For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come.
Here there is no permanent or lasting home in this present world, but a future city, a lasting home to come, is looked for. Those who hold this hope are pilgrims and strangers on earth, traveling toward a better, heavenly country, a heavenly Canaan. Seeking that coming city means going out to Jesus outside the camp and following Him, bearing His reproach even when hardship comes. In that hardship and reproach the response is not surrender to sorrow but continually offering God praise and thanksgiving through Christ, because the lasting hope lies ahead.
That hope calls away from centering life on self and from seeking special favor. Minds are to be set on that future home, and as they are Christ is by the side, with eternal life held out as the hope. Because the home sought is still to come, there is readiness to leave any earthly place and go wherever He calls. In such moves the future is trusted to Him.
Life is to show that the aim is not earthly honor or wealth but serving God and preparing others for His final message of mercy, with affections turned from earthly concerns toward God and heaven. While journeying toward that home its atmosphere is to be lived in now, its sweetness and fragrance breathed in with pleasantness and love rather than a surly, sour spirit, so that influence is pleasant and heavenly. Especially ministers learn from this that earth is not their resting place, and they are not to seek an easier, less self-denying life but to look beyond earthly hardship to what is to come. Earthly homes and their comforts are temporary, though they can be received with gratitude.
Here there is no permanent or lasting home in this present world, but a future city, a lasting home to come, is looked for. Those who hold this hope are pilgrims and strangers on earth, traveling toward a better, heavenly country, a heavenly Canaan. Seeking that coming city means going out to Jesus outside the camp and following Him, bearing His reproach even when hardship comes. In that hardship and reproach the response is not surrender to sorrow but continually offering God praise and thanksgiving through Christ, because the lasting hope lies ahead.
That hope calls away from centering life on self and from seeking special favor. Minds are to be set on that future home, and as they are Christ is by the side, with eternal life held out as the hope. Because the home sought is still to come, there is readiness to leave any earthly place and go wherever He calls. In such moves the future is trusted to Him.
Life is to show that the aim is not earthly honor or wealth but serving God and preparing others for His final message of mercy, with affections turned from earthly concerns toward God and heaven. While journeying toward that home its atmosphere is to be lived in now, its sweetness and fragrance breathed in with pleasantness and love rather than a surly, sour spirit, so that influence is pleasant and heavenly. Especially ministers learn from this that earth is not their resting place, and they are not to seek an easier, less self-denying life but to look beyond earthly hardship to what is to come. Earthly homes and their comforts are temporary, though they can be received with gratitude.