1Therefore we must have before us the fear that while the promise of entering his rest remains open, one or another among you should be found to have missed his chance. 2For indeed we have heard the good news, as they did. But in them the message they heard did no good, because it met with no faith in those who heard of it. 3 [ Ps.95.11. ] It is we, we who have become believers, who enter the rest referred to in the words, 'As I vowed in my anger, they shall never enter my rest.' Yet God's work has been finished ever since the world was created; 4 [ Gn.2.2. ] for does not Scripture somewhere speak thus of the seventh day: 'God rested from his work on the seventh day'?— 5 [ Ps.95.11. ] and once again in the passage above we read, 'They shall never enter my rest.' 6The fact remains that someone must enter it, and since those who first heard the good news failed to enter through unbelief, 7 [ Ps.95.7-8. ] God fixes another day. Speaking through the lips of David after many long years, he uses the words already quoted: 'Today if you hear his voice, do not grow stubborn.' 8If Joshua had given them rest. God would not thus have spoken of another day after that. 9Therefore, a sabbath rest still awaits the people of God; 10for anyone who enters God's rest, rests from his own work as God did from his. 11Let us then make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by following this evil example of unbelief.
12For the word of God is alive and active. It cuts more keenly than any two-edged sword, piercing as far as the place where life and spirit, joints and marrow, divide. It sifts the purposes and thoughts of the heart. 13There is nothing in creation that can hide from him; everything lies naked and exposed to the eyes of the One with whom we have to reckon.
14Since therefore we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast to the religion we profess. 15For ours is not a high priest unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who, because of his likeness to us, has been tested every way, only without sin. 16Let us therefore boldly approach the throne of our gracious God, where we may receive mercy and in his grace find timely help.
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