"Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul."
"These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth." Hebrews 11:1313These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. (Hebrews 11:13)
A sojourner is a person who is only staying in a certain place temporarily...a person who is not a permanent resident...a transient. This is what the believer, who is a citizen of heaven, is ever to keep in mind. He, or she, is to walk through this world as a stranger and pilgrim.
Notice the order in the two Scriptures quoted above. It is not pilgrims and strangers, but strangers and pilgrims. This is very important!
A stranger is one who does not belong: a foreigner, an alien, an outsider. We are not of this world, but we are, "fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God."
But as soon as we lose sight of the fact we are strangers, we also lose sight of the fact that we are pilgrims. Because, a pilgrim is one who is just passing through. If we settle down in this id and forget our heavenly calling, we are not going to live as those who are on their way to another land—heaven. We are going to become earthly minded, and begin to have our goals, hopes, and aspirations centered on and around temporal things. We are not going to exhibit a true pilgrim character.
So, let us, like those in our verse in Hebrews 11, keep the eye of faith on "a better country." Verse 16. This is what caused them to confess that they were "strangers and pilgrims.
The truth of this in the soul will also keep us from "fleshly lusts." It will cause us to live for the glory of God and not for ourselves.
May this be true of every believer!
This world is not our home now,
As strangers moving on,
We seek a better country,
With an eternal dawn.
As pilgrims pressing forward,
Onward and upward wend;
We're citizens of heaven,
Our journey there will end.