Address—C. Hendricks
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Ernest Heade.
To the things which we have heard, lest at anytime we should let them slip.
For if the words spoken by angels was steadfast.
And every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense of reward. How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?
Which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him. God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according to His own will.
For unto the angels hath he not put in subjection the world to come whereof we speak. But one in a certain place testified, saying, What his man?
That thou art mindful of him.
Or the Son of man, that thou visitest him.
Thou madest him a little lower than the angels.
Thou crownest him with glory and honor, and it set him over the works of thy hands.
Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet.
For in that He put all in subjection under him, he left nothing that is not put under him. But now we see not yet all things put under him.
But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death.
Crowned with glory and honor.
That he, by the grace of God, should taste death for every man.
For it, it became him for whom are all things.
And by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings?
For both he that sanctifies and they who are sanctified are all of 1.
For which 'cause he's not ashamed to call them brethren, saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren.
In the midst of the Church will I sing praise unto thee.
And again I will put my trust in him. And again, behold I and the children.
Which God hath given me, for as much then, as the children are partakers of flesh and blood.
He also himself likewise took part of the same that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is the devil, and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to *******.
For verily he took not on him the nature of angels, but he took on him the seed of Abraham. Wherefore in all things it behooved him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people. For in that he himself hath suffered, being tempted, he is able to succor them.
That are tempted.
As you read through this epistle.
You are impressed with the.
Often quotes that are many quotes that he brings forward from the Old Testament.
Of course it's written to Jews.
And they would know these scriptures.
And how he brings them to bear in his teaching, for this is teaching ministry, How he brings these scriptures to bear upon the truth that Jesus is the Messiah.
And he is the Christ.
He is the Anointed 1 and these Old Testament scriptures predicting, looking forward to the coming of this one. He brings them forward as he unfolds this wonderful teaching.
There are a number of instances in this epistle where he warns those that had outwardly embraced Christianity. He warns them of the danger of going back to Judaism.
And giving up the belief in that Jesus is the true Messiah. There was always that danger.
They had to establish them in the fact that the Lord Jesus is infinitely better than all these others that they had put so much.
Trust in and whom they revered so highly, Moses and Abraham and these men of faith of the Old Testament, David, and so on.
So he starts out in this 2nd chapter. He also brings before us, as we had last night in the 1St chapter and again here in this chapter, that the Lord is greater than angels. Though when he became a man in the 1St chapter, he is greater than the angels, and when he comes into the world, the angels worship him. But when he became a man, as we learn in this chapter, he went lower than the angels.
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When he assumed humanity.
Well, we'll come to that.
Now the first verse. Here, therefore, we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard. He's referring now to what they heard from the preaching of the apostles, what they have heard of Christian light. We ought to give the most the more earnest heed, lest at any time we should let them slip.
And I think the other translation gives it. We should slip away from them.
Fall away from them. The danger all through this epistle is apostasy. It's not backsliding.
He's not talking about a backslider when he talks about those that might go back and and turn away from the truth. He's talking about one who abandons Christianity as the truth and Christ is the truth and goes back to Moses and to the leaders in the Old Testament that were so highly revered.
And so there was that danger to to let them slip or to slip away from them, these things that they have heard.
For if the word now he warns them, if the word spoken by angels was steadfast, the law was evidently given through the instrumentality of angels that's mentioned in numbers of times in Scripture given by the Let's look at Acts 7, for instance, where Stephen.
It's giving his message.
Which they answered by stoning him.
But in Acts Chapter 7, it was the last opportunity that Jerusalem had to to receive the Lord Jesus.
He finishes His message where He goes over the whole history of the nation of Israel with her in verse 51 of Act 7. You stiff necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you do always resist the Holy Ghost as your Father's did. So do ye. Now here was a man. He was speaking in the power of the Holy Spirit. So to resist Him was to resist the Holy Spirit, which they had done in the past.
Which of the prophets have not your Father's persecuted? And they have slain them, which showed before of the coming of the Justice One?
Of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers.
Who have received the law. Notice this by the disposition of angels.
And have not kept it.
And So what he says here in Hebrews 2, Umm.
The words spoken by angels was steadfast, yes, and so they had received the law by the disposition of angels that have not kept it. They heard him up to that point, and when they heard these things, they were cut to the heart, Acts 7. And they gnashed on him with their teeth. But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up steadfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing.
On the right hand of God.
You get it again in Galatians. I think it's the third chapter.
Galatians, chapter 3.
We can see what a prominent place the angels had in the former dispensation.
319 Wherefore then serveth the law?
It was added because of transgressions. Galatians 319 Till the seed should come to whom the promise was made, and it was ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator. So evidently the angels were instrumental in giving the law written by God, of course, to Moses, and then he to the people. All right, let's go back to Hebrews 2.
Verse 2 again for if the word spoken by angels.
Was steadfast. Now that's in contrast with the first verse of the 1St chapter. God, who had sundry times in many diverse manners, spake in time passed under the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son.
It was not now through angels, not now through the prophets, but the Son himself speaking, and how serious to reject what has been given by the one who is the Son of God.
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If the word spoken by angels was steadfast in every transgression and disobedience received.
A just recompense of reward. How shall we escape we who have much further light?
We who have heard the word spoken by the Son of God Himself, not by prophets, not by angelic hosts, but by the Lord Jesus himself, how shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?
Which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord.
And was confirmed unto us by them that heard him through the apostles.
God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders and with diverse miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost according to His own will.
So God has spoken in the Old Testament through the prophets and through angelic, angelic hosts, but now he's spoken directly he himself in the person of his Son. How shall we escape, he says, if we neglect so great salvation? He knew the danger there was with these Jews of.
Learning all this added light, being enlightened and and then going back, he speaks of that. Turn over to the 6th chapter for a moment.
That I'm going to read from chapter 5, verse 12, for when for the time, ye ought to be teachers.
You have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of God.
And are become such as have need of milk.
And not of strong meat.
For everyone that uses milk is unskillful in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe.
Now, to remain in the Jewish state of things is to be a babe.
To mature into the Christian truth and light of Christianity is to be.
One that needs the strong meat, but he so many of them were still.
On the level of Jewish light they did. They hadn't really entered in to the full truth of Christianity and all that comes in through the Lord Jesus. Verse 14. But strong meat belongeth to them that are a full age. Those who are full age are those who have graduated from the infant state, which was Judaism, into the adult state, which was Christianity.
Even those who by reason of use says have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil. Not Chapter 6.
Therefore, leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, the new translation gives that the word of the beginning of the Christ.
You get those. You get those things in the Gospels, especially the three synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke.
The Gospel of John has a unique place where it brings out Christian truth before Christianity actually had begun through his death and resurrection. But you have it in in in the teachings that come out in the Gospel of John.
Leaving the word of the beginning of the Christ, let us go on unto perfection. Let us go on. He's telling these Jewish believers unto that which is Christian light perfection.
Not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works.
And of faith toward God. These are all truths that they had held in the Old Testament of the doctrine of baptisms. It should be the doctrine of washings. It has nothing to do with Christian baptism. It's an unfortunate translation. It's the doctrine of washings. They in the Jewish economy and ritual of things, they washed. They washed their their feet and their hands as the priests served. They were bathed all over. The sacrifices were washed and so on. That's what he's referring to.
All of those things and of laying on of hands, the laying on of the hands of the offer and the priest with the sacrifice and so on, and of resurrection of the dead. Notice the Jewish belief is resurrection of the dead. That's a very general expression. Christian truth is resurrection from among the dead.
Not of the dead.
Resurrection of the dead is just a general thought, and there are many in Christendom today that that's as far as they've been taught. That's as far as they understand one general resurrection at the end of time when all the dead will be raised. Resurrection from among the dead is Christian truth. That is when the Lord comes for us, He will raise those who believe in him in this present day. And the Old Testament Saints from among the dead and the rest of the dead who have no faith and died in in unbelief will remain in the grave. They won't be raised.
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Until after the 1000 years are finished of the Lord's reign, so Christian truth of the resurrection is from among the dead, and the general Jewish light that they had was resurrection of the dead.
And then he says, and of eternal judgment.
That was this vague teaching and belief of judgment that would come, which would be eternal judgment.
He says leaving the principles, leaving these things now, he doesn't mean that he that they were to give them up, abide with those teachings only they were to make progress. They were to graduate from the infant state to the mature state.
So he says, this will we do if God permit. In other words, he will go on to what pertains to full growth. Now notice verse 4 of chapter 6. For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened. Now he's referring to these Christians, Jews who had embraced Christianity, had embraced receiving the Lord Jesus as the true Messiah. They were enlightened.
Now, he says, it's impossible for those who were once enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift.
The heavenly gift has to do with Christian truth.
And were made partakers of the Holy Ghost. Now that's a that's an expression that is.
Has stumbled many, they said. Well, if they have received the Holy Ghost, they must be truly saved. No, not necessarily.
There are two words in the New Testament.
Of for a communion, one word means communion and the other word means partakers of something.
Outside of yourself, the thought of communion is a joint participation in it. Now, if that had been the word that was used here, that we were made.
Brought into the communion of the Holy Ghost, then we'd have a real problem of of of the the idea that you could be saved and lost again. But he says we're made partakers of the Holy Ghost. Is that one who comes among the Christian company and outwardly embraces Christianity.
And moves among Christians who are real. You may not be real yourself, but you're a partaker of the Holy Ghost. In that sense, that is your you're a partaker of the sphere where the Holy Spirit dwells.
And everyone of us who is brought up in a Christian home is in that sense a partaker of the Holy Ghost. Doesn't mean they've been born again, doesn't mean they've been sealed by the Spirit of God, doesn't mean they have eternal life, but they are in the sphere where the Holy Spirit dwells. And so there are partakers of the Holy Ghost in that sense. And it's a most solemn thing to be in that sphere, to be brought up in that sphere, especially today, the Holy Spirit dwelling on earth in the assembly.
And if you move in that circle, you are a partaker of the Holy Spirit, whether you've been born again or not.
Judas Iscariot, in a sense, in the in the sense I'm Speaking of, was a partaker of the Holy Spirit because he he cast out demons and he did miracles just like the rest.
But he wasn't the Lord's.
So you can you can come that close to the reality and miss it.
And that's why it is so essential and important that you're not just an outwardly a partaker of the Spirit and of the blessings of the Spirit of God, but that it's a vital thing with you that you've been born of the Spirit, you've been born again, and you've been sealed of the Spirit of God and that he dwells in you.
So he says it's impossible for those who were once enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come. They even maybe had done miracles like Judas did and.
What does it say if they shall fall away, if they shall apostatize, if they shall renounce Christianity and go back to Judaism? He says. It's impossible to renew them again to repentance.
So he's not talking about a backslider here. If he was, then if, then this passage would teach those that say this is a backslider that if you slide back and fall away from the Lord, get out of fellowship, it's impossible to renew you again to repentance. But that's not true. A backslider can be renewed. He can repent, he can be restored to fellowship, but one who is an apostate, and that's what you have dealt with here.
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In Hebrews.
It's impossible to renew them again unto repentance.
Seeing they crucified to themselves the Son of God, afresh their people crucified him. An apostate is one among the Jews is one that finally comes to the conclusion the leaders of my nation.
Were right when they crucified Jesus. He was an impostor. He was not the Messiah, and I take sides with them. So he is in him in his own heart crucifying. He's adding his Amen to what the Jewish leaders did to the Lord Jesus when they rejected him. So it says, seeing they crucified to themselves the Son of God afresh and put him to an open shame.
So what Hebrews is constantly talking about and warning against is apostasy.
A renouncing.
Of Christianity and going back to Judaism most solemn thing with one has had all the light and the truth of the heavenly gift and and and the and the been brought into the sphere where the Spirit of God is working and operating by these miraculous signs in that and maybe even do some of those things you remember the verse where the Lord said some will come to me and say, Lord Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name and in thy name have done many mighty works and.
Will say, I never knew you. Depart from me, ye workers of iniquity.
All right.
Let's go back to Chapter 2.
Again, with those comments before us, verse 3, I'll read it again. How shall we escape?
If we neglect so great salvation.
Which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him.
God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders and with diverse miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost according to His own will.
For unto the angels hath he not put in subjection the world to come whereof we speak. The world to come is what we call the Millennium. When the Lord will reign here for 1000 years, He will come back with His assembly, with His Saints, and establish His rights in this world.
But he's not subjected that scene, that coming scene, that coming Kingdom is not subjected to angels.
But to a man.
To a man, just as going back to Genesis 1 and 2.
He placed that whole earthly creation under a man, Adam. He was the head of it, and all was placed in subjection to Him. The Lord Jesus is that second man. That last Adam, the first man failed and surrendered everything.
The second man, the enemy attacked him just like he attacked Adam.
Lust of the flesh And when Eve saw that the tree was good for food, lest the flesh and pleasant of the eyes, the lust of the eyes and a tree desired to make one wise the the pride of life, she took it, and she was deceived by the serpent.
He listened to, she listened to him and she was deceived, but Adam was not. And she took the the fruit and she gave it to her husband. She sort of stepped back and said to the serpent, you talked to my husband, you talked to Adam. He's the head. But she didn't do that. So the sin came into the human race when the woman got out of her place and when man allowed her to do that.
When he was right there, because it says she took of it and gave it to him who was by her, he was right there and.
Sin came in, so the human race fell.
It's very beautiful.
In Genesis 2.
In Genesis 3 after the fall.
He asks Adam what happened, and he says the woman whom thou gave us to be with me, she gave me of the fruit, and I did eat.
Then he asked the woman what happened. The serpent deceived me, and I did eat. And then he talks to the serpent. He said, because that was done, This cursed art thou above all cattle, and so on.
He says his most profound thing, the first promise in the Bible of a coming Redeemer. He says the seed of the woman shall crush thy head, and thou shalt crush his heel.
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The seed of the woman. He introduced sin into the human family through the woman.
God says he counters this by saying I'm going to introduce the Redeemer who will crush your power.
Through the woman.
The very one you used is the very one I will use to defeat you.
And so we have that developed in this chapter very beautifully.
Verse 5 again.
Unto the angels hath he not put in subjection the world to come, whereof we speak?
But one in a certain place testified saying.
What is?
That thou art mindful of him.
Or the Son of man, that thou visitest him.
Thumb made his Tim a little lower than the angels.
Thou crownest him with glory and honor.
And it set him.
Over the works of thy hands.
Thou has put all things in subjection under his feet.
All things turn back to Psalm 8. He's quoting the Old Testament all the time here in this epistle, building his Christian teachings based on Old Testament passages.
Psalm 8 This is a Psalm that looks forward to.
To that coming day.
When the Lord will reign.
O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth.
Who has set thy glory above the heavens in that day? How exodus thy name in all the earth in that day. The earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea. It won't be necessary in that day to say, Know the Lord, For all shall know me. From the least to the greatest all shall know me.
Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength, because of the thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger.
When I consider thy heavens the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars.
Which thou hast ordained.
What is man, that thou art mindful of him?
And the Son of man, that thou visitest him, for thou hast made him a little lower than the angels.
And has crowned him with glory and honor. Now Satan was an Angel, and he was the highest 1 And when God created Adam and set him over this whole earthly creation, Satan was intensely jealous of that.
He immediately set himself to spoiling it, which he did right away. He came in and he spoiled it.
But the second man.
The last Adam.
He could not. He attacked him in the wilderness with the same temptations. If thou be the Son of God, command these stones to be made bread. Satisfy your hunger. He was hungry after 40 days fasting.
And the Lord said, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.
And then he goes on with the same kinds of temptations that he had given to Eve, and she fell for it. But the Lord Jesus rebuked him in every case.
He is the victor. Well, let's go on. In Psalm 8, what is man? Thou art mindful of him, and the Son of man that thou visitest him. Verse 5. Thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and has crowned him with glory and honor. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands. Thou has put all things under his feet. All sheep and oxen. Yeah, and the beasts of the field, creation under Adam.
And then it ends again with the same thing it begins with began with, O Lord our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth. Now going back to Hebrews 2, this is what he's quoting from.
Verse 6 Again, But one in a certain place that Psalm 8 testified, saying, What is man? That thou art mindful of him, or the Son of man, that Thou visited him, Thou madest him a little lower than the angels. Thou crowned him with glory and honor, and it set him over the works of thy hands. That was true of Adam the first man. Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet, for in that he put all in subjection under him, he left nothing that is not put under.
But now we see not yet all things put under him.
But now he applies this to the second man, to the Lord Jesus. But we see Jesus.
Who was made a little lower than the angels? Why? For the suffering of death.
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Crowned with glory and honor.
That's used in a little different sense now. In the glory he's on high. He's crowned with glory and honor that he, by the grace of God, should taste death for every man.
He was made a little lower than the angels. He came into humanity. He became one of us that he might.
Taste death for every man he might pay the penalty for the transgression that came in through Adam and Eve.
For it became him God. It became him God.
For whom are all things?
And by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect?
Through sufferings.
He was made perfect in resurrection, He went through the death of the cross, He suffered those awful sufferings and putting our sins away. And now he's been made perfect, the head of a new creation.
Risen from the dead, made perfect in resurrection glory through sufferings.
He went through those sufferings, bore the judgment that your sins and mine deserved, and now there he is, the head of a new order of things.
And he's there because he's gone through sufferings.
Now, verse 11.
For both, he that sanctifieth, that's the Lord Himself.
He's the sanctifier, and they who are sanctified, that's us who believe we're the sanctified ones are all of 1.
We have the same life, we have the same nature.
We have the same father.
We are one with him.
Are all of 1.
For which causes not ashamed.
To call them brethren.
Brethren.
Remember in John 20, in resurrection, he said to Mary Magdalene. He gave her that wonderful message. Go to my brethren.
And tell them, I ascend unto my father, and to your Father, to my God, and to your God.
What a message. He puts them in his own place, before the Father and before God.
He calls them brethren.
And here it says he's not ashamed.
To call them brethren. We're one with him, Lord Jesus, are we one with Thee, O height, O depth of love.
There's a teaching in Christendom which is wrong, that the Lord united himself to man.
In humanity, when he became Incarnate, that is wrong.
One verse in John 12 proves it's wrong.
Let's read it rather than me quote it.
We'll come back here to Hebrews in a moment, but let's just read this verse. It's so John 12.
Verse 23.
And Jesus answered them, saying, the hour has come.
That the Son of Man should be glorified.
Verily, verily, I say unto you.
Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die.
It abideth alone.
But if it die.
It bringeth forth much fruit.
If the Lord Jesus had abode alone, not died.
These truths that we're looking at here, that we're now one with him, would not be so.
His death formed the foundation.
For the many to the abundant crop to be produced, if it died, it bringeth forth much fruit.
So we are united to Him in resurrection.
Not before.
Not before the resurrection. He was made perfect, as it says here and.
We are now one with him.
I'll read verse 10 again. For it became him, God, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things?
In bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through suffering.
For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of 1.
For which 'cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren.
In the midst of the Church will I sing praise unto thee.
And again.
That's a quote from the 22nd Psalm, and again I will put my trust in him.
Again, that's a quote from Second Samuel.
And again, behold, I and the children which God hath given me. A quote from Isaiah chapter 8.
He's quoting from the Old Testament, putting these things together to show how that now in Christianity, there's a fulfillment of these things that goes far beyond anything that they had ever thought of in the Old Testament.
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For as much then as the children.
Are partakers of flesh and blood.
He also himself likewise took part of the same.
That through death.
He might destroy him, annul his power, him that had the power of death, that is the devil, and deliver them who through fear of death.
Were all their lifetime.
Subject to ******* deliver them.
Deliver them from Satan's power.
Defeat Satan and know his power. Destroy him.
As to his power and deliver those who were under his sway.
Those who, through fear of death, were all their lifetimes subject to *******. We do not fear death as Christians. The Lord has gone into death. He's come out in glorious triumph in resurrection.
He's the first fruits.
Afterwards, those that are Christ that is coming, he the first fruits.
Boys, would you listen?
He's the first fruits.
Afterward, all of us will be taken home in resurrection power.
Again, verse 14.
Important that we repeat these verses.
And that we understand the immensity of the truth that is being presented here to these Jewish believers.
Or I should say more accurately, these Jewish professors, many of them believers. Not all, though.
For as much, then, as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, we all partake of it.
He also himself likewise took part of the same He came to where we were in order to save us. He had to become one of us.
Wonderful truth.
He also himself took part of the same that through death.
He might destroy him that had the power of death, that is the devil, and deliver them who through fear of death.
Were all their lifetimes subject to *******? We don't fear death now. Death is ours. Look at First Corinthians 3. First Corinthians chapter 3, verse 21.
Therefore, let no man glory in men.
For all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death.
Or things present, or things to come. All are yours. Death is ours.
And here Christ.
In Christ is God's.
Turn back to Romans 8, Romans 8.
Verse 38. The end of this glorious chapter. Verse 37. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God.
Which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Many of our brethren today.
In Muslim lands and communist lands are paying what we call the supreme sacrifice by giving their lives because they belong to Christ.
Death is ours. It is not some awful tyrant that we fear. He has gone through it and come out in resurrection power.
And so there's this, there's this sense of victory for those who were his if they put us to death.
Those that go to martyrdom, they're just ushering that person into the presence of the Lord.
And awaiting the resurrection day in His presence, death is ours. How wonderful that we do not fear that awful.
A power that Satan wielded over us all the years before we got saved.
He who had the power of death. He uses death to keep man from even thinking of what's going to happen to him after he passes over and goes through the article of death and has to meet God on the other side.
Verse 15 now Hebrews 2 and deliver them.
Who through fear of death, were all their lifetime subject to Bondi *******. Now we have to correct the translation again in verse 16. It's wrong.
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It's not just, it's not just a slight thing. This is wrong. For verily he took not on him the nature of angels. That's not what it says in the original.
Verily he took not hold of angels by the hand.
That is, He did not espouse the cause of angels, but whose cause did he espouse, He took on him.
By the hand is the thought, the seed of Abraham. He did not die for angels.
Those who have sinned, who are angels, there is no redemption for them.
There is no salvation provided for them. They rebelled against God in which followed Satan. There is no there are those that teach that universal reconciliation. There's a day coming when even the devil himself will be reconciled. That is not the teaching of Scripture.
The death of Christ does not avail for angels.
It only avails for those who partake of flesh and blood, which He himself took part of, that he might save us.
Man fell into sin from an outside source, Satan.
Had tempted him and led him astray.
Not so the angels. And so there is no salvation held out in scripture for angels. So it should read Verily He took not, He took not hold of angels by the hand.
But he took hold of the seed of Abraham. Wherefore in all things seed of Abraham are those that have faith.
Those that believe Abraham was the man of faith.
Father of the Faithful.
He took hold of the seed of Abraham.
Wherefore in all things?
It behooved him.
To be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful High Priest.
In things pertaining to God.
To make again, it should be corrected not reconciliation here, but propitiation.
For the sins of the people, there are two instances.
Reconciliation should be propitiation in Hebrews 2.
And if you turn back to Romans 5.
In Romans 5 verse 10 for if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. That's correct. That's the right word, reconciled. And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the IT ought to be the reconciliation.
The word reconciled in the previous verse is the verb, and this is the noun of the same word, not the atonement. Atonement and propitiation are the same thing. They've got these two passages, just backwards, the enrollments. It ought to be the reconciliation, and in Hebrews here it ought to be to make propitiation for the sins of the people. What's that alluding to? It's alluding to the great day of Atonement in Leviticus 16, when the high.
With blood went into the holy place once a year, and only once could he dare enter into that place in a cloud of incense and with blood. And he sprinkled the blood before the altar and upon it.
And it made propitiation it it met the eye of God. As the cherubim looked down upon that altar, upon that mercy seat, they could see the blood. That blood propitiated God.
Glorified Goddess to the whole sin question.
I like this definition of propitiation. Listen to it carefully.
Propitiation is that aspect of the work of Christ by which all sin is met.
For the eye of God to behold.
And to see it is met and judged. Propitiation is meeting all the claims of God's holiness with respect to sin, so as to maintain untarnished that holiness while acting in grace. Now God is free, because of the blood and the mercy seat, to act in grace towards mankind.
Because he has been propitiated.
That is Christ's work.
Has met his holy eye.
And he is glorified by what Christ did on the cross. That's the most important aspect of the work of Christ. It's what he did before God. And for God next comes to us. The next is the thought of substitution. He bore my sins in his own body on the tree.
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That substitution, we usually put that first as though that's the most important. That's not the most important, is the blood on the mercy seat, the propitiatory sacrifice of Christ. He is the propitiation for our sins before God. When God looks upon the blood, he doesn't see our sins anymore. They're gone and He's been propitiated. So this ought to read verse 17 again.
Wherefore in all things it behooved him.
To be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God. To make propitiation for the sins of the people.
For in that he himself hath suffered, being tempted, he is able to succor.
Them that are tempted. Now it says He was made in all things like unto his brethren. But there is a qualification to that in the 4th chapter, and I'll turn you to it now in the 4th chapter, verse 14. Seeing then that we have a great high priest that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God.
Let us hold fast our profession, for we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are now. We have His temptation, when it says in all points He was made like to man. That means He became a true man, spirit, soul and body. In all points he's a full man.
But when it comes to temptation, it says but was in all points tempted, as we are yet without sin. But you'll notice the word yet is in italics. It makes you think it means yet without sinning. But that's not what it means. It means yet without. It's not not the yet. It means He was tempted in all points as we are sin apart or without sin. There was no sin in him. There was nothing in him to respond to the temp.
He was that holy one of God. So that's The only exception to his humanity. It was in a different state than ours. We have humanity in a sinful fallen condition. He has humanity in a holy condition, sin apart. So his temptation came from without, from Satan. He had no inner urge to sin.
He had nothing that was not according to God in his holy nature, sin apart.
Now let's just in a few minutes, let's just go on the few verses in the 3rd chapter. Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling?
How? That's a contrast with Judaism where they had an earthly calling, an earthly land that they were going to. Now these Christians are partakers of the heavenly calling. Consider the apostle and high priest of our profession, Christ Jesus. As the apostle, the Lord Jesus is sent from God, and he's speaking to us from God. He's the Synth 1.
He's representing God to man, and as the high priest, he's representing man to God.
Man to God he is both.
The apostle was like Moses. Moses spoke the word of God to Israel, to the people.
And Aaron was the one that represented them in a priestly character to God. So the Lord is.
He fulfills both of those offices. He's the apostle and high priest of our profession, Christ Jesus, who was faithful to him that appointed him as also, Moses was faithful in all his house. His house refers to God's house. Moses was a faithful servant in God's house.
For this man.
Referring to the Lord Jesus now was counted worthy of more glory than Moses.
Inasmuch as he who hath builded the house hath more honor than the house. But we saw that in the 1St chapter that He made all things, He made the world's, He upholds all things by the word of His power. He's the Creator, He's the one that made the house.
Moses was merely a faithful servant in the house. Christ was a son over the house, as he goes on to say.
He that built all verse 4 again, but every house for every house is builded by some man, but he that built all things is God.
So the end of verse 3 is I'll read verse 3 again. For this man Christ was counted worthy of more glory than Moses.
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For as much inasmuch as he who hath builded the house hath more honor than the house.
For every house is builded by some man, but he that build all things is God.
And Moses fairly was faithful in all God's house, his house, Oregon, God's house.
As a servant.
For a testimony of those things which were to be spoken after.
But Christ.
As the son over his house, it says his own house. And that's true. It is his house because he is God. But it's God's house he's talking about all the way through. The contrast is Moses was a faithful servant in God's house. Christ was a son.
In God's house, Christ as a son over God's house, whose house are we?
How can he be over God's house if he is not God himself?
It's God's house and he is God the Son, as we have this so beautifully brought out in these chapters, the glory of this person.
He was faithful in all God's house.
Moses was now Christ as a son.
Over his house.
Take the word own out. It sort of sort of Mars the thought it's God's house he's talking about all the way through Christ as a son over God's house. Whose house are we?
We constitute the House of God, not what Solomon built in the Old Testament, which was a building of stone and beautiful things and that, but this house is is built by God and it's composed of people.
We are.
God's house, whose house are we? And then he says.
If we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of hope.
Unto the end, and there's a lot of warnings in this third chapter about.
He goes back to the nation of Israel. They left Egypt. They were delivered from the House of ******* and from the power of Pharaoh and the Egyptians.
And many of them didn't make it to the promised land. They didn't make it. They fell in the wilderness through unbelief. And this is the danger that he's bringing before these professing.
Jews that if they don't continue, if we hold fast the confidence rejoicing of hope firm unto the end, if they don't continue, they won't make it either.
If they're real, they will continue. It's not, it's not teaching here that you can be truly saved and then lost again. But you can be a professor. You can be a partaker of the Holy Spirit in the outward sense and still not be real.
And fall in the wilderness, as Israel did through unbelief.
Unbelief. The important thing is do you believe? Do you? Do you have personal faith?
Not your parents faith, not your mother's faith, not your father's faith, not your brother's faith or your sister's faith. Do you personally believe?
That the Lord Jesus is God the Son.
If you believe that.
You are part of God's house. You have eternal life. You are sure of heaven.
And you won't fall in the wilderness like so many Israelites did. It's a thrilling book.
Hebrews 86 hymn #86-O. Lord, thou art seated above the heavens on high, Thy gracious work completed, for which thou camest to die. To Thee our hearts are lifted.
While pilgrims wandering here.
For thou alone are gifted are every weight to bear.