AND EMBRACED THEM

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Apr 22, 1889

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 15, No. 16.

AND EMBRACED THEM.

WE read in our Bibles that the patriarchs saw the promises afar off "and were persuaded of them and embraced them." Heb. 11:13. The revisers have marred the beauty of this verse by substituting "greeted" for "embraced." Webster defines greeting as "saluting," "accosting with friendship," "paying respect to another." This is the modern way of treating God's promises, but it was not the way Abraham treated them when he gave up home and kindred. The word translated "embrace" in Heb. 11:13 is the intensive and reflexive form of the Greek spao, which means, to draw. The idea is, therefore, to draw somebody or something strongly to ourselves. This is not greeting but embracing. It is not the occidental politeness that lifts the hat and says, "Good-morning;" but the oriental demonstration of affection, like that of the father who ran to his returning son and fell on his neck and kissed him.

We have a touching instance of this oriental style in Acts 20:37, where we are told that the elders of Ephesus "fell on Paul's neck and kissed him." They did not shake hands and bid him good-by as we would do. No. They drew him to themselves and clung to him as a mother clings to the child from which she must soon part, or as the bride clings to the husband for whose sake she leaves home and kindred. The patriarchs were "persuaded of the promises." They believed that they were from God, or could not fail. This was their intellectual conviction, like that of thousands in our Christian land to-day. But if they had stopped there Abraham would have died in Haran, and the Old Testament, if we had any, would end with the eleventh chapter of Genesis. All the wonderful history of this man and his descendants turned upon the act set forth in that word "embraced." They took the promises into their hearts. They twined the tendrils of their affections and their hopes around them. Guided only by those words of the unseen God, they went forth, not knowing whither they went, and became strangers and pilgrims in the earth. By their sojournings, they testified to their faith in the promises, their living, loving, life-long trust in Him who spake to them in dreams and visions of the night.

We have more and better promises than the patriarchs had. We have some degree of faith in them. We have great respect for them. When they are read from the pulpit we listen reverently, and say in our hearts, That is true. We are glad that we are not heathen, ignorant of the promises, or skeptics, who scoff at them. We comfort ourselves with the thought that we are Christians, intellectually at least. But, alas, how rare is the faith of Abraham! How few live as if they had embraced the promises, confessing that they are strangers and pilgrims, and declaring that they seek a better country, even a heavenly!

Embracing means self-denial. If one meets a friend and his arms are full of bundles he must drop them before he can embrace his friend. If we are holding the world or any portion of it with the grasp of selfishness, we must let it go before we can take hold upon the promises. Abraham believed God when he was told to go to a strange land. And because he believed he obeyed. He went out not knowing whither he went. He clung to the word of promise as a wrecked sailor clings to a spar in mid-ocean. He gave up all else to live upon the word of God. And thus he became the father of them that believe. Like Abraham, the true heir of the promises must be a stranger and a pilgrim. He must endure as seeing him who is invisible. He cannot live a life of sense and a life of faith at the same time. He must empty his heart of the world before its tendrils can grasp the things that are set before him in the gospel.—Interior.