Hebrews 4:1-16

4:1 | The reference to fear is not suggesting that Christians can lose their salvation or will suffer God’s judgement; rather, it is meant to encourage them to press on in light of God’s holiness. The rest that God has in store for His people - peace with Him now and eternal life in His presence - should motivate believers to persevere in their fatih rather than give up.

4:2 | In this instance, gospel refers not to the good news of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus but to the good news of God’s rest proclaimed to the ancient Israelites. Unfortunately, the gospel did not profit the Israelites in Moses’ day because they did not recieve it with faith. In contrast to their faithlessness, the author gives examples fo faithfulness in 10:19-12:29.

4:3 | Faith is God’s way for His people to appropriate what He has provided for them. Christians do not need to work to enter in the rest of salvation; they only need to trust Christ’s finished work and believe.

4:6-8 | This quote from Psalm 95:7-8 demonstrates that in the span of time from Moses to David, one thing had not changed: the Israelites were still rejecting God’s invitation to rest.

4:9 | The believer’s rest is in Christ’s finished work on the cross which is one reason NT Christians do not keep the OT Sabbath (Matt. 11:28-30). Rest is not inactivity but harmonious involvement in God’s program. To enter into God’s rest is to enter into God’s best.

4:12 | Discerner is better translated “judge.” The inner life of a Christian is often a mixture of genuinely spiritual and completely human motivations. Only a supernaturally discerning agent such as the Word of God can sort out what is of the flesh and what is of the spirit.

4:15 | Jesus was tempted as we are to prove that He could not sin and to enable Him to sympathize with people as their High Priest. Only those who do not yield to temptation can know its intensity, because they experience the full extent of its force.

4:16 | Come boldly literally means that God’s people do not need to fear being turned away, so they never need hide or omit anything from their prayers (10:19-22; Eph. 2:18). God gives mercy for past failures and grace for present needs. The root word translated “aid” or help in Hebrews suggests that Jesus, the Great High Priest, assists and sustains His people in weakness and in difficulty (2 Cor. 12:9). In time of need could be understood as “at the right time.”