THE HOPE OF ISRAEL - The Preterist Archive

The Hope of Israel: What Is It? 35
"These all died in faith, not having received
the promises, but having seen them afar off;
and were persuaded [fully convinced] of them,
and embraced them, and confessed that they
were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For
they that say such things declare plainly that
they seek a country. And truly, if they had been
mindful of that country from whence they came
out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.
But now they desire a better country,
that is an heavenly: wherefore God is not
ashamed to be called their God; for He hath
prepared for them a city" (vv. 13-16).
This gives us clearly to know, first that "the promises"
exerted a mighty influence over those to whom
they were first given, (proving that their faith in
what God had spoken was real and unwavering) ; and
second, that the nature of the promises was such as
to turn their thoughts entirely aivay from the earth,
and to raise in their hearts the expectation of a country
"better" than the very best of earth (showing that
the promises themselves were spiritual and heavenly
in character). For those promises had the effect of
making even "the land of promise" itself to be to them
as a foreign country. For while the land of Canaan
was indeed promised to Abraham's natural seed, that
promise never was "the hope of Israel." The hope
of the gospel which God preached to Abraham was
of such a nature that it caused him, and those who
were "the heirs with him of the same promise," to declare
themselves "strangers and pilgrims on the
earth."
As will be more fully shown in subsequent Chapters,
God's promise that He would bring Abraham's des-