Hebrews 13:1-3 “Let Love Remain”

Translation & Sermon by Nate Wilson for Christ the Redeemer Church of Manhattan, KS, 16 Feb. 2019

Omitting greyed-out text should bring presentation time down around 45 minutes.

Intro

• There was a pastor in the first century named Ignatius who wrote letters to the churches of modern-day Turkey, much like the Apostle Paul did a couple of decades before him, and in his letter to the church in Smyrna, he commented on the lack of love among false teachers, “But consider those who are of a different opinion with respect to the grace of Christ which has come unto us, how opposed they are to the will of God. They have no regard for love; no care for the widow, or the orphan, or the oppressed; of the bond, or of the free; of the hungry, or of the thirsty.”

• Christians, on the other hand, are to be marked by love. In Hebrews 13, we move from the theology of Christ and the foundation of faith in Him to the practical nuts and bolts of Christian living grounded in one common principle: love. Let’s look together at the first three verses of chapter thirteen and how to exercise Christian love toward brothers (in v. 1), toward strangers (in v. 2), and toward the persecuted (in v. 3).

v.1 Let your brotherly-fondness remain.

• This command is in the Greek Present tense, which encourages them to continue living out that value:

  • Hebrews 10:32 recalls "...the earlier days... in which y'all endured much strife of suffer­ings... becoming partners with those who were being thus treated – for y'all suffered together with my chains also..." (NAW)

  • The Hebrews may have shown some generous acts of love in the past, but they are exhorted don’t stop now!

  • You may have shown some generous acts of love in the past, but don’t stop now!

• The word translated “love” by most English versions here is the Greek root fila-, which can be used as a synonym for agape-love¹ that gives sacrificially for the best interests of another person, but fila-love includes an enjoyment of and fondness for the object of its love.

  • Are you able to take enjoyment in the company of other Christians? Are you actually fond of others in the church?

• The word “brother” is generic and includes sisters as well².

  • Jesus calls us "brothers" in Hebrews 2:10-13 "For it was appropriate to Him, the chief-leader of their salvation, for whom all things exist and by whom all things exist, to accomplish success through sufferings, having led many children into glory, because both the One who makes holy and the ones who are being made holy are all of one kind, on account of which He is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying, 'I will proclaim your reputation to my brothers; in the middle of church I will sing your praises,' and again, 'I will place my confidence on Him,' and again, 'Look, I and the children which God has given to me…'" (NAW)

  • The Apostle calls us brothers in Hebrews 3:1 "In view of which, holy brothers, compan­ions of a calling from heaven above, nail down in your minds that the One so commis-sioned and the High Priest whom we acknowledge is the Messiah Jesus." (NAW) (He also does this in several other places, such as 3:12, 10:19, and 13:22.)

  • And God encourages us to call our fellow believers "brothers" in Hebrews 8:10-11 "...this is the covenant which I will contract with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord, giving my laws into their understanding I will indeed inscribe them upon their hearts, and I will be to them for a God and, as for them, they will be to me for a people. And they shall never teach - each one his fellow-member and each one his brother – say­ing, 'Start getting knowledge about the Lord,' because they will all know me, from the little one among them up to the great one among them." (NAW)

• So, what does it look like to practice brotherly love? Let’s look at two parallel passages in the New Testament with lists of activities associated with brotherly-love:

  • 1 Peter 3:8-9 "The goal is for y'all to be like-minded, sympathetic, brotherly-loving, com­passionate, humble-minded, not paying back bad for bad or insult for insult, but in­stead speaking blessing, because y'all were called into this in order that y'all might inherit blessing." (NAW) Here’s a summary of my sermon³ from 4½ years ago on 1 Peter 3:8:

    • To be “likeminded” is to have common grasp of God’s wisdom and a common obedi­ence to His will. That unity in God’s wisdom can be cultivated on a day-to-day basis by turning our mind away from thinking about earthly, fleshly things, and turning our thoughts toward Christ and the Holy Spirit:“Having the same mind” also means not fighting and quarrelling with other Christians but rather being humble: The more our thought life is conformed to Christ, the more completeness we will experience in unity.

    • “Sympathy” is grieving over the effects of sin in someone else’s life. Sympathize with each other when we hear of their pain and heartaches.

    • “Compassion/pity/tenderhearted/kindheartedness” - means allowing your emotions to be touched by what your brother or sister is experiencing. Compassion is also equated with “forgiving...as God forgave you” in Ephesians 4. And then compassion leads to action which will soothe the grief of other people.

    • Next is humility: we are called to adopt a lowly attitude around other Christians. It has a lot to do with will-power: a humble person seeks to do the will of another person, putting his (or her) own will out of the way. Humble people seem to have a way of finding out how to motivate others to actually want to do what God wants, so that there is not a lot of friction of will against will; instead there is the oil of humility and unity in wanting to do God’s will together.

    • Finally, “not paying back evil for evil... but with blessing...” The Proverbs warn us that if we stoop to insults and abusive speech, we become fools ourselves. Count to ten; pray for God to give you gracious words, and then blow their minds by doing or saying something kind. That’s brotherly-love!

    • The second passage I want to use to describe brotherly love is...

  • Romans 12:9-13 "Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good. Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving prefer­ence to one another; not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord; rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer; distributing to the needs of the saints, given to hospitality." (NKJV)

    • Brotherly love has integrity. It doesn’t have different standards for different people. It doesn’t say the right thing to impress everybody... and then do the wrong thing while they’re not looking. It is “without hypocrisy.”

    • Brotherly love “hates what God says is evil and enjoys what God says is good.”

    • Brotherly love “honors and gives preference” to your brother or sister. It bows out of the way and says, “You first!”

    • Brotherly love “does not lag in diligence, but is fervent in spirit.” It doesn’t get tired of shor­ing up the weaknesses of old friends. It will always be there, quick and eager to serve.

    • Brotherly love “rejoices in hope and is patient in tribulation.” When things get hard, it doesn’t give up and go away; it hangs in there and keeps on loving and hoping for God to bless.

    • Brotherly love prays for fellow-believers. Not just during prayer meeting once a month, but “continuing steadfastly,” pressing the needs of others upon God’s mercy and argu­ing their case before God for them so that they might not miss a single blessing.

    • Brotherly love “distributes to the needs of saints.” If a brother or sister is in need of food or clothing or transportation or employment, we share with them from what God has provided us so that their needs are covered.

    • Finally, brotherly love shares hospitality. Romans 12:13 transitions us back to Hebrews 13:2, because these are the only two passages in the Greek Bible which use this Greek word φιλοξενίας (“hospitality”), a word that literally means “love/fondness for strangers.” We are called to keep loving brothers in verse 1, and then to broaden that love to strangers in verse two!

v.2 Don’t be forgetting your hospitality, for through this, some folks were unaware of having hosted angels!

• Many English versions use the KJV word “entertain,” but our contemporary media culture has turned that word to mean “to put on a show,” which doesn’t carry the right connotations anymore, so I prefer to translate it with words like “hosting/hospitality” to communicate today more accurately what this practice entailed.

• This concept of showing hospitality to strangers is illustrated in the book of Acts:

  • The same word is used to describe Peter the Apostle being hosted by Simon the Tan­ner at his villa on the Mediterranean coast (Acts 10:6). Peter was not from around there; he was from over in Galilee. (Peter was a fresh-water fisherman, not a seaman.) And yet, when He decided to preach in towns along the Mediterranean coast of Israel, locals put him up for the night and fed him and took care of his needs and helped him get where he needed to go. I suspect that Peter was not alone, for Scripture says he had a wife⁴, and Jesus had previously instructed His disciples to minister with others rather than alone, so the Tanner villa may have been hosting a whole bunch of people along with Peter. Then, what hap­pens when the Roman army captain from the next town over sent two of his house­hold servants with an armed escort to the Tanner villa to get onto Peter’s itinerary? Peter in­vites those guys to eat and spend the night with him! Did he ask Simon the Tanner first? It doesn’t say. That’s some hospitality to cheerfully accommodate guests who are stran­gers to you – and who were invited over by a group of guests who were already staying with you!

  • Later on, the same Greek word for “hospitality” is used in Acts chapter 21, where Luke – and at least two other companions – were travelling through that same coastal region and were hosted by Phillip and his daughters at their house. Phillip heard that they were head­ing up to Jerusalem from there, so he connected them with a Christian friend from Crete named Mnason who was there at the seaport on his way to do business in Jerusalem. Mnason owned a house in Jerusalem and offered to host Paul and Luke and the others at his house in Jerusalem when they went there. Another instance of hospitality.

  • Again in Acts 28, we see the same Greek word describing the hospitality of Publius, the governor of Malta, who provided three days’ food and lodging for the Apostle Paul and a whole crew of sailors that had shipwrecked on his island one cold, rainy day.

• This kind of hospitality is not only modeled for us, it is commanded throughout the Bible:

  • Leviticus 19:34 "The visitor [προσήλυτος] visiting with y'all shall be [treated] by y'all like a native among yourselves, and you shall love [ἀγαπήσεις] him as yourself, because visitors are what y'all were in the land of Egypt; I am Yahweh your God." (NAW)

  • Isaiah 58:6-7 “This is the fast I choose: to open the manacles of evil, to spring the bindings of the yoke and to send forth the oppressed [as] freemen, and tear off every yoke, to split your bread for the hungry, and bring home [εἴσαγε εἰς τὸν οἶκόν σου] the poor vagabonds [ἀστέγους]..." (NAW)

  • 1 Peter 4:7-10 "...be reasonable and alert for the purpose of prayers, holding before all things extensive love [ἀγάπην] toward yourselves (because love will cover over a lot of sins), [and being] hospitable [φιλόξενοι] toward one another without grumblings, serving up grace toward yourselves, just as each has received it, like good administrators of the diverse grace of God." (NAW)

  • Matthew 25:34-36 "Then the King will say to those off to His right, 'Come here, you who have been blessed by my father! Start inheriting the kingdom prepared for y'all from the foundation of the world, for I was hungry, and y'all gave me [something] to eat; I was thirsty, and y'all gave me a drink; I was a stranger [ξένος], and y'all gathered [συνηγάγ­ετέ] me in; I was naked, and y'all wrapped me up; I was sick, and y'all watched over me; I was in prison, and y'all came to me!'" (NAW)

  • 1 Timothy 3:2 “A [church overseer] then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, temperate, sober-minded, of good behavior, hospitable [φιλόξενον], able to teach...” (NKJV, cf. Titus 1:8)

  • 1 Timothy 5:10 demands the same qualification of hospitableness of widows before they are financially supported by the church. They must be “well reported for good works: if she has brought up children, if she has lodged strangers [ἐξενοδόχησεν], if she has washed the saints' feet, if she has relieved the afflicted, if she has diligently followed every good work.” (NKJV)

• Now, this isn’t necessarily a matter of hosting complete strangers who could cause a threat to your household; the context of this is Christian brothers and sisters.

  • 2 John 1:10, for instance, warns against hosting any teacher who who does not confess Christ. You should have a reasonable certainty that they are believers, even if they are “strangers” in the sense that they aren’t part of your family or part of your local church.

  • “Wherever you see the image of your Lord – wherever there is a consistent profession of the faith of Christ – there ought we to fix our Christian affections; and having fixed them, we are not easily to allow them either to abate or to be transferred… It is still the duty of Christians to open their houses as well as their hearts to their stranger brethren, especially to such as are occasional visitants on business connected with the kingdom of our Lord Jesus.” ~J. Brown, The Epistle To The Hebrews

  • A Christian guidebook called the Didache written in the first century AD gives some stand­ards for hospitality including, “every stranger who came in the name of the Lord, that is, professing to be a fellow Christian, should be received, but... his profession should after­ward be put to the test, and if a wayfarer, his stay should be for only two or three days… [and if he] asked for money, [he] was to be dismissed as an impostor and a parasite.”⁵ These aren’t necessarily Biblical commands, but they are practical advice.

  • These days, there are are some pretty well-developed Christian hospitality networks – some of which my family has used – that can help you open your home to qualified guests and find hospitality when you travel. I’ve stayed with folks who didn’t have much but who gave us their best!⁶

  • Bringing orphans into your home through protective care, fostering, or adoption is another way that we can exercise hospitality.

• The reason the apostle gives for keeping up the practice of hosting is interesting: “because through this some folks were unaware of having hosted/entertained angels!”

  • The Greek word translated “angels” has a root meaning of “messengers,” so it’s possible that it could be referring to hosting itinerant Apostles and Gospel preachers.

    • “The force of the motive does not seem to lie in any probability that they might have the same honor [of seeing angels], but in this general principle, that they might derive advantage from the exercise of hospitality greater than they anticipated; that they might have the honour and happiness of entertaining men distinguished for their Christian worth and excellence, and who, by the spiritual communications made by them, would far more than compensate for the external accommodations afforded them.” ~J. Brown

    • 3 John vs. 5-8 certainly recommends this: "Beloved, you are acting faithfully in whatever work you happen to do for the brothers – even this for outsiders [ξένους] - who themselves gave a good reference concerning your love [ἀγάπῃ] before the church, [and] whom you will do well to send forward in a manner worthy of God, because they went abroad under [the auspices] of His Name, taking nothing from the pagans. Therefore, as for our part, we ought to support [ὑπολαμβάνειν] such men, in order that we may become co-workers in the truth.” (NAW)

  • However, it is also true that Bible characters like Abraham (Gen. 18), Lot (Gen. 19), and Manoah (Samson’s father – Judges 13) offered food and lodging to strangers who turned out to be actual angels. Who knows but that you might end up doing the same?

    • Of course, if they are hosted unawares, then you’ll actually never know, but then again, sometimes God lets His people in on His angelic operations from time to time for special encouragement.

    • In his book, Angels, Billy Graham told the story of a medical doctor in England who was visited at his office by a little girl in the middle of a winter storm. The girl begged him to visit her sick mother right away. Reluctantly, he followed the girl out into the snow and all the way to her house. The mother was indeed in critical condi­tion, but he was able to save her life that night. When he expressed admiration to the mother at the courage of her daughter in bringing him out there through the storm, the mother replied that she had no daughter; her daughter had died some time ago. She even showed the doctor the clothes she had kept from her daughter’s wardrobe. The doctor recognized the clothes; they were the clothes that the little girl who had summoned him had been wearing! Graham gave the name and residence of the doctor and concluded that he had entertained an angel unawares. Would you have made a house call like that in the middle of a winter storm if a stranger had asked you to?

    • History is replete with accounts of angel appearances. Probably some of them are bogus, but some are legit. Others can’t really be proven – like the time I ran out of gas on a deserted highway while I was itinerating as a missionary, and an elderly couple pulled up, took a gas can out of their trunk, put enough gas in the tank to get us to the next filling station, and then vanished as they drove away. I can’t prove they were angels, but that experience was definitely out-of-the-ordinary for me. Now, what if it had been the other way around? Would I have gone out of my way to get gasoline for them? I’ve done it for my family, but I haven’t done that for a stranger before.

• The third arena in which to express love is even more challenging:

v.3 Continue to remind yourselves of the prisoners, as having bound yourselves together – of those being abused, as you yourselves indeed are in [one] body.

• This verse neatly divides into a command to remember, followed by two groups of people to remember – and the grammar seems to indicate that they are not two different groups of people but two descriptions of the same group of mistreated, imprisoned Christians, and then two parallel comparisons that picture unity with those persecuted Christians.

  • We are to remember τῶν δεσμίων -the prisoners

    • Paul and Silas were imprisoned in Phillipi in Acts 16,

    • then Paul was imprisoned in Jerusalem in Acts 23, in Caesurea in Acts 25, and in Rome in Acts 28,

    • and the apostle who wrote the book of Hebrews had also been imprisoned. He mentioned this back in Hebrews 10:34 when he wrote that the Hebrew Christians had "suffered together with⁷ [his] chains/imprisonments also" in their "partnership."

    • Christians were being persecuted for their faith and put in prison. “They were to be often thought of with affection and interest; they were to be prayed for; they were to be visited; they were to be supplied with food and clothing and other comforts, and every lawful means employed to mitigate the rigour of their confinement and to obtain their liberty.” ~J. Brown

    • In this we have the Biblical example of Onesiphorus, described by Paul in 2 Timothy 1:16-18 “Onesiphorus… often refreshed me, and was not ashamed of my chain; but when he arrived in Rome, he sought me out very zealously and found me… and you know very well how many ways he ministered to me at Ephesus." (NKJV)

    • In the United States of America, we are blessed to have a government which does not persecute Christian faith with imprisonment, but there are many countries today which do: China, North Korea, Yemen, Laos, Iran, Turkey, Indonesia, Pakistan, several of the Central Asian Republics, and others. Through organizations like Voice of the Martyrs, the Barnabas Fund, Middle East Concern, Open Doors, China Harvest, and Samaritan’s Purse, we can support Christians who actually visit and bring relief to brothers and sisters in those countries. We can also pray for our former governor Sam Brownback for wisdom and effectiveness as he works through the U.S. Government to mitigate religious persecution worldwide.

    • The 2^nd category of persons to remember can be more-readily found in our country:

  • κακουχουμένων/those being abused/which suffer adversity/who are ill-treated/mistreated

    • This verb showed up back in Hebrews 11:37 describing the persecution of the prophets of old too.

    • “To be reproached, turned out of secular employment, spoiled of goods, banished, or in any other way to be exposed to suffering on account of the profession of the Gospel – all this is included in suffering adversity.” ~J. Brown

    • A couple of years ago, when sexual revolutionaries called for a boycott on Chick-Fil-A due to their association with conservative Christianity, Christians went out of their way to buy their chicken sandwiches to keep them in business.

    • For us in a university town, it may take the form of supporting Christian professors who are being threatened with losing their job – or conscientious leaders in civil government who are being slandered.

    • We are to do this...

  • ὡς συνδεδεμένοι

    • “as if chained with [them]/ as if you were [their] fellow prisoners” You know, if you were in the prison with them, you’d have a hard time forgetting their plight because it would be in your face every moment too! That’s how often we should remember them and how intensely.

    • This phrase could perhaps more accurately be translated without adding the word “if” and by translating the Greek deponent verb in the middle voice: “as having bound your­selves together.” For as long as Christians have taken membership vows, they have bound themselves together in spiritual community, pledging to love and submit to one another as members of the body of Christ. The Perfect tense of this verb denotes the fact that they already have been bound together as brothers and sisters in Christ.

    • Whether you like it or not, you are connected to persecuted believers on the other side of the globe, so God calls you to remember them in prayer and giving.

    • One good way to start is to note the persecuted church slide in our church announcements each Lord’s Day and pray for them all week.

  • The other comparative phrase is ὡς καὶ αὐτοὶ ὄντες ἐν σώματι “as you yourselves indeed are in a body” or “since you yourselves are in [the] body also. “(The NIV totally re-worded it: "as if you yourselves were suffering.")

    • Now, the vast majority of Bible commentators⁸ (with the notable exception of John Calvin) indicated that this means that we are still living on this earth in physical bodies.

    • It is true that all the other occurrences of the word “body” in the book of Hebrews⁹ refer to physical bodies, not church congregations, and, among all the epistles, there are two dozen references to being "in" physical flesh and blood "bodies¹⁰," two of which have the exact same Greek words and spelling¹¹ as we find here in Hebrews 13:3, and furthermore, in the rest of the Bible outside of the epistles, the word "body" never means "church."

    • However, I count a dozen places in the epistles which speak of being "in" the "body," where it refers to Christians in the church, the body of Christ, such as:

      • Romans 12:5 “The many are one body [ἓν σῶμά] in Christ,”

      • 1 Corinthians 12:13 “You were baptized into one body [εἰς ἓν σῶμα] (cf. v.18 ἐν τῷ σώματι, and 25 μὴ ᾖ σχίσμα ἐν τῷ σώματι), and v.26 “if one member suffers; all suffer together.”

      • Ephesians 1:22-23 "in the church, which is His body" [τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ, ἥτις ἐστὶν τὸ σῶμα]; (cf. 2:16 ἐν ἑνὶ σώματι; 4:4 Ἓν σῶμα, & v.16)

      • Colossians 3:15 “You were called in one body [ἐν ἑνὶ σώματι]” and “in His body, the church” Col. 1:24 (cf. v.18).

    • This phrase “as you yourselves are being in a body” is in parallel with the phrase “as you being bound together” (again, the word “if” is not explicitly in the Greek). With such parallelism in the grammar, I’d expect both phrases to mean the same thing, thus both could be interpreted as referring to our bond as brothers in Christ. Because of the parallel structure, it doesn’t make sense to me for the two comparative phrases to mean two different things (one speaking of imagining yourself figuratively being roped together in prison and the other speaking of you having a physical body).

    • Finally, it makes more sense to me to say that you should help those who are mis­treated because they are part of your church body than to say that we should be kind to those who are mistreated because you have a physical body. (Why do I need to be reminded that I have a physical body?) Almost all the commentators say that the last phrase is basically saying that you could be the next one persecuted, but it makes more sense to motivate, not by physical self-interest, but rather by Christian love for your church members¹².

• When we remember others who are bound and visit them, we follow the character of God Himself, of whom it was said in Hebrews 2:6b "What is man that you remember [μιμνῄσκῃ] him or the son of man that that you look after [ἐπισκέπτῃ] him?" (NAW) God “cares for” and “remembers” us in our misery, so we reflect His character by “remembering” and “caring for” others in need.

CONCLUSION

• So there are our three avenues of expressing love practically: “Let your brotherly-fondness remain. Don’t be forgetting your hospitality to strangers…. And continue to remind yourselves of the prisoners... of those being abused...”

• “The love which is among His disciples is that whereon the Lord Christ hath laid the weight of the manifestation of His glory in the world.” ~J. Owen (John 17)

• Let me close with two thoughts on how to grow in this love and not let it shrink.

1. You must fight pride in order to love. “Nothing flows away so easily as love; when every one thinks of himself more than he ought, he will allow to others less than he ought; and then many offenses happen daily which cause separations.” ~J. Calvin Self-centeredness will destroy your ability to love.

2. Begin with the love of God, for that is the engine for loving others: “[T]he more they grow in devout affection to God their heavenly Father the more they will grow in love to one another for His sake” ~M. Henry

• May God give us His grace to love so that it may never be said of us, “They have no regard for love; no care for the widow, or the orphan, or the oppressed; of the bond, or of the free; of the hungry, or of the thirsty.”

APPENDIX: Greek Text & English Versions of Hebrews 13:1-3^A