I didn't mention one of the books, Dangerous Calling (by Paul Tripp) that I am reading, when I wrote my list of recommended books from last year. I am about a third of the way through it, and it has been incredibly helpful. Convicting and encouraging and challenging..
Here's a series of quotes regarding Hebrews 3:12-13 that I thought would be helpful. ("Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.")
Every person still living with sin inside is a very skilled self-swindler. I think we do this way more often than we are aware.
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But spiritually blind people are not only blind; they are blind to their own blindness. They are blind, but they think that they see well. So the spiritually blind person walks around with the delusion that no one has a more accurate view of him than he does.
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The blinding ability of sin is so powerful and persuasive that you and I literally need daily intervention. What the writer of Hebrews is crushing with this warning and call is any allegiance we might have to an isolated, individualized, “Jesus and me” Christianity. He is arguing for the essentiality of the ministry of others in the life of every believer.
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The author argues here that personal spiritual insight is the product of community. It’s very difficult to get it by yourself.
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This self-righteous blindness also means that they will not deal very well with opposition and accusation. They will not see these things as tools of uncomfortable grace sent by a God who is continuing his work in them. Because they are content with who they are, they will wonder why God has singled them out for this particular difficulty, in moments giving way to questioning the goodness and wisdom of God.
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