Cast not away therefore your confidence, which has great recompense.
Just before this verse, the writer reminds these believers of their earlier days. They suffered much for their faith, and they stood firm. Now he turns to a new danger. It is not that enemies will crush them. It is that they may let go of what they already hold.
The word translated "confidence" here is not a mood or a personality trait. It is the same word used earlier in the chapter for the right of access believers have into God's presence.
The apostle urges them not to throw away or cast off their confidence, because a great reward is laid up for them in heaven… It is the same word that is translated "boldness" earlier in this chapter: "Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus." They were not to cast away this boldness. They were to hold fast the joy of their hope and keep their confidence firm to the end.
Samuel Ridout (older translations read "boldness" in verse 19)
The reason to hold on does not lie in the believer's own steadiness. It lies in the One they trust. He is what He was when they first trusted Him.
In all they did and suffered then, the moving spring was hopeful confidence in Jesus. They were to keep that firmly (verse 35). For Jesus had not changed. Suppose they compared their first love and its effects with the reduced zeal that had since made the apostle's heart sad. If that made them question their own sincerity, they were wrong. What they did earlier was rightly done. And God was not unrighteous to forget their work. They must not cast away their confidence, because He was faithful to preserve the trust they had once placed in Jesus.
If pressure makes someone drop his confidence, the fault lies in that confidence. The pressure has changed nothing about God.
If someone casts away confidence in the living God, that confidence proves to be very deficient, for God Himself has not changed. Persecution tests it, no doubt, and the apostle would strengthen souls to stand by true, living faith.
What happens inside a believer is the source of what he can bear and what he can do.
The great guard is against casting away their confidence or boldness of soul, the root within of outward suffering as of service. Patient endurance is needed as ever. The love of Christ is its spring, glory with Him is its only hope, and the road is doing the will of God as He did it perfectly. The reward He assures cannot be separated from His coming, which here, as elsewhere, is kept right in front of the Christian.
The reward had not arrived yet. That is the whole difficulty. The answer is how little of the road is left.
They are called not to cast away their confidence and its great recompense. True, they needed endurance. But let them remember that the end of everlasting joy is near. He who is coming will come and will not delay, and it is yet a very little while. What blessed grounds to persevere in faith! They had long walked in Christ's path: a few trials more might be theirs. All above is glorious, and He is coming quickly.
Whatever they had lost by confessing Christ was not lost permanently.
He remembered, and he called on them to remember, the earlier days when they suffered much persecution for their faith, and he appealed to them not to cast away their confidence at this late hour in their history. An abundant recompense was coming for any loss they had suffered here.
The promise of a reward opens a side of faith that goes beyond forgiveness.
"Do not throw away your confidence," for it thus shows that it has "a great reward." Faith is a principle that grasps two different things about God. It views Him as one who justifies the ungodly, as in Romans 4. But here it grasps God as "a rewarder of those who seek Him." The moment you grasp God by a faith that does not work, you enter on a faith that does work. And while we rightly value a faith that saves our souls, let us not be indifferent to a faith that serves our Saviour. How boldly we sometimes assert our title, but do we value our inheritance?
- Confidence — the word is the same "boldness" as in verse 19: the right to enter God's presence through the blood of Jesus. That is what they were told not to throw away.
- Grounds — the confidence rests on Christ, not on feelings. Jesus has not changed, so there is no reason to let go.
- Root — boldness inside feeds both the suffering they bear and the service they give. Lose it and both dry up.
- Reward — the reward does not come now. It comes with Christ, and the wait is only a very little while.
- Reach — the same faith that receives justification also seeks God as a rewarder. Hold the title, but value the inheritance too.
For ye have need of endurance in order that, having done the will of God, ye may receive the promise.
These words were written to believers under persecution, tempted to give up. The verse ties three things together: endurance, doing God's will, and a promise still to come.
This endurance is not learned in comfortable circumstances.
He reminds them that they need patience, as we all do — or, as the word really is, "endurance." And it is tribulation that "produces endurance, and endurance produces character." Character and endurance do not come from an unexercised life. They needed that endurance which stayed under every stress, so that after they had done the will of God, they would still hold to Him, and so obtain the promise laid up for them in heaven.
The same word appears elsewhere in the New Testament, and it has one perfect example.
The word for endurance comes from a verb meaning "to sustain." It is translated "enduring" in one place (2 Cor. 1:6), and "patient continuance" in another (Rom. 2:7), and that sense is fully part of the word. It is a "patient endurance" that does not give way under trial and suffering… It is never applied to God directly, because there could be no such testing or pressure in regard to Him. But the Lord Jesus, in the place He has taken as Man, is our perfect example in it, Heb. 12:2-3.
What does doing God's will look like? One life shows it exactly.
When He was here He did God's will only, and that is why the apostle Paul says, "For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done (what Jesus did) the will of God you may receive what is promised" (Heb. 10:36)… A man who is doing the will of God is not living for himself. His only thought is to do what God wishes. And that is exactly what the blessed Lord did here.
The verse follows a warning about throwing confidence away. Persecution puts that confidence to the test.
If someone throws away confidence in the living God, that confidence is shown to be badly lacking, for God Himself has not changed. Persecution tests it, no doubt, and the apostle would strengthen souls to stand by true, living faith. Patient endurance would gain its reward. God's will for every believer is that hard experience should prove his trust is really in the living God.
Readers who had once been Jews might have expected honour and relief in this life. Commentators say the Christian's portion runs the other way.
As Jews, they might associate with the Christ freedom from suffering and promotion to high honour; but as Christians, their portion is to share His sufferings for righteousness and love and truth. No mistake is more common in Christendom than looking for present reward and distinction and ease through the gospel and the church… It is through suffering in faith and patience that we are disciplined and bear fruit to Him who chooses in this way to prune the branches of the vine.
The promise is certain. Endurance covers the waiting.
One thing only was necessary: that they should continue with endurance doing the will of God. Then without fail all that had been promised would be fulfilled to them. Their very position was that they had "fled for refuge" to "hold fast to the hope set before us" (6:18). That hope was abundantly sure, but its fulfilment can only be at the coming of the Lord, as verse 37 shows.
The call to endure also comes with comfort. It has a time limit.
Finally, the apostle gives them the cheer that it is only a little while that there will be need for this endurance… At any moment the welcome shout, with the voice of the trumpet, may be heard from heaven, and saints snatched from their place of trial will enter into the joy of the Lord. This very inducement is held out for perseverance. This sharp trial may be the last. This temptation to turn into an easier path may be followed by the coming of the Lord.
Endurance needs peace. A troubled mind makes the quiet doing of God's will impossible.
There is nothing that the soul of the believer is more brought to feel than that he has "need of endurance" (Heb. 10:36); but if he is hindered by anything from finding God to be "the God of peace," if sorrow and trial hinder this, there is the will of the flesh at work. There cannot be the quiet doing of God's will if the mind is troubled and unsettled about a thousand things.
- Endurance, not patience. The word means a steadiness that stays under pressure, and it is trial — not an easy life — that produces it.
- Endurance obeys. The one who endures is doing God's will — not living for himself, exactly as Christ did.
- Endurance is tested. Persecution proves whether your confidence is really in the living God.
- Endurance receives. Nothing promised will fail. But it comes at the Lord's return, not as ease or honour now.
- Endurance is short. It is "a little while": the sharp trial you are in may be the last one before He comes.
For yet a very little while he that comes will come, and will not delay.
These words close a section written to believers who were losing heart. They were tempted to go back to what they had left, and into that pressure comes a promise taken from the prophet Habakkuk.
This is not a detached prediction. It gives tired believers a reason to hold on.
Jewish believers, when disheartened, might naturally look back at their old setting of visible splendour. If so, the danger is pressed on them with great seriousness: the danger of abandoning all God had now done in Christ and given to faith. They are called not to throw away their confidence and its great reward. True, they needed endurance. But let them remember that the end of everlasting joy is at hand; for He that comes (and it is yet a very little while) will come and will not delay. What blessed grounds to persevere in faith! They had long walked in Christ's path: a few trials more might be theirs.
A natural way to comfort a suffering believer is to point to the end of life. That is not the comfort chosen here.
A modern preacher would say: "Yet a little while, and this scene will close. Death will put an end to your troubles. You will depart to be with Jesus, which is far better." But this is not the language of the Holy Spirit. Why? Because the Holy Spirit, knowing the mind of God, always puts the Lord's coming, and not death, as the expectation of the Christian.
Habakkuk was told that a vision would surely come, and that he should wait for it. The letter to the Hebrews takes up those words.
From this quotation we learn that the vision which will surely come is a person, the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the centre of every vision, and without Him there is no vision.
The wording is emphatic. Two small details press how short the wait really is.
What a wonderful hope is before us — nothing short of our blessed Lord Himself... In Hebrews 10:37 the word that qualifies "little" comes twice over. That gives the force of "ever so little." What follows makes it stronger still: "will come and will not delay." Very remarkable words, are they not?
Elsewhere Scripture tells of a bridegroom who is slow in coming. Does that clash with a promise of no delay?
Near the end of his life the apostle Paul comforts the Hebrew believers. He assures them that in a very little while the Coming One will come, and will not delay. "The very little while" in the one passage matches the delay of the bridegroom in the other. Once that delay is over, He will come and "will not delay." The two are in full harmony. When the apostle wrote, the Lord had already delayed. He did not know the hour of His return. He was inspired to announce only that it would be sure and soon.
Commentators differ over which stage of the Lord's return is in view. One reads it of His public appearing in glory:
Hebrews 10:37 does not deal with His coming (parousia) for the Church, to take up all saints. It deals with His appearing (epiphania) as King. That appearing, just as much as His coming, is what we expect. For then Christ's reign on earth will begin — the subject of nearly every Old Testament prophecy — and the faithful ones will receive their crowns.
Another applies it to the moment Christ gathers His own, before the judgments fall:
How happy it is that before that time arrives Christ will come for His Church... How sweet and happy is our prospect.
So what is the waiting for?
In contrast to the wicked, the godly will find in this delay an occasion for the exercise of faith... So the people of God, in the prophet's day or in ours, are urged to run with spiritual energy, to wait with patience, and to live by faith.
- Pressure — These believers had already suffered loss. They were close to throwing away their confidence. What they needed was endurance.
- Person — The hope held out is not death, and not an event. Habakkuk's promised vision is a Person: the Lord Jesus Himself.
- Nearness — The word for "little" comes twice over, giving the sense "ever so little." The promise adds that He will not delay.
- Certainty — Any delay belongs to the waiting time, not to the arrival. Once the little while is over, He comes.
- Faith — The delay is the space where the righteous live by faith instead of drawing back. They run with energy and wait with patience.
But the just shall live by faith; and, if he draw back, my soul does not take pleasure in him.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
But *we* are not drawers back to perdition, but of faith to saving [the] soul.
Chapter 10 has just closed with a warning about shrinking back. The last verse draws a line between two kinds of people, and the writer puts himself and his readers on the safe side of it.
The verse sets one group against another. That contrast shapes how we read every warning in the letter.
Do not miss the contrast in the last verse of our chapter. It lies between drawing back to ruin and believing to the salvation of the soul. This is more proof, if any were needed, that the contrast in Hebrews is not between believers who do well and believers who do badly and so (as some suppose) may perish. It is between those who truly believe to salvation and those who only profess, and who draw back to their eternal ruin.
The wording carries the point. It names a kind of person, not one past act.
Men could not be saved while giving up this faith. Drawing back from Christ would be drawing back to ruin. Yet in the same letter this apostle puts those who had believed to salvation in a completely different class from those who could fall away. He writes, "we are not of those who shrink back" — not simply, "who have shrunk back," which there would be no need to say, but "who shrink back." We are not the kind of people who do that. We are "of those who have faith and preserve their souls." That is the class we belong to.
The letter warns and reassures at the same time. Each word goes to a different group.
Like all the strong warnings of that letter, this one goes first to a body of professing Christians. They had been trained in Judaism, and they were in danger of being pulled back under its influence... Yet while the letter warns a body of professors, it shows the fullest confidence about individual believers... It is always good to distrust ourselves; but we can never go too far in trusting God. The worst of it is that those who really need the warning do not heed it. They go on in a light and careless way. Meanwhile the warnings frighten those who seek to walk with a tender conscience and an honest heart, though they do not apply to them at all.
Notice the pronoun: he does not say "you", he says "we".
But the apostle, as he always does, cannot leave the subject with those solemn words. True faith must have a word of cheer, and so in the last verse he puts himself alongside them, alongside all true believers... We are of those who believe. Our faith is not the short-lived kind — like the seed on rocky ground, which lasts a season and then withers away under pressure.
Keeping the soul reaches further than rescue from judgment. Commentators differ on where its weight falls. Ridout points ahead to "that day of glory, when all the fruit of faith will appear to view." Another writer sees it as already begun:
Soul-salvation in these scriptures must include the salvation from judgment that is ours when we believe, when we receive the forgiveness of sins and God justifies us on the principle of faith. But on its positive side it takes in the present enjoyment in the soul of that salvation which, in its fullness, is ready to be revealed. It is ours in this world now, because it is "in Christ."
The verse is not an ending but a hinge. What follows shows what faith looks like.
After the appeals and encouragements that close chapter 10, we find in chapter 11 a review of the great lives of the Old Testament. The aim is to put before the Hebrews all the resources of faith... Now this is what faith is.
The danger did not end with the first readers. The professing Christian world can draw back by copying.
Christendom has drawn back by way of imitation. It has copied the Jewish system. Once again it puts up magnificent temples with visible altars, and appoints official priests to conduct elaborate ceremonies. These appeal to the eye and to the natural man, and they raise no question of conversion or new birth. So Christendom has not given up the profession of Christianity to go back to Judaism. Instead it has tried to attach Judaism to Christianity. The result is that Christendom is losing the vital truths of Christianity, which only a true believer can enter. At the same time it keeps the outward things of Judaism that the natural man can appreciate.
- Two classes. The line runs between real believers and people who only profess. It does not run between believers who do well and believers who do badly and perish.
- Two directions. One class draws back to ruin; the other believes onward — a settled character, not a single act.
- Two audiences. The warning goes to a professing body. The confidence goes to individual believers, and the writer counts himself among them.
- Two horizons. Saving the soul covers forgiveness now and present enjoyment of that salvation, with its full display still ahead.
- Two ages. The same drawing back happens today by copying: people keep the outward religion and lose the truths only faith can enter.