Author: Lamar Austin

Well, we’ve come in our study of the book of Hebrews to that infamous section of Hebrews that causes people a lot of problems with regard to the doctrine of eternity security.  I’m talking about Hebrews 5:11-6:20, in particular Hebrews 6:4-6.

This is the third of five warning passages in the book of Hebrews.  Our desire is to become confident in our understanding of it so that we can respond obediently to it and explain it to others who may struggle with it.

It is obviously a difficult passage which has given rise to many different interpretations.  In pursuing a clearer understanding of this passage, I want to do several things.

First, I want to look at the question.  Why does God inspire difficult texts?  Some passages of Scripture are easier to understand than others.  The doctrine of the clarity of Scripture holds that with study and the Spirit’s illumination we should be able to understand Scripture.  Yet clarity is not the same as simplicity, and not all texts are as simple and straightforward as others.  The conviction that we can understand Scripture is obvious even in the New Testament itself, where Peter could speak of some things in Paul’s letters “which are difficult to understand” (critically here Peter says “difficult,” not “impossible”) but which can nevertheless be approached with confidence — and it is possible to discern when they are being ‘twisted’ (2 Pet. 3:16).  Peter went on to affirm that Paul’s writings were just as authoritative as the rest of Scripture (2 Pet. 3:16b).  Augustine has written, “[The Bible is] shallow enough for a child not to drown, yet deep enough for an elephant to swim.”

In another context Wayne Grudem explains that…

Scripture affirms that it is able to be understood

but (1) not all at once

and (2) not without effort

and (3) not without ordinary means

and (4) not without the reader’s willingness to obey it

and (5) not without the help of the Holy Spirit

and (6) not without human misunderstanding

and (7) never completely.

Even verse 14 in Hebrews 5 concludes

14 But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.

Second, I want to identify some general principles of interpretation to guide us.  First and foremost is that every text is part of a context—both literary and historical/cultural—which guides how we understand a passage.

Third, I want to examine the specific context of this passage, so that we don’t insert a pretext into it.  There is always a tendency for us to approach a passage from our own denominational or worldview background.

Fourth, I want to make some observations about the structure of the passage and identify some of the details of this third warning passage.

So, why does God inspire hard texts?

We believe that all Scripture is inspired by God (2 Timothy 3:16), thus He sometimes inspired difficult texts that are hard to understand.  Why did He do that?

As John Piper wrestled over Romans 3:1-8 several years ago, he meditated over why God would put hard texts in the Bible.  Why doesn’t he make everything clear?  Here are four reasons he came up with:

First, desperation.  God uses hard texts to create a sense of desperation and dependence in us.  We see this desperation and inability expressed by Paul in 1 Corinthians 2:14, “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.”  The “natural man” is certainly here not a Christian, but could describe anyone without the help of the Holy Spirit.  We cannot, naturally, that is, by ourselves, understand the Scriptures.  We are not only sinful, but finite.  God’s knowledge and ways are higher than ours (Isaiah 55:8).  God wants us to acknowledge our dependence upon Him for illumination.

Second, supplication.  God wants us to consciously and intentionally turn to Him for help.  This follows from our sense of desperation and dependence.  Knowing we cannot understand Scripture without His help, we turn to Him.  We cry out, as the Psalmist, “Open my eyes, that I may behold wonderful things from your law” (Psalm 119:18).  Seven times in Psalm 119 the Psalmist prays, “Teach me your statutes” (Psalm 119:12, 26, 64, 68, 124, 135, 171).  Or, as Psalm 25:5 says, “Lead me in thy truth, and teach me.”  By inspiring some texts that are hard to understand, God has unleashed in the world desperation which leads to God-glorifying supplication—crying out to God for His help.

Third, meditation.  Hard texts cause us to think hard, to labor over the text.  You might think that with praying to God we wouldn’t have to work hard to understand the text; that He would just magically bestow the answer to us.  But no, praying and thinking are not mutually exclusive alternatives, they are both needed.  We learn this especially from 2 Timothy 2:7, where Paul says to Timothy, “Think over what I say, for the Lord will grant you understanding in everything.”  Yes, it is the Lord, who gives understanding.  But he does it through our God-given thinking and efforts that we take, along with prayer, to think hard about what the Bible says.

Finally, education.  Because God has inspired a Book as the foundation of the Christian faith, there is a massive impulse to translate these Scriptures into the languages of every people group and to teach them to read.  And if God ordained for some of that precious, sacred, God-breathed Book to be hard to understand, then God unleased in the world not only an impulse to teach people how to read, but how to think about what they read.  Paul said to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:2, “What you have heard from me before many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also.”  Impart understanding to others, Timothy, to enable them to teach others.  Education is cultivating the life of the mind so that it knows how to grow in true understanding.  That impulse was unleased by God’s inspiring a book with complex, demanding paragraphs in it.

Well, what John Piper said about Romans 3:1-8 could be applied to Hebrews 5:11-6:20, which we will be diving into over the next couple of months.  This is a difficult passage, causing many differing interpretations.

I hope to lead us through it, taking it apart and putting it back together again, so that we can understand it and interpret it within its own context so that we can be confident that we know what it means and how to apply it to our lives.

Let’s talk about some principles of interpretation.  This is called hermeneutics—the art and science of interpreting a piece of literature.  In our case, the Bible.  So what are some principles of interpretation?  What “rules” do we follow in trying to accurately understand the Bible?

First, Scripture must always shape our theology.  We cannot not come to Scripture from some theological or worldview framework.  What I mean by that is that it is impossible for us not to come to Scripture which some preconceived notions about what it must mean—based upon our upbringing, our learning, the culture around us.

But we must let the Scripture speak for itself as much as possible.  We must come to God, admitting that we come with our preconceived notions, asking God to guide us into truth even if it conflicts with our own thinking.

We must seek to understand the plain meaning of the text and allow that to fashion our theology and worldview.

The proper, natural sense of the passage as intended by the author is to be taken as the fundamental meaning of the text.  We must interpret it within its own context and seek to understand the meaning the original recipients would have understood as they read it.

The second basic principle of interpretation is that Scripture must interpret Scripture.  Since all Scripture is inspired by God it is cohesive and coherent and will not contradict itself.  The scope and significance of one passage will be brought out by relating it to other passages.  Clear passages of Scripture help us to interpret the less clear passages of Scripture.

For example, this text in Hebrews is hard to understand and it seems to argue against eternal security.  However, there are many other passages that very clearly and forcefully argue for eternal security, such as John 5:24; John 10:27-30; John 6:37, 39; Romans 8:1 and 38-39.  For example, John 6:37-39 (and this is Jesus speaking):

37 All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.

That is literally “no not cast out,” a double negative in Greek.  Double negatives are not good English, but excellent Greek.  It emphatically states that it is impossible for Jesus to cast out anyone the Father has given to him.

38 For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day.

Notice that Jesus will “lose nothing (or no one) of all that he has given me.”  Rather, they will be raised up in the resurrection.

Another principle of interpretation is to look to the history of interpretations.  How have great Christian thinkers and theologians viewed these problematic passages?  What insights do these great hearts and minds give to contemporary readers of the Bible?

For example, here are some of the historical positions on how to interpret this passage, from the different denominational groups:

Augustine, for example, placed great emphasis on the connection between election and perseverance in grace.  Ultimately, the renewed heart cannot return to an unregenerate condition.  This position, Augustine asserted, was grounded in the immutable work of God.  In other words, he did not believe a true Christian could lose their salvation.

John Calvin built on Augustine’s foundation.  Calvin and John Owen agreed that Hebrews 6 describes the length to which an unregenerate person can experience God’s grace; yet, in the end, fall short of his profession.  In other words, they see Hebrews 6:4-6 referring to unbelievers.

Roman Catholicism affirms the belief that Christians may, through mortal sin, lost their standing in grace and finally, fatally fall away from a previously held faith.  The Council of Trent concluded that assurance of a secure standing in grace was presumptuous.  Thus, they would see Hebrews 6:4-6 as describing a Christian who falls away.

Early Arminianism failed to make definitive statements about the possibility of a genuine Christian falling from grace.  However, in time, Arminians came to affirm such a position.  John Wesley, for instance, rejected the notion of unconditional perseverance.  Some Baptists have affirmed a similar position, such as Dale Moody (not Dwight L. Moody) and Clark Pinnock.

A couple of other more modern approaches see it as hypothetical, taking the “if” at the beginning of verse 6 as conditional, meaning it may or may not happen.  The author is then presenting a case that couldn’t really happen, but is presenting it in such a way to warn them against remaining in an immature condition.

Another approach is to see the consequence of falling away as not the loss of salvation, but the loss of eternal rewards.

I would recommend the book Four Views on the Warning Passages in Hebrews put out by Kregel Publishing for anyone who would like to explore this further.

Now, with some interpretative principles behind us, let’s look at the context of this passage.

First, we need to remind ourselves to whom this book was addressed.  First, since the readers are very familiar with the Old Testament and this book refers so often to the sacrificial system and the priesthood, we are confident that these recipients are primarily Jews who had grown up under Judaism.

While it is likely that some, or maybe even most of them had truly embraced Jesus Christ as their Savior and Lord (remember, he calls them “holy brothers” in chapter 3, verse 1), there are very likely others who have experienced the teaching and fellowship and ministries of the church, but had not yet made a commitment to Jesus Christ.  Some of these seem to be in danger of moving back into Judaism because of the persecution the Christians were facing.

Our author is warning them against that danger—of going back to the law.  To him that would be an apostasy impossible to move back from.

It thus seems to be a mixed congregation, for Hebrews 6 speaks of “those” (in vv. 4-6) and “you” (in vv. 9-12).

Second, we need to remember that this is one of five warnings scattered throughout the whole book.

These five warnings (2:1-4; 3:7-4:13; 5:11-6:20; 10:19-39 and 12:14-29) are strategically placed throughout the book and generally provide two options with clearly defined consequences—do this and such-and-such will happen, do that and other consequences follow.  Whereas some warnings provide positive affirmations, all reveal a very unattractive and dire consequence is the readers choose incorrectly.

They also seem to be presented in a chiastic fashion.  A chiasm, after the Greek letter Chi, which looks like a big X, is a literary feature which lines ideas up as presented in the text in the shape of an X.  Thus, the elements at the beginning and end will be similar, and this will step down with each element until the middle elements, which seem to be the focus of the passage.

If this is a chiasm, with 2:1-4 and 12:14-29 invoking the important need to listen to and heed God’s message, and 3:7-4:13 and 10:19-29 directed towards trust and obedience to God’s message, then 5:11-6:20 is the heart of the passage.  Thus it is very important for us to interpret it correctly.

Third, we need to see this warning as part of a larger section of Hebrews, which is the central section and concern of the book, and that is about how Jesus is the superior high priest.  Our author introduces Jesus as the high priest of the Melchizedekian order in 5:10 and will pick it back up again after this warning section in Hebrews 7:1-28.  So, this is essentially a warning about rejecting Jesus as their high priest.  Notice that in 5:11 our writer mentions that he wanted to go on speaking on this subject, but could not because they were in danger of remaining in immaturity.

Now, let’s look at the structure and details of Hebrews 5:11-6:20.  This section actually consists of two major units (5:11-6:12 and 6:12-20).

The first unit explores the peril of immaturity, of not going on to maturity (5:11-6:12).  The tone of the four paragraphs in this unit alternates, notice, between pessimism and optimism:

5:11-14 is pessimistic in tone—“you have become dull of hearing.”

6:1-3, however, is optimistic in tone—”let us leave…and go on…if God permits.”

6:4-8 then goes back to pessimistic—“it is impossible to renew them again to repentance.”

And 6:9-12 turns back to optimism—“we are persuaded of better things concerning you”

This variation is designed to engage the attention of the hearers, to draw them in with both dire warnings and encouraging possibilities.

The second unit gives them a basis for perseverance, which is found in the very reliability and faithfulness of God’s promises to them (6:13-20).  This passage shows that perseverance has much more to do with God’s faithfulness to keep His promises than with our promises to be faithful to Him.

Thus, this pastor holds before them two options—peril or promise.  They may expose themselves to extreme peril by closing their ears to God, or they may find a basis for stability by listening to the voice of God expressed through oath and promise.

Jesus is our great high priest.  This is the point the author of Hebrews is making.  Israel had had a succession of high priests throughout their history.  These were men called by God to be priests and they had “acted on behalf of men in relation to God” (Heb. 5:1).  They had their weaknesses, which led them into sin and thus they could sympathize with the plight of their fellow men. But there is now a better high priest, Jesus Christ.  He also was appointed by God and He also suffered.  He did not sin, however, and thus His priesthood is more effective.

Starting at Hebrews 5:1

1 For every high priest chosen from among men is appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins. 2 He can deal gently with the ignorant and wayward, since he himself is beset with weakness. 3 Because of this he is obligated to offer sacrifice for his own sins just as he does for those of the people. 4 And no one takes this honor for himself, but only when called by God, just as Aaron was. 5 So also Christ did not exalt himself to be made a high priest, but was appointed by him who said to him, “You are my Son, today I have begotten you”; 6 as he says also in another place, “You are a priest forever, after the order of Melchizedek.” 7 In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence. 8 Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. 9 And being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, 10 being designated by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek.

Today we want to focus on vv. 7-10 and here we can see how Jesus is perfectly suited to sympathize with our weakness.  His appointment to the superior high priesthood is not being conferred merely because of His special relationship with God as Son, but He also receives it by taking the path of suffering, obedience and endurance (just like they would receive their full salvation, that is glorification, through enduring suffering).

The phrase “in the days of his flesh” makes an overt reference to Jesus’ incarnation in general (a short, but important interlude between eternity past and eternity future), but the rest of vv. 7-8 focus on the more specific moments of Gethsemane and the cross.

We saw in vv. 1 and 3 that the Israelite high priests “offer gifts and sacrifices for sins” and “is obligated to offer sacrifice for his own sins” while here Jesus “offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death.”

This possibly refers both to Jesus’ prayers in the Garden of Gethsemane that this cup of suffering pass from him and also his cries from the cross.  Both point out that obedience to God’s will in this case brought extreme suffering.

Like us, when going through deep trials, Jesus found it necessary to pray.  Like us, Jesus needed His Father’s help.  He was entirely dependent upon the sustaining presence and strength of His Father.

Jesus has never failed to engage human misery with a compassionate heart and action.  Philip Hughes writes,

“But now in the Garden the moment has come, in his self-identification with mankind, to plumb human depravity and fallenness to its very depths as he prepares, in all his innocence and purity, to submit himself in the place of sinners to the fierceness of God’s wrath against the sins of men.  This meant an experience incomparable in the horror of its torment, from which his whole being shrank instinctively but which was inescapable if the purpose of his coming was to be achieved” (Philip Edgecumbe Hughes, A Commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews, p. 182).

Mark tells us Jesus was “greatly distressed” (Mark 14:33).  The idea here is that of terrified human surprise.  As he considered the cup he must drink, he was astonished with horror.  

Jesus knew that what He was facing was not merely an excruciatingly painful death, but also judgment for sins—the wrath of a thrice Holy God against sin—our sins, but laid upon him—which is to experience the “second death” (Rev. 20:4; Heb. 9:27), the disintegrating experience of utter separation from God.

It is clear from His own words that He dreaded the bitter “cup” He was about to drink (Mt 26:39).  That cup was the wrath of God against all sinners.  To drink it meant spiritual death, i.e., separation from God.  For Jesus, Who knew no sin, to become as the ONLY sinner in the world and endure God’s wrath for that sin, was something from which He cringed in horror.  We can’t fathom what it must be like for God to lay the “iniquity of us all,” on someone Who was holy.  We must see Him as a man, appalled by what was ahead of Him.  The very thought of separation from God must have seemed too much for Him to bear–yet He surrendered.  (C. S. Lovett, Lovett’s Lights on Hebrews, 114)

The dread with which he approached the cross is explained, as Calvin says, by the fact that in the death that awaited him “he saw the curse of God and the necessity to wrestle with the sum total of human guilt and with the very powers of darkness themselves.”

Mark also tells us that Jesus said, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death” (Mark 14:34), for his sorrow was so deep, it threatened death to his human body. Mark takes us even deeper into the terror-filled mystery, telling us: “And going a little farther, he fell on the ground and prayed that, if it were possible, the hour might pass from him. And he said, ‘Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will’” (Mark 14:35, 36).  The inner circle of disciples saw Jesus’ body fall prostrate to the ground.  There he prayed repeatedly.  Our text in Hebrews gives us even more light, for it mentions “loud cries.”

How can Jesus sympathize with the pain and suffering and heartache that we go through?  Because He has been there.  He knows what it is like.  In fact, He knows the heights of physical pain as well as the depths of emotional distress.  He knows the very horrors of hell.

Amazingly (in the light of redemptive history), he was repeatedly asking that if possible the “hour” and the “cup” (metaphors for his death) might be avoided!  How could he desire something contrary to the Father’s will?  The answer is: Jesus was truly God and truly man.  As a man he had a human will and voluntarily limited his knowledge.  His prayer was not to do something other than the Father’s will, but he did say in prayer that if there were a possibility of fulfilling his messianic mission without the cross, he would opt for that.  As a man Christ cried for escape, but as a man he desired the Father’s will even more.

John Calvin quotes Cyril of Alexandria as saying: “You see that death was not voluntary for Christ as far as the flesh was concerned, but it was voluntary, because by it, according to the will of the Father, salvation and life were given to all men” (John Calvin, A Harmony of the Gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke and the Epistles of James and Jude , vol. 3, trans. A. W. Morrison (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1975), p. 515).

The ”loud cries and tears” which accompanied Christ’s supplication are to be understood, then, in relation to the indescribable darkness of the horror that he, our High Priest, was to pass through as, on the cross, he bore not only the defilement and guilt of the world’s sin but also its judgment.  At Gethsemane and Calvary we see him enduring our hell so that we might be set free to enter into his heaven (Philip Edgecumbe Hughes, A Commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews, p. 183).

Matthew Henry notes: “”The prayers and supplications that Christ offered up were joined with strong cries and tears, herein setting us an example.  How many dry prayers, how few wet ones, do we offer up to God!” (Matthew Henry, p. 1951).

These prayers with tears were addressed to the Father, described here as “him who was able to save him from death,” which could mean either that the Father would keep him from dying on the cross or raise him from the dead, so that death could not forever hold him.  As a man, he probably preferred the former.  By doing God’s will, Christ was “saved from death” by rising again after three days.

Our text here in Hebrews tells us “he was heard because of his reverence” (v. 7b).  His reverence for the Father determined that his humanity would do nothing but please the Father.  His prayer was, of course, answered, for though his body died, he was saved out of death—and so the Father’s will was done.  His prayer was not to escape the Father’s will, but to fully accept it.  It seems unlikely that Jesus was actually asking to be spared from dying.  Just a week earlier he had said it was for this very purpose that He had come (John 12:27).

And in doing it this way, as we’ll see in v. 9, Jesus “became the source of eternal salvation” for those who put their faith in him.

This reminds us that sometimes God’s “hears” our prayers but does not do what we think He should; rather He has something greater in mind.  God did hear the prayers of His Son, and delivered him through death to life.

The Father attended to His Son’s cries because of Jesus’ heart posture of complete abandonment to the Father’s will.  His reverence for the Father determined that His humanity would do nothing but please His Father.

Richard Foster, in his book Prayer: Finding the Heart’s True Home, begins his chapter on “The Prayer of Relinquishment” with an analogy between human and spiritual development:

As we are learning to pray we discover an interesting progression.  In the beginning our will is in struggle with God’s will.  We beg.  We pout.  We expect God to perform like a magician or shower us with blessings like Father Christmas.  We major in instant solutions and manipulative powers.

As difficult as this time of struggle is, we must never desire it or try to avoid it.  It is an essential part of our growing and deepening in things spiritual.  To be sure, it is an inferior stage, but only in the sense that a child is at an inferior stage to that of an adult.  The adult can reason better and carry heavier loads because both brain and brawn are more fully developed, but the child is doing exactly what we would expect at that age.  So it is in the life of the spirit.

In time, however, we begin to enter into a grace-filled releasing of our will and flowing into the will of the Father.  It is the Prayer of Relinquishment that moves us from the struggling to the releasing.

It might be expected that because He was God’s Son, God’s one and only beloved Son, that he would be exempt from suffering.  But no, to become our perfect high priest, He had to experientially learn obedience through suffering.  Although Christ has a unique standing with God as His Son, this did not keep him from having to go through a “learning experience” in which he perfectly, or completely, learned the role He must play as the Captain of our salvation (Heb. 2:10).

The word “Son” here has no definite article.  But that doesn’t mean that “the Son,” Jesus Christ, is not in view here.  Rather, the lack of the definite article means this word “Son” is being used in a qualitative sense.  “Sons…learn…”  That just the nature of growing up and becoming mature.

The structure of the passage, “Although He was a Son, he learned…” expresses what grammarians label a “contraexpectation,” of what one might call a “sweet surprise.”  In other words, the dynamics of the situation was not what you would expect.  Unlike an ancient prince on whom positions were bestowed simply by being born into the royal lineage, this divine Son was called to walk a path of obedience through suffering.

The “Son” being the Son of God, was under no necessity to learn obedience through suffering, but He did.  He chose this path (Phil. 2:8; Heb. 12:2).

Verse 8 says, “Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered.”  This does not mean he moved from being disobedient to being obedient.  It means he moved from being untested to being tested and proven.  He moved from obeying without any suffering to obeying through unspeakable suffering.  It means that the gold of his natural purity was put in the crucible and melted down with white-hot pain, so that he could learn from experience what suffering is and prove that his purity would persevere.

When the author says that Christ “learned obedience” and was “made perfect,” he is not suggesting to his readers that the Son was less than divine, less than God, less that omniscient, omnipotent, and certainly not that He had been disobedient before and had learned to be obedient.  It is not that He was morally flawed in any way.  Remember, in Heb. 4:15 he told us Christ was “yet without sin.”  Rather, Jesus’ calling involved walking obediently all the way to the end of the path to which the Father had appointed him—to the cross.  That he “learned obedience” simply means that the son arrived “at a new stage of experience,” having passed through the school of suffering.  Perfection refers to the Son’s having “graduated” from that school, accomplishing the mission and making it to the end of that passion.

Remember C. S. Lewis’ comment about how it is the “good man,” not the “bad man” who knows the full extent of what it means to be tempted, because he endured to the full extent and didn’t give in early like we normally do in our temptations.

Even as God the Son, and as such perfect in one sense, Jesus gained something through His sufferings, namely, experiential knowledge of what being a human involves.  Griffith Thomas remarks, “”Innocence is life untested, but virtue is innocence tested and triumphant” (W. H. Griffith Thomas, A Devotional Commentary, p. 64).

The “perfecting” in view has to do with Christ’s vocation, his calling to be the savior of his people. It was a process by which he was shown to be fully equipped and qualified for his office.

We need to understand Jesus’ learning and becoming “perfect” in the context not of moral deficiency but as the completion of a task.  He finished the task and drank the full measure of the experience that was needed in order to make a complete sacrifice for our sins.

There is a link here between Jesus’ prayers in the midst of his suffering and the prayer of the Servant of the Lord in Isaiah 50:4-9.

5 The Lord GOD has opened my ear, and I was not rebellious; I turned not backward. 6 I gave my back to those who strike, and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting.

What did the servant learn?  He learned how to sympathize deeply with us in our suffering.

Philip Hughes describes it like this: “His perfection consisted in the retention of his integrity, in the face of every kind of assault on his integrity, and thereby the establishment of his integrity.  Had he failed at any point, his integrity would have been impaired and his perfection lost, with the consequence that he would have been disqualified to act as mediator and redeemer” (P. E. Hughes, A Commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews, p. 188).

Jesus succeeded where Adam failed and cried “It is finished” from the cross (John 19:30).

John MacArthur says, “Christ did not need to learn any new information when He came to earth.  He was omniscient, all-knowing.  But He chose to participate in man’s feelings personally as that He could be sympathetic, all-feeling.”

Verses 9 and 10 proclaim the happy result of the Son’s reaching this perfection, accomplishing this goal.  He became the “source of eternal salvation.”  This affirmation links the perfecting process closely to the cross, where our great high priest offered up himself as the sacrifice for our sin.  His blood opens the door to our salvation.

9 And being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, 10 being designated by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek.

As an eternal high priest, He could offer eternal salvation.  His offering differed from that of the high priests.  First, He did not have to offer a sacrifice to atone for his own sins.  He had none.  Second, his sacrifice was once-and-for-all.  He did not have to offer it year after year.  Third, this offering was Himself.

Back in chapter 2, verse 10, our author had said:

10 For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering.

The obedience that is being referenced here is the obedience of faith, responded to the Spirit and the gospel call with an obedient trusting in Jesus Christ.

F. F. Bruce comments: “There is something appropriate in the fact that the salvation which was procured by the obedience of the Redeemer should be made available to the obedience of the redeemed.” (The Epistle to the Hebrews, p. 133).

“Jesus didn’t waver, neither should you,” the author of Hebrews is telling his audience.

Prolonged obedience is proof of saving faith.

Like Jesus, believers often learn obedience through their suffering (see 12:2-11).  This example from Christ encouraged the readers to remain firm and not drift away from the faith in times of suffering.  Just as Christ was perfected through his suffering, so Christians will be, too.  (Bruce Barton, Life Application Bible Commentary: Hebrews, 68)

The author of Hebrews is making the case that Jesus is a superior high priest to the Aaronic high priests in Judaism.  He makes comparisons between the high priests in their religion with the kind of high priest Jesus is.

1 For every high priest chosen from among men is appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins. 2 He can deal gently with the ignorant and wayward, since he himself is beset with weakness. 3 Because of this he is obligated to offer sacrifice for his own sins just as he does for those of the people. 4 And no one takes this honor for himself, but only when called by God, just as Aaron was. 5 So also Christ did not exalt himself to be made a high priest, but was appointed by him who said to him, “You are my Son, today I have begotten you”; 6 as he says also in another place, “You are a priest forever, after the order of Melchizedek.” 7 In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence. 8 Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. 9 And being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, 10 being designated by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek.

We were talking last time about verses 1-3 and saw their the high priest’s solidarity (that he was a man like them) and his sympathy (vv. 2-3, that he shared their weaknesses).  We were discussing verses 2 and 3, showing that the Aaronic high priest had to offer sacrifices to pay for his own sins since he had sinned out of his weakness.  This made him sympathetic so that he could “deal gently with the ignorant and wayward.”

F. F. Bruce suggests that the phrase “with the ignorant and wayward” should be taken as a hendiadyes, meaning “those who go astray through ignorance.”

It was for this type of person—the person who, because of moral weakness, has unintentionally wandered off the path of righteousness—that God had designed the Old Covenant sin offerings.

This is reflected in Numbers 15:28-29.

28 And the priest shall make atonement before the LORD for the person who makes a mistake, when he sins unintentionally, to make atonement for him, and he shall be forgiven. 29 You shall have one law for him who does anything unintentionally, for him who is native among the people of Israel and for the stranger who sojourns among them.

The defiant sinner, however, blasphemes God and thus find no such provision.  In all of the Old Testament there is absolutely no provision made for the unrepentant, deliberate, defiant law breaker.  The following verses in Numbers 15 say…

30 But the person who does anything with a high hand, whether he is native or a sojourner, reviles the LORD, and that person shall be cut off from among his people. 31 Because he has despised the word of the LORD and has broken his commandment, that person shall be utterly cut off; his iniquity shall be on him.”

Likewise, the Psalmist says

12 Who can discern his errors?  Declare me innocent from hidden faults. 13 Keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me!  Then I shall be blameless, and innocent of great transgression.

This is serious indeed.

Philip Hughes, in his commentary on Hebrews, reminds us that it was this kind of sin—open, defiant, high-handed sin which the readers of this epistle were in danger of committing.  Thus, he passionately warns them.

Of course, God is still able to forgive, if He so chooses.  Aaron himself, whose feeble yielding to the people’s demand for a visible symbol of deity is matched only by the ineptitude of his excuse to Moses:

Exodus 32:24

So I said to them, ‘Let any who have gold take it off.’  So they gave it to me, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf.”

Wow, did you see that?  I threw that gold jewelry into the fire and out came a golden calf.  Amazing, isn’t it Moses?

In this case, Aaron was in no condition to make intercession for the people of God—to act in his priestly role—because of his rebellion; rather it was Moses who went into the presence of God and made atonement for their sin and procured their pardon (Exodus 32:11-14, 31ff).

Not only must the high priest be a man in solidarity with the people and not only must he sympathize with people who are weak, just like him, but he must also be selected by God.

The third and final qualification is straightforward—the high priestly position must spring from divine selection: “No one takes this honor for himself, but only when called by God, just as Aaron was” (v. 4).  All Israel’s priests were to come only through divine appointment (Exodus 28:1–3; cf. Leviticus 8:1ff.; Numbers 16:5; 20:23ff.; 25:10ff.).

In other words, the office of high priest is an office of immense dignity and you can’t just decide to have it.  God has to call you to it like he called Aaron in the Old Testament.

The high priest served in that role only because he was “appointed” by God, not because of his own ambition or aspiration.

Attempts to do otherwise met with catastrophic judgment. Korah and his 250 followers were swallowed by the earth because they elevated themselves to the priestly office by burning unauthorized incense (Numbers 16:16–40).  Saul lost his reign because he impatiently assumed Samuel’s priestly function (1 Samuel 13:8ff.).  And Uzziah, wrongly utilizing a priestly censer, broke out with leprosy that lasted until his dying day (2 Chronicles 26:16–21).

It is possible that the writers of Hebrews is reminding them that in their own recent history—in the two centuries before Christ—the high priests had been appointed by political rulers and even in some cases by popular vote!

The High Priest was taken from the community of God’s people but was not chosen by God’s people.  He was appointed by God for His people.  Aaron did not say to himself one day, “I think that I shall go to priest school and obtain a degree in Priesthood and become a priest.”  It did not even help that he had an “in” with his brother Moses.  The only way that Aaron became a priest was because God chose him to be a priest.

No genuine priest ever arrogated himself to the high priestly office.  All were sovereignly chosen.  Therefore, a proper priest was filled with deep humility.  His work was never a career.  It was a divine calling.  The role of high priest derives from a divine rather than a human authority.  God created the role of high priest, and any high priest thereafter must be called by God to be considered an authentic and authoritative representative of the people before God.

What an inviting picture the ideal human high priest was.  He bore Israel on his shoulders and over his heart.  He was crowned with holy intent for all—“Holy to the LORD.”  He kept the bells ringing as he worked at intercession and atonement.  He was in solidarity with his people—he was one of them.  He was a real link between them and God.  He was in such sympathy with them that he always could “deal gently” with them.  He was the product of divine selection —free from ego and hubris.  He was selected to serve.  How appealing this was to the Hebrew mind, and quite frankly to us!  The ideal high priest was a man of incomparable attractiveness.

When a human high priest completely fulfilled these principles, he was attractive to the Hebrew mind.  Could anyone or anything ever exceed this ideal in attractiveness and efficacy?  The answer is a resounding “Yes!”—Jesus Christ.

Our writer now turns from the universal principles that related to the Old Covenant high priesthood and applies them specifically to Jesus Christ.  Just as Aaron was called by God (5:4), so Christ himself did not “take upon himself the glory” but was appointed to the position.

David Guzik points out:

It is easy to see why the priesthood of Jesus was difficult for early Jewish Christians to grasp. Jesus was not from the lineage of Aaron.  Jesus neither claimed nor practiced special ministry in the temple.  He confronted the religious structure instead of joining it. In Jesus’ day, the priesthood became a corrupt institution.  The office was gained through intrigue and politicking among corrupt leaders.

5 So also Christ did not exalt himself to be made a high priest, but was appointed by him who said to him, “You are my Son, today I have begotten you”; 6 as he says also in another place, “You are a priest forever, after the order of Melchizedek.”

The author establishes that Jesus Christ is our great high priest because first, He too was appointed by God.

The verb “exalt” or “glory” in verse 5 is used only here, but the cognate noun is sprinkled throughout Hebrews.  We see Jesus as “the radiance of God’s glory” (1:3), “crowned with glory” (2:7, 9), “worthy of greater honor [glory] than Moses” (3:3), and the one to whom should be ascribed “glory for ever and ever” (13:21).  In each instance the glory comes to Christ from another party or parties, he never seeks glory for himself.  In fact, he takes the opposite path.  He ”did not exalt himself” as we see in Philippians 2.

In 5:5-6 the author focuses on the glory bestowed by God the Father on the occasion of the son’s appointment to the high priesthood, finding evidence for that honor in Psalm 110:4.

The Son-who-was-King was also declared the Son-who-was-High-Priest, but not in the order of Aaron, rather in the order of Melchizedek.

Here the author quotes Psalm 2:7 (which he quoted before back in 1:5) and Psalm 110:4, two Psalms acknowledged by the Jews as Messianic.  Psalm 2 declares him to be the “Son-who-was-King,” the heir of David whose destiny was to rule the nations (Psalm 2:8). 

His royal office was prophesied in Psalm 2:7—“You are my Son; today I have begotten you” (cf. Hebrews 1:5), which in the mind of the writer of Hebrews refers to Christ’s enthronement as “both Lord and Christ” (Acts 2:36).  This is an implicit statement that Jesus is eternal King!

Psalm 110 declares the Messiah to be the “Son-who-was-High-Priest.”  He is a priest of a special order.

Here the author is likely refuting a Qumran interpretation in which the Messianic King and the Messianic Priest were two separate individuals—the king coming from the Davidic line and the priest from the Aaronic line.

Jesus’ priestly office was prophesied, says our writer, in Psalm 110:4—“You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.”  This was a bombshell statement to his hearers because, while Psalm 110:1 had been applied to Christ by others (and even in Hebrews 1:13), this is the first time Jesus was ever identified with the mysterious priesthood of Melchizedek!  Not only that, but Psalm 110:4 now becomes the virtual theme-text of the heart of the letter to Hebrews (that text is quoted three times, in 5:6; 7:17, 21; and there are an additional eight allusions to it in chapters 5 and 6).  It is especially important here to realize that Melchizedek, according to Genesis 14, was both king of Salem and priest of God Most High (Genesis 14:18; Hebrews 7:1).

So our author gives us a stupendous truth: Jesus is both eternal King and eternal priest.  And it all came to him by the ordaining word of God the Father. Jesus did not seek it!  Just as in eternity, he “did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men” (Philippians 2:6, 7), neither did he clutch the office of king and high priest.  His only goal was to glorify God the Father.

So Christ has the dignity to be our High Priest and to become the source of eternal salvation.  No one but the Son of God could do it.  No other being in the universe has the dignity that was required to obtain an eternal salvation.  It took an infinite dignity.  No priest of Aaron’s line and no angel in heaven could do it.  Only one could do it—the Son of God.

So the author is here using a rabbinic technique known as “verbal analogy,” coupling Psalm 2:7 and 110:4 by virtue of their common elements: Both psalms contain a pronouncement by God in the second person (“You are…”), thus making both of them statements from God the Father to His Son Jesus Christ.  Linking his primary passage (Psalm 110:4) with Psalm 2:7 serves to infuse his priesthood with kingly authority from the beginning.

Melchizedek will be discussed in greater detail in Hebrews 7, but a brief introduction is important here.

Melchizedek is mentioned two times in the Old Testament (Genesis 14:18 and Psalm 110:4), that’s all.  In Genesis he meets Abraham coming back from a military conquest and blesses him, and Abraham gives him tithes.  The text simply says, “He was a priest of God Most High.”  There is no information about his parents or his ethnic origin.  He appears and disappears until a thousand years later in the time of David, who quotes God as saying that the Messiah is “a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.”  And that’s it.  Nothing more about Melchizedek until this writer mentions him here.

• He was a king-priest who lived at the time of Abraham, and whose ancestry is completely unknown.
• He was king of Salem (the ancient name for Jerusalem) and was a priest of the true God (Genesis 14:18).
• He lived many centuries before the Aaronic priesthood was established and his priesthood was never ending (Hebrews 7), unlike that of Aaron, which began in the days of Moses but ended in 70 A.D.

Melchizedek represented a “non-Jewish, universal priesthood” much like the role that Abraham played in relation to the covenant (B. F. Westcott).

The Melchizedekian priesthood was superior in two ways: First, Melchizedek was a king; Aaron was not.  Second, his priesthood was perpetual; Aaron’s was temporary.  The writer of Hebrews traced Jesus, from the tribe of Judah, not Levi, back to Melchizedek, a superior priest.

Thus, Jesus is a high priest of a better order than that of Aaron.  He was appointed in this role by God.  When did this happen?  When the Son “sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven” (Heb. 1:3).  This is affirmed in Acts 2:36.

“Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.”

Melchizedek symbolizes in the Old Testament a priesthood different from the priesthood of Aaron and the tribe of Levi.  Melchizedek became a kind of symbolic pointer to a priesthood with no beginning and no ending.  That’s why Psalm 110 and Hebrews 5:6 stress the word “forever”—”You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.  Christ really is a High Priest, as Hebrews 7:3 says, “having neither beginning of days nor end of life.”

He did not act on His own initiative.  His life was one of obedience to the Father.

So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise. (John 5:19)

“I can do nothing on my own.  As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me.” (John 5:30)

The authority that Jesus acted upon was not His own authority.  The miracles which He brought about were not by His own power.  The message which He preached was not independently His own.  Everything that He did was from a higher authority.  Everything that He did was from the Father and the Spirit.  When He was baptized by John, He did not say, “Look everyone, I’m the Son of God!”  Instead, it was the Father’s voice from heaven who made this announcement.  Jesus ALWAYS acted from the authority of God.

Jesus was not a rebel, usurping authority by himself or for himself.  He was always submissive to the Father and to proper authorities on earth.  And this will lead us into this Great High Priest’s submissive suffering that we will see next week in vv. 7-10.

Jesus is the best high priest you could have.  And you say, “So what?”

Why is this important to us?  It was important to the Jews, but why is it important to you and me? 

Among the first thing a Jew might have asked another person about his religion was, “who is your high priest?”  I bet no one has ever asked you, “who is your high priest?”

A Jew during the first century might have asked a new follower of the Way, Christians, “How are your sins going to be pardoned when you have no one offering sacrifices for you?”

So the writer of Hebrews wanted them, and us, to realize, “But we do have a high priest, in fact, a better high priest, the perfect high priest, and His name is Jesus.”

The author from the beginning has been setting up Jesus as the unique Son-who-is-King.  Then he began presenting Jesus as the Son-who-is-High Priest.  This will be the focal point of chapters 5-10.

The Epistle to the Hebrews stands alone among the NT books in calling Christ priest.  The cause for this neglect may perhaps be found in the history of the Jewish people.  Throughout the ages the Jews had expected a king from David’s house.  This king would deliver them from foreign oppression.  And this king, because David’s line was from the tribe of Judah, could not be a priest; priests were descendants of Aaron in the tribe of Levi.  Therefore, Jesus was known as king.  At his birth the wise men called him “king of the Jews” (Mt 2:2), and this appellation was commonplace during the trial and crucifixion of Jesus.  He was not known as priest.  (William Hendriksen & Simon J. Kistemaker, NT Commentary: Hebrews, 135)

The heart of the book focuses on Jesus’ high priesthood.  His superior priesthood makes the New Covenant superior to the Old Covenant.  He has done what all the priests together under the Old Covenant could not do and never could have done.

Within this main section of the book (5:1-10:18) can be discerned two movements: (1) the first addresses the Son’s appointment as high priest according to the order of Melchizedek (5:1-7:28), which is bracketed off by an inclusio (the same elements at beginning and end) and includes an exhortation in 5:11-6:20 which is an exegetical conundrum.  It will take us several weeks to explain that portion of Scripture.

Before enlarging on the consequences of the priesthood of Christ for his readers, the author seeks to show Christ’s qualifications for that role.

When the high priest was donned with all his majestic priestly garments (described in Exodus 28), it was quite a display.  But what was more important were the inner qualifications so necessary for effective ministry.

The writer closed the previous chapter with the statement that we have a high priest in the person of Jesus.  The Jew would immediately object, “Hold it right there!  It takes certain rigid qualifications to be a priest.  Not just anyone can take that title to himself.”

The writer anticipates this objection and so, he pauses to examine three particular aspects of the high priest.  Then, in verses 6-10, he goes back over those same aspects in reverse order, applying them to Jesus.  This type of reverse parallelism is known as a CHIASM (after the Greek letter Chi, which looks like one half of the letter X).  It can be charted like this:

A     The old office of high priest (5:1)

B       The solidarity of the high priest with the people (5:2-3)

C       The humility of the high priest (5:4)

C’      The humility of Christ (5:5-6)

B’      The solidarity of Christ with the people (5:7-8)

A’      The new office of high priest (5:9-10)

The use of chiasm functioned both to emphasize the central elements (humility) and as a mnemonic device to help listeners remember.

The introduction of verse 1, the conclusion in verse 10 and the apex of the chiasm in vv. 4-6 all serve to focus the attention of the theme of Christ’s legitimate appointment to the high priesthood.  In contrasting the Aaronic priesthood in general terms (vv. 1-4) to Christ’s Melchizekian priesthood (vv. 5-10), the author is attempting to show that Jesus is a superior high priest.

Again, the big idea is that Jesus is the best high priest you could have.

1 For every high priest chosen from among men is appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins. 2 He can deal gently with the ignorant and wayward, since he himself is beset with weakness. 3 Because of this he is obligated to offer sacrifice for his own sins just as he does for those of the people. 4 And no one takes this honor for himself, but only when called by God, just as Aaron was. 5 So also Christ did not exalt himself to be made a high priest, but was appointed by him who said to him, “You are my Son, today I have begotten you”; 6 as he says also in another place, “You are a priest forever, after the order of Melchizedek.” 7 In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence. 8 Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. 9 And being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, 10 being designated by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek.

First we see the qualifications of the Earthly High Priest (vv. 1–4)

The writer opens this section by asserting in verses 1–4 the three essential qualifications for one who would aspire to be high priest—namely, solidarity, sympathy, and selection.

Solidarity, oneness with humanity, was fundamental to priestly ministry and is explicitly stated in verse 1: “For every high priest chosen from among men is appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins” (cf. Exodus 28:1; Numbers 8:6). 

This was established in Exodus 28:1a, “Then bring near to you Aaron your brother, and his sons with him, from among the people of Israel, to serve me as priests…”

The high priest must originate among the people.  In order to represent mankind He had to become a man.  No angel or celestial being could stand in the place of the high priest.

Not just anyone could serve as a priest in the Old Testament.  In the first place, you had to be a member of the tribe of Levi.  But not everyone in the tribe of Levi qualified.  You also had to be a descendant of the family of Aaron.  Aaron, you will recall, was the brother of Moses.  And only one of the descendants of Aaron was given the privilege of serving as the High Priest.

The emphasis here is on the similarity, or solidarity, between the high priest and the people—he was “one of them.”  This is a continuation of the theme introduced back in 2:10-18 where the Son came down “among humanity” to accomplish reconciliation in our behalf.  Chapter 2 ended with a statement of Christ’s identity with the people as their high priest (2:17-18).

17 Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. 18 For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

This theme popped up again at the end of chapter 4.

14 Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

And this is why the author of Hebrews unpacks the implications here.

The role of the high priest was to “act on behalf of men in relation to God.”  The high priest stood between God and man as their representative with Him.  As a priest acting “on behalf of men” Luther made this astute and important comment: “It is not enough for a Christian to believe that Christ was instituted high priest to act on behalf of men, unless he also believes that he himself is one of these men for whom Christ was appointed high priest.”

In other words, YOU must believe that you need a high priest, not merely that Jesus is a high priest, just like you must believe that you need a Savior, not merely that Jesus is a Savior.  This is similar to the distinction made in Hebrews 4:14.  It’s not just that there is a high priest available to us, but “we have a great high priest.”  And we have one because we need one!

So Jesus Christ is our go-between with God, our mediator.  As high priest, He functions as our mediator.  The priests under the Old Covenant were bridge builders to God.  Men could not come directly into God’s presence, and God therefore appointed certain men to be ushers, as it were, to bring men into His presence.  The way to God was opened only as the priests offered sacrifices–day in and day out, year after year–presenting the blood of animals to God.  The priests were God’s mediators.  (John MacArthur Jr., The MacArthur NT Commentary: Hebrews, 118)

Let me illustrate for you what a high priest is and does.  The Latin phrase for “high priest” is pontifex maximus.  The word “maximus” means great.  The word “pontifex” is interesting and is itself comprised of two words: “pons” (bridge) and “facio” (to make or build).  A high priest, therefore, is a bridge builder.  He makes a way for man to be connected with God and relate to God.  And what our author is about to unpack for us is that Jesus Christ is the bridge that spans the gap created by our sin, the gap that had separated us from God.  Through his sinless life, sacrificial death, bodily resurrection, and his current ministry of interceding for us at God’s right hand, he has built a bridge for us to get to God!

Christ holds three offices in His mediatorial role: prophet, priest and king.  According to Arthur Pink there seems to be a special importance attached to Christ’s role as priest, which is what is emphasized here in Hebrews.  First, we never read of “our great prophet,” or “our great King,” but we do of “our great High Priest” (Heb 4:14)!  Second, the Holy Spirit nowhere affirms that Christ’s appointment to either His prophetic or His kingly office “glorified” Him; but this is insisted upon in connection with His call to the sacerdotal office (5:5)!  In this priestly role he was exalted.  Third, we read not of the dread solemnity of any divine “oath” in connection with His inauguration to the prophetic or the kingly office, but we do His priestly–“The Lord has sworn, and will not change his mind, You are a priest forever.” (Ps 110:4)!  Thus the priesthood of Christ is invested with supreme importance.  (Arthur W. Pink, An Exposition of Hebrews, 238-9)

In particular, the high priest handled the sacrifices on the Day of Atonement.  Then and there he would offer “gifts and sacrifices for sins.”

The High Priest wore a breastplate on which were inscribed the names of all the tribes of Israel.  This pointed to the fact that his role was to represent all the people in the presence of God.  He alone could enter the Holy of Holies on only one day each year, the Day of Atonement.  On that day he offered sacrifices for the sins of the people and made it possible for them to remain in relationship with God.

On the Day of Atonement the high priest would take two goats and a ram from among the Israelites (Lev. 16:5).  After casting lots for the goats, the high priest slaughters one of the goats as a sin offering “for the people” (16:15), and the other goat is brought forth alive from the tent.  The high priest lays his hands on the head of the “scapegoat,” confessing all the sins of the people before the Lord, then sends the goat away into the desert (16:20-22).  By carrying out this part of God’s instructions for the Day of Atonement the high priest acts before God as a representative on behalf of the people, making atonement for their sins.

Exodus 28:1, 3; 29:1 stressed that the high priest was appointed for God, but in this verse the writer said that he was appointed for people.  Both statements are true.

Verses 2 and 3 expresses the high priest’s sympathy with his people:

2 He can deal gently with the ignorant and wayward, since he himself is beset with weakness. 3 Because of this he is obligated to offer sacrifice for his own sins just as he does for those of the people.

Verse 2 shows the sympathy of the priest, expressed to the greatest degree in Jesus Christ, as we saw back in Hebrews 4:14-16.

You see, the high priest had to offer a special sacrifice for himself and his household before he could offer the goat sacrifices in behalf of his people.  In this regard, the Old Testament reads:

Aaron shall present the bull as a sin offering for himself, and shall make atonement for himself and for his house. He shall kill the bull as a sin offering for himself. (Leviticus 16:11)

The Mishna records this prayer by a priest, which probably reflect something of the ancient Aaronic prayer:

O God, I have committed iniquity and transgressed and sinned before thee, I and my house and the children of Aaron, thy holy people. O God, forgive, I pray, the iniquities and transgressions and sins which I have committed and transgressed and sinned before thee, I and my house.” (M Yoma 4:2)

This was followed by the high priest taking the blood of the sacrifice into the Holy of Holies and sprinkling some on the mercy seat and then sprinkling more seven times before the seat (Leviticus 16:6–14, esp. v. 14; cf. Leviticus 4:3–12; 9:7).  It was only after taking care of his own sins that he dared offer sacrifice for his people on the Day of Atonement.  The ideal high priest knew he was a sinner through and through—and thus was equipped to “deal gently” with his sinful people.  He did not elevate himself above them, but ministered with sympathetic grace as a priestly sinner on behalf of other sinners.

The necessity stems from the priest’s being “beset with weakness” (v. 2b).  The Greek word translated “beset” (perikeimai) means “to be surrounded” by something, like a millstone tied around the neck (Mark 9:42; Luke 17:2) or the witnesses that surround us in Hebrews 12:1.  The priest’s weaknesses close in on him and leave him no way out, thus obligating him to first offer sacrifices for his own sins.  He shared in the universal “community of weakness” of all mankind.

Remember, it is in this respect alone that Christ did not exactly correspond to the qualifications and characteristics of high priest in this passage (cf. 7:27).  He IS able to sympathize because He has endured the temptations, yet without sinning.  To have been a fellow sinner would be of no worth to us.

This facing of temptation, however, has redemptive value in that it enables him to “deal gently with the ignorant and wayward.”  And in this we have something most beautiful, because the word translated “deal gently” was used classically to define a course of conduct that was the middle course between anger and apathy, between being incensed at sin or laissez-faire about sin.  It meant “wise, gentle, patient restraint.”  Such a high priest was compassionate and sensitive.  He dealt gently with his people.

There is a remarkable parallel between the chemistry that produces the ability to “deal gently” (awareness of weakness plus sinfulness equals gentleness) and the first three Beatitudes.  There an awareness of weakness —“Blessed are the poor in spirit [those who realize there is nothing within themselves to commend them to God], for theirs is the kingdom of heaven”—is combined with an awareness of sin —“Blessed are those who mourn [over their sins and the sins of the world], for they shall be comforted”—to produce gentleness —“Blessed are the gentle, for they shall inherit the earth” (Matthew 5:3–5 NASB).

When one is truly aware that he or she is a sinner and couples this with the interior awareness of human weakness, this person will deal gently with others.  Conversely, a harsh, judgmental, unsympathetic spirit is a telltale indication that one has outgrown his sense of weakness and awareness of sin.  Many evangelicals fall to this syndrome after humbly coming to Christ at conversion, for their initial experience of sanctification deludes them into imagining they are better than others.  Such arrogance, however, actually disqualifies them from spiritual ministry.  What a beautiful priestly quality it is to “deal gently” with those falling into sin.  How wonderful a priest like this would be.

Edwin Friedman, in his book Generation to Generation, says that a good leader will be a “non-anxious presence,” meaning that he or she can keep control of their emotions and not allow the tensions around them to dictate their emotions, yet he or she also does not draw away from the situation, but stays connected people.

This is what the ideal high priest was supposed to do.  It is what Jesus does for us.

We ended last week talking about the wonderful reality that through the death of Jesus Christ access has been graciously given to us so that we can have all confidence in approaching God in prayer.  Hebrews 4:16 says…

16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Access to the most powerful leader in the world—the President of the United States—is granted to only a few who have successfully passed through a series of detailed, cautious checkpoints!

It is hard to get in to see the President.  A Norway teen created quite a stir when he challenged the system, boldly dialing a secret phone number for the White House.  Sixteen-year-old Vifill Atlason claims he called President George Bush out of curiosity.  “I just wanted to talk to him, have a chat, invite him to Iceland, and see what he’d say,” he later told ABC News.

In order to get through security, Atlason pretended to be Olafur Ragnar Grimsson, the President of Iceland.  He was surprised when his initial call didn’t pass through the switchboard, but went directly to a higher office to be screened by various security officials.  Atlason was then asked a series of personal questions in an attempt to verify his identification as President Grimsson.

Needless to say, he never made it through and was later taken from his home for questioning by local police, but no charges were filed.

Yet we have access to the all-powerful, all-glorious, most-sovereign ruler of the universe!

Our experience is more like this story…

During the civil war, there was a soldier who lost both his brother and his dad to death on the same day.  He wanted to see the president and plead his case.   He was given a pass to do so.   He went to the White House but was told by the guard on duty, “You can’t see the president, young man!  Don’t you know there’s a war going on?  The president is a very busy man!  Now go away, son!  Get back out there on the battle lines where you belong!”

So the young soldier left, very disheartened, and was sitting on a little park bench not far from the White House when a little boy came up to him.  The lad said, “Soldier, you look unhappy.  What’s wrong?”  The soldier looked at the little boy and began to spill his heart to him.  He told of his father and his brother being killed in the war, and of the desperate situation at home.  He explained that his mother and sister had no one to help them with the farm.  The little boy listened and said, “I can help you, soldier.”  He took the soldier by the hand and led him back to the front gate of the White House.  Apparently, the guard didn’t notice them, because they weren’t stopped.  They walked straight to the front door of the White House and walked right in.  After they got inside, they walked right past generals and high-ranking officials, and no one said a word.  The soldier couldn’t understand this. Why didn’t anyone try to stop them?

They reached the Oval Office—where the president was working—and the little boy didn’t even knock on the door.  He just walked right in and led the soldier in with him.  There behind the desk was Abraham Lincoln and his Secretary of State, looking over battle plans that were laid out on his desk.

The president looked at the boy and then at the soldier and said, “Good afternoon, Todd.  Can you introduce me to your friend?”  Todd Lincoln, the son of the president, said, “Daddy, this soldier needs to talk to you.”  The soldier pled his case before Mr. Lincoln, and right then and there he received the exemption that he desired.

Because of Jesus, we have direct access to the Father, let’s never forget that.

More important than any President is this King to which we can draw near.  And as the hymn puts it, “Thou art coming to a king, large petitions with thee bring!”

The point is, we are not coming to a cosmic welfare agency for a meager handout or to the back door for scraps off someone’s dinner plate.  When we need grace for our souls we are coming to the throne of the King of kings!  “In prayer,” said Spurgeon, “we stand where angels bow with veiled faces; there, even there, the cherubim and seraphim adore, before that selfsame throne to which our prayers ascend” (“The Throne of Grace,” in Spurgeon’s Expository Encyclopedia, Vol. 12 [Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1996], p. 206).

John Calvin wrote: “The glory of God cannot but fill us with despair, such is the awfulness of his throne.  Therefore, in order to help our lack of confidence, to free our minds of all fears, the apostles clothes it with grace and gives it a name which will encourage us by its sweetness.  If is as if he were saying, ‘Since God has fixed on his throne…a banner of grace and fatherly love towards us, there is no reason why His majesty should ward us off from approaching Him” (Calvin’s Commentaries: The Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Hebrews and the First and Second Epistles of St. Peter , trans. William B. Johnston (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1963), p. 57).

Because it is a throne of grace, nothing is required of you but your need.  Your ticket to this throne is not works but desperation.  God doesn’t want sacrifice or gifts or even our good intentions.  He wants your helplessness in order that the sufficiency of his grace, at work on your behalf, might be magnified.  This is a throne for the spiritually bankrupt to come and find the wealth of God’s energizing presence.  “This is not the throne of majesty which supports itself by the taxation of its subjects, but a throne which glorifies itself by streaming forth like a fountain with floods of good things” (Spurgeon, 210).

By Christ’s self-sacrifice God’s throne of judgment is turned into a throne of grace.  Sinners are no longer commanded to keep their distance in fear in trembling (cf. Exodus 20), but are invited to “draw near.”

One commentator says, “this is nothing less than a revolution of the fundamental concept of religion and one of the most important revelations of the epistle” for “only Christianity can give sinful creatures the boldness to present themselves before God.”

Satan would love to steal your confidence away.  He is the accuser who doesn’t want you to have any assurance that you have a right to draw near to God.

Remember that the command here, “draw near,” is in the present tense.  This not only indicates that we should obey it by coming continually before the throne, but that it is a throne that is open to us all the time.  It is our privilege to come consistently to the throne of grace!

There is never a time when it is inappropriate.  There is never a time when he is not available to you.  There is never a circumstance that makes approaching the throne of grace a bad idea.

And what will we receive at this throne of grace?  We will receive mercy and grace.

We receive mercy for our past failures, and grace for our present and future needs.

If justice is getting what we deserve, mercy is not getting what we deserve.  It is pardon for our sins.

A mother once approached Napoleon seeking a pardon for her son.  The emperor replied that the young man had committed a certain offense twice and justice demanded death. 

“But I don’t ask for justice,” the mother explained.  “I plead for mercy.” 

“But your son does not deserve mercy,” Napoleon replied. 

“Sir,” the woman cried, “it would not be mercy if he deserved it, and mercy is all I ask for.” 

“Well, then,” the emperor said, “I will have mercy.”  And he spared the woman’s son. 

Any time we need mercy from God, all we have to do is come and confess our sins to Him and He will forgive us.

The tax collector, in Luke 18:13, realizing that he was a sinner, cried out, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”

In Ephesians 2, Paul says,

1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience–3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.

We certainly deserved God’s wrath.

4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ–by grace you have been saved—

Mercy—not getting what we deserve.  Not having to pay the price for our sin.  Having our debts erased.

Psalm 103:10 says, “He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities.”  He goes on to say that this is because of His love (v. 11) and His willingness to forgive us (v. 12).  It is because He recognizes our frailty and weaknesses (v. 13).

We come to a God who is willing to forgive and He does forgive us when we confess our sins.

But we need more than mercy, we need more than just not getting what we deserve.  We also need grace—getting something that we don’t deserve.  Grace is undeserved kindness.  It is unexpected generosity.  It is a gift given to us unearned and undeserved.

Grace does not ignore God’s justice; it operates in fulfillment of God’s justice, in light of the cross.  Mercy and grace are both needed to deal with our sin.  Mercy assuages our misery while grace expunges our guilt.

Mercy focuses upon the negative. It looks at our sin and it forgives that sin.  Grace focuses on the positive.  It gives God’s riches to you in spite of the fact that you are still undeserving.

Both of these attributes of God are aspects of His goodness and kindness towards us, particularly as sinners.

This verse again contrasts the superiority of Christianity over Judaism.

“The law was given that every mouth may be shut, for we are guilty.  The High Priest is given that every mouth may be open, for Jesus receive[s] sinners.” (Adolph Saphir, 1:207)

What the author of Hebrews wants these struggling believers to know is that when they come to God He isn’t going to berate them.  He doesn’t make fun of them, or mock and ridicule them.

Instead, he grants the mercy we need for forgiveness and the grace that energizes us for perseverance.  Grace is power. Grace is energy. Grace is God at work in us to change us.  Grace changes how we think, giving plausibility and sense to ideas once believed to be false.  Grace changes how we feel, bringing joy in Jesus and revulsion for sin.  Grace changes how we choose, creating new and deeper desires for what we once found unappealing.  Grace changes how we act, equipping and energizing the soul to do what we have failed to do so many times before. 

If we are to have hope for perseverance in holiness, we must have the heart-changing, mind-changing, will-changing work of divine grace that is sovereignly bestowed when heart-weak, mind-weak, will-weak people ask for it from the only place it may be found: the throne of grace. 

Notice that this grace “helps” us.  It doesn’t do it for us, but helps us.  It is like Philippians 2:12-13, “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.”

We work out what God works in us.  He puts the “will” or desire in us to “work for his good pleasure,” to produce the fruit of the Spirit as we obey Him and do good works.  He also gives us the “work” or the power to do these things.  We are not able in our own strength, and need the grace-gift of enablement in order to be obedient to God.  We not only desire, we also do, by virtue of the dynamic, antecedent activity of grace in our souls.

This is the grace that constitutes the help that God so freely supplies in response to the humble prayer of those who rely on him for holiness.  God helps by imparting to our souls a new taste for spiritual things that we might relish and savor the sweetness of Christ above all rival flavors.  He helps by infusing our hearts with a new disposition, a fresh way of thinking, a passion for the joy of enjoying him.  This help is grace!  Without it we are hopelessly consigned to living out the impulses of the flesh that will invariably lead us into the deceitfulness of sin (cf. Heb. 3:12). 

If we are to find in Jesus the fairest of ten thousand, if we are to revel in the joy he so generously supplies, our hearts must be fed with grace.  If we are to see in him surpassing excellency and for that reason say No to the passing pleasures of sin, our hearts must be fed with grace.  If we are to be fed with grace, we must come boldly to the throne on which it is seated, poised and ready to help us in our time of need, and we must ask. (Sam Storms)

And notice when we get that mercy and grace.  It helps us “in time of need.”  Whenever you need it, it is available to you.  Are you going through a time of need?  Are the circumstances in your life threatening to engulf you?  There is a light at the end of the tunnel – and it isn’t the light of an oncoming train.  It is The Light.  And He brings with Him mercy and grace.  Sometimes those grace gifts come at just exactly the right moment.

This is a true story that happened to Helen Roseveare, a missionary to the Belgian Congo.

One night, in Central Africa, I had worked hard to help a mother in the labor ward; but in spite of all that we could do, she died leaving us with a tiny, premature baby and a crying, two-year-old daughter.  We would have difficulty keeping the baby alive.  We had no incubator.  We had no electricity to run an incubator, and no special feeding facilities.  Although we lived on the equator, nights were often chilly with treacherous drafts.   A student-midwife went for the box we had for such babies and for the cotton wool that the baby would be wrapped in. Another went to stoke up the fire and fill a hot water bottle. She came back shortly, in distress, to tell me that in filling the bottle, it had burst.  Rubber perishes easily in tropical climates. “…and it is our last hot water bottle!” she exclaimed.  

Hot water bottles do not grow on trees, and there are no drugstores down forest pathways.  All right,” I said, “Put the baby as near the fire as you safely can; sleep between the baby and the door to keep it free from drafts.  Your job is to keep the baby warm.” 

The following noon, as I did most days, I went to have prayers with many of the orphanage children who chose to gather with me.  I gave the youngsters various suggestions of things to pray about and told them about the tiny baby.  I explained our problem about keeping the baby warm enough, mentioning the hot water bottle.  The baby could so easily die if it got chilled. I also told them about the two-year-old sister, crying because her mother had died.

During the prayer time, one ten-year-old girl, Ruth, prayed with the usual blunt consciousness of our African children. “Please, God,” she prayed, “send us a water bottle.  It’ll be no good tomorrow, God, the baby’ll be dead; so, please send it this afternoon.”  While I gasped inwardly at the audacity of the prayer, she added by way of corollary, ” …And while You are about it, would You please send a dolly for the little girl so she’ll know You really love her?”  As often with children’s prayers, I was put on the spot.  Could I honestly say, “Amen?”  I just did not believe that God could do this.  Oh, yes, I know that He can do everything: The Bible says so, but there are limits, aren’t there?  The only way God could answer this particular prayer would be by sending a parcel from the homeland.  I had been in Africa for almost four years at that time, and I had never, ever received a parcel from home. Anyway, if anyone did send a parcel, who would put in a hot water bottle? I lived on the equator! 

Halfway through the afternoon, while I was teaching in the nurses’ training school, a message was sent that there was a car at my front door.  By the time that I reached home, the car had gone, but there, on the veranda, was a large twenty-two pound parcel!  I felt tears pricking my eyes.  I could not open the parcel alone; so, I sent for the orphanage children.  Together we pulled off the string, carefully undoing each knot. We folded the paper, taking care not to tear it unduly.  Excitement was mounting.  Some thirty or forty pairs of eyes were focused on the large cardboard box.

From the top, I lifted out brightly colored, knitted jerseys.  Eyes sparkled as I gave them out.  Then, there were the knitted bandages for the leprosy patients, and the children began to look a little bored.  Next, came a box of mixed raisins and sultanas – – that would make a nice batch of buns for the weekend.  As I put my hand in again, I felt the…could it really be?  I grasped it, and pulled it out.  Yes, “A brand-new rubber, hot water bottle!” I cried.  I had not asked God to send it; I had not truly believed that He could.  Ruth was in the front row of the children.  She rushed forward, crying out, “If God has sent the bottle, He must have sent the dolly, too!”  Rummaging down to the bottom of the box, she pulled out the small, beautifully dressed dolly.  Her eyes shone: She had never doubted!  Looking up at me, she asked, “Can I go over with you, Mummy, and give this dolly to that little girl, so she’ll know that Jesus really loves her?” 

That parcel had been on the way for five whole months, packed up by my former Sunday School class, whose leader had heard and obeyed God’s prompting to send a hot water bottle, even to the equator.  One of the girls had put in a dolly for an African child — five months earlier in answer to the believing prayer of a ten-year-old to bring it “That afternoon!”

“And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear.” (Isaiah 65:24)

One of the reasons we are encouraged to go in prayer to Jesus Christ with anything we are going through is because He is the ultimate sympathetic high priest.  Hebrews 4:15-16 says…

15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Last week we noted that he is able to sympathize with our weaknesses because (1) he has been tempted “in every respect” and that (2) he has been tempted “as we are.”  He has gone through those same temptations that we have faced due to Him sharing humanity with us.

Jesus, our High Priest, has an unequalled capacity for sympathy. It goes far beyond the intellectual, because it is truly experiential.  Jesus does not just imagine how we feel—he feels it!  The word for “sympathize” here means “to share the experience of another”—to sympathize through common experience.  The most sensitive Man who ever lived feels with us.

A third thing we see in this passage is that, although he was tempted in every respect as we are he was “without sin.”  His temptations were genuine.  As a human, Jesus felt the full force of these temptations.  But as God he had predetermined not to sin.  And as God, he had the power not to sin.

Earl Radmacher illustrated how Jesus could not have sinned this way: Suppose you had a thick iron bar and a thin wire.  The bar represents Christ’s divine nature and the wire His human nature.  The bar cannot be bent, but the wire could be.  Yet, if the wire is fused to the bar, the wire cannot be bent either.  Thus, the fusing of Christ’s divine and human natures meant that He could not sin (Salvation, pp. 40-41).

All orthodox theologians hold that Jesus did not sin.  Not only is this affirmed in our present passage (v. 15), but we find this repeated throughout the New Testament and pictured in the Old Testament sacrifices that had to be spotless and without blemish.

For example, 1 Peter 1:19 says, “but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.”  In 1 Peter 2:22 Peter, having been a close observer of Jesus in daily life and under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, says, “he committed no sin.”  The apostle John concurs, saying “in Him there is no sin” (1 John 3:5) and Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:21 that Jesus “knew no sin.”  He was holy even in the womb (Luke 1:35) and continued so throughout His whole life, as Hebrews 7:26 emphasizes, our high priest is “holy, innocent, unstained, separated from sinners.”  This last phrase does not mean that He didn’t associate with sinners or identify with sinners, but that he didn’t enter into their sinning ways.

When Hebrews 4:15 says Christ was tempted in every respect as we are, yet without sin, we should understand the preposition “without” (choris) as extending both to the outcome of the temptations (unlike us, Christ did not sin) and also to the nature of the temptations (unlike ours, Christ’s temptations were not sinful).  In other words, we are tempted by the world, the flesh, and the Devil, while Christ never faced temptation from His flesh.  Or as John Owen put it, Christ faced the suffering part of temptation; we also face the sinning part.

Christ’s inability to sin does not make his temptations less genuine.  The army that cannot be conquered can still be attacked (W. G. T. Shedd, Dogmatic Theology, 662).  If anything, Christ’s temptations were more intense than ours precisely because he never gave in to them.  This makes Christ even better able to sympathize with us than any other person could.

Since Jesus is one person with two natures, and since sin involves the whole person, in this sense, Jesus could not have sinned or else He would have ceased to be God.  But the question remains, “How then could Jesus temptations have been real?”  The answer seems to be that Jesus met every temptation to sin, not by means of His divine power, but rather through His human nature relying upon the power of the Holy Spirit.  As Wayne Grudem explains, “The moral strength of his divine nature was there as a sort of ‘backstop’ that would have prevented him from sinning…, but he did not rely on the strength of his divine nature to make it easier for him to face temptations…” (Systematic Theology, p. 539).

“Yet without sin” means an absolute absence of sin.  He was never, for a single moment, tainted by sin.

This identification with our weakness without sinning is what makes him the absolute best high priest.  He can sympathize because he experienced it all, to an even greater depth of suffering than any of us—because we give in so quickly. 

If he had sinned, he would then have had to make atonement for himself and that would have rendered his sacrifice unacceptable for atoning for our sins.

He would not have been an “improved high priest” had He sinned.  We mistakenly believe He would have understood us better had he engaged in sin.  But in fact, if he had, then He could not serve as our high priest.

Charles Spurgeon pointed out “[D]o not imagine that if the Lord Jesus had sinned he would have been any more tender toward you; for sin is always of a hardening nature.  If the Christ of God could have sinned, he would have lost the perfection of his sympathetic nature.  It needs perfectness of heart to lay self all aside, and to be touched with a feeling of the infirmities of others” (“The Tenderness of Jesus” [Ages Software], sermon 2148, p. 407, italics his).

What makes him able to sympathize is that he had “much greater love, infinitely more sensitive concerns, infinitely higher standards of righteousness and perfect awareness of the evil and dangers of sin.  Contrary, therefore, to what we are inclined to think, His divinity made His temptations and trials immeasurably harder for Him to endure than ours are for us” (John MacArthur, pp. 111-112).

Think about it.  When we are injured, our bodies go numb of into shock to protect us.  The amount of pain we can endure is not limitless.  We can conclude, therefore, that there is a degree of pain that we will never experience, because our bodies will turn off our sensitivity to pain in one way or another.

Similarly, we will never experience the degree of temptation that Jesus did, because no matter our level of spirituality, we will succumb before we reach it.

If we were to place every temptation on a 100 point scale, most of us would wimp out at 30 or 40, maybe if we’re a giant in the faith at 75 or 80.  But Jesus always engaged every temptation 100%, because He didn’t give in.  Satan ultimately had to give up and “return at an opportune time.”

Since Jesus never succumbed, He experienced every temptation to the maximum extent.  Yet He did not give in and sin.

As he approached his death he faced the prospect that following his Father’s will would lead to suffering and death in apparent estrangement from his Father.  Hence the agony of Gethsemane as he strained to commit himself to follow his Father’s will (Matt. 26:37–39; Luke 22:41–44).  Jesus’ endurance without sin, meant that he experienced the full depth and suffering of temptation.  All sinners, at some point, relent from the pressure of temptation and succumb; Jesus did not.

This reality led B. F. Wescott to write:

“Sympathy with the sinner does not depend on the experience of sin but on the experience of the strength of the temptation to sin which only the sinless can know in its full intensity. He who falls yields before the last strain” (The Epistle to the Hebrews, p. 59).

“This sinlessness, it should be stressed, is not something passive, a mere state of being, but the achievement of Christ’s active conquest of temptation.  Indeed, it is entirely synonymous with the complete obedience learned by him through all he endured, by which his perfection was won and established and which fitted him to become the source of our eternal salvation” (Philip Edgecomb Hughes, Hebrews, p. 173).

So Jesus understands our every weakness.  He sympathizes with every temptation.  He understands our inability to say “no” to temptation and give in, although He never did.

We all need someone to sympathize with our problems and weaknesses without condemning us.  Sometimes that is enough to get us through—to know that someone else understands what we’re going through and accepts us and loves us.

I read about a boy who noticed a sign, “Puppies for sale.”  He asked, “How much do you want for the pups, mister?”

“Twenty-five dollars, son.”  The boy’s face dropped.  “Well, sir, could I see them anyway?”

The man whistled and the mother dog came around the corner, followed by four cute puppies, wagging their tails and yipping happily.  Then lagging behind, another puppy came around the corner, dragging one hind leg.

“What’s the matter with that one, sir?” the boy asked.

“Well, son, that puppy is crippled.  The vet took an X-ray and found that it doesn’t have a hip socket.  It will never be right.”

The man was surprised when the boy said, “That’s the one I want.  Could I pay you a little each week?”

The owner replied, “But, son, you don’t seem to understand.  That pup will never be able to run or even walk right.  He’s going to be a cripple forever.  Why would you want a pup like that?”

The boy reached down and pulled up his pant leg, revealing a brace.  “I don’t walk too good, either.”  Looking down at the puppy, the boy continued, “That puppy is going to need a lot of love and understanding.  It’s not easy being crippled!”  The man said, “You can have the puppy for free.  I know you’ll take good care of him.”

Well, that is a limited illustration of our Savior’s sympathy for our condition.  Since He became a man and suffered all that we experience, He sympathizes with our weaknesses.  He demonstrated His compassion many times during His earthly ministry.  But His humanity was not diminished in any way when He ascended into heaven.  We have a completely sympathetic high priest at the right hand of God!

Christ’s sympathy for us goes beyond the intellectual to the experiential.  He not only “knows how we feel,” but He has felt how we feel.  It has impacted Him deeply.

The very idea that the high and holy God could sympathize with humanity was an amazing and almost unbelievable idea to the Jews.  They could not comprehend Him experiencing pain, much less temptation.  The Jews believed that God was incapable of sharing the feelings of men.

It was just as hard for Gentiles of that day.  Stoics believed that God’s primary attribute was apathy—being without feeling or emotions.  The Epicureans believed the gods lived between the physical and spiritual worlds and were detached from mankind and suffering.

But the genius of Christianity is a God who drew near to us, became one of us so that he could suffer our pains and be tempted with our temptations.  He has experienced what we have experienced and feels what we feel.

Tim Keller, former pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan, New York, writes:

Christianity does not so much offer solutions to the problem of suffering, but rather provides the promise of a God who is completely present with us in suffering.  Only Christians believe in a God who says, “Here I am alongside you.  I have experienced the same suffering you have.  I know what it is like.”  No other religion even begins to offer that assurance.

After the World Trade Center tragedy, between 600 and 800 new people began attending Redeemer.  The sudden influx of people pressed the question, “What does your God have to offer me at a time like this?”

I preached, “Christianity is the only faith that tells you that God lost a child in an act of violent injustice.  Christianity is the only religion that tells you, therefore, God suffered as you have suffered.”

This wonderful, marvelous reality leads the writer of Hebrews to urge his readers to this action:

16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Here is a call to action.  It is essentially the same call that we saw back up in verse 14.  There we were told to “hold fast our confession.”  Now we are told to draw near with confidence.  These are not two separate actions.  They are connected.  The way that you hold fast your confession is by drawing near to Jesus with confidence.  And when you draw near to Him, you will find yourself holding fast your confession.   So this verse urges us to an action which will help us persevere—consistently drawing near to the throne of grace, availing ourselves constantly of the throne of grace.

The exhortation is based on all He has said about Jesus Christ being the perfectly suited high priest for us in our weaknesses.  We have Him, so draw near to Him.  “Draw near” is in the present tense, indicating a consistent, regular habit of coming into His presence in prayer.

We are to draw near to Him.  It is His presence and His ear that we most need.

Psalm 73:28 says, “But for me it is good to be near God.”  Asaph is contrasting the seeming good life that the wicked are experiencing, with the reality that the only real good life is found in God and in His presence.

James 4:8 urges us to “draw near to God and He will draw near to you.”  He will respond.  God is not the one playing hide-and-seek.  We are.  God is the one who wants to be found.

As sinners, we have a tendency, learned from Adam, to hide from God.  They did it by hiding behind bushes and fig leaves; we do it through psychological barriers like denial and distractions and drugs.

The Old Testament was all about barriers—this far and no further, because we are sinners.

The Old Covenant taught us that we are not welcome, naturally, in the presence of a holy God.

Only the high priest could enter into God’s presence, once a year.  The regular person was cut off from God’s presence.

And God’s presence was very terrifying much of the time.  In fact, in encouraging us to draw near to the throne would be very intimidating in the ancient culture.  Ancient thrones were typically flanked with huge statues of lions, instilling fear and terror in supplicants to the throne.  Kings only allowed an audience through invitation, as we see in the book of Esther.  Free access, much less a bold approach, was unheard of.

But Jesus opened access into God’s presence, dramatically represented by the rending of the veil in the temple during His death on the cross.  He has not only passed through the heavens, but He has also paved the way for us to join him in that adventure (cf. 2:10; 6:20; 10:19-20).

In Romans 5 Paul lists several benefits of being justified by faith (which we wouldn’t have if we could possibly be justified by works) and one of those is access to God.  Listen to Romans 5:1-2

1 Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

We have access to God!

And we are to draw near to God with “confidence.”  This word has the idea of freedom of speech, of being bold in expressing one’s thoughts.

There is no suggestion of disrespect here, but simply that we are to come to God without hesitation or tentativeness.  What a contrast with the trepidation of the high priest when he entered the Holy of Holies!  This is one of the grand revelations of this letter: “Come frankly and confidently to God, brothers and sisters!”

This letter urges us to come into the presence of a God who welcomes us and a Christ who understands us.  To neglect the place of prayer is to rob ourselves of immense and timely resources.  (Raymond Brown, The Bible Speaks Today:  Hebrews, 96-7)

This is the way we’ve been told by the author of Hebrews to persevere, to come regularly and boldly and confidently to the throne of grace.

Let’s look today at this wonderful promise given to us in Hebrews 4:14-16…

14 Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

There are two exhortations here: (1) “let us hold fast our confession” and (2) “let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace.”  Both exhortations are based on this wonderful reality that we have a better high priest who made complete and final payment of our sins so that we are completely forgiven.

“Let us hold fast” means “don’t move away from Christ” (a negative) and “let us draw near” means move ever closer and closer to Christ.  Run to Him, go to Him.

The author of Hebrews is encouraging his readers not to quit on Jesus Christ, but to persevere no matter what the cost.  Failure to endure trials is the mark of the seed sown on rocky soil. Jesus explained that this seed represents those who, “when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy; and they have no firm root in themselves, but are only temporary; then, when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately they fall away” (Mark 4:17).  Endurance is one mark of genuine saving faith (Heb. 3:6).

The word “since” at the beginning of verse 14 shows that what the author has said about Jesus as our “great high priest” serves as a reason for the exhortation to “hold fast.”  If we really understood the deep and wonderful ramifications of who Christ was, our pioneer into the very presence of a holy God, then we would not fail to “hold fast” to Him.

Physically, the word krateo, in “hold fast,” is used of grasping a person, such as when the women grabbed hold of the resurrected Jesus (Matthew 28:9), or the lame man who clung to Peter and John in Acts 3:11.  In that sense it betrays a sense of urgency and desperation.

Picture someone holding on for dear life as their raft goes down the raging rapids of the Snake River, like my mother did in 1986.  Or when you’re swept off a paddle boat in a swollen river and hang on to a slippery tree for dear life, like my nephews did.  Or when you’re holding on to a mountain ledge with all your might so you don’t fall into the valley below.  That’s what our author is encouraging us to do with Jesus Christ, to hold on to Him for dear life!

In this context it refers to determined commitment to do whatever is necessary for one’s own protection.  In Hebrews it is used to encourage us to hold on to hope (6:18; 10:23), our confidence (3:6, 14; 4:16) and the confession of faith (here and at 10:23).

The “confession” or “profession” of faith may be thought of as the act of standing before a congregation to indicate one’s initial commitment to Jesus Christ.  We make a public declaration of faith in baptism, but that profession is often put to the test when persecution arises.  They were in danger of turning away from that profession.

Paul links “believing with the heart” and “confessing with the mouth” in Romans 10:9-10.  Both are needed.  Just because someone says with the mouth that “Jesus is my Savior” doesn’t necessarily mean that they are truly saved, unless they have also believed with the heart.  Our writer has been encouraging his readers that their perseverance in that which they professed to believe was their only hope of salvation.  They must continue to believe and continue to live out their profession of commitment to Jesus Christ.

It is important that we publicly confess our faith in Jesus Christ, but the reality lies in what we believe in our hearts.

Today, in our individualistic, privatistic world, we often neglect the salutary benefit of public confession of the truth we hold.  When we are going through hard times, we need to confess Christ as our “apostle and high priest”—to own his magnificent ministry as our own—to clutch it close!  We ought not to limit our confession to congenial company alone.  There are times to confess him in unfriendly surroundings.  Such confession may be just what our soul needs.  Confess and embrace your High Priest! (R. Kent Hughes, Hebrews)

Are we willing to pay the price?

Martin Luther did.

On April 18, 1521, Martin Luther stood for the second day before Emperor Charles V at the diet being held in Worms.  The diet anticipated hearing his answers to the two questions that had been put to him the day before:  First, was he the author of the twenty-five works that had been gathered there, and second, would he now recant of the false teachings in them?  Luther readily acknowledged the authorship of the works and then tried to engage in a discussion of what were the false teachings in his works.  This ploy did not work, and he was informed that he was the theologian and knew full well the heresies that he had taught.

He showed that remarkable courage again in the bold words with which he concluded his address:

Unless I am convinced by the testimony of the Holy Scriptures or by evident reason—for I believe neither pope nor councils alone, as it is clear that they have erred repeatedly and contradicted themselves—I consider myself convicted by the testimony of the Holy Scriptures, which is my basis; my conscience is captive to the Word of God. Thus I cannot and will not recant, because acting against one’s conscience is neither safe nor sound. [Here I stand; I can do no other.] God help me. Amen.

His profession of the adequacy of Jesus Christ’s work on the cross and justification by faith is what got him in trouble with the Catholic Church.  But he stood his ground, even though it could cost him dearly.

Notice that this is a command, an exhortation to act.  He is not saying, “Since we have a great high priest…we will inevitably hold fast our confession.”  Perseverance in faith is not inevitable.  We must energetically “hold fast” to Jesus Christ.

How can we possibly maintain our confession when it may cost us so much?  Only by running in prayer to our Savior.  The basis for our ability to “hold fast” to Christ and “draw near with confidence” is found in verse 15.

In order to tighten his friends’ grip on their confession of Christ, the writer seeks to enlarge and elevate their understanding of the tenderness of this divine priesthood:

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

Hold tight to your confession of Jesus, he urges, because he is capable of unparalleled understanding and sympathy.

This was an incredible revelation in its ancient setting.  The Stoics believed that the primary attribute of God was apatheia, the inability to feel anything at all.  They reasoned that if he could feel, he could be controlled by others and therefore would be less than God.  The Epicureans believed that God dwelled in intermudia, the spaces between the worlds, in complete detachment.  The Jews, of course, had a far more accurate picture of God.  But before Jesus came it was incomplete, for he revealed the revolutionary Fatherhood of God—daring to address him as “Father” and calling his followers to do the same (Matthew 6:9).

But the assertion that their Messiah entered the world in order to suffer, and therefore sympathize with our sufferings, was an absolutely staggering thought!

To do that, the “Son of God” (v. 14), though completely and fully divine, had to take on human flesh.  As he said back in chapter 2, verse 17, “he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.”

He is fully God, but also fully man.  He was a real man, with flesh and blood, experiencing all the needs and desires, yes, and temptations that we all face.  ”He was ignorant and was taught.  He walked like a baby before he walked like a man.  He thought and talked like a baby before he thought and talked like a man.  This is why our text asserts he is able ‘to sympathize with our weaknesses.’  He lived with a human body, mind, and soul—with all their limitations, except for sin” (R. Kent Hughes, Hebrews)

Notice how our author phrases this.  By saying “we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses,” what he really means is the positive state, “we do have a high priest who is able to sympathize with our weaknesses.”

But why put it in the negative?

Possibly because they were thinking this way.  They were thinking that this Jesus who is a “great high priest” who is now in heaven would be so detached from us, so distant, indifferent towards the needs and worries and fears and weaknesses and trials of ordinary people like you and me.

But no, our author says, He’s not that kind of high priest.  Let me tell you what He’s really like and why you can trust Him and why He can be counted on to understand your deepest struggles and pains. 

Jesus added humanity to deity and lived among us.  He came to our neighborhood and experienced all the temptations we have faced.

David Guzik points out that the fact that Jesus has been here among us makes a difference in the depth of his sympathies:

“When you have been there, it makes all the difference.  We might hear of some tragedy at a high school, and feel a measure of sorrow.  But it is nothing like the pain we would feel if it were the high school we attended.” (https://enduringword.com/bible-commentary/hebrews-4/)

Rather than being removed from our human experience because of his exalted position, he associates with our weaknesses because He took on human flesh.

That he is compassionate and sympathizes with us does not refer to his sharing our experience of sin.  Temptations, yes, but not sin.  But the fact that He has shared our temptations and weaknesses means that he is compassionate to the point of helping us.

“Weakness” is a general word that could range from physical weaknesses to moral weaknesses and in this context refers to our propensity to sin.  It refers to the feebleness of resolve that allows temptation to lead us into sin.  It can refer to things like tiredness, hunger, aloneness, that all can make us more vulnerable to temptations.

Christ was tempted, but did not sin.  Notice three things about Jesus’ temptation.

First, he was tempted “in all things.”

Although the expressions or tools of sin have changed the past two millennia (Jesus wasn’t exposed to online pornography or couldn’t have embezzled funds through electronic bank fraud), yet the essential nature of temptation hasn’t changed.  He still experienced the temptations of lust and greed.

Expressions of temptation change over time, but the essence never does.

“In every way” doesn’t mean that He experienced every individual temptation we do (although he did experience many kinds).  He did experience the essential temptations that cover whatever we may experience in life.  There is no category of sin that Jesus did not face.  He faced “the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions” (1 John 2:16).

John Piper points out that Jesus can sympathize with us in our allurements to sin, because he was tempted —

• to lie (to save his life)
• and to steal (to help his poor mother when his father died)
• and to covet (all the nice things that Zacchaeus owned)
• and to dishonor his parents (when they were more strict than others)
• and to take revenge (when he was wrongly accused)
• and to lust (when Mary wiped his feet with her hair)
• and to pout with self-pity (when his disciples fell asleep in his last hour of trial)
• and to murmur at God (when John the Baptist died at the whim of a dancing girl)
• and to gloat over his accusers (when they couldn’t answer his questions)

Jesus knows the battle.  He fought it all the way to the end.  And he defeated the monster every time.  So, he was tested like we are and the Bible says he is a sympathetic High Priest.  He does not roll his eyes at your pain or cluck his tongue at your struggle with sin.

The one sin that may have been uppermost in the mind of our author was the sin to break one’s commitment to God when under severe suffering.  Jesus didn’t do that either.  In Hebrews 5:7-8 we find that he “learned obedience from what he suffered.”  For Jesus, the ultimate temptation would have been to get around his death some way and turn his back on His Father’s will.  But He didn’t do that.  He obeyed His Father to the end.

Jesus could sympathize with the temptation to turn and run in the face of evil.  He felt the same urge, but declined it.  He can thus help us when we face this very challenge (cf. 12:2-3).  Thus, we are told to “hold firmly to our confession (of faith) and “draw near to the throne of grace” to get those divine resources we need for the battles against temptations, just as Christ did in the Garden.

Second, Christ was “tempted as we are.”

We don’t need to turn to psychologists to understand us.  Jesus experienced the full force of every kind of temptation we have faced, to the full.  Therefore, He can understand and sympathize with us.

Some believe that Jesus doesn’t really know temptation because He didn’t give in to temptation.  However, as C. S. Lewis points out, his experience of the struggle of temptation was even greater than ours—who give in so quickly and easily.

As C. S. Lewis explained:

A silly idea is current that good people do not know what temptation means.  This is an obvious lie.  Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is.  After all, you find out the strength of the German army by fighting against it, not by giving in. You  find out the strength of a wind by trying to walk against it, not by lying down.  A man who gives in to temptation after five minutes simply does not know what it would have been like an hour later.  That is why bad people, in one sense, know very little about badness.  They have lived a sheltered life by always giving in.  We never find out the strength of the evil impulse inside us until we try to fight it: and Christ, because He was the only man who never yielded to temptation, is also the only man who knows to the full what temptation means—the only complete realist. (Mere Christianity, pp. 124-125)

Thomas Constable adds:

As an illustration of the thoroughness of Jesus’ temptations, imagine a large boulder on the seacoast. Since it does not move it experiences the full force of every wave that beats against it. Smaller pebbles that the waves move around do not receive the full force, because they yield to the force of the waves. Similarly Jesus’ temptations were greater than ours because He never yielded to them. By the same principle a prizefighter (Jesus) who defeats the champion (Satan) endures more punishment than other contenders who throw in the towel or are knocked out before the end of the fight.

Jesus knew depths and pains we can never know, precisely because he did not sin! No human was ever tempted like Jesus was!  “Because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted” (2:18).

Think of this in terms of pain.  There is a degree of pain which the human frame can stand–and when that degree is passed a person loses consciousness so that there are agonies of pain he cannot know.  It is so with temptation.  We collapse in face of temptation; but Jesus went to our limit of temptation and far beyond it and still did not collapse.  It is true to say that he was tempted in all things as we are; but it is also true to say that no one was tempted as he was.  (William Barclay, The Daily Study Bible Series, Hebrews, 42)

He can understand and sympathize because He shares our humanity.  Did you know that if you have two pianos in the same room, when you strike a note on one piano, the same note will gently respond on the other piano, though no one has touched it?  This is called “sympathetic resonance.”  When a chord of pain or temptation is struck in the weakness of our human heart, it resonates in His!

Isn’t it wonderful, when you are going through a difficult period in your life, that you can find someone who says, “I’ve been there too”?

Robert Griffin’s song “I’ve Been There” talks about how Jesus came into this world as a man and “began a journey of experiences just for me, just for me.”  And he says to us, “I’ve been there so I understand; I’ve been there, walked as a man; I’ve felt the pain that you’re feeling now…”

Jesus has experienced, at least categorically, everything we have experienced, including temptations and therefore he can sympathize with us in our sufferings and temptations.

We all have need for grace.  All of us face situations that are beyond our wisdom, beyond our strength, beyond our patience.  Some people live with crippling fears and others anxious doubts.  Some live in fear of the future while others struggle with regrets about the past.

But it doesn’t matter whether your struggles are overwhelmingly catastrophic, or whether they have been crippling you for years, the only thing that matters is that you know you have a great need AND that you know you have a sympathetic Savior who can sympathize with your troubles and give you mercy and grace to help when you need it.

Not everyone has that, but oh Christian, you do!

We are looking now at the last three verses of Hebrews chapter 4, the closing of this section that started in chapter 3, verse 1, which forms our author’s second warning, not to harden our hearts in unbelief.

14 Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

As usual, Charles Spurgeon put it well:

The sympathy of Jesus is the next best thing to his sacrifice. . . . It has been to me, in seasons of great pain, superlatively comfortable to know that in every pang which racks his people the Lord Jesus has a fellow-feeling.  We are not alone, for one like unto the Son of man walks the furnace with us.

These verses stand at a particularly important junction in the book of Hebrews, serving both as a conclusion to the exhortation not to harden one’s heart from 3:1-4:16 and also as an opening to the great central exposition on the high priesthood of Christ.  Just as Christ is superior to the angels and to Moses, He is also superior to the Aaronic priesthood.

These three verses consist of three intertwining components, two exhortations to “hold fast our confession” and to “draw near to the throne of grace,” supported by the discussion of Christ’s superior priesthood.  Two exhortations, grounded in a profound spiritual truth.

What our author is focused upon is the fact that Christ’s priestly work is finished—sins have been paid for at the cross—and now Christ “has passed through the heavens,” that is, He has ascended and now sits in session at the right hand of God.

Our writer believes that this truth should help us to “hold fast our confession” and “draw near to the throne of grace.”

As you look at these two exhortations, “holding fast” is the command not to move away from Christ and “drawing near” is the command to move forward, towards Christ.  It is the same truth that he will drive home again and again, DON’T MOVE AWAY FROM JESUS CHRIST.

Stand there and don’t move away—there are truths we should not move from.

Once you have that relationship with Jesus Christ, move into a deeper relationship with Him.  You don’t need something more, something added…just Jesus Christ.

These two exhortations fit together hand-in-glove.  They catalyze and balance each other.  “Hold fast…draw near…hold fast…draw near.”

When we are being tempted to draw away, that is exactly when we need to stay near.

“The reference to Jesus in his office as high priest in v. 14 is not an afterthought, but the intended conclusion of the entire argument.  The crucial issue for the community is whether they will maintain their Christian stance [that is, there complete, unwavering hope in Jesus Christ].  The issue was posed conditionally in 3:6b, and more pointedly in 3:14.  It was raised again forcefully in verse 14 in the exhortation to hold fast to the confession that identified Christians as those who had responded to the message they had heard with faith (cf. v. 2).  The ministry of Jesus in the heavenly sanctuary as a faithful high priest in the service of God gives certainty to the promise that God’s people will celebrate the Sabbath in his presence if they hold fast their initial confidence” (William Lane, p. 105).

So chapter 4 ends these two chapters with a positive exhortation, in comparison to two chapters of serious warnings (3:1-4:13), including the preceding image of the scrutiny and judgment of the Word upon our lives in 4:12-13.

In these last two paragraphs our author has clued us in to two resources we need in order to persevere and win the race—(1) God’s Word which reveals our hearts and (2) God’s grace which helps us.

Is right now your time of need?  Have you any times of need today?  This week?  Maybe nothing but a time of need!  The hymnist Robert Lowry expresses the reality, “I need Thee every hour.”

Our writer believes that Jesus’ high-priestly ministry on behalf of the believers, correctly understood and implicitly believed, would be a great anchor in the coming storms.

R. Kent Hughes draws the contrast between Christ’s priesthood and the Aaronic priesthood they had grown up under:

To dramatize the greatness of Christ’s priestly ministry, the author contrasts it with the ministry of the Levitical high priest who once a year passed from the sight of the people into the Holy of Holies bearing the blood of atonement.  In contrast, Jesus, our High Priest, passed once for all from the sight of his people at the ascension to the ultimate Holy of Holies, having shed his own atoning blood.  Specifically, the contrast becomes clear as we reflect on the temporal and circumscribed nature of the high priest’s work.  Once a year on the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) the high priest, representing all the people, entered the Holy of Holies, where he sprinkled blood on the mercy seat to symbolically atone for all the sins of the people. But even before doing this, he had to offer a sacrifice for his own sins.  And then when he entered the Holy of Holies he only stayed long enough to sprinkle the atoning blood.

His entrance into the Holy of Holies was through three portals.  First, he bore the blood through the door into the outer court.  Second, he entered another door into the Holy Place.  And third, he entered through the veil of the Holy of Holies.  Thus, the ancient high priest had a three-portaled entrance in coming before the thrice-holy God—and he had to do it year after year.

On the other hand, Jesus, our great High Priest, after his once-only sacrifice for sins on the cross, passed “through the heavens”—going through the first heaven (the atmosphere), the second heaven (outer space), and finally into the third heaven (the most holy of all places, the presence of God, cf. 2 Corinthians 12:2–4).  And there he sat down (something no high priest had ever done!) because his atoning work was finished.  He remains at God’s right hand, making intercession for us.

The idea that Jesus is our high priest has been mentioned before (Hebrews 2:17 and 3:1) but now this concept will receive extensive treatment.

The writer of Hebrews calls attention to the unique character of Jesus as high priest.

No other priest was called great.

No other priest passed through the heavens.

No other priest is the Son of God.

Aaron was the high priest, Jesus Christ is the great high priest.  He is superior in every way.  The high priest was superior to all the other priests; Jesus is superior to the high priest.

Never was it said of any OT high priest that he was “great,” not even of Aaron the first one.  Only of Jesus is this attribute given.

The high priesthood was hereditary (Exodus 29:29-30; Leviticus 26:32), a fact to which the author of Hebrews gives extensive attention (Hebrews 7:11-28), and normally for life (Numbers 17:7; 25:11-13; 35:25, 28).  Although the high priest shared a number of duties with the other priests, he alone could enter the Most Holy Place on the annual Day of Atonement (Leviticus 16:1-25).

Why is Jesus superior to the high priest?

First, because He is not just a man, but the God-man, referred to here as “Jesus, the Son of God.”  That makes him the most competent high priest to represent man before God.

He was not merely a human exalted to this priestly place.  He is the divine Son of God who created the earth and the heavens (Hebrews 1:8–10).  This gives his sacrifice its infinite worth.  Jesus does not take the blood of bulls and goats into the heavenly temple.  Nor does he even take the blood of a mere human.  He takes his own precious blood, the blood of the Son of God (Hebrews 9:12).  And when God the Father sees this sacrifice for my sin, he says, “That is enough.  The debt has been paid.  My righteousness is vindicated.  My glory is exalted.”  And he overlooks my punished transgression and counts me as his loved and innocent child (John Piper, https://www.desiringgod.org/messages/draw-near-to-the-throne-of-grace-with-confidence).

Even though the high priest could represent the nation on the Day of Atonement, he was a sinner himself and would have to offer up sacrifices for his own sins first (5:2, 3; 7:27; 9:7).  As our current text points out, in verse 15, Jesus, although tempted in every way as we are, was “without sin.”

An imperfect priest can only offer imperfect sacrifices (9:11-14; 10:1-4).  Therefore, both the covenant on which his priesthood is based (8:6ff.) and the Holy Place in which it is performed (9:11) are imperfect.  Finally, the net result is imperfect.  The old system “can never…make perfect those who draw near” (10:1).

He was also “great,” or superior, because he has been appointed by oath from God (5:4-10; 6:17-20; 7:15-22), which assures us that His priesthood is eternal (7:16-25).  He will not be succeeded by any other.

He is great because He presented His own blood in the heavenly tabernacle rather than the earthly (8:2; 9:1-28), used superior blood, His own (9:1-28) and only had to offer a once-for-all sacrifice ((10:1-18).  The high priest had to present an animal sacrifice year after year after year.

But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, (Hebrews 10:12).

His blood was totally effective to cancel your guilt and deal a death blow to your shame once and for all!

In addition, the high priest, once he was finished with his offering, high tailed it out of there as quickly as possible.  Jesus, however, when he had made “purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high” (Hebrews 1:3).  This again indicates that His work was finished, final and totally sufficient.  Nothing more was needed.

The Jewish high priest entered the inner sanctuary of the temple once a year and stood momentarily in the very presence of God.  Jesus, by contrast, has entered the heavens and is always in the presence of God (Heb 9:24).  He has been raised from the dead, has ascended to heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father.  He has gone through and is “exalted above the heavens” (Heb 7:26).  (William Hendriksen & Simon J. Kistemaker, NT Commentary: Hebrews, 124)

Rather than one who stands between God and humanity [like the typical high priest], Jesus takes us to God, ripping away the moral and ritualistic obstacles that prevented our free entrance to his presence.  He not only has passed through the heavens, but he also has paved the way for us to join him in that adventure (e.g., 2:10; 6:20; 10:19-20).  Thus, when we communicate the high-priest concept, we must emphasize its signification of a “means of free access to God.”  (George H. Guthrie, The NIV Application Commentary: Hebrews, 178)

Now Christ sits in heaven.  And what is He doing?  He is continuing to make intercession for us.

Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them (Hebrews 7:25).

Now, often we miss the little words and the little words really do make a big difference.  “Since then we have…” starts verse 14.

First, the word “since” is the first class conditional sentence, meaning that it is an assured condition.  We don’t have to doubt it.  We definitely do have this great high priest.

Second, notice that our author does not say, “Since there is a great high priest…” just stating it as a fact, but he says “Since we have a great high priest…” emphasizing our present possession of something very important.  It is important for us to realize that we “have” this.  It is not something that is just “out there,” but something we possess, or have personal experience of.

Blessings are fully realized and appreciated only if we “have them,” not if they just simply exist.  It’s very important that we “have them,” that we really have them as a personal possession.  And that is what our author is interested in, that we not simply talk about a priest existing, a great high priest existing, one who’s at the right hand of the throne of God, but he wants us to grasp the importance of knowing that “he” is ours, our great high priest.  And, of course, the throne of grace is “our” High Priest’s throne of grace.

As Sam Storms notes:

Having just been told in vv. 12-13 that the Word of God pierces and divides and discerns our hearts and thoughts and intentions, having been told that we are all laid bare and exposed to the God to whom we must given an account, there is a strong likelihood that some will recoil in fear.  The fear of judgment, the fear and apprehension of standing in the presence of an infinitely holy God, might paralyze some.  So, our author says, “No, no, don’t be afraid.  You must remember that Jesus is your high priest.  He is the Son of God and has passed through the heavens and has taken his seat at the right hand of God, there to intercede on your behalf.  He’s your advocate.  He’s your defense attorney.  He’s your eternal friend.”

Hard times had come upon the church.  Believers were being persecuted for their faith.  And some were beginning to think that it might be easier if they put aside their beliefs about Jesus and went back to their Judaism with its ceremonies and rituals.

Our author wanted to encourage them that they have a faithful friend, a great high priest who has not only done everything necessary for their salvation, but also sympathizes with their troubles and persecutions.

Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.

Why?

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses [that’s the negative, now the positive…]

but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

Then he comes back to the exhortation

Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

We are looking at the characteristics of the powerful Word of God in Hebrews 4:12-13.  There, the author of Hebrews tells us…

12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. 13 And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

We have seen that it is first, God’s Word, His very words spoken through His prophets so that we might truly know who he is and about who we are.  This Word is also “alive,” not dead and it is “active” or “powerful” so that it accomplishes its purpose.  Whatever God has said, He will do; whatever He has promised, He will fulfill.  Nothing can thwart His purposes.

We were discussing the fact that the Word of God is a sword, or maybe better thought, a scalpel, which pierces our inner person and reveals the truth about our hearts.  So, he said, that His Word is “sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”

A surgeon uses a scalpel to begin a process of opening a patient up. The surgeon does this in order to see or understand more about a problem inside the patient.

Hebrews describes God’s Word as “sharper than any double-edged sword.” In our world today, this picture of a sword may be difficult to grasp. The idea of a scalpel may be a little easier to understand. A scalpel can open us up and reveal what’s going on inside us.

God’s purpose in cutting us is to bring healing, not to leave us wounded.  Sin is like a cancer growing inside of us.  Untreated, it will be fatal.  The sharp sword of God’s Word, as J. B. Lightfoot put it, “heals most completely, where it wounds most deeply; and gives life there only, where first it has killed” (Cambridge Sermons [Macmillan and Co.], p. 162).

God’s Word exposes our sins so that together we might put our sins to death, before they kill us!  God’s book is a dangerous tool.  It will cut you!  When it makes your conscience go “Ouch!” don’t harden your heart.  Rather let God do surgery and cut away the diseased thoughts and intentions of your heart.

As Hebrews urges us to “make every effort to enter [God’s] rest,” we soon learn why we should pay attention to that warning—“for the word of God is alive and active.” The all-powerful, all-knowing God knows us through and through; nothing “is hidden from God’s sight.”

God’s Word penetrates and exposes what is in our heart of hearts.  This Word is able to pierce “to the division of the soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”

Does the “division of the soul and of the spirit” mean that man consists of three parts?  Body, soul and spirit?  That there is some distinction between soul and spirit is obvious in passages like this (Hebrews 4:12) and 1 Thessalonians 5:23.  Passages like Job 7:11 and Isaiah 26:9 show that the terms are sometimes both used to generally refer to the inner man.  In other words, they are interchangeable.

If they are distinguished here, soul likely refers to the heart and mind, the processes by which we interact psychologically with this world, while spirit refers to our capacity to relate to God.

God’s Word is able to pierce into these inner processes and lay them bare before God.  Leon Morris remarks, “”What the author is saying is that God’s Word can reach to the innermost recesses of our being.  We must not think that we can bluff our way out of anything, for there are no secrets hidden from God. We cannot keep our thoughts to ourselves” (Hebrews Bible Study Commentary, p. 44).  And R. C. H. Lenski says “The Word of God is the only power that can penetrate so deeply and expose so completely the inwardness of our being” (Interpretation of the Epistle of Hebrews and the Epistle of James, p. 143)  X-ray machines and MRIs cannot expose the thoughts and intents of our heart.  Only God’s Word can do that.

When God wills it, his Word will pierce anyone.  George Whitefield, the great eighteenth-century evangelist, was hounded by a group of detractors who called themselves the “Hell-fire Club,” derided his work, and mocked him.  On one occasion one of them, a man named Thorpe, was mimicking Whitefield to his cronies, delivering his sermon with brilliant accuracy, perfectly imitating his tone and facial expressions, when he himself was so pierced that he sat down and was converted on the spot!  Mr. Thorpe went on to become a prominent Christian leader in the city of Bristol. (R. Kent Hughes, Preaching the Word: Hebrews, 121)

Fifth, the Word is a discerner of our inner being.

When we read that God can “discern the thoughts and intentions of our heart” it reminds us of the marvelous description of God’s omniscient knowledge of our inner being in Psalm 139:1-4…

O Lord, you have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.

We may hide from our neighbors and friends and even from our spouse, but not from God.  God cannot be fooled by sham or hypocrisy or cover up.  He knows what you’re thinking right now and what you’ll think and feel ten years from today.

The word translated “discerning” in v. 12 is also rendered to “judge” in other translations.  But he doesn’t mean the word “condemns” us.  He means the Word evaluates our thoughts and intentions and weighs them and assesses and analyzes them.  The Word of God penetrates deeply into the most secret recesses of our hearts and brings an awareness of what is there: is it good or bad, sincere or hypocritical, honorable or corrupt?  (Sam Storms)

James indicates that God’s Word functions as a mirror revealing who and what we really are (cf. James 1:23, 24).  

Of all forms of deception self-deception is the most deadly, and of all deceived persons the self-deceived are the least likely to discover the fraud.

The reason for this is simple.  When a man is deceived by another he is deceived against his will.  He is contending against an adversary and is temporarily the victim of the other’s guile.  Since he expects his foe to take advantage of him he is watchful and quick to suspect trickery.  Under such circumstances it is possible to be deceived sometimes and for a short while, but because the victim is resisting he may break out of the trap and escape before too long.

With the self-deceived it is quite different.  He is his own enemy and is working a fraud upon himself.  He wants to believe the lie and is psychologically conditioned to do so.  He does not resist the deceit but collaborates with it against himself.  There is no struggle, because the victim surrenders before the fight begins.  He enjoys being deceived.  (A.W. Tozer, Man: The Dwelling Place of God, 88)

This gift of self-knowledge is no small grace and we should thank God for it because when we grasp something of the serpentine ways of our hearts, we are disposed to cast ourselves even more on God’s grace.

This is how God works through his Word to protect us against sin and temptation.  You will recall that in Hebrews 3:12 God warned of the “deceitfulness” of sin.  Sin is incredibly deceptive when it burrows deeply into our souls and lies to us that we will be better off by sleeping around and ignoring God’s appeals or by amassing more wealth by illicit and illegal means or by pursuing that divorce even though we have no biblical grounds or by spreading slander about someone who stands in our way.

Sometimes we try to hide and cover up the sin in our life. But nothing is hidden from God. And God’s Word reveals things in us and to us that we might think could be hidden. It shows us the truth about us.

God will discern whether or not we make every effort (4:11) and whether or not we have truly come to faith in Christ; nothing can be hidden from God.  We may fool ourselves or other Christians with our spiritual lives, but we cannot deceive God.  He knows who we really are because the word of God is living and powerful.  (Bruce Barton, Life Application Bible Commentary: Hebrews, 55)

Our only hope is that we might find something that is powerful enough and sharp enough that it can penetrate through the fog of deception and shed light on my thoughts and intentions and reveal to me the lies that I’m so easily prone to believe. And the one thing that can do that is God’s Word!

We do not always know what is in our hearts (Jeremiah 17:9), but God does.  He looks right below the extremely thin veneer of merely outward piety to the true thoughts of man.  He can test man’s sincerity.  Nothing whatever is hidden from his searching gaze.  Everything is exposed to his sight.  In view of this, how ridiculous is our pretense and how nauseating our hypocrisy.  (Raymond Brown, The Bible Speaks Today:  Hebrews, 92)

The wise Christian invites the penetrating, discerning work of God’s Word in his life. As wise Christians of old prayed:

O thou elect blade and sharpest sword who art able powerfully to penetrate the hard shell of the human heart, transfix my heart with the shaft of thy love. . . . Pierce, O Lord, pierce, I beseech thee, this most obdurate mind of mine with the holy and powerful rapier of thy grace (Philip Edgcumbe Hughes, A Commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1977), p. 166, quoting from Liber Meditationum xxvii, in Augustini Opera, IX (Lyon, 1664), p. 29).

We have been speaking of God’s Word in its living, penetrating , and discerning powers. Now in verse 13 the discussion continues, but the focus switches from God’s Word to God as a knowing and reckoning God.  God works through His Word.

Verse 13 gives us one of Scripture’s great descriptions of God’s knowing: “No creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.”

Other passages say: “The eyes of the LORD are in every place, keeping watch on the evil and the good” (Proverbs 15:3). The psalmist likewise witnesses, “You have set our iniquities before you, our secret sins in the light of your presence” (Psalm 90:8).

A. W. Tozer sums this up in lyrical cadence:

God knows instantly and effortlessly all matter and all matters, all mind and every mind, all spirit and all spirits, all being and every being, all creaturehood and all creatures, every plurality and all pluralities, all law and every law, all relations, all causes, all thoughts, all mysteries, all enigmas, all feeling, all desires, every unuttered secret, all thrones, and dominions, all personalities, all things visible and invisible in heaven and in earth, motion, space, time, life, death, good, evil, heaven, and hell (A. W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy (New York: Harper & Row, 1961), p. 63).

God sees and knows everything…everything!  There is not an action, a word, a thought, a desire, a mood that gets by God.  We cannot hide from His gaze.  We are “naked and exposed” like Adam in the garden.

“Naked” renders gymna, a word used of the soul being without the body (2 Cor 5:3), of a bare kernel of grain (1 Cor 15:37), or of a body without clothing (Acts 19:16).  Here it means that all things are truly uncovered before God. 

The Greek word for naked means “uncovered,” and the term translated exposed comes from the Greek word from which we get our English word trachea.  The word “exposed” literally means “twist the neck” or “take by the throat.” It can be used for bending back the neck of a sacrificial animal to administer the fatal stroke (Bruce, The Epistle to the Hebrews , p. 83).  It was sometimes used to describe a wrestler’s hold on the opponent’s throat, rendering him helpless, a choke hold (Lane, Hebrews: A Call to Commitment , p. 69).  And sometimes it was used to describe how a man being led to execution had a knife placed beneath his chin so that he could not bow his head in shame away from the gaze of the people (William Barclay, The Letter to the Hebrews (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1957), pp. 36, 37).

Whatever the exact use of the metaphor here, its meaning is clear: all creatures are in the grip of God, totally vulnerable, helpless, and “exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.”

He will examine every one of us—Christians at the judgment seat, unbelievers at the Great White Throne judgment.  We will each have to give an account for every deed, every word, every thought, every desire.

God’s Word can distinguish between the raw drives of the human organism (sex, hunger, survival), and the effects those have on his thoughts.  It even is aware of the effect of his sub-conscious forces on his decisions.  So when a man makes a decision about the things of God, whether to obey or not to obey, the Word knows what is behind the decision.  (C. S. Lovett, Lovett’s Lights on Hebrews, 97)

Have you ever turned over a two-by-four or large piece of plywood that has been lying on the ground for a long time?  When you do it reveals an enormous city of bugs and spiders and ants, all dwelling in the dark, undisclosed damp place unseen by anyone.  And they don’t appreciate being uncovered, all scurrying off for cover once the light of day exposes their presence.

Many professing Christians live lives where secrets are covered up by darkness.  People live in fear that someone someday will lift up the plywood and all will be seen.  That’s what the Word of God does!  It pulls back the curtain on our souls.  It lifts the veil on our thoughts and intentions.  It shines a light into the darkness of our hearts and forces us to deal honestly with what is hidden deeply within.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the author of the Sherlock Holmes mysteries, loved practical jokes.  As a joke, he once sent a telegram to each of 12 friends.  All were men of great virtue and respected in society.  The telegram simply read, “Flee! All has been discovered.”  To his shock, within 24 hours, the story goes, all 12 had left the country!

There may be some exaggeration in the story, but the point is that many people have dark secrets that haunt their consciences.  There is nothing more painful than a guilty conscience, and no pillow as soft as a clear conscience.  Thankfully God’s Word exposes our secrets and gives us freedom of conscience as we repent of those sins.

Medieval map-makers would typically write on the edges of their maps where land and sea were unexplored: “Here be dragons and wild beasts.”  Similarly, there are unexplored and mysterious dimensions to the human soul that can only be seen and known and healed by the penetrating power of God’s Word.  When the Spirit of God takes in hand the truth of God, our deepest and darkest secrets are surfaced and brought into the light of day; our conscience is pricked; our hearts are inflamed; our hidden sins are laid bare before the God to whom we must all give an account.

God cannot be fooled.  The accounting of our lives will be accurate and leave out nothing.  Happily, that means good things won’t be forgotten or overlooked.  But to the sinning, self-righteous heart, apart from the grace of God, the knowledge of this accounting brings nothing but unmitigated terror.

But this is what the Word of God is for.  It is designed to confront our lives with the reality of our behavior, our thinking and our affections so that we can align them with the gospel and then God’s commands.

Andrew Murray is right.  He said, “If we will not have it judge us now, it will condemn us hereafter.”  Submit to the searching gaze of God through the Word and let it identify the poisonous thoughts, the traitorous desires, the rebellious actions, the sin-laced conversations, so that you can repent and have a free conscience, knowing that there is “no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1).

Remember the context.  The writer to the Hebrews trusts that he has pierced the hearts of his audience, who thought about “giving up” on Jesus.  In this passage, he makes it clear that they can’t give up on Jesus can keep it “hidden” from God.  The word of God discovers and exposes their condition.  Which is a good thing!

This solemn thought prepares the way for the second main part of the epistle in which the purpose and effectiveness of the high-priestly work of Christ is expounded.  The fact that nothing can be concealed makes all the more pressing the need for an effective representative who can act on behalf of men (Donald Guthrie, Tyndale NT Commentaries: Hebrews, p. 119).

When I was a youngster my mom didn’t want me to have a pocket knife, knowing that I would probably cut myself.  Well, I finally begged enough to be given one, only to be carving one day on the edge of the sandbox and have the knife blade close on my finger.  I immediately started to bleed AND to scheme how to keep this from my mom.  So I ran into the well house and hide my knife in a drawer and went inside to bandage myself.  When my mom saw the cut, she asked what had happened.  I lied and told her I had cut it on a piece of glass in the yard.  Needless to say, she wasn’t fooled.  I didn’t realize that the cut was far too clean and precise to be caused by a jagged piece of glass.  She asked to see it.  So we went and searched (fruitlessly, I might add) for that piece of glass, then she followed the blood trail into the well house right to where I had hidden my pocket knife.  I thought she was omniscient.  She said she had “eyes in the back of her head.”

The Word of God, accordingly to the author of Hebrews, also cuts sharply and accurately.  He says…

12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. 13 And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

When Peter preached his Pentecost sermon in Acts 2, those who heard “were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, ‘Brothers, what shall we do?’”  The Word of God, in this case the preached Word of God, pierces and lays open our hearts, causing us to be aware of our sins and desire forgiveness.

Though this text has broad positive implications for our life and growth, in its context it functions negatively as a warning to those who disregard God’s Word.  These verses begin with the word “for,” indicating that they function to give us the reason why the exodus generation and anyone else who fails to combine faith with hearing God’s promises, experience such grim results.

An extended warning began twenty-five verses earlier in 3:7, where Psalm 95:7–11 is first quoted as the hearers are repeatedly exhorted with phrases from the psalm not to repeat the mistake Israel made at Kadesh-Barnea—disobeying God’s word and missing God’s rest (cf. 3:15; 4:3, 5, 7, all of which reference Psalm 95).

In fact, the warning against disobedience builds throughout this section and is summarized in 4:11, which introduces our text: “Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience [i.e., to God’s word]. For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword. . . .”  Our author wants to remind them of the searching power of God’s Word and man’s inability to hide from that Word.

New Testament scholar William Lane has noted a subtle allusion to the tragedy at Kadesh-Barnea in the reference to “sword,” because after Israel disobeyed God’s word, God said, “None of the men . . . shall see the land” (Numbers 14:22, 23).  The people then responded in essence, “We have made a tragic mistake.  Let’s take our weapons and enter the land.  We are now prepared to believe in God” (cf. Numbers 14:39, 40).  Moses warned them not to go, saying: “Do not go up, for the Lord is not among you, lest you be struck down before your enemies.  For there the Amalekites and the Canaanites are facing you, and you shall fall by the sword.  Because you have turned back from following the LORD, the LORD will not be with you” (Numbers 14:42, 43).  But they disregarded his warning and went up without Moses and without the ark and without the blessing of God, and they did indeed fall to the swords of the Amalekites and Canaanites (Numbers 14:44, 45).  So we see that the mention of a sharp, doubled-edged sword in our text is a sober warning not to disregard God’s Word as Israel did in the wilderness (Hebrews: A Call to Commitment (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1988), p. 69).

A strong connection undoubtedly exists between this verse and the last. The warning was based in fact on the nature of the divine revelation.  It was of such a character that its claims could not be dismissed as of no consequence.  Indeed, the powerful qualities of the word are described by means of an impressive metaphor, which emphasizes not only the activity, but also the effectiveness of the word of God.  (Donald Guthrie, Tyndale NT Commentaries: Hebrews, 116-7)

There are five characteristics of God’s Word in this passage.

It is, first of all, the “Word of God,” none other than the communication of the one and only true God.  “All Scripture is breathed out by God…” (2 Timothy 3:16a).  It does not originate with man, even those who are prophets, but “men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit” (2 Peter 1:21).  It can refer to a word spoken directly from God without human instrumentality, but normally it refers to His words as spoken or written through his prophets.

Without God’s Word we would be utterly helpless and hopeless in understanding anything about God, ourselves or the world in which we live.  Thankfully we are not left to guess at these important issues, but God has revealed what we need to know Himself, ourselves and our world through His Word.

Let us never forget that what Scripture says, God says. It is the transcript of divine speech. Paul applauded the Thessalonians because, and I’m reading from 1 Thessalonians 2:13, “when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers.”

Secondly, this Word of God is alive.  It is not dead.  It is energetic and effective.  It has life in itself and produces life in those who hear and believe it.  “There is something about the Truth, as God has revealed it, that connects it to God as a source of all life and power.  God loves his word,” says John Piper.  As the living word, it endures forever, faithfully communicating God’s revelation to every generation.  As Isaiah 40:8 proclaims, “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever.” 

Now, for many people, the Word of God is just writing on a page.  It is inert material printed on pages bound together.  It seems as dumb as the ancient idols.  But in reality, it is alive and produces life.  It brings new life to spiritually dead sinners (1 Peter 1:23) and continues to give life to the saints (Psalm 19:7).

Even though the Bible was written many centuries ago, the Spirit of God still speaks directly to us through it.  It is never out of date or irrelevant.  It speaks to the very issues that we face in our modern world.

This was the experience of E. V. Rieu, the famous classics scholar when, as an unbeliever, he undertook the translation of the Gospels for the Penguin Classics series.  Rieu described what happened during an exchange with J. B. Phillips on a now famous BBC interview:

Rieu: My personal reason for doing this was my own intense desire to satisfy myself as to the authenticity and the spiritual content of the Gospels.  And, if I received any new light by an intensive study of the Greek originals, to pass it on to others.  I approached them in the same spirit as I would have approached them had they been presented to me as recently discovered Greek manuscripts.

Phillips: Did you get the feeling that the whole material is extraordinarily alive?—I got the feeling that the whole thing was alive even while one was translating.  Even though one did a dozen versions of a particular passage, it was still living.  Did you get that feeling?

Rieu: I got the deepest feeling that I possibly could have expected. It—changed me; my work changed me.  And I came to the conclusion that these words bear the seal of—the Son of Man and God.  And they’re the Magna Carta of the human spirit.

Peter put it this way: “you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God. . . . And this word is the good news that was preached to you” (1 Peter 1:23-25).  James echoes Peter’s sentiment: “Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth.”  Not by our own will but by his divine and sovereign will were we born again, and that by the word of truth.

Thirdly, the word is described as “active” or “powerful,” meaning that it accomplishes its purpose.  The same word that at creation set the elements of the cosmos to their appointed tasks and still governs the universe toward God’s desired intentions (1:2-3), has the ability to effect change in people.  It is not static and passive but dynamic, interactive, and transforming as it interfaces with the people of God.  (George H. Guthrie, The NIV Application Commentary: Hebrews, 156)

The Word of God is perfomative.  Even in your simple reading of the text, it accomplishes something.  Notice again what Paul said at the end of 1 Thessalonians 2:13, “the word of God, which is at work in you believers.”  Even if you don’t remember what you read or heard in a sermon, that word “is” (present tense) at work in you!

In those the Spirit is calling, the Word works in us to produce conviction of sin.  For us who already believe, the Word works in us to turn our focus to Jesus Christ so that we grow from glory to glory (2 Corinthians 3:18).

As Isaiah 55:11 so beautifully says: “so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.”  Indeed, the Word of God is alive and effectual!

This text goes on to describe the dramatic transformative power of God’s effective Word:

“Instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress; instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle” (Isiah 55:13).

Paul David Tripp, in his pastoral theology work entitled Dangerous Calling, says, “When the Word of God, faithfully taught by the people of God and empowered by the Spirit of God, falls down, people become different.  Lusting people become pure, fearful people become courageous, thieves become givers, demanding people become servants, angry people become peacemakers, complainers become thankful, and idolaters come to joyfully worship the one true God.  The ultimate purpose of the Word of God is not theological information but heart and life transformation” (Dangerous Calling, p. 51).

Now think about this, if I have a thorn bush in my back yard and it’s nourished by the rain and the snow, what do I expect to get?  I don’t expect to get a myrtle tree; I expect to get a larger thorn bush.  It’s a word picture that makes no sense.  If I have a brier in my back yard and it gets nourished by rain and snow, the only thing I would expect is a bigger brier.  What Isaiah is doing is it’s pushing this metaphor to let us know what the Word of God is about.

The Word of God has as its primary purpose the transformation of our hearts, and in the transformation of our hearts, the transformation of our lives.  Not that we become bigger and better of what we are, but we become fundamentally different than we could ever have been apart from the Word of God.  The theology of the Word of God is never an end in itself.  The stories of the Word of God are never an end in itself.  The wisdom principles of the Word of God are never an end in themselves; they’re always a means to an end, and the end is the transforming power of God’s grace.  When the Word of God is brought to you by the Spirit of God, propelled by the grace of God, the result should be heart and life transformation.

You need the Word of God in your life because you need to be transformed.  All of us still have the artifacts of sin inside of us.  All of us still need the power of transforming grace.  If you’re not satisfied with who you are, you’re not satisfied with everything you say, everything you choose, everything that you decide, the ways that you act, then you need the Word of God every day in your life.  It’s God’s powerful tool of personal transformation. (www.paultripp.com/bible-study/posts/why-do-i-need-the-bible)

This was the bottom line in the great Reformation.  Erasmus, the brilliant Renaissance humanist, collected and collated manuscripts of the Greek New Testament, publishing a Greek New Testament that then unleashed the ineluctable power of God’s Word upon the sixteenth century.

Thomas Bilney, who became one of the English Reformers, had been vigorous about his religion, all to no avail.  Then he obtained a copy of Erasmus’s Greek New Testament, and all changed.  Says Bilney:

I chanced upon this sentence of St. Paul (O most sweet and comfortable sentence to my soul!) in 1 Timothy 1: “It is a true saying, and worthy of all men to be embraced, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am the chief and principal.”  This one sentence, through God’s instruction and inward working, which I did not then perceive, did so exhilarate my heart, being before wounded with the guilt of my sins, and being almost in despair, that . . . immediately I . . . felt a marvelous comfort and quietness, insomuch that “my bruised bones leaped for joy.”  After this, the Scriptures began to be more pleasant to me than the honey or the honeycomb.

Martin Luther might have been overstating his case, but he said:

What is Luther? The teaching is not mine. Nor was I crucified for anyone … How did I, poor stinking bag of maggots that I am, come to the point where people call the children of Christ by my evil name? … I simply taught, preached, wrote God’s Word; otherwise I did nothing.  And while I slept, or drank Wittenberg beer with my friends Philip and Amsdorf, the Word so greatly weakened the papacy that no prince or emperor ever inflicted such losses upon it.  I did nothing; the Word did everything.

John Calvin believed in the power of God’s Word to change lives.  His style is to explain the text in simple terms that ordinary people could understand, even though he preached directly out of his Hebrew and Greek Testaments, without notes.  After Easter Sunday, 1538, the town fathers banished Calvin from Geneva.  They later realized their mistake, and brought him back in September, 1541.  Calvin picked up with the next verse after the one he had taught in 1538, as if it had been the previous Sunday (T. H. L. Parker, Calvin’s Preaching, p. 60)!  His theme invariably was to show God’s majesty and holiness, our wretchedness and spiritual poverty, and the riches of grace that God in His fatherly kindness has made available to us through Christ (Parker, pp. 93-107).

Sociological trends, psychological factors, philosophical and political theories do not have the power to radically change people’s lives from the inside out.  But the Word of God does!

So Sam Storms encourages:

Let it be the anchor for your soul.  Let it be the rock on which you stand.  Let it be the compass to guide you through trials and tragic times.  Let it govern your choices and renew your heart and restore your joy and ground your hope.  Build your life on its moral principles. Embrace its ethical and moral norms.  Believe what it says about the nature of God. Believe what it says about the nature of mankind.

God has invested the biblical text with the power to change human lives and transform the experience of the church.  If for no other reason we must think about, meditate upon, and study the Word.

To put it simply: the Word of God pulsates with power. It is active and energetic.

The Word is not a written document of past centuries.  It is alive and current; it is powerful and effective; and it is undivided and unchanged.  Written in times and cultures from which we are far removed, the Word of God nevertheless touches man today.  God addresses man in the totality of his existence, and man is unable to escape the impact of God’s Word.  (William Hendriksen & Simon J. Kistemaker, NT Commentary: Hebrews, 118)

Fourth, the Word of God is sharper than any two-edged sword, so that it can pierce even infinitesimally small spaces.  In mathematics, an infinitesimal or infinitesimal number is a quantity that is closer to zero than any standard real number, but that is not zero.

Notice that our author describes the Word of God as a sword.  There are many other metaphors of God’s Word in Scripture.  Besides being a sword that pierces, it is a mirror that reveals (James 1:23); a seed that reproduces (1 Peter 1:23) in good hearts (Luke 8:12-15); milk that nourishes the Christian (1 Peter 2:2); a lamp that shines, lighting our path (Psalm 119:103); a fire that consumes (Jeremiah 23:29a); and a hammer that shatters (Jeremiah 23:29b).

The Word is not used to slay us.  In fact, in this context a better image might be the surgeon’s scalpel, which is used to heal us.  First it has to lay us open to see what is wrong with us, then it may have to cut away cancerous cells or some other diseased part—all for our good.

The two-edged sword in view (Gr. machairan) was originally a small one, like a boning knife that cooks used to cut up meat.  In its double-edged form it was a symbol for judges and magistrates in the Roman world.  It illustrated the power of those officials to turn both ways to get to the bottom of a case.

It has no blunt side, another way of describing its effectiveness in accomplishing its purpose of exposing us, exposing what is really happening on the inside where no one but God can see.