If the first few chapters of this letter to the Hebrews were a slow build to define and describe the significance of God’s truth, the final two chapters are a rapid-fire plea for application. 

We've just got this one life to live, this one race to run, and the Lord cares about how we run it. God's encouragement and His discipline go hand-in-hand are both His gift to us as He guides and cares for us.

We've finally come to the first chapter of Hebrews that we are likely already familiar with. We're so accustomed to reading Hebrews 11 and viewing it as an account of the incredible faithfulness of the ones who've gone before us. But what if instead, we viewed it as an account of those who can testify to the faithfulness of their God--of our God?

In this episode, we consider what it means to draw near to God and to his people by putting our faith into practice.

In Lesson 8, we talk about the significance of remembering. We are encouraged to remember what God has done for us -- to recall His past faithfulness and remind ourselves that He can be trusted.

I was deep into preparing this lesson about Jesus' faithfulness to His covenants, about how even the Old Covenant Law is intended to point us to the Lord who forever welcomes us into His presence, who places that presence within us, and I was encouraged by it. But then things didn't go as planned, and I ended up in a place where I hadn't intended to be. And right there in the tire shop -- in the place I wished I wasn't -- God showed me what the New Covenant meant for me in that moment.

In Hebrews 7, we find Jesus introduced as the final mediator--the perfect go-between for God and man. Christ offered Himself as the perfect sacrifice for our sins and revealed Himself to be the perfect priest.

In Hebrews 6, we come across one of the most controversial and confusing passages of Scripture, and we are forced to ask ourselves, what does it mean to "fall away" from God? My hope in this lesson is that we will be challenged and encouraged to "press on" to maturity, to not grow weary in seeking Christ, to persevere in our pursuit of Him--not because we are earning salvation but because we are assured that Christ has provided it.

When we encounter the holiness and glory of God, the last thing we'd expect is an encouragement to draw near with confidence to Him. We would expect His holiness to make us step back, aware of the impurities of our own hearts. We might think His glory would exclude us completely from His presence, causing us to cower rather than to step toward our God.