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Post by Admin on Aug 31, 2023 12:27:36 GMT -5
B. Following After the Witnesses (12:1-29)
Though the chapter break might suggest a change of topic, chapter 12 continues the same line of thought. Throughout his letter, and suited to his pastoral intent, the writer’s approach has been to conclude sections of instruction with appropriate exhortation. So here, chapter 12 draws out the
practical implications of the heritage of faith his readers enjoyed: “Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us…let us run with endurance the race set before us.”
These Hebrews had endured all sorts of difficulty and suffering since openly embracing Jesus of Nazareth as Israel’s Messiah, but they weren’t alone in this. Yes, it was true that their forefathers hadn’t suffered because of faith in the person of Jesus, but their faith was in the same God whose promises had now been fulfilled in Jesus. Their forefathers shared the same essential faith in Israel’s God, and their faith had cost them just as dearly (11:35-38).
All of the considerations the writer set before his readers – the promises of the God who is faithful, the heritage of faith they enjoyed, the surety of the promises in Messiah Jesus, His triumphant reign and mediation and their share in Him – served their encouragement, but they
also confronted them with their solemn obligation to show themselves faithful. If those who received Yahweh’s promises clung to them in faith without ever seeing them fulfilled, how much more should those remain faithful who live in the “fullness of the times” – those who not only
have seen all of the Lord’s promises become “yes and amen” in Jesus, but are themselves sharers in His triumph, kingdom and glory?
1. The writer chose an interesting image in issuing his exhortation, namely that of a runner engaged in a strenuous athletic contest (12:1-2). This imagery is well suited to the matter at hand, and so it’s not surprising to see Paul drawing on it as he spoke of the Christian life (ref. 1 Corinthians 9:24-27; cf. also Acts 20:24; Galatians 2:1-2, 5:7; Philippians 2:14-16; 2 Timothy 4:7-8). This imagery connotes all sorts of other related images, such as training, discipline, focus, arduousness, perseverance, completion and victory. All of these are wrapped into the writer’s exhortation, but he emphasized in particular the mindset and discipline that his readers needed to bring to their endeavor.
a. The first thing he mentioned concerns, not the contestants themselves, but the witnesses who surround them. This imagery underscores that the writer’s point in chronicling the faithful in Israel’s history was to provide encouragement to his readers in their own contest of faith. Their forefathers had faced the challenges of living faithfully, and they met and triumphed through those challenges as those who died without receiving the promises to which they attached their unwavering hope. These Hebrew Christians, on the other hand, had witnessed those promises
fulfilled in Jesus; how much more, then, ought they persevere in faith, knowing that He had ascended to take His place at the right hand of power, where He was now ruling toward the goal of bringing all things into subjection to Himself?
These readers needed to know that they were surrounded by all of the faithful who
preceded them. But not as observers watching and cheering them on, but as
examples whose faithful “running” should encourage them in their own contest.
This multitude were “witnesses,” not in the sense of looking down on those in later generations as they ran their own race, but as faithful men and women who testified of their confidence in their God and His promises by their steadfastness and perseverance in faith. This “great cloud of witnesses” supplied strong encouragement to those who came after them, not by cheering them on like
excited spectators in the stands, but by giving them an example to be imitated – by bearing witness to what a faithful human life entails.
b. The writer intended that his readers would draw encouragement and renewed resolve from their Israelite forefathers who completed their contest of faith well and faithfully. But this wasn’t enough; each contestant must compete in his own time and circumstance; he must run the race God has uniquely set before him.
And this involves proper preparation. In particular, the writer highlighted the obvious fact that a runner who is serious about winning his contest will take pains to insure that he has addressed every possible impediment to victory.
- He’s not going to undertake his race wearing bulky or heavy clothing, but will make himself as unencumbered and agile as possible.
- So also he will be careful to identify and remedy anything in his outfitting that might possibly trip him up while he’s running. Only a fool comes to the starting line wearing shoes with untied laces, and runners in the ancient world gathered and tied up their long garment (“girded up their loins”) so that it wouldn’t entangle their legs.
As it pertains to “running” the Christian “race,” this sort of preparation involves
removing all encumbrances and impediments that might hinder or jeopardize
one’s faithfulness and perseverance in it. Interestingly, the Hebrews writer didn’t
identify any specific things that weigh a person down (“lay aside every
encumbrance”), but then mentioned sin as an entangling power that very easily
trips up the Christian “runner” and causes him to fall (12:1).
He didn’t specify any particular encumbrances, but also spoke of sin in general, without providing any further clarification. This may seem odd at first glance, but it’s actually perfectly appropriate. Indeed, naming specific “sins” would likely lead his readers to miss his point. Certainly that would be the case with contemporary readers. For the common tendency is to associate “sin” with particular offenses or transgressions, but the biblical terminology (in Hebrew as well as Greek) speaks to the general nature of human failure rather than a catalog of behaviors and offenses. As a scriptural concept, sin has to do with deviationfrom what is right, true or appropriate, and so is often defined as “missing the mark.” The concept of sin pertains to truth versus falseness more than good and bad conduct. And inasmuch as it is a human phenomenon, sin concerns a person’s
deviation from the truth of human existence as human beings are the image and likeness of God. Put most simply, sin refers to human existence that is less than or other than what God created His human creatures to be.
With this understanding, it becomes clear that the catalog of things that Christians (and people in general) typically designate as “sin” are actually symptoms of it; at bottom, they are simply the psychological, spiritual, and behavioral
manifestations of human deviation from the truth of man as God’s image-son.
This, then, has a couple of crucial implications for the present context:
First, this understanding of sin helps illumine the writer’s perspective and intent in issuing his exhortation. The obligation he was imposing on his readers reaches far beyond identifying and turning away from certain errant behaviors. His concern wasn’t so much with “sinful” actions that can lead to stumbling, but with a mindthat deviates from the truth – a mind that fails to conform to the truth of the Christian’s identity, renewal and destiny in Jesus (so the emphasis of verse 12:2).
In the case of his Hebrew audience, the primary issue was distracted and distorted thinking resulting from the pressures coming against them, thinking that worked to undermine their steadfastness in faith (10:26-39).
Second, the wider context shows that the writer was especially concerned with the sin of disbelief – that is, compromise in one’s faith in Jesus that results in unfaithfulness (cf. 3:1-4:11). And this understanding shows why and how this sin so easily entangles. Foremost, Christian disbelief involves distraction and subtle deception. No runner comes to the starting line wearing clothing that he knows might entangle his legs. If he’s tripped up during his race, it’s by something that escaped his notice at the start, or that shifted or came loose while he was running.
So it is with the sin of disbelief. It’s relatively easy for Christians to identify and deal with their sinful behaviors; it’s far more difficult to detect and address the subtle motions of their minds and hearts that work against their faith and faithfulness. Indeed, even mature Christians can confuse faithlessness with faith when it comes to matters that are personally significant. The greater a person’s longing for a particular outcome, the greater his propensity to seek and expect that outcome from God. In this way, he substitutes presumption for faith, typically
without even recognizing it (cf. Psalm 91 with Matthew 4:5-7). So pride in the Christian heart very naturally cloaks itself in the guise of a commitment to holy living (Colossians 2:20-23), just as self-preoccupation and self-concern often present themselves as “godly sorrow”
(2 Corinthians 7:8-10).
c. The writer instructed his readers that faithfully running the race appointed for them required that they set aside the things that could impede them or cause them to stumble. Finishing and winning their race depended on discarding certain things, but it also depended on holding tightly to something: They needed to “fix their eyes on Jesus” (12:2). The verb the writer chose is significant in that it connotes two distinct, but related actions. The one is obvious from the English rendering, which is setting one’s gaze on an object – in this case, Jesus Himself.
The second is more implicit, but absolutely critical to the verb’s meaning. This implied action is looking away from what was the previous object of attention.
The writer understood that hardship, affliction and suffering have the effect of
causing the sufferer to become preoccupied with finding a remedy. So it was with
his readers. But whatever they happened to be looking to in the hope of finding
relief, they needed to turn their eyes away from it and lock their gaze on Jesus –
the long-awaited Deliverer on whom they had fixed their hope in the first place.
Like all who suffer, these Hebrew believers longed for relief and deliverance. The
easiest way to obtain it was to soften their commitment to Jesus as Israel’s
Messiah, and some were doubtless tempted to forsake Him altogether. But the
writer wanted them to understand that the answer to their suffering was to hold all
the more tightly to Him – specifically as the One who is “the author and perfecter
of faith.” This phrase is often interpreted in terms of personal faith, but the writer
was speaking of the faith: faith as the new mode of human relationship with God
that Jesus inaugurated by His own faithful commitment to fulfill His Father’s
purposes and promises (cf. Galatians 3:15-29, esp. vv. 22-26).
Jesus inaugurated this “faith” as the new human paradigm through His atoning death and His resurrection as consummate Image-Son. But that triumph was the culmination of His entire life lived as an authentic human being – a son of Adam (“Son of Man”) whose relationship with God was defined and governed by faith and faithfulness (ref. Galatians 2:20, where “faith in the Son of God” should be rendered “the faithfulness of the Son of God”; cf. also Romans 3:21-22).
Jesus has become the “author and perfecter of faith” by means of His own personal life as the true man of faith. His faith and faithfulness reached their apex in His self-offering at Calvary (cf. Luke 22:41-42; John 12:23-32, 14:30-31 with Matthew 27:43), and this is what the Hebrews writer was pointing to when he exhorted his readers to fix their eyes on Him who, “in faith, for the joy set before Him, endured the cross and disregarded its disgrace and shame.”
- If their Israelite forefathers stood before them as examples of the triumph of human faith and faithfulness, how much more was that true of the
faithful Man who fulfilled in Himself Israel’s identity and calling as son, disciple, servant, and witness?
- And if they could rightly draw strength for their struggle of faith from their faithful ancestors, how much more should their encouragement and
resolve be grounded in the supremely faithful Son of Abraham?
For there was no dimension or degree of suffering or tribulation that He did not endure; indeed, the supreme agony of Calvary was the culmination of a life of hardship that derived from His faithfulness to His Father’s will and work (John 15:18-25). Jesus’ path of sonship was the path of the suffering of faith (Hebrews 5:7-8). How could these Hebrews, who had embraced Him as the One in whom they obtained their own authentic sonship, believe that their path of sonship unto its perfection would somehow differ from His (12:2-3; ref. also 2:5-3:6)?
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Post by Admin on Aug 31, 2023 12:28:42 GMT -5
2. If the faithful throughout history were worthy examples to scrutinized and followed, that
was preeminently the case with the truly faithful Israelite, Jesus the Messiah. For He was
the son of Abraham in whom Israel became Israel indeed; the One in whom Israel at last
fulfilled its covenant election and vocation as son, servant, disciple and witness for the
sake of the world’s blessing and restoration to God (ref. Isaiah 49:1-6).
Jesus lived out His life as the quintessential faithful son whose mind, heart and will were
fully one with His Father. He alone, among all mankind, could truthfully make the claim,
“to see Me is to see the Father” (cf. John 1:14-18 with 4:1-34, 5:1-20, 8:12-56, 10:22-38,
14:1-10). Thus Jesus’ faithful sonship is the superlative example for men to follow, and
His faithfulness saw its supreme expression in His sacrificial death at Calvary. For, by
His submissive act of self-giving, Jesus fully disclosed and fulfilled His Father’s purpose
in sending Him into the world. His horrific and appalling death was Jesus’ superlative
testimony to His Father’s love, goodness and glorious design for His beloved creation.
Far from being detached from Jesus’ brutal death at Roman hands, Israel’s God was
supremely revealed and glorified in it (John 12:23-28). If the Son’s work was the Father’s
(John 5:19, 10:32-38), the apex of the Father’s work was Calvary’s unspeakable agony
and disgrace (John 17:1-5, 19:30).
a. The cross represented the pinnacle of Jesus’ faithfulness as a Son fully devoted to
His Father’s purpose and will. So also it brought to a climax the suffering that
faithfulness invariably incurs. These Hebrews were well familiar with this
dynamic, for they themselves were suffering because of their faithful adherence to
the messianic Son. They shared their Lord’s suffering of faith, and thus the writer
exhorted them to find in Him strength and encouragement for their own contest of
faith – from His faithful life, but supremely from his faithful death: “Consider
Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you may
not grow weary and lose heart. You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding
blood in your striving against sin” (12:3-4).
Jesus had persevered in faith all the way to the point of death, and God had not
yet required this of these Hebrew disciples. Whatever the challenges to their
faithfulness, they were eclipsed by what their Lord had withstood; their resistance
hadn’t cost them their lifeblood. But it wasn’t merely that His suffering exceeded
theirs; they should stand firm because His suffering was for their sake: He
remained faithful unto death in order that they should share in His triumph over
death and be perfected in His life (cf. John 6:22-33, 47-58; Romans 6:1-11; etc.).
b. The writer recognized that Jesus’ suffering was crucial to his readers’
perseverance in faith, but not simply because they shared a common plight with
Him, or because “misery loves company.” No, the key to their encouragement
was recognizing the relationship between suffering and sonship; the fact that
suffering is essential to the progress and perfection of sonship. Jesus had “learned
obedience” (matured as God’s human image-son) through the things He suffered
(5:8), and so it is for all who are God’s image-children by sharing in Him. Those
who are sons in the Son will see their sonship perfected in the same way His was.
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Thus the key to the readers’ encouragement was viewing their hardship and
affliction through the lens of their status as sons. And not merely that suffering
plays a crucial role in the progress of God’s children (which it does), but that it is
directly and intentionally the goodness of God toward them; suffering is a key
aspect of the Father’s loving discipline of His beloved children (12:5-10).
The writer wanted his readers to rethink their hardship and affliction in terms of
their new identity and status as children of the God who had now become their
covenant Father through their union with His Son. And the marrow of that new
perspective is recognizing their suffering as their Father’s discipline. Notably, he
indicated that this was not some new insight for them, but a truth they had lost
sight of because of the distraction of their suffering (12:5a). Thus the author
pointed them back to the book of Proverbs by way of reminder (vv. 5-6; ref.
Proverbs 3:11-12). He knew his Jewish readers well enough to know their
familiarity with the scriptures, and he was confident that they understood the
scriptural principle that God disciplines His children. This is the focus of the
passage he cited, which helps explain why he chose it. In context, the exhortation
is Solomon’s charge to his own son, not God’s instruction to His children. But the
marrow of Solomon’s charge is the truth that God disciplines those he loves, just
as every father disciplines his children, and this is the sense in which the Hebrews
writer regarded Solomon’s words as God’s word to his readers: “You have
forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you as sons.”
c. Hardship and persecution had caused these Hebrew Christians to lose sight of the
significance of their suffering. They’d “forgotten” God’s word to them, not
because their memory failed, but because their afflictions were obscuring what
they knew to be true. They were becoming discouraged and resentful of their
difficult circumstance, no longer able to perceive their suffering as in any way
related to their Father’s love for them.
It’s always been challenging for people to reconcile the seeming contradiction
between a loving God and human suffering, and the difficulty is heightened when
the suffering is close to home. Contemporary attitudes have also added to the
challenge, especially the expectation of a trouble-free life: If God is good and
loving, He wouldn’t want His children to suffer and would do all He could to keep
them from it. Similarly, discipline is now widely viewed as punishment, so that
the notion of God disciplining people through suffering is most often understood
as Him punishing them for their sin. In a certain sense, people have always
conceived of divine interaction this way: Deities (however conceived) reward
what is good and right and punish evil (cf. Job with Luke 13:1-4; John 9:1-2).
There are, then, two critical considerations for grasping the relationship between
suffering and God’s loving concern and care. The first is the biblical concept of
discipline, which refers to the process of child-rearing, but as it has in mind a
particular goal. Discipline isn’t punishment or correction per se, but wholistic
instruction and training that prepares a child for his role as an adult in the world.
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This intentional, goal-oriented concept of discipline is becoming less common in
contemporary Western culture, which tends to take a more subjective, childoriented approach to child-rearing: Good parenting now focuses on nurturing a
child’s sense of self-identity and self-worth, affording him every opportunity to
develop his own interests, and working toward his eventual personal success.
But child-rearing was very different in the ancient world, and discipline in
parenting had nothing to do with the child’s own interests and desires, but focused
instead on the role he or she was expected to fill. Children were perceived in
terms of the family’s good, and the father was the final determiner of that “good”
as it pertained to each child. That “good,” in turn, determined the training and
preparation (discipline) a child received until he (or she) was ready to fulfill his
responsibility, whether through vocation, marriage, etc. It wasn’t that parents had
no concern for their children’s happiness and well-being, but they perceived those
benefits as transcending their personal gratification. For most people, life
consisted of hard work and bare survival, and children were expected to do their
part in providing for their family. Children of noble birth didn’t work as laborers,
but their lives were no less devoted to the family’s well-being. In fact, sons in
such families were often raised outside of their home by nurses and pedagogues
chosen by the father to prepare them to assume their role in the family when they
came of age (cf. Galatians 4:1-2). From the lowest laborer to the highest lord, no
one was asking his children, “How can I help you fulfill your dreams?”
The process and practice of child-rearing and discipline vary in different eras and
cultures, but all parents instinctively recognize an obligation to their children,
however they choose to act on it. Here, the writer focused on fathers and sons
because of the unique relationship that existed between men and their male
offspring in the ancient world. Men viewed their sons as an extension of
themselves, and so the means for perpetuating their life and its significance. This
was as true of the laborer and tradesman as the king on the throne. Thus the
writer’s rhetorical question: “What son is there whom his father does not
discipline?” Discipline (purposeful instruction and training) demonstrated that a
man regarded a child as his son; and as it is with men, so it is with God (12:7-8).
The second crucial consideration is the role of suffering in God’s discipline of His
children. If discipline is intentional and directed toward a certain goal, that goal
for God’s children is their full conformity to the likeness of His unique Son. And
that conformity involves the transformation and perfection of their humanness.
God’s goal for human beings is that they become all that Jesus is as resurrected
and glorified man. Put simply, God’s intent is that His human creatures fully
realize their created nature and function as His image-bearers. But bearing God’s
image in the world involves manifesting His life and likeness, and this implicates
the concept of sonship. In scriptural terms, a son is of his father, so that to see a
son is to see his father. But this is only the case when a son fully embraces and
lives out his sonship – when he is true to who he is in relation to his father.
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This, then, is the key to understanding why suffering is vital to the discipline by
which God grows His children in their sonship. This sort of sonship involves
understanding, conformity, devotion and dependence, and all of these are nurtured
through suffering (in its various dimensions and expressions). And this is true for
every human being – the spotless Son of Man as well as every child of Adam. As
much as for the vilest sinner, suffering was fundamental and essential to Jesus’
growth and maturity as God’s son.
The discipline Jesus was subjected to involved suffering in every form, yet He
was, from the point of His birth, the sinless Son in whom the Father was wellpleased. This shows that His suffering wasn’t punitive, and neither was His
Father’s discipline. Throughout His life Jesus was fully pleasing to His Father,
and yet His progress from newborn baby to exalted image-son was marked by
hardship, injustice, affliction, and anguish. So much so that these things are the
marrow of Isaiah’s great messianic portrait (53:1-9). But why was it that the
flawless, faithful Son had to “learn obedience” through suffering?
- Jesus lived a perfectly faithful life as God’s human son, but as a process of
normal human growth, not as a static condition. He was obedient to His
Father at every point throughout His life, but commensurate with the state
of His maturity as a human being. What it meant for Jesus to be faithful as
a small child was very different than as an adolescent or a grown man. He
was “made like His brethren in all things,” which meant that He passed
through the same stages of development that all people do.
- Jesus grew and matured as a human being, and so did His relationship
with His Father. He learned what it means to be a son of the Creator-God
by growing in His understanding (of His Father, Himself, and His
mission), His communion with His Father, His devotion to Him, and His
dependence on Him. And all of this growth was nurtured through the
things He suffered, because suffering drew Jesus ever closer to the One in
whom He found all wisdom, love, and provision.
But as it was with the Son of Man, so it is with every son of the Father; all must
walk the path of maturing sonship that has suffering at its center. Jesus triumphed
over His Adamic nature at every turn, always living in perfect faith and
faithfulness, and yet He needed to experience difficulty, temptation and affliction
to learn what it means to truly live as a son of the Father in perfect intimacy,
devotion, trust, dependence and joy. It was through the fruitfulness of His
suffering that Jesus was able to claim that seeing Him is seeing the Father. How
much more, then, is this path of sonship necessary for the other sons whose faith
and faithfulness are imperfect and easily distracted? Moreover, this discipline
comes at the hand of a Father whose love, wisdom, and intention are perfect. If
children yield to the flawed discipline of their finite human father, much more
should they embrace the discipline of their all-loving, infinitely wise Father who
seeks their ultimate good – their full conformity to Him as image-sons (12:9-10)
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Post by Admin on Aug 31, 2023 12:29:49 GMT -5
3. The writer reminded his readers of something they all knew to be true: Every father who
is truly a father to his children disciplines them. And though all fall short in their
understanding and implementation, fathers who genuinely love their children strive to
nurture them with a view to their maturity and flourishing as human beings. This is an
imprecise and messy enterprise, and one that is never free of difficulty, pain, sorrow and
regret. And not just in terms of correcting wrong behavior, but in the very nature of
discipline itself and the work it seeks to accomplish. Again, discipline is the wholistic
training of children (through instruction, correction, practical demands, etc.), with the
purposeful intent of fully preparing them for their adult life. Historically, the father
determined this future life, and his discipline aimed to direct all of the dimensions of his
children’s day-to-day existence toward the realization of that goal.
This understanding, then, is key to the writer’s insistence that all discipline seems painful
at the time (12:11). He wasn’t talking about corporal punishment, or even correction
more generally. Rather, he was identifying the fact that discipline, as discipline, is
inherently distressing and painful. And the reason is that it is concerned is with an
outcome that transcends the immediate. Discipline isn’t at all interested in present
interests or desires; certainly not the child’s, but also not the father’s. It is wholly
concerned with the future – a future that isn’t fully discerned by the one being
disciplined, and that is remote from, and often contrary to, his own present concerns. In
this way, discipline strips the “disciple” of his own agenda and sense of himself, and so
takes from him the delight of pursuing his own course and ends.
In the moment, all genuine discipline is distressing, for it won’t allow its subject to “be
himself” – to be who he believes himself to be. Quite the opposite, properly administered
discipline compels the child (disciple) to reconceive himself according to a vision that yet
lies in the future. It instructs its subject in the truth of who he actually is, and continually
reinforces that truth, even as it strives to bring to full realization the vision it holds out.
Thus the answer to the distress of discipline is to embrace its vision and goal. If a child
will embrace the identity that his father’s discipline has in view, he will find himself no
longer at cross-purposes with the destiny ordained for him. In the case of God’s children,
they will find themselves being true to themselves, because they are embracing the
destiny for which their Father created them, namely their full conformity to Him (12:10)
through sharing in the life and likeness of His true Image-Son. Thus Jesus’ warning to
His disciples: “Whoever would preserve his life (as he conceives it) will lose it; but
whoever loses his life (as he conceives it) for My sake, will find it (his authentic life).”
Instinct says that the remedy for discipline’s sting is to eliminate it. But the true remedy
is to embrace its good outcome – to bring the future into the present, even as Jesus salved
Calvary’s agony by embracing the triumph and joy to come from it (12:2). This is how
the unique Son responded to His Father’s discipline, and so should all of the sons. The
goal of His discipline is His children’s consummate good: the “righteousness” that is
their full conformity to their identity and role as image-sons. Whatever their present
distress, their destiny is peace (12:11) – the peace that is perfect harmony with their God,
themselves, and His creation; the peace that flows from the True Son (John 14:27).
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a. The writer reminded his readers that they were to perceive their hardship and
affliction as God’s discipline. They were suffering because of their faithfulness to
Messiah Jesus, but His Father – who was now their Father – was working in and
through their suffering to nurture their growth, unto the goal that they should
become sons fully conformed to the unique Son. Thus the proper response to their
present tribulation was to fix their minds on its future glorious fruit. The same
faithfulness that was causing their suffering was the answer to it. They were
suffering because of Jesus, and they needed to keep their eyes fixed on Him.
This, then, is the lens for interpreting the exhortation in verses 12-13. The writer
continued to use athletic imagery, drawing on his previous depiction of the ordeal
of faith as a strenuous athletic contest (12:1-2). This is how the imagery works: It
requires all of one’s energy and effort to persevere in a long and arduous foot
race, and the ordeal will invariably leave the athlete weary and sore, even to the
point of feeling unable to continue on. If he is to complete his race, then, the
runner must “strengthen weary hands and weak knees” and be especially careful
to avoid uneven and rocky terrain – terrain he might easily navigate as a fresh
runner, but that poses a real danger to him in his weary and weakened condition.
So it is with the “race” of faith. It, too, is a long and arduous ordeal that wears out
those who persevere in it and leaves them exhausted, battered and bruised. In
order to continue to the end – especially as the race gets further along, these
“runners” also need discipline and fortitude to muster strength in their weakened
condition and watch closely the path they follow. Otherwise, they, too, will find
their race jeopardized with a “lame limb” being “put out of joint.” This, then, is
the context for understanding the writer’s charges in verses 14-17, which simply
flesh out in practical terms the metaphorical language of verses 12-13.
b. The first charge is two-fold, and is the most general (12:14). It concerns both
arenas of faithfulness, namely one’s relationship with others and with oneself.
With respect to others, the writer exhorted his readers to “pursue peace with all
men.” Two things about this are important to note:
First, this charge encompasses all that is involved in rightly relating to other
people. For peace doesn’t denote the absence of open conflict, but the state of
harmony between individuals that God intends for all relationships within His
creation. (This is the biblical concept of shalom.) Thus peace has to do with one’s
attitude, orientation and intent more than one’s conduct; it is the fruit of love.
Second, this is a universal obligation. These Hebrews were to pursue peace with
all people, even those who were opposing and persecuting them. If their suffering
was indeed their Father’s wise and loving discipline, it was working toward their
full maturity as sons. And growth as a son is growth in one’s likeness to the
Father, so that their suffering should find them becoming more like Him in their
thinking and attitude toward men. Embracing their affliction as discipline would
lead these sons to become peacemakers like their Father (Matthew 5:9, 43-48).
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As they were to pursue peace with other people, these Hebrews were also to
pursue their own holiness, for both are essential qualities of their Father.
Faithfulness as sons is manifest in peacemaking, but also in personal holiness.
This connection between faith/faithfulness and holiness is critically important,
especially because so many Christians equate holiness with upright conduct.
Indeed, the passage itself could seem to support this perspective, as the writer
followed his exhortation to holiness with warnings about bitterness, ungodliness
and immorality (12:15-17). But interpreting him this way is to miss his point.
Holiness expresses itself practically (1 Thessalonians 4:1-7), but the scriptural
concept is essentially ontological: It speaks to what a thing is, not what it does.
Hence the “holy” articles of the sanctuary could not be touched or even looked at
by anyone other than the chosen priests, and yet they were inanimate objects
(Numbers 4:1-20). Their holiness referred to their consecration; Yahweh had set
them apart to Himself and devoted them to a particular function in His worship,
and thus they were excluded from any and all “common” contact or usage. So it is
with God’s children: They, too, are set apart to Him, and not just as entities
devoted to His worship and service; they are the very place of His worship and
service. Together, God’s “holy ones” form His new, everlasting sanctuary (ref.
Ephesians 2:11-22; 1 Peter 2:4-10; cf. also 1 Corinthians 3:16-17, 6:19).
And so, when the Hebrews writer exhorted his readers to pursue holiness, he was
calling them to fully embrace and live out their new identity as sons: people who
have become God’s children as He has taken them up into His own life through
union with His unique Son by His Spirit (Colossians 3:1-4; cf. John 14:1-23).
Thus Christians “pursue holiness” when they discipline themselves to live
according to the truth of their sonship. Indeed, this is the very essence of what it
means to live by faith – to be “faithful” (cf. Romans 1:1-4; 2 Corinthians 6:1-7:1).
Pursuing holiness in this way won’t deliver a person from difficulty and suffering;
quite the contrary, it will increase one’s suffering because faithfulness involves
contradiction, which introduces a new dimension of hostility, opposition and
affliction. Nevertheless, living into one’s sonship grants the blessing of peace,
even in the fiercest opposition and suffering. This is because the life of sonship is
life in union and communion with the Son who embodies and alone imparts true
peace and rest (John 14:27, 16:25-33; also Luke 1:67-79; Romans 8:5-14).
The life of holiness, then, is the life of faith, and faith draws the future into the
present; it gives substance to what is hoped for, and makes visible what is unseen
(11:1). Faith enables God’s children to own their sonship in the present, but
according to its glorious destiny, not what appears in their present experience (cf.
1 John 3:1-3; Philippians 3:1-4:7; Colossians 3:1-11). All who pursue holiness in
this way, embracing their ordeal of faith as the Father’s discipline, will find their
distress fade into the background and the righteousness and peace appointed for
them flooding their hearts and minds (12:11). And this will enable them to “be at
peace with all men,” even those who oppose them (12:14; cf. Romans 12:17-21).
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c. The writer followed up his exhortation in verse 14 with a general warning about
“coming short of the grace of God,” which he then exemplified in terms of
bitterness, ungodliness and immorality (12:15-17). Again, it’s important that these
concepts be treated in context in order to not miss the writer’s meaning. These
Hebrews were in danger of coming short of God’s grace, but primarily because
their struggle of faith was distracting them, wearing them down, and weakening
their resolve. It’s clear, then, that the writer was warning his readers against
apostasy: wandering away from their faith in Jesus such that they ultimately
exclude themselves from the grace of God that is revealed and made effectual in
Him (cf. 2:1-4, 3:1-4:11, 6:1-6; cf. also 2 Corinthians 6:1-2 and Galatians 5:1-7).
The author described this “coming short” in three particulars, bitterness being the
first (12:15). His expression literally refers to the root of a plant that produces a
bitter or poisonous fruit, which provides a poignantly appropriate image. For his
concern was the human disposition that begins as subtle, inward resentment and
continues to grow until it breaks out in overt and consuming bitterness that
poisons everyone it touches. Many things can lead to such bitterness, but perhaps
nothing so much as unjust suffering. And all the more so when the person is
suffering for his faith and finds no relief from the Lord. Such was the case with
these Hebrews, and the corrective to any root of bitterness was to remind
themselves that their Father wasn’t unconcerned with their plight of suffering, but
was rewarding their faithfulness by nurturing their sonship through it.
The writer treated the next two particulars – ungodliness and immorality – as a
pair, and used the example of Esau to clarify his meaning (12:16-17). And what
Esau’s example shows is that he was using these terms to describe two essential
aspects of idolatry: the universal human quality of self-centeredness in
perspective, judgment, interest, and concern. In Esau’s case, he was flippantly
willing to give away his birthright – his status of primogeniture within God’s
covenant household – for a single meal. That act seemed insignificant to Esau at
the time, but it determined his future as a son of the covenant. Later, when he
sought Isaac’s covenant blessing, there was none to give him, though he pled for
it with angry tears. Yes, his brother Jacob had schemed and deceived their father
to obtain his covenant blessing, but it was Esau’s dismissive disregard for his
covenant status – his godlessness – that took it from him (Genesis 27:30-40).
But the same fleshly self-concern that moved Esau to forfeit his birthright
provoked his anguish and tears. For all his pleading, there was no true penitence
(“he found no place of repentance”), just a man utterly preoccupied with himself.
And when he found himself stripped of his blessing, Esau didn’t condemn himself
for his careless self-indulgence. No, his anger burned against his brother, and he
resolved to murder Jacob after their father Isaac died and the time of mourning
had passed (Genesis 27:41). This was Esau’s immorality (pornos as spiritual
harlotry) and it points to the Hebrews writer’s concern. It wasn’t that he feared his
readers might kill someone, but their sense of injustice and desire to alleviate their
pain could find them falling prey to the same profane passions that drove Esau.
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4. The writer understood that his readers’ perseverance in faith depended on them
recognizing their suffering as the Father’s instrument in His wise and loving discipline.
Far from disregarding their affliction, He was diligently working in and through it to
mature them as His beloved children in view of the day when they would receive their
inheritance as fellow heirs of all that the Messiah had inherited. That was the perspective
from which they were to draw strength and resolve and orient their response to their
various hardships (ref. again 10:32-39). But it wasn’t simply that an inheritance was held
in trust for them; in a very real way that inheritance was already theirs. They were
already living as sons in the Father’s house together with the preeminent Son; they, like,
Him, were sons of the everlasting kingdom.
Thus the writer returned to a key theme at the very heart of his epistle: his Hebrew
readers were covenant sons of Israel’s God in the way that their forefathers knew only by
promise and longing. Israel’s covenant relationship with Yahweh was privileged and
glorious, but it was only a prophetic and preparatory shadow of the ultimate relationship
He had planned for His children. One day, the children of Abraham would become sons
indeed – true sons abiding in the Father’s house – through the person and work of
Abraham’s singular son (3:1-6; cf. John 8:31-36).
Israel’s covenant sonship corresponded as a prototype to the covenant sonship that has
now been realized in Jesus the Messiah, but it also fell woefully short of it. And not
merely as promise comes short of fulfillment, but as failure comes short of success. Israel
failed to fulfill its identity and calling as covenant son, and that failure, given God’s
everlasting covenant with Abraham, necessitated a future family of covenant children
who would prove faithful as Abraham’s offspring (ref. Isaiah 49:1-6; Jeremiah 31:31-34;
Ezekiel 34-37; Hosea 1-2). God ratified the Abrahamic covenant relationship with Israel
at Sinai, and now had consummated it in the “fullness of the times” in the son of
Abraham who embodied Israel in truth. Thus the Sinai Covenant fulfilled its own
prophetic and pedagogical purpose, yielding at the appointed time to the New Covenant
in Jesus the Messiah (cf. Matthew 11:1-15; Galatians 3:15-4:7). This covenant dynamic is
the premise behind the Hebrews writer’s instruction in 12:18-24, and he underscored the
crucial distinction between the two covenants in terms of sharply contrasting imagery.
a. Again, the writer had a pastoral purpose in penning his letter; he wrote with the
specific intent of helping his beloved brethren stand fast in their faith and
faithfulness through all that they were suffering as Jewish disciples of Jesus. And
he understood that their thinking was the key to their perseverance in faith: right
understanding that would afford them a right perspective on their suffering and
motivate a right response to it (inward as well as outward). Thus the inferential
conjunction (“for”) that introduces verse 12:18 looks back to the immediately
preceding instruction, but as that instruction contributes to the writer’s overall
intent in his epistle. Put simply, these readers were to perceive and embrace their
affliction as the means of their Father’s discipline. He was using it to nurture them
and prepare them for their inheritance and vocation as His sons – sons, not as their
Israelite forefathers were, but as Jesus is (ref. again 2:5-13); sons of the
everlasting kingdom that is defined and governed by the New Covenant in Him.
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b. And of first importance in their understanding is the fact that they were already
sons of that kingdom. Yes, they were still very much subject to the kingdom of
this world whose ruler is the prince of the power of the air. But their affliction
within that kingdom was itself proof that they were no longer citizens of it (John
15:18ff). For their suffering was the suffering of contradiction and opposition; it
came to them because they served another ruler. They were now “aliens and
strangers” in a foreign land, enduring what their Lord had endured as He
manifested true sonship in a world that knows nothing of it, and is even hostile
toward it. By their Father’s will, and in accordance with His purpose and grace in
His Messiah, these Hebrews had become citizens of another kingdom ruled by
another King – the consummate, everlasting kingdom of God’s new creation in
King Jesus (cf. Ephesians 2:1-6; Philippians 3:17-21; Colossians 1:13-14, 3:1-4).
On the other hand, their forefathers had inherited the land of Canaan and the
kingdom established there, but with a nagging and relentless sense of insecurity
and foreboding. For overshadowing Israel’s covenant sonship was the separation,
threat and terror of Sinai. Yahweh had ratified His Father-son relationship with
Israel at Mount Sinai, but while keeping His distance and warning His sons to
stay away, and then punctuating His warning with ominous and terrifying
manifestations of power. But it was not so with their descendents who had
embraced Jesus as Israel’s Messiah. The sonship these Hebrews enjoyed wasn’t
associated with Mount Sinai; rather they had come to Mount Zion as the site of
the heavenly Jerusalem and its sanctuary (12:22).
c. Echoing Paul’s exhortation in his Galatian epistle (ref. 4:21-31), the Hebrews
writer depicted the distinction between the Old and New Covenants in terms of
their sharply contrasting features and circumstance. And like Paul, he particularly
associated the two covenants with Mount Sinai and Mount Zion. Many have
noted that the writer didn’t mention Mount Sinai by name, but referred only to a
tangible entity – “that which may be touched.” But it’s clear from his other
descriptors and his citation from Exodus 19:12-13 that he was referring to the
episode of covenant ratification at Sinai (12:18-21). For all of Sinai’s glory, it was
a deeply traumatic experience that remained etched into Israel’s consciousness.
Indeed, its terror of sight and sound was so intense and frightening that the people
pled with Moses to make it stop by interacting with Yahweh on his own (ref.
Exodus 20:18-21; cf. Deuteronomy 18:15-16). According to Jewish tradition,
even Moses himself, the Lord’s beloved servant, was terrified (ref. 12:21). Thus
the writer depicted this encounter in terms of blazing fire, darkness, gloom and
whirlwind, images that underscore the distant and tenuous relationship between
God and His covenant children.
But these Hebrews, though descendents of those Israelites, had a very different
encounter with Israel’s God; theirs was the relationship that Sinai pointed toward.
They had come to Mount Zion – not the physical site in Jerusalem, but the true
and everlasting habitation of the living God, the “heavenly Jerusalem” (12:22).
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These entities and images were well familiar to the original Jewish audience, but
not so much to many contemporary Christian readers. But they are profoundly
important for understanding the writer’s meaning, especially his sense of what
God has accomplished in Jesus and the significance of that work for those who
embrace Him as Messiah. The place to begin, then, is with the concept of Mount
Zion and its historical role in Israel’s life with God.
- Mount Zion is a particular hill in Jerusalem, but the expression came to be
synonymous with Jerusalem itself, specifically as it was Yahweh’s
dwelling place (Psalm 48:1-2). God had disclosed to Moses that He would
eventually identify a place to situate His “name” – i.e., a place where He
would manifest His presence and His people would meet with Him
(Deuteronomy 12:13-18).
- When David conquered Jerusalem (the Jebusite stronghold that had eluded
Israel’s conquest to that point in time), he made it the capital of his
kingdom. He established his own residence there, and also installed
Yahweh’s ark there (2 Samuel 5-6). Later David became convinced that
Jerusalem was the place Moses had spoken of, and he determined to build
Yahweh a permanent dwelling there.
- David’s son Solomon fulfilled that intent, building the temple on the site
traditionally associated with Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac (Mount
Moriah). Thus Mount Zion as Yahweh’s holy mountain – the place of His
habitation – came to refer to the entire city of Jerusalem.
If Canaan was Yahweh’s sanctuary land (Exodus 15:18), Jerusalem was the city
of His habitation. And more narrowly, Mount Zion was the place of His
enthronement in His sanctuary; the place where He met with His people. Mount
Zion, then, represents the place where the heavenly and earthly realms meet:
Yahweh is enthroned in the heavens, but the ark in His earthly sanctuary is the
footstool of His throne, so that Israel spoke of Him being enthroned above the
wings of the cherubim (ref. Psalm 80:1, 99:1-5, 113:4-5, 123:1, 132:1-8). This
imagery expresses the idea of God’s throne room encompassing heaven and earth,
and so also His reign. The God of Israel is the Creator God who rules over all the
earth and its inhabitants (cf. 2 Kings 19:15; Isaiah 66:1-2; also Psalm 47, 99).
These ideas were woven into Israel’s life and understanding, and they are
fundamental to the Hebrews writer’s statement and its relevance to his readers.
When he insisted that they had come to Mount Zion, he was speaking of the
ultimate reality that that mountain represented: the realization of Yahweh’s
presence and rule among His people and in all the earth that the prophets
associated with the Messiah and His triumph (cf. Isaiah 2:1-4, 11:1-12; also
Hosea 1-3; Zechariah 2-3). The kingdom that Yahweh ruled from Jerusalem was
the prototype of a future kingdom that would encompass the whole world – a
kingdom that Yahweh would rule in the person of His messianic Son-King.
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From the beginning of their history, the Israelite people recognized that Mount
Zion had a heavenly counterpart that was remote to them and their relationship
with their God. But He had pledged that one day the symbolic union of heaven
and earth in the physical sanctuary on Mount Zion would become an actual
reality; the heavenly and earthly realms would become one. So it was that these
Jewish readers understood what the writer was referring to when he reminded
them that they had come to Mount Zion and the heavenly Jerusalem: That which
had been Israel’s hope and longing since the frightful and calamitous days at the
foot of Mount Sinai had now come to pass.
- Sinai’s Torah (Law of Moses) defined and prescribed the intimate
communion of Father and sons that the covenant established, but it came
to them through a fearful and foreboding display that reminded them of
the essential estrangement between God and themselves. Israel was “son
of God” by covenant identity and calling, but not in reality.
- Now, at last, the Torah had become “yes and amen” in and through the
only-begotten Son (Matthew 5:17; Galatians 3:10ff). He has fulfilled the
intimacy prescribed by Sinai’s covenant, not only as True Israel unto
Yahweh, but as Yahweh unto Israel and the world (John 1:1-18, 14:1-11).
These Hebrew Christians had come to the heavenly Jerusalem because they had
come to God Himself through living union with His incarnate and resurrected
Son. Taken up in His life, they were “seated in the heavenly realm” just as He is
(Ephesians 1:18-2:7; Colossians 2:9-13, 3:1-4). Though not accessible to their
physical senses, they stood alongside His innumerable angelic hosts who worship
in His presence, in contrast to Mount Sinai where the “sons” were separated from
the Lord and His angels (Deuteronomy 33:2).
So also they were part of God’s “assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in
heaven” (12:23a). (Though some English versions might suggest two entities –
“general assembly” and “church of the firstborn,” the Greek expression reads as
rendered above.) This is an especially pregnant expression given the Jewish
audience, for God had historically designated Israel this way. Israel was the elect
ecclesia (assembly of “called out ones”) that God identified as His firstborn and
gathered to Himself in covenant union at Sinai (cf. Exodus 4:22-23; Deuteronomy
9:10, 18:15-16). But just as Sinai was non-ultimate, so was the ecclesia it formed.
Now, the better covenant in Jesus’ blood (12:24) gathers an assembly “enrolled in
heaven” – covenant children whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life
(cf. Philippians 4:3 with Revelation 3:5, 13:8, 17:8, 20:12, 15, 21:27).
These Hebrews had come to God’s dwelling, which meant that they had come to
God Himself, for they, in Christ, were His new sanctuary (Ephesians 2:19-22).
The writer noted this, referring to God as the Judge of all (12:23b), which
highlights His insight, authority and power to hold all things accountable to the
truth; He is the Creator-Lord who will see His creation attain its ordained destiny.
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Though people (even Christians) tend to associate judgment with condemnation
and punishment, thus assigning a negative connotation to God as judge, this
designation is actually positive and hopeful. Yes, condemnation is an aspect of
God’s judgment, but as it serves His work of putting all things right. Thus the
creation rejoices in hope at the prospect of God’s judgment (which is in the
Messiah), for when the Creator completes His work as Judge, all things will at last
be in truth what He created them to be (cf. Psalms 67, 82, 96, 98; Isaiah 11:1-12).
God as “Judge of all” is the promise of creational renewal, which already has its
first-fruits in the resurrected Messiah and those who share in Him. Thus, if it’s
true that these Hebrews had come to this God, they had also come to those who
are the beginning of His new creation; they had come to “the spirits of righteous
men made perfect” (12:23c). This dense phrase reflects back on “the assembly of
firstborn who are enrolled in heaven,” and likely refers to the pre-Christ faithful
who died without receiving what was promised, but have now been made perfect
in the resurrected Messiah (ref. 11:39-40). These faithful forefathers have attained
the goal of their faith and hope in union with their Christian brethren; together,
they form the Father’s assembly of sons who are the firstborn of His new creation
as sharers in the Son who is the firstborn from the dead (Colossians 1:15-20).
Lastly, and as the climax of his depiction, the writer reminded his readers that
they had come to Jesus, the One in whom all that he had described is “yes and
amen” (12:24). He is the very substance of God’s final, everlasting sanctuary and
the renewed humanity that forms it (Ephesians 2:11-22; 1 Peter 2:4-10; cf. also
Revelation 3:7-13), and He is the One in whom God is “judge of all” (John 5; cf.
also Acts 10:34-42, 17:30-31; 2 Timothy 4:1-8). He is thus the “mediator of a
new covenant,” but as embodying God’s covenant relationship with human beings
and His entire creation (ref. Isaiah 42:1-7, 49:1-12, 59:20-21; cf. Galatians 3).
This, then, is the lens for interpreting the writer’s assertion that Jesus’ blood
“speaks better than the blood of Abel.” First of all, by referring to it as sprinkled
blood, he was connecting Jesus’ shed blood with the sacrificial blood by which
the Sinai Covenant was ratified (ref. Exodus 24:1-8) and then sustained (ref.
Leviticus 1-16). His blood, too, is “blood of the covenant,” but the New Covenant
that the prophets pledged as God’s renewal of His covenant relationship with
Israel, and, through Israel, with the entire cursed creation (ref. 8:1-13; cf. also
Isaiah 59:16-60:5, 61:1-11; Jeremiah 31:31-34, 32:36-44; Ezekiel 34, 37; Hosea
1-2; Zechariah 9:1-12; Malachi 3:1-4 with Luke 22:20 and Hebrews 13:20-21).
Second, the writer’s reference to Abel brought his treatment of faith full circle.
Abel’s blood was the first shed under the curse and its sentence of death (11:4),
and Jesus’ was the last, in that His shed blood conquered the curse and death.
Abel’s blood cried out for vindication, and Jesus’ blood answered that cry. He
obtained vindication, not just for Himself, but for Abel and all of Adam’s race,
becoming a New Adam for man’s sake (2:5-18). And finally, both men offered
their sacrifice to God in faith as they held tightly to His promise in hope (12:2)
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5. The Hebrews writer’s overall approach in his epistle was to instruct his readers and then
draw out the implications of that instruction in the form of exhortations and warnings.
His letter reminds them of the truth of what God has accomplished in Jesus the Messiah,
what the truth requires of them, and the consequences of neglecting the truth. So in the
present context, he reminded his Jewish readers of their heritage of faith, going all the
way back to Abel and culminating with Jesus Himself. He then exhorted them to run their
own race of faith with discernment and perseverance, understanding what had come in
Jesus, their participation in His accomplishment, and the destiny it granted them.
They had become disciples of the prophet Jesus with the conviction that He is indeed
Israel’s Messiah – Yahweh’s triumphal Servant who has accomplished His pledge to
purge, renew and regather His creation to Himself. In solidarity with His Father, Jesus
conquered the curse and its fruits, condemning and crucifying in Himself all that deviates
from the truth (“sin”), then inaugurating renewed life and immortality by His resurrection
from the dead. This is the Messiah that these Hebrews had embraced, and this embrace
brought with it great glory and privilege, but also immense responsibility and obligation.
They needed to own in practice and discipline the truth of their new life in Jesus, and
failure to do so would bring dire consequences. Thus the writer concluded this section of
instruction and exhortation with a sober admonition (12:25-29).
a. The substance of his plea was that his readers be vigilant to not turn away from
the one speaking from heaven; refusing Him (or even ignoring Him) wouldn’t
enable them to escape Him. The writer notably used a grammatical construction
that indicated his confidence in their faithfulness to that point, but he was clearly
concerned for them going forward (cf. 2:1-4, 3:12-14, 4:1-11, 6:1-9, 10:19-23, 35-
39). He knew they were struggling in their hardship and the opposition of their
Jewish kinsmen, and he feared that they might buckle under the pressure.
But who is this One speaking to them from heaven? Some have understood two
referents in verse 25: Yahweh (or Moses), who spoke to Israel on earth, and Christ
who now speaks from heaven. Others believe Yahweh is the sole referent. In fact,
it seems that both are true in the sense that Yahweh, who spoke to Israel at Sinai,
now speaks to men in His Son. When God speaks to men from heaven, he does so
through the enthroned Messiah, the Image-Son at His right hand. This is certainly
the perspective of the Hebrews writer (ref. 1:1-2), and his preceding statement
about Jesus’ blood “speaking” suggests that he also had Him in mind here.
Tying verses 24-25 together helps explain how Jesus speaks from heaven, and
why turning away from His words is such a serious offense. The writer obviously
wasn’t suggesting that Christians (note his pronoun we) hear a voice out of
heaven, akin to Yahweh’s audible communication at Sinai. Rather, just as Jesus’
shed blood speaks truth, so does His resurrection and exaltation to the “right hand
of the Majesty on high” as King of kings and Lord of lords. The triumph of His
life, death, resurrection and enthronement is God’s climactic word to men – a
powerful, inescapable and compelling message that sounds throughout the world
and obligates all hearers to embrace its truth (cf. Acts 14:16-17 with 17:24-31).
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The writer underscored the gravity of this obligation by arguing from the lesser to
the greater (a fortiori), which was common Jewish rhetorical practice: If those
who heard God speak on the earth didn’t escape His words and their compulsion,
how will those escape who hear Him speak from heaven? He was pointing his
readers back to their Israelite forefathers who heard Yahweh speak to them from
Mount Sinai, and yet turned away from Him and His words. (In Hebrew, the
Decalogue is designated the ten words, and these “words” formed the substance
of the covenant – Exodus 34:28; Deuteronomy 4:10-13.) The Israelites at Sinai
turned away from Yahweh’s words, even as He was speaking them. And though
they did so out of fear, rather than disregard or disdain, their fear underscored the
fundamental alienation between them and their covenant God. This alienation
insured the covenant children’s waywardness; throughout their generations, they
persisted in turning away from the God who continued to speak to them through
His covenant, His prophets, and His actions. And these Hebrew Christians were
painfully aware that Israel’s refusal to hear hadn’t ended with the incarnate
Word. Indeed, for many Jews, refusal became outright rejection and opposition.
But Yahweh wasn’t oblivious or indifferent to all of this; from the time the
Israelites departed Egypt He showed them over and over again that there was no
escape for those who turned away from Him. His word and works are truth, and
all who depart from the truth will meet the fate that denial and contradiction
bring; nothing that violates truth will endure. That was the case for the people of
Israel, to whom Yahweh spoke “in portions and various ways” (i.e.,
incrementally through His prophets, and through structures, symbols and actions).
How much more, then, is that the case for those who have “heard” the fullness of
truth by witnessing Jesus the Messiah – the Son who is God’s full disclosure of
Himself, His purpose, will and work (1:1-3; cf. John 1:14-18, 14:1-11, 18:33-37).
And so the writer wasn’t contrasting heavenly and earthly speech, as if divine
words out of heaven have more weight and consequence. The contrast is between
God’s communication to men in the time of preparation, versus His full and
consummate speech now in the living and enthroned “word” (cf. John 15:22-25
with 5:17-19, 33:47, 14:1-11). This is the sense, then, in which God’s earthly and
heavenly speaking correspond to Mount Sinai and Mount Zion (ref. 12:26).
b. God’s voice “speaking on earth” from Mount Sinai “shook the earth” (ref. Exodus
19:17-18; cf. also Deuteronomy 5:1-5; Psalm 68:8), and the writer noted that God
has promised another future shaking – one that will be cosmic and not merely
local (12:26). Readers and commentators have long wrestled with what “promise”
he was referring to. For the prophets often used this sort of language to depict
cataclysmic events in Israel’s history and future, particularly in relation to the
theme of the Day of Yahweh (cf. Isaiah 13; Joel 2:1-11, 3:9-16; Zephaniah 1:14-
18; etc.). Haggai also spoke in this way, but in describing God’s mighty work in
perfecting His end-time sanctuary (2:1-9, 20-23). In fact, Haggai’s words come
closest to the Hebrews writer’s statement, but the “Day of Yahweh” contexts also
relate to it, in that they speak of the same end-times judgment and renewal.
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In the end, it seems that the writer wasn’t pointing to a specific text, but rather
God’s promise, reiterated throughout the salvation history and Israel’s scriptures,
to banish the curse and cleanse and renew His creation. This promise was fulfilled
in Jesus’ life and triumph – Jesus’ coming was Yahweh’s return to Zion, the
“Day” when Yahweh arose to judge His enemies, deliver His people and restore
the desolate habitations. The Lord shook the earth at Sinai, but He shook both
earth and heaven in the cosmic battle and triumph when He renewed the covenant
and restored His sanctuary in His Son. This is the “shaking of heaven and earth”
that Haggai spoke of, but there does remain a future, final counterpart, for God’s
work of creational renewal isn’t yet fully realized (Romans 8).
c. This is what the Hebrews writer was referring to (12:27). He had in mind the
future day when God will complete His creation’s transformation; the day when
all that is transitory and liable to judgment (that which can be “shaken”) is done
away with. He will accomplish this separation by shaking the heavens and earth,
which calls to mind a couple of images. The first is an earthquake, which breaks
apart and destroys whatever is unstable, compromised, or poorly constructed. The
second image is a sieve, which uses a shaking motion to separate out what is of
value to the worker, leaving the rest of the material to be discarded. The Lord’s
shaking, then, will separate out of His creation all that is flawed and worthless, so
that He is left with what He intends to remain – all that is part of His renewed
creation and its perfect flourishing in His everlasting kingdom.
d. Implicit in the writer’s argument is that human beings are part of this renewal and
“precious value” that God intends to remain – specifically, human beings who
share in His own life through union with His Son. Humans are central in God’s
new creation – “a kingdom that cannot be shaken” (12:28) – because the Messiah,
the consummate Man and New Adam – is at its center. The resurrected ImageSon is the beginning of the new creation and its very essence. God’s intent is to
make the entire creation His enduring sanctuary, such that He will at last be “all
in all” (1 Corinthians 15:12-28; Revelation 21-22). Jesus is the chief foundation
stone in that sanctuary, and its superstructure consists of human beings who have
become living stones in Him (1 Peter 2:4-10). This closely accords with Haggai’s
prophecy, in which Yahweh promised to shake the heavens and earth to gather in
the “precious value of the nations,” so that His sanctuary should be completed in
all its glory (Haggai 2:1-9). Haggai’s contemporary Zechariah spoke of the same
purpose and outcome (Zechariah 2-4, 6:9-15).
God’s design, revealed in ever brighter light through the progress of the salvation
history, is that His creation should find its ultimate destiny – its true meaning,
purpose and function – in His glorified Image-Son (Ephesians 1:9-10). Two
related implications follow: First, only those things that are bound up in Him will
remain after God finishes shaking His creation. Second, anyone who fails to
“hear” Him as God’s consummate Word of truth, or who turns away from Him,
will pass away together with all that is false in the created order. These two
implications are at the heart of the Hebrews writer’s warning.
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e. By embracing Jesus as the Messiah revealed in Israel’s scriptures, these Hebrews
were affirming all of the truths unfolded here. For everything that had transpired
in connection with Jesus was exactly what the Law, Prophets and Writings had
predicted (Matthew 5:17-20; Luke 24:13-27, 44-48; John 5:39). They understood
that Messiah’s people are the sons of Yahweh’s enduring kingdom (the Holam Ha
Ba) that He pledged to David (2 Samuel 7), and they had embraced the Nazarene
prophet Jesus with the belief that He is this Messiah, evidenced in His
resurrection from the dead. But believing that Jesus is the Messiah promised in
the Scriptures, they also believed that they were sons of His kingdom and heirs of
its consummate fullness. This was the writer’s vantage point for his summary
exhortation: “Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let
us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with
reverence and awe; for our God is a consuming fire” (12:28-29).
Given all that he has discussed and so splendidly unfolded, and given that these
glorious truths call the Christian to bind his entire self to them, the way the writer
summed up his instruction is profoundly significant. He was jealous for his
readers to grasp, own, and live into the truths he’d labored to expound. And what
that would look like was them becoming truly grateful people – grateful, not for
the good things God had given them, but for God Himself and His wise and
loving purposes fulfilled so gloriously in His triumph in Jesus. This sort of
gratitude is obviously limited to those who know God in truth, but it is also a
fundamental characteristic of such ones – all those who are children of the Father.
This is why the writer insisted that gratitude is the foundation for true worship
and acceptable service to God. How can a person rightly acknowledge, worship
and serve the God he doesn’t truly know – the God who is known through His
words and works that all find their verity and meaning in Messiah Jesus, who He
is, what He has accomplished, and what awaits God’s creation in Him? But then
how can a person know this God in Messiah Jesus and not be overwhelmed with
gratitude, awe and reverent devotion? (Gratitude for personal benefits doesn’t
induce reverence and awe.) Thus the author’s further exhortation: “Through Him,
then, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of
lips that give thanks to His name” (13:15).
True knowledge of God in Christ produces gratitude that expresses itself in
sincere devotion. But the author added a further incentive to gratitude: “Our God
is a consuming fire.” Taken alone, this statement might seem out of place, but it is
a fitting capstone to the context (chaps. 11-12). Some interpret it negatively as a
sharp warning: God will consume the ungrateful and wayward. The writer was
warning his readers against turning away from their Lord, but by spurring them on
in solidarity with himself (“since we… let us…”). Their struggles should provoke
gratitude, not resentment or fear, for they were suffering as sons and citizens of an
enduring kingdom. And one day the fire of their Father’s zeal will complete that
kingdom by consuming all that is false and purifying what is to remain (v. 27).
That was His sure word to them, and they must hold it fast with grateful hearts.
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Post by Admin on Oct 12, 2023 21:52:21 GMT -5
i. Yet it is true that the blood of Jesus the Messiah speaks better things than that of the blood of Abel the martyr. The blood of Abel cried, justice must be satisfied, bring vengeance. The blood of Jesus cried, justice has been satisfied, bringmercy.
i. But you have come to Mount Zion: The lesson is plain. We shouldn’t come to Mount Zion as if we were coming to Mount Sinai. So put away your hesitation, be encouraged and get bold in coming to God.
i. Consider the contrasts between Mount Sinai and Mount Zion.
· Mount Sinai was marked by fear and terror – Mount Zion is a place of love and forgiveness.
· Mount Sinai is in the desert – Mount Zion is the city of the Living God.
· Mount Sinai spoke of earthly things – Mount Zion speaks of heavenly things.
· At Mount Sinai, only Moses was allowed to draw near to God – at Mount Zion, an innumerable company, a general assembly is invited to draw near.
· Mount Sinai was characterized by guilty men in fear – Mount Zion features just men made perfect.
· At Mount Sinai, Moses was the mediator – at Mount Zion, Jesus is the mediator.
· Mount Sinai brought an Old Covenant, which was ratified by the blood of animals – Mount Zion brought a New Covenant, which is ratified by the blood of God’s precious Son.
· Mount Sinai was all about exclusion, keeping people away from the mountain – Mount Zion is all about invitation.
· Mount Sinai is all about Law – Mount Zion is all about grace.
ii. Of course, the idea of the superiority of the New Covenant is also repeated. It shows that these Jewish Christians should not even consider going back and preferring the religion of Mount Sinai to the relationship of Mount Zion.
5. (25-26) Watch out; great privilege has a great warning and danger within it.
See that you do not refuse Him who speaks. For if they did not escape who refused Him who spoke on earth, much more shall we not escape if we turn away from Him who speaks from heaven, whose voice then shook the earth; but now He has promised, saying, “Yet once more I shake not only the earth, but also heaven.”
a. See that you do not refuse Him who speaks: As described in the previous verses, God holds the goodness and glory of Mount Zion before us – the perfect and finished work of Jesus and the New Covenant through Him. If we choose to refuse this from God, we can’t ignore the consequences.
b. They did not escape: There were consequences for rebelling at Mount Sinai. There are and should be even greater consequences for resisting God’s greater work at Mount Zion.
c. Whose voice then shook the earth… Yet once more I shake not only the earth, but also heaven: At Mount Sinai God shook the earth with His voice. The New Covenant shakes things up even more (Yet once more I shake not only the earth, but also heaven).
i. It’s easy – and dangerous – to think that God was severe and mean in the Old Testament and somehow became nice in the New Testament. This is so simplistic that it is deceiving – there is more mercy in the Old Testament than many imagine, and there is more judgment in the New Testament than many imagine.
ii. When everything is shaken the only question is, where are you standing? Is it safe and secure?
6. (27) Why God shakes the existing order.
Now this, “Yet once more,” indicates the removal of those things that are being shaken, as of things that are made, that the things which cannot be shaken may remain.
a. Indicates the removal of those things that are being shaken: God promises to shake things again to take away (the removal) reliance on the material – as in material things, materialism.
b. That the things which cannot be shaken may remain: God shakes things to test them, and then to take away the things that can’t take the test.
7. (28-29) The unshakable kingdom.
Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. For our God is a consuming fire.
a. Since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken: In contrast to the instability of the world around us, the kingdom of Jesus cannot be shaken, and we are receiving this kingdom.
i. This is our stability in an unstable world. We don’t yet full have this kingdom; it is yet to come. Yet we are receiving it. Griffith Thomas noted that the ancient grammar and phrasing indicates “We are constantly and perpetually (Greek) receiving a Kingdom that is incapable of being shaken.”
ii. How we have already received the kingdom
· We have received it in promise; a promise from a trustworthy man is just as sure as having the thing itself.
· We have it in principle, and we see the principles of God’s kingdom at work in the world.
· We have received it in power, and see the life-changing and miraculous power of God at work in the world today.
· We have received some of the provision and protection of the kingdom, because our King provides for and protects us.
· We have in received it in community, for our congregational gatherings are kingdom communities.
b. Let us have grace: The kingdom itself will never be shaken. So we must seize God’s unmerited approval in Jesus, helping us to serve God acceptably.
i. “Glory be to God, our kingdom cannot be moved! Not even dynamite can touch our dominion: no power in the world, and no power in hell, can shake the kingdom which the Lord has given to his saints. With Jesus as our monarch we fear no revolution and no anarchy: for the Lord hath established this kingdom upon a rock, and it cannot be moved or removed.” (Spurgeon)
ii. We may serve God acceptably: These words explain just how this may be done.
· Our acceptable service begins with our being receivers (since we are receiving a kingdom).
· Our acceptable service is offered by the work of God’s grace in us (let us have grace).
· Our acceptable service is marked by reverence (with reverence).
· Our acceptable service is marked by the spirit of happy reverence (with godly fear).
· Our acceptable service is marked by a profound sense of the divine holiness (for our God is a consuming fire).
iii. Some wrongly argue that “too much” grace gives license and breeds disrespect towards God. Actually, grace gives us reverence and godly fear. Perhaps those who think grace gives them license to sin aren’t walking in grace at all.
c. Our God is a consuming fire: Since God is in fact a consuming fire, we do best to come to Him on His terms. These are the terms of unmerited approval in Jesus. He will consume all that is outside of that sphere.
i. Elijah knew that God was a consuming fire; He consumed the sacrifice at the altar on Mount Carmel. Solomon knew that God was a consuming fire; He consumed the sacrifice at the altar at the dedication of the temple.
ii. The truth that God is a consuming fire is a comfort to the believer. They realize that the Father poured out His consuming fire of judgment on the Son in our place. When He did, it completely consumed the guilt of sin in all who believe. The penalty of sin was consumed in Jesus at the cross.
enduringword.com/bible-commentary/hebrews-12/
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