CRITICAL AND EXEGETICAL NOTES
Hebrews 6:13.—The connection of thought may be thus given: “Follow the godly, I say. Take one such for an instance. Abraham. See how graciously God met his steadfast goodness.” But how does this illustrate the point? Thus God revealed Himself to Abraham, even as, in Christ, he has revealed Himself to you. Abraham believed. Abraham patiently continued. Abraham has long ago attained the promise. But, from this illustration it might be argued that Abraham had the advantage of a positive oath and promise: there was no uncertainty trying his faith. The writer replies, “Neither is there in Christianity.” That is the new grace of Him who has proved Himself faithful. What then are the two immutable things? The promise and oath of God. Given for confirming our faith. Stuart says, “the oath that David should have a son, and the oath that Christ should be a priest after the order of Melchizedek.”
Hebrews 6:19. Anchor of the soul.—This is a figure of hope; it was a familiar emblem from very early days. It is the hope, not the anchor, which is thought of as entering within the veil, resting on the living, exalted, spiritual High Priest. It is not necessary to think of the anchor as holding within the veil. Hope holds there, not the mere emblem of the hope. The figure of heaven is borrowed from the Jewish sanctuary.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Hebrews 6:13-20
Two Immutable Things.—In this epistle there is certainly one of the marked characteristics of the Pauline style. St. Paul was constantly swept aside from the main line of his argument by new thoughts suggested by words he used. And he does not always come back precisely upon the point where he broke off. The writer here has a train of thought suggested by speaking of those who “through faith and patience inherit the promises.” He checks himself to make mention of one, the patriarch Abraham. But it is not difficult to trace the continuance of his main argument. He had been urging the Jewish Christians to a persistent steadfastness. But what can he say to strengthen them in making the effort? What can he do better than remind them that God is always on the side of goodness? He has, through all the ages, encouraged His people to persevering and steadfast goodness, by two immutable things—His promise, and the oath that confirms it. Abraham is the example of those who can unite faith in God with patient waiting for Him. To him came the comforting of God’s well-assured promise, “Blessing I will bless thee.” In the ways of men promises are things to be relied on and acted on. Promises, when confirmed by solemn oath, become covenants, and are regarded as absolutely reliable. “In every dispute of theirs the oath is final for confirmation.” I. The ground of Abraham’s hope was God’s solemnly confirmed promise to him. II. The ground of our hope is God’s promise of eternal blessing, eternal life, in Christ Jesus, sealed and confirmed as it is by the Divine assurance and oath. It is evident that the term “oath” is not used in the precise way that is familiar to us. It means generally “a solemnly assured promise.” There is therefore good reason for considering Stuart’s suggestion, that the two immutable things are:
1. The solemn declaration and assurance that Abraham should have a son, in whom all nations should be blessed. Abraham was encouraged and strengthened to endure all disabilities by that assurance. He lived and suffered and acted in the inspiration and cheer of it.
2. The solemn declaration and assurance, to which God, as it were, pledged His faithfulness, that Abraham’s son, David’s son, the Messiah, should be man’s High Priest for ever, and after the permanent human order of Melchizedek, not the temporary and strictly Jewish order of Aaron. Both these promises are regarded as solemnly confirmed and sealed, because both are written down in the infallible Scriptures, to which God is solemnly pledged,—one in Genesis 22:18; the other in Psalms 110:4.
I. God’s solemn pledges to His people.—
1. They are given in ways that show gracious Divine consideration for human weakness.
2. They are given in ways that make a basis for absolute confidence.
3. They are represented by the extremest ways in which men gain the confidence of their fellow-men.
4. They are written down in the sacred Scriptures so that there may be no disputing about their character and meaning.
5. So written, they become equally Divine pledges to the people of God in each succeeding generation.
6. The honour of God’s name is involved in any failure to keep the promises so solemnly made. And God is a jealous God—jealous of the honour of His own name.
II. A representative instance of God’s faithfulness to His pledge.—The case of Abraham. Specially interesting to Jews, because Abraham was the great race-father. God made a solemn promise to him. But it was one which it seemed, naturally, impossible to fulfil. Nevertheless Abraham accepted the assurance, relied on the promise, and found, what God’s people find over and over again, that the impossible with men is possible with God, and that God’s word never does “return unto Him void.” The promised son was born; in his descendants came the Messiah, and in Him all nations of the earth have been and are blessed.
III. The universally interesting instance of God’s faithfulness to His pledge.—As solemnly as Abraham was assured that all nations should be blessed in him, so solemnly was humanity assured that Messiah should be the Priest of humanity after the order of Melchizedek. That may seem strange and almost impossible to men who could recognise no priesthood but the limited Levitical. But the pledge is kept. Christ is that priest; and if He seems to supersede the high priest for Jews, it is only because He is God’s High Priest for humanity, Jews included.
SUGGESTIVE NOTES AND SERMON SKETCHES
Hebrews 6:13. Swearing as Asseveration.—An examination of the references to swearing and oath-taking in a Bible Concordance will impress the familiarity of the custom in Bible times. It was the ancient way of assuring things which has in modern times been replaced by the signing of documents.
1. Swearing may be wrong. What is now commonly understood by swearing is always wrong. It is the “taking of God’s name in vain,” which is the expression of irreverence or unrestrained passion.
2. Swearing may be duty. It is when we are called upon seriously to confirm our word with an oath, in a court of justice.
3. Swearing may be the befitting thing. It is when the solemn confirmation of our word is called for. But Jesus taught that in the utterances of His followers there should always be such a ring of truth, that their words should never need such confirmations. Only in condescension to man’s weakness can God ever confirm His word with an oath. And He can only swear by Himself, as there is no one greater than He to whom His appeal can be made.
Hebrews 6:15. The Issue of God’s Waiting-time.—“And thus, having patiently endured, he obtained the promise.” However long God may call us to wait for the fulfilment of His promise, the fulfilment comes at last; but when it comes, it may not come to the person who first received the promise, or it may not come in the form which he expected it to take. Abraham himself did not receive the promise in its fulfilment, but his posterity did. Abraham did receive the fulfilment of the promise, if its spiritual significance be apprehended; for the spiritual blessing which holding the promise was to him was its really best fulfilment. This gives us two principles which can be applied to our Christian expectations.
I. Whatever God has literally promised will be actually and literally fulfilled, however long the fulfilment may seem to tarry, and even if the the waiting-time overpasses any one man’s life.
II. The spiritual blessing which God makes our times of trustful waiting for the fulfilment of His promise to be, are the very best fulfilment of that promise. In our trustful waiting we now “receive the end of our faith, even the salvation of our souls.”
Hebrews 6:17. The Immutability of God’s Counsel impressed upon His People.—R.V. “Wherein God, being minded to shew more abundantly unto the heirs of the promise the immutability of His counsel, interposed with an oath.” God’s taking oath to confirm His promise was an act of most gracious and pitiful condescension to the weakness of men—condescension indeed to admit for one moment the bare possibility that He might not be true to His word. Such a suspicion might arise in man’s frail heart; but it is a marvel of grace that God should recognise it, and so patiently and so graciously arrange for its removal, by taking solemn oath for the confirmation of the promise. As if, for the comforting of man, and as if He were a man with men, He would pledge His very life upon His faithfulness. That marvel of condescending grace is seldom worthily estimated, and our response of absolute and entire trustfulness is seldom worthily made. The unchangeableness of God’s word and God’s plan, the “immutability of God’s counsel,” needs to be impressed upon us. But when we speak of change in relation to God, it is necessary to speak with great care and precision. There never can be change in His plan or purpose, there must be change in His modes of carrying out His purposes, if He is to adapt them to the ever-changing moods and circumstances of His uncertain and ever-changing creatures. But that sort of change we know is quite consistent with the steadfast and unwavering purpose of our human parenthood. Within the human limits, parents are at once unchangeable and changeable. But it is always a most serious endeavour of wise parents to fix the conviction of their faithfulness and unchangeableness on the minds of their children. It is the support of their authority; it is the ground of their claim to full trust. Just so, and in the higher, the infinite sense, God must adequately impress on us the “immutability of His counsel,” because on our confidence in it rests our response to His authority, and our trust in Himself.
Hebrews 6:17-19. The Anchor of Hope.—One of the saddest things that was ever said about the heathen world is said by the apostle Paul, who wrote of it as having no hope. The agnostic literature of our own period is doing what it can to drag Christendom back and down to the same dismal abyss. A grim, hard unbelief seeks to bound our little life for us, and there is no hereafter. We have a foundation in a Divine promise—a hope of eternal life. We have “an assurance of hope unto the end,” that is a certainty as opposed to uncertainty, meagreness, and shallowness. This blessed hope is described and illustrated in the text.
I. It is a “hope set before us.”—That form of expression is to be found again and again in this epistle. It is not uncertain, but devised, planned, and provided for by the God of our love. “Confirmed by an oath.” “Set before us.” Whom? Those who “flee for refuge.” Not for self-confident persons.
II. It is a “hope sure and stedfast.”—It rests on the promise of God. We need it in the face of the frequent defeats of natural earthly hopes, and the frequent discouragements of our personal experience and service.
III. It “enters within the veil.”—Thus it is like an anchor that goes into the sea—its proper place. Its security is in heaven, where Christian believers have and hold all their best things. The writer of this epistle never lost sight of the priesthood and the sanctuary. Nothing can twine itself about the person or injure the life of the great High Priest who is “within the veil.” We hope in Him, think of Him, and wait—that is our hope.
IV. The hope illustrated.—
1. It is an anchor of the soul. A most apposite and instructive metaphor. The anchor gives steadiness and security. So of our hope that goes down beneath the surface-troubles of life, and grapples with some secret ground of strength and comfort.
2. The folly of going to sea without an anchor. Men have impulse, energy, but no hold on the promises of God, no good hope through grace. So, too, unsound anchors and chains are worse than having none. A little profession, a faint hope, is an unsound anchor.
3. A well-taught, well-disciplined Christian has good hope, and is secure against going on the shoals of doubt, or the hard rocks of despair. When life is troubled, conscience agitated, and the heart tossed with tempests and conflict, the Christian can hope in God. The shipwreck of faith is well prevented by the strong anchor of hope. There is no perfect calm. We must put our hope in the promise of eternal life, which God has given to us in Christ Jesus. That is our anchorage ground. If, like Bunyan’s pilgrim, we “feel the ground,” we shall “see the Gate and Him standing by it to receive us.”—Donald Fraser, D.D.
Hebrews 6:18. The Immutable Promises of God.—This is one of the most inspiring and helpful passages in the New Testament. The key to it is in the dual thought presented, and which runs all through the paragraph. God gave to Abraham a promise which He confirmed by oath. These, His word and His oath, are the two immutable things; they constitute not only a consolation, but a strong consolation; we have not only an anchor, but an anchorage; the word is sure, and the oath makes it steadfast. This double form of presentation thus pervades the passage. God condescends to human frailty and the weakness of our faith. He gives His word of promise, and then confirms it with an oath; and because He can swear by no greater, swears by Himself. A deeper thought lies here. Jesus Christ is the living, incarnate oath of God—His word of promise made flesh, and thus doubly secured to the believer. The word of God is our anchor; but the anchor needs an anchorage; and Jesus, the forerunner, takes the anchor and lodges it within the veil, making it fast to the rock of ages. The introduction of the person of Christ here is to be accounted for on this ground—that He represents God’s confirming oath; and hence without Him the promise would lack its confirmation. (Compare Hebrews 7:22, also 2 Corinthians 1:18-20.) The theme suggested is the immutable promises of God.
1. God has given His word, and cannot lie.
2. God has given His oath, and cannot perjure Himself.
3. God has given His Son, and so has given Himself. Christ incarnates His word of promise and His oath in Himself, and fulfils both. He adds the yea of confirmation to God’s word. He seals the promise with His own blood. Practical thoughts:
1. The folly of unbelief. The land of promise is before us, but we are slack to possess it. All depends on our appropriation. (Compare Joshua 1:3.) Only what we measure off with our own feet do we actually possess and enjoy.
2. The sin of unbelief. We virtually make God both a liar and a false swearer by not accepting His promise. We dishonour and disobey so far as we lack faith.
3. The inseparableness of the word written and the word incarnate. He who appropriates or rejects the promises appropriates or rejects Jesus. No man’s anchor has an anchorage until he finds Jesus as his Saviour.
4. Faith and hope are close akin (Hebrews 11:1). To believe God’s word begets hope. The more confident the faith the more assured the hope. Both reveal their real value, like an anchor, only when subjected to the strain of trial.—Anon.
Taking Sanctuary with Christ.—“Fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us.” There are two sets of associations which will materially help us in the endeavour to understand and to apply this somewhat figurative expression. There are one or two cases mentioned in Old Testament Scriptures in which men whose lives were imperilled fled for personal safety into the tabernacle precincts, and caught hold of the horns of the altar of burnt offering, evidently with the idea that they could not be slain while they held those horns. Adonijah, an elder son of David, made a desperate effort to secure the succession to David’s throne. He was thwarted by the promptitude of Solomon and Bathsheba; and then, knowing that he had forfeited his life by his rebellious scheme, “he arose, and went, and caught hold on the horns of the altar.” Solomon graciously accepted this symbolical appeal, and granted him the right of asylum which he thus claimed. Because Adonijah had been successful, Joab, one of the rebellious party, and a much more dangerous man, thought he would try the same plan, and demand the same asylum. He also “took sanctuary.” “And Joab fled unto the tabernacle of the Lord, and caught hold on the horns of the altar.” But Solomon refused in this case to recognise the right of asylum; and as Joab would not voluntarily come forth from the holy place, he ordered Benaiah to fall upon him and kill him, even as he clung to the “horns.” It is not necessary now to vindicate the wisdom, or the rightness, or the policy of Solomon’s different action in these two cases; we only need attend to the fact, that laying hold of the horns of the altar was one of the ancient modes of claiming sanctuary, or protection from the legal consequences of misdeeds. It should, however, be fully understood that no sanctuary was allowed for wilful and determined criminals, though it was always difficult to decide who were to be classed as such. Sanctuary was recognised for those who had done some wrong by haste, or inadvertently, or by accident, or through circumstances that were quite beyond their own control. It was altogether a degradation of the idea of “sanctuary” when, in the middle ages, villains and criminals were shielded from the proper punishment of their crimes. It is interesting to know that the right of sanctuary was enjoyed by various districts and buildings in London. “In times when every man went armed, when feuds were of hourly occurrence in the streets, when the age had not yet learned the true superiority of right over might, and when private revenge too often usurped the functions of justice, it was essential that there should be places whither the homicide might flee, and find refuge and protection until the violence of angry passions had subsided, and there was chance of a fair trial. Whitefriars was once a refuge for all criminals except traitors; but in the fifteenth century it afforded shelter to debtors only. The ancient sanctuary at Westminster is of historical celebrity as the place where Elizabeth Gray, queen of Edward IV., took refuge when Warwick, the kingmaker, marched to London to dethrone her husband, and set Henry VI. on the throne. The precinct of St. Martin le Grand was also a sanctuary. So was the Savoy; and it was the custom of its inhabitants to tar and feather those who ventured to follow their debtors thither.” Dr. Turner, the missionary in Polynesia, tells us that, in the Samoan Islands, the manslayer, or the deliberate murderer, flies to the house of the chief of the village, or to the house of the chief of another village to which he is related by the father’s or the mother’s side. In nine cases out of ten he is perfectly safe if he remains there. In such instances the chief delights in the opportunity of showing his importance. The other set of associations likely to help us in understanding the metaphor of the text is that connected with the very familiar Mosaic “cities of refuge.” Indeed, that is more likely to have been in the mind of the writer, and to have guided his thought, than the less familiar sanctuary safety of the horns of the altar. Moses was instructed to make an arrangement which would give an unintentional manslayer, in any part of the country, a temporary asylum from the family goël, or avenger of blood. Three cities on each side Jordan were made refuge cities, and the roads giving access to these cities were required to be kept in good repair, so that the man fleeing from the avenger might have no hindrance. A man with the stain of a brother’s blood upon him must flee for his life to the nearest city of refuge; or, as our text expresses it, “he must flee for refuge to the hope set before him.” With these two sets of associations in our minds, can we find the applications of our text to our own religious conditions? If we are Christians indeed, we have taken sanctuary with Christ; we are in the Christ-sanctuary; we have, as it were, firm hold of the “horns of the altar”; we “have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us.” The writer is using persuasion to Christian professors.
I. A Christian is one who has had cause to flee.—He has been a sinner, and such a sinner that he has forfeited his life. The law has reached him, “The soul that sinneth it shall die.” We need not speak exaggeratedly about this, or in any unreal, excited, sentimental way. The Christian has not been a murderer, or a thief, or a slanderer, or unclean. He may look at the great commands that affect moral relations, with the rich young ruler, and say as sincerely as he did, “All these have I kept from my youth up.” And yet the fact may remain, that relative to the searching spiritual law of God which demands a spiritual perfection of motive as well as of conduct, and the supreme devotion of the whole man to the glory of God, he is found wanting, judged a sinner, guilty before God. He has sinned with his soul; he must die. We can never get that sense of our sin which makes us feel the need of Jesus as our Saviour while our attention is fixed on acts of sin. It is not until we come to apprehend what sin really is, not until we see it to be the soul’s rebellion against God in order to exalt itself, that we see how righteously there hung over us the rebel’s doom—the doom of the spiritual and eternal death. Once the avenger of God’s outraged honour and claim was aroused, was at our heels, and we had cause to flee. Bunyan pictures Graceless awakened to see himself a sinner, and exposed to the sinner’s death. In his hand is the roll, in which he reads. There is the direction which he needs. He has cause to flee; and it reads, “Flee from the wrath to come.”
II. A Christian is one for whom a refuge has been provided.—It is pictured and anticipated in the old cities of refuge for the manslayer. It is a secure refuge; it is near at hand: the access to it is easy. But the old city was only a materialising of the the spiritual reality. The refuge provided for the soul-sinner is a man, a fellow-man, a Divine Man—altogether competent, for He has gained the full right and the full power to become man’s sanctuary. The psalmist had his foreshadowing of the truth which is so plain to us when he said, “I flee unto Thee to hide me.” An imperilled criminal may find refuge in a house, in a tabernacle, in a city; but an imperilled soul—and remember you once were a soul-sinner, that is the supreme fact of the past which demands such anxious attention—cannot find refuge at an altar, in a church, or even in an appointed city of refuge. No sanctuary that you ever heard of is any good at all to you, you soul-sinner. The imperilled soul, after whom the eternal death-avenger is pursuing, can find no refuge save in God—nay, nay, there is something far deeper, far more wonderful than that—only in the God-man, in God come into the soul’s actual sphere, to stretch out arms of welcome, and to make precisely adapted defences and securities. That Samoan custom to which allusion has been made suggests the true and spiritual refuge-provision. The man fleeing for his life fled to a man, the strongest, noblest, most powerful man within his reach; and the man, the chief, became his sanctuary: and Christ Himself is our refuge provided.
III. A Christian is one who has fled to the refuge provided.—It was much that three cities this side Jordan, and three cities that side, were known throughout the land to be “cities of refuge.” But the knowledge never secured any manslayer from the avenger of blood. Only his actual energetic flight over bridge and road, only his breathless hurrying till he could almost leap the last step within the gates of the city, could secure him. He must flee for refuge. It is much that an all-sufficient, almighty, infinitely adapted, and most gracious Saviour-refuge has been provided for us. We may dwell with the utmost satisfaction upon His Divine person, His finished righteousness, His perfect work, His recognised merit, His entrusted power to save, and His satisfying attractiveness; but the meditation, and even the knowledge, never yet saved one soul from the fatal grip of the avenger who executed the eternal death-penalty on soul-sinners. Adonijah would have found no clemency if he had satisfied himself with knowing about the safety gained, and the rights secured, by clutching the horns of the altar. He must flee to the tabernacle, and clutch them; and there must be no possibility of mistaking the fact that he does clutch them. And we cannot be Christians if we only know about Christ our refuge. We must have come into personal relations with Him. We must have fled to Him for refuge. We must have actually taken sanctuary with Christ. We must be behind Him, safe behind Him, so that He shall meet and answer all our foes. The apostle Paul has a famous passage, which is the exulting triumph of the soul that has fled for refuge, that is actually in the sanctuary. It is the song of the soul’s safety. “Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth: who is he that shall condemn? It is Christ Jesus that died; yea rather, that was raised from the dead, who is at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?”
IV. A Christian is one who has found more than he expected in the refuge to which he has fled.—Here we leave all the earthly symbols of Christ our sanctuary far, far behind. The old city of refuge provided safety—nothing more; or rather nothing more that was unusual. The “horns of the altar” provided safety—nothing more. The middle-age sanctuaries provided safety, and little or nothing more. And if all I could tell you about Christ the soul’s sanctuary were that it provided for the soul’s safety, but nothing more, I would scarcely care to tell the story—at least, there would be no passion of intense persuasion in the telling. Some people think to take sanctuary with Christ that they may be secure from going to hell. Many want Christ for nothing more than safety from their spiritual peril. Let us begin with that, but do not let us stay with that. Take sanctuary with Christ for shelter from the eternal death-avenger; and if you are true-hearted, you will soon find that taking sanctuary is an altogether more precious, more inclusive, more wonderful thing than you could have imagined. Christ our sanctuary is a provision for present enjoyment, and an inspiration to our hope. All thought of peril passes away in the restful, happy, beautiful life we can live in this sanctuary; and everything in it seems full of reminders of the “house not made with hands eternal in the heavens.” In Christ our sanctuary we are safe—that is true. In Christ our sanctuary we are being saved—that is yet more precious truth. In Christ our sanctuary we have the pledge of eternal salvation—that is the unspeakably precious truth. We fled for refuge to a Saviour, and we find that we have fled for refuge to gain a hope full of immortality and bliss. Would you be a Christian? Verily you have good cause to flee. A refuge has been provided for you. You must flee to it, or it can be no refuge to you. If you do take sanctuary with Christ, there is safety for you, joy unspeakable for you, a hope laid up in heaven for you.
Hebrews 6:19. Hope as a Christian Grace.—Hopo is the looking for something to come with an earnest longing and desire. What is it that Christians hope for? Is it not for “fulness of joy” in the presence of God, for the “pleasure” which is at His “right hand for evermore”? There can be no true hope where there is not some faith and some love. If we have no faith, no living interest in the things of another world—no strong feeling of their vast importance—how can we hope for them? And we only hope for that on which we have set our affections; and hope, in its very nature, springs from and implies a love of that which we hope for. Perhaps we do not think enough of hope, as a Christian grace and duty. We strive after a brighter faith and a warmer love, but suffer our hope to be weak and dim. We do not dwell enough on the glorious things which it is our privilege to hope for. God has given us hope as a help and support to other higher motives.—W. Walsham How, D.D.
The Anchor Figure for Christian Hope.—The anchor, in one form or another, was known among the most ancient navigators of whom we have any record; and very early, as was natural, it became a symbol of hope. The Jews were not a maritime people, and they probably borrowed both the anchor, and the symbolic use of it, from their Gentile contemporaries. From the text it appears that the anchor, as a symbol of hope, was well known in the apostolic Church. The early Christians engraved it on rings, sculptured it on monuments, and on the walls of cemeteries and catacombs. Sometimes the symbol was associated with the fish, which was regarded as the symbol of Christ Himself. The anchor still holds its place as a sign of hope, and will do so probably to the end of time.
The Soul’s Anchor-hold.—Christ is the soul’s anchor. He is within the veil. He is there for us—there in such real connection with us as is represented by the relation of the anchor to the vessel. The illustration can only be taken in a general way, suggesting the stability of that in which the anchor holds; the strength of the grip with which it holds; and the real—though not necessarily apparent—safety and restfulness of that for whose sake the anchor holds. The verse is a somewhat difficult one, and the metaphor is more involved than our Western precision of thinking can readily appreciate. Stuart gives the meaning so as to put the stress on the quality, soundness, of the anchor. “Which hope we are in possession of, ἔχομεν, and it will prove to us, in our troubles and distresses, what an anchor of sound materials, and one firmly fixed, will be to a ship in a tempest, i.e. it will keep us from making ‘shipwreck of the faith.’ Ἀσφαλῆ means, that which will not fail, i.e. like an anchor of good materials, which will not give way. Our Hope enters into the inner sanctuary, where God dwells. The meaning is, that the objects of hope are in heaven. The sentiment then is this: Hold fast the objects of your Christian hope. These will keep you steady in your adherence to the Christian religion, and preserve you, like an anchor, from making shipwreck of your faith.” Then the soul’s anchor-hold is its hope. We have said above that the soul’s anchor is Christ. Both are true. And perhaps if we could see more than the surface of things, if we could see the depths of things, we might find these two to be really one. When our thoughts circle about ourselves, our anchor seems to be our hope, which we put out into the heavenly things, and try to steady ourselves by getting a strong hold. But when we are in worthier and less self-centred moods of thought, we lose satisfactions in our hope, in anything that is ours, and see Christ to be our anchor, close fastened to us here amid the seas of time, but actually reaching into, actually there in the heavenly world, gripping tight for us the everlasting rocks, and holding us so firm that no wildest storm of earth can ever shift us from our Christian place.
Hebrews 6:20. Jesus as our Forerunner.—“Whither as a forerunner Jesus entered for us.” The use of the term “forerunner” reminds us at once of John the Baptist, and suggests a comparison or contrast between John as the forerunner of Jesus, and Jesus as the forerunner of His Church. It is necessary to the idea of a forerunner that
(1) he announces one coming;
(2) that his presence pledges the certainty of his coming; and
(3) that he secures all due preparations for the coming. In these senses we may look at the work of John the Baptist as the forerunner of the earthly Messiah. He announced the Coming One. His presence was the pledge that He was coming, and the assurance that He was coming at once. And his work as forerunner was only completed in his endeavour to secure the necessary moral preparations for the coming. It is manifest that these peculiarities of a forerunner can only be applied to Jesus in modified ways, if He be regarded as the forerunner of the Church, as the Church comes to its spiritual privilege and heritage; and that other ideas must be associated with Christ as forerunner. He does go into the spiritual world to say that His Church is coming, and to pledge His Church’s coming, and to prepare for His Church’s coming; but we must not miss His peculiarity as forerunner—He is the ground on which the Church has the right to come, and the source of the Church’s power to come.
The Order of Melchizedek.—In what sense was Christ a priest after the order of Melchizedek? The question may be answered thus: The Aaronic priesthood was typical of Christ, but in two principal respects it failed in representing the great Antitype. It consisted of succeeding generations of mortal men; it consisted of priests not royal. The Holy Ghost, on the other hand, suddenly brings Melchizedek before us in the patriarchal history. A royal priest, with the significant names “King of righteousness” and “King of peace” (Genesis 14:18-20), and as suddenly withdraws him. Whence he comes and whither he goes we know not. As a private man he had an unwritten history, like others; but as a royal priest he ever remains, without father, without mother, without origin, succession, or end; and therefore, as Paul says (Hebrews 7:3), made beforehand of God an exact type of the eternity of the priesthood of Christ (Psalms 110:4). The prophecy was “Thou shalt be a priest for ever,” or an eternal priest, “after the order of Melchizedek.” The similitude of this type therefore included two things:
1. An everlasting priesthood.
2. The union of the kingly and priestly functions in one person.—Hodge.
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 6
Hebrews 6:13. Three Kinds of Oaths, or Swearing.—In early times we find no scruples about the employment of the oath. As then humanity had to be accustomed to a mutual reverence for truth and fidelity, it was natural that its use should be frequent and its signs forcible. We may distinguish three kinds:
1. The simple kind, when a private individual would confirm something in a sacred manner by his own spontaneous action. He would call on the name of his God, and the Semitic nations raised the right hand, as if in a challenge, to heaven. Along with the name of God, the person swearing would at the same time designate His other attributes, His power and greatness, or whatever else of the essence of this God appeared to him at the moment of swearing of special significance. One of the shortest and finest of the asseverative phrases is that of the last king of Judah: “As Jahveh lives, who has created for us this soul” (Jeremiah 38:16). There is a peculiar Hebrew word which means “to bind oneself by seven [things].” According to this, the person swearing deemed it necessary to call upon seven things as witnesses of his declaration, or as enduring monuments of the truth. It might be seven men whom he invoked, or seven gods, or else he might touch seven sacred objects, or take seven steps to a sacred stone. (This last was customary amongst the ancient Indians in concluding treaties.) Sometimes seven sacrificial animals were presented (Genesis 21:27-31).
2. The oath became an adjuration, when it was used to compel another to confess the truth, or observe a command. Then the punishments imprecated from heaven would undoubtedly be always expressed in the strongest language. In the patriarchal times the person who desired to bind another to the strictest truth used to make the latter lay his hand under his own hip, on that part of the body out of which, according to ancient ideas, posterity proceeded. Thus he would refer the latter to the whole of posterity at once, and to its revenge should he break his promise.
3. When the oath was employed in making contracts or alliances, each of the two contracting parties made the other utter aloud the words of the contract which concerned him, these mutual promises being accompanied by similar oaths and imprecations.—Biblical Things.
Swearing by laying Hands on the Koran.—The present mode of swearing among the Mahometan Arabs, that live in tents as the patriarchs did, according to De la Rogue, is by laying their hands on the Koran. They cause those who swear to wash their hands before they give them the book; they put their left hand underneath, and the right over it. Whether, among the patriarchs, one hand was under and the other upon the thigh is not certain. As the posterity of the patriarchs are described as coming out of the thigh, it has been supposed that this ceremony had some relation to their believing the promise of God, to bless all the nations of the earth by means of One that was to descend from Abraham.—Harmer.
Oath “By the life of Pharaoh” (Genesis 42:15).—Extraordinary as the kind of oath which Joseph made use of may appear to us, it still continues in the East. Mr. Hanway says the most sacred oath among the Persians is “By the king’s head”; and among other instances of it we read in the travels of the ambassadors that “there were but sixty horses for ninety-four persons. The nehemander (or conductor) swore by the head of the king (which is the greatest oath among the Persians) that he could not possibly find any more.” And Thevenot says: “His subjects never look upon him but with fear and trembling; and they have such respect for him, and pay so blind an obedience to all his orders, that how unjust soever his commands might be, they perform them, though against the law both of God and nature. Nay, if they sware by the king’s head, their oath is more authentic, and of greater credit, than if they swore by all that is most sacred in heaven and upon earth.”—Burder.
Touching the Altar.—Patrick tell us that it was the custom of all nations to touch the altar when they made a solemn oath, calling God to witness the truth of what they said, and to punish them if they did not speak the truth.
Swearing lawfully.—Cruden says: That a person swear lawfully, must have a regard
1. First to the object; that he swear by the Lord alone; for seeing we deify and make that our god which we swear by, therefore we forsake the true God if we swear by that which is no God (Jeremiah 5:7).
2. To the manner; that he swear in truth, in judgment, and in righteousness (Jeremiah 4:2); that he swear not falsely or deceitfully, but that which is agreeable to truth; that he swear not rashly, but upon due consideration of all circumstances; and that he swear nothing but what is agreeable to justice and equity.
3. He must have a regard to the end; that God may be glorified, our duty discharged, controversies appeased, our brethren satisfied, or our own or others’ innocency cleared.
Hebrews 6:18. The True Refuge.—During the rebellion in Ireland in 1798, the rebels had long meditated an attack on the Moravian settlement at Grace Hill, Wexford County. At length they put their threat in execution, and a large body of them marched to the town. When they arrived there, they saw no one in the streets nor in the houses. The brethren had long expected this attack; but true to their Christian profession, they would not have recourse to arms for their defence, but assembled in their chapel, and in solemn prayer besought Him in whom they trusted to be their shield in the hour of danger. The ruffian band, hitherto breathing nothing but destruction and slaughter, were struck with astonishment at this novel sight. Where they expected an armed hand, they saw it clasped in prayer—where they expected weapon to weapon, and the body armed for the fight, they saw the bended knee and humble head before the altar of the Prince of peace. They heard the prayer for protection; they heard the intended victims asking mercy for their murderers; they heard the song of praise, and the hymn of confidence, in the “sure promise of the Lord.” They beheld in silence this little band of Christians; they felt unable to raise their hand against them; and after lingering in the streets which they filled for a night and a day, with one consent they turned and marched away from the place, without having injured an individual or purloined a single loaf of bread. In consequence of this signal mark of protection from heaven, the inhabitants of the neighbouring villages brought their goods, and asked for shelter in Grace Hill, which they called the City of Refuge.
Hebrews 6:19. The Anchor-symbol in the Catacombs.—Because the anchor is often the sole hope and resource of the sailor, it came to be called by the ancients “the sacred anchor,” and was made the emblem of “hope.” By the early Christians it was naturally adopted, sometimes with regard to the stormy ocean of human life, at other times in relation to the persecutions and dangers of the ship of the Church. It is found engraved on rings, and depicted on monuments, and on the walls of cemeteries in the catacombs. The symbols on sepulchral tablets often contain allusions to the name of the deceased. The Chevalier de Rossi states that he has three times found an anchor upon tituli, bearing names derived from spes, the Latin, or elpis, the Greek word for “hope,” upon the tablet of a certain ELPIDIVS, and upon two others, in the cemetery of Priscilla, two women, ELPIZVSA and SPES. In some cases above the transverse bar of the anchor stands the letter E, which is probably the abbreviation of the word elpis. Further, we find the anchor associated with the fish, the symbol of the Saviour. It is clear that the union of the two symbols expresses “hope in Jesus Christ,” and is equivalent to the formula so common on Christian tablets, “Spes in Christo,” “Spes in Deo,” “Spes in Deo Christo.” The fact that the transverse bar of an anchor below the ring forms a cross may have helped towards the choice of the anchor as a Christian symbol.
THE TYPE OF UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD