23Let us hold on to the confession of our hope without wavering, since he who promised is faithful. 24And let us consider one another in order to provoke love and good works, 25not neglecting to gather together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging each other, and all the more as you see the day approaching.

Hebrews 10:23-25

The writer of Hebrews is taking a moment to summarize where he’s been so far. Hebrews 10:19-22 would be where he’d tell us, “You know what, all you need is a personal relationship with God and you will be just fine,” if “me & God” is all we need. The writer confirms individual realities such as…

The confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus.
The access through the tearing of Jesus’ flesh.
A Great High Priest.
The ability to draw near to Jesus and God.
The cleansing of our hearts.
The washing of our bodies.

Every single one of the above realities do not need another person to help us live them out. However, the writer keeps going.

In the light of the above realities…

Challenge each other towards love and good works

Yesterday we saw encouragement is what pushes us through a challenge. Today we see challenging is what moves us towards how we are to live our lives.

Maybe this is the Enneagram 8 coming out in me, but I love the word translated “provoke” in Hebrews 10:24. The concept is to “stir up” or to “agitate.” We are to be the sand in the shoes for each other! We are to rub each other the wrong way so that all of us can be better at loving and doing good works!

This seems like the opposite should be true. And maybe your experience in church was the opposite…

We challenge each other to stop sinning.
We encourage each other to love and good works.

So what ends up happening is we say, “You have to stop doing that!” or “How can you keep being deceived to sin like that!” or “I can’t believe you’re still doing that!” This strategy for leading others to break through the cycle of sin will backfire.

And we hear, “Aw, it’s ok. Keep going. You’ll figure out how to love and do good works.” Again, not how God tells us to lead others into love and good works. We need something more to get us to break through selfishness towards love and good works.

Seeing these scenarios played out, it’s obvious why this doesn’t work. Let’s turn to a pop culture icon to see this played out how God wants…

When Rocky Balboa was faced with the challenge of pushing through the wall when inside the ring to win each fight, he had Mickey and Adrian encouraging him. Essentially telling him, “You can do this!” to give them the strength to push through.

When Rocky Balboa was training for his “good work,” he didn’t need encouragement…he needed provoking and challenge. Training is hard. We need someone to be hard on us to break through.

The same is true in our lives. We do not default to love and good works. We default to selfishness and doing what we want to do. Someone needs to challenge…provoke us to do the good works that God has in store for us.

Recently we saw this played out in our family. Our church had a serving project to deliver Thanksgiving food baskets to some underprivileged in our area. Our boys were not excited to wake up early on Saturday and show love and good works in this way. My wife & I provoked them to the good works (and actually my refereeing job took me away on travels; so mainly it was my wife!).

At the end of the deliveries, God brought a person along who was not on the “agenda” for the day. My wife and boys were able (and excited to) extend the love of Christ to this person and children in their time of need.

Given the chance, they all would have stayed in bed. However, with a little challenge, they were able to see God at work through their love and good works.

“Traditional Church” uses Hebrews 10:25 as a guilt trip for coming to as many church services as possible. Do not settle for this vision.

We gather together in order to challenge each other towards this love and good works. We do not have the self discipline to consistently challenge ourselves towards this vision. Don’t gather to gather. Don’t gather to make yourself feel good.

Gather with other believers because you need the challenge of others to lead you towards the love and good works God has for you.

Don’t gather to gather. Don’t gather because you feel guilty. Gather with other believers because you need the challenge of others to lead you towards the love and good works God has for you.

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How has other believers challenged you towards love and good works?