Bible Commentaries
Hebrews 12

Verses 1-29

XII 1, 2 All Eyes on Christ— The foregoing Roll of Honour summons a dense cloud of witnesses who tell of the victories of faith. Therefore—and the ’therefore’ is most unusually emphatic—let us do our part. Our part is conceived athletically, cf.1 Corinthians 9:24f.; Galatians 5:7; Philippians 3:14; 2 Timothy 4:7. Let us, free from every weight and every sin that besets us and stands only too ready to lay hold of us (e?pe?ístat??)—let us with patience run the race (???? ’contest’) lying before us, looking away (from ephemeral things) and fixing our eyes on Jesus the Author (rather than Leader) and the Finisher of our faith—who first brought it to us and will give it the final perfection of vision. He is a perfect Model, for in view of (rather than instead of) the joy set before him, he endured the cross, thinking nothing of the shame and ignominy of it, and he has taken his seat (for ever, as the perfect tense denotes) at the right hand of the throne of God.

3-13. That ’Sign of contradiction’, which is Jesus, well considered is a remedy for all faint-heartedness,

3. There had been few martyrdoms amongst this HebrewChristian community, and the ordinary discipline of hard-knocks is only what children must expect. Proverbs 3:11 is cited as showing that chastisement is a sign of God’s love.

4-8. To be under discipline therefore is a cause of joy, for it makes those who partake of it feel that they belong to the family.

9. Submission to the chastising hand of an earthly father of our flesh has been a matter of filial reverence. Are we then to demur when the heavenly Father of spirits uses a chastening hand to lead us to eternal life?

10. Human discipline fits us for a fleeting life, and it may at times be arbitrary or wrong, but God’s educational regime is always profitable and sanctifying.

11. Not the present but the future is the proper test. Chastisement here and now is painful, but later it produces the peaceful fruit 11of justice. /par/par12-13. Therefore, no slackness! The limping limb must not be allowed to get dislocated but rather set on the way of recovery.

14-24 Peace, Holiness, Fidelity: Sinai and Sion— 14. Peace belongs to the children of God; and striving after the purity of holiness is the necessary road to the vision of God.

15. Charity has an ’episcopal’ eye; its overseership must ensure that no one defaults from the grace of God, and that no bitter root of poisonous influence causes disturbance resulting in the defilement of the many.

16-17. The spirit of fornication and profane low-mindedness—the latter (and perhaps both) exemplified in Esau—is not to be tolerated. The dangers of a mentality steeped ’in earth are very real. Esau sold his rights of primogeniture for one mess of pottage, and later when he sought, even with tears, a return of the paternal blessing—which in the Providence of God his profanity had sold to Jacob—he was rejected by his father Isaac who refused to repent of his decision. Opportunities can be irreparably lost by the lowminded, cf. §§ 938a,b, 942c.18. Sion demands greater fidelity and sweeter obedience than Sinai. This is powerfully shown in a two-panelled picture.

19-21. Sinai was a material mountain, blazing with terrible fire, surrounded by such darkness as precedes a storm, and the murkiness of heaped-up clouds, disturbed even by the fury of tempestuous wind. The long-drawn sound of a trumpet and the angelic voice representing God so dreadful that the people asked that they should be spared those terrors of God’s Majesty. Even a beast that touched the Mountain, while God legislated from it, had to be stoned. Moses himself showed the awe which he felt for he said ’I am utterly terrified and trembling’—words substantially spoken by him on account of the apostasy of the Golden Calf, Deuteronomy 9:19, but psychologically representing his terror at the whole scene of God’s majesty manifested on the Mountain.

22-24. On the other hand, Christians have come to a Mountain which is Sion, to a City which is the city of the Living God to a Jerusalem which is heavenly—to myriads of angels, a truly festive assembly (pa?ð???e?) —to a Church of first-born enrolled in heaven (all enjoying the privileges of primogeniture: blessing and double portion—and enrolled in God’s book of heavenly citizens), to God the Judge of all, and to those favourably judged by him, namely, the spirits of the just who have come to perfection in the beatific vision already attained—to the Mediator of the New Covenant Jesus (of whom much has been said)—and to a blood of sprinkling crying for pardon more loudly than the blood of Abel cried for vengeance. The Rest and Peace of Sion are in this diptych set in strong contrast to the terrors of Sinai.

25-29 Last Warning— When God speaks, the earth shakes. He spoke from Sinai and the people made an act of refusal. He speaks now from heaven and this time his voice produces a shaking of earth and heaven, that is, of all creation—a shaking predicted by Aggeus, 2:6-8, and ending in an unchangeable kingdom. Therefore, we who have received that kingdom must have grace and serve God with a great desire to please him—always with pious reverence and deep fear, for our God is a consuming fire, Deuteronomy 4:24; Deuteronomy 9:3.