HEBREWS: Jesus is Greater “A Greater Word” (Hebrews 1:1-3) | 8/20/23
Hebrews 1:1-3 | 8/20/23 | Will DuVal
MJ or LeBron? DaVinci or Michelangelo? Batman or Superman? The Beatles or the Stones? We love to debate: who is the GOAT; the “Greatest of All Time”. Apparently the author of Hebrews did as well, except when it comes to the greatest BEING of all time, there is simply no contest: Jesus is Greater. That is the central message of the letter to the Hebrews, as we will see over the next 15 or so weeks together this fall.
*Good morning… Welcome to West Hills… Will DuVal… “Connect Card”...
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I’m excited to kick off this sermon series in Hebrews with you this morning. As we do, I want to ask you to do something with me every week of this study: would you commit to reading every excerpt that I’ll be preaching on the upcoming Sunday prior to coming to church that week? The readings will never be long; only 13 chapters in Hebrews that we’re covering in about 15 weeks, so less than a chapter a week (only 3 verses this morning!). But I think that little bit of preparation on your part will greatly enhance your understanding of this important book as we work our way through it.
That means, of course, you’re going to need to pay attention to your weekly EMAILS from the church (which I hope you do already! If you don’t receive our emails, please check that box in your Connect Card and give us your contact info so we can add you to the list!); that way you’ll know what verses to read for the following Sunday.
Finally - I should’ve asked you to do this in preparation for TODAY; hopefully some of you took the initiative and did so, unprompted - but would you carve out half an hour this week to read the ENTIRE book of Hebrews in one sitting, and then watch the “Bible Project” summary video online. That should give you a really good orientation to our study this fall.
I have to say: Hebrews has never been one of my favorite books of the Bible. But as I began studying it deeper in preparation for this fall, I’ve really gained SUCH a greater appreciation for this book, and I hope you will too. Maybe it’s because we just got done preaching through EXODUS, and Hebrews is essentially a NT commentary on the OT, especially the books of Exodus and Leviticus.
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Maybe it’s because I’m so COMPETITIVE, and I’m just now realizing how competitive HEBREWS is; the central message of the book, the tagline for our whole series, is this: JESUS IS GREATER! The word “better” is gonna be used 13x throughout Hebrews - Jesus is BETTER than the angels; he’s better than Moses; better than the prophets; better than the Levitical priests; he’s the better sacrifice for sin; he’s better than the old covenant; better than the Temple - Jesus is better than EVERYTHING!
As a matter of fact, he’s not just better; Jesus is PERFECT. And that’s a word that will be used 14x throughout Hebrews to describe Jesus and the NEW covenant salvation and promises that He now offers ALL who would trust in Him by faith.
Before we dive into our text for this morning, I want to give you some BACKGROUND info on the book as a whole. For starters: why is it called “Hebrews”? [TITLE]: As Dennis Johnson explains, Hebrews is a bit unique in that “Unlike the other General NT Epistles, which bear their authors’ names, the title of Hebrews describes its recipients.” (ESV: Hebrews, p19) Hebrews is also unique in that it doesn’t open with a salutation (e.g., “Greetings…”). WHY NOT? Because the author wants to make it clear right out of the gate - as we’re gonna see in the first 3 verses we’re expositing this morning; perhaps the most powerful opening to ANY book in the entire Bible! - that THIS letter is all about JESUS! HE is the center and theme.
By the way, I mentioned Johnson’s commentary; I thought it might be helpful to give you a list of ALL the commentaries I plan to use throughout our study, in case any of you want to go even deeper on your own. Inevitably, I’ll get busy, and I’ll find my favorite 2 or 3 that I lean on more heavily. But I’ll just take this opportunity to remind you of the VALUE of a good commentary, as you’re walking through ANY book of the Bible. Or at least a good study Bible. We don’t just want to READ; we want to UNDERSTAND; because without understanding, we can’t properly APPLY God’s word. And we want to be not just HEARERS of the word, but DOERS.
How about the AUTHOR of Hebrews? Well, Hebrews is ALSO unique in THIS regard as well: that WE SIMPLY DON’T KNOW who penned this letter. The author never introduces himself (he was too eager to write about JESUS!). So he is unknown, to US anyway. But NOT to his AUDIENCE; in ch13 he asks them to PRAY for him, he catches them up on their common friend Timothy. So the author was KNOWN to the letter’s recipients.
The earliest church tradition ascribes authorship to the apostle PAUL. It is unlikely, however, that Paul actually wrote Hebrews. For 4 reasons:
Paul was careful to introduce himself by NAME in every letter he wrote (cuz he was concerned about false-apostles writing forgeries in his name).
As Richard Phillips points out: the Greek used in this letter is of a very “high literary style… in contrast to Paul’s more common Greek” (Phillips, REC: Hebrews, 6)
“The structure of Hebrews, with its interspersed exhortations, contrasts with Paul’s tendency to save practical applications for the letter’s end.” (Phillips, 6) And finally, but perhaps MOST significantly…
Paul stresses elsewhere (esp Gal 1:1-17) his direct, unmediated encounter of the revelation of Jesus, in contrast to this author’s admittedly indirect encounter; in Heb 2:3, he’ll say: “[This gospel] was declared at first by the Lord, and it was attested to us by those who heard”. In other words: “I received the good news second-hand from the apostles, who knew Jesus personally.” But Paul claimed apostolic authority himself.
So who IS this guy… OR GIRL?! Some modern liberal scholars have suggested perhaps PRISCILLA, wife of the Corinthian tentmaker Aquila who we met in Acts ch18, that SHE wrote Hebrews. However, their feminist bias is pretty obvious, since the author of Hebrews uses masculine pronouns of himself later in ch11 (v32). Other more sensible suggestions include Paul’s traveling companion Luke, who authored the books of Luke and Acts, or perhaps Paul’s friend Silas. But Richard Phillips points out (7): “Most persuasive are the arguments in favor of Barnabas (by Tertullian), and Apollos. Hebrews 13:22 describes the letter as a ‘word of exhortation’, and Barnabas’s name means ‘son of exhortation’. Not only was Barnabas a close associate of Paul, but as a Levite he would likely have had the kind of interest in the Jewish priesthood that shows up in Hebrews. An even more intriguing suggestion was made by Martin Luther in favor of Paul’s sometime associate Apollos. Acts 18:24 identifies him as ‘an eloquent man, competent in the Scriptures’... Furthermore, Apollos hailed from Alexandria, and Hebrews shows an interest in theological themes known to have been popular there.”
Such speculation may be interesting, but ultimately we must conclude with the 2nd c. church father Origen that: “Only GOD knows” who wrote Hebrews, and therefore “content ourselves with knowing that [MOST importantly,] the letter is the Word of GOD.” (Phillips, 7)
Henceforth, I’ll simply refer to the author as… ‘The Author’ 🙂
*What we DO know about him, however, is that he was a brilliant theologian and linguist (Hebrews contains some of the most high-brow theology in all the NT, articulated in some of the most eloquent vocabulary), he was a skillful interpreter of the (Greek) OT Scriptures (this author knew his Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, backwards and forwards!), and that he clearly possessed pastoral authority amongst this congregation to whom he was writing.
Which leads us to our NEXT point of context about the letter’s AUDIENCE, but FIRST, I just want to again COMMEND this book to you. Hebrews is perhaps the most avoided, neglected letter in the NT. For 3 reasons, I think:
For starters, as we’ve just said: it’s ANONYMOUS. So one might wrongly assume that Hebrews therefore carries less weight than one of the letters of PAUL, or PETER, or one of the other APOSTLES. But we’ve gotta remember that “ALL Scripture is [ultimately] God-breathed”; that God himself CO-authored all 66 books of the Bible. So they are ALL “useful for teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteousness”, especially Hebrews, as I hope to show you.
But secondly, Hebrews is admittedly quite COMPLEX, theologically. Some readers avoid it because they’re afraid it’s just gonna go over their heads. Like if you don’t have your PhD in theology and you haven’t read through the entire OT in the original Hebrew language, you’ve got no shot of understanding this book. And while Hebrews IS a more sophisticated book - RICHLY so! - I ALSO hope to show you that HEBREWS IS FOR YOU! That you too can and should and actually, you MUST understand this book.
Lastly, though, many avoid the book of Hebrews because it is also challenging SPIRITUALLY. The author includes some pretty DIRE warnings here - FIVE of them, to be exact - 5 warning passages for those who are professing believers in Jesus, but who are tempted to walk AWAY from the faith. To them, the author is gonna say: IF you walk away, you will face a fate worse than those who rejected God’s OLD covenant gift - the Law - in other words: a fate worse than DEATH! (2:1-3) He’s gonna say: If you turn your back on Jesus, he’ll turn his back on you FOREVER (6:4-8). And he’s gonna say: “if [you] go on sinning deliberately AFTER receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for [your] sins, 27 but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume” (11:26-27). I told you: TOUGH STUFF ahead!
But oh, how IMPORTANT are these warnings, in a day and age when “deconstruction” has become a household term in our church lingo; when “ex-vangelical” is a trending hashtag on social media; when 80% of kids raised in the church will walk AWAY from the church within 5 years of graduating high school. The Church needs these warnings against apostasy NOW more than EVER!
But returning now to the letter’s BACKGROUND - how about Hebrews’ AUDIENCE? I’ll let Kent Hughes do the teaching this time, from his commentary (Hebrews, 16): “A consensus [agrees that] they were a group [a church, perhaps even a tiny HOUSE church] of Jewish Christians [even more specifically: HELLENIZED - aka “Greek-ified” Jewish Xians, since the author quotes from the Septuagint for them] who had never seen Jesus in person, yet had believed. Their conversion had brought them hardship and persecution (in ch10, vv32-34, the author reminds them of “the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, 33 sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction… the plundering of your property…”) with the result that some had [now] slipped back into Judaism. And thus the purpose for writing was to encourage them not to fall away, but to press on (cf 2:1ff; 3:12ff; 6:4ff; 10:26ff; 12:15ff).”
And we’ll return to the book’s PURPOSE in just a moment, but for now, let’s just take note that the author is writing to culturally JEWISH, linguistically GREEK, socially PERSECUTED, religiously CHRISTIAN believers, and we MIGHT add, geographically ROMAN; that is our best educated guess. Here is Hughes again (17): “The description of their earlier sufferings (from ch10 that I just read you) fits well into the picture of the hardships that came to Jewish Christians under emperor Claudius in AD49. [The Roman historian] Suetonius records that ‘There were riots in the Jewish quarter at the instigation of Chrestus. As a result, Claudius expelled the Jews from Rome’ (25.4). ‘Chrestus’, historians believe, is a reference to Christ… Now, as the author of Hebrews [currently] writes, fifteen years have gone by since the Claudian persecution, and a new persecution looms. No one has been killed yet, [according to ch12, v4, but it] raises the possibility that martyrdom may soon come… The circumstances accord well with the Neronian persecution that would come with the great fire of Rome in AD 64.”
The author of Hebrews ALSO sends greetings at the END of the letter, on behalf of “Those who come from Italy”, presumably Roman expatriates, sending well-wishes back home.
You heard me suggest a possible DATE for the letter in there as well, probably somewhere around the year 64. We know it HAD to be written BEFORE the destruction of the Temple in the year 70, otherwise the author wouldn’t have referenced the priests’ endless animal sacrifices, which stopped after AD 70. He also references Timothy’s recent release from prison in ch13. Between that and the mounting persecution against the church, a date in the mid-60s is most likely.
LASTLY in the way of CONTEXT, and we’ve already touched on it, is the letter’s PURPOSE. Phillips summarizes it well (9): “The writer warns Christians not to fall back from faith in Christ in the midst of trials and exhorts them instead to press on to full maturity... His method is to point out the supremacy of Christ over everything to which the readers might be tempted to turn.” Johnson adds (21): “Th[is] sermon [cuz that’s what Hebrews is, really; it’s a SERMON written from a PASTOR to his congregation; this SERMON…] argues throughout that Jesus and his redemptive work surpass and replace the means of atonement and access to God, the sanctuary and sacrifices, commanded in the law given to Moses. This argument impl[ies] that the hearers were inclined to look to the institutions of Judaism for assurance of God’s forgiveness, as well as for relief from [their] persecution.”
And this is PRECISELY where I want to exhort US again this morning that “Hebrews is for YOU”! Sure, we may not be tempted to turn back to Jewish rituals for our source of comfort and assurance. But that’s only because most of us aren’t formerly JEWISH. But we WERE formerly WORLDLY. Maybe before you came to Jesus, you trusted in your MONEY to bring you comfort and security. Or you trusted in your FAMILY. Or you trusted in your LIKEABILITY - “I’m a good person, people like me; so I believe it’ll all work out for me in the end”. There are plenty of things out there that compete for supremacy in our hearts. GOOD things, just like all the good OT things that these HEBREWS were tempted to go back to trusting in - the Law, the prophets, the sacrifices, the Temple - all GREAT.
Money is great. Family is great. Kindness is great. But friends, NONE of them is a firm foundation on which to build your LIFE, your ETERNITY. For that, you need something GREATER. And the message of Hebrews is that Jesus is GREATER. He ALONE is “a sure and steadfast anchor [for our] souls [and ALL our] hope” (6:19).
So, with all that context in place now, let’s READ OUR TEXT for this morning… I invite you to STAND… Hebrews 1:1-3:
Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, 2 but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. 3 He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.
[This is the word of God… SEATED…]
SERMON INTRO:
When I taught “Theology 101” at Culver, one of the assignments I used to give my students was this paper: “If you were God, and you wanted to REVEAL yourself to humanity, how would you DO it? And WHY?” And it was always interesting to see them reason through the various pros and cons of each potential method of revelation: “Well, if I appear VISIBLY, that’s pretty impactful, but it’s also pretty short-lived (and I might not wanna hang around FOREVER…). I could reveal myself to them in a DREAM, but then…” - so on and so forth. But MOST of the students would eventually conclude that it would be BEST for God to SPEAK.
And according to these opening verses of Hebrews, that’s EXACTLY what God - the REAL God, Yahweh - HAS done: He SPOKE formerly to the prophets, and he has SPOKEN now to US.
And we’ve gotta understand how MASSIVELY consequential this is: God’s WORD is the revelation of His GLORY. We saw last week - as we concluded the book of EXODUS, and we saw the “cloud of God’s glory” descend and FILL the tent of meeting - that God’s GLORY is the most important thing in the universe, because it is the “whole GOD-ness of God” (Ryken); His glory is the WEIGHTINESS, the magnitude, the IMPORT of God’s very BEING. And God’s WORD is His REVELATION of that glory to US. And according to v1 here, God has revealed himself - He has SPOKEN - “in MANY ways, at many TIMES”. God REALLY wants us to know, to appreciate, to FEEL the weight of His GLORY, and to WORSHIP Him accordingly. But of ALL His words, God’s GREATEST Word, according to Hebrews 1, is HIS SON, JESUS. And the author is gonna give us SIX REASONS why Jesus is God’s GREATEST Word of all.
#1 - Jesus is God’s FINAL Word. (vv1-2a)
He starts: “Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers…” in all KINDS of ways…
*God spoke through CREATION - Psalm 19 says “The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the sky above[a] proclaims his handiwork.
2 Day after day pours out speech…
4 Their voice goes out through all the earth,
and their words to the end of the world.” - Every sunrise, every starry night sky SHOUTS God’s glory to us!
*Romans 2 claims that God has written His LAW - God speaks MORALITY - into every human heart, into our CONSCIENCES.
God spoke in all KINDS of ways, but v1 here highlights ESPECIALLY God’s speaking “by the PROPHETS”. But even there, God spoke to and through the PROPHETS in all kinds of different ways - He spoke to MOSES (you remember from just recently in Exodus) in a burning bush. He also spoke to Moses in LOUD crashes of thunder and lightning and trumpets up on Mt. Sinai. But then God spoke LATER to the prophet ELIJAH NOT in the fire or the earthquake, but in a “still small voice”. “He spoke to Isaiah by a heavenly vision. God spoke to Hosea through a family crisis. [He spoke to Balaam through a talking DONKEY! ] God [even] spoke to Amos through a basket of fruit!” (David Guzik, “Jesus Speaks - Hebrews 1:1-4”). God can and will use any and EVERY means possible to get through to us!
But what we learn here in v2, is that in His Son JESUS, God has now spoken FINALLY. Jesus is God’s final, decisive, authoritative, once-and-for-all revelation; He need NOT speak again. Jesus says it ALL! He is SUFFICIENT!
God didn’t decide He had MORE to say, later in the 7th c. to the prophet Muhammad, out in the Meccan desert. God didn’t need Joseph Smith to write an APPENDIX to the Bible, called the Book of Mormon, later in the 19th c. He didn’t need Mary Baker Eddy’s “Science and Health” (that’s Christian Science), or Charles Taze Russell’s “The Watchtower” (that’s Jehovah’s Witnesses). God is not speaking new, special words to Kenneth Copeland or any of the other charlatans who promise to share God’s revelation for a nominal fee - No; God has already said EVERYTHING that He wanted and needed to say to us IN HIS SON JESUS! Jesus is God’s FINAL Word; he is God’s MIC DROP. For God to SAY any more now, would be to completely undermine the SUPREMACY and the SUFFICIENCY of His revelation in CHRIST.
Can you IMAGINE someone trying to make a SEQUEL to BRAVEHEART? Or GLADIATOR? Or The Shawshank Redemption. There are some movies that not only don’t NEED a sequel; you can’t MAKE one without severely cheapening and INSULTING the legacy of the original.
Friends: to even SUGGEST that God has something MORE to say, that He needed to ADD to His revelation in CHRIST, is simply BLASPHEMY. It is to SLIGHT the completeness and the consummation - the PERFECTION - of Jesus, God’s FINAL word.
Listen: when you go to an ARETHA concert, and she **“ENDS”** the show with “You Make Me Feel Like a Natural Woman”, but we all know the drill, so we cheer real loud, and she comes back on stage, and THEN she sings “R-E-S-P-E-C-T”, listen: you don’t wait around for ANOTHER finale! “Respect” IS the finale; it’s Aretha’s mic drop; she can’t TOP it. She doesn’t NEED to - “RESPECT” is what you’ve been waiting all night long to HEAR! You can now collect your purse, and drive home happy.
Friends: Jesus IS God’s finale. The author is trying to tell these Hebrews: “Jesus is the One we’ve been waiting 2,000 years, since Father ABRAHAM, to hear God SPEAK”. For God to sing ANY OTHER SONG NOW would be the biggest letdown imaginable; if you’re still hanging around the auditorium, waiting on another ENCORE, I’m afraid you have MISSED the GRAVITY and the AWESOMENESS of God’s Son. God’s FINAL Word.
#2 - Jesus is God’s DESERVING Word. (v2b)
He’s the one “whom [God] appointed the heir of ALL things”.
Jesus is the One God was addressing 1,000 years prior, in Psalm 2:8, when God promised: “I will make [ALL] the nations your heritage”.
Colossians 1:16 says “all things were created… FOR him”.
Romans 11:36 - “all things… are TO him”.
Creation speaks a good word. The old prophets spoke a good word. But none of THEM are gonna inherit the UNIVERSE. Jesus is GREATER because He is the rightful HEIR of it ALL.
If Polly and I DIED tragically tonight, no one reading over our last will and testament tomorrow would be SHOCKED to hear that we had left our FORTUNE to Ellery, Elijah and Bo, to our KIDS. They are our HEIRS. Similarly, Jesus is God’s own SON, His HEIR. The difference is that God owns EVERYTHING!
#3 - Jesus is God’s POWERFUL Word. (v2c, 3b)
He is the One “through whom [God] created the world…”
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.” (Jn 1:1-3)
So how powerful is that? Well, I appreciated Kent Hughes’ attempt to put it in a little perspective (25), he points out that “Cambridge physicist Stephen Hawking… [identifies] our galaxy as an average-sized galaxy that is over 100,000 light-years across - about 600 trillion miles. He says, “We now know that our galaxy is only one of some hundred thousand million galaxies that can be seen using modern telescopes [keep in mind, this commentary was written a decade ago, so I’m sure we’ve discovered magnitudes more galaxies since then; but…], each galaxy itself contain[s] some hundred thousand MILLION stars.”
And astronomers estimate that we have only discovered 4-5% of our universe; the rest still lies BEYOND us.
What’s the point? Any BEING capable of creating THAT kind of universe - THIS kind of universe; a universe so expansive, so GREAT - its CREATOR must necessarily be GREATER STILL. And He IS. Jesus is GREATER.
And by the way, not only did He CREATE it all; He SUSTAINS it all as well. V3 tells us “he upholds the universe… [HOW??] by the word of his power.”
Jesus MAINTAINS the cosmos the same way He CREATED it in the first place: with the most powerful force there IS - His WORD. If Jesus stopped speaking for even a nanosecond, the entire universe would COLLAPSE into nonexistence. Colossians 1:17 says “in him [in CHRIST] all things hold together”.
#4 - Jesus is God’s INCARNATE Word (v3a), His EMBODIED word. The prophets conveyed God’s word; Jesus WAS God’s Word. The prophets said, “Here is God’s message… Thus saith the Lord…”; Jesus said, “I AM God’s message, here in the FLESH!”
“He is the radiance of the glory of God” - Jesus (God the Son) is to Yahweh (God the Father) what its RAYS are to the SUN (Wiersbe, 805). Technically speaking, none of us have ever SEEN our sun; what we see is the LIGHT it EMITS. Similarly, we learned back in Exodus that no one has seen - no one CAN see - God the FATHER (and LIVE to tell about it!). But here’s how John ch1 describes Jesus: “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as OF the only Son from the Father… No one has ever seen God; [but] the only [BEGOTTEN] God, who is at the Father's side, he has made him KNOWN.” (Jn 1:14-18)
Or maybe more simply put, as Jesus would explain to his disciple Phillip, when Phillip asked, ““Lord, show us the Father”, Jesus replied, “Philip - Whoever has seen ME has seen the Father” (Jn 14:8-9). It’d be like staring up at the RAYS, the RADIANCE of the sun, and saying, “I want to see the SUN!” - you CAN’T! The rays ALONE are ALREADY too bright, too GLORIOUS for you; you’re already burning your retinas… And that’s where the analogy breaks down, because looking at the SUN is really BAD for you (don’t do it!), but looking at JESUS - GOD’S Son - is really really GOOD for us; that’s actually the whole reason the author of Hebrews is writing this BOOK: to try and get us to BEHOLD GOD’S SON! LOOK TO JESUS! REVEL in his RADIANCE.
Second, Jesus is described here as “the exact imprint of [God’s] nature”. The Greek word translated there as “exact imprint”, it’s one word - CHARACTER - it’s the word from which we get our ENGLISH word… [wanna guess?] CHARACTER! The idea is an outward manifestation of one’s internal personhood; your “character” is who you ARE, or more precisely, it is the REVELATION of who you are. I can’t see your SOUL, the “seat of your very personhood” (only GOD can). But you can SHOW me who you really are, deep down, through your CHARACTER.
V3 is saying: Jesus is God’s CHARACTER, the very NATURE of His BEING made MANIFEST, made known to us.
Colossians 1 says, Jesus “is the image of the invisible God” (v15) - we can’t see God (this side of eternity anyway) and live to tell about it. But God has drawn us a PICTURE - an “image” - a walking, talking, living, breathing, “exact representation” of Himself, God in the flesh, in the person of JESUS; “in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell” (1:19).
And in these two ANALOGIES - “radiance” and “representor” - we get just a glimpse into the profound mystery of the TRINITY. Hughes explains (27): “As RADIATOR - ‘the radiance of the glory of God’ - Jesus is part of the source, one with the Father. John says, “the Word WAS God” (Jn 1:1). But also as REPRESENTOR - ‘the exact imprint of his nature’ - Jesus is distinct, much as John also emphasizes: “the Word was WITH God”. Jesus is all God… when you see him, you see the Father. But he is also a distinct person. This is… the mystery of the holy Trinity.”
But the big takeaway here is simply (“SIMPLY”?!?!) that Jesus IS God’s Word INCARNATE, EMBODIED, “in the flesh”. When Elijah has trouble getting his car seat buckled in the backseat, I give him my WORDS - I try and TALK him through it: “It’s easier if you buckle the TOP part first, up at your chest… GOOD, now, hold the crotch piece with one hand… No, with your LEFT hand, if you’re buckling the right strap…”, but eventually it becomes clear that the ONLY way his car seat is getting buckled is if I stop sending words back to him from the front seat, and I EMBODY those words - I put my own words into ACTION, I “en-FLESH them”, by crawling INTO the backseat MYSELF to buckle him.
Friends: THAT’S what God did for us, in Christ. He had GIVEN us His word in the LAW - “Here’s how to live…” - He had REMINDED us of His word through the PROPHETS - “Remember: top buckle first…” - but we were just so hopeless and God is just so GRACIOUS that eventually, He decided to just climb in the backseat and buckle us up HIMSELF in the person of JESUS.
And how’d he DO it? How did Jesus protect us, secure us from injury and harm? He did by dying on the cross, in our place, to remove all our sins.
#5 - Jesus is God’s SAVING Word. (v3c)
V3 says he “ma[de] purification for sins” - he CLEANSED us of the stain of our sin. We discussed this in DETAIL back in Exodus, especially as we examined the function of the bronze altar within the tabernacle complex, and the role of the PRIESTS, who offered SACRIFICES, made atonement, made “purification” for the peoples’ SIN. And we’ll discuss it in even GREATER depth later in chapters 9 & 10, where the author of Hebrews is gonna call Jesus our GREATER high priest, because He is Himself our greater SACRIFICE for sin. But for now, let’s just consider this glorious gospel truth in the context of Jesus as God’s better WORD:
Jesus is better than all the prophets because the message that he brought concerning SALVATION was better.
Zechariah had prophesied: “Behold, [Israel,] your king is coming to you;
righteous and having salvation is he”
Jeremiah had prophesied: ““Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with [you]… For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.””
And Isaiah had prophesied how he would DO it; how the Messiah would be “pierced for our transgressions… crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his wounds we are healed.”
Prophet after prophet, for centuries, communicating God’s MESSAGE of SALVATION: “It’s COMING! Just wait - salvation is COMING!”
But friends, Jesus is God’s better word, because HIS message was: “It’s HERE! Salvation is HERE… because I’M here!”
Your long-awaited king, righteous and “having salvation”...
The fulfillment of the new covenant, who FORGIVES your iniquities…
Because I was pierced and crushed for your sins, by MY wounds you are healed - I suffered, bled, and DIED on the cross to pay the penalty for YOUR sins, and satisfy God’s righteous, just WRATH against your sin, I took the chastisement, the punishment, on your behalf, so that YOU might instead be forgiven and SAVED, if you would SIMPLY surrender your life to me in FAITH.
If you were drowning in the middle of the ocean, the sound of a rescue boat off in the distance would be a beautiful sound, wouldn’t it? A good word. And the sound of the sirens of MULTIPLE boats, getting CLOSER - that would be even MORE encouraging. But how much BETTER the sound of the SPLASH of the RESCUER diving in the water to GRAB you and pull you OUT.
THAT’s the sound of Jesus, friends - God’s BETTER word of salvation - it is HERE! Trust in Jesus today - His life, death, and resurrection - and be SAVED.
Finally, #6 - Jesus is God’s REIGNING Word. (v3d)
“After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.”
I love how Richard Phillips explains this: “There were NO SEATS in the temple at Jerusalem. [NO SEATS in the tabernacle - we just spent the last MONTH or so going over God’s blueprints for the tabernacle in the last half of Exodus; do you remember anything about a CHAIR, anywhere in there? NO! Why?] The priests offered sacrifices for the purification of the people day and night without ceasing because the problem of sin had not yet been solved. They never sat down. But when God’s Son… shed his blood for us… He sat down, because there was no more sacrifice to be made, [Jesus] having offered his infinitely holy and precious blood once for all.” (Phillips, 22)
You don’t sit down til the work is FINISHED. And what were Jesus’ penultimate words from the cross, just before he breathed his last?
“IT. IS. FINISHED.” My work of REDEMPTION - the payment for ALL your sins, past, present, and future - FINISHED. Paid in FULL!”
But not only is this a picture of the completion of Jesus’ work as our better high priest; Jesus seated there on the throne, at God’s right hand - the place of HONOR and PRIVILEGE - is a picture NOW of His KINGLY RULE and REIGN. Jesus is God’s REIGNING Word, because AFTER He died for our sins, and was RAISED to life everlasting, “God highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil 2:10-11).
CONCLUSION:
Friends: Jesus Chris IS Lord, He IS God’s GREATER WORD; have you CONFESSED Him as such with YOUR tongue, have you bowed YOUR knee to KING Jesus? The greater prophet, the greater priest, the greatest KING - JESUS is the G.O.A.T., the GREATEST of all time.
Hebrews OPENS with the glorious announcement that ‘God… has spoken to us in His Son’ (1:1-2). Spoiler Alert: it’s gonna END with this WARNING: ‘See to it that you do not refuse Him who is speaking’ (12:25).
And the message of Hebrews all throughout is that because we now HAVE God’s FINAL… DESERVING… POWERFUL… INCARNATE… SAVING… REIGNING… GREATER Word, we are ALL without excuse, not to BELIEVE. Not to TRUST in Him, for salvation.
God has SPOKEN to us - powerfully, SAVINGLY - in Christ. Will you LISTEN, and RESPOND?