Today’s passage: Hebrews 13:17-19
Helpful thoughts:
- Verse 17 can be tough for everyone to stomach, but that doesn’t make it null and void.
- Leaders have fallen and failed so many times, we are therefore prone to try protecting ourselves by avoiding submission.
- All leaders will stand before God and give an account for how they led, therefore we are prone to try protecting ourselves by avoiding leadership responsibilities.
- Neither solution truly protects us. We cannot make ourselves safer by avoiding God’s revealed will.
- Without love and humility it is impossible to lead or to submit well.
- The letter to the Hebrews is full of good teaching/doctrine, commendation, and rebukes. A Christian minister who avoids any of the three would likely struggle to have a clear conscience.
- The writer’s clear conscience and his assurance that the readers would respond in faith encourage him to ask for prayer for their soon restoration.
Questions to consider:
- What are the causes of poor leadership? Poor submission? What are the cures? What are the causes and symptoms of good leadership and submission?
- What would make a godly leader “groan” (Verse 17)? Why is that “to no advantage” for the church?
- If restoration was needed between the writer and the recipients of this letter to the Hebrews, what was the cause of any disunity? What brings about unity in the church?