In the Epistle to the Hebrews, “we see Jesus” crowned with glory and honor seated at the right hand of the majesty on high. He is there for us, our Great High Priest. It is good for us to look up and see Him there, and have our gaze fixed on Him; for in this way our hearts are weaned from this world. We follow where He has gone before and His strength is ours on the road as we pass through this weary scene to where He is in the glory.
The word Hebrew means “one who goes,” that is a pilgrim. Abraham was the first Hebrew (see Gen. 14:13) and the father of the faithful. It was a word from heaven that made him a pilgrim and a stranger in the earth. “The God of glory” (Acts 7:2) appeared to him. If we have heard the voice of God calling us and have followed the heavenly vision, we too are children of Abraham, the “father of them that believe” (Rom. 4:11). As those who “go on,” we qualify to receive the message of this book to the Hebrews, those who go on (see Heb. 4:1, 11, 14, 16; 6:1; 10:22, 23, 24; 12:1, 28; 13:13, 15 for the “let us” exhortations in the epistle).
That is why this letter begins with God speaking to us. He is calling us apart from earth. He would have us view the glory of the unseen world. He would have us walk in separation unto Himself and with Himself. For this reason the human author is out of sight altogether. Hebrews is the book of the sanctuary, and in the sanctuary God’s voice alone is heard. With unshod feet we enter and listen.
The book of the sanctuary in the Old Testament, Leviticus, begins as does our epistle with the voice of God, “And the Lord called unto Moses, and spake unto him out of the tabernacle of the congregation” (Lev. 1:1). We read that—
“God who at sundry times, in olden days
Spoke through prophetic lips, made known His ways,
In the incarnate Son, to whom all knees must bow
Spoke to make known Himself, is speaking now.”
‘The simple fact that God does speak to us is amazing. Why should He condescend to do so? But He does speak and the heart rejoices in hearing His voice. To some the speech of God is simply the accepted fact of a creed and has become commonplace. To others it is the most wonderful of all facts for God has told out all His heart. He speaks directly to us. He speaks fully, revealing all His counsel. He speaks finally; there is no need for further speech once He has spoken. His words are words of love, words of salvation and words of hope.
God spoke in times past. Adam heard His voice in the garden, but He could not say all He wanted to say in those early days. God was giving the various clues to the message then, but now we have the entire alphabet in His Son. He is Alpha and Omega, the sum total of all that God has to say to us. The river of God’s revelation, beginning in the Garden and running through the ages, has widened into a majestic ocean of the fullness of revelation in His Son.
A young man lay on the operating table of a hospital. A skilled surgeon stood nearby with a group of students observing. Presently, bending over the patient, the surgeon said, “My friend, as you know, the removal of this cancer will also end your ability to speak. Is there anything you would like to say before the anesthetic?”
The young man, apparently lost in thought, waited for a long moment. The onlookers wondered what he would choose for such an occasion. Then the lips parted, and in a barely audible whisper he said: “Thank God, Jesus Christ.”
God’s last words to man are summed up in Jesus Christ. He too gave long pause before He uttered His final Word. Four hundred years of silence elapsed between the last of the prophets and the Son. Then came those wonderful three-and-a-half years of glory upon earth, the final great heartthrob of God to man. After them God could say nothing more. All His wisdom and power, all the depths of His fathomless love, had been poured out in the Person of Christ our Lord. God had fully and finally spoken.
—excerpted from Hebrews: Bible Class Notes, pp. 9-11