He swore by himself

Hebrews 6:13-20

For when God made a promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself, saying, “Surely I will bless you and multiply you.” And thus Abraham, having patiently waited, obtained the promise. For people swear by something greater than themselves, and in all their disputes an oath is final for confirmation. 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, 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. We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

God promised Abram that he would become the father of many nations, and that through his son the world would be blessed.  Abram, impatient for the fulfillment of the promise and unable to see how God would fulfill it through Sarai, took matters into his own hands and became the father of Ishmael by his servant Hagar.  And God promised him that he would become the father of many nations, and that through his son by Sarai the world would be blessed.

It is easy to receive God’s promise and then to assume that its fulfillment relies on us.  Often we take matters into our own hands, working to bring about what God has said that he himself will achieve.  Certainly this is something we ought not to do, since our trying to work it out often leads to problems.  We are encouraged by this passage to imitate Abraham in the end, as he waited patiently for God to fulfill the promise.  But this tendency to work out God’s promises for ourselves is not the main issue for me today.

The tendency to work out God’s promises for ourselves is revealing of the greater problem.  That is, we believe that God’s promises are dependent on our actions.  Most often in my life, this works itself out through the belief that God will bless us and give us the gifts that he has promised only if we merit the gifts.  If I follow him closely enough, if I will finally quit getting enmeshed in this or that sin, if I work hard enough for his cause, then he will give me what he has promised.  If I fail to do so, then I will not receive God’s blessing.

Had I been Abraham, I would have given up all hope once Ishmael had come along.  I would have believed that I had botched God’s plan and given up my chance at the blessing.  Either God would bless me and the world through Ishmael or he would choose someone else.  He certainly would not still give me the promised Isaac.  But this is a view that makes the promise depend on me instead of the God who made the promise.  We know that when God promises, he fulfills it.

We see this pattern repeatedly throughout scripture.  A major instance that comes to mind is his promise to free Israel from slavery in Egypt.  It had nothing to do with the actions of the people of Israel.  We know that they were constantly rebellious and faithless and that they didn’t believe God would or even could save them from Pharaoh.  In one of this morning’s psalms it is even stated that God loathed the generation that he brought out of Egypt.  But because God’s promise was not dependent on them, he fulfilled it and performed a host of miraculous signs to prove himself to them.

I have heard of people who have taught that God’s promise is dependent on our actions.  I have heard of ministers who will promise God’s blessing very specifically, even calling it prophecy, to individuals in their congregations.  When the prophecy is not fulfilled and the blessing does not come as it had been promised by the pastor, the person who was given the promise is blamed.  If only they had been better during the time since they had been told, then the prophecy would have come true. 

I will take a moment to note that there are times when blessings are conditional.  Throughout Torah we see this.  “If you keep this covenant, then I will bless you with these things.  If you do not keep this covenant, then these curses will be your reward.”  In these cases, the condition is always stated.  There is never an underlying assumption that the promise depends on the action of the individuals involved.  If no conditions are named in the giving of the promise, then there are no conditions.  If a “prophecy” is given without conditions and then, when it doesn’t come about, it turns out there were conditions all along, I would judge the prophecy and the prophet to be suspect at best, if not outright deceivers.

But we know that the promises of God are based on God alone.  They are not rooted in our merits, but in the merit of Jesus Christ.  So when we are given a promise by God, we can have confidence that the promise will be fulfilled.  The greatest promise that Christ guarantees for us is our salvation and inclusion in his household, and in the inheritance of his kingdom.  He guarantees us the Holy Spirit, and through the Holy Spirit we are promised an array of gifts.  Not the least of these is the peace and comfort that our Helper grants us in the midst of trials.  He also, at times, promises things to us individually.  Things that are particular to us at the moment.  Personally, when I have seen these promises and seen them fulfilled, it has been in unlooked for ways that had nothing to do with the recipient of the gift and everything to do with the Giver.  Be encouraged.  You aren’t going to mess up God’s gift by being a screw up.

Somehow this is leading me into talking about good works and righteousness.  Having lived most of my life believing that I had to earn love from God and man, this is something that is taking me a long time to grasp.  I have historically been inclined to view good works as the sure sign of my salvation, but not in the right sense.  I have pushed myself toward good works, manufacturing them where I can, to prove to myself that I am really saved.  A friend of mine recently, talking about her garden, said that she wishes she could make her vegetables grow by willpower alone.  It has been that sort of thing.  I have wanted to make the fruit of the Spirit grow by my own power.

The fruit of the Spirit.  That is the sense in which our works are a sign of our salvation.  The fruit grows, and we are changed.  We do these good works out of our very nature.  We are trees bearing good fruit, and because we are trees bearing good fruit, we do things in accordance with the good.  Forcing ourselves to do good against our will is not the same thing.  Doing good willingly, from the depth of our souls, is the key here.  (Doing good against our will is different from willingly doing good contrary to our flesh.  It would take too long to fully go into this now.  I have to go to work in sooner than nine weeks.)

And briefly I would like to touch on another topic that is directly related to good works.  There are branches of Christianity that are accused of basing their salvation on good works rather than on faith in Christ.  Certainly in some cases this is true.  Old Gnostic heresies have not completely died out.  But in many cases it is a misunderstanding of teaching.  The one that comes to mind most is the accusation that the Catholic church teaches salvation by works.  So here I am, the least qualified, coming to the defense of the Catholic church.

The brief defense:  Good works are not the means of salvation.  In one sense they are the evidence of salvation, as we see in the epistle of James.  “Show me your faith apart from works, and I will show you my faith by my works.”  It is the faith that saves.  The works are how the faith is seen.  But there is another role of good works other than simply being evidential.  That is, doing good works is a way to work with God.  It’s a way to spend time with God, doing what he cares about.

Which of us, if he sees a little child working with his dad in the garage or in the yard, will think that the child is trying to earn his dad’s love by the work he’s doing?  Don’t we rather think that the child loves his dad and wants to spend time with him?  So when we see a Christian doing good works, we ought to see a child spending time with his father, doing the work that his father is doing.  It is notable that a very young child “helping” his dad sincerely believes that he is helping.  Without his help, he believes, his dad couldn’t get this work done as well.  But when the child gets a little older and still “helps,” he understands that he isn’t really helping.  His dad is doing the work, and he’s there spending time with his dad.  And maybe holding something.

And what about penance?  Earning God’s forgiveness?  Absolutely not.  God has promised to forgive our sins.  Christ purchased us, and purchased forgiveness for us.  So it depends on Christ, and not on our merit or works.  So why do we do penance?  Because we did something (and I’m having trouble finding the right words here) that violated our relationship with God.  We did something hurtful.  Penance is a way to show we’re truly sorry for what we’ve done, yes, but it’s deeper than that.  It’s primarily a way to heal.  Not to satiate God.  Not healing God because of what we’ve done.  Healing ourselves.  It’s the child who does something wrong, knows they have done something wrong, gets spanked by his mother, and then immediately goes to his mother for comfort.  (In Christ, or as mature people, the spanking is generally not required.  We see our sin, we confess it, and we go to the one we transgressed to be comforted and restore our souls.)

I shouldn’t have to mention prayer, but I will.  Prayer can be seen as another of the works that Christians do to earn their salvation or prove their value to God.  “He prays for an hour a day, or three times or nine times a day.  Who does he think he is?  Why does he think that’s necessary?”  It’s prayer.  It’s spending time with God.  Spending time with God is great.  Who doesn’t want to spend time with someone they love?

So these good works are not a means of earning salvation, redemption, forgiveness, or anything else.  They are not a way of meriting the gifts of God.  They are a way of engaging the gifts won for us by Christ, promised to us by God and sworn to us on his oath by himself.  They are a way of fully entering in to what God has done.

So may we be encouraged, knowing that the God who promised us good things will bring them about.  And may we believe, without doubting, that the promised blessing depends not on us, but on the God who promised.