The Anchored Soul – Part 4
Hebrews 6:13-20
August 23, 2015
As you know we’ve been working through the book of Hebrews.
And most recently we’ve been in the middle of a parenthetical section of the book where the writer is talking about having an anchored soul.
The issue with the Hebrews was simple.
They were vacillating.
They had made at least an outward profession concerning Christ, but pressure from the Jews caused them to contemplate leaving Jesus and returning to Judaism.
The writer of Hebrews wrote very simply to solidify in their minds
Why they should stick with Jesus.
He sought to anchor their souls.
So he began to give them reasons why Jesus was greater.
• Greater than the prophets
• Greater than the angels
• Greater than Moses
• Greater than Joshua
• Greater than Aaron
He even told us in chapter 5
Hebrews 5:8-10 “Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered. And having been made perfect, He became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal salvation, being designated by God as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.”
And if you’ll remember the writer showed us how Jesus is a greater priest because Jesus doesn’t serve like Aaron served.
Those priests only served for a short while
And all they could negotiate with God was atonement for 1 year.
But Jesus serves according to the order of Melchizedek
And thus holds His priesthood permanent.
This means that the salvation of Jesus isn’t temporary, but eternal.
He can save you forever.
But then, he entered this parenthetical section.
It is a section meant to encourage the Hebrews to
Pay attention to the great truth about Jesus being our high priest.
And you’ll recall the points.
#1 HE EXPOSED THE PROBLEM
Hebrews 5:11-14
(11) “Concerning him we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing.”
• You won’t hear the truth.
• And because you won’t hear it you haven’t learned it
• And because you haven’t learned it you don’t know it
• And because you don’t know it you can’t benefit from it
You really, really, really need to pay attention to the truth.
In fact, in the next passage he showed us the penalty for those who don’t pay attention to the truth
#2 HE EXPLAINED THE PENALTY
Hebrews 6:1-8
There we read of people who had been
Thoroughly exposed to the truth and yet refused to heed it.
Instead of receiving the truth and following Jesus,
They fell away and the consequence is destruction.
He even gave an illustration about ground that continually receives rain,
But which only responds with thorns.
That ground is cursed and ends up being burned.
So it is with a person who just won’t receive the truth they are given.
So the writer started out with a really harsh confrontation and warning.
Last week we heard him soften up his approach a bit
#3 HE ENCOURAGED THE PEOPLE
Hebrews 6:9-12
There he reminded the people that while there are really apostates who fall away from the faith, he didn’t think that was who they were.
He was “convinced of better things concerning [them] and things that accompany salvation.”
He saw their love for God
He saw their love for God’s people
He believed them to be the real deal
His desire was that they now work just as hard to grasp the truth
As they had to serve one another.
And he concluded in verse 12 saying, “so that you will not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.”
In short, don’t be like the sluggish people
Who are slow of hearing and eventually fall away,
Be like the faithful people who know God’s promises
And trust them with faith and patience.
He encouraged them to hear the truth and confirm their hope,
Imitating the faithful of old.
That brings us now to his final point here in this parenthetical section.
He Exposed the Problem He Explained the Penalty He Encouraged the People
#4 HE EMPHASIZES THE PROMISE
Hebrews 6:13-20
The people of old that we are supposed to imitate trusted the promise,
Now he talks about the promise he wants us to trust.
To get started I now need to remind you of
What specific truth he wanted them to see and trust.
(It’s tough to catch because it’s been about a month since we last read it)
Look back at where the writer was before he began this parenthetical section.
Hebrews 5
He was talking about how real high priests are sympathetic and faithful
And how they minister on behalf of man to God.
And then the writer introduced Jesus as a greater high priest
Hebrews 5:5-6 “So also Christ did not glorify Himself so as to become a high priest, but He who said to Him, “YOU ARE MY SON, TODAY I HAVE BEGOTTEN YOU”; just as He says also in another passage, “YOU ARE A PRIEST FOREVER ACCORDING TO THE ORDER OF MELCHIZEDEK.”
In order to introduce Jesus
• He quoted from Psalm 2 to remind us that God selected His Son to
be our priest.
• He then quoted from Psalm 110 to show us that His Son would be
a priest forever like Melchizedek.
That passage in Psalms 110 is huge to the writer
Because not only did God make an announcement in that passage,
God also took an oath there.
TURN BACK TO: PSALMS 110
If you’re an outline type of person, you can make a note on this Psalm.
The Psalmist points out three roles
That God the Father appointed for God the Son.
• He would be EXALTED KING (1-3)
• He would be ETERNAL PRIEST (4)
• He would be EVENTUAL JUDGE (5-7)
Now, while all of those are titles worth discussing,
The writer of Hebrews focuses in on what is said in verse 4.
Because in that verse God not only made a promise, He took an oath.
Psalms 110:4 “The LORD has sworn and will not change His mind, “You are a priest forever According to the order of Melchizedek.”
God swore that His Son – Jesus Christ would be “a priest forever”
THIS MEANS THAT WE ALWAYS HAVE AN INTERCESSOR
We always have forgiveness
It will never expire
And that was the writer’s point back in chapter 5.
Hebrews 5:9-10 “And having been made perfect, He became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal salvation, being designated by God as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.”
Because Christ is a priest forever,
His ministry is forever and so is His salvation.
AND NOW the writer really wants to focus on the fact
That when God made that statement He took an oath to solidify it.
THAT IS BIG TO HIM.
In fact, he’s going to return to this thought again in chapter 7
Hebrews 7:17-22 “For it is attested of Him, “YOU ARE A PRIEST FOREVER ACCORDING TO THE ORDER OF MELCHIZEDEK.” For, on the one hand, there is a setting aside of a former commandment because of its weakness and uselessness (for the Law made nothing perfect), and on the other hand there is a bringing in of a better hope, through which we draw near to God. And inasmuch as it was not without an oath (for they indeed became priests without an oath, but He with an oath through the One who said to Him, “THE LORD HAS SWORN AND WILL NOT CHANGE HIS MIND, ‘YOU ARE A PRIEST FOREVER'”); so much the more also Jesus has become the guarantee of a better covenant.”
You can see that the writer loves the fact that Jesus is his high priest
And he loves the fact that God swore that it would always be that way
He knows that because Christ will always serve as his priest,
That he will always have salvation.
It is huge to him.
That is the main promise he has been trying to get across to the Hebrews.
• I want you to know you have a great High Priest
• I want you to know you have a permanent High Priest
• I want you to know that He can save you forever
• I want you to know that thanks to Him, salvation is eternal
• I want you to know that instead of confusion, you can have hope
• I want you to know that there is security and assurance in Jesus
That is what this writer has been driving at all along.
THIS MORNING HE IS EMPHASIZING THAT PROMISE AGAIN.
Namely that you can bank on it.
• Not only because God said it (which would be enough)
• But because God also took an oath to confirm it.
God wanted you to know it is a done deal…permanent!
So, let’s look at how the writer begins to emphasize the promise.
There are three things he really looks at here.
1) WHO IS PROMISING? (13-15)
“For when God made the promise to Abraham, since He could swear by no one greater, He swore by Himself, saying, “I WILL SURELY BLESS YOU AND I WILL SURELY MULTIPLY YOU.” And so, having patiently waited, he obtained the promise.”
Now the promise mentioned here
Is NOT the promise the writer is primarily focusing on.
Rather, he pulls this promise up as an illustration
To confirm in your mind about God’s impeccable character.
If I promise you something, and even swear I will do it.
Before you believed it you’d want to know if my word was any good.
I mean after all, a promise is only as good as the man who gives it.
An oath is only as permanent as the man who gives it.
So if the writer is about to tell you that God made an oath,
He first wants to show you that
God is the type of God who keeps the oaths He makes.
So, he gives us an example. – Abraham.
(Incidentally Abraham is also the type of person that the writer wants you to imitate)
Here the writer reminds us that God also made a promise to Abraham.
What was it?
“I will surely bless you and I will surely multiply you.” (notice the “surely” there)
God swore that He would bless Abraham.
What the writer wants you to see is that He did.
And He did so without any help from Abraham whatsoever.
What does the Scripture Abraham did?
“patiently waited”
Notice it doesn’t say, “persistently worked”
All Abraham had to do was wait.
Why?
Because God promised to do it.
So do you see the point?
When God makes a promise (especially with an oath) it will happen.
All you have to do is patiently wait for it.
It is a done deal.
So you now understand that if God makes a promise
He has a faithful track record of keeping that promise.
God’s character is established.
We see who is promising and we trust Him.
But that isn’t all we want to know.
2) WHAT IS PROMISED? (16-18)
“For men swear by one greater than themselves, and with them an oath given as confirmation is an end of every dispute. In the same way God, desiring even more to show to the heirs of the promise the unchangeableness of His purpose, interposed with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have taken refuge would have strong encouragement to take hold of the hope set before us.”
Here the writer gives another quick analogy.
He talks about two men having a dispute.
Two men are in disagreement about something.
What ends the dispute?
“an oath given as confirmation”
Even among men, when one man takes an oath
It is supposed to end the quarrel.
We go to court and a man places himself under oath
Therefore we have confidence that we can believe his testimony.
Now if that is true of sinful men, it is certainly true of holy God.
“In the same way God, desiring even more to show to the heirs of the promise the unchangeableness of His purpose, interposed with an oath…”
God could have just said it and that would be enough
Because God never lies.
But God wanted you to know beyond a shadow of a doubt
That these things were certain so He did what He didn’t have to do.
He “interposed with an oath”
And I already showed you what that oath was,
Even though it is not stated again here.
He is referencing God’s oath to set Christ as high priest forever.
He wanted everyone to know that He wasn’t just blowing smoke
When He made that decision.
It is a done deal
You can bank on it
And so the result of God’s oath should be your CONFIDENCE
(18) “so that by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have taken refuge would have strong encouragement to take hold of the hope set before us.”
The “two unchangeable things” are God’s promise and God’s oath
God did them both for a reason.
So that “we who have taken refuge” (that is we who have come to Jesus)
“would have strong encouragement to take hold of the hope set before us.”
• God wanted the followers of Jesus to know that they had a High
Priest who would never leave office.
• To make sure they knew that, God not only promised it, He took an
oath to it.
The result then being that everyone who follows Christ
Could be extremely confident and filled with hope
Because their priest (and atonement) is forever.
Do you see that?
Do you understand the point?
There is no reason for anyone who follows Jesus
• To question whether that is the right move.
• To doubt the permanence of His salvation.
• To live in fear that His salvation will expire.
Jesus will be priest forever.
Jesus can save and save forever.
GOD SWORE TO IT.
That is security to the max.
No more fear, no more confusion, no more anxiety about losing salvation,
It all rests on the back of the One who will never stop being your priest.
So we see who is promising We see what was promised
3) WHAT IS THE OUTCOME? (19-20)
“This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and one which enters within the veil, where Jesus has entered as a forerunner for us, having become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.”
To put it plainly, the outcome is hope.
• The outcome is confidence.
• The outcome is assurance.
• The outcome is security.
I’ve got someone holding me in place!
“This hope we have as an anchor of the soul”
Surely you know what an anchor is for.
It is to keep a ship from drifting, it is to keep it one place.
Remember that warning early on in the book?
Hebrews 2:1 “For this reason we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away from it.”
Well here we find that we have an anchor
To keep us from drifting away.
When you talk about security of the believer,
Inevitably someone will talk about how a person might walk away from God.
“I know nothing can snatch me out of His hand,
But what if I get up and walk out of his hand.”
I don’t know about you, but to me that is a terrifying thought.
If that’s true, we could all be in very much trouble.
What if those Isis people make it over here and nock on your door (like they’ve done to many) and say, “You’ve got 24 hours to decide if you are a Christian before we come back and kill your family.”
Are you strong enough to watch your children beheaded?
Are you strong enough to watch your spouse killed?
Are you strong enough to endure the harshest of tortures?
Peter though he was, and we know how that ended.
My point?
If my security is only as certain as the strength of my grip, I’m in trouble.
I want Him holding on to me.
I want something to anchor me when I can’t hold on on my own.
GOOD NEWS!
That is what have.
Christ is our anchor, holding us, even when we couldn’t hold ourselves.
“This hope we have as an anchor of the soul”
Let’s go a little further.
If you go home this afternoon and want to do a little research,
Then go home and do a little study about anchors.
There are all types of anchors that you can buy for your boat.
And in your search you will see that two real questions will emerge
As you search for an anchor.
How strong does it need to be?
What is it supposed to grab?
Regarding the strength of the anchor you will hear about two things.
HOLDING POWER
That has to do with how strong those hooks are how well it grabs.
(You want an anchor that will be steadfast as it holds to the bottom)
SHAFT STRENGTH
Because the hooks may be locked, but if the shaft doesn’t hold, you’re still in trouble.
(You want an anchor that is strong and sure not to bend or let go)
Then they’ll want to know the type of SURFACE will you be anchoring to?
• Sand is easy, they offer a fluke (normal anchor)
• Mud is a little deeper, so you need a bigger fluke get deep in the mud.
• Coral requires a grapple hood to hold on to
• Shale, or clay, or grass requires a heavy anchor to be effective
SO YOU WANT AN ANCHOR THAT WILL ANCHOR WHERE YOU WANT TO BE.
Well, we want an anchor that will hold on to heaven
And won’t let go under any circumstances.
Now let’s look at the anchor.
(19) “This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and one which enters within the veil.”
Shaft strength – ours is “sure”
Holding power – ours is “steadfast”
Where does it anchor? – our “enters within the veil.”
Jesus Christ is there to anchor your soul to heaven.
It’s not you holding on, it’s Him holding on.
He’s the anchor.
“Blessed Assurance, Jesus is mine! Oh what a foretaste of glory divine!
Heir of salvation, purchased of God, born of His Spirit, washed in His blood!”
“Perfect submission, all is at rest, I in my Savior am happy and blessed;
Watching and waiting, looking above, filled with His goodness, lost in His love.”
This is my story, this is my song
Praising my Savior all the day long
This is my story, this is my song
Praising my Savior, all the day long
“My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness
I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus’ name.”
“When darkness seems to hide His face, I rest on His unchanging grace;
In every high and stormy gale, My anchor holds within the veil.”
“His oath, His covenant, His blood support me in the whelming flood;
When all around my soul gives way, He then is all my hope and stay.
On Christ the solid rock, I stand;
All other ground is sinking sand,
All other ground is sinking sand.”
And no matter the storm, no matter the wind, no matter the waves,
Our ship will endure because the anchor holds.
I might fear a lot of things in this life, but losing heaven isn’t one of them.
I know my anchor.
(19-20) “This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and one which enters within the veil, where Jesus has entered as a forerunner for us, having become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.”
So do you see the writer’s point?
Hebrews, you are so confused regarding salvation.
You’ve let those Jews convince you to leave Jesus and return to Judaism.
If you knew the truth you’d never even consider it.
• Jesus is your High Priest – God swore to it
• He can save and save you forever
• He will anchor your soul
Don’t walk in fear, have hope!
THE ANCHOR HOLDS
