“Maintain the course”
By Rev. Michael Stonhouse
Meditation – Thursday, January 11, 2024
(Hebrews 3:1-11Forward, p. 74) CEV p. 1260
The author of the Letter to the Hebrews is counselling his readers to do something that we humans find very, very difficult, and that is, to continue faithful, to maintain the course of trusting in God when things aren’t exactly turning out the way we’d like. When everything is ‘hunky dory’ and fitting in with our wishes or agendas, we are quite prepared to trust God—but, when things turned bad, well, that’s another story.
That is exactly the scenario that our author refers to in his quote from Psalm 95. The people of Israel were in the wilderness and things weren’t exactly to their liking. They were facing hunger and thirst, not to mention the desert conditions normal to the Sinai. And so, they forgot what God had previously done for them, murmured, and put God to the test. Basically, they rebelled against God and His servants Moses and Aaron.
Interestingly, this psalm asserts that they hardened their hearts against God and indeed were never really in tune with God wanted: “This people are wayward in their hearts; they do not know my ways.”
And so, the author of this letter counsels his readers not to be like this. And well we might wonder how this could ever be so: how could people who’d once put their faith and trust in God, in Jesus, ever turn away and harden their hearts? Seemingly, according to this letter and Psalm 95, it can be so, especially if one is faced with very difficult and trying circumstances. And so, my prayer would be. “Let it not be so with any of us”. Amen.
Forward notes: “Therefore, brothers and sisters, holy partners in a heavenly calling, consider that Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession, was faithful to the one who appointed him, just as Moses also ‘was faithful in all God’s house’” (verses 1-2).
“Often, when we think of someone having a heavenly calling, we imagine a scenario like the burning bush in Moses’s story or the angel unexpectedly visiting Mary. And so, we wait for these moments of magnificent clarity to reveal our own calling or purpose in this life. Many of us may be waiting for a very long time! What if we saw ourselves as ‘holy partners’ in a heavenly calling?
“God has already placed inside of us everything we need, weaving these things into every thread of our DNA. Our partnership with God is perfected in our faithfulness to God. Pay attention to the whispers in your heart, to what tugs at your imagination. But above all, remain faithful to God. You may doubt yourself, but you’re in good company: Moses, too, doubted himself. But his faithfulness to God, even amid uncertainty, brought clarity. Let us be God’s holy partners, faithful to God’s work and creation in us.”
Moving Forward: “How can you be a holy partner in God’s heavenly calling?”