Jesus is greater than Moses
1 So, Christian friends, think carefully about who Jesus is. Like us, God has chosen you to serve him. We tell people that we believe in Jesus as the messenger that God has sent. He helps us as God's great priest. 2 God is the one who chose him for this work. He serves God faithfully, as Moses also faithfully served God's people long ago.
3 We know that someone who builds a house is more important than the house itself. In the same way, we should praise Jesus more than we praise Moses, because Jesus is greater. 4 Every house has someone who built it. But God is the one who has built all things.
5 We say that Moses served God well, like a servant in God's house. He took care of all God's people. In this way, Moses showed clearly the message that God would speak later. 6 But Christ serves in God's house as a son, not only as a servant. He is the leader of God's family. We belong to God's family if we continue to believe in Christ. We must be brave. We must continue to show people clearly that we trust God. He will do what he has promised to do.
God has a special place of rest for his people
7 God's Holy Spirit says this:
‘You must listen when you hear God speak today.
8 Do not refuse to obey him.
Do not be like God's people many years ago.
When they travelled in the wilderness,
they turned against me.
They wanted to see if I would punish them.
9 For 40 years your ancestors saw the great things that I did.
But still they did not obey me.
10 That is why I became angry with them.
I said, “They always want to do what is wrong.
They refuse to understand my message.”
11 Because of that, I promised to punish them.
Because I was angry with them, I said,
“They will never arrive in my special place of rest.” ’
3:11Many years before, God rescued his people from Egypt, where they had been slaves. He promised to take them to a land that would be their new home. It would be a place where they would have rest. But the people did not trust God. See Exodus 17:1-7; Numbers 14:1-35. So God did not let those people go into the country that he had promised them. Only their children could go there. 12 So be careful, my Christian friends. Do not refuse to trust God. That would be a very bad thing to do. Do not turn away from the God who lives for ever. 13 Instead, help each other to be strong every day. Today, you can still hear God's message. While that is still true, do not refuse to obey God. Do not think that sin will not hurt you. That is a lie. 14 We must continue to trust Christ very well, as we did when we first believed in him. We must continue to trust him until the end of our lives. Then we will share in everything that is his. 15 We have seen what the Bible says:
‘You must listen when you hear God speak today.
Do not refuse to obey him.
Do not be like God's people many years ago,
when they turned against God.’
16 Who were those people who heard God speak? All of them were the people that Moses led away from Egypt. They heard God's message, but they refused to obey him. 17 Who was God angry with for 40 years? He was angry with those same people. They did what was wrong. So they died and their bodies remained in the wilderness. 18 God promised to punish them, because they refused to obey him. He said, ‘They will never arrive in my special place of rest.’
19 So we must be careful ourselves! Those people did not trust God. As a result, they never arrived in God's special place.
Hebrews 4
God's place of rest is for people who trust him
1 God promised his people that they could go to his special place of rest. That promise is still true for us today. So we must be very careful. Do not fail to arrive in that place. We certainly do not want that to happen. 2 We have heard God's good news, just like God's people in the wilderness heard his message. But that message did not help them, because they did not believe it. They did not trust God, like those who obeyed him. 3 But those of us who trust God do enjoy his special place of rest. This is what God said:
‘Because I was angry with them, I promised this:
“They will never arrive in my special place of rest.” ’
God said that, even though he had finished his work when he made the world. 4 In the Bible God has spoken about the seventh day like this:
‘God rested from all his work on the seventh day.’
5 As we have already seen, God said something later about his rest:
‘They will never arrive in my special place of rest.’
6 So we see that there is still a chance for people to go to God's place of rest. But those people who first heard God's message in the wilderness refused to obey him. As a result, they did not arrive in his special place of rest. 7 So God chose another time for people to go to his place of rest. He called it ‘Today’. A long time after Moses, David spoke God's message. As we already know, he said:
‘You must listen when you hear God speak today.
Do not refuse to obey him.’
8 This shows that Joshua did not bring God's people to the place where they could rest. Later, God had to speak again about another day of rest. 9 So we see this: God still has a place ready for his people, where they can rest. They will rest as God rested on the seventh day. 10 When God made the world and everything, he rested after he had finished his work. It is the same for everyone who goes to God's place of rest. They too will rest. They will no longer need to work.
4:8After Moses died, Joshua led God's people into the land that God had promised to give to them. See Joshua 1:1-3. But this was not the final place where God's people would have rest. 11 So we must do everything possible to arrive in God's special place of rest. God's people in the wilderness did not obey him. We must not be like them. If we do not obey God, we also will fail to arrive in that place.
God's message shows what we are really like
12 So be careful! God's message to us is alive and powerful. It is like a sword that has two sharp edges. Even more than a sword, God's message goes very deep into us. It cuts between our soul and our spirit. It is like a sharp knife that can cut deep into our body between our bones. God's message shows what we are really thinking. It shows what we really want. 13 There is nothing in the whole world that can hide from God. He sees everything clearly and he knows everything. We will have to explain to him everything that we have done during our lives.
