I started the day in Hebrews 6, and it undid something in me.

The warning in verses 4-8 is sobering: people who tasted the goodness of God, and then drifted away. Nobody is immune. What I saw is that it isn’t about one dramatic failure. It’s about posture: pride, power from self, no humility. Esau wept over the blessing he lost, but his tears were over the consequences, not over the One he had despised. Regret and repentance can look the same from the outside. Only one turns toward God.

I went looking for context and Hebrews 3 hit me like never before. The wilderness generation saw God’s works and still didn’t enter his rest, “because of their unbelief.” They didn’t fall in one rebellion. They hardened slowly. And the remedy is right there: “exhort one another every day, as long as it is called ‘today,’ that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin” (3:13).

Reading about the impossibility of restoration scared me, and I had to ask what kind of fear it was. Esau feared losing the blessing. The fear of God is different. It’s reverence for who he is, “reverence and awe” for a God who is a consuming fire (12:28-29), and it sends me toward him, not away. Perfect love casts out the fear of punishment (1 John 4:18), but the fear of the Lord is where wisdom begins (Proverbs 9:10). The warning wasn’t meant to crush me. It was meant to wake me up, and it did.

I also saw new dimension to what resting on my laurels really is. When I coast, when things feel good, when I’m pointed inward and pursuing my own interests, I’m trusting my track record instead of God. Real rest is trust. The battle is the attitude, and the mind under constant threat of distraction is the one worth protecting.

That’s why fellowship isn’t optional. Hebrews 10:24-25 says to stir one another up to love and good works and not neglect meeting together. It’s why I share gratitude every morning with a group of people, and why we’re shaping each other. It is a practice of intimacy and presence which builds accountability. Others often see the drift before I do.

Then the end of chapter 6. Hope is “a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul” (6:19). Pride says I must know, must understand, must be secure. Hope admits I don’t hold the outcome, and that can feel shameful. But Paul says hope “does not put us to shame” (Romans 5:5). In 1 Corinthians 13:13, faith, hope, and love abide. They remain whether I’m doing anything or not. The ground is already there. The decision is mine.

In 1995 I got sober, gave my life to Christ, and started to pray and study, not understanding, but seeking and obeying with faith, hope, and belief. It took thirty-one years, and ten months of daily practice, for this glimpse to land. I’m not the only one, and I’m only seeing part of it. More to come.

Not once. Daily.