Charles Spurgeon Commentary Hebrews 3:7-11

"Wherefore, even as the Holy Spirit saith, To-day if ye shall hear his voice, Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, Like as in the day of the trial in the wilderness, Where your fathers tried [me] by proving [me,] And saw my works forty years. Wherefore I was displeased with this generation, And said, They do always err in their heart: But they did not know my ways; As I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest." — Hebrews 3:7-11 (ASV)

(As the Holy Ghost says, Today if you will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness: When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works forty years. Therefore I was grieved with that generation, and said, They do always err in their heart; and they have not known my ways. So I swore in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest.)

Oh, that none of us, as professors of the faith of Christ, may be like Israel in the wilderness! I fear there is too much likeness; God grant that it may be carried no further! May we hear the voice of God, as they did not hear it, for their ears were dull of hearing! May we never harden our hearts as they did, for they kicked against the command of God, and rebelled against the thunders of Sinai! May God grant that we may never tempt him, as they did, when they were continually proposing that God do something other than what he willed—something for their gratification which would not have been right, and which he therefore did not do!

Oh, that we might never grieve him as they did, for they grieved him forty years! He bore with them, and yet they bored him. He forgave and overlooked their errors only to be provoked by their repetition, for they would not know what God made very plain. His works were such that the wayfaring men might have read them; but they did not know God's ways, and at last he banished them from all participation in His rest.

Their carcasses fell in the wilderness, and they did not enter the land of promise. "Therefore"—