Hebrews 12:1-11. Exhortation with encouragement and reproof, in view of all these witnesses, and of the later example of Jesus, to maintain the conflict, and to remember the love from which all discipline comes, and the fruit it is intended to produce. The chapter is introduced by a strong Pauline p... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:2. Even more important than the contemplation of these martyr witnesses for maintaining the athlete spirit is the continuous LOOKING UNTO JESUS, THE ORIGINATOR AND FINISHER OF OUR FAITH (or of FAITH). ‘Our faith' favours the interpretation that Jesus begins and completes the faith which f... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:3. FOR (He suffered as well as you, therefore you may well) CONSIDER (properly, compare His case with your own, and gather the lessons) HIM WHO HATH ENDURED (it is His permanent character that is described) SUCH CONTRADICTION (not in words only, but hostility of every kind, even treason ... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:4. Special care is still needed, for there may be severer trials in store. FOR NOT YET HAVE YE RESISTED UNTO BLOOD IN YOUR CONFLICT WITH SIN. Here the image is changed, as in 1 Corinthians 9:24-27, from running to boxing; and the meaning is that whatever some of the Hebrew Christians had... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:5. AND YE HAVE QUITE FORGOTTEN (not a question, as Calvin, and Delitzsch, and others have suggested; the fact is rather assumed in Hebrews 12:7-11; and a question,; after the strong assertion of Hebrews 12:4, is unnatural); THE EXHORTATION (blended exhortation and comfort or consolation,... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:6. WHOM HE RECEIVETH, _i.e._ whom He takes to His heart as His son. The quotation is from the Septuagint of Proverbs 3:12. The Hebrew may be rendered as in the English version (‘even as a father'), or, by an alteration of the vowel points, as here, ‘and scourges.' All suffering inflicted... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:7. IT IS FOR CHASTENING (for filial chastening) YE ENDURE; AS WITH SONS GOD DEALS WITH YOU (bears Himself towards you). The reading, ‘It is for chastening for improvement as sons ye endure,' has decisive support. It differs from the common text only by the addition of a single letter (_us... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:8. IF YE BE WITHOUT (be severed from, have no part in) CHASTISEMENT (filial discipline), OF WHICH ALL (God's sons, or better, because of the tense, the sons mentioned in chap. 11) HAVE BECOME PARTAKERS (or have had their share), THEN ARE YE BASTARDS (of spurious parentage) AND NOT SONS.... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:9-10. The fatherhoods differ, and so the rule and purpose of their discipline differ also. FURTHERMORE, WE ONCE HAD FATHERS OF OUR FLESH (our natural parents, and probably rather more those who were mediately the originators of our flesh), AS CHASTENERS (correctors), AND WE GAVE THEM REVE... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:10. And this deeper reverence is reasonable. FOR THEY (our earthly parents) FOR A FEW DAYS (for the time of youth, and with special reference to it, whether successful or not, it came to an end) CHASTENED US ACCORDING AS IT SEEMED GOOD TO THEM (their rule being their own view of what was... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:11. NOW NO CHASTENING (either God's or any other) SEEMETH FOR THE PRESENT TO BE JOYOUS, BUT GRIEVOUS (literally, a matter of joy, but of grief); NEVERTHELESS AFTERWARD IT YIELDETH THE PEACEABLE FRUIT OF RIGHTEOUSNESS (_i.e_ righteousness is the fruit; and as the conflict is over, it is en... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:12-17. Further exhortations. Hebrews 12:12. WHEREFORE (connecting the practical appeals, as is usual in this Epistle, with the reasoning and imagery of the previous verses) LIFT UP (make straight) THE HANDS THAT HANG DOWN, AND THE WEAK (the loose or the palsied) KNEES. The figure of a rac... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:14. FOLLOW PEACE WITH ALL (believers, the true parallel being Romans 14:19), AND HOLINESS (the appropriation by us of the Divine holiness of Hebrews 12:10; there it is the Divine attribute, here it is the process whereby the quality is made our own); WITHOUT WHICH (apart from which) NO MA... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:15. LOOKING DILIGENTLY. The word is used generally of pastoral oversight, but is here used to enforce mutual watchfulness and discipline; a truth set forth also in chap. Hebrews 10:24; Hebrews 3:12; Hebrews 4:1. LEST ANY MAN FAIL OF (come short of by willfully relinquishing) THE GRACE O... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:16. LEST THERE BE ANY FORNICATOR (taken literally, as is the uniform meaning in the New Testament except in Revelation), or PROFANE PERSON (rather, worldly person; one who has no sense of the value or glory of Divine things) AS ESAU, WHO FOR A SINGLE MEAL SOLD HIS OWN BIRTHRIGHT (the doub... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:17. FOR YE KNOW (a fact familiar to every Hebrew) THAT WHEN AFTERWARD HE WAS DESIROUS OF RECEIVING THE BLESSING (part of his birthright, and involving the rest), HE WAS REJECTED (rejected after trial, as the word means), by his father and by God (Genesis 27:33); FOR HE FOUND NO PLACE OF R... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:18-29. All these warnings become the more impressive from the fact that our economy is one of much greater privilege than the previous, and that it is the last revelation which God will give. FOR YE HAVE NOT DRAWN NEAR TO A MOUNTAIN THAT IS TOUCHED (a material, tangible mountain) AND THA... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:21. AND SO TERRIBLE WAS THE SIGHT (what was made to appear) THAT MOSES shared their feeling of dread. Such was the access to God which ancient Israel possessed an access that belonged to a visible mountain full of terror; an access rather of repulse and enforced approach, which they praye... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:22-24. Seven things, Bengel notes, show the inferiority of the condition of Israel under the Law, and seven things show the superiority of the true Israel under the Gospel. Our gathering-place is MOUNT ZION (not Sinai), the abode of Him who is Father and King, AND THE HEAVENLY JERUSALEM,... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:25. SEE THAT YE REFUSE decline NOT (the same word as in Hebrews 12:19) HIM THAT SPEAKETH (offering peace through the blood of Christ: see Hebrews 12:24): FOR IF THEY ESCAPED NOT, DECLINING AS THEY DID TO HEAR HIM THAT SPOKE ON EARTH a different word, meaning to speak as an oracle with Div... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:26-27. In these verses we have fresh evidence of the accuracy of the views which the writer takes of the Gospel a system that is to supersede Judaism as the prophet foretells, and a fresh ground of earnest remonstrance. This is the last economy, and men must beware of rejecting it. WHOS... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:27. AND THIS WORD YET ONCE MORE once for all, as it means, shows plainly that there is to be one change only from the time when the prophet spoke, and consequently that the things which are introduced by that change are to remain unshaken. The shaking of the ‘heavenly things' has created... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:28. WHEREFORE, WE RECEIVING AS WE DO A KINGDOM THAT CANNOT BE SHAKEN, LET US BE THANKFUL (or have grace), AND THEREBY SERVE GOD ACCEPTABLY (well-pleasingly) WITH GODLY REVERENCE AND FEAR. Thankfulness, not discontent, is the becoming feeling, and when blended with fear (‘awe') will make o... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 12:29. FOR a fresh reason for the reverence AND THE SERVICE OUR GOD IS A CONSUMING FIRE. The description is taken from Deuteronomy 4:22, and the meaning may be, Our God also (as well as the God of the Jews) is a consuming fire; but the former rendering an additional reason simply without spe... [ Continue Reading ]