312 PERFECT THROUGH SUFFERINGS
4. The role of " Captain " which Jesus assumed necessitated suffering. The word translated "captain" in the Authorized Version, which occurs only four times in Scripture, means literally one who leads or begins any course or thing ; hence it comes to mean a commander (or a prince, as it is twice translated) ; and then again, with a very easy transition from the notion of leading to that of origination, it comes to mean cause (or author^ as it is once translated). The conception of author is the dominant one here, but the word is probably chosen as prolong- ing the metaphor in the previous clause. This great procession of sons up into glory, which is the object and aim of God's work, is under the leadership of Him who is the Captain, the foremost, the Originator, and, in a profound sense, the Cause, of their salvation. So, then, we have before us the thought that God brings, and yet Christ leads, and that God's bringing is effected through Christ's leadership.
This Captain needs to be made perfect through sufferings. We are not to suppose that the perfecting through sufferings which is here declared to take effect upon our Lord means the addition of anything to, or the purging away of any- thing from, His moral nature. We are refined by suffering, which purges out the dross if we take it rightly. We are en- nobled by suffering, which adds to us, if we submissively accept it, that which without it we could never possess. But Christ's perfecting is not the perfecting of His moral character, but the completion of His equipment for His work as the Captain of our salvation. That is to say. He Himself, though He learned obedience by the things that He suffered, was morally perfect, ere yet one shadow of pain or conflict had passed across the calm depths of His pure spirit ; but He was not ready for His function of Leader and Originator of our salvation until He had passed through the sufferings of life and the agonies of death. Thus the whole sweep of Christ's sufferings — both those which preceded the cross, and especially the cross itself — is included in the general expression of the text ; and these equipped Him for His work.
^ It may be that under other conditions the discipline of suffering would have been unnecessary. To be a perfect king of angels, for instance, there would have been no need for Christ to
HEBREWS II. 10 313
suffer. To be the joy and bliss of unfallen spirits there would have been no need for Christ to suffer. To be the light and life of a sinless heaven there would have been no need for Christ to suffer. But to be a perfect leader for broken, stricken, sinful men, Christ had to suffer. To be able to emancipate them from their bondage and to lead them out of the prison-house, Christ had to suffer. To be an adequate Saviour and Eedeemer, Christ had to suffer. The suffering was meant to fit Him for leadership. It was as the Leader of men's salvation that Christ was made perfect through sufferings.^
i
^ It is recorded of Captain Hedley Vicars that he singularly won the hearts of the soldiers under his command. Whilst keeping his own position he put himself into theirs. An in- cident in connexion with his life in the Crimea will illustrate the verse before us. In those bitter winter nights, which even now we can hardly bear to think of, when our brave soldiers slept out in an almost Arctic cold, they naturally gave way to some murmurs ; but when the men under Captain Vicars learned that he absolutely refused to avail himself of special protection and comfort so long as his men suffered, and that he preferred to share their trials, all murmurings ceased. How could they com- plain when their captain for their sakes volunteered to share their hardships ! As regards his sympathy with and his relation- ship towards the men, their captain was " made perfect through sufferings." *
(1) The Deliverer of man must he a Man. — The leader must have no exemption from the hardships of the company. If He is to be a leader, He and those whom He leads must go by the same road. He must tramp along all the weary paths that they have to tread. He must experience all the conflicts and difficulties that they have to experience. He cannot lift us up into a share of His glory unless He stoops to the companionship of our grief. A man upon a higher level cannot raise one on a lower, except on condition of himself going down, with his hand at any rate, to the level from which he would lift. And no Christ will be able to accomplish the Father's design, except a Christ who knows the fellowship of our sufferings, and is made conformable unto our death. Therefore, because He " took not hold to help angels, but the seed of Abraham, it behoved him to be made in all things like unto his brethren." And when the soldiers are weary on the
* J. D. Jones, The Unfettered Word, 209. » J. W. Bardsley.
314 PERFECT THROUGH SUFFERINGS
march, footsore and tired, they may bethink themselves, " Head- quarters were here yesterday."