched the scriptures to see if these things were so. And so here's how I break the tie between what I feel, what I understand, and what other people are saying and feeling and understanding. How do I know? I go to the word. And it says, hereby know we the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. And the whole reason we go to the trouble, say, turn in your Bibles, or I give you notes to go home and search your Bibles, is this is how you know whether you're hearing truth or not. So now we come back to Hebrews chapter 3 and verse 10. Hebrews 3 verse 10. Now God is saying of the Jews that perished in the wilderness, wherefore I was grieved with that generation and said they do always err in their heart. and they have not known, have not known my ways." So, another way it's translated in modern Bibles is they err or they go astray. They go astray in their heart. Their hearts wander away from the straight path that God presents to them. Now, in this area, he is quoting Psalm 95-10. We're not going to turn there. But in Psalm 95-10, the Hebrew word to err To wander, to go astray, to stagger, to be deceived or seduced. That's the kind of word being used. And here in the New Testament with the Greek word, we're referring to that. Let me say that little list again. To err, to wander, to go astray, to stagger, to be deceived, or to be seduced. Now, this word that I'm referring to, my Bible says, err, and yours might say, wander or go astray. But it's also used again in James chapter 1. And if you'll bear with me, please, I'm going to go just past Hebrews to James chapter 1, verses 12 through 16. James chapter 1, verses 12 through 16. Blessed is the man that endureth temptation, for when he is tried he shall receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to them that love him. Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God. For God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempts he any man. But every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin, and sin when it is finished bringeth forth death, and then the admonition," verse 16, "'Do not err, my beloved brethren.'" Do not err. Do not go astray, my beloved brethren. Now what's interesting here, same Greek word as in Hebrews 3.10, the root word is the word for planet. Now you may not be into astronomy and things like that, but you know, the stars are so stable that we can tell the seasons. We got that North Star, we can know true North at all times, but we can tell what season is by how these other stars move. But there's these radical random bright lights in our Earth. And if you ever look at them with magnification, be it binoculars or anything else, they don't twinkle like the others. They are the planets. And they're operating in a solar system, and from our point of view, they're all over the place. Jupiter sometimes will be right up by the moon, and boy, that's so cool. That's the second biggest thing in the sky you can see at night, next to the moon. The next night, it's way over here. The next night, it's way over there. And some other time, it'll be in a different place entirely, not near the moon at all. And so they're a different thing to trace. And so you know what the word planet actually means? It means wanderer. Wanderer. Not the steady course like the stars have. They seem to wander. And that word is given to us. Don't be like that. Don't wander around. Get on track. Now in Psalm 1, blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly. nor stands in the way of sinners, and does not sit in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate day and night, and he shall be like a tree." I'm not going to read the rest of it. You can go there. But the person walks in the way of sinners, Let me get this in order. The person listens to the counsel of ungodly people, then he finds himself walking in the way of sinners. Next thing you know, he plum sits down, and he's now in the seat of the scornful. One time I was trying to make that more powerfully clear to us, and I used the reference to manure pits. which some of you may know how deadly a thing that can be, get in a manure pit, and many people have died there, overcome with fumes and so forth. Blessed is the man that does not listen to those who say go to the manure pit, nor stands in the manure pit, nor takes a seat and sits in the manure pit. See, now you understand the toxicness of this. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and his law doth he meditate day and night, and he's like a tree. Stability. Oh, planted by the rivers of water. Rivers there is plural because it's referring to irrigation canals, river yulets. Most trees don't get the benefit of more than one river if they're near a river at all. But these places, these vineyards or whatever, they would have irrigation canals so that they're going to be fruitful and they're protected by good water and so forth. So here we're getting the idea of the prosperity of being well-planted and not wandering around. I've learned the hard way that if you plant a tree and you don't like where you plant it and you uproot and plant it somewhere else, eventually that tree ain't going to make it if you keep uprooting it. That psalm also started with the word blessed. Here's another Hebrew root word. Blessed generally means happy. And it's a joyful, godly, spiritual happiness, not just temporal, shallow pleasures. But the root word for blessed here used a lot in the Psalms. The root word means to walk a straight path, to walk straight on. And the idea is you will be happy if you don't get off the path and stay on the right path and walk straight, stay on the level. Because if you get off this path, there's quagmires, there's lions and tigers and bears, oh my. There's all kinds of things out there, quicksand, snakes. You'll be so glad if you stay on the path. You'll get there faster. You'll get there better. As a matter of fact, you'll get there. And so that's the kind of thing. And just for a lovely little study, I gave you a sample in the Psalms where blessed is used. And I'm not going to deal with those references, but that's something you could have. And if every case you think about it, these are the things that help me walk straight on. stay on the path and not err, not wander, not go off the path. Now, Psalm 119, verse 59. I obviously have more references here than I even plan to use. They're just for your benefit if you'd like to go further, but Psalm 119, verse 59, this one's straightforward. The psalmist says, I thought on my ways and turned my feet unto thy testimonies. I thought about what I was doing. Something didn't seem right. So I decided I better get back to the book. Get back to the book. Get on the right path. I'm going to skip the Proverbs 4 and kind of end with that one in just a moment. But I'd like to give you something maybe you don't feel familiar with. It's Jeremiah 14, verse 10. Go farther past Isaiah to Jeremiah chapter 14. And verse 10. Thus saith the Lord unto this people, thus have they loved to wander. They have not refrained their feet. Therefore the Lord does not accept them. He will now remember their iniquity and visit their sins. Powerful admonitions. Micah 6, 8. I'd like it if you were familiar with that, but maybe you aren't, or you don't recognize the reference. But Micah 6, verse 8, "'He hath showed thee, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of thee but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?' Now, I'll be reticent if I don't give you something encouraging here at this moment. It's in the book of Isaiah, chapter 53. I like to call it the gospel according to Isaiah. So much about Christ is in Isaiah. So much about the gospel is in Isaiah. And in Isaiah 53, verse 6, all we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned every one to his own way. And the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all." So this isn't just a lecture about walking the straight path, because in the flesh, you're going to flop. Even if you seem to succeed, you're going to miss the important part. Did you know the Lord? Because the Lord knows you enough to know that he's got to do something for you you can't do for yourself. I owed a debt I could not pay. He paid a debt he did not owe. I needed someone to take my sins away. And now I sing a brand new song. Amazing grace the whole day long. Christ Jesus paid the debt that I could never pay. We're all wanderers. We're all prone to wander. Lord, I feel it, the hymn says. Jesus came to rescue us from wandering. And so that last statement, I got to touch it at least. Hebrews 3.13. We're told to exhort one another daily while it is called today. And he's referring to that statement in Psalm 95. Today is the time, the accepted time. Now is the accepted time. Today is the day of salvation. So while it's still that today mode, We're to exhort one another. Exhort means to call somebody alongside and join you as you walk to follow the Lord. And if all the sheep are following the Lord, they'll find themselves near each other too. But sometimes somebody's starting to go off, hey, come on over here, join me, let's go. It's encouragement. But exhort one another while it is called today, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. People's hearts can become hard through deceptive, sinful temptations." I've got all kinds of goodies here that I can't touch, but I said I wanted to do Proverbs 4. Let me end on that. Proverbs chapter 4. And verse 23, I hope you'll find a well-beaten path to this place in your Bible, at least in time. Very practical truth. Proverbs chapter 4, starting with verse 23, where we are told to keep thy heart with all diligence. Okay, make it a priority. For out of it, the heart, are the issues of life. Put away from thee a froward mouth, a crooked, perverse mouth, and perverse lips put far from thee. Let not thine eyes look right on, let thine eyes look right on, and let thine eyelids look straight before thee. Ponder the path of thy feet, and let all thy ways be established. Turn not to the right hand, nor to the left. Remove thy foot from evil." Okay. Sloppy read that there, but you get the idea. There are things you are to put away from. It kind of boils down to something Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15, that evil communications corrupt good manners. Evil companions can wreck our character and our habits of life. And it's kind of funny because it's a catch-22 here. I've got to keep my heart pure so that I can do what's right. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. But in order to keep my heart pure, I've got to watch out what I'm doing, too. So it isn't some abstract over here purifying my heart, and then somehow I'm going to do everything right. It's a combination. I have to try to stimulate my heart in pure things, but I also have to say, look at the influencing. The popular word today, influencers. What influencers do we have that aren't taking us in godly paths? The counsel of the ungodly, the stimulization of the ungodly, the media of ungodly, the different things coming at us, false teachers, whatever they are. But we gotta keep ourselves away from that. There's things that lure us the wrong way, and we call it entertainment. We call it being mature and tolerant. And what we're doing is we're opening up and having screen doors in our submarine, and we wonder why we're lilting and sinking. Keep our hearts. So what you do with your mouth, what you do with your eyes, what you do with your feet affects the heart. Keep the heart. Don't allow yourself to get a hard heart. Do not go astray. Do not err, my beloved brother. And if somebody's not a true brother, God can reveal that to them. and they can get plugged into the right resource from the very beginning. Others of us, we know who, we know we have him, but we haven't followed him. We still got a problem with wandering. So may God help us with this. Lord willing, I'm gonna deal with chapter four, verses one and two our next time, but let's pray. Father, thank you for giving us these moments to consider a very big message that's encircled by many other great messages about keeping the heart. not letting it become hardened, not wandering and going astray. Please give us your grace. Reveal to us, Lord, that Jesus is enough and more than enough. Reveal to us whether we have Jesus or not. And if we do, that we'll now be strong in the grace which is in Christ Jesus. And I ask that you do these things for his name's sake. Amen.