Hebrews 3:13  But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called “Today,” so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.    

    I think I must be the luckiest person alive! I can’t tell you how many Apple iPad Pros and Yeti coolers I have won! Although to be honest, I haven’t actually received them yet. But I have received a number of emails notifying me of my winning! (Actually, I’m fairly certain that I’m not going to be receiving any tablets or coolers because I keep deleting those emails.) I don’t want to. I wan’t to believe they’re legitimate. 

    I don’t know what the success rate is for email scammers, but I know that it is a lot higher than it would be if they were just honest in their approach. But if they were honest, there would be no point. If you knew they were trying to separate you from your money, you’d be firm in your resistance. 

    The thing is, Satan is the king of all scammers. He is constantly presenting us with offers that are too good to be true. Sin is deceitfulness. What he offers is always packaged for maximum appeal. The terrible results are always hidden. He is far too smart to ever just be honest in his approach. He is not called the father of lies for nothing!

    We must encourage one another as one means of fending off his deception. The group of encouragers to which the writer refers is the church. The idea of a person, wholly committed to Jesus, but never going to church is a modern idea. It would have been completely foreign to those in the first century. It is in fact, another scam of Satan. We do need one another. 

    But the writer says we are to encourage one another daily. Once a week on a Sunday morning just won’t cut it. (Not to mention even less!) We need the involvement of Christian brothers and sisters daily. This letter is meant to be just such an encouragement. If I do not want to be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness, I need others. You need others. We need to be encouraging one another. We need to seek out encouragers while we are actively being encouragers. 

    (Even when that means breaking the bad news to me that I didn’t actually win a Yeti cooler or an iPad Pro!)

 

Blessings,        

Pastor Russ