SPIRITUAL
DIARY FOR 05-23-03
My
Worship Time Focus: Living by faith
Bible
Reading & Meditation Reference: Hebrews 10: 37-39
Message
of the verse: “37 For, yet a very
little and the One coming will come, "and will not delay.’ (Hab. 2):3 38 ‘But the just shall live by faith;"
"and if he draws back,’ ‘My soul is not pleased in him.’ (Hab. 2:4) 39 But
we are not of those withdrawing to destruction, but of faith, to the
preservation of the soul.” (Greens) “For in just a little while, the Coming One will
come and not delay. And a righteous
person will live by faith. But I will
have no pleasure in anyone who turns away.
But we are not like those who turn their backs on God and seal their
fate. We have faith that assures our
salvation.” (NLT)
If I am
not mistaken this is the promise that the writer has wrote about in verse
36. It is a quotation from the OT books
of Isaiah and Habakkuk that the writer is using to show the promise of God to
them that continue fast in their faith.
As stated before the Habakkuk 2:4 passage is used in three New Testament
books and in each book the emphases is on a different part of the verse. In the case of Hebrews the phrase being
emphasized is “by faith.”
Also as
stated before the writer is writing to Jewish believers who are tempted to go
back into Judaism and he is encouraging them not to do that a seen in verse 38b
where he says “and if he draws back, My soul is not pleased in him.” The one whom He is pleased in is the one who walks by faith
as the first part of verse 38 speaks of.
He goes on to say that those who are believers are not withdrawing to
destruction but because of the believer’s faith will have our soul’s preserved.
I want to
quote Warren Wiersbe on his comments on verse 39: “The believer who lives by faith will ‘go on
to perfection’ (6:1). But the believer
who lives by sight will ‘draw back unto perdition’ (10:39). What is ‘perdition’ in this context? The Greek word translated ‘perdition’ is used
about 20 times in the New Testament and is translated by different words: ‘perish’ (Acts 8:20), ‘die’ (Acts 25:16),
‘destruction’ (Rom. 9:22), and ‘waste’ (Matt. 26:8). The word can mean eternal judgment, but it
need not in every instance. I personally
believe that ‘waste’ is the best translation for this work in Hebrews
10:39. A believer who does not walk by
faith goes back into the old ways and wastes his life.
“The
saving of the soul’ is the opposite of ‘waste.’
To walk by faith means to obey God’s Word and live for Jesus
Christ. We lose our lives for His
sake—but we save them! (See Matt.
16:25-27). In my own pastoral ministry,
I have met people who turned their back on God’s will and (like Israel) spent
years ‘wandering in the wilderness’ of waste.”
“But we
can be confident! As we walk by faith,
our great High Priest will guide us and perfect us!”
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: I want to
be one of Christ’s followers who learns to walk by faith, as I surely need to
do so in the storm of life that I find myself in at this present time. I would pray that the Lord will give me
wisdom as to what I am suppose to do in a tangible way. I know the first thing He would want me to do
is to pray, as praying should not be something done as a “last resort,” on the
contrary it should be the very first thing to do.
The Word of God was indeed challenging to me as I read it
this morning, and at the same time it was refreshing.
My Steps of
Faith Today: To
continue to trust the Lord in these circumstances that I find myself in. To be open to the Lord’s voice as He speaks
to me through His Word and by His Spirit, and also in this storm that He has
lead me into.
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