Rest Assured

Guys, if you're visiting with us, welcome to Impact.

It's good to have you here.

And my name is Ryan.

I'm one of the pastors here at the church.

And we are in week two of a series through the book of Hebrews.

So if you have your Bibles, you can open to Hebrews chapter three.

I don't know if you guys like me, when I was little, my parents took me to the store.

Every once in a while, it would be a special shopping day where they say you can pick out a treat.

Anyone?

Yeah.

And I would always skip the candy.

I would go for the gum because the gum would always last longer.

And my preferred gum, my go-to, was big league chew.

Big league chew because I played baseball and it was just, you know, what you did.

You know, tear open that pouch and there's all that shredded gum.

Now it's a whole pouch, a pack of gum that's supposed to last multiple chewing experiences.

But if you were like me, I had zero self-restraint.

So I wouldn't just take a little like, you know, pinch of it and pop it in and start chewing on uh on the gum like a normal person.

No, I would grab and take a half of it, shove it in my mouth at one time, and then after about five minutes, I would take the rest of it and shove the rest of it in my mouth.

So I was chewing an entire pack of big league chew.

I couldn't even get my mouth around it.

I didn't have enough like I'm doing one of those.

Anybody with me on that?

I'm the only loser in the place.

All right, awesome.

But then what would happen is my jaw would start to hurt and I couldn't chew it anymore after like 30 minutes, and I didn't want to waste it all.

So I would take this big old fat wad of gum and I'd stick it in our freezer.

And I would just save it until later.

And then it would rewarm up in my mouth, you know, and just had all the bacteria and saliva just, you know, preserved perfectly in the freezer.

That's what I did.

Now I bring this up because I feel like this is kind of what we are going to be doing over the next couple of months.

About a year ago, as we were mapping out the teaching calendar for uh 2026, we were like, you know what?

Hebrews, yes, Hebrews is gonna be a great book to study through.

Haven't gone through it yet as a church family, so this will be great.

And so we left 10 weeks for ourselves to go through the book of Hebrews.

And I didn't realize fully until just now how much we are taking an entire pack of big league chew and shoving it into our mouths today.

And so, with that being said, knowing how much we have to get through, how much we're biting off, everybody open wide for me.

Can you do that?

And let's start reading together.

Now, last week we kicked this series off.

Pastor James did a great job of kind of laying that foundation.

Uh, just a little recap.

The author of Hebrews is writing uh what's known as a sermonic letter, a little different in style, where he's not specifically addressing situations in different local churches that need to be addressed.

It's more of a sermon style, one that was meant to be read and almost taught through.

So it's rich in theology, it is rich in uh historical references, all of these things.

Now, the main idea, right?

The main or key theme is the author is exhorting the church, the people of God, not to give up on in the midst of suffering and persecution and trials, not to give up on, not to walk away or fall away from the purity of their faith and devotion to Jesus.

That is the whole of his letter and what he's trying to get at.

And he begins the letter, as we studied last week, by bringing us back to the simplicity of the person of Christ, reminding us that Jesus is greater than any kind of spirituality or angels or anything in existence, that Jesus reigns and rules supreme as the author of life, the creator, sustainer, and savior of all things.

That is who Jesus is.

And the the reminder and challenge was to make sure that he remains first and foremost in our own lives and hearts.

Now, there is some debate as to the authorship of the book of Hebrews.

Uh, there's different biblical scholars, theologians that have different ideas as to who wrote Hebrews.

Some would say it was written by the Apostle Paul.

And there's truly a lot of Pauline theology and ideas in this book.

Now, the the difference is that Paul, in his letters to the churches, would always identify himself up front.

You guys remember this pattern?

You say something to the effect of Paul, a bondservant, the doulos, bondservant of Christ.

And that's how he would introduce.

So he would name himself.

He doesn't do that here if he did, in fact, write this.

The pushback or or argument to that, or counter, would be, well, it's because it's a different style of letter to the church, and that's why he didn't address himself or name himself up front.

Which there's an argument to be made for that.

But there's other people that say, no, it would be more a contemporary of Paul that most likely wrote the book of Hebrews.

Somebody like Apollos, who was a mighty preacher of the gospel and brought many to faith in Christ.

Uh, others would argue someone like Barnabas, who was the co-minister uh with Paul and later on with John Mark and went on many missionary journeys.

And some of the little nuances here, as you look at whoever wrote this, there are a lot of Old Testament references.

And so we're gonna be talking about uh not just Jewish history, but things like the tabernacle, things like the priesthood that that was very unpacked in great detail.

We're gonna be looking at things like the sacrificial system.

So we can conclude that whoever wrote this was Jewish in heritage and was writing to a predominantly Jewish audience.

And yet we also know that he was familiar with Greek or Gentile language, culture, and customs because he quotes from the Old Testament, but he quotes from the Old Testament in the Greek, known as the Septuagint, right?

The Greek translation of the Old Testament originally written in Hebrew.

And so we can piece all this together and take some guesses.

My conclusion, I do have an opinion about this, by the way.

My conclusion is that the book of Hebrews was written by Barnabas, right, who was this co-worker, co-minister of Paul, which is why so many of the ideas and some of the structure is kind of Pauline and has a hint of Paul in there, and yet there is differences and nuance in in how he goes about things and style and preference and all of those different uh details.

And so that's my conclusion on this.

People think differently, you can conclude differently, that is perfectly fine.

You all have the right to be wrong, but truly, this is not a hill to die on, and what we do ultimately know is that this was written and inspired by the Holy Spirit.

And so that's what we take to heart.

Hebrews is this sermon filled with biblical history, as I mentioned, a rich theology, and yet all of it is used as supportive of these warnings and encouragements that the author of Hebrews wants God's people to be aware of, not to drift or fall away from faith in Christ.

And so there's a lot of strong language that challenges us as God's people.

And it's an encouragement, but it's one that we are to take seriously.

I don't know if you've ever experienced this with anyone.

Uh, Tracy, my wife and I, we just got back from North Lake Tahoe.

We were up in the incline village area.

I have a buddy who's a pastor at Cornerstone Community Church up there, uh, invited me to come and guest preach for him this last Sunday.

Uh, and initially I'm like, man, I love you, but an eight-hour drive to go and teach one service up in North Lake Tahoe seems like a little bit much.

And he goes, hey, if you're able to do that, I can get you a cabin for free for the week.

And so I changed my mind.

Figured, you know, what a great idea to go and serve the Lord in North Lake Tahoe last Sunday.

So that's what we did.

We shared at this church.

Now, when we got there, uh he we got there on Saturday and we're he met us at the cabin with the key, and he starts immediately walking me through all of these encouragements, and that's what he's he would tell me.

He's hey, I want to encourage you to, I'm gonna encourage you to.

And he started warning us that it was bear season.

So, what that meant in Lake Tahoe is these bears were preparing for hibernation, which meant they were looking for places that they could hibernate as the winter is going to approach, and they're also storing up for food.

So they're very aggressive, trying to get into whatever they can to be able to eat whatever they can find.

So he warned us and he said, Hey, just to encourage you, do you have any food in your car?

All right, well, I don't think so.

I think we got it all in.

He goes, All right, because even if there's like a candy bar wrapper that still has some candy smell on it, I have friends where bears have ripped the doors off of their vehicles.

I'm like, I think I need to go double check my car.

He says, also, I want to encourage you, be sure to bolt lock the doors at night and whenever you're in the house.

Because if you have food in the house, they have actually learned how to open doors using the handles and get into homes.

And I'm going, where are we right now?

These burglarizing bears, are we this is Smoky the Bear, Yogi?

How have they come to a place where they can open?

Do they pick locks, dude?

Like, how worried should we be here?

But he was encouraging us with warnings to make sure that we were safe and secure.

In fact, that first night, I think I locked all the outside doors, double-checked them, all the windows.

We got into our bedroom and I locked the bedroom door.

I'm taking no chances, right?

None.

This is exactly what the author of Hebrews is doing here.

Now we're going to be jumping from different places through Hebrews 3 into the middle of Hebrews 4.

We'll get through as much as we can today as we shove the big league chew in our mouth.

But let's start in verse 7 and let's dive right into this warning, this encouragement that the author of Hebrews is giving to us as the people of God.

Verse 7.

Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, and now he's about to quote Psalm 95, the words of King David, today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness where your fathers put me to the test and saw my works for forty years.

Therefore I was provoked with that generation, and said, They always go astray in their heart.

They have not known my ways, as I swore in my wrath, they shall not enter my rest.

Now he's referring to Psalm 95, and the psalmist King David in that moment was referring back to the book of Exodus and the history of God's people being led out of slavery from Egypt, wandering in the wilderness, grumbling and complaining against God, not trusting him, as he was trying to lead them into the land of promise and rest.

And yet because of their sin they could not enter.

Verse 12 Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God.

But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called today, that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end.

As it is said, Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.

For who were those who heard and re and yet rebelled?

Was it not all those who left Egypt led by Moses?

And with whom was he provoked for forty years?

Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness?

And to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest, but to those who were what?

Disobedient.

So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief.

What is the author's warning, the exhortation to the church?

Simply put, it's to examine our hearts, to do the work of examining our own hearts.

Is our heart like the people of Israel?

Evil and unbelieving?

Now a lot of us would immediately say, Well, no, no, I believe in God.

And yet when we look at how we live our lives, our lives will be evidence of what we truly believe.

Someone once said very well, I'm not sure who it is, somebody smarter than me, but they said, you never have to tell someone to live out what they believe.

They always will.

So if you want to know what you truly believe, what your true faith convictions are, look at your life, and that will be evidence that points back to what you believe.

Do we have hearts that are evil and unbelieving toward God?

Willfully choosing not to believe everything he has revealed to us through his word, everything he has revealed to us through his son, and everything he reveals to us through his spirit.

Do we willfully make that choice?

I know a lot of us have a mindset where we struggle because we're cynical, maybe we're skeptical by nature.

And so our mindset is well, I just have a hard time.

I can't believe these things.

But it is not a matter of can or can't, it is will or won't.

Faith and belief is a matter of will or volition.

Atheism is simply a worldview adopted by those who want to live as if God doesn't exist.

That's all atheism is.

We don't want to live with the tension of what we know to be true.

There has to be someone, something greater, far greater or more transcendent than me, that started all of this, this great designed universe.

But I don't want to submit to that.

I want to live how I want to live without any guilt or remorse or regret.

And so the way I do that is adopt a worldview where God does not exist.

And that is what I choose to believe.

And as scripture says, the fool says in his heart, there is no God.

We won't believe what he has said about himself, about this world in which we live, this world that we love so much.

We won't believe what he says about our sin, our hearts apart from him and his saving work.

We won't believe what he says about our sin's inevitable consequences and eternal separation from him, because we don't want to submit control to his control.

Has our heart been become evil and unbelieving?

Or has our heart, as the author mentions as well, been hardened by the deceitfulness of sin?

You notice he didn't say hardened just by sin.

I love that he's specific.

That it's been hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

You know, hope deferred or hope that isn't realized makes a heart grow sick.

It makes it grow callous and hardened.

And this is exactly what sin does to each and every one of us.

It writes checks that you try to cash in your life and there are always insufficient funds.

You know what I'm talking about?

Right?

Because it promises, but they are empty promises.

It's this abusive relationship that we have with sin, where it is constantly promising us the world and yet not fulfilling our hearts, not bringing the contentment and satisfaction at the soul level that we crave and need as God's image bears.

I know that we live in a world where most of us are perfectly okay with looking around, going, yeah, this world is filled with people whose hearts are hardened before God.

We all know this.

A world filled with hard-hearted people toward God, want nothing to do with Him.

I think we need to be reminded that the author here isn't talking about unbelievers in this world.

He's talking about unbelievers in the church.

He's talking about those whose hearts have been hardened by the deceitfulness of sin amongst the people of God.

Right?

That's why he says, leading you to fall away, that none of you may be hardened.

So we're so quick to look out there at this godless world, and yet God's word constantly turns the mirror back upon ourselves so that we take a look at our own hearts.

Have our hearts become hardened toward God?

Sin in our life that promises things, doesn't fulfill it, but we keep chasing after it.

And maybe, just maybe, we tolerate it and are even okay with it in our lives now.

It's become normalized.

These secret sins, because nobody else has learned about them, or at least not a lot of other people know about these sins that we harbor and we indulge.

And so because no one's learned about them yet, we haven't had to face the full consequence of it.

And so we have deluded and deceived ourselves into thinking we're just fine before the Lord.

Even God probably has just turned his blind eye to it.

It must not be that big of a deal.

And it's become just a part of our lives, and it's hardening our heart toward the things of God, his holiness and his righteousness, a life that is one of following after him.

And we have to be reminded of what God's word actually says about itself.

Right?

If we go to chapter 4, verse 12 of Hebrews, let's just jump there as a church here in this moment.

For those of us who might actually think that, you know, I'm a pretty good person, I don't really sin against God.

Can I encourage you?

It has a pretty good indication that you have not been spending sufficient time in this.

In God's word.

What does it say about itself?

Verse 12 of Hebrews 4.

For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

And no creature is hidden from his sight.

But all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give an account.

This doesn't sound like a pain-free process, does it?

But when we start thinking to ourselves, listening to our inner dialogue of, you know what, I'm doing pretty well.

I'm a good person.

Yeah, I know there's some things that I could change, but yeah, I think overall, compared to a lot of other people, I think God's pretty good with me.

He's pretty pleased, happy with me.

In and of our own strength and morality, those are the moments where we know we have not been in God's word.

Letting what James refers to, not Pastor James, but the book of James, James refers to as the mirror of God's word do its work in our life, where we see our reflection, we see the faults and the standard that he has truly set out of how he's called us to live, where we see our own sin because of the conviction of his word and truth.

Because we have to let the word do its job.

You notice that kids, if you have little kids, you're probably still in this season where everything they do, they want you as mom and dad to watch.

Remember?

Right?

When you guys had kids, maybe when you were a little kid, I mean, no matter what you did, you could be walking to the bathroom.

You're like, mom, dad, watch.

Watch.

Watch me walk here, watch me run here.

You know, everything we do, we just want our parents watching.

The only time little kids don't want mom and dad to be watching is when?

When they're doing something wrong, when they're doing something they know they shouldn't be doing.

These words that all things are laid naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give an account.

There is no creature that is hidden from his sight.

Guys, this is a terrifying thought for some of us here today.

And yet it's one that we've got to let sink deeply into our sin-hardened hearts.

We're not getting away with anything.

The author of Hebrews wants to make sure that we understand the day that is coming.

If I told each of you, hey, next week, I want all you guys to come and to be here because uh God has spoken to me and He's given me a list for each and every one of you of all of your sins this past week.

Not just the bad things you do, but the bad things you say, maybe even under your breath, the insults that you've thrown at people that they didn't hear and you felt like it was fine because they didn't hear you, the grumbling and complaining, the names you've called them, the bad attitudes, the thoughts that you've thought, the bad attitudes that you've harbored in your own heart.

We know all of these things.

God showed it, and I'm gonna have each of you come up front here and I'm gonna go ahead and read for the church family all of your sin for this past week.

We wouldn't have a single person here at church next week.

Right?

Not a single one of us.

Because all of a sudden, even those of us who feel pretty confident in how we're pretty good people will start thinking about everything that was pretty bad this past week.

Going, oh man, I don't want people to know about that.

The author of Hebrews reminds us, guys, please hear this.

A day is coming where you and I will take our last breath here on earth, and we will cross over into eternity and we will stand face to face with the judge of all the earth who will do right, whose wrath against sin was stayed, his hand of wrath was stayed because of the grace through his son Jesus.

But that day of judgment will happen where everything wrong will be made right, and we will give an account to the creator of all things in his holiness and his majesty and his glory.

And we won't even be able to stand in his presence.

And as he opens his book and is going through the list of offenses throughout your life, how confident are we gonna be?

In our own goodness in that moment?

Or has the Word of God done its job to reveal the ugliness and horror of our sin if we're left to our own devices, our selfishness, our disdain for other people, that it's always just about us, and in that moment we can't hide.

There's nowhere to go.

All that we have, all that we hope for, is that in that moment we can hear these things and say, pointing to his son, but I know Jesus.

I'm with him.

That's all that we have is him as our Savior and Lord.

Are we still trusting in our own goodness and righteousness?

The author of Hebrews says we need to stop.

Let his word do its job.

The result of our sin hardened hearts is that we aren't able to enter God's rest.

We are restless souls, striving and struggling for an ever-elusive peace, this fulfillment at a soul level, shalom, scripture refers to it as.

That's why God's people knew this word shalom in the Hebrew.

It means peace, but it literally means welfare, well-being.

It is alignment with God's created order.

Where our lives, our actions, our thoughts, our emotions, our feelings, everything becomes aligned with God's created purpose.

And that is when we experience shalom.

I don't know if you've ever had something out of whack in your neck or in your back where you're out of alignment.

It's painful, isn't it?

And you go to the chiropractor and the chiropractor and they work their little magic, which you know, they pop everything.

I always wonder, like, how did you practice that?

You know?

Who's the first guy going, oh, you've never done this before?

Yeah, go ahead, give it a try.

Right?

But all of a sudden everything just pops and realigns.

And there's shalom, there's a peace, this relief that comes with that.

We lack rest.

Let's go to chapter four, verse one, as the author talks about the rest we find in the Lord.

Therefore, while the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it.

Now keep in mind, he's going back to the people of God, leaving their slavery and bondage to sin in the world in Egypt, and now going to the land of promise and rest that God has for them, but wandering for 40 years because of their sin, and they never could enter God's rest.

Verse 2, for good news came to us just as to them.

But the message they heard did not benefit them, because they were not united by faith with those who listened.

In other words, when God spoke through Moses and said, I've got a land of rest and promise for you, it was of no benefit to them, because they didn't believe.

For we who have believed enter that rest.

As he has said, as I swore in my wrath, they shall not enter my rest, although his works were finished from the foundation of the world.

For he has somewhere spoken of the seventh day, that day of rest and Sabbath, in this way.

And God rested on the seventh day from all his works, quoting from Genesis.

And again in this passage, he says, They shall not enter my rest.

Since therefore it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly received the good news, meaning the Israelites, failed to enter because of disobedience.

Again he appoints a certain day.

What day, guys?

Today, saying, Through David, so long afterward, in Psalm 95, in the words already quoted, Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.

For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken of another day later on.

So then there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God.

For whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his.

Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience.

What so many of us lack, even today, as Christians, as followers of Jesus, as it's rest.

And look around.

Everyone around you is tired.

Anybody here could have used an extra hour or so of sleep?

Yeah.

We have a 1020 service, but this is good.

Stay here.

Yeah, we're always tired, aren't we?

Exhausted.

We are stressed out and stretched thin, overmaxed, no margin.

We are perpetually exhausted people.

We think we need a nap, we think we need a vacation, these things can be good things, but what we really need is rest at a deeper level.

And it's not just exhaustion, it's restlessness.

We don't know how to rest.

Even when we have opportunity.

Some of you are sitting right now and you're able to rest and just hear from the word and just got through worshiping.

Things are relatively comfortable, and you're still sitting here and your legs like this.

Some of you guys are like, he knows.

I do the same thing.

What does that say about us that we can't even sit still for any amount of time without this restless energy that needs to be released?

We don't know rest as people.

Because of the hardness of our hearts due to sin, chasing after sin that we're never going to get.

We are slaves to sin, just like the people were uh people of God in Israel when they were slaves to Egypt.

Right?

We live in the same bondage.

And this is why God made rest and Sabbath one of the distinguishing characteristics of his people.

That we are called to be people who know rest at the deepest level.

That no matter what is going on in our lives, it is well with our soul because we are at rest in the promises of God.

That is the assurance that we have of rest that this world can't know or experience, and it's found in life with Him.

Not just intimacy, but obedience to the life He's called us to.

No amount of days off or binge watching our favorite shows is going to repair the restlessness of mind and heart and spirit that can only be repaired in the presence of Jesus.

Now it's important because too many of us, we try to fix our sinned hardened hearts through self-surgery.

Right?

We strive to enter his rest, but we do it on our own merit, trying to earn admission into the land of promise that was given as a gift through his son Jesus.

And this is what the author refers to even back in chapter three.

Let's go back to the beginning of chapter three, and we're gonna bring it home with this.

I got five minutes to cover about 20 minutes worth of stuff.

No problem.

Verse one.

Therefore, holy brothers, you who share in a heavenly calling, consider Jesus the apostle.

It's another word for ambassador, right?

Representative of heaven, the apostle and high priest of our confession, who was faithful to him who appointed him, just as Moses also was faithful in all God's house.

Right?

So this is speaking to a people who revered Moses, the giver of the law, the commandments.

And so many of them were raised, thinking, I have to keep the law of Moses to be right with God.

Verse 3 for Jesus has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses.

As much more glory as the builder of a house has more honor than the house itself.

For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God.

Now Moses was faithful in all God's house as a servant or slave, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later.

But Christ is faithful over God's house as a son, and we are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and are boasting in our hope.

As Moses represented, he personified the law, man's efforts to be righteous and acceptable to God.

And what the author is making sure we understand is that life and rest that our soul craves is not found by being in Moses.

Because Jesus is greater than Moses, and that rest for our soul is only found in Christ, not through religious performance or effort.

That's not what's meant by striving to enter rest.

We strive by trusting and maintaining and clinging to our faith in our Savior.

He's the only one that can truly lead us into that land of God's promises and rest.

Otherwise, we're just exchanging one form of slavery for another.

Slavery to our sin, and we're trading it in for slavery to the law, trying to make God happy with us and never feeling fully righteous enough.

Because we can't do it on our own.

And we miss what all of this is even about.

We make it our checklist and religious duties and going through the moral motions, you know?

And we forget that God wants relationship more than anything, that all of this is to make us right with him so we can know him.

We can love him with all that we are, and we can share in the goodness of all that he has entrusted and given to his son so that we're not slaves anymore, but we're his sons and daughters, children in his household.

And being up in Tahoe, one of the things we got to do was go kayaking in the lake.

And someone from the church let us use their kayaks.

It was awesome.

And so we ship out and we're kind of on this water, it was beautiful.

We were safe from the bears.

That was awesome.

And we have nowhere to go, we have nowhere to be all the time in the world.

I don't know why, but something just kicks in with me.

I'm in this single-person kayak.

My wife, Tracy, she's in another kayak.

And as soon as we hit that water, guys, you with me on this?

I just decided, you know what?

We're trying to paddle all the way to this place called Burnt Cedar Creek or wherever it is.

So I'm gonna get there as fast as I can.

I'm gonna set a personal record in this kayak.

And I'm gonna just see.

She said it would take 30 minutes, I'm gonna see if I can do it in 15.

And so I just started paddling, and all of a sudden I hear my wife shortly after I started paddling, she's like, What are you doing?

And I turn around and she's way back there.

And I'm like, What's wrong?

Why aren't you keeping up?

And when I finally just sat there and I'm just dying, just waiting for her, she finally catches up to me and I'm like, babe, you gotta just dig that paddling, like, dig it in.

And she looks at me, and I love this.

She just goes, Why?

What is wrong with you?

Why are you rushing to get there?

It's not about that.

This experience isn't about a record or achievement or accomplishment.

I'm supposed to just be there enjoying everything with my bride.

It's about relationship.

As Moses doesn't bring life and rest.

Religious performance doesn't bring it.

Only Jesus brings it.

We're no longer slaves.

And we know it because if we sin, if we fail, do you still cower from God?

Try to hide it from him, conceal it from him, because you don't want to deal with the punishment.

That is a slave mindset.

But we who are through Christ made children of God, we don't have to fear that.

Yeah, we know there may be discipline in our lives for our good, but we never doubt or question the love of our Father because we're his kids.

And so we mess up and we sin and we struggle and we don't hide it, we don't conceal, we go to our dad because he's gonna know what to do.

Can we stand together?

That was about half my notes.

Guys, there's so much rich content here.

Please go home.

Read through Hebrews 3 and 4 again.

Lord Jesus, thank you for your word that is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword.

And God, we know that it never returns void.

And so today, Holy Spirit, I pray that your word will do its work.

Cut through every callous part of our hearts, lay it all bare and open before you.

God, show us who we are apart from you, that there is no life and no rest from our sin.

There's no life and no rest in our sin.

But God, there is life and rest in our Savior, in you.

And so we don't look to ourselves and our own goodness, God.

We turn to you and ask that you will be honored and glorified in our lives, that you will be present.

God, bring us into your presence and may we know you more and more every single day of our lives.

We pray this all in Jesus' name.

Amen.