You are rushing out the door. You are leaving the kids with friends or the in-laws. What final exhortations do you give them? What do you say as you walk out the door, and leave your precious but pernicious progeny with some poor, unsuspecting perhaps former friend or relative?
‘Be good for grandma/Margaret/Sharon! Do what you are told, you hear! No screens after 8pm, bath, stories, teeth, bed by 9pm! If I hear you’ve been good, we will go to Aqua Golf tomorrow. If not, we’ll stay at home, smackarama, and no pocket money!’
It’s really the shotgun approach to parenting. Do this, do that. This if you do, that if you don’t.
Families can speak like that to one another. There is a shared history and trust. Time is short, so instruction is very directive, to the point, general. Warnings and incentives are liberally given.
We've come to the end of Hebrews. We’ve taken all term. It is, from one perspective, a long letter. But that is not what the Author thought. Chapter 13 verse 22:
Brothers, I urge you to bear with my word of exhortation, for I have written you only a short letter. (Hebrews 13:22 NIV)
He has spent 12 chapters talking about who Jesus is, what he has done, and why we should stick with him. He has an existing relationship, he has built up a shared history and platform. He hopes that he will be restored to them, and that Timothy will reach them. (Hebrews 13:18-19, 23)
But now, he has to give them his final words as he signs off. So he adopts the shotgun method. Whatever he thinks they need to know, he throws at them before he goes.
There are some things he means to imprint on their minds about Jesus. In verse 8, he lays down a proposition worthy of memorizing. Verse 8:
Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8)
The Author thinks to himself, ‘what will keep you going before Timothy or I see you again?’ And he says: Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8)
What a high view of Jesus! As the eternal son, Jesus Christ doesn’t endure the changes that occur to the created order. As the Author said in chapter 1, Jesus is the Lord who:
…laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you will remain; they will all wear out like a garment. You will roll them up like a robe, like a garment they will be changed, but you remain the same, and your years will never end. He is the same, and his years never end (Hebrews 1:12 NIV).
As the Author opened his ‘short word of exhortation, so he closes it’. Jesus is unchanging, and his years never end.
Only God is like this. Only God is the same yesterday, today and forever, the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last, the one who was and is and is to come. He has no need of improvement, so he doesn’t change.
And this is also true of Jesus. Because Jesus is God, perfect and unchanging, faithful and consistent. In the yesterday of eternity, he is God the Word, the One and Only Son. In the yesterday of time, he became human, died as the perfect sacrifice for our sins, rose again on the third day, and ascended into heaven as our Great High Priest.
Today, he still speaks to us. The Risen Jesus Christ rules his Church with his word. The Risen Lord Jesus speaks to us on every ‘Today’ when the living and active Word of God is proclaimed. (Hebrews 3:7; 4:12-13).
And forever, he will be with us, not just as eternal God, but also as our brother, like us in every way. And he will be our Priest forever. Jesus has an eternal being (in that he is God) and an eternal Priesthood (in that he will live to intercede for us forever). He has won us an eternal redemption and has saved us for an eternal inheritance.
The Old Covenant has changed and reformed. But not Jesus. The Law has been fulfilled and become obsolete. But not Jesus. Many things have changed for God’s people since the Old Testament. But Jesus is constant and faithful.
For you who have been Christians for many years, the Jesus you first came to love and trust is still there as your Great High Priest, seated at the right hand of God. He showed his love for you in the past by making you and redeeming you. He loves you now by interceding for you. And he will complete the work he started in you by giving you a new resurrection body and taking you to be with him forever. Praise the Father for the changeless Son!
But this eternal son also suffered in time and space. His person is changeless, and his work is to make his people holy. Verses 11 to 14:
11The high priest carries the blood of animals into the Most Holy Place as a sin offering, but the bodies are burned outside the camp. 12And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through his own blood. 13Let us then go to him outside the camp bearing the disgrace he bore. 14For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come. (Hebrews 13:11-14 NIV)
The Author refers to Old Testament Day of Atonement rituals (Leviticus 16). The carcasses of the slaughtered animals were burnt outside the camp. The animals weren’t eaten. They were totally burnt up. And they were burnt up not in the holy places, but outside the camp, in unholy places. Jesus suffered outside the gate of Jerusalem, not in a holy place, but an unholy place. Jesus suffered disgrace and stigma and shame outside the city. And by so doing, Jesus in the unholy place made the unholy people holy.
And the author to the Hebrews says, ‘We are to bear his disgrace’. We are not to be ashamed of Jesus Christ. Instead of seeking the honour and establishment of the city, we are to likewise bear his shame.
Do you sometimes feel disgrace and shame for standing up for Jesus. ‘What did you do on the weekend?' ‘Oh, I went to church, and we had a good talk about Jesus and following him.’ Deep silence. You’ve mentioned the name Jesus, the socially unacceptable name, the divisive name, the name trusted by the unsophisticated, the rustic, the fundamentalists, the stupid. How could you? But the author says, ‘Go out to him, bearing his disgrace’.
Because the institutions and establishment and power base of our current society is illusory. The great temple of Herod – ‘Look Lord, what magnificent stones, what magnificent buildings’ – destroyed by 70 AD, without a stone left on another. The wonderful halls of power in modern Australian society: parliaments, Canberra, Macquarie Street, courts and the judicial system. All of them will fade into nothing. Verse 14 again:
For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come. (NIV)
So given the unchanging nature of Jesus, and given his work to sanctify us, how then should we act.
Now, when parents are rushing out the door, they give sharp commands only about the most important things. They throw the commands out and hope they stick. And so too does our Author. And because he is doing so quickly and in rapid fire, we probably should think that each command is important.
And the first thing he calls us to is love. Chapter 13 verse 1:
Keep on loving each other as brothers. (Hebrews 13:1 NIV)
The Lord Jesus showed us brotherly love. He became like his brothers in every way except sin. Despite our sin, He is not ashamed to call us ‘brothers’ (Hebrews 2:10,11,14). God’s fatherly care uses even hardship to makes us like our older brother Jesus, the man of sorrows, familiar with suffering (Hebrews 12:5-6). So we are called to love each other as brothers. The Greek word is philadelphia, like the American city. Get used to each other, for we look forward to spending eternity with each other (Hebrews 12:22-24). So for the present, let’s share our lives, possessions, money, time, and resources. That’s what brothers do.
But we must not just love our brothers. We must also love strangers. Verse 2:
Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it (Hebrews 13:2 NIV)
We are called to both love one another as brothers (phil-adelphia) and show loving hospitality to the stranger (philo-xenia).
God’s angels have gone undercover in the past. So Abraham fed three strangers at Mamre, which changed his life (Genesis 18:2,16).
When I worked at Maccas, we were told about the ‘secret shopper’. It would be some unknown, unnamed person, who would rate our burgers.
It’s even more serious to think angels are assessing our hospitality. Our fitting response is to be open-handed and open-hearted with strangers. And this especially applies to fellow Christians. As we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to the household of faith (Galatians 6:10).
But it is not just the brother or the stranger, but the prisoner. Verse 3:
Remember those in prison as if you were their fellow prisoners and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering (Hebrews 13:3 NIV)
In some parts of the world, Christians face ill treatment, imprisonment and death. We have all heard of Nelson Mandella and Aung San Suu Kyi. But what about those who suffer for their faith in Christ? As far as I know, no-one in Australia has been imprisoned for their faith. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen in God’s world. Richard Wurmbrand spent the best part of 15 years in prison in Communist Romania. North Korea and Somalia are ranked as the most dangerous for Christians. Iran and Saudi Arabia are not good places for a Christian’s health.
We need to do what we can for the persecuted church. Voice of the Martyrs will help us to do this. See http://www.persecution.com.au
But our Author is also concerned with our sexual purity. It’s not just a side issue. It is one of the foundational issues. How we use our bodies and minds and think and act about sex and marriage matter. Verse 4:
Marriage should be honoured by all and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral (Hebrews 13:4 NIV)
Marriage is, as our law still says, between a man and a woman for life and to the exclusion of all others. And that is exactly what Jesus says: Matthew 19, verses 4 to 6:
4 "Haven't you read," he replied, "that at the beginning the Creator 'made them male and female,' 5 and said, 'For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh' ? 6 So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate."’ (Matthew 19:4-6 NIV)
Currently, we are fighting for this. The homosexual lobby seeks to change the definition to a union of two persons. And that is just the start, as former High Court Judge Michael Kirby has publicly indicated: http://www.acl.org.au/2012/08/mr-consequences-of-gay-marriage-a-concern-after-brazils-three-person-civil-union/.
Marriage has a privileged position. And that’s the way it should be. In the words of the Incredibles, when everybody is super, than nobody is. And when everyone can call whatever they like marriage, which is the logical position of ‘marriage equality’, then nothing is privileged.
We need to keep fighting for marriage as the union between a man and a woman for life to the exclusion of all others.
However, we also need to fight not just for the idea of marriage, but for individual marriages. Marriages are fragile in a society that doesn’t honour marriage. Our society no longer encases marriage in protections, like a precious piece of china. It leaves it out in the elements, and then is surprised that it cracks and fails. It then blames 'marriage' (see, marriage is failing) or Christianity (well, if you weren't so narrow and bigoted, more people would get married), rather than sin and the societal pressures that marriage is now put under.
Currently in Australia, sex before marriage and serial monogamy (moving from one heterosexual partner to the next) is the norm. The word ‘adultery’ is falling from use. Now, it is a ‘relationship’ or an ‘affair’, and they are ‘partners’. Divorce, while painful, is acceptable and even thought advisable. Our leaders, celebrities, and TV shows don’t honour marriage, by their refusal to enter it, and their readiness to leave it. And their examples spread through our community.
But brothers and sisters, we need to be different. God will judge the one who defiles the marriage bed. God will judge the fornicator, the one who has sex outside of marriage, unless they repent. God will judge the adulterer. Remember this, when you consider sex outside of marriage . God the consuming fire will judge sexual immorality.
It is NOT your body. It belongs to Jesus. You do with it what Jesus wants, not what you want.
Our author is also concerned with what we do with money, and with what money does to us. Verses 5 to 6:
Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, “Never will I leave you’ never will I forsake you.” So we say with confidence, “The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?” (Hebrews 13:5-6 NIV)
In our society, we need money. We must pay for accommodation, transport, water, electricity, food, clothing, education, and communications, for ourselves and our family. But we are told not to love money.
Few people say they love money. How do we know whether we do?
One way is if we compromise to get money: cheating on tax, stealing, breaching copyright, not paying what we owe. All these things show we love money more than God.
Another is if we can’t be generous. Still another is if we fight loved ones and break relationships to get it.
This world is passing away. So we need to be content with simply what will enable us to navigate this world with godliness so that we can enter the next. Wisdom is the happy medium. Proverbs chapter 30 verses 8 to 9 enshrine this:
Give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is the LORD?’ Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonor the name of my God’. Otherwise, I might have too much and deny you, saying ‘Who is the LORD?’ (Proverbs 30:8-9 NIV).
Jesus teaches us this way of thinking when we pray, ‘Give us today our daily bread’.
This is the command: Be satisfied with what we have.
And what do we have? We have God. He has promised never to leave or forsake us. It is said, ‘No child is poor who has a mother’. And, no Christian is poor who has God as Father and Jesus as brother. God promises to provide all our needs in Christ Jesus. And we ourselves may be the means of God providing for the needs of other Christians.
Our author cares about how we think about our leaders and how we treat them. He has two verses which deal with leaders, verse 7 and verse 17. Now of course, I have a vested interest in what Hebrews says about leaders, given that I am one. So the cynic among us might think that this is very self-serving, for me to speak about Christian leadership, to sure up my authority and give me more power. That is not my motivation. We read the bible as we find it. By working systematically through the bible, we deal with the bits we like and the bits we don’t like. Because Hebrews is God’s Word, and God’s Word is how the Lord Jesus rules the church, we need to pay attention to our Author.
First, verse 7:
Remember you leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith. (Hebrews 13:7 NIV).
Verse 7 is probably a command to remember past leaders. These past leaders may have known the Lord Jesus Christ during his earthly ministry (Hebrews 2:3). Perhaps he means the Apostles, Jesus’ brothers, and other early Jewish disciples. Acts records many thousands of Jewish believers. The word ‘outcome’ refers to the sum total of their accomplishments during their lives. Thus, they not only preached, but adorned the gospel with their lives. Now they have finished their service.
So we apply this by looking back. Who was important to your Christian growth? Perhaps it was a previous Minister? Perhaps it was a faithful saint now gone to their rest?
What was the outcome of their life and ministry? Remember them! Observe the outcome of their life! And imitate their faith.
But the Author also speaks about current leaders: Verse 17:
Obey your leaders and submit to their authority. They keep watch over you as men who must give an account. Obey them so that their work will be a joy, not a burden, for that would be of no advantage to you. (Hebrews 13:17 NIV)
The two commands are twofold. First, it is to ‘obey’, meaning to entrust yourself to or to put your confidence in. Second, it means to submit, yield or give way to them.
The leader’s watchfulness here literally means ‘to go without sleep’. I find this a little embarrassing, as I get plenty of sleep!
The leader’s concern is particularly for the negligent or lazy. While all are responsible to God for themselves, I also am accountable to God for you. This is a joy if the congregation trusts and co-operates with the leader. It is awful if it doesn’t. I rejoice when you come together in church or bible study, ready to encourage one another, grow in love and knowledge of Christ, and reach the lost. The command for you is to be a joy, not a burden! And the command for me is that I must watch!
The Author also wants to give them the right perspective about food. What is the thing that will strengthen our hearts? It is not food laws, but grace. Verses 9 to 10:
Do not be carried away by all kinds of strange teachings. It is good for our hearts to be strengthened by grace, not by ceremonial foods, which are of no value to those who eat them. (Hebrews 13:9-10 NIV)
The bible often warns us about false teachings. We must beware of false teachers who Jesus calls ‘wolves in sheep clothing’ (Matthew 7:15). Often they come with teaching that looks religious. Thus, at the time of the Author to the Hebrews, they came with messages about food, probably some form of Jewish food laws.
However, according to Jesus, all food is clean (Mark 7:19). Food is a matter of freedom and wisdom, not a matter of regulation. The Old Testament food laws no longer apply. And we say that only because Jesus said it.
However, there is something that strengthens us as Christians: Grace. Grace is the unmerited kindness and generosity of Christ. Grace is God’s riches at Christ’s expense. Grace is knowing that Christ died and rose again for us. Grace is knowing that our sins are forgiven and forgotten, and cast away from us as far as the east is from the west. Grace is knowing that nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus. Grace is the throne to which we come at our time of need, because we have a Great High Priest. May our hearts be strengthened by grace.
And we are also told that we have an advantage over the Old Testament Priests. We can feed in a way that they can’t. Verse 10 again:
We have an altar from which those who minister at the tabernacle have no right to eat (Hebrews 13:10 NIV)
I take it that we don’t have a literal altar[1], just as we can’t literally go out to Jesus outside the camp. Rather, our Author uses metaphoric language drawn from the Old Testament tabernacle. Our ‘altar’ is the whole sacrificial action of Christ, his cross where Christ offered himself once for all. This is the reality that answers the Levitical sacrifices of the altar on the Day of Atonement (Leviticus 16). The Levitical Priests had no right to eat their sin offerings. We however, as partakers of Christ by faith, eat of his figurative flesh and drink of his figurative blood when we believe in Christ (John 6:35; 51-55). Of course, actual blood drinking was forbidden under the Old Covenant. It is a metaphor. Christ is our sacrificial Paschal lamb and Passover feast (1 Corinthians 5:7).
It is not just because I am protestant that I say this. Thomas Aquinas said, ‘this altar is either the cross of Christ, on which Christ was sacrificed for us, or Christ himself, in whom and through whom we offer our prayers’. Indeed, the Roman Catholic Commentator Spicq likewise takes the ‘altar’ as Christ’s sacrifice at Calvary. Both of whom are quoted in P E Hughes masterful commentary, 578.
The use of sacrificial language in this passage and also those that follow also highlight that every Christian is a priest (compare 1 Peter 2:5). Priestly language is used of our words and works in verses 15 and 16: Verse 15:
‘Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise – the fruit of lips that confess his name.’ (Hebrews 13:15 NIV).
Our sacrifice of praise is not just the singing of hymns. All that we speak is to be a sacrifice of grateful praise to God. But our singing is no doubt included as the fruit of the lips that confess his name. God doesn’t want bullocks anymore to show our thanks. He wants our words. Hosea 14:2:
Take words with you and return to the LORD. Say to him: "Forgive all our sins and receive us graciously, that we may offer the fruit of our lips. (NIV)
We offer God the fruit of our lips, we praise and thank him. So we also need to get rid of cursing and bitterness.
But not only our words are our sacrifice of praise. So too are our works. Verse 16:
And do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased. (Hebrews 13:16 NIV)
We can now please God with our good works. Not that our works put away our sin, or make us right with God. Our works can never do that. To be sanctified forever required not our works but only the propitiation that only God could give (Hebrews 2:17). Jesus Christ had to die to take away our sins and win us forgiveness. And anyway, in Christ we now experience rest from our works, just as God did from his (Hebrews 4:3,10). Coming to Christ means not working for our salvation, but resting in him.
But our well doing, our good works, is a thank offering. It is the sacrifice that the Old Testament worshipper made after the propitiatory sacrifice which took away sin and re-established their relationship with God[2].
And that is what our lips and our lives do now. Our words our works, our lips and lives, offer God a thank offering, now that he has turned his anger from us, sanctified us once and for all, and set aside our sins.
We cannot leave Hebrews without commenting on the beautiful benediction, or final prayer. Again, the author, in this parting prayer, shows us what matters in the meantime as he gives his leave – perhaps for a short time, perhaps until the new heaven and the new earth. Verses 20 to 21:
May the God of peace, who through[3] the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus that great shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and every. Amen. (Hebrews 13:20-21 NIV)
This last prayer commits the people to God.
Notice, God is a God of peace. Jesus Christ is our peace and came to bring peace for us (Ephesians 2:14-18). Peace with God and peace with neighbor. And God did this through the blood of Jesus Christ, which refers to Christ’s propitiatory sacrificial death. The covenant of Christ’s blood is said to be eternal. Previously it was called ‘new’ and ‘better’, and ‘second’ (Hebrews 8:6-8, 13, 9:15)
But now we are reminded it is also eternal. The New Covenant is the Eternal Covenant. It might be second, but it is NOT plan B. It was eternally in the mind of God. It has been in operation since the fall for all believers in God, because every true believer, no matter when they lived, is a member of this eternal covenant and has been cleansed by the blood of the eternal covenant (Hebrews 9:15). And it will last unto the ending of this world and into all eternity (Hebrews 10:12,14).
And we are reminded that Jesus Christ is risen. From the midst of Jesus’ bloody sacrificial death, God raised him and seated him at his right hand. We have a great high priest. Yet another reason we have peace with God.
But Jesus Christ is not only great high priest, but the great shepherd of the sheep. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. And your Lord Shepherd is Jesus Christ. If I am a shepherd of the sheep, it is only as a privileged under-shepherd, knowing that Christ is the Chief Shepherd, the Good Shepherd, who laid down his life for the sheep.
Jesus is alive. He is the Great High Priest. He is the Great Shepherd. It is not as if he just gives us some nice teaching to love each other, and is now dead, like every other religious teacher, like Buddha, Mohammad, Ghandi. Liberal Christianity seeks to separate Christianity from Jesus as living. It doesn’t matter if he is dead or alive. But that is out and out heresy. True Christianity says ‘Jesus is now alive and seated at the right hand of God.’ We believe what we do not yet see. Jesus has defeated death for us, and will come back to take us with us. If that is not true, don’t be a Christian. Ditch Christianity, there is nothing that should be salvaged from it. But if it is true, as I believe it is, death has been conquered, and we have a hope of eternal life that nothing can take away.
And so always give yourself fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labour is not in vain. And Jesus Christ is there to help us, when we call to him. He listens to our prayers. He answers and enables by his Spirit. We are not left alone. We are not orphaned. We have the Risen Jesus Christ, the Mighty Son, God who stretched out the heavens, who is the same yesterday, today and forever. He is still shepherding us even now. And he will come back and reward his faithful people.
Let’s pray.
[1] There is no reference to altars in connection with the Lord’s Supper until the 3rd Century, with Cyprian: Hughes, Hebrews, 577-8.
[2] See T Longman III, Immanuel in Our Place: Seeing Christ in Israel’s Worship: The Gospel According to the Old Testament (Phillipsburg: P & R, 2001), 91
[3] The Greek is en.