Evangelical Lutheran Diocese of North America

Thursday after the Twenty-Fifth Sunday after Trinity Sunday

Posted on November 12, 2020 by Pastor Dulas under Devotions
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Scripture: Hebrews 3:7—4:13 (NKJV)
 
3:7 Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says:
 
“Today, if you will hear His voice,
 
8 Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, in the day of trial in the wilderness,
 
9 Where your fathers tested Me, tried Me, and saw My works forty years.
 
10 Therefore I was angry with that generation, and said, ‘They always go astray in their heart, and they have not known My ways.’
 
11 So I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.’”
 
12 Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God; 13 but exhort one another daily, while it is called “Today,” lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. 14 For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end, 15 while it is said:
 
“Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.”
 
16 For who, having heard, rebelled? Indeed, was it not all who came out of Egypt, led by Moses? 17 Now with whom was He angry forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the wilderness? 18 And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who did not obey? 19 So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.
 
4:1 Therefore, since a promise remains of entering His rest, let us fear lest any of you seem to have come short of it. 2 For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them; but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it. 3 For we who have believed do enter that rest, as He has said:
 
“So I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest,’”
 
although the works were finished from the foundation of the world. 4 For He has spoken in a certain place of the seventh day in this way: “And God rested on the seventh day from all His works”; 5 and again in this place: “They shall not enter My rest.”
 
6 Since therefore it remains that some must enter it, and those to whom it was first preached did not enter because of disobedience, 7 again He designates a certain day, saying in David, “Today,” after such a long time, as it has been said:
 
“Today, if you will hear His voice,
 
8 For if Joshua had given them rest, then He would not afterward have spoken of another day. 9 There remains therefore a rest for the people of God. 10 For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His.
 
11 Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience. 12 For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. 13 And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account.
 
Devotion
 
“For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”
 
I was a first year seminarian when first I heard the word “performative”. I heard a fellow classmate say that “God’s Word is performative.” I was embarrassed to ask him what he meant by that strange word. Later, I asked another classmate what does “God’s Word is performative” mean? And he said to me, “It means that God’s Word does what it says.”
 
I went home that night and told my wife that God’s Word is “performative”. And I told her what it means. That “performative” Word was life-changing for both of us. God’s Word truly is life-changing, and life-giving. God’s Word is strong and powerful, though it might seem weak and of no effect. It does all of the things that Hebrews 4:12 says, and more.
 
Though we live as sinners in a sin-filled, corrupted, and fallen world, we can rely on God’s “Performative” Word. God’s Word “does what it says.” It is the only life-giving truth to be found in this world. God’s Word is life-changing and life-giving. And the Word of the Lord endures forever.
 
Prayer: Almighty God, we beseech Thee, show Thy mercy unto Thy humble servants, that we who put no trust in our own merits may not be dealt with after the severity of Thy judgment, but according to Thy mercy, through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, who livest and reignest with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
 
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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