The Lord Jesus Christ dominates the Scriptures as the sun dominates our solar system. As the Eternal Son, He acts through creation and history. As the virgin’s Son, He joins the stream of our race, the tributary destined to unite the currents of Jew and Gentile, and to divide our river into two courses: one flowing with ever-increasing depth to the ocean of everlasting love; the other flowing darkly, a torrent of unbelief and enmity, to be swallowed up at last in the Saharan sands of the second death.
No article, no book, no library, no university can contain the infinite treasure of the revelation of God in His Son. Indeed the world itself cannot contain the books about Him that should be written. He is the master Theme of prophecy; He is the Source of the music of the Psalms; He is the Judge, administering the holy, righteous law; He is the Hero of the Gospel; He is the Authority of the Acts; He is the Subject of the Epistles; He is the enthroned Lamb and glorious Lord of the Revelation. Alas! He is also the despised and rejected Saviour of the world; the disobeyed Head of the Church; the Perfect Guest wounded in the house of His friends; the long-absent King, who will suddenly return to take account of His servants.
To escape being overwhelmed by the exceeding riches of the grace of God, we concentrate attention upon a few of the words in the Epistle to the Hebrews. With the exception of the First Epistle of John, all the other Epistles begin with a man: Paul, Peter, James, Jude. Hebrews begins with the greatest word in any language — God. But immediately associated with Him is His Son, so that far from being terrified by the awe-full word, we are delighted by the assurance that the Son is the Father’s Heir, demonstrating His power; the Father’s radiance, expressing His character; the Father’s provided sacrifice, manifesting His mercy, and the Father’s Companion at the right hand of His Majesty. Then lest this high estate should be thought comparable with principalities and powers, the angelic host is revealed, ranked immeasurably far below the Son. He is the Son, they are servants; to Him alone belongs Deity. He is the Only Begotten Son in whom dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.
The writer of this Epistle, skillfully hidden from our sight in the shadow of the Holy Spirit’s hand, is enamored with his subject, and as an instructed scribe, he brings forth from the Scriptures a wealth of comparison and contrast, to be woven into a wonderful revelation of his Lord. He will marshal the men and women of faith in noble array; he will pronounce the most solemn words of warning; he will touch upon homey subjects, but all will be pressed into the service of the Incomparable Son, to whom he frequently refers without title in deepest reverence as Jesus, teaching us that in that solitary word is all the grandeur belonging to the name of God.
“We see Jesus!” (2:9) he cries, after a disappointing glance at a world which fallen man has spoiled. From man, the monarch who has lost his crown, he turns to the One, who, laying aside His native glory, is found in human fashion, that He may become representative Man, and so as a supreme act of sacrifice taste death for His fellows and fulfill His name, “Jehovah the Saviour.” To this basic sight, the eyes of faith repeatedly return; it is the first sight of faith on earth; it will be the central sight of Heaven, “A Lamb as it had been slain.” Oh! satisfying sight; the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me, that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest to make propitiation for the sins of His people.
This is He who has passed into the Heavens, “Jesus the Son of God” (4:14), able to sympathize, having triumphed over all temptation. With such a Mediator, we are urged to hold fast our confession. With such a Man in such a place, with such evidences of His perfect love, how can we let it go? “Hold Him fast!” cried traitorous Judas to the soldiers in the Garden. “Hold Him fast!” is the burden of this Epistle to the Hebrews and to us, “lest at any time we should slip away.” Then as a safeguard against reliance upon our own resources, we read: “We might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: which hope we have as an anchor of the soul both sure and steadfast, and which entereth into that within the veil; whither the Forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus” (6:18-20). The feeble grasp of faith has gripped the mighty promise, which like an anchor holds beyond our sight; it is better there, for it is where He is, attached to Him inseparably. The rains descend, the floods come, the winds blow and beat upon us, but to the obedience of faith there is no overthrow, for none can pluck our hand from His, or His from ours, or either from His Father’s.
To make assurance doubly sure, He has entered into a covenant of grace which is final, eternal, and satisfying, because it is sealed by the blood of the Great Shepherd of the sheep. It is based equally upon what God and the Man of His right hand have done. “By so much hath Jesus become a Surety of a better covenant” (7:22), and He in all His perfections becomes us, for He is “holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the Heavens.” But not only so, for if we have indeed been made partakers of this new covenant, then where Sinai failed, Calvary succeeds, and the promise is fulfilled. “I will put My laws into their minds, and write them upon their hearts, and I will be to them a God and they shall be to Me a people.”
Nor is the work of grace ended yet, since the Father’s heart desires worshipers for His glory, and for the full exercise of their ransomed powers. Therefore “boldness to enter the holiest by the blood of Jesus” is granted (10:19); the exclusive privilege of one member of one family of one race, has become the inclusive birthright of all the people of God. Each has an abiding place at the mercy-seat by virtue of that sacrifice which not only cancels guilt, but confers the privileges of access and affection, formerly enjoyed only by the Son, upon those whom the Father has given Him, and of whom He says: “Behold I and the children whom Thou has given Me.” Then lest these blood-bought privileges should be to us only theoretical, we are urged to draw near with a true heart. How can we stay away? What attractions can rival the presence of the Father and the Son?
For a little while there is another parallel phase of experience; for although we have such a privileged place in the heavenlies, we have also responsibilities in a very different place among the shaken, overturning things of time; yet the secret of the sanctuary is the pledge of victory in every conflict. “Looking unto Jesus, the Captain and Perfecter of faith” (12:2). Not short-sightedly peering towards some faint object, but gazing upon One who is just ahead, who will never leave us to our own resources; who, having triumphed gloriously, is leading us on through enemies impotent to harm us while we follow obediently in His steps.
The battlefield passes from view, and we are seen on Mount Sion, walking in the city of the Living God, heavenly Jerusalem, graced by an innumerable company of angels, numbered among the general assembly and Church of the Firstborn, in the presence of God our Judge and Justifier, and with Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and His precious blood that has made our peace (12:22-24). This is our Homeland; here we breathe our native air and speak the vernacular of our chosen clan; here we sing the psalms of victory to celebrate the Victor’s fame. On Him our eyes are fastened, for He is altogether lovely; grace has been poured into His lips, they are like lilies dropping sweet-smelling myrrh; His words contain all the music of David’s harp, all the wisdom of Solomon, the eloquence of Isaiah, and the pathos of Jeremiah. “Never man so spake,” for never man so prayed, worked, loved, suffered, died and overcame.
This is our Lord Jesus, who to bring us to His Father and our Father, suffered without the gate (13:12). And lest the Firstborn should be separated from His brethren, He allows us to share the fellowship of His sufferings, the shame of His Cross without the camp, where His blessed footsteps are so clearly seen, in preparation for that moment when we shall be glorified together, and the incomparable Son of God shall see the travail of His soul and shall be satisfied.
Written by A. C. Rose