|
|
HOLY HELP FOR THE HOPELESSACCOMPLISHES GOD'S ETERNAL PURPOSEHebrews 2:5-13 INTRODUCTION Two weeks ago I preached on the first four verses of chapter two. In those four verses we are warned that we must pay careful attention to Christ and his gospel so that we do not drift away from Christ and thus be destroyed, like a ship running aground on a reef. After the sermon several people came up to me and expressed their dismay at how hard it is to pay attention. Between job and family and caring for homes and aging parents and the endless distractions of an entertainment saturated culture, paying attention to Christ feels like an almost impossible task. I have repeatedly heard this complaint over the years as I have talked with people about the purpose of life, which is, to know God as he is revealed in Jesus and to grow in our enjoyment of him. More than one person, when confronted with the fact that the purpose of life is to seek God has exclaimed, "So am I supposed to go be a monk!" "How can I pay attention to Christ and my wife and my job and my children? I can't do it all." All who understand how amazing it is to belong to God through Christ regularly feel guilty about how indifferent they are to Christ and how inattentive we are to him and his salvation. The Thursday after I preached that sermon, exhorting us to pay more careful attention to Christ, I went deer hunting for five days. I determined before I left that I was not going to do what I do every time I go deer hunting and that is to ignore God. Yet, when I returned from hunting Tuesday night I had done what I always do, I had hardly given God a thought while hunting. You would think that sitting alone in the woods would be an excellent time to pray and meditate on Christ and his gospel. There are no distractions except for an occasional bird or squirrel. However, no matter how many times I tell myself I am going to pray, I don't. My attention is fixed upon the silence, listening for the approaching footsteps of a deer and my eyes are constantly scanning the woods for the telltale movement. I cannot pay attention to deer hunting and pay attention to Christ at the same time. So I returned from hunting feeling guilty, just like I do every time I go hunting. I ignored God and people, even though I lived with my brothers, dad, son and nephews in a 22 foot by 24 foot cabin for five days. So what am I to do? How can I claim to be a Christian? How can I be a pastor? How can I possibly stand in front of you and say the things I say? There are three things to say. First, what we are to pay attention to is Christ and his gospel, not our paying attention. This is the great tension in the Christian life. Let's say that I had read my Bible and prayed for two hours every day while deer hunting and that I had spoken with my family about Christ and joyfully gotten up an hour before them and made pancakes and eggs for breakfast each morning, would there have been no cause for feeling guilty when I returned home? We betray ourselves when our guilt is diminished or eliminated by our performing particular religious or moral actions. If I don't feel guilty is it because I have not sinned or is it because I subtly believe that right standing with God is due to what I do and not to what Christ has done? No one is forgiven of their sins and going to heaven because they perfectly pay attention to Christ but because Christ always paid attention for us and he died for all the times we fail to pay attention. To pay attention to Christ is first of all to trust in Christ's life and death for me and second of all it is about my conscious efforts to pay attention. I must never confuse the two. Second, does that mean God doesn't care whether or not I prayed for five days? No. It is a sin to ignore God. Therefore, I must confess my sins to him. I must tell him that it was and is a sin to not pay attention to him and then I must thank him that in spite of my indifference to him I am forgiven because Christ was not indifferent to him and because Christ died for my indifference. Confession is the daily work of Christians. Christians don't ignore their sins, they confess them. Third, I must ask God for help to pay better attention. I must ask God to increase my faith. The cool thing is that God has given us his word to provide us with that help. In particular he has given us this letter to the Hebrews. Look at v. 5. In chapter one the author showed us how much greater Christ is than everyone and everything, including angels. Then in 2:1-4 he exhorts us to pay more careful attention because Christ and his salvation are so great. Now, in v. 5 he goes back to his main theme. He continues discussing the greatness of Christ and his salvation. But notice that he transitions not right back to Christ but to "the world that is to come." He says that the subject of his conversation with us is the end result of God's plan for the universe, a new world that is like this world but infinitely greater and better because it is a world without sin and God's curse upon sin. This world that is to come is not going to be ruled over by angels. By whom then is this coming world going to be ruled? To answer that question, the author quotes 2 1/2 verses from Psalm 8. What he is doing here is amazing. He takes us back to Psalm 8 in order to first show us the purpose for which God made the world and then to show us how God is fulfilling his purpose in and through Christ. The goal of this author is to increase our faith, our confidence that God is fulfilling his ultimate purpose for the universe. When you are engaged in a long and difficult endeavor in which you are tempted to give up what do you need to help you to keep going? You need two things. First, you need to know that the end result will be worth it. The Olympic athlete needs to be reminded that standing on the podium with the gold medal will be worth all the trouble of training. The student needs to know that getting the degree and the access the degree confers will be worth the late nights of study and not partying. The second thing you need to know is that success is not in doubt. No matter how hopeless it might feel now, you can be confident that the promised benefit will be yours without a doubt. This is the point of the author's argument in vv. 5-13. God has a goal for the universe and for his people that is absolutely glorious and he is going to make sure that his goal is accomplished. MAIN POINT God’s purpose for human beings is realized only in Jesus because…
I. Human beings are obviously not experiencing the promised glory (vv. 5-8) In v. 5 the author asserts that he and his audience are discussing the "world that is to come." He has also said that this coming world, the new heavens and the new earth, is not going to be ruled over by angels. Then in vv. 6-8a he quotes Psalm 8, verses 4, 5 and the second half of v. 6. Then, in the second half of v. 8 and vv. 9-10 the author of Hebrews gives us the meaning of Psalm 8. We need to turn back to Psalm 8 first of all. Psalm 8 is a poetic reflection by David upon the creation account in Genesis 1-2. When David looks at the complexity and majesty of the created world and then considers the unique position and special care that God has given to human beings he is forced to ask a question. In comparison to the obedient and awesome creation of what significance is disobedient and finite humanity? What is there about mankind that would draw God's favor or motivate him to care for us? Verse four is the central concern of the psalm: given who we are, why does God care? The psalm doesn't really answer the question. In order to show that God has indeed cared about humanity he lists four things that God has done for puny man. First, he made human beings a little lower than angels, those terrifying and mighty heavenly beings who live in God's unveiled presence and willingly serve him. Humankind, in our current condition, is but a small step less than mighty angels. Second, God crowned human beings with glory and honor. He made us in his image and likeness. Unlike angels or any other created being, human beings reflect and reveal something of the very nature and being of God in our existence and our living. Third, he made humans rulers over all of creation. Fourth, he made all things subject to us. He has placed every created being, including angels under us, subservient to us. Now look back at Hebrews 2. In the second half of v. 8 the author begins to tell us what the Psalm means. First, he points out that the language of Psalm 8 does not permit anything to not be subject to human beings. God left nothing that was not subject to us. In the original it is an emphatic statement. There is nothing in all of creation that does not submit to human beings. No creature, no physical process, nothing in all of creation, according to Psalm 8 is in rebellion to him, meaning, each and every human being. Notice what he does next. He says that is not true; all things are not subject to us. The absolute statement that David makes in Psalm 8 is not, at present, true. All sorts of things don’t submit to human beings. Viruses don't submit to us, they kill us. Wild animals eat up our gardens, infest our homes and sometimes devour us. I can't even get my dog to submit to me all the time. Insects transmit diseases, eat up our crops, and destroy trees that we need. The skies don't send enough rain or they send too much rain and so our food supplies are destroyed. The chemicals we make to combat this out of control world poison us, deform us and kill us. The machines we have made to help us control this world and make it useful kill us by crushing us in accidents and by slowly poisoning us and our planet with their emissions. There is no way that this world can be described as submitting, in every part, to human beings. Murhpy's law is true: if something can go wrong, it will go wrong. Therefore, the author of this letter recognizes that David is not talking about this world, but about the world to come and he is not talking about human beings in general but about the one perfect human being, Jesus Christ. Verses 9-10 are his explanation as to how Psalm 8 is describing Jesus. Then, vv. 11-13 tell us how we are included in the promises made in Psalm 8 and fulfilled in and by Christ. Before we move on to look at Christ and our participation in Christ, I want you to think for a moment about the world we live in and the world to come. The reason that this world does not submit to us is because of sin. God made an agreement with Adam and all of his descendants, that if he obeyed God and did not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil then Adam and all his descendants would live forever in perfect fellowship with God, in the perfect experience of the glory and splendor of being made in God's image and with all of creation serving our needs and bending to our gracious rule over it. However, God also told Adam that if he didn't obey that he would die. That is, he would be separated from God, he would not have the glory and honor of being the perfect representation of God and none of creation would serve him. It is due to Adam's sin and our participation in his sin by our own sins that this world does not work as it ought. Yet, God's purpose to have a perfect world ruled over by perfect men and women who perfectly reflect his image cannot be thwarted by human sin. Since before the world began, the Triune God has had a plan to make the world and the people who live in it conform exactly to his will. God is going to make a new heavens and a new earth inhabited by a new people who will perfectly reflect his glory and completely rule over every part of his creation, including angels. The gospel of Jesus is chiefly concerned with the world that is to come, not this world. This world does not work as it should due to human sin and God's curse but there is a world coming that will work exactly according to God's perfect will. Don't you want to be a part of that world? We are not together each week in this place to talk primarily about how to get on in this world but in how to get into the next world. I know how difficult it is to believe the next world is better when you are inundated with images of an opulent life in the U.S.A. But in spite of the propaganda you know this world is not working the way it ought to work; so don't be a fool and live as if this is all there is, because God has something infinitely better, the world to come and that is what we're talking about. God’s purpose for human beings is realized only in Jesus because…
II. Jesus has clearly fulfilled God’s promised purpose (vv. 9-10) Verse 8 ends by stating the obvious: we do not now see everything subject to him, which is to Adam and his kin, as God promised would be the case at creation and in Psalm 8. Then v. 9 begins with a word of contrast, But now we see Jesus. What the author does is show that the three things that Psalm 8:5 & 6b say about human beings are true of Jesus. First he says that Jesus was made lower than the angels for a little while. Psalm 8:5a is referring to the incarnation of the eternal Son of God. He took on human flesh, being made a man and thus taking a position lower than the angels for a little while. He became a man so that he might die. That is the next point. He suffered death on the cross as the consequence of his becoming a man. He was born that he might die. Then we are given the two purposes of his death. First, he died so that he might be crowned with glory and honor. This is Psalm 8:5b. This perfect man died and by his obedient death gained the glory and splendor that had been promised to Adam, but which he lost for himself and all of us. Now Jesus is crowned with the glory and honor of being the exact representation of God in human flesh. He has attained as a man what God created man to be. He did it by obedience, even the obedience of death on a cross. Then he states the second purpose of Christ's death: he did not gain this glory and honor for himself alone but he also tasted death for all. Notice the reason Christ tasted death for all is the grace of God. Remember, back in Psalm 8:4 David asks the question, "what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?" The author to the Hebrews sees the answer that the psalm is pointing to: the grace of God. It is God's delight to be kind to hell deserving sinners that motivated him to have Christ be made lower than the angels in order to taste death for all. It is his unmerited favor that moves God to care for man by providing a Savior to fulfill his purposes. That is why in v. 10 he brings up God the Father again. The ESV preserves the word order of the original, which is helpful. Verse 10 literally says, "For it was fitting that he, for whom and through whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering." There are two questions to be answered here. First, why is it fitting for God to make Jesus perfect through suffering? Second, what does it mean that God made Christ perfect through suffering? The word, "fitting" means that God the Father requiring that God the Son suffer and die is in perfect accord with who God is. It is the appropriate means by which God accomplishes his purpose in the universe to have a perfect world filled with perfect human beings gladly reflecting his glory and ruling over his creation. But why is it fitting? There are two reasons. First, as we've already seen it is the only way that accords with God's grace. There is nothing that can display God's free, unmerited, unconstrained love for sinners more than the suffering and death of the Son of God, Jesus Christ. There is nothing greater that God can do to show you his love than what he did in causing his Son to suffer and to die for you. If you know that Christ has died for your sins than you can know that you are loved by God forever. As Jesus told his disciples the night before he was killed, "Greater love has no one than this; that he would lay down his life for his friends." Giving you a better husband or a better job or better children is not a fuller expression of God's love. If you live in a refuge camp in southern Sudan with nothing and yet know Christ died for your sins, you can know you are loved by God. Second, God making Jesus perfect through suffering is the only way that is in step with God's sovereignty. All things exist for God and by means of God. He is the agent of creation and he created all things for himself. He is the sovereign ruler over all things and is working out his perfect plan for all things to bring him glory according to the purpose of his own will. This sovereign God determined before the creation of the world that he was going to fulfill his purpose by making Jesus perfect through suffering. His will is accomplished through the weakness of his son. The death of Christ is God's irresistible weapon to accomplish his sovereign purposes in the world. No one and nothing can resist the effects of the death of Christ. The cross is the supreme weapon of God in the accomplishment of his will. But what does it mean to say that Jesus is made perfect through suffering? The word translated, "make perfect" is not a word that refers to making something that is imperfect, either morally or spiritually, perfect. Rather it is a word that refers to the completion or fulfillment of a process. It is used repeatedly in Exodus and Leviticus for the process of consecrating or ordaining priests to serve at God's altar. Listen to how it is used in Exodus 29:9 which is at the end of a long description of the process of preparing Aaron and his sons to act as priests, "…and you shall gird Aaron and his sons with sashes and bind caps on them. And the priesthood shall be theirs by a statute forever. Thus you will ordain (make perfect) Aaron and his sons." In other words, just as Moses prepared and perfected Aaron and his sons through a whole series of religious rituals for the task of acting as priests in Israel, so God has prepared and perfected Jesus as the founder of our salvation, the one who sanctifies us by causing Jesus to suffer and to die. He was made fit to act as our high priest by his death which is a theme that the letter to the Hebrews is going to explore at some length later. So God the Father perfectly fit Jesus for his role as the founder or author or champion of our salvation. It is through Jesus that God the Father has led many sons to glory. The language that is being used here is highly evocative. It is the language of the hero, who at great risk to himself and through the exercise of discipline and strength and wisdom overcomes powerful enemies to free those he loves and bring them to safety. The world is full of stories about heroes who perform amazing feats to rescue those they love. All these stories are merely echoes of the one true story of the hero. This is Gandalf standing on the bridge in the caves of Moriah to confront the great beast Balrog and perishes in the doing, so that the rest of the fellowship of the ring can escape. This is Luke Skywalker and Hans Solo entering the Empire's "death star" to rescue Princess Leah. This is Rambo taking on an entire army to free American POW's. It is this kind of heroic act that the Son of God undertook on behalf of the sons of God in order to rescue us out of this present evil age and to bring us to glory, the glory of being like him and of reigning with him in the world that is to come. God’s purpose for human beings is realized only in Jesus because…
III. Jesus fulfilled God’s promised purpose for all his brothers (vv. 11-13) There is a question that the author poses at the end of v. 9 that he begins to answer in v. 10 and fully answers in vv. 11-13. At the end of v. 9 he said that "…by the grace of God he tasted death for everyone." Who are the "everyone" for whom Christ tasted death and who therefore receive the benefits of his being made perfect through suffering? The "everyone" at the end of v. 9 does not refer to every human being who ever lived. It does not mean every human being any more than my saying, "I am delivering this sermon for everyone," means that I intend to give this sermon to every human being who ever lived. I am delivering this sermon to everyone who is in this room. The "everyone" referred to at the end of v. 9 is identified throughout vv. 10-13. In v. 10 it is "the many sons" God leads to glory and those for whom Christ is the founder of salvation. In v. 11 it is "those who are made holy" by the "one who makes men holy". In vv. 11 & 12 it is those whom Jesus is not ashamed to call brothers. In v. 13 it is those children that God gave to Jesus. The point is that Jesus tasted death for all his brothers and no others. Therefore, all his brothers receive all the benefits of his death on their behalf. Everyone whom Jesus sanctifies is sanctified wholly and permanently. His death cannot fail to effect the salvation of the many sons for whom he died. While the NT does indicate that there is a sense in which the death of Christ is sufficient for the sins of the whole world, yet the bulk of the emphasis in the NT is upon the effectiveness of the death of Christ for his people. This is the ground of our assurance and hope. We can be confident we are going to share in the glory of Christ because the death of Christ accomplishes fully our salvation. This is not a potential salvation, but an actual, accomplished salvation. I want you to see the various ways the author makes this clear. First, notice that Jesus is identified as the one who makes men holy. This identification leads right from where v. 10 ended and confirms that the "made perfect" refers to fitting Jesus for being our priest. It was the duty of the priests to "make holy" the people and the objects of worship. This is their primary duty. As the priests "sanctified" the people through their service in the temple, so Christ sanctifies his people by his death. Also, in the OT, God himself is identified as the one who "makes Israel holy." So, in this one descriptive phrase both the humanity and deity of Christ is acknowledged. However, his ability to make men holy or fit for God is rooted in the fact that he shares our humanity. That is the point of the first sentence. Jesus became a man and thus became part of the human family. It is because of his humanity that he is able to sanctify us. We must have a human savior because God made a covenant with human beings, not the angels. The end of v. 11 is so helpful. Jesus did not grumble and complain when he took on human flesh. He is not ashamed to call us his brothers. He is not ashamed to share in our humanity. This is not due to the fact that it is so cool to be a human. The Son of God taking on human flesh isn't like a Packer fan being invited to put on a Packer uniform and join the team in the pre-game meeting and then standing on the sidelines during the game and being invited to the after game party at Brett's house. Any Packer fan that was given that privilege would be shouting it from the housetops. No Packer fan would be ashamed of this privilege. The Son of God becoming part of the human family is more like one of us being arrested as a terrorist and then being imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay. That is not something we would be proud of, nor would we want any people to know about it. So Jesus not being ashamed to call us brothers isn't because we're so cool but because he is so cool. He delights to save his people and he was willing to pay any price to do it, including becoming something as degrading as a human being. But Jesus is not only not ashamed to call us his brothers but he delights to dwell among us and to declare the name of God to us and to sing praises to God with us. He fully embraces his identification with us and his suffering for us. Verse 12 is a quote from Psalm 22 which is one of the clearest descriptions in the OT of Jesus' crucifixion. Jesus himself prayed the first verse while hanging on the cross, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" The first half of the Psalm describes in horrible detail the abuse, torture and physical and spiritual pain that Jesus experienced upon the cross. But in the second half it recounts the joy of the suffering Messiah when he is delivered from his suffering by the resurrection. This psalm fits perfectly in the context of Hebrews 2 which aims to show that the glory of Christ and the glory of those whom he saves is due to his suffering of death on the cross. It is the glorified Christ then who is not ashamed to call us brothers. He counts us brethren and friends in his exalted condition. He leads us in our worship of the father. John Calvin says it so well, "And it is a truth, which may serve as a most powerful stimulant and may lead us most fervently to praise God, when we hear that Christ leads our songs and is the chief composer of our hymns." Then in v. 13 the author quotes two lines from Isaiah 8:17-18. Again the context of that chapter is a description of the apostasy of Israel but of Isaiah and his children and other disciples who remain as a believing remnant within unfaithful Israel. Isaiah' trust in God foreshadows Jesus' trust in God; again showing his unity with his people. He trusted God as we also must trust God. He relied upon God's faithfulness to his promise to deliver him from death and to crown him with glory and honor just as we must trust God's faithfulness to deliver us and crown us with glory and honor in Christ. Then again, Jesus, by his faith in God remains along with all the children that God gives to him. These are God's children who are given to Jesus as his brothers. God gives them to Jesus because Jesus did not fail to trust him. The emphasis here is that we are not children of God because of who we are or what we have done but because the Father rewards the Son's obedient faith by giving him all those whom he decided to save before the world began. What security belongs to those whom Jesus sanctifies; those who Jesus is not ashamed to call brothers, those children whom God the father gave to God the Son. What a glorious future awaits us because Jesus was not ashamed to call us his brothers and was willing to taste death for all who belong to him. As Philip Hughes says, “Only in union with him can man become man as God meant and made him to be.” This is the Christ we are called to pay attention to. This is the glorious future that awaits us, to become what God made us to be, in Christ. God’s purpose for human beings is realized only in Jesus because…
© Copyright 2006 John Swanson.
|