That’s why the Holy Spirit says,

Today, please listen;

don’t turn a deaf ear as in “the bitter uprising,”

that time of wilderness testing!

Even though they watched me at work for forty years,

your ancestors refused to let me do it my way;

over and over they tried my patience.

And I was provoked, oh, so provoked!

I said, “They’ll never keep their minds on God;

they refuse to walk down my road.”

Exasperated, I vowed,

“They’ll never get where they’re going,

never be able to sit down and rest.”

12–14  So watch your step, friends. Make sure there’s no evil unbelief lying around that will trip you up and throw you off course, diverting you from the living God. For as long as it’s still God’s Today, keep each other on your toes so sin doesn’t slow down your reflexes. If we can only keep our grip on the sure thing we started out with, we’re in this with Christ for the long haul.

These words keep ringing in our ears:

Today, please listen;

don’t turn a deaf ear as in the bitter uprising.

15–19  For who were the people who turned a deaf ear? Weren’t they the very ones Moses led out of Egypt? And who was God provoked with for forty years? Wasn’t it those who turned a deaf ear and ended up corpses in the wilderness? And when he swore that they’d never get where they were going, wasn’t he talking to the ones who turned a deaf ear? They never got there because they never listened, never believed.