The Book of Hebrews 1:5-14 Of the Son He says

Good morning. We're going to be moving into this passage here in our second study, digging into the text of the book of Hebrews. And so we're going to be studying the verses that were just read for us here. And one of the things that we want to point out, and this is true of the passage we studied last week, this week's passage, and will be true through basically into chapter two.

We saw last Sunday that Christ is compared and contrasted with all the angels in Hebrews chapters 1 and 2. We'll see an ongoing use of the interpretive principle of comparison and contrast. And what do we mean by comparison and contrast? That means asking what's the same and what's different. And one of the things that's going to stand out as we go through this passage in Hebrews and continue on in chapter 2 is that there is a huge contrast between Christ and the angels.

Hence the question, basically twice in this passage, are any of the angels qualified like this? And so that contrast is going to be shown here again in this passage, just like we saw last time. Words like, much better and more excellent. Christ is shown to be unique and not one of the angels, not like them. and in fact very different.

One of the other things we point out that makes a tie or a connection between last week's passage, Hebrews 1-4, and the passage that we'll be looking at here today, and that is that there is, especially in verses 2 and 3, a comparison between the contents in the first four verses, and then the contents in today's passage. Example, appointment as a royal heir is in 2, we say 2B, that is the part of it. Appointment as a royal son and heir in verses 5 through 9, and executor of the creation in both passages, verse 2 again and verse 10. and eternal nature and pre-existent glory is brought up in the first part of verse 3 and again in verses 11 and 12. What we find is the passage today expands on themes that were brought up in last week's passage in verses 1 through 4.

You also have here the quotes in today's passage that are from the Old Testament. Now what they are is quotes from the Greek version of the Old Testament And he repeatedly quotes them, and why? Here's why. He's writing to who? He's writing to Hebrews. He's writing to those who would have a regard for the Old Testament. And so if he's trying to persuade them and convince them of anything, he's certainly going to draw upon the Old Testament again and again, and that's exactly what he does. Draws from several of the Psalms, and also from 2 Samuel and from Isaiah as well. And so we have that, we won't be going in detail through that, but you can follow through that on your own.

We do have a few observations as we go into the book of Hebrews about what we call the Trinity, the three persons of the Godhead. It's not a word that's used in the Bible, and sometimes you will hear people, especially cult groups, pointing that out.

It's not a word that's used in the Bible, it's a handle for saying that God is three personal beings and one essence. Three personal beings and one essence. Now, for a lot of us, that kind of blows our circuits, because we're used to one personal being, one essence, right? I'm here, I'm Vern, I'm one personal being, I'm one essence, and the same can be said for all of us. But what we have in the Godhead, the Trinity, is three personal beings in one essence.

And that's going to continue to show up as we go through the book of Hebrews. We're going to see the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. As a matter of fact, Christ, or Jesus, is not mentioned here in the first chapter. What we see repeatedly is Christ is called the Son, again and again. The Bible clearly teaches this truth. It's something that Christians recognize. The Jews did not, and do not now, recognize that teaching as they read the Old Testament. They don't see it. They don't believe in the Trinity.

As we'll see in the weeks and months ahead as we proceed through this book of Hebrews, the author of Hebrews refers to God, most certainly, but also to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, all three persons of the Trinity who have one essence. All three persons who have one essence.

One of the things that you're going to come across here, if you look through those quotes, people will go and they'll say, okay, here's the quote in the New Testament, and I'll read the Old Testament, and it's not quite the same. Why is it different? And we want to answer that question. It starts off like this.

The various versions of the English Bible that we have, were translated in the last couple of centuries. And by the way, your King James, that was translated in the last couple of centuries because it's been updated since 1611. But our English translations translated in the last couple of centuries from Hebrew in the Old Testament and in a very few places, mostly in Daniel and Ezra from a language that's similar called Aramaic. The scholars who did that translation, when you have a whole Bible, Old Testament and New, were Christians, as opposed to there are some Jewish translations of just the Old Testament. That was from Hebrew, as you see at the bottom of the screen there, it was from Hebrew directly into English.

That was the pattern that was used. What happened, however, with the Greek Old Testament, it was translated a couple of centuries before the birth of Christ by Jewish scholars. They didn't know English, right? They didn't know English. As a matter of fact, the English didn't know English at that point in time. And I mean that. If you ever see, let's see, I'll try to bring a translation at some point.

If you ever see John 3.16 from a translation before the year 1000, it is almost unrecognizable English. So when I say the English didn't know English, I mean it. And so the Greek Old Testament that we read now quoted in Hebrews went through another layer of translation. It went from Hebrew to Greek to English. And by the time you get through a couple of translations, you start getting variations.

So don't be concerned when you look at the quote that's there in Hebrews and then go look those quotes up. in your Old Testament, the difference is in great part because of that additional language translation that we're dealing with here when we're seeing a quote here in Hebrews.

One of the things that gets pointed out real carefully in this passage, and actually repeatedly in different aspects, is there is a unique relationship between the Father and the Son. And that's something that he points out. Why? Because he wants to say the Father and the Son have a relationship that the angels do not have with either one.

The author of Hebrews quotes, of course, from the Greek Old Testament, drawing from something that they would see as authoritative. The Hebrews would see as authoritative. They would relate to that. The first point is made about the Father and the Son as we go through this passage here.

He begins that comparison and the contrast with these words, for to which of the angels did he, that is, God the Father, ever say? And then he does that with the intent to show the unique relationship between the Father and the Son. No angel has that relationship. The unique relationship between the Father and the Son is shown by quoting Psalm 2-7 and 2 Samuel 7-14, there in Hebrews 1-5, there to show the uniqueness of the relationship between the Father and the Son. There is nothing like it in the whole universe, and no angel has that.

The Son refers to Jesus, Jesus Christ, in three ways. One, he was always the pre-existent son. Way back in eternity past, before God said, let there be light, the son had a relationship with the father. As a matter of fact, before angels were created, the son had a relationship with the father. Next, he became the incarnate son at his birth. Fully God, and then at his birth, fully man. fully God and fully man. So he went from being the pre-existent son to becoming the incarnate son at his birth. And thirdly, he became the exalted son when he returned to heaven after his death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and seating. Right? He returned to heaven to be seated at the right hand of the Father.

That is a unique relationship that no angel can claim. No angel can claim. So the Bible teaches these three personal beings, one essence. This passage focuses on the relationship between the Father and the Son. We're going to see the Holy Spirit brought up here as we proceed into our next parts of our study.

One of the things we do, and you have this on a slide on page two of your handout, is we show the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and then we have a quote there from John 18.6, is not. What do we mean by that? The Son is not the Father. That passage shows that they're two distinct beings. Two distinct beings.

We see also between the Father and the Holy Spirit is not, John 14.26, which shows that the Father and the Holy Spirit are distinct beings.

And then finally at the bottom part of that graphic we have the Son and the Holy Spirit, and Acts 10.38 shows that the Son and the Holy Spirit are two distinct beings. So that shows the distinctness of those beings. All three of them, however, are God, as we show, and we won't go through all the passages there, but the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit have multiple passages, and by the way, this is just a sampling, that show that the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God. So that's why we say three personal beings, okay, they're not the same, three personal beings, One God, one essence. See that?

Now, so as we move into Hebrews 1.6, the point here is that all the angels of God worship the Son.

And one of the things that the author of Hebrews does to make this distinction even greater is he always, through the whole book, refers to angels in the plural. always refers to angels in the plural, not the singular, but the sun gets referred to in the singular.

So the angels are all grouped into one. And something else that's unique about this book, the first two chapters mention angels, plural. The last two chapters mention angels, plural. There is never a mention of one singular angel, nor any angels named. The sun, however, is singular and named, Jesus Christ.

Revelation 19, 9 and 10 and again in Revelation 22, 8 and 9, John, here he is in the heavenly scene, here's the Apostle John, he begins at those two places to worship an angel. Imagine, here's John who's been given the command, write what you see, but he has no context, how do I write about heaven? And the things that I see here are so way over the top, I can hardly figure out how to get this down. He is so disoriented that he sees this angel who is a created being of lesser glory than God, and he begins to worship the angel.

And the angel in both cases says, whoop, stop! Don't worship me, worship God. And John's probably thinking, well, I thought I was, right? Isn't it amazing? This angel in each case is so glorious that John is blown away. And yet that is much, much less glory than God himself.

So worshiping an angel is off-limits. The angels themselves refuse it. The worship of any angel is declined by the angel himself, that is, if it's an angel of the Lord. The angel says to worship God in both of those passages there in Revelation. Worship of angels is warned about by Paul in Colossians 2.18, but all the angels, everyone, all the angels worship God the Son. Therefore, he is not an angel, right? All the angels worship God the Son.

As a matter of fact, we can find other instances in scripture. Go back to Matthew 2, 1 and 2, where it records this. Now, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem saying, where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star in the east and have come to what? Worship him. We've come to worship him.

And guess what? Do they do that? Yes, they do. When they saw the star, this is Matthew 2, 10 and 11, When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy, and after coming into the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell to the ground and worshipped him. And it was appropriate to do so.

There was no point at which an angel showed up and said, Whoa! Don't do this! There was no point at which Joseph and Mary said, Stop! Whoa! No, it was appropriate to worship Him. That's what they came for. That's what we saw in the previous passage there. And that's exactly what they did. And it was totally fitting that they do so.

It would not have been fitting if they had worshipped the angels. Notice when the angels showed up to tell the shepherds about the baby that was born in nearby Bethlehem. When the angels showed up, the angels were pointing them to Jesus, not saying, hey, worship us, right? Worship of an angel is completely off-limits and inappropriate. Worship of the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, completely appropriate. Why? He is deity.

Here's Revelation 5, 11 through 14, and you have this on a slide on page 2 of your handout. And it reads like this, the angels and the elders are worshiping in this, and it says, Then I looked, this is John the Apostle speaking, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne and the living creatures, and that's what you see in the picture there is the four living creatures who are angelic beings. and the elders, and the number of them was myriads of myriads, that's ten thousands of ten thousands.

You can imagine, here's John, he says, I'm not going to guess, ten thousands of ten thousands. Just a huge number. Myriad is the largest number in the Greek numbering system. So he says, I've hit the top, I'm going to just say the largest number times the largest number and call it good. And thousands of thousands saying with a loud voice, and I won't do loud voice like I did when I taught the revelation because it wakes the babies up.

Okay. Worthy is the lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing and every created thing which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and on the sea and all things in them I heard saying to him who sits on the throne and to the who to the lamb Christ the lamb Be blessing and honor and glory and dominion forever and ever. And the four living creatures kept saying amen and the elders fell down and worshiped.

Is it appropriate to worship the sun? Most certainly. Do it forever. Right? Appropriate to worship the sun? Certainly. Is it appropriate to worship angels? Not at all. This very same book. John has turned down twice his mistaken attempt to worship an angel. The angels themselves, in fact, do the worshiping. Okay. In verse 7, Hebrews 1-7, he talks about angels as winds and as fire. By describing the angels as winds, the author of this psalm was drawing attention to the angels' spirit nature. They are spiritual beings.

There are two kinds of created spiritual beings so far as we are told in scripture and one of those is angels and those do not reproduce and seem all to be have been created at one time. The other is human beings who are not all created at once but in fact we have the creation of Adam and Eve and then others descended from them not all created at once. The angels so far as we know have no plan of salvation made available to them. They, however, are involved in carrying out aspects of God's plan of salvation for us.

That must be amazing for them to look at. Now, by describing the angel as wind, the author of Psalm was drawing attention to the angel's spirit nature, to their invisibility. The angels appear to human beings only when they decide or are told to do so. They otherwise have no appearance. They don't need it. They don't need a physical presence except on those instances where they are told to or decide to have a physical presence. It talks about their power, as wind can be powerful, and their role as servants of a higher power.

By the way, when I'm talking about power, I figured something out this last week. I figured out why Wayne retired. I did. I figured out why Wayne retired. It's because the power line started doing crazy things and he said, this is the time to get out of here. Let me tell you. Look at this. Anyway, that's just an aside. Anyway, now I know why he retired. I don't blame them. I'd do that too.

Anyway, as flames of fire, the angels are God's agents of judgment and illumination, too. Not just the previous things we listed under winds, but also fire helps shed light, and fire also means judgment. So we see those, and we see them both in the book of Revelation as well.

Either way, whether as winds or as fire, The angels serve God and are at His command. The angels are at His command. The Son is the one who commands the angels. Now in verses 8 and 9 there's mention of a scepter and also the Son being anointed. The scepter of the tribe of Judah through David, King David. will end in the hands of the Son forever. That's the plan laid out throughout the Scriptures.

It starts in Genesis 49.10, and in that passage, Judah is equated to a lion. That's why we see in Revelation Jesus is called the Lion of Judah. The Lion of Judah. The scepter that is the symbol of power and the reality of that power will end in the hands of the Son forever. You see, David had a line of kings, but at Jesus that line ends. At Jesus that line ends. He will be forever, forever powerful. He is the Lamb, but he is also the Lion, and he is also the King, and the King of Kings, and Lord of Lords.

Here in Genesis 49.10, and I Deliberately quote the NIV because it brings something out in the original language that isn't always brought forth It says the scepter will not depart from Judah nor the ruler's staff from between his feet Until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of the nations that is the Gentiles is his hey Who is the one to whom it belongs? Jesus Jesus the King of Israel and the King of, as this points out, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, the Lord of the Nations.

The other part of that that comes out in here is, talks about being anointed. Christ and Messiah both mean the anointed one. So certainly, certainly that's referring to Christ, the one who is the anointed one. Whether we have it as Christ and Messiah, the Greek would be Christos. We say Messiah in an anglicized form, it would be Hamashiah in the Hebrew. And in this case, here both of those names mean the Anointed One.

So only the Son fulfills that. The angels are not anointed. While the angels take orders, Christ the Son will give orders. Christ the Son will give orders. The angels take them. Christ gives them as the Son. Christ was a servant only for a time. He came for a ministry as a servant, here for a time, a brief moment of time in all the span of history. The angels are always servants all of the time. Since they were created, they were servant beings. That's true in Genesis. It's true in Revelation. It's true in between. forever they will be servant beings. That's God's role for them. In verses 10 and 12, Christ the Son is the agent of creation but outlasts creation. Christ the Son is the one by whom all things were created both in the heavens and on the earth.

And by the way, that heavens and earth as describing all of the universe is a Hebrew or Jewish term, right? It's a Hebrew or Jewish term. And so by using that, these Hebrews that the author is writing to would relate to that. He is the ultimate master of it. He is the one, as this Hebrews chapter describes, He is the one who created it at the outset. He is the one who creates the rolling ages within time. He is the one who sustains the creation.

A lot of people, even those especially who don't recognize that there is a God, and especially don't recognize the place of Christ, do not realize that their very existence depends upon the sustaining power of Christ to keep the universe in existence.

And there could come a time, 1,007 years from now, that soon, There will come a time when this universe will just vaporize. The elements will melt. And that will be the time when Christ ceases sustaining this universe and begins the new one. Christ is the beginning of that new creation. And since you are in Christ and Christ is in you, you likewise already now have a part in that new creation. Nothing here will last, it will all come to an end someday, as soon as 1007 years from now.

The sun, however, had no beginning, there was no place when he started. When you see reference here in this passage and elsewhere to the firstborn, that's talking about his preeminence and primary place. It doesn't mean that he was a created being. He had no beginning. He has no end. He does not change or wear out like everything else does in this universe. Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

Hebrews 13.8 Christ is the same. He does not change. He doesn't wear out. He is not subject to the things that wear out in this universe. He's not subject to time except as he volunteered to be under it.

If we look at Job 38 verse 1 and then 4 through 7, God is talking to Job and asking Job questions to get Job to understand and see some things. So the passage reads like this, Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind and said, Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me if you have understanding. Who set its measurements? Since you know. Or who stretched the line on it? On what were its bases sunk? Or who laid its cornerstone?

When the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy. Sons of God is an Old Testament term. You notice that's lowercase s. It's an Old Testament term for the angels. So the angels were there watching creation as created beings. And what did they do? What was their response? They sang together about it and they shouted for joy as they watched God creating things. Isn't it amazing to think of these angels as conscious spiritual beings watching what's going on, watching what God is doing. As God says, let there be light. As God says, okay, I create the sun and the moon and the stars.

As God creates all the little tiny creatures and everything in between. their response they sang together and they shouted for joy this was amazing wow this is great and we were just made yesterday right but there will be a time when this universe here will end it'll all be gone the day of the Lord will come as Peter writes in 2nd Peter 3.10 The day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be burned up." Gone. Poof. That's the end of it. Why? Is that something sad? No, because there's a new heavens and a new earth.

And you and I will be there with the Lamb, the Son. Hebrews 1 13 and 14 there is the the word set sit at my right hand this is the father speaking to the son and one of the things we find here as we look at this the angels are ministering servants doing whatever God commands God tells them go here do this in some cases appear in other cases don't appear and influence this.

It's amazing. One of the things you don't see, although the angels show up in lots of different places, you never see a human being kill an angel. In all of the Bible. You don't see a human being kill an angel. And that comes to mind, I recall when Brad here was talking to us about the resurrection, and here the angels show up.

And the angels are completely unafraid by seeing these, you know, what are otherwise fearsome Roman soldiers, heavily armed and fully equipped to kill anyone that tries to break the seal of Rome and open the tomb. And the angels come and they just kind of, eh, no big deal. They're not slightly afraid, not even remotely. completely unfazed by this group of fierce soldiers. They do whatever God commands. They do not fear being executed or having human beings interrupt or disrupt anything they're doing.

But Christ the Son is at the right hand of the place of power, the one who gives commands. The angels come and go and they get sent on different things. They take orders from God to go here, do this, carry this out, let this be known, announce this. They do those things under orders from God, including God the Son. But the angels don't give orders to the Son. The Son gives orders to the angels.

The angels render service for what this passage tells us? For the sake of those who inherit salvation. That's you and me. The angels are sent to do things then and now and in the future for the sake of us. The angels who don't know salvation, very interestingly Christ didn't die for the angels, right? The angels who don't know salvation are involved in carrying out God's orders regarding our salvation.

That is astounding stuff. Here is one spiritual being of one kind addressing the needs of another spiritual being, us, of another kind. And we experience salvation and grace that they know nothing about. It is astounding. It's amazing. So far as we have any revelation, the angels have no opportunity for salvation by grace through faith like us. They must be astounded at it. They must be amazed. I would imagine, and there's even some indication in the New Testament, that the angels are curious about these things, because they themselves haven't seen it.

But God has ordered that they be involved in various aspects of it. One of the things that we have in our culture is lots of mythology about angels. We have cultural expressions and things like that that cloud, actually in some cases, some pretty important issues. And so we want to address some of those.

Angels are not little babies. That's one little thing. Angels are not little babies, as sweet as little babies look and all that. Matter of fact, one of the reasons why I would point this out is frequently the angels have to say to a human being, don't be afraid. Right? You're afraid of an infant? Well, if you've ever taken care of one, you might be. But anyway, the angels have to warn people, don't be afraid, because why? Their appearance is frightening, naturally. It can be frightening.

The next thing, angels don't have these little affairs and romances with human beings, things like that. There was a group of angels who tried that. back as recorded in Genesis 6, and they got relegated basically to angel prison. But that's not something that's ongoing. Not something ongoing, despite all the different stories and mythology and artwork and everything else that goes along that line. There are no angel babes, no such thing.

The angels in fact appear as men. It's funny, a lot of the angels are all buff, you know, like they've been pumping iron for a thousand years, you know. And the reality is, nah, I'm not sure that they look all that extraordinary. As a matter of fact, at times, here Abraham served angels and was completely unaware of, you know, anything unusual. He just thought they were guys passing through.

And as a matter of fact, Hebrews will talk about that farther down the line. No angel from heaven is actually tempted romantically. It says, Jesus said, that they're neither male nor female. They appear as men when they appear, but they're in fact neither male or female. They don't look like babies. They don't look like lovely women. That doesn't happen. And by the way, we don't change into angels. Angels stay angels and we stay us. We don't change into angels when we go to be with the Lord. The standard of righteousness is Christ himself. We have this expression, you know, well, he's no angel or she's no angel. You ever hear that one? Angels are not the standard of righteousness. The standard of righteousness is Christ himself.

That is why his very life is lived in and through us as we depend upon him. Why did we need to have Christ dwell in us and not an angel dwell in us? Because we need Christ's righteousness. An angel isn't going to cut it. We need Christ's righteousness. Christ, the one who loved us and gave himself up for us. That's the righteousness we need. Exactly the righteousness we need. Let's pray. Lord, thank you that we do have your righteousness.

We are in you and you are in us. And so we have that righteousness intimately. And that gets lived out as we depend upon you, and depend upon your working in and through us, your very life lived through us. We thank you for what you have brought about, and thank you for this morning's distinctions between the angels, who are indeed awesome beings, but they're created beings, and Christ, Christ our Lord, Christ the one in whom we are, Christ the one who is in us. Thank you for that. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.