Our Soul's Anchor

I’m fascinated by machines of all sorts

Planes, trains, automobiles

And even ships

I Googled what is the largest ship in the world currently operating.

It sort of depends on if you are talking about passenger ships or cargo ships

The largest container ship afloat right now is the MSC Irina

The dimensions are staggering

It is one centimeter short of 400 meters long! (1312 feet!

It is 61 meters wide (200 feet!)

It carries 24,346 standard shipping containers!

It weighs around 240,000 tons! that’s 480 MILLION pounds!

Ideally ships like this sail from port to port and are tied up along side docks when the the engines are shut down

But occasionally they have to wait out in the harbor.

Or, perhaps because of bad weather, they have to stop out in the ocean

And that’s when they need an anchor

For a large ship, an anchor can weigh up to 30,000 pounds, which seems like a lot.

But in comparison to the size of the ship, they seem small

But anchors are absolutely crucial to having a safe ship

Because the purpose of the anchor is to keep a ship secure and to prevent it from drifting with the wind and current

There are different types of anchors, but they are all designed to grip the sea bed and secure the ship against drifting

This tiny, seemingly almost insignificant piece of metal will keep this massive piece of metal secured and won’t allow it to drift with the current

Folks, the application to our lives is pretty obvious, isn’t it?

The danger of us drifting away from God and from His blessing is ever present

We already highlighted this and talked about the urgency that this pastor feels

Remember back in chapter 2:1

Therefore, we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, let we drift away from it

Drifting

Becoming sluggish, lazy, unprofitable

This danger is ever present

And we need an anchor to keep us grounded and faithful

And this pastor’s plea

MY plea for you and for all of us is to be faithful. Stay faithful. No matter what comes down the road!

And we can stay faithful

Remember what we read before

It was a strongly worded exhortation to press toward maturity and not continue to be a spiritual infant

But, what follows on the heals of this warning is one of the most wonderful passages in Hebrews.

I’m going to back up and read some verses that I kind of flew over two Sundays ago

Starting at verse 9

Hebrews 6:9–20 “9 Though we speak in this way, yet in your case, beloved, we feel sure of better things—things that belong to salvation. 10 For God is not unjust so as to overlook your work and the love that you have shown for his name in serving the saints, as you still do. 11 And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end, 12 so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. 13 For when God made a promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself, 14 saying, “Surely I will bless you and multiply you.” 15 And thus Abraham, having patiently waited, obtained the promise. 16 For people swear by something greater than themselves, and in all their disputes an oath is final for confirmation. 17 So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, 18 so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. 19 We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, 20 where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.”

So, he says here in this passage

“Look, it’s hard to hear warnings like the one that I’ve given you . I know these aren’t pleasant words”

But this author is a pastor

And he says, “Beloved”

you can hear the earnestness in his heart coming through

“Beloved, I believe better things about you. Yes, I have to give you these warnings because lack of spiritual maturity and being sluggish in our approach is a danger for all of us”

And the reason that this can happen to us is because we live “in between”

We live in between what God has promised, and the fulfillment of those promises

We live in this time of waiting

In this time when sometimes it seems that God may even be silent

Or maybe He’s not really active. He’s not doing anything

And it’s in those times when it might be easy for us to become

sluggish

For our growth to become stagnant

And perhaps for us to abandon our faith altogether

But this pastor says, “I believe better things about you”

God isn’t going to overlook the way that you have loved and have continued to serve each other

And just like last Sunday, I echo his heart

I believe better things about us! God isn’t going to overlook your love and faithfulness and the way that you serve each other

And the reason that he can be so sure about this is because

He knows who God is and the way that God has worked in the lives of the saints of old

And to prove his point, he directs our attention to the life of Abraham

Let’s think about the life of Abraham for a moment. God made some tremendous promises to Abraham

He promised that Abraham would have a son

Abraham was 75 years old when God made that promise to him

how old was he when Isaac was finally born? 100 years old! That was 25 years later

And meanwhile, an already old man is getting older and older

God promised him land

he never saw that fully fulfilled

God promised him descendents so numerous that hey would be like sand on the seashore

he never saw that promise fulfilled

And during those years, he was tested by God

God asked him to be willing to give up his son, the fulfillment of God’s promise

He went through famine

He went through armed conflict

He went through a bit of a conflict with his nephew, Lot

But through it all, he continued to persevere and exercise faith

Yes, he had some hang ups.

Abraham messed up big time on occasion

He took having a son into his own hands. Yeah, his wife suggested the plan of getting her servant pregnant. But he went along with it

He got scared that one time and lied about who his wife was

Abraham was a common, ordinary man, but he chose to persevere

He chose to exercise a deep and abiding faith

His faith was so great that when God called him to leave his relatives and his father’s house and country, Abraham went without question

why was that important?

Because in those days people didn’t just leave their father’s house

they stayed and took care of their extended families

it wasn’t common for people to just up and wander off

But Abraham did

because God had told him to. And somehow he had this deep abiding faith that it would be OK

His faith was so great that in Genesis 21, it says that Abraham made a covenant with Abimelech, the ruler of the Philistines

And then he planted a tamarisk tree

Why is that significant?

Because it was a symbol of God’s provision and of Abraham’s intention to stay in that place

Tamarisk trees thrive in dry climates and so this tree was not going anywhere, and neither was Abraham

His faith was so great that when God told him to give up his son, the very fulfillment of God’s promise, Abraham got ready and prepared to do it, no questions asked

Why was he able to do that? Why did Abraham persevere?

Why was his faith so great?

What made his anchor so strong and stable?

Well, the author of Hebrews answers this question for us:

In verse 18, he mentions this:

Two unchangeable things

There were two unchangeable things that made it possible for Abraham to continue on in faith

And should make it possible for us to continue on in faith

And these are highlighted in this passage

God’s unchangeable character

God’s unchangeable promise

This is what he is emphasizing in this passage

God’s unchangeable character

God’s unchangeable promise

And he treats these two things as separate, yet equal and the same

As well he should!

If God’s character were changeable, we would have a hard time trusting His promises

If His promises were constantly changing, His character would be undependable.

God’s character and God’s promises are wrapped up intricately with each other

God’s character

Illustrated by this argument

verse 16:

When people make an oath, they swear by something greater than themselves. Verse 16

(now we in the Mennonite tradition have a bit of trouble with this whole thing of swearing oaths because of what Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount: “Dont swear oaths. Let your yes be yes, and your no be no. Anything more than that comes from the devil.)

Anyway, that is another subject for another day

but even in that commandment, Jesus confirms this point

that when we swear oaths, we use something that we perceive as being bigger or more important than ourselves

He says, “Don’t swear by heaven. That’s the throne of God. Don’t swear by earth. That’s His footstool. Don’t swear by Jerusalem. That’s the city of the great King”

When people swear oaths today, they use something bigger or greater than themselves.

The Bible

When we covenant to each other in marriage, we covenant before God and everyone that is watching to be faithful

The reason we do that is because our character is weak. We have a lot of trouble being dependable

I’m talking about our character here

We can be one person one day, and depending on what’s going on in our lives, we can be someone quite different the next day

Our husband our our wife can look at us and say, “Goodness, who did I marry here? This isn’t the person whom I thought I married”

A wife can say, “I’m so confused. Usually he is so loving and I feel so protected by him. But not today! Not this past week! I don’t know who this man is!”

A husband can say, “Man, what’s going on here? She is usually so caring and sensitive. But not today! I’m not sure who I married here!”

I told you about one of my friends in high school who one day just switched on me, and we were no longer friends, and I never did quite know what I had done

but that’s the way we as humans can be. Our character is not always quite up to scratch and so when we covenant, we want to bring is something or someone bigger and more stable than ourselves to bear witness to what we are covenanting to do

But GOD!

When He wanted to swear an oath, or make a covenant, there was no one greater by whom to swear, so He swore by himself

Basically this: God, how do I know that I can trust you?

because I said so!

What does that tell us?

it tells that the God revealed to us in Scripture is absolutely the same God that we can know intimately and personally today

He is unchanging

And today, we know this same God in the person of Jesus Christ our Savior

Jesus is God’s revelation to us. And in the person of Jesus, we see what God is like

In John 14, the disciple Thomas said to Jesus, “Show us the Father (that is, God, and we will be satisfied”

And Jesus said, “Thomas! Have I been with you this long, and you still don’t get it? If you’ve seen me, you have seen The Father!”

Just look at me. Study me. Learn to know me, and as you do, you will be seeing and getting to know The Father

The dependable Character of God is revealed to us in the dependable character of Jesus

It says later in this same epistle, Hebrews, Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today, and forever

God’s dependable promise

because God’s character is always dependable, His promises are always dependable

vs. 17. When God wanted convince the heirs of the promise (that’s Abraham and his descendants) of the unchangeable nature of His purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath

And that oath was, and is dependable

Because His character is dependable, His oath is not something that we have to sit around worrying, “I wonder if He will follow through today! I know this is what He said, but not sure if means what He says or if He will be able to follow through with what He says!”

No, His oath, His promises, His word is always dependable because

Numbers 23:19  God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?

These words were spoken , oddly enough, by Balaam, a man of apparently questionable character.

But on this statement, he was absolutely right

God absolutely cannot lie because it would contradict His character

If He says something, He will fulfill it

God’s promises, His word, are revealed to us in Jesus Christ, God’s word made flesh who dwelt among us

2 Corinthians 1:20 “20 For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory.”

Promises of mercy

Promises of love

Promises of redemption

Promises of renewal

Promises of life

all of these promises find their fulfillment, or their “Amen” in Christ Jesus

Do you know the promises of God this morning?

Have you do know experientially that God’s promises indeed have found, and are finding, their fulfillment in you and in us through knowing Jesus Christ?

And because of these two things, God’s unchangeable character, and His unchangeable promise, that Abraham, the forefather of the Hebrews was able to stay faithful

These two things were like an anchor that kept Abraham secured and moored

Even while he struggled, and at times took things into His own hands,

it seems that he never quite lost sight of that fact that he would always know who God is and that He would do what He said He would do

And the writer says, the same is true for us

These two things create for us

A place of refuge

An anchor for the soul

He says that we have fled

We flee not away from something

We don’t flee from the world,

We don’t flee from God

But we flee TO something, or rather to someone

We flee TO God for refuge

the author is drawing on the history of the Hebrew people

And reminding them how In the OT, God told His people to designate certain cities as Cities of Refuge

If you mistakenly caused the death of someone, you could flee there

Folks, where do go for refuge?

We as people know instinctively that we need a place of refuge

As much as we try to make it look like we have our lives put together

and as much bravado as we put on

underneath, we deal with fear and uncertainty

And if we are honest with ourselves, most of our fear has to do with our spiritual condition.

where do I stand with God

Is God actually knowable?

Can I be right with Him

And people flee to all kinds of things and all kinds of places and things to assuage their fear

I am hear this morning to declare that there is a place of refuge

And it is in Jesus Christ. Who He is, what He has done for us

And the question for all of us this morning is, where have you fled for refuge? Where are you fleeing for refuge?

Jesus stands as the only One who can truly offer the refuge where we can find protection and rest

“Come unto me all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest”

It’s in Jesus that we find an anchor for the soul

A place of groundedness, of stability, a place where the storms of doubt that we face will not cause us to drift away from our place of rest

We have Hope

a place of refuge, an anchor. = hope

A hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain of the temple into the Holy of Holiest places, vs 19

That Hope is Jesus

He has gone there as a forerunner

This is a word that occurs only once in the Bible

It’s used in Greek literature to describe a group of soldiers who go to explore the way before the main army arrives—scouts

But it agrees with what this author has said before that

Jesus is the apostle of our faith

He is the Founder of our faith

He has led the way.

And we go there with Him into the presence of God

Folks, where is your anchor this morning? What keeps you moored and grounded in your faith?

Is it your work?

Is it your reputation?

Is it church tradition?

Or is it resting in the unchangeable character of God

Resting in the unchangeable promise of God

Revealed to us in Jesus Christ

English Standard Version Chapter 13

20 Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, 21 equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.