8DO NOT HARDEN YOUR HEARTS AS WHEN THEY PROVOKED ME,
         AS IN THE DAY OF TRIAL IN THE WILDERNESS,

9WHERE YOUR FATHERS TRIED Me BY TESTING Me,
         AND SAW MY WORKS FOR FORTY YEARS.

10“THEREFORE I WAS ANGRY WITH THIS GENERATION,
         AND SAID, ‘THEY ALWAYS GO ASTRAY IN THEIR HEART,
         AND THEY DID NOT KNOW MY WAYS’;

11AS I SWORE IN MY WRATH,
         ‘THEY SHALL NOT ENTER MY REST.’”

The Peril of Unbelief

      12Take care, brethren, that there not be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God. 13But encourage one another day after day, as long as it is still called “Today,” so that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. 14For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end,

15while it is said,
         “TODAY IF YOU HEAR HIS VOICE,
         DO NOT HARDEN YOUR HEARTS, AS WHEN THEY PROVOKED ME.”

16For who provoked Him when they had heard? Indeed, did not all those who came out of Egypt led by Moses? 17And with whom was He angry for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? 18And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who were disobedient? 19So we see that they were not able to enter because of unbelief.

NASB ©1995