Freedom is Good News Part 167

So, picking up from last week, we read that Abraham kept God’s commands, requirements, decrees and laws; and he did so some 400 years before God codified them and gave them to Moses and the children of Israel.  We know Abraham as a man of faith but he was also a man of obedience.  These laws of God have been in effect since creation.

We read of these laws in the books of Exodus and Deuteronomy, and many feel that they were just for the Israelites but do not take into consideration that the laws of an all wise God, creator of mankind, were meant for the benefit of all of Abraham’s children as well as for all of mankind.  Yes He loves all of His creation.

Let me pause here so as to help us keep our focus.  Our original thought was that which is found in Revelation 22:12, “Behold, I am coming soon!  My reward is with me, and I will give to everyone according to his works.”  In speaking of the law which is to be obeyed, we are in no way suggesting that salvation may be earned!  No, we have already established that Paul tells us in Ephesians 2:8, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith … not by works, so that no one can boast.”  Let us never forget that!!  This is our fifth consecutive article on the dual subject of; 1) the rewards for works and 2) the faith and obedience of Abraham. 

The writer of the book of Hebrews touches on this subject in a couple of ways.  In chapter 3 he gives us a quote that he lifts from Psalm 95:7-11 “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.’”

Today we do have His voice to hear, for His words are recorded in our bibles.  But oft times we harden our hearts against them.  Let us not provoke God as they did!  And who were they?  Hebrews 3:16 tells us: “For who were those who heard 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 disobedient?”

So we see that they were unable to enter the Promised Land because of unbelief.  Here in the book of Hebrews we learn that disobedience is equated with unbelief.  And what “reward” did they receive?  They were not allowed the blessing of entering the land promised to Abraham.  The book of Hebrews goes on to teach us something more: “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.  For good news came to us just as to them, but the message they heard did not benefit them, because those who heard did not combine it with faith.”  And yet Abraham did!!  Do you combine faith with obedience?  Stay with me here – this topic is important.