Lesson 2 - Better ’n’ Sliced Bread, Angels, and Moses

• Jesus - God’s Son - the Best!
• Why all the stuff on angels in Chapter 1?
• Hey, Chapter 2 is about people!
• So what’s with Moses in Chapter 3?

OK - let’s jump into the first four chapters of Hebrews. Remember the writer’s target audience - a discouraged, disheartened group of converted Jews who were seriously considered abandoning their ten-year “fling” with Christianity and rejoining the synagogue. After all, the synagogue respresented 1500 years of life under the law God gave to Moses. Their brief experience with Christianity had been one problem after another and they were ready to throw in the prayer shawl.

Wait! cries the writer. Consider some things about Jesus, God’s son. First of all, he's superior to angels, so rejection of what he did is more serious than rejection of what was done through angels. Second, he’s superior to Moses, so rejection of what he did is more serious than rejection of what was done through Moses. Be careful, warns the writer, about rejecting the work of the Son.

Jesus is God’s Son - the best!

Wow - the writer really makes some sweeping statements about the person of Jesus! He calls him the source of God’s final revelation (vs. 2), the ultimate demonstration of who and what God is, the very “Character” - a strong word in the original - of God himself. Yet, even though Jesus was (and is) the Son, he “made purification” for sin. As every Jew knew, this required sacrifice, and reminded these Christian Jews of the most basic claim of their new faith - Jesus died as the ultimate sacrifice for your sins.

After Jesus dealt with the sin question he “sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.” By the way, this is the closest the writer gets to mentioning the resurrection of Jesus, a major theme in Paul’s writings. He sat down - his work was finished. He sat down beside God - he work was accepted!

I don’t know who wrote this book, but the author really packs a lot of information a few well-chosen words!

And speaking of “Son” we should remember that this term meant something in those days that it doesn’t mean today - equality! In John 5:18 Jesus calls God his Father, and his enemies are enraged because in so doing he was “making hmself equal with God.” When the writer calls Jesus God's “Son,” he is proclaiming his deity lound and clear.

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So why all the stuff on angels in the rest of Chapter 1?

Because most of the time God appears he has angels with him. In Ezekiel's weird visions “cherubim” surround God's throne. In Isaiah 6 the “seraphim” talk to the prophet. Revelation describes other spirit “beings” around God. What about when Moses got the law from God? Deuteronomy 33:2, Acts 7:53, and Galatians 3:19 make it clear that angels were involved here as well, though we don’t read about it in Exodus.

Do you see the point? Angels virtually every other point of contact between God and man. But in Jesus God spoke directly without any intermediary. Jesus is “direct revelation” with nothing between. Surely this must be important, and our rejection what he reveals is serious business. And that’s exactly what the writer says in the first few verses of Chapter 2.

Rejection of the terms of the contract with Moses, something mediated by angels, was severely punished. Now what will happend to those who reject the “new” salvation directly announced to us by the Son of God?

Tangent - in verses 3-4 of Chapter 2 the writer makes it clear that he’s a second-generation believer, for the salvation that came from “the Lord” was confirmed “to us by those who heard.” The writer was a convert of the first disciples and had seen how God had confirmed their message with “signs, wonders, and miracles.”

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Hey, Chapter 2 is about people!

No angels - but people! The writer smoothly shifts into his next major point - Jesus the Son of God is also completely and perfectly human. Jesus is God, but God inside human skin. As a human Jesus learned what it is to be human. He suffered and learned from his suffering (5:8). He suffered, lived, and died (2:9). As a result, he can serve as a qualified representative of people before God, for he is one of us!

Under the Mosaic Covenant the point of contact between God and the Israelites was the work of the High Priest. We’ll talk more about that part of the tradition later, but the point here is that the Priest certainly knew our side of things, for he was one of us. Since Jesus is one of us, he is definitely qualified to represent us to God as our High Priest, for he knows exactly how things are in our world.

Good luck on putting Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 together! There's no greater mystery to me than the union of perfect God and perfect man in one person. I have a hard time believing it, much less explaining it. However that works out, Chapter 2 zeros in on Jesus as human - perfect, sinless (4:15), yet open to all human experiences, up to and including death.

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So what’s with Moses in Chapter 3?

Remember - Moses was George Washington, Billy Graham, the Pope, Napoleon, Colombus, the Beatles and Elvis all rolled into one! Single-handedly he brought Egypt, the world’s greatest power at that time, to its knees, led the Israelites out in triumph, and did the greatest job of nation-building that has ever been done. OK - he did all of this at God’s direction, but he did it! His fingerprints were all over everything that made Israel a nation - laws, religious rituals, historical documentation, everything!

So how does Jesus stack up against Moses? Like a homeowner stacks up against a contractor! Moses, the writer claims, was faithful in God’s house (house=Israelites) as a servant (3:5). Jesus, however, is the “Son over the house” (3:6). Remember - a “Son” is equal with the Father, the home-owner. So Jesus stands on a totally different level than Moses - no comparison.

Now - let’s take a trip back into Old Testament history. After Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt they went to Mount Sinai where they received the laws (= Mosaic Covenant). Then they moved to the southern border of the territority God has promised to give Abraham and his descendants (= Abrahamic Covenant). Here the 12 spies surveyed the “promsied” land and reported that the local economy was doing just fine, but the people were too strong to be defeated in battle.

The crowds listened to this report and decided to return to Egypt. God punished this rebellion by condemning the people to wander in the Arabian desert for 40 years until all those 20 years old and over had died. God had closed the door to the the “salvation” of the promised land to an entire generation of rebellious people.

OK - so far, so good. Now check out verses 7-11 of Chapter 3. That’s a quote from the 95th Psalm. Now here’s a test - what came first, the experiences of Moses of the Psalms of David? Right! Moses is first, David is next - about 500 years after Moses! And that's the writer’s point - because Psalm 95 offers an invitation to God's salvation - “Today, if you hear his voice” - the door to God’s final salvation has not been closed!

God slammed the door on a rebellious generation, but the door to salvation is still open. Yet what happened to those who rejected the “salvation” of the proised land? They died. Therefore, the writer says, watch out so that you don’t enter into rebellion and have the door to salvation slammed in your face in judgment.

Think about it. Because people rejected the promises offered through Moses God slammed a door in their face. Today God offers salvation through someone greater than Moses. Don’t risk getting a door slammed in your face by rejecting this offer. If you persist in rebellion against the person and work of Jesus you risk judgment.

The good news, however, is that the door is still open, so while the historical generation was not able to enter the promised land because of their unbelief, we still have the chance to enter through faith.

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