Jesus Our Lord Jesus Christ is God s best thought and His last word! When the Almighty wanted to say something of eternal significance, He said, Jesus. Today when the business world, the media, and politicians are stressing the importance of good communication, it is essential to realize that God has spoken across the communication gap of all time-the breach between a Holy God and sinful man. We must respond. It will not be a meeting of equals, a conversation between creatures of the same essence, but rather a meeting of Creator and created, of Infinite and finite. I am often asked, How does God speak to us today? Is His voice like ours? How will we recognize His voice? The first few verses of Hebrews tell us that in Old Testament times, God spoke many times and in various ways to holy men. He spoke to them directly by his Spirit, or in visions or dreams. He spoke through angels who are His special messengers, and He revealed Himself by theophanies (appearances of God Himself as an angel of Jehovah). But this was only part of the story, a fragment of the whole. It is as if God were an artist, sketching the outline of a picture. When Christ came, the picture was completed, finished, leaving nothing to the imagination. The written word of the Old Testament is like the headline news, while the full explanation of God is like an autobiography, written in living words across the person and life of Jesus Christ. God, as Hebrews 1:2 tell us, in these last days has spoken to us by His Son. So, What has He said? you 1
ask. God has told us that Jesus is His beloved Son and that we are to listen to Him. We must consider His Word carefully, paying full attention to the message He wants to communicate to us. And what is this message? Christ is heir. God wants us to know that Christ is heir-he has been appointed heir of all things (Heb. 1:2). Heirship comes with sonship. And the heavenly Father has provided a magnificent, eternal inheritance for His Son- all things were created by Him and for Him (Col. 1:16b). Jesus is to inherit not only the earth, but the entire universe as well. The unbelievable news in that He has chosen to share His wonderful inheritance with us. In bringing many sons to glory, both those who make men holy and those who are made holy are part of the same family and Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers. Romans 8:16-19 reiterates the fact that we are joint-heirs with Christ. Christ is creator. Moffat says, What the Son was to possess He had been instrumental in making through whom also He made the ages. Not only is Christ the creator, He is also the sustainer of all that He created. In Hebrews 1:2 we read, But in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, and through whom He made the universe. Not long ago I was on an airplane flight where we were experiencing a pretty rough ride. The man sitting next to me mumbled something about wishing his feet were on solid ground. I don t know how such a heavy thing stays in the air, he muttered. I had just been reading an article in a flight magazine about the weight of the world, so I shared it with him. The writer of the article seemed to suggest that 2
the solid ground which hangs there in space, is even more of a miracle. I was able to tell my flight companion about the God who sustains all things by His powerful word (Heb. 1:3) and whom I knew personally! Christ is God. As Christians, we believe that only God creates. And the Book of Hebrews clearly teaches us that Christ, who created, is God! (Heb 2:2) He is the visible and outward expression of the majesty and presence of the Lord. Once or twice, while God walked this planet in a Jewish body, His divine glory broke through the trappings of His humanity. We see this in Luke 9:28-36 where Peter, James, and John, whom Jesus had chosen to accompany Him to the mountain to pray, saw the Lord transfigured before their very eyes. It was at times like this that the very expression of God s substance, the representation of His being, in fact, the imprint of His essential nature, was seen. The Greek word used for substance, hypostasis, carries with it the concept of the impress of a stamp, coin, or ring. Jesus is the very stamp of God. Anyone who has seen Me has seen the Father, Jesus told His disciples (John 14:9). We cannot come to God apart from Christ, because Christ is God, and how can we come to God apart from God? Faith Enough to Finish Christ is Saviour. Hebrews 1:3 says that He provided purification for [our] sins. At a single point in time, the Son of God shed His blood and finished His work here on earth with an unrepeatable act. It is finished! He cried in triumph. Notice He did not cry, I am finished! but rather It is finished! You see, Jesus is not only active in the universe, but in the moral and personal realms as well. 3
Christ Is Lord. After fulfilling His mission, Jesus Christ our Saviour sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven (Heb 1:3b). In no way does this statement indicate that our Lord retired. On the contrary, the Scriptures teach us that our exalted Head is ceaseless in His activity-sustaining the universe, ruling history, and working on our behalf. The right hand of the Majesty on high indicates a place of equality, not subordination, for the seat is a throne around which all the angels of God worship Him. Christ is supreme. Christ is, in fact, greater than the angels, greater than the greatest of men, and greater than the devil and all his emissaries. If we believe that Jesus is Lord and that this word, which was declared by angels in the Old Testament and delivered in person in the New, is indeed true, then it seems totally unthinkable to do anything else but fall on our faces and worship Him. The first century Christians to whom the Epistle of Hebrews was written, knew all these things, and yet were in danger of drifting away from the truths that they had received. They were willfully neglecting and failing to practice the faith they professed. Really, is it any different today? To drift away is literally to flow by; to slip away. This phrase can be used to describe a boat drifting aimlessly, a ring slipping off a finger, or a dripping faucet losing precious water. When my sister and I were just children, our family owned a small cabin cruiser on a lake in the middle of the beautiful English Lake District. Sometimes Father would leave my mother, sister, and me on the boat for a vacation, joining us 4
again for the weekends. My mother, who was bit nervous about the dinghy drifting away as we were moored a little way from shore, would thread the rope through the porthole and wrap it around her wrist. Then she would go to sleep, saying in effect, Take me, take my boat! If only we would so earnestly endeavor to stay securely moored to the truths we have learned about Christ. The warning of Scripture is clear, We must pay more careful attention, therefore, to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away. For if the message spoken by angels was binding, and every violation and disobedience received its just punishment, how shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation? (2:1-3) The opposite of neglect is to pay close attention to. Either course of action is a choice. The readers of this letter were established believers, and yet, the pressures of their circumstances were such that they were willfully neglecting the basic tenets of their faith. What can cause us to drift in our faith life? I wrestled with this very issue years ago as a young missionary. Times were hard for me as a mother of three preschoolers. My husband was continually gone due to the course of his work. I became angry with God for permitting this stressful situation and I began to allow my spiritual disciplines to slip. I remember making a very definite decision to let go of the rope and let the boat-the truths I believed drift out of sight. Each day I consciously chose to ignore what I had learned about the Lord. It was not easy at first, but soon it became a habit. After three miserable months, I began to pay attention to Christ again. By a sheer act of the will I chose to read the Book of Hebrews and was 5
confronted with words like these, if we ignore such a great salvation (Heb. 2:3) and do not harden your hearts (3:8). I had deliberately let the truths of Jesus leak away, like the constant dripping of a water tap. It was not long before the Word of God did its own wonderful renewing and refreshing work in my heart and I found myself wrapping the dinghy rope firmly around my wrist again, saying to my world, Take me, take my boat! It was what I knew of Christ that restored my relationship and fellowship with Him. As I studied the Scriptures, I was reminded that He was my Lord, that I had been redeemed to meet His expectations, that He wanted to save me from selfishness, and that He was to be supreme in my life. It was what I relearned of Christ that enabled me to exert my will and respond, submitting my life and circumstances to Him. He was there, as He had always been, to assure me that He fully understood my predicament. After all, He had left His own home in heaven for thirty-three long years. And as a faithful High Priest who ever liveth to make intercession for me (Heb. 7:25), I knew He would be praying about it. What a comfort and what a release! 6