By This past Sunday we heard from Hebrews 3:1-6, a passage in which the author of Hebrews compares Jesus and his faithfulness with Moses, who was also faithful, though only as God’s servant. The passage begins with an imperative (a command) and finishes with a conditional statement, both of which should get our attention.
Read Hebrews 3:1-6 together as a group before discussing these questions, and don’t forget to pray.
- In the sermon I mentioned briefly that the theme of faith in Hebrews begins here (or perhaps in 2:1) and carries all the way through the rest of the book. As I was thinking more about that concept, it occurred to me that Hebrews is really one long exhortation to believers in Christ to be and remain faithful to God, because of what Christ has done on our behalf. Do you agree or disagree?
- Why do we need constant exhortations to be faithful?
- What does being faithful to God look like? Be as specific as you can.
- The imperative in this passage is “consider Jesus” — to think about carefully, to direct our minds toward, to fix our minds on. How’s that going for you? Are you doing it?
- Specifically, what we are to be considering about Jesus is his faithfulness to God, in his life, ministry, suffering, death, and resurrection. How does fixing your mind on Jesus’ faithfulness help you? Does it?
- The author of Hebrews refers to Moses and shows from Numbers 12 that Moses, who was only human, was counted faithful to God in all God’s house as a servant. He then goes on to say that Jesus not only was faithful, past tense (3:2), to God, but he still is faithful, present tense (3:6), over God’s house as a son. Building off the previous question, does knowing these things about Moses and Jesus help you in your faithfulness to God?
- The author of Hebrews lays down a conditional statement in verse six, that we are God’s house if we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.
- What is “our confidence?”
- What is “our boasting in our hope?”
- How do we hold fast to these two things?