Heb 6:18–20 — The Sure and Steadfast Anchor of Our Souls

Two Unchangeable Things

Last week we looked at that oath that the author of Hebrews talks about here. He mentions two unchangeable things. What are those two unchangeable things?

The promise and the oath used by God to confirm the promise that he made to Abraham. That oath is given to confirm the truth of the promise. God knows our weakness. He did not have to add the oath, his word should be good enough by itself, but he knows our weakness and our desire for greater assurance and confirmation, and so he added the oath to guarantee it to us and to give us strong encouragement.

We saw that this is referring to a number of instances and episodes in the life of Abraham recorded in the book of Genesis. When God first called Abraham out of Ur of the Chaldeans, he made that promise to Abraham. He said, to your offspring I will give this land. And he repeated that promise several times throughout the narrative, the patriarchal narrative of God’s dealings with Abraham.

But there is one key moment, it is recorded in Genesis chapter 15, when God repeated the promise, and Abraham believed in the promise, and it was counted to him as righteousness, but Abraham followed up that faith with a question, Lord, how can I know for sure that I will inherit these promises?

So God made that oath where he himself passed between the pieces of the carcasses of the animal. God is taking the oath, swearing by his own existence, may I become like these animals if I do not keep my word. Of course, God is self-existent. God cannot die. And so God is placing His own existence on the line. Guaranteeing that because God is self-existent that this promise is sure.

We also saw that there is a wonderful picture there of the cross of Christ when Christ Himself took that curse upon Himself. And endured it for us, that we might have that promise confirmed to us. There is a wonderful little point in the text that I mentioned. It is in verse 17, where it says that God desired more convincingly to show to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of His purpose. And so he guaranteed it with an oath. And I pointed out last week that word guaranteed is a little bit hard to translate.

It is sometimes translated as interposed or intervened. And the reason it is translated that way in some other translations is because this word in Greek is actually the verb form of the word mediator. Christ is the mediator of the new covenant. That is something that the author of Hebrews focuses on in chapter 8 verse 6 and chapter 9 verse 15. But here he uses that same word not as a noun, but as a verb.

He mediated it with an oath. And I think that he is already drawing our attention to the fact that this oath is fulfilled in Christ. When Christ on the cross took upon him the wrath of God and the curse of the breaking of the covenant. God did not break the covenant, but we did. And God took that breaking of the covenant and that curse upon himself as our mediator. God guaranteed it with an oath. He intermediated it with an oath.

Almost giving us the impression, is it not the case that Maybe Christ himself is the oath. Christ himself and his death on the cross and his glorious resurrection from the dead is the very thing that God used to give us that confirmation that his promise is sure. So the whole focus of the preceding part of this passage is on this wonderful swearing of an oath, which God literally did in Genesis 15, but it was fulfilled ultimately in Christ. And his cross and resurrection. But now in this part of the text, in the last three verses here, we have a wonderful set of metaphors that further explain and expand upon this oath. This confirmation of God’s promise through the oath. God’s oath is now explained by two metaphors illustrating a sense of safety and security that we receive from this oath.

Fleeing for Refuge

The first metaphor that is used is the metaphor of taking refuge. It uses that word refuge there at the end of verse, let us see, where is it? In verse, 18, 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. The second metaphor that is used here is the metaphor of an anchor, the anchor. Of our soul. We will get to that in a moment, but let us first briefly talk about this metaphor of fleeing for refuge. This is a common metaphor that is used throughout the Bible, throughout the Old Testament. Just think of all the different cases where this idea of taking refuge is referred to.

First, the first thing that comes to my mind is in the Psalms. Over and over again in the Psalms, it says, God is our refuge. The noun refuge is used 11 times in the Psalms and the verb to take refuge in the Lord is found 25 times. So 36 times in the Psalms alone.

We have this metaphor of God’s people and especially of God’s suffering servant, David, who is a picture of the Messiah. He is taking refuge from his enemies and seeking refuge in God. There is always this idea of some sort of danger. Some sort of, maybe it is an enemy, or maybe it is a storm, but there is some kind of danger that is causing us to flee, to hide ourselves under the cleft of the rock, and to take refuge under the almighty shadow of God himself. Psalm 91, take refuge in the shadow of the Almighty. Over and over again we see this, but there are also other passages too, not just in the Psalms.

Think about the establishment of the cities of refuge. You remember that? If someone committed manslaughter unintentionally, and the family members of the person that was slain are now seeking revenge and seeking that person’s blood, a person can flee to one of the cities of refuge, these special cities that are associated particularly with the Levites and the priests. These cities are refuge and they can go there and they can find a refuge from their enemies. Or again, how about the example of Noah’s Ark?

Noah and his family, they knew that the floodwaters of judgment were coming, and they took refuge inside the ark. Of course, the ark is a picture of Christ. He is our ark. He is the one that delivers us. All those that did not take refuge, all those that were not aware of the coming judgment or did not believe in it, were scoffing at it, they were those that perished outside the ark. But those that took refuge within the shelter that God had appointed, they were delivered from the coming judgment.

It is a wonderful image and metaphor. I think it is amazing how the Bible is full of images and metaphors. And they are not just literary devices. They are telling us something glorious about the gospel. They are telling us something wonderful about Christ himself. And it is an amazing thing in our text here that God specifically wanted to convince us of His unchangeable promise so that we would have strong encouragement to flee for refuge to Christ and to hide ourselves in Him.

So our text is just full, it is brimming with all these different metaphors. The oath, the fleeing for refuge to Christ. But there is another metaphor here that I really want to zero in on today. And that is this metaphor of the anchor. Look at that wonderful description of Christ as our anchor. At the end of verse 18 and down to the end of verse 20.

The Anchor within the Veil

We who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast or to lay hold of the hope set before us. And we have this hope 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. We do not really have time to talk about that word forerunner today, but that might be another metaphor here in our text. This text is brimming with metaphors to illustrate to us the glory of Christ, our Savior. But I want to focus in specifically on this one here, that Christ is the anchor of the soul.

You might be wondering in your mind, what exactly did anchors look like, or how did they function in the ancient world? We probably in our own minds have kind of the modern idea of an anchor, usually a pretty massive with, the two sides that come out with the hooks, and then the main shaft, and then it is connected by some pretty hefty chains to the ship. Actually, in the ancient world, it was not that different. They maybe did not use chains. Maybe they used ropes instead. But the concept of an anchor in the maritime technology of the day was very similar to what we think of today. Similar shape and size. Something that has serious heft to it. Some major oak beams encased in iron. And they have those arms that can hook into the sand at the bottom of the ocean to give us a secure position to lock in the ship.

One of the main situations in which an anchor would be useful in the ancient world, and no doubt even today, is when there is a storm at sea. And we actually have an interesting illustration of this in the Book of Acts. Remember that passage near the end of the book of Acts, in Acts chapter 27, where there is this long description of Paul’s voyage to Rome, and he is going to Rome as a prisoner to make his appeal before Caesar. And as he is on this ship going to Rome, they encounter a storm on the Mediterranean Sea. And in Acts 27 verse 29, it tells us that the sailors, they let down four anchors.

That is pretty interesting. Four of them! These are big, massive anchors. In fact, it even mentions a little bit later on in the passage that some of the soldiers were attempting to escape, and they made it a scene, they kind of gave the impression that what they were doing was they were laying out anchors, but it specifically says that they had to use smaller boats, a little skiff, to take out those anchors. So these are significantly sizable anchors. The anchors were let down, four of them from the stern, to prevent the ship from being driven into the rocks.

So picture in your mind kind of the physical layout. You have the storm that is happening and this ship. It is a pretty big ship. We are not just talking about a little, a little skiff like the disciples when they are fishing in the Sea of Galilee. We are talking about a pretty big ship here, a Roman ship. So imagine this ship that is under great duress, that is being significantly knocked about by the waves and the wind. And in danger of capsizing and it is taking on water.

And they know that there is some rocks up ahead. And they are trying to prevent the ship from being driven into the rocks where it would be broken up. And so they let down four massive anchors from the stern, that is the back end of the ship, to prevent the ship from being driven into the rocks. Eventually, in the story, they are driven to the rocks, but everyone escapes safely onto the land.

But this is just giving us an illustration. It is giving us a picture. It is a vivid metaphor for this idea of when an anchor is needed. When there is a storm at sea, everything around you is topsy-turvy. There is chaos. There is the threat of drowning and death. And yet these anchors are there to provide mass, to provide strength, to provide security, to provide Immovability, is that not really the key idea? Immovability. We want a sure and steadfast anchor that is strong enough to hook into the bottom of the ocean and really give us strength and security so that we cannot be destroyed, so that we are secure.

Jesus Our Forerunner

And the author of Hebrews is saying that is what Christ is for us. We 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 for us. What we need is, we need to be moored to an immovable object. Is that not what we need? We need to be secure. We need to be fastened to an immovable object.

Christ, our high priest in heaven, according to the author of Hebrews, the whole point of this book, of this letter, is to declare to us, to proclaim to us, to open our eyes to see the reality that we have Jesus Christ as our great high priest in heaven.

He is the anchor. He is the one to whom we are moored. He is that immovable object, so that when the storms are coming, we are secure in Him. Christ, our High Priest in Heaven, is the anchor. And what does that mean, Christ our High Priest in heaven? It is focusing upon the two natures of Christ. That He is both God and man in two distinct natures and one person forever.

And specifically, as the God-man who has been raised from the dead and exalted to heaven in His glorified human nature. The text mentions this back in chapter 5. Remember back in chapter 5? Where it gives us this transition between the time of Christ’s suffering in the flesh and the time of His being made perfect in heaven. This is in chapter 5 verse 7. In the days of His flesh…

Jesus offered up prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears to him who was able to save him from death. And he was heard because of his reverence. That is, he was raised from the dead because of his reverence. Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. That statement there, although he was a son, is linking back to the quotation from Psalm 2:7. You are my son, today I have begotten you. Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. So that is the time of his flesh, the time of his suffering.

But then, in verse 9 it says, and being made perfect, that is having been raised from the dead and ascended into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him. In other words, he became the anchor. He became the one who entered into that heavenly place as the glorified and exalted God-man so that he might be the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, being designated by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek. There he is quoting from Psalm 110, verse four, you are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. And just remember that verse in Psalm 110 verse 4 is just a few verses after verse 1.

Which says, the Lord said to my Lord, this is David speaking about his Lord Jesus, the Messiah. The Lord Yahweh said to my Lord Christ, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies the footstool of your feet. Referring to the exaltation of Christ. And so, when it says a few verses later, in verse four, you are a priest forever, it is referring to Christ in his state as the exalted God-man, having finished the work, having sat down at the right hand of God in heaven.

This doctrine of the two natures of Christ and how they are united together in one person is critical. This is what the whole author of Hebrews is focusing on. Remember how in chapter 1 he focuses on the deity of the eternal son? How he is greater than the angels? And then in chapter 2 he focuses upon how he himself partook of the same nature as us so that he might be our elder brother and bring many sons to glory. The author of Hebrews is focusing upon this wonderful person, this God-man who is the eternal Son of God who took a human nature into union with himself so that he lived out his divine Sonship in the flesh as a man.

But he did not just live it out in the time of his suffering. He lives it out now as one who has been exalted. As the author of Hebrews says, has been perfected and placed at the right hand of the majesty on high. Referring to his glorified human nature.

This is where the mass and the heft and the hook of that anchor comes in. If it was not for the humanity of Christ, we would not have that anchor of the soul. We would not have that sure hook that gives us, who are frail humans and mortal sinners. It does not give us any confidence unless we have a glorified man in heaven.

He is not just a man, he is the eternal Son of God who became man and is now glorified and made perfect forever in the presence of God. He is the immovable object connecting us to that heavenly world, which the author of Hebrews describes as the inner place behind the curtain.

He is referring to the Old Testament tabernacle, and later on, the temple, which both are pictures of this heavenly reality. There is the outer court, the outer sanctuary, and then there is the inner sanctuary behind the curtain, where the very presence of God is. Only the high priest could go into that inner sanctuary, and he could only do it once a year on the Day of Atonement. The author of Hebrews is telling us that Christ has entered into the holy place, to the heavenly reality to which the earthly sanctuary pointed. The earthly sanctuary, whether it is the tabernacle that Moses built in the wilderness, or whether it is the more permanent version at the time of Solomon with a temple made with stones. That inner sanctuary, that inner place behind the curtain was symbolic of, it was an earthly replica of the heavenly place where God dwells with his angels. In the Old Testament, there are many times where the veil, the curtain, not the literal one in the temple, but the veil that separates us from that heavenly reality parts for a moment.

Like Isaiah, when he saw God seated upon his throne and all the angels crying out, holy, holy, holy. There are many cases throughout the Old Testament where prophets would be, as it were, caught up into heaven to see God upon his throne in the heavenly place.

The author of Hebrews is saying that Christ has entered that heavenly place. He enters into the inner place behind the curtain. He has entered into heaven. Later on in Hebrews 9, verse 24, he clarifies that. He says, Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, not the earthly temple, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God Oh, I love this last phrase. Now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf. Okay? He is there in the holy place. He is there in the inner sanctuary. He is there in heaven itself, in the very presence of God, where all the angels are crying out, holy, holy, holy.

He is there, not for himself, but for us, to be the anchor. To have that heft, to have that certainty, so that we know that we are anchored there regardless of all the storms that are happening around us. Whether it is the storms of life and all the trials and tribulations of this passing world, or whether it is the storms of the wrath of God to come. There is a day of judgment coming. We are firmly lodged and moored to that heavenly sanctuary through Christ our representative.

Remember, the key idea that we talked about a few weeks ago, that the whole point of being a priest in the Old Testament is to be chosen from among the men, among the people, to represent them before God. Remember that in Hebrews 5 verse 1? Every high priest is chosen from among men and is appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God. In other words, to be a mediator, to represent the people before God. So that when the high priest went into the inner sanctuary and was not immediately killed, he was accepted there. That meant that the people were then accepted because he goes there as their representative. So also Christ is our great high priest who has entered into the heavenly sanctuary on our behalf.

I just love the way the author of Hebrews just throws out all these different metaphors, refuge, anchor, forerunner, high priest, but he is trying to stir our hearts to see the glory of this wonderful person that we have, this wonderful mediator and representative that we have before God, who is there for us, to go to bat for us, to be our anchor in the storm, and to give us assurance and certainty.

Let us think about some applications that we can draw out from this glorious text. Let us focus in there on that wonderful phrase at the beginning of verse 19, which is also the title of the sermon. We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul. I made a slight change, I turned it into the plural. The sure and steadfast anchor of our souls. But it is interesting that the text says the soul. He is the sure and steadfast anchor of the soul. Why does he put it that way? I think that is kind of interesting. So the first application I want us to think about here is to understand that you need an anchor for your soul.

Now we know that in biblical anthropology, that is our understanding of who we are as humans, that we are both body and soul. We have bodies, physical bodies, but we also have an immortal spiritual component to us called the soul. And there is a temptation to want to elevate one or the other, but we cannot do that. Both are absolutely necessary to being human. We have to have a body and a soul. In fact, the true nature of being a human and made in the image of God is to be a soul in a body and to be able to express itself and to communicate and to interact with others through that body. But the soul, in a sense, is somewhat more important than the body because When we die and our bodies are in the grave, our soul continues on.

Our souls continue on to exist. I think it is a sad thing when you think about the world around us that so many people, especially secular people, seems like the vast majority of people in the world around us, they do not even believe that they have a soul. They just think of themselves as being a body. And so what does that lead to? It just leads to pursuing material things, whether wealth or material comfort or pleasure, just continually seeking out the latest stimulation for your senses and your body.

But without realizing that they have an immortal soul that will continue to exist after they die. If they are not a believer, they are going to meet their maker and be accountable to him. At the moment of death, they will be before the Holy Creator God and give an account of their life to Him.

How important it is to realize that we have a soul. Now I do not want to downplay the importance of the body because we do not believe that we just continue to exist as disembodied souls for all eternity. We believe that there is a glorious hope that one day Christ will come back and raise our bodies from the grave and reunite us with our souls so that we can live that full embodied holistic existence as embodied souls as we were designed to be from the beginning. That is the goal. Even with Christ himself we see that. That on the third day he rose again from the dead and his body was raised and transformed and he continues now to exist as a full human being, although a glorified human being at the right hand of God. But what I am trying to get at here is this important thought that I think our text is sort of hinting at here. We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul.

I think we need to think about the importance of our souls, and then that gives us a greater sense of understanding of why we need an anchor for our soul. If we move beyond the worldly view that we are just bodies, that we are just animals, If we move beyond that to recognize, no, there is something about me, my personhood, and who I am that is different. And I can tell that because of the thoughts that I think, and the way that I can have a relationship with God through prayer, the fact that there is a spiritual side to my existence, and that I know that I am going to continue to exist as a sentient being even after this body is in the grave. The fact that we have a soul then begins to draw us to realize that there is something about our souls that is in need of an anchor, is there not?

How often our souls are so easily shaken and swayed. Have you ever experienced that in yourself, just how quickly you can shift in your emotional state from one state to the next? It is kind of weird how we can do that. One moment you could be praying and having a wonderful time of devotion with the Lord and it just seems so real and true. And then you get up and you go about your day and pretty soon you are doing something that you should not be doing. How is that?

How is it that our souls are so mutable, so easily shaken and just distracted and thrown off into some other direction so quickly and so easily? How is it that we are so easily tempted by sin? How is it that we are so shaken by our emotions? Have you ever noticed that about your emotions? That sometimes they can just come upon you out of nowhere and you have this extreme emotion of anger or extreme emotion of fear and anxiety. You do not even know how it happened, but somehow you are just being blown around by the things that you are experiencing in this world.

Our souls are weak. Our souls are so easily tossed about by the storms of this life. Or distracted by the things that are presented to us at any moment. And we react. We react emotionally. We react in a way that we should not and we have to catch ourselves and say, that was not good. I reacted in anger to that thing and I should not have done that. Why was I even angry in the first place? It does not even matter.

We have to realize though that we need an anchor of our soul. We have the anchor of our body because we know that Christ is going to raise our bodies from the dead at the last day. But we also need an anchor for our soul. As our text explicitly states, we have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul. What a wonderful savior we have. The second application is not only to realize our need for the anchor, and specifically the anchor of our soul and our emotional life, but also we need to realize that there is another aspect to it here, which is that we cannot simply allow ourselves to be blown around by all of these experiences and emotions and things that happen to us in this world.

The author of Hebrews is specifically addressing a congregation, some of whom are seriously contemplating leaving the Christian faith and returning to their former Jewish religion. And he is concerned that some of them might be starting to get a little bit sluggish. A little bit, as he says, they are hard of hearing, dull of hearing back in chapter 6 verse 11. He says, we have much to say about this great high priest, but it is hard to explain because your spiritual state right now is that you are kind of dull of hearing, some of you. And he also says, again, he uses another phrase in chapter 6, verse 12.

He says, I do not want you to be sluggish, but I want you to be imitators of those who through faith and patience inherited the promises, like Abraham. And so the second, the first application was realize that you have a soul, that you need an anchor of your soul, and that Christ is the anchor to give you that security and to give you that stability. But the second thing is to realize that we do need to kind of, wake ourselves up out of our sluggishness and actually take hold of that anchor. And that is the verb that is used there at the end of verse 18, to hold fast to the hope set before us. So the NASB also translates that to take hold of the hope set before us.

It can go either way, but I think take hold is good. As believers, sometimes we struggle with assurance, and we struggle with all the buffeting storms of life, and our souls being knocked around by all the things that I was just describing. But we do not realize that we are not just completely helpless. We are not simply getting knocked around. That we have the anchor, for one thing, but we also have the ability, by God’s grace, by the Spirit working in us, to lay hold of it, to take hold of that anchor.

The way I would explain this is going back to our whole analogy of the anchor and the ship. After they have put the anchors out and put them down, you cannot really see the anchor. It is down there in the darkness of the water. You might see a little bit of the rope sticking out and hitting the, attaching to the ship, but you do not really see the anchor. And especially if there is a storm going on, there is no way you could see anything down there. It is just way too tumultuous and stormy.

But they can, the person, the sailor could start to reason with themselves and say, I am afraid that this boat is going to be ground into the shore and it is going to be broken up. But I remember when I put that anchor out there, I remember how heavy it was. I remember specifically taking it on the little skiff to get it out there and dropping it down. And I know about anchors.

So you can see how there is something that we can do. It is not just that we are sitting there on the boat and the storms are banging us around and we are just like, oh no, what is going to happen? The Bible tells us that we are able, of course it is only by the Spirit enabling us to do this, but we are able to lay hold of the promise. That is what the Bible is all about. That is what the Bible is for, is to give us that teaching about the promises of God, to give us this teaching about who Christ is, and to remind us of these truths.

Hope Fixed in Heaven

Just like the anchor is down there in the depths of the ocean. You cannot see it. So also Christ is in heaven and we do not see Him. It is an act of faith to believe that we have this anchor of our souls. But there is something we can do. It reminds me of in the story of Pilgrim’s Progress.

When Christian was in the den of giant despair. And he was struggling with assurance. And then he realized, oh, I have a key in my pocket that God gave me, the promises of God. And he could have escaped from that dungeon any moment if he had just used the key, which is the word of God and the promises of God that are found in scripture.

The author of Hebrews is trying to do that with his audience. He is telling his audience, I know that you are struggling. I know that you are a little bit sluggish in your faith. But what I am going to do is, I am going to simply paint before you this glorious picture of this awesome anchor that we have.

This great high priest, who is both God and man in two distinct natures and one person forever. Who has offered the final sacrifice. Who has made purification for sins, and who now sits at the right hand of God, who is the anchor, who is lodged in that immovable place in heaven. So fix your eyes on Jesus through the Word of God, and also through the sacraments. The sacraments are visible signs of the Word of God. Fix your eyes on Jesus.

It takes faith, it takes an act of faith, it takes active laying hold of the truth, like the sailor sitting there on the boat and realizing, no, I know about anchors, I actually felt that anchor in my hand, and reasoning through it and then realizing, no, it is going to be okay. We must do that. We must not allow our experience, our emotions, our trials, our temptations to become more real than Christ himself. We must lay hold of the truths of the gospel by faith in Christ. God’s word is given for that precise purpose.

And that is why we need to spend time in God’s word throughout the week. Reading God’s Word, hearing again those precious promises of God’s Word, seeing Christ in all the Scriptures, both in the promises and in the types and shadows, seeing Him in the Gospel records. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John just present us Christ. They tell us, look at this glorious Christ. Look how powerful He is. Look how He saves those who are sick. How He goes to the cross because He loves His people to save them from their sins.

Or to put it another way, I think the author of Hebrews himself tells us exactly what to do. In Hebrews chapter 12, near the end of his letter, he just says what? He says… Therefore, laying aside all the sin that clings so closely, let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, fixing our eyes on Jesus. That is why the Bible is given, that is why the author, he was just writing this book, is to show us Christ so that we might fix our eyes upon Him.

What a wonderful Savior we have. And how wonderful it is that He condescends to our weakness. He even gives us communion. Which we are going to celebrate in just a moment, to reassure us, to confirm to us that he loves us. He loves us more than any other creature in heaven or on earth. There is no creature in heaven or among the creatures on earth who loves us more than Jesus Christ does. And he is there at the right hand of God, interceding for us.