Hebrews 3:16

Now who were they who heard and yet were rebellious? Was it not all those who left Egypt under the leadership of Moses? But with whom was he angry forty years? Was it not those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? And to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest, if not to those who were disobedient? So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief.

If you’re reading this passage closely and following its argument, you may notice that the very last word seems out of place. Throughout the first five questions of the passage, the author rhetorically points to Israel’s active rebellion against God: it was a total rebellion (involving “all those” in Moses’ leadership), manifesting itself in disobedience, resulting in God’s anger for forty years while Israel wandered blindly in the wilderness.

We expect, then, that the final sentence would read “So we see that they were unable to enter [the Promised Land] because of rebellion.” But this, of course, is not what the passage says. Rather, it claims that they were excluded from the Promised Land because of unbelief.

Unbelief, as we gain from the whole of the chapter, inevitably led to hardness of heart. That is, when we fail to recognize God’s voice and give it respect, we begin to grow numb—numb to God’s voice, numb to the inner promptings of the Spirit, numb to the witness of Scripture, eventually numb to issues of right and wrong, resulting in a life wholly opposed to the life God has designed for us.

Colored by our culture, we sometimes think issues of belief are minor, unimportant. And indeed we should not go around refusing to be friends with people who may differ from us—that’s simply part and parcel of living in this world today! But we should always be aware of the danger of unbelief in such a culture. For unbelief may just make our heart numb—now, when we need it to be the most sensitive.