Wherefore, being encompassed with a cloud — A great multitude, tending upward with a holy swiftness. Of witnesses — Of the power of faith. Let us lay aside every weight — As all who run a race take care to do. Let us throw off whatever weighs us down, or damps the vigour of our Soul. And the sin whi... [ Continue Reading ]
Looking — From all other things. To Jesus — As the wounded Israelites to the brazen serpent. Our crucified Lord was prefigured by the lifting up of this; our guilt, by the stings of the fiery serpents; and our faith, by their looking up to the miraculous remedy. The author and finisher of our faith... [ Continue Reading ]
Consider — Draw the comparison and think. The Lord bore all this; and shall his servants bear nothing? Him that endured such contradiction from sinners — Such enmity and opposition of every kind Lest ye be weary — Dull and languid, and so actually faint in your course.... [ Continue Reading ]
Unto blood — Unto wounds and death.... [ Continue Reading ]
And yet ye seem already to have forgotten the exhortation — Wherein God speaketh to you with the utmost tenderness. Despise not thou the chastening of the Lord — Do not slight or make little of it; do not impute any affliction to chance or second causes but see and revere the hand of God in it. Neit... [ Continue Reading ]
For — All springs from love; therefore neither despise nor faint.... [ Continue Reading ]
Whom his father chasteneth not — When he offends.... [ Continue Reading ]
Of which all sons are partakers — More or less.... [ Continue Reading ]
And we reverenced them — We neither despised nor fainted under their correction. Shall we not much rather — Submit with reverence and meekness To the Father of spirits — That we may live with him for ever. Perhaps these expressions, fathers of our flesh, and Father of spirits, intimate that our eart... [ Continue Reading ]
For they verily for a few days — How few are even all our day on earth! Chastened us as they thought good — Though frequently they erred therein, by too much either of indulgence or severity. But he always, unquestionably, for our profit, that we may be partakers of his holiness — That is, of himsel... [ Continue Reading ]
Now all chastening — Whether from our earthly or heavenly Father, Is for the present grievous, yet it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness — Holiness and happiness. To them that are exercised thereby — That receive this exercise as from God, and improve it according to his will.... [ Continue Reading ]
Wherefore lift up the hands — Whether your own or your brethren's. That hang down — Unable to continue the combat. And the feeble knees — Unable to continue the race. Isaiah 35:3.... [ Continue Reading ]
And make straight paths both for your own and for their feet — Remove every hinderance, every offence. That the lame — They who are weak, scarce able to walk. Be not turned out of the way — Of faith and holiness.... [ Continue Reading ]
Follow peace with all men — This second branch of the exhortation concerns our neighbours; the third, God. And holiness — The not following after all holiness, is the direct way to fall into sin of every kind.... [ Continue Reading ]
Looking diligently, lest any one — If he do not lift up the hands that hang down. Fall from the grace of God: lest any root of bitterness — Of envy, anger, suspicion. Springing up — Destroy the sweet peace; lest any, not following after holiness, fall into fornication or profaneness. In general, any... [ Continue Reading ]
Esau was profane for so slighting the blessing which went along with the birth — right.... [ Continue Reading ]
He was rejected — He could not obtain it. For he found no place for repentance — There was no room for any such repentance as would regain what he had lost. Though he sought it — The blessing of the birth — right. Diligently with tears — He sought too late. Let us use the present time.... [ Continue Reading ]
For — A strong reason this why they ought the more to regard the whole exhortation drawn from the priesthood of Christ: because both salvation and vengeance are now nearer at hand. Ye are not come to the mountain that could be touched — That was of an earthy, material nature.... [ Continue Reading ]
The sound of a trumpet — Formed, without doubt, by the ministry of angels, and preparatory to the words, that is, the Ten Commandments, which were uttered with a loud voice, Deuteronomy 5:22.... [ Continue Reading ]
For they could not bear — The terror which seized them, when they heard those words proclaimed, If even a beast, &c. Exodus 19:12, &c.... [ Continue Reading ]
Even Moses — Though admitted to so near an intercourse with God, who "spake to him as a man speaketh to his friend." At other times he acted as a mediator between God and the people. But while the ten words were pronounced, he stood as one of the hearers, Exodus 19:25; Exodus 20:19.... [ Continue Reading ]
But ye — Who believe in Christ. Are come — The apostle does not here speak of their coming to the church militant, but of that glorious privilege of New Testament believers, their communion with the church triumphant. But this is far more apparent to the eyes of celestial spirits than to ours which... [ Continue Reading ]
To the general assembly — The word properly signifies a stated convention on some festival occasion. And church — The whole body of true believers, whether on earth or in paradise. Of the first — born — The first — born of Israel were enrolled by Moses; but these are enrolled in heaven, as citizens... [ Continue Reading ]
To Jesus, the mediator — Through whom they had been perfected. And to the blood of sprinkling — To all the virtue of his precious blood shed for you, whereby ye are sprinkled from an evil conscience. This blood of sprinkling was the foundation of our Lord's mediatorial office. Here the gradation is... [ Continue Reading ]
Refuse not — By unbelief. Him that speaketh — And whose speaking even now is a prelude to the final scene. The same voice which spake both by the law and in the gospel, when heard from heaven, will shake heaven and earth. For if they escaped not — His vengeance. Much more shall not we — Those of us... [ Continue Reading ]
Whose voice then shook the earth — When he spoke from mount Sinai. But now — With regard to his next speaking. He hath promised — It is a joyful promise to the saints, though dreadful to the wicked. Yet once more I will shake, not only the earth, but also the heaven — These words may refer in a lowe... [ Continue Reading ]
The things which are shaken — Namely, heaven and earth. As being made — And consequently liable to change. That the things which are not shaken may remain — Even "the new heavens and the new earth," Revelation 21:1.... [ Continue Reading ]
Therefore let us, receiving — By willing and joyful faith. A kingdom — More glorious than the present heaven and earth. Hold fast the grace, whereby we may serve God — In every thought, word, and work. With reverence — Literally, with shame. Arising from a deep consciousness of our own unworthiness.... [ Continue Reading ]
For our God is a consuming fire — in the strictness of his justice, and purity of his holiness.... [ Continue Reading ]