Hebrews 10

Hebrews 10:22-29

XXX AND SPECIAL The seventh exhortation in this book is as follows: “Let us draw near with a true heart in fulness of faith – let us hold fast the confession of our hope that it waver not – let us consider one another to provoke unto love and good works, not forsaking our own assembling together, exhorting one another” (Hebrews 10:22-25). The doctrines that underlie this manifold exhortation are, (1) Christ has rent the veil hiding the holy of holies by his death, and dedicated for us a new and living way. (2) We have a great High Priest over the house of God. (3) The day of his final coming is rapidly approaching (Hebrews 10:19-21).

Here a question arises, Does “having our bodies washed with pure water” (Hebrews 10:22) refer to water baptism, and if so, what the bearing of the teaching? It is not clear that it has such reference. But if it does, it strongly supports the Baptist teaching, to wit: Our souls are cleansed by the application of Christ’s blood by the Holy Spirit in regeneration. Baptism in water only washes the body, and hence can only externally symbolize the internal cleansing. In this way Paul, internally cleansed, could arise and wash away his sins symbolically in baptism (Acts 22:16), or as Peter puts it: “Water, even baptism, after a true likeness doth now save us, not putting away the filth of the flesh [i.e., the carnal nature] but the answer of a good conscience toward God, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 3:21). In other words, it is a figurative salvation, and the figure or likeness is that of a resurrection (see Romans 6:4-5). Paul’s reason for the seventh exhortation is expressed in the famous passage (Hebrews 10:26-29), the whole of which is an explanation of the eternal, unpardonable sin against the Holy Spirit, very different from the gradual, unconscious sins of “drifting” and “hardening.” Its conditions and characteristics are:

1. There has been great spiritual light and knowledge, thoroughly convincing the judgment of the truth of the gospel, and strongly impressing the mind to accept it.

2. It is a distinct and wilful rejection of the well-known light and monition of the Holy Spirit.

3. It is a culmination of sin against every person of the Trinity. (1) It is a sin against the Father in deliberately trampling under foot the Son of his love. (2) It is a sin against the Son in counting the blood of his expiation an unholy thing. (3) It is the sin against the Holy Spirit in doing despite to his grace who has furnished complete proof to the rejector’s conscience that it is God’s Son who is trampled under foot, and that the blood of his vicarious sacrifice alone can save.

4. Once committed, the soul is there and then forever lost, having never forgiveness in time or eternity, and knows that for him there is no more sacrifice for sin, and expects nothing but judgment and fiery wrath which shall devour the adversaries.

5. Let the reader particularly note that this sin cannot be committed except in an atmosphere, not merely of light and knowledge, but of spiritual light, knowledge and power, and that it is one wilful, malicious act arising from hate – hating the more because of the abundance and power of the light. The eighth exhortation is, “Cast not away your boldness” (Hebrews 10:35). The exhortation is based on appeal to their remembrance of the triumphs of their past experience. They had patiently endured a great conflict of suffering just after their conversion; they had been made a gazing stock both by reproaches and afflictions cast on them and by their sharing in the afflictions of their leaders. This is evident from the history of Paul’s labors among men. There was nothing in their present afflictions severer than those they triumphantly endured in their earlier experience.

The ninth exhortation is, “Therefore, let us also, seeing that we are compassed about by so great a cloud of witnesses, lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising shame, and hath sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider him that hath endured such gainsaying of sinners against himself, that ye wax not weary, fainting in your souls” (Hebrews 12:1-3). The imagery here is that of a foot race, such as these people had often witnessed in the Isthmian Games at Corinth, or in the great amphitheater at Ephesus. “The race set before us” – the great example upon whom the runner must fix his eye – is Jesus, the author (or captain) and perfecter of our faith.

The force of the example of Jesus in Hebrews 12:2 is this:

He is set before us as the one perfect model or standard. A joy was set before him as a recompense of reward that when attained would make him the gladdest man in the universe. For this he voluntarily became the saddest man in the universe. Thus “the Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” was “anointed with the oil of gladness above his fellows;” “He saw of the travail of his soul and was satisfied.” Here we are confronted with this double question: Does the phrase, “author and perfecter of our faith,” mean that Jesus first inspires and then completes our individual faith – i.e., what he begins he consummates – or that he is the captain and completer of the faith in the sense that his completed victory is both cause and earnest of our own victory, as in Hebrews 2:10? The latter best accords with the import of the Greek word, archegos, used both here and in Hebrews 2:10, and with the whole context.

The word “witnesses” in Hebrews 12:1 means martyrs whose examples should excite our emulation, and accords with the meaning and usage of the Greek word marturos, which makes them witnesses to the truth and not spectators of what other people may do. Moreover, the biblical evidence is scant, if there be any at all, that departed souls are allowed to sympathetically intervene in the struggle of those left behind. Yet, by rhetorical license, in the exercise of the imagination, a poet, orator or writer may summon the dead to appear before the living for dramatic effect. But we go far when we seek to construct doctrine on rhetorical license. What is the “besetting sin” in Hebrews 12:1? It may not be the same in all cases. It is the sin to which one most easily yields whether pride, lust, covetousness, anger, vanity, or any other.

The tenth exhortation (Hebrews 12:4-13,) is, “Regard not lightly the chastening of the Lord, because (1) chastening is an evidence of sonship. (2) If we have borne arbitrary chastening from earthly parents, much more we will bear disciplinary chastening from our Heavenly Father. (3) While grievous at first, it yieldeth afterward peaceable fruit or righteousness, if rightly received.

Here come up the Creationist theory of the origin of human spirits and the Traducian theory. The Creationist theory is that the spirit of every human being born into the world is a direct creation of God, and only the body is derived from the earthly parent. The Traducian theory is that every child, in his entirety, spirit and body, is derived from his earthly parents, begotten in the likeness not only of bodily features but in spiritual state, otherwise man could not propogate his species, and every child would, in his inner nature, be born holy, not subject to inherited depravity and not needing regeneration until he became an actual transgressor hence needing only proper environment and training to grow up in holiness.

The passage in question is not decisive for either theory. God is the Father of spirits in that originally the spirit of man was not a formation from inert matter, but a special creation (see Genesis 2:7). Thus the whole race, body and spirit, was potentially in the first man, died body and spirit in him when he fell, and after his fall he “begat children in his likeness” body and spirit.

In Hebrews 12:12-13, “hands hanging down,” “palsied knees,” and “crooked paths” refer to the physical effects of spiritual depression or terror, the inner man acting on the outer. See case of Belshazzar (Daniel 5:6), and recall cases coming under your own observation in which discouragements or despondency of the spirit enfeeble the body. Some men, morally brave, are physically timid. A famous French marshal always trembled at the beginning of battle. On one occasion his officers rallied him on his shaking legs. He answered, “If my legs only knew into what dangers I will take them today, they would shake more than they do.”

The eleventh exhortation (Hebrews 12:14 ff) is, “Follow after peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no man shall see the Lord.” There are two hazards attending obedience to this exhortation, against which there are special cautions, as follows: (1) The springing up of a root of bitterness to defile many. (2) The spirit of profanity, or the despising of sacred things.

In our own experience or observation, cases arise of a single root of bitterness disturbing the peace of communities and retarding the sanctification of hundreds.

Profanity here means, not so much swearing as it does a spirit of irreverence in speaking of sacred things, and, sometimes interested lost souls are completely sidetracked by the levity and foolish jestings, and the questionable anecdotes of preachers in their hours of relaxation.

The author having often, in his early ministry, witnessed the wounding and shocking of sober-minded Christians and the loss of interest in awakened sinners caused by the foolish jestings in the preacher’s tent concerning sacred things, and sometimes by obscene anecdotes, entered into a solemn covenant with Dr. Riddle, the moderator of the Waco Association, never to tell nor willingly hear a doubtful anecdote. This covenant was made while camping out one night on the prairie in the light of the stars.

The twelfth exhortation and its doctrinal basis are found in Hebrews 12:28-29 : “Wherefore, receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us have grace, whereby we may offer service well-pleasing to God with reverence and awe: for our God is a consuming fire.

I will group in classes the exhortation of Hebrews 13 as follows:

1. Love to brethren, strangers, and those in bonds.

2. Honor the sanctity of marriage.

3. Eschew the covetous spirit.

4. Hold in kind remembrance your leaders that have passed away.

5. Bear the reproach of Christ, even if it ostracises from worldly society.

6. Offer spiritual sacrifices of praise, confession, contribution, and prayer.

In closing this exposition there are two things worthy of note: First, The bearing of Heb 13:8 on the preceding verse, which means that preachers may come and go, but Jesus is ever the same. Second, The controversy arose over Hebrews 13:10, a controversy as to what is the Christian altar. Was it the cross on which Jesus was crucified? Then how can the altar be greater than the gift on the altar, as Christ taught? Was it Christ’s divinity on which his humanity was sacrificed? This controversy was a refinement of foolishness, because the altar under consideration is not supporting the expiating sin offering of which the priests were never allowed to have a part, but the altar to which non-expiatory offerings were brought, such as meat offerings, thank offerings, tithes etc.

Of these the priests and Levites might partake. The meaning is simply this – that Christianity provides in its way for the support of its laborers through the voluntary offerings to Christ’s cause (see 1 Corinthians 9:13-14).

1. What is the exhortation in this book relative to faith, hope, and love?

2. What doctrines underlie this manifold exhortation?

3. Does “having our bodies washed with pure water” (Hebrews 10:22) refer to water baptism, and if so, what the bearing of the teaching?

4. How do you interpret Paul’s reason for this exhortation as expressed in Hebrews 10:26-29, which refers to the eternal sin?

5. What is the exhortation relative to boldness, and on what is it predicated?

6. What is the exhortation relative to weights, sins, etc., what its imagery, and what its elements?

7. What is the force of the example of Jesus in Hebrews 12:2?

8. What does the phrase “author and perfector of our faith” mean?

9. What is the meaning and import of “witnesses” in Hebrews 12:1?

10. What is the “besetting sin” in Hebrews 12:1?

11. What is the exhortation relative to chastening, and what its reasons?

12. What are the theories relative to the origin of human spirits, and what the bearing of this passage on the subject?

13. What is the meaning and force of “hand hanging down,” “palsied knees,” and “crooked paths?”

14. What is the exhortation relative to peace and sanctification?

15. What two hazards attending obedience to this exhortation?

16. Do you know of a case of a single “root of bitterness” disturbing communities and hindering sanctification?

17. What is the meaning of profanity here, and what illustration of the effect of such profanity given?

18. In what did Esau’s profanity consist?

19. What is the meaning of Heb 12:17? So, What the exhortation relative to grace, and what its doctrinal basis?

20. Group in classes the exhortations of Hebrews 13.

21. What is the bearing of Heb 13:8 on the preceding verse?

22. What controversy arose over Hebrews 13:10?

23. Why was this controversy a refinement of foolishness?