"1Therefore, while the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it. 2 For good news came to us just as to them, but the message they heard did not benefit them, because they were not united by faith with those who listened."
Hebrews 4:1-2
It will be useful at this point to stand back a little, as it were, to see the pattern of the Apostle's thought. He has already, in ch 1, described our salvation in Christ in terms of lordship over the world to come; and in ch 2, in terms of deliverance from sin and Satan through the great atonement and reconciliation wrought by Christ our merciful and faithful High Priest. Now he pictures salvation under the aspect of rest, and this is the theme of the whole chapter. Salvation is so many-sided that we cannot hope to comprehend it under one image. That is the first point here. The second is to notice how the Apostle links the Old and New Testament times together (2). The gospel preached was the same in both dispensations - a gospel of rest. We should beware therefore of assuming - as some do to the misunderstanding of the Scriptures and the impoverishment of their spiritual experience - that God's dealings with Israel were on the level of material blessings rather than spiritual. This is to fail to see the true meaning of the Old Testament story, and the New Testament, both here and elsewhere, such as 1 Corinthians 10, refuses to countenance such a misinterpretation. Salvation by grace through faith is the one unifying theme of the Scriptures. Note also the continued emphasis on fear (1), The Apostle is not afraid to use this as a moral restraint and constraint upon his readers. According to the Scriptures there is a moral power in fear, and we need not be over-concerned about the assertion the psychologists make about its crippling and disintegrating power in people's lives. There are some lessons that God can teach us only by making us afraid. It is good that we should have a healthy fear of falling short as believers. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom! Not that the Apostle stresses it exclusively. He is much too wise for that. Indeed there is a finely balanced alternation of hope and fear throughout which is both healthy and wholesome. We may well trust the 'psychology' of the Holy Spirit in His dealings with us!