Hebrews 12
12
Follow Jesus’ Example
1So we have many people of faith around us. Their lives tell us what faith means. So let us run the race that is before us and never give up. We should remove from our lives anything that would get in the way. And we should remove the sin that so easily catches us. 2Let us look only to Jesus. He is the one who began our faith, and he makes our faith perfect. Jesus suffered death on the cross. But he accepted the shame of the cross as if it were nothing. He did this because of the joy that God put before him. And now he is sitting at the right side of God’s throne. 3Think about Jesus. He held on patiently while sinful men were doing evil things against him. Look at Jesus’ example so that you will not get tired and stop trying.
God Is Like a Father
4You are struggling against sin, but your struggles have not yet caused you to be killed. 5You have forgotten his encouraging words for his sons:
“My son, don’t think the Lord’s discipline of you is worth nothing.
And don’t stop trying when the Lord corrects you.
6The Lord corrects those he loves.
And he punishes everyone he accepts as his child.” Proverbs 3:11-12
7So accept your sufferings as if they were a father’s punishment. God does these things to you as a father punishing his sons. All sons are punished by their fathers. 8If you are never punished (and every son must be punished), you are not true children and not really sons. 9We have all had fathers here on earth who punished us. And we respected our fathers. So it is even more important that we accept punishment from the Father of our spirits. If we do this, we will have life. 10Our fathers on earth punished us for a short time. They punished us the way they thought was best. But God punishes us to help us, so that we can become holy as he is. 11We do not enjoy punishment. Being punished is painful at the time. But later, after we have learned from being punished, we have peace, because we start living in the right way.
Be Careful How You Live
12You have become weak. So make yourselves strong again. 13Keep on the right path so the weak will not stumble but rather be strengthened.
14Try to live in peace with all people. And try to live lives free from sin. If anyone’s life is not holy, he will never see the Lord. 15Be careful that no one fails to get God’s grace. Be careful that no one becomes like a bitter weed growing among you. A person like that can ruin all of you. 16Be careful that no one takes part in sexual sin. And be careful that no person is unholy like Esau. He sold all his rights as the oldest son for a single meal. 17You remember that after Esau did this, he wanted to get his father’s blessing. He wanted this blessing so much that he cried. But his father refused to give him the blessing, because Esau could find no way to change what he had done.
18You have not come to a mountain that can be touched and that is burning with fire. You have not come to darkness, sadness and storms. 19You have not come to the noise of a trumpet or to the sound of a voice. When the people of Israel heard the voice, they begged not to have to hear another word. 20They did not want to hear the command: “If anything, even an animal, touches the mountain, it must be put to death with stones.”# Quotation from Exodus 19:12–13. 21What they saw was so terrible that Moses said, “I am shaking with fear.”# Quotation from Deuteronomy 9:19.
22But you have not come to that kind of place. The new place you have come to is Mount Zion.# Another name for Jerusalem, here meaning the spiritual city of God’s people. You have come to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem. You have come to thousands of angels gathered together with joy. 23You have come to the meeting of God’s firstborn# The first son born in a Jewish family was given the most important place in the family and received special blessings. All of God’s children are like that. children. Their names are written in heaven. You have come to God, the judge of all people. And you have come to the spirits of good people who have been made perfect. 24You have come to Jesus, the One who brought the new agreement from God to his people. You have come to the sprinkled blood# The blood of Jesus’ death. that has a better message than the blood of Abel.# The son of Adam and Eve, who was killed by his brother Cain (Genesis 4:8).
25So be careful and do not refuse to listen when God speaks. They refused to listen to him when he warned them on earth. And they did not escape. Now God is warning us from heaven. So it will be worse for us if we refuse to listen to him. 26When he spoke before, his voice shook the earth. But now he has promised, “Once again I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.”# Quotation from Haggai 2:6, 21. 27The words “once again” clearly show us that everything that was made will be destroyed. These are the things that can be shaken. And only the things that cannot be shaken will remain.
28So let us be thankful because we have a kingdom that cannot be shaken. We should worship God in a way that pleases him. So let us worship him with respect and fear, 29because our God is like a fire that burns things up.
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Copyright © 2015 by Tommy Nelson™, a Division of Thomas Nelson, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Hebrews 12
12
1Let us also therefore, having so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, laying aside every weight, and sin which so easily entangles us, run with endurance the race that lies before us, 2looking stedfastly on Jesus the leader and completer of faith: who, in view of the joy lying before him, endured the cross, having despised the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. 3For consider well him who endured so great contradiction from sinners against himself, that ye be not weary, fainting in your minds.
4Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, wrestling against sin. 5And ye have quite forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons: My son, despise not the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when reproved by him; 6for whom the Lord loves he chastens, and scourges every son whom he receives. 7Ye endure for chastening, God conducts himself towards you as towards sons; for who is the son that the father chastens not? 8But if ye are without chastening, of which all have been made partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons. 9Moreover we have had the fathers of our flesh as chasteners, and we reverenced them; shall we not much rather be in subjection to the Father of spirits, and live? 10For they indeed chastened for a few days, as seemed good to them; but he for profit, in order to the partaking of his holiness. 11But no chastening at the time seems to be matter of joy, but of grief; but afterwards yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those exercised by it. 12Wherefore lift up the hands that hang down, and the failing knees; 13and make straight paths for your feet, that that which is lame be not turned aside; but that rather it may be healed. 14Pursue peace with all, and holiness, without which no one shall see the Lord: 15watching lest there be any one who lacks the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and many be defiled by it; 16lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one meal sold his birthright; 17for ye know that also afterwards, desiring to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, (for he found no place for repentance) although he sought it earnestly with tears.
18For ye have not come to the mount that might be touched and was all on fire, and to obscurity, and darkness, and tempest, 19and trumpet's sound, and voice of words; which they that heard, excusing themselves, declined the word being addressed to them any more: 20(for they were not able to bear what was enjoined: And if a beast should touch the mountain, it shall be stoned; 21and, so fearful was the sight, Moses said, I am exceedingly afraid and full of trembling;) 22but ye have come to mount Zion; and to the city of the living God, heavenly Jerusalem; and to myriads of angels, 23the universal gathering; and to the assembly of the firstborn who are registered in heaven; and to God, judge of all; and to the spirits of just men made perfect; 24and to Jesus, mediator of a new covenant; and to the blood of sprinkling, speaking better than Abel. 25See that ye refuse not him that speaks. For if those did not escape who had refused him who uttered the oracles on earth, much more we who turn away from him who does so from heaven: 26whose voice then shook the earth; but now he has promised, saying, Yet once will I shake not only the earth, but also the heaven. 27But this Yet once, signifies the removing of what is shaken, as being made, that what is not shaken may remain. 28Wherefore let us, receiving a kingdom not to be shaken, have grace, by which let us serve God acceptably with reverence and fear. 29For also our God is a consuming fire.
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First published in 1890. This edition is maintained by the British and Foreign Bible Society.