Read the New Testament in 24 Weeks

3 So then, brethren, consecrated and set apart for God, who share in the heavenly calling, [thoughtfully and attentively] consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest Whom we confessed [as ours when we embraced the Christian faith].

² [See how] faithful He was to Him Who appointed Him [Apostle and High Priest], as Moses was also faithful in the whole house [of God].^(A)

³ Yet Jesus has been considered worthy of much greater honor and glory than Moses, just as the builder of a house has more honor than the house [itself].

⁴ For [of course] every house is built and furnished by someone, but the Builder of all things and the Furnisher [of the entire equipment of all things] is God.

⁵ And Moses certainly was faithful in the administration of all God’s house [but it was only] as a ministering servant. [In his entire ministry he was but] a testimony to the things which were to be spoken [the revelations to be given afterward in Christ].^(B)

⁶ But Christ (the Messiah) was faithful over His [own Father’s] house as a Son [and Master of it]. And it is we who are [now members] of this house, if we hold fast and firm to the end our joyful and exultant confidence and sense of triumph in our hope [in Christ].

⁷ Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says: Today, if you will hear His voice,

⁸ Do not harden your hearts, as [happened] in the rebellion [of Israel] and their provocation and ^[a]embitterment [of Me] in the day of testing in the wilderness,

⁹ Where your fathers tried [My patience] and tested [My forbearance] and ^[b]found I stood their test, and they saw My works for forty years.

¹⁰ And so I was provoked (displeased and sorely grieved) with that generation, and said, They always err and are led astray in their hearts, and they have not perceived or recognized My ways and become progressively better and more experimentally and intimately acquainted with them.

¹¹ Accordingly, I swore in My wrath and indignation, They shall not enter into My rest.^(C)

¹² [Therefore beware] brethren, take care, lest there be in any one of you a wicked, unbelieving heart [which refuses to cleave to, trust in, and rely on Him], leading you to turn away and desert or stand aloof from the living God.

¹³ But instead warn (admonish, urge, and encourage) one another every day, as long as it is called Today, that none of you may be hardened [into settled rebellion] by the deceitfulness of sin [by the fraudulence, the stratagem, the trickery which the delusive glamor of his sin may play on him].

¹⁴ For we ^[c]have become fellows with Christ (the Messiah) and share in all He has for us, if only we hold our first newborn confidence and original assured expectation [in virtue of which we are believers] firm and unshaken to the end.

¹⁵ Then while it is [still] called Today, if you would hear His voice and when you hear it, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion [in the desert, when the people provoked and irritated and embittered God against them].^(D)

¹⁶ For who were they who heard and yet were rebellious and provoked [Him]? Was it not all those who came out of Egypt led by Moses?

¹⁷ And with whom was He irritated and provoked and grieved for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose ^[d]dismembered bodies were strewn and left in the desert?

¹⁸ And to whom did He swear that they should not enter His rest, but to those who disobeyed [who had not listened to His word and who refused to be compliant or be persuaded]?

¹⁹ So we see that they were not able to enter [into His rest], because of their unwillingness to adhere to and trust in and rely on God [unbelief had shut them out].^(E)

4 Therefore, while the promise of entering His rest still holds and is offered [today], let us be afraid [^[e]to distrust it], lest any of you should ^[f]think he has come too late and has come short of [reaching] it.

² For indeed we have had the glad tidings [Gospel of God] proclaimed to us just as truly as they [the Israelites of old did when the good news of deliverance from bondage came to them]; but the message they heard did not benefit them, because it was not mixed with faith (with ^[g]the leaning of the entire personality on God in absolute trust and confidence in His power, wisdom, and goodness) by those who heard it; ^[h]neither were they united in faith with the ones [Joshua and Caleb] who heard (did believe).

³ For we who have believed (adhered to and trusted in and relied on God) do enter that rest, ^[i]in accordance with His declaration that those [who did not believe] should not enter when He said, As I swore in My wrath, They shall not enter My rest; and this He said although [His] works had been completed and prepared [and waiting for all who would believe] from the foundation of the world.^(F)

⁴ For in a certain place He has said this about the seventh day: And God rested on the seventh day from all His works.^(G)

⁵ And [they forfeited their part in it, for] in this [passage] He said, They shall not enter My rest.^(H)

⁶ Seeing then that the promise remains over [from past times] for some to enter that rest, and that those who formerly were given the good news about it and the opportunity, failed to appropriate it and did not enter because of disobedience,

⁷ Again He sets a definite day, [a new] Today, [and gives another opportunity of securing that rest] saying through David after so long a time in the words already quoted, Today, if you would hear His voice and when you hear it, do not harden your hearts.^(I)

⁸ [This mention of a rest was not a reference to their entering into Canaan.] For if Joshua had given them rest, He [God] would not speak afterward about another day.

⁹ So then, there is still awaiting a full and complete Sabbath-rest reserved for the [true] people of God;

¹⁰ For he who has once entered [God’s] rest also has ceased from [the weariness and pain] of human labors, just as God rested from those labors ^[j]peculiarly His own.^(J)

¹¹ Let us therefore be zealous and exert ourselves and strive diligently to enter that rest [of God, to know and experience it for ourselves], that no one may fall or perish by the same kind of unbelief and disobedience [into which those in the wilderness fell].

¹² For the Word that God speaks is alive and full of power [making it active, operative, energizing, and effective]; it is sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating to the dividing line of the ^[k]breath of life (soul) and [the immortal] spirit, and of joints and marrow [of the deepest parts of our nature], exposing and sifting and analyzing and judging the very thoughts and purposes of the heart.

¹³ And not a creature exists that is concealed from His sight, but all things are open and exposed, naked and defenseless to the eyes of Him with Whom we have to do.

¹⁴ Inasmuch then as we have a great High Priest Who has [already] ascended and passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession [of faith in Him].

¹⁵ For we do not have a High Priest Who is unable to understand and sympathize and have a shared feeling with our weaknesses and infirmities and liability to the assaults of temptation, but One Who has been tempted in every respect as we are, yet without sinning.

¹⁶ Let us then fearlessly and confidently and boldly draw near to the throne of grace (the throne of God’s unmerited favor to us sinners), that we may receive mercy [for our failures] and find grace to help in good time for every need [appropriate help and well-timed help, coming just when we need it].

5 For every high priest chosen from among men is appointed to act on behalf of men in things relating to God, to offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins.

² He is able to exercise gentleness and forbearance toward the ignorant and erring, since he himself also is liable to moral weakness and physical infirmity.

³ And because of this he is obliged to offer sacrifice for his own sins, as well as for those of the people.

⁴ Besides, one does not appropriate for himself the honor [of being high priest], but he is called by God and receives it of Him, just as Aaron did.

⁵ So too Christ (the Messiah) did not exalt Himself to be made a high priest, but was appointed and exalted by Him Who said to Him, You are My Son; today I have begotten You;^(K)

⁶ As He says also in another place, You are a Priest [appointed] forever after the order (with ^[l]the rank) of Melchizedek.^(L)

⁷ In the days of His flesh [Jesus] offered up definite, special petitions [for that which He not only wanted ^[m]but needed] and supplications with strong crying and tears to Him Who was [always] able to save Him [out] from death, and He was heard because of His reverence toward God [His godly fear, His piety, ^[n] in that He shrank from the horrors of separation from the bright presence of the Father].

⁸ Although He was a Son, He learned [active, special] obedience through what He suffered

⁹ And, [His completed experience] making Him perfectly [equipped], He became the Author and Source of eternal salvation to all those who give heed and obey Him,^(M)

¹⁰ Being ^[o]designated and recognized and saluted by God as High Priest after the order (with ^[p]the rank) of Melchizedek.^(N)

¹¹ Concerning this we have much to say which is hard to explain, since you have become dull in your [spiritual] hearing and sluggish [even ^[q]slothful in achieving spiritual insight].

¹² For even though by this time you ought to be teaching others, you actually need someone to teach you over again the very first principles of God’s Word. You have come to need milk, not solid food.

¹³ For everyone who continues to feed on milk is obviously inexperienced and unskilled in the doctrine of righteousness (of conformity to the divine will in purpose, thought, and action), for he is a mere infant [not able to talk yet]!

¹⁴ But solid food is for full-grown men, for those whose senses and mental faculties are trained by practice to discriminate and distinguish between what is morally good and noble and what is evil and contrary either to divine or human law.