"Did Not Receive the Promise"
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Scripture teaches at least eight (8) results of doctrine in the soul.
1) Doctrine resident in the soul produces confidence for time — Job 5:24 ; 2 Corinthians 5:6 ,8 .
24 You shall know that your tent is in peace; You shall visit your dwelling and find nothing amiss.
6 So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord.
8 We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.
2) It produces divine viewpoint of life — Isaiah 55:7,8 ; 2 Corinthians 10:5
7 Let the wicked forsake his way, And the unrighteous man his thoughts; Let him return to the Lord, And He will have mercy on him; And to our God, For He will abundantly pardon.
8 “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways,” says the Lord.
5 casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ,
3) It orients the believer to the plan of God — Isaiah 26:3-4 ; Romans 8:28 .
3 You will keep him in perfect peace, Whose mind is stayed on You, Because he trusts in You.
4 Trust in the Lord forever, For in Yah, the Lord, is everlasting strength.
28 And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.
4) It produces stability of mind — James 1:8 .
8 he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.
5) It is the basis for divine guidance in the execution of the will of God — Romans 12:2-3 .
2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
3 For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.
6) It leads to occupation with the person of Christ and the capacity and the ability to love God Philippians 3:10 ; Ephesians 3:19 ; Hebrews 12:2-3 .
10 that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death,
19 to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
2 looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
3 For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls.
7) It attains and holds the supergrace status Philippians 3:12-14 .
12 Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me.
13 Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead,
14 I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
8) it attains surpassing grace blessings in eternity Hebrews 11:9-10 , 13 ; James 1:25 cf. James 2:12-13
9 By faith he dwelt in the land of promise as in a foreign country, dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise;
10 for he waited for the city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God.
13 These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off were assured of them, embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.
25 But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does.
12 So speak and so do as those who will be judged by the law of liberty.
13 For judgment is without mercy to the one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment.
Therefore, Bible doctrine becomes the most important thing of all.
“You cannot choose your battlefield, God does that for you
But you can plant the colours where the colours never flew.”
-Stephen Crane, via Nathalia Crane
Sunday June 26, 2022
Sunday June 26, 2022
Did Not Receive the Promise.
Did Not Receive the Promise.
Have you ever thought about not receiving the promises that were made to you? We as humans are very familiar with the concept, because our fellow humans disappoint us.
We are human. We are finite. We forget. We make mistakes. We prioritize incorrectly. We fall through, as opposed to following through, on promises made.
Children grow up and learn about the fallibility of their parents. The discovery varies just as every human life situation is variable.
But this is never a discovery that we make with God. You see, God is faithful. He is the faithful one. He never is faithless.
So as we read the next phrase in our text in Hebrews 11:39, we are tempted to read our human viepoint understanding into the text. But let’s explore what is written here, and determine what is God’s viewpoint that He wishes to instruct us with:
We continue on with our text in Hebrews 11:39
39 And all these, having obtained a good testimony through faith, did not receive the promise,
“received not the promise” — “received not” is the aorist middle indicative of κομίζομαι (komizomai). mid. I receive back, I receive what has belonged to myself but has been lost, or else promised but kept back, or I get what has come to be my own by earning, I recover. In other words - I take into possession for myself that which is mine, but which I have not yet received.
Alexander Souter, A Pocket Lexicon to the Greek New Testament (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1917), 137.
κομίζομαι (komizomai) is used in our text here in Hebrews 11:39, but the word for “receive” typically used in the Greek is λαμβάνω (lambanō). Why do we have a different word used here? Why the change in vocabulary from the norm?
Because the author is wanting to communicate something that is due to the recipient that has not yet been delivered. So Komizomai was the better vocabulary choice.
This is following a principle, that stands behind all of our Hebrews 11 heroes, as they have grasped divine viewpoint thinking, and made it their own: Grace in life denotes Grace to be delivered in eternity. If we experience Grace unlocked for us here on earth, there is corresponding Grace that will be unlocked for us in eternity.
This Grace is unlocked in the same way that salvation was unlocked. By Faith. God owes Surpassing Grace in eternity just as God owes you SuperGrace in life. It is freely available to all who believe.
In eternity, outside of time and thus before creation God the Father said, “I have a special blessing paragraph for you in time.” It was designed then. Your SuperGrace life is a reality. You may never get there but it is a reality, just as salvation is actually available to all mankind. κομίζομαι (komizomai) means God has already designed it and made it available. It is available at any time.
According to the verb used in our text, God owes Grace to you. That may sound odd to your ear, but It is just a matter of accessing the Grace doctrine to attain it.
Now to be clear - God does not owe us anything based on our merit, rather He has provided Grace blessing for us, and we activate this blessing by receiving the gift in time, by trusting, and relying, upon Bible doctrine in our soul. So god owes us based on the merit of Christ.
Just like salvation was a free gift ready for us — we did not bring merit to the negotiating table, and say “God, I did this, so you must give me” … rather, we believed and trusted in His provision on our behalf, and we were saved — so too, we rely on God’s provision in life, prepared for us by Grace, and God graces us!
So you can count on this: SuperGrace is a down payment on the SurpassingGrace of eternity. SuperGrace unlocked is the downpayment showing that Surpassing Grace is coming.
Our text, by use of the vocabulary and grammar, is telling us this. We looked at the lexical or word meaning.
The grammar of our word, furthers this insight, as the middle voice of the verb Komizomai is a direct middle thus indicating that the results of the action come directly back to the agent of the verb, described as reflexive force. It is being done to self. And since it is in the negative, it should be translated as, “did not receive to himself.”
The author is communicating something that is due that has not been delivered. Grace in life denotes Grace to be delivered in eternity.
In other words, doctrine that is depended upon unlocks Grace provision for time for that believer, which indicates that Grace provision for the future and for eternity is coming. The one, grace provision in time, is the down, the down payment, or the promise, or guarantee of the other - Grace provision in eternity.
When, for example, you make a down payment on a house, you are indicating a promise to make all of the payments on the house. But in this case, it is not us making the promise, who can fail, but it is God who is making the promise, who never fails.
We were given the Holy Spirit at salvation, as an indication, a down payment, or a guarantee of a promise, that we have eternal life.
We see this in Eph 4:30
30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.
There is another verse that I want to go to, that seems like it is talking about the gift of God the Holy Spirit - but it isn’t.
We’ve been to this passage many times, as it is one of the core passages to instruct us about the difference between the carnal man, the spiritual man, and the natural man.
This gift is given to us so that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.
See I Corinthians 2:12
12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.
The word “know” is οἶδα (oida) which is more about understanding than about knowing. That is the subject of 1 Corinthians 2: the understanding of spiritual things: Grace doctrine and the provisions of Grace - “that which is freely given to us by God.”
I find this astounding. One of the purposes of giving the ministry of the person of God the Holy Spirit to us, is that spiritual things are not understood by natural man, and they are not properly understood by the carnal man.
The natural man is he who is not regenerate - is not saved, and thus is spiritually dead to God. Spirit=Dead.
The carnal man is he who is saved or regenerate - but is not fellowshipping with God, so is spiritually alive to God, but dead in fellowship. Spirit=Alive - Fellowship=Dead.
The spiritual man is he who is saved or regenerate - and is fellowshipping with God the Holy Spirit, so is spiritually alive to God, and alive in fellowship. Spirit=Alive - Fellowship=Alive:
Let’s lay it out side by side:
Natural Man means Spirit=Dead
Carnal Man means Spirit=Alive, Fellowship=Dead
Spiritual Man means Spirit=Alive, Fellowship=Alive
Now 1 Corinthians 2:12 is wrestled over by scholars, and they diverge widely as to what the meaning is. But in essence they agree on a few things. But what we want to know, is what is the meaning of the text, not what I can make the text mean.
Now normally, when there is an article before Spirit - we are going to assume that it is talking about God the Holy Spirit. We have that back in 1 Corinthians 2:10 .
10 But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God.
Notice that verse 10 says “HIS” Spirit, so that is the Spirit of God, or God the Holy Spirit. Then it mentions THE Spirit, which searches all things, the deep things of God. So that is a reference to God the Holy Spirit too.
verse 11 continues:
11 For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God.
The spirit of man is here compared to the Spirit of God.
But what does “spirit of man” mean?
Now this can get confusing, and we don’t have the time to take a deep dive into exegesis of this passage. But in essence spirit can mean 5 things in this passage in this context. And the same word is used to create contrast and comparison. These is where the weak interpretations of the charismatic, and English-only readers of the text, and others who are light on scholarship or stuck on theology instead of the plain meaning get into trouble.
The spirit of man does not refer here to the human spirit, and does not refer to the Holy Spirit, so there is another use of the word ‘spirit.’ Sometimes the word ‘spirit’ is used for life and sometimes it is used as a system of perception.
Systems of perception include rationalism, empericism, mysticism, and authority.
“The spirit of man which is in him” is a reference to a system of thinking called rationalism, a meritorious system of perception. It is mans ability to be rational, logical, or analytical.
And the reason that the word ‘spirit’ is used in the text here for perception is to be in contrast to the Holy Spirit. In other words, there is more than one way of perception and they are in opposition to each other when it comes to spiritual phenomena.
We learned last week that we cannot properly know God or about the things of God without His divine revelation, the release of doctrine through His word.
So too, we cannot properly process and perceive spiritual things apart from His Spirit. Doctrine can be appraised with the mind. Unbelievers can understand the meaning of the Word of God. But perception and thinking require fellowship with God the Holy Spirit. Human rationalism can not give us the insight that we need for understanding spiritual things, but there is a functioning divine viewpoint rationalism that is available to every believer who is walking by grace in fellowship with God.
Bible doctrine cannot function apart from the ministry of God the Holy Spirit via fellowship with the believer. OT believers could understand scripture, live in faith-rest depending on the promise … but they could not operate in the divine dynasphere, the unique power system provided for Church Age believers.
OT believers had the fullness of the Word of God, and could experience the coming upon of God the Holy Spirit as empowerment for service.
NT believers are equipped to follow the Lord Jesus Christ who functioned in full dependence upon God the Holy Spirit and the fullness of the Word of God.
So, the word “spirit” is not a reference to God the Holy Spirit, rather a gift that came from God, in contrast to the spirit of the world [the thinking of the world]. This means divine viewpoint understanding in contrast to the understanding of the world.
The 1900 King James Version was the only translation we looked at (out of about 15) that got this right:
12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
Back to Hebrews 11:39
39 And all these, having obtained a good testimony through faith, did not receive the promise,
We see that the verb κομίζομαι (komizomai), is in the aorist verb tense, and thus gathers up into one view of entirety, all future Grace blessings. They were not received by those heroes of faith.
What they did not receive was “the promise
The word “promise” is the accusative singular direct object from ἐπαγγελία (epangelia) = to declare or state something publically. This is a reference to the Surpassing-Grace paragraph of eternity.
Enhanced Translation: “And so all these [supergrace heroes], having received approval [SuperGrace in life] by means of doctrine functioning in the soul, did not receive for themselves the promise [Surpassing Grace in Eternity].”
Verse 40
Verse 40
We move on to Hebrews 11:40.
40 God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us.
Verse 40 tells us when the Old Testament saints will all get their promise that is owed them which they have not yet recieved: their Surpassing Grace bundle for eternity.
The text reads, “God” — ὁ (ho) plus θεός (theos), “The God” — this is the genitive. It is not normal to have a subject in the genitive case in language.
Grammar is important in this passage.
Grammar is what helps us to understand the flow of a writers thoughts; and when they were writing on their scrolls in the ancient world they didn’t have boldface type and italics. They couldn’t change the fonts and font sizes and underline things and all that we do today to try to draw people's attention to something. They didn’t have highlighters. So they used grammar to do it.
What's interesting in this without getting too technical is that - when first looking at this in the Greek it starts off with a genitive phrase that you would think should be translated “of God.” But a genitive doesn't express the subject of the clause. It's a nominative case that expresses the subject of a clause.
This should immediately capture the Greek reader’s attention. That's because you have this funny little thing that happens in Greek that’s called a genitive absolute that places the subject in the genitive case to create emphasis. It's not related to anything else in the sentence. So it stands apart as a nominative clause, which is how it should be translated. So that’s why your English Bible translates it this way.
Nouns have 5 major cases that they can be classified by:
• Nominative (subject) case - The driver drove the car.
• Objective case (or Accusative case) The book is on the table.
• Dative (indirect) case - Get him a pen.
• Possessive case (or Genitive case) - that is my pencil; John’s shirt is blue.
• Vocative case - You there, stand up!
It is very hard to turn a subject into a genitive, but the Greeks found a way to do it by way of what is called a genitive absolute, a system for getting the genitive case, or that which is possessed in the subject.
God becomes the subject but it is “our God” who is the subject. There is the possessive genitive.
And it is our (possessive) God who is the descriptive subject. it is God who is going to provide for supergrace believers surpassing grace blessings and rewards forever and ever.
But the Old Testament believers are going to have to wait out the Church age. The royal family is first in line.
“having provided” — aorist middle participle of προβλέπω (problepō). It means to provide but it meant originally to see beforehand, to see it before it happened. The constative aorist contemplates the action of the verb in its entirety, it gathers into a single whole the doctrine of divine decrees in eternity past, and your grace blessings in time and eternity are all there, as well as all of these Old Testament supergrace heroes.
The middle voice is indirect, emphasizing God as the agent producing grace blessings in time and eternity, but doing it in eternity past, or in eternity prior to creation. “The God himself having provided beforehand”. This is a causal participle denoting what is the ground of action for the main verb. Therefore it should be translated “since” — “Since the God himself having provided ahead of time.”
“some better things” — the accusative of direct object from κρείττων (kreittōn) which in the neuter means “something better.”
This is a fantastic statement.
Something Better refers to the entire structure of the Church Age - that which is better than what the recipients of the book of Hebrews have been clinging to. It begins at the point of salvation with the baptism of the Spirit whereby suddenly you are late as far as OT history is concerned but you’re first in line.
The baptism of the Holy Spirit makes you royal family forever and puts you up in the front of the line of God’s plan. As the royal family of God the believer of the Church Age lives at a time when the strategic victory has already been accomplished and the issue of the tactical victory is the basis for our intensive conflict.
The death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ to the right hand of the Father has now settled the strategic victory forever. We are in the midst of the tactical victory, and exploitation of the strategic victory.
The holy of holies was forbidden to the Old Testament saints because it was for us, the believers of the Church Age first. Add to this also the fact that for the first time in history, and exclusive to the Church Age, Yeshua-Jesus also indwells every believer.
Israel was dependent on a specialized priesthood from the tribe of Levi. We have a universal priesthood. The variety of sources of doctrine in the Old Testament were very confusing in confirmation of authority of the communicator.
Now all divine revelation is reduced to writing, there is one source, the completed canon of scripture, and there is no extra biblical revelation. Concentration of doctrine provides a better system for communication and the gift of pastor-teacher, the provision of a classroom, the local church, all make it easier today than it ever has been before to achieve supergrace growth and maturity in a hurry.
Therefore the best dispensation in which to live is the one in which we live. Furthermore, the abrogation of the Mosaic covenant and the clear definition of the new life in Christ a superseding principle, clarifies the issue of grace.
By the way the Church is not a recipients of the New Covenant or any aspect of the New Covenant. We are in Christ. He is the Mediator. We are the Ministers (once it is given). We will be ministers of the New Covenant in the Messianic Kingdom.
“for us” — περί (peri) plus the genitive plural of ἐγώ (egō) means “on behalf of us”; “that” is the conjunction ἵνα (hina) which introduces a purpose clause — “in order that” or “for the purpose that.”
“without us” — an adverb χωρίς (chōris) is what is called an improper preposition, plus the genitive of ἐγώ (egō). This is an adverb used as a preposition and is called an improper preposition. And χωρίς (chōris) plus the genitive means “apart from,” and so it means “apart from us.”
Apart from us David will never get his surpassing grace provision; apart from us Abraham will never get his surpassing grace provision. “Us” = the Church Age believer. Apart from us the supergrace heroes of the Old Testament do not get their rewards. They are last in line and you have to have the first in the line before the last. As royal family we get ours first, so after admiring all of these fantastic supergrace heroes we are encouraged now to press on so that they can have theirs.
“should not be made perfect” is wrong. We have the aorist passive subjunctive third person plural of τελειόω (teleioō) and it means to be completed.
The aorist tense is a culminative aorist employed to view the attainment of surpassing grace provision and dying grace in its entirety but to emphasize the existing results in the attainment of surpassing grace.
The negative μή (mē) indicates that these Old Testament supergrace heroes all have super grace (grace production that is mature) plus dying grace. But μή (mē) plus the culminative aorist: they have not yet received surpassing grace - the eternal rewards.
They have not yet been completed. The completion will be eternity and receiving their surpassing grace rewards. So they are waiting for the royal family.
The passive voice plus the third person suffix of the verb refers to the Old Testament supergrace heroes, plus the negative indicating that they do not have surpassing grace rewards yet. They are going to have it in the future but they do not have it and will not have it until we get ours first.
μή (mē) plus the subjunctive is a prohibitive subjunctive and it doesn’t mean it is potential or that they may get it, they will have it! They are prohibited from claiming it until we claim ours.
Enhanced Translation: “Since the God himself [God the Father] having provided something better for us [the royal family], so that apart from us [royal family] they [OT supergrace heroes] should not be completed.”