Heb. iv. 12. The word of God is quick, and jioiverful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, jnercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and i?itents of the heart.
THE state of a Christian's mind should he alike distant from slavish fear and from presumptuous con- fidence. He is authorized to entertain a confidence, because he has Omnipotence for his support, and the veracity of God pledged to supply him with all that is needful for his spiritual welfare. But he has need of fear also ; because he is in the midst of temp- tations, and has a deceitful heart, ever ready to beguile him. In the view of his privileges, he may rejoice : but in the view of his dangers, he should tremble. In a word, he should, as David expresses it, " rejoice with trembling." This frame of mind is supposed by many to be unsuited to that full liberty into which we are brought under the Christian dis- pensation. But St. Paul continually inculcates the
necessity of it in order to a safe and upright walk : " Be not high-minded, but fear :" " Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall." But in no place of Scripture is this mixture of diffidence and affiance more strongly insisted on than in this and the preceding chapters. We are taught the indispensable necessity of " holding fast the confidence, and the rejoicing of hope, firm unto the end^;" and yet we are again and again warned by the example of the Israelites, who were excluded from the promised land, lest we also should " fall after the same ex- ample of unbelief^." It is in this view that the de- clarations in our text are introduced. There is an abruptness in them which renders the meaning of the Apostle somewhat difficult at first : but when the connecting link is supplied, the sense of the passage is clear, and very important. It speaks to this effect: The Israelites thought they had sufficient grounds for their unbelief; yet it ruined them. You also may be deceived by an evil heart of unbelief: but, however you may vindicate yourselves, that word, which you now disobey, will judge you in the last day ; and will both expose your self-delusion, and justify God in passing against you a sentence of exclusion from the promised land.
The scope of the passage being thus explained, we propose to consider,
I. The description here given of the word of God — Many able commentators have given it as their opinion, that, by " the word of God," we are to un- derstand the Lord Jesus Christ, who is frequently called by that name in the Holy Scriptures. But St. Paul never speaks of Christ by that name : nor is there any mention of Christ in the context. On the contrary, the word of revelation is mentioned, as that which the Israelites would not believe ''; as that also which excluded them from the promised resf*; and as that which speaks to us precisely as it did to them*.
a Heb. iii, 6. ^ ver. 1, 11. <^ ver. 2.
d Heb. iii. 7—11. ^ ver. 7—9.