Hebrews 13:9 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

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Hebrews 13:9

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This is a very clear warning. The verb ‘carried about’ perhaps has in mind a poor disabled person who has to be carried. Of course in those days ordinary people did not have the mobility appliances which would be used today, and so people would literally be carried. Somebody who was disabled would have to move about, according to the whim of others, and was no longer properly in charge of their life. The people who care for the person want to go to someplace, so they lift the person up if it is necessary to take him or her with them and go. He or she has no choice in the matter. The disabled person is unfortunately totally susceptible to the preferences of others. Or equally you could apply the language to clouds that are just picked up and driven by the wind, or to aquatic plants just are swept whichever way the current goes. ‘Be not carried about’ like some highly susceptible person, someone with no individual personal control, someone who is a lightweight, and hardly counts. People can be so impressionable; even Christian people can be so shallow and this applies to all kinds of people, even bright people.The word ‘divers’ is an archaic term. It does not quite mean the same as diverse. Divers means many, while diverse means various. The Greek word is a cross between the two. Do not be carried about with many and varied doctrines, and with strange doctrines. Every one of those factors is important. Do not to be carried about by motley differing doctrines about which there is nothing consistent. The truth of the Bible is consistent and interlocking; one doctrine fits another. There is a sequence, a connection, and a logic about the truth of God – Christ is in everything – it is a wonderful theological system of truth. But false doctrines are all bits and pieces. They don't always agree with each other, because they have come from the minds of men, and been tossed into the pot, as it were. It is astonishing to discover that some of the most educated and able people in worldly matters can be the most foolish and the most impressionable in spiritual matters. You find yourself remonstrating with people who have been taken in by some foolish idea or teaching, and this is a professional person. This is a top-flight accountant or a leading hospital consultant, someone who has demonstrated capacity to master all kinds of things, and yet is so foolish and so childish in spiritual things. How can this happen? Some people truly and sincerely come to Jesus Christ, and they find him and the blessings of salvation, and then they practically stop learning and they cannot discern spiritual issues. They do not read books about biblical doctrine or church history, and so they are vulnerable, impressionable people. The first person who comes along and says, ‘I had a vision and we all ought to be hopping up and down or doing strange things for the Lord in worship’ causes them to be taken in. They just do not know the Bible; they do not know where in the Scriptures it is said that in New Testament times believers will not have visions and new revelations because the Bible is now complete. They do not know simple basic facts about the Christian faith. Somebody comes along and says ‘I have discovered Catholic mysticism, and how to commune with God by various mystical techniques’, and they reply ‘Oh really? Tell me all about them.’ It is a good thing that the heart is established, settled, fixed, with grace, not with meats. The reference is to ceremonial food prescribed by the law. These food laws had important lessons built into them, but the keeping of them did not give righteousness or save. Anyone who thought so was relying on their own good works to save them. But these things do not mix: the free unmerited favour of God through the death of Jesus Christ does not mix with the eating of these ceremonial meats. Those who are ‘occupied’ or, literally, who walk in these ways think that their salvation is secured by following of the food laws, but no matter how hard they try that never secures forgiveness or salvation; it is all about grace, free salvation, which came with Christ.

Application

Think of the consistency of the Christian faith. Take the five points of Calvinism, so called. Nobody even designed them as a method of teaching, and yet because they are based on Scripture, they fit so amazingly together. In fact it was the opponents of the Reformation who came up with the five points of Calvinism: actually they were expressing the opposite of each point. Those who were in favour of the doctrines of the Reformation simply turned them round the other way. As a result you get the so-called five points as a summary of key salvation doctrines. We speak of them are as the TULIP: T – Total depravity of mankind; U – Unconditional election to life; L – Limited election or particular redemption; I – Irresistible grace; P – Perseverance of the saints. Total depravity means salvation is all about grace. It doesn't teach that man is 100% depraved, but it teaches that in every department of his being there is corruption. There is some capability in him for good, but it is ruined by the bad. In every good endeavour there is a bad motive, and therefore not only can he not save himself, but he does not desire God and he will never seek after God. And how glad we are that God’s election to life in eternity past is unconditional, because if it was conditional there would be no hope for any of us. When Christ came, he did not die for everybody, so that everybody is potentially saved. It is not left up to us to determine whether we benefit from the death of Christ. No! This was a literal real atonement; Christ actually took the eternal punishment of sin for each one who is saved. He made everything secure. When God calls us to respond to the gospel, he does not leave it up to the fallible human will whether or not to respond. He as it were takes us by the hand, and we are made willing to come to him, so that it is our genuine response, but a response superintended by God. I would never submit to Christ if the Holy Spirit did not work irresistibly within me. Those who are made believers are kept by the Father and the Son and the Spirit. Even as a believer, there is still sufficient foolishness in me to fall from grace, but by the grace of God the Spirit works to ensure that I persevere in the faith all the way to the end. That is the order, the symmetry the connected nature of truth.

Some try to mix grace with other things. In 1977 the Bible believing party in the Church of England had a convention, which was held during the vacation at Nottingham University, and they gathered together under the chairmanship of the late minister of All Souls Langham Place, Dr John Stott. Among their deliberations they came to this conclusion: We are pretty well the same as the Church of Rome and we believe that all those people in the Church of Rome, even though they depend on Mary for salvation or the mass or the priesthood are to recognised as fellow-Christians. Even though they do not trust exclusively in Christ and his suffering and death on Calvary and repent and believe the gospel, but they also rely on good works and images and the intercession of dead saints, their way of salvation is just as good as ours, and it is just as valid. The conference made a declaration a statement in which they virtually said good works are sufficient as a means of getting to God, though we prefer grace. But a mixture of works and grace: it is all the same; everybody is all right in the end. You cannot do that! Opposites do not mix. You cannot mix grace and works.

Questions

How do I know if a doctrine is right, biblical? I know because it is in the Bible many times over. and it is never contradicted, and it is quite plain. There are some things, it is true, that we may find difficulty proving in the Scripture. We may feel sure that this is the right understanding, but if somebody challenged us or if someone had a slightly different view on that matter and they advance scriptural grounds for their view, we would not conflict with them. So there are some things, it is true, that are rather secondary, and while we think this is what they mean, we cannot be absolutely and utterly certain that everybody else is wrong. But all the important things in Scripture are repeated many times, and they are never contradicted, and they are solid and confirm each other. The great doctrines of the Bible are so plain, and you can organise them into a shape, and you can demonstrate that they fit, interlock and support each other. That is truth. Take one away, and there would be something plainly missing.

Outline

Purpose

Introduction

Hebrews 13:9 Commentary and Bible Study