Hebrews 10:36–39

10:36 The prohibition of verse 35 (“do not throw away your confidence”) is restated in positive terms (“you have need of endurance”), transitioning to the theme of faith’s endurance. Faith must endure because God’s promises concern things not yet seen (11:1, 7). Those who trust God’s promises take appropriate action in the present in light of his announcements concerning the future. Faith is not mere intellectual assent to God’s declarations; rather, it moves the believer to do “the will of God.” Christ came “to do your will, O God” (10:7), and the fruit of his costly commitment to do God’s will (Mark 14:36) is the new covenant in which God writes his laws on believers’ hearts (Heb. 8:10) so that they may willingly do his will.

Faith’s forward focus is implied in the prospect of receiving “what is promised” by God. OT believers, “who through faith and patience inherit the promises” (6:12), have set the example, with Abraham in the lead (6:13–17; 7:6; 11:9–19). Although they received God’s promises in words and preliminary fulfillments (6:15; 11:33), in another sense they “did not receive what was promised” but awaited God’s better provision in the new covenant instituted by Christ (11:39; cf. 11:13). We too eagerly await Christ’s return and the full salvation he will bring (9:28).

10:37–38 Most of this OT quotation is from Habakkuk 2:3–4, but “a little while” comes from Isaiah 26:20–21, intensifying the promise that the Coming One “will not delay” his arrival. Both prophetic texts advise sufferers to await patiently the coming of their God to deliver them and judge their enemies. The context of the words drawn from Habakkuk expresses the tension between eager expectancy and patient endurance demanded by the mysterious timing of God’s promise keeping: “The vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end. . . . If it seems slow, wait [LXX hypomenō, “endure”] for it; it will surely come; it will not delay” (Hab. 2:3). Jesus prepared his followers for the unpredictability of his return, which may seem either unduly delayed or unexpectedly sudden (Luke 12:35–46; 18:7–8; cf. 1 Thess. 5:1–4; 2 Pet. 3:4–10).

The Hebrew of Habakkuk 2:4 is difficult. The LXX seems to capture its sense by contrasting the individual who displeases God through shrinking back to “my righteous one” who “shall live by faith.” Our author inverts the descriptions, introducing the faithful righteous one before the apostate who “shrinks back” in cowardice¹ and receives God’s displeasure. Key terms from this text (righteous, faith, pleasure) will reappear in the following survey of OT saints: “faith” distinguishes the person whom God commends as “my righteous one,” such as Abel or Noah (cf. Heb. 11:4, 7), while Scripture’s statement that Enoch “walked with God” means that he “was commended as having pleased God” (11:5–6).

10:39 Our author follows the negative conclusion of the OT citation (“my soul has no pleasure in” the one who shrinks back) with the reassurance that his hearers are not among the cowering apostates who are destined for destruction but instead have the lasting faith that secures their souls for eternal life (1 Thess. 5:9).