Falling Into the Hands of the Living God

It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. (Hebrews 10:31 NKJV)

Yes, it can be a very terrifying thing to fall into the hands of God. That is not because of God’s disposition toward us but is purely a matter of our perception of and disposition toward God.

When Adam turned away from God in the Garden, pulling away from the very life God offered, his perception of God became distorted. So, when God came calling in the Garden in the cool of the day, Adam hid in fear. He perceived God as being against him instead of for him. He was hostile against God in his own mind (Romans 8:7).

God is love (1 John 4:8), and those who are properly oriented toward God perceive him properly, as love. But those who are not properly oriented toward God perceive him in terror and dread.

God is Love, and God loves as God is, so all God’s actions are always loving toward all, even the most wicked. When Adam disobeyed, God did not love him one bit less. God’s love toward us never wavers toward us, never gives up on us but perseveres for our sake. It is steadfast.

First John 4:18 tells us that there is no fear in love but perfect love drives out fear. Where we are properly oriented toward God and his love, there is no fear, for we know God and his love for what they are, and that leaves no room for fear. But those who turn away from God misperceive even the love of God, and it seems a torment to them and that it comes to do them harm.

We are not, as Jonathan Edwards wrongly supposed, sinners in the hands of an angry God. We are sinners in the hands of a loving God, the God who put himself in the hands of angry sinners in order to deliver us from ourselves and our wrong perceptions of God.

The Possibility of Repentance After Death

Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment ... (Hebrews 9:27)

Evangelical universalism entails the possibility of “post-mortem conversion,” that is, the proposition that, though many depart this life without faith in Christ, yet is it still possible for them to come to such faith after they have died.

A common objection to this view has been Hebrews 9:27, “Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment …,” and it is supposed that this precludes any post-mortem opportunity for salvation. It is then further assumed that if one has not come to faith in Christ when they die, all that is left for them is an eternity of conscious torment.

What is the Context?
But there are a few problems with such a reading. First, it ignores the context. Verse 27 is not a stand-alone statement or a completed thought but is part of a larger discussion about Christ as our high priest, holding him in contrast with the Levitical priesthood of the Old Testament:

For Christ did not enter a sanctuary made with human hands that was only a copy of the true one; he entered heaven itself, now to appear for us in God's presence. Nor did he enter heaven to offer himself again and again, the way the high priest enters the Most Holy Place every year with blood that is not his own. Otherwise Christ would have had to suffer many times since the creation of the world. But he has appeared once for all at the culmination of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself. Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment, so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him. (Hebrews 9:24-28)

The high priest of the Old Testament had to go into the Holy of Holies every year to make sacrifice for sins. But Christ did not come year after year to offer himself as a sacrifice over and over for our sins. He did not suffer many times but only once. Mark the word “once” in the verses immediately preceding and following verse 27; it is the key to the comparison the author makes.

• Christ has appeared once for all to do away with sin (v. 26).
• Just as people are destined to die once (v. 27).
• So Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of the many (v. 28).

Note also the use of “just as” by the NIV (or “and” in several other versions) at the beginning of verse 27. It indicates the continuation of a preceding thought. The use of “so” at the beginning of verse 28 shows a continuation of the thought carried along in verse 27 and completes this portion of the argument the author is making: Just as people are destined to die once, so Christ was offered once, in sacrificial death.

What is the Judgment?
Here, we come to my second point, though still considering the context. The second clause in verse 27 has to do with judgment. If we think of this in general terms, it is worth noting that the author does not specify how soon after death this judgment comes, only that people are destined once to die, and after this comes the judgment. We cannot simply assume that it comes immediately, leaving no room for coming to repentance and faith.

But the author of Hebrews has been focusing our attention on Christ, and that, it seems to me, is how we should think of judgment here. The first part of verse 27, “destined to die once” is answered by the first part of verse 28, “Christ was sacrificed once.” So also, the second part of verse 27, about judgment, is answered in the second part of verse 28: “to take away the sins of the many.”

To see how the taking away of our sins in verse 28 corresponds to judgment in verse 27, we need to understand something important about the nature of God’s judgment: it is not retributive but restorative. Our own sense of judgment is often about retribution or pay-back, even to the point of the destruction of offenders — and we tend to imagine that God must be that way, too.

But God’s judgment is always about restoration, for God is love, and love does not seek retribution. God comes to set things right — to set us right. The judgment of God does not come to destroy the offender but to remove the offense. For God did not send Christ into the world to condemn us (John 3:18) but to bring about reconciliation (more on that in a moment).

The judgment of God, then, does not preclude any further possibility of repentance, for repentance and faith are exactly what it is intended to bring about. Think of the many times in the Old Testament when God judged wayward Israel. It was not to abandon Israel forever but to bring her to repentance, for there was always the promise of the day when God would finally gather her in from the nations.

The ultimate judgment of God took place at the cross, where the “once for all” death Christ died destroyed the works of the devil (1 John 4:8), disarmed the principalities and powers (Colossians 2:15), broke the power of death, and the power of the devil, who held the power of death (Hebrews 2:14), and so, broke the power of sin. The cross is where the forgiveness of God was revealed, and the judgment of God made manifest.

The author extends the thought at the end of verse 28, showing that the One who was offered once for our sins, “will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.” The death of Christ brings salvation — and that is the judgment of God.

The author of Hebrews is not arguing that death is a “point of no return” that precludes any possibility of post-mortem conversion but showing us something very different, a Christ-centered focus. Nor can we conclude that the future appearing of Christ is the cut-off point for repentance and faith; the author simply does not make that argument.

What is God’s Purpose in Christ?
This brings me to my third point: there are numerous passages in Scripture that clearly indicate God’s purpose is the reconciliation of all things in heaven and on earth through Christ and by the blood of the cross. I have listed several of them in another article, “What If ‘All’ Means All?”, but I will mention three here:

All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. (2 Corinthians 5:18-19)

With all wisdom and understanding, [God] made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillment — to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ. (Ephesians 1:9-10)

For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross. (Colossians 1:19-20)

In the end, God will be, as Paul said, “All in all” (1 Corinthians 15:28). The reconciliation of all things will not happen apart from Christ, or the cross, or repentance and faith. But Paul does seem convinced that it will indeed happen.

If that is so, and all are finally to be reconciled, then it seems to me that post-mortem conversion is not only possible but is inevitable, seeing that so many people appear to depart this present life without having come to any repentance or faith in Christ. Hebrews 9:27 does not preclude this; it does not even address the question, much less answer it.

Trampling the Fear of Death

Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death — that is, the devil — and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death. (Hebrews 2:14-15)

For the past couple of posts, we have been looking at the relationship between sin and death, particularly at the question of whether we are mortal because we sin, or we sin because we are mortal. My understanding of Scripture is the latter, that we sin because we are mortal. (See Whereupon All Sinned and The Sting of Death.) But how is it that mortality leads to sin? I think Hebrews 2:14-15 provides a clue.

First, let’s notice what the author of Hebrews identifies here as the problem that is solved by the death of Christ. It is not sin but death, which is to say, the power of death, and the power of him who holds the power of death. It may come as a surprise that the one identified here as holding the power of death is not God but the devil. But God is not the one who kills.

God has the power of life, not of death. Death is nothing in itself; it is the absence of something. Just as darkness is nothing but the absence of light, so death is nothing but the absence of life. Christ is life, and when he encounters the power of death, as he did at the cross, it is “game over” for death. There is simply no contest.

In Revelation 1:18, Christ says, “I am the Living One; I was dead, and now look, I am alive for ever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and Hades.” But what does he do with those keys? In Revelation 20, both death and Hades (the place of the dead) are cast into the “lake of fire,” but before they are, they are emptied out.

At the cross, Christ broke not only the power of death, but also the power of the one who held the power of death, that is, the devil. In 1 John 3:9, we read that Christ came to destroy the works of the devil. This, too, happened at the cross and was revealed in the resurrection when Christ broke the gates of Hades and set its captives free.

Now, let’s look at how the author of Hebrews describes what the power of death and of the devil does: It causes us to fear, and that fear leads us into bondage. But Christ has broken that power so to “free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.”

Fear of death is a terrible bondage, causing people to do all sorts of things to avoid it, or else to get all the pleasure they can out of this life before they meet their inevitable end (supposing that death has the last word). It is fear of death that whispers in us, “What shall we do? How shall we survive?” Jesus speaks to this deep anxiety in his Sermon on the Mount:

So do not worry, saying, “What shall we eat?” or “What shall we drink?” or “What shall we wear?” For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. (Matthew 6:31-33)

We live in bondage and the fear of death when we do not know we have God as our loving Father who takes care of us in every way. It causes us to live as orphans, believing we must make do for ourselves in whatever way we can. Fear of death blinds us to the truth: “The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father’” (Romans 8:15). “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 4:7).

There is an illuminating scene toward the end of the comedy movie, Moonstruck. It is a brief conversation between Rose Castorini (Olympia Dukakis) and Johnny Cammareri (Danny Aiello).

Rose: Why do men chase women?

Johnny: Well, there’s a Bible story ... God ... God took a rib from Adam and made Eve. Now maybe men chase women to get the rib back. When God took the rib, he left a big hole there, where there used to be something. And the women have that. Now maybe, just maybe, a man isn’t complete as a man without a woman.

Rose: [frustrated] But why would a man need more than one woman?

Johnny: I don’t know. Maybe because he fears death.

[Rose looks up, eyes wide, suspicions confirmed]

Rose: That’s it! That’s the reason!

Johnny: I don’t know ...

Rose: No! That’s it! Thank you! Thank you for answering my question!

Fear of death is a terrible bondage. But Christ rescues us from it, having delivered us from the power of death and of the devil — and so from the power of sin. He did this:

• By the Incarnation, in which he fully participates with us in our humanity (and we participate with him in his divinity).
• By the Cross, where he experienced the full measure of our mortality, destroying the power of death and the works of the devil.
• By the Resurrection, shattering the gates of Hades through the victory of his death, binding the strong man — the devil — and liberating captive humanity.
• By his Ascension to the right hand of the Father, leading captivity itself — death and Hades — captive, showing himself as Lord and victor over them. And being emptied out, they are finally cast into the “lake of fire.”
• By Pentecost, where he poured out upon all people the gift of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit by whom we cry out “Abba, Father,” so that no longer need we live in fear of death or of anything else.

Breaking the Powers

In bringing many sons and daughters to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through what he suffered. Both the one who makes people holy and those who are made holy are of the same family.

So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters. He says, “I will declare your name to my brothers and sisters; in the assembly I will sing your praises.” And again, “I will put my trust in him.” And again he says, “Here am I, and the children God has given me.”

Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death — that is, the devil — and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death. (Hebrews 2:10-15)

Sons and daughters. Brothers and sisters. God is intensely interested in his children — his family. He is not ashamed to call us sons and daughters but desires to bring us into the full experience and participation of his glory.

Jesus is not ashamed to call us brothers and sisters. He came to set us free, and it is for this reason that God became a man. It was necessary that he fully share in our humanity, to become mortal flesh and experience death, so that by the life and power of God he might overcome death for us all. His death, then, became the means by which the power of the devil, the power and fear of death, was broken.

Death was not a retaliatory judgment of God on the sin of man but the natural consequence of man turning away from life. It was the devil who tempted man to sin, to rebel and turn away from God, the very source of life. When life is rejected, what else is left except death? So here is another reason why Jesus needed to become a man.

For this reason he had to be made like them, fully human in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people. Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted. (Hebrews 2:17-18)

Jesus knows exactly what it is like to go through trials and tests and temptations. He experienced them at their most fundamental level yet remained faithful throughout, even to the point of death. And having suffered such things himself, he is well able to help us in our time of testing. He has, in a word, broken the power of sin.

Here, then, is the reason for Good Friday and the Cross: It is where the Lord Jesus broke the powers — the power of sin, the power of the devil and the power of death. And having broken the powers, he is able to reconcile us back to God, by the blood of the cross, and breathe new life — his life — into us by the Holy Breath of God.

Not Ashamed to Call Us His Own

For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. For both He who sanctifies and those who are being sanctified are all of one, for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brethren. (Hebrews 2:11)

But now they desire a better, that is, a heavenly country. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them. (Hebrews 11:16)

God is not ashamed of those who belong to Him by faith. Even as messed up as we are, God is not ashamed to call us His people. And Jesus is not ashamed to claim us as His brothers and sisters. For we are being sanctified by Him. Notice the tense, “are being sanctified.” That indicates that this process of being sanctified, being transformed as God’s own people, is ongoing. We are a work in progress.

Paul tells us that “it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure” (Philippians 2:12-13). In other words, God is not only enabling us to do what pleases Him, He is even creating in us the desire to do what pleases Him. God has no doubt about what the end result will be. As Paul said earlier in his letter to the Jesus believers at Philippi, “He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ” (Philippians 1:6). And God knows exactly what that end result will look like — it will look like Jesus. “For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren” (Romans 8:29).

God is currently in the business of shaping us into the image of the Lord Jesus Christ, so that we may forever be like Him. And God, who sees the end from the beginning, is happy with that, because He is happy with Jesus. Jesus is happy with that too, which is why He is not ashamed to be “the firstborn among many brethren” and to call us His brothers and sister.

Lessons from Hebrews on the Nature of Faith

Hebrews 11 has often been called the “hall of fame of faith,” because of the litany of Old Testament saints and the dynamic of faith at work in their lives.

• When Abel “offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain,” was it a matter of faith, or of works? (See Hebrews11:4)
• When Noah “prepared an ark for the saving of his household,” was it a matter of faith, or of works? (See Hebrews 11:7)
• When Abraham “obeyed when he was called to go out to the place which he would receive as an inheritance,” was it a matter of faith, or of works? (See Hebrews 11:8)
• When Abraham “dwelt in the land of promise as in a foreign country,” was it a matter of faith, or of works? (See Hebrews 11:9)
• When Abraham “offered up Isaac, and he who have received the promises offer up his only begotten son,” was it a matter of faith, or of works? (See Hebrews 11:17)
• When Moses became of age and “refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin, esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt,” was it a matter of faith, or of works? (See Hebrews 11:24-26)
• When Moses “forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king; for he endured as seeing Him who is invisible,” was it a matter of faith, or of works? (See Hebrews 11:27)
• When Moses “kept the Passover and the sprinkling of blood, lest he who destroyed the firstborn should touch them,” was it a matter of faith, or of works? (See Hebrews 11:28)

The answer, of course, is that it was all “by faith.” What does this tell us about the nature of faith?

God the Rewarder

But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. (Hebrews 11:6)

Notice that faith does not just require that we believe that God exists but also that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. We are to seek Him, believing that it is in our best interest to do so, that as we diligently seek Him, we receive something in return. However we might describe the nature of this reward, it is, after all, still reward. So, in this relationship of faith that we have with God, there is God-interest, but that is also self-interest. And this self-interest is not merely incidental, it is required — those who come to God must believe that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.

God has often promised blessings and benefits to those who seek Him, trust in Him, listen to His voice and walk in His ways. See, for example, Deuteronomy 28:1-14, where God promises wonderful blessing for those who “diligently obey” His voice and “observe carefully” His commandments (v. 1). In Psalm 103:2-5, David reminds himself of the many benefits of the LORD:

Bless the LORD, O my soul,
And forget not all His benefits:
Who forgives all your iniquities,
Who heals all your diseases,
Who redeems your life from destruction,
Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies,
Who satisfies your mouth with good things,
So that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

In Malachi 3:10-12, God invites His people to test Him concerning the tithe and promises great reward for doing so:

Bring all the tithes into the storehouse,
That there may be food in My house,
And try Me now in this,”
Says the LORD of hosts,
“If I will not open for you the windows of heaven
And pour out for you such blessing
That there will not be room enough to receive it.
And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes,
So that he will not destroy the fruit of your ground,
Nor shall the vine fail to bear fruit for you in the field,”
Says the LORD of hosts;
“And all nations will call you blessed,
For you will be a delightful land,”
Says the LORD of hosts.

In the New Testament, Jesus promises the reward of hundredfold return to those who leave all for Him:

Assuredly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands, for My sake and the gospel’s, who shall not receive a hundredfold now in this time — houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions — and in the age to come, eternal life. (Mark 10:29-30)

Paul, encouraging the believers at Corinth to be diligent in the grace of giving, gives this promise:

But this I say: He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. So let each one give as he purposes in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity; for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work. (2 Corinthians 9:6-8)

There are many other examples we could look at, but I didn’t mean to post a long article today, and this one has already gone on longer than I intended.

Now, some will insist that we should not seek reward from God, that it somehow makes our faith and our motives impure. “Seek His face, not His hand,” they say. But, to follow that analogy, if you are like me, your hand is not far from your face, and the same is true of God. And the author of Hebrews teaches us something different: We must diligently seek God for who He is, but we must also believe that He rewards those who do so, that His hand is not far from His face. Without that kind of faith, it is impossible to please God.

We are Receiving a Kingdom

Do not fear, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. (Luke 12:32)

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. (Hebrews 12:28)

Jesus came into the world preaching, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the Gospel” (Mark 1:15), and He said that it is the Father’s desire to give us the kingdom. The author of Hebrews says that we are receiving that kingdom.

Note the tense. It is not “we have received,” as if it has fully arrived and we have taken complete possession of it, nor is it, “we will receive,” as if it is all and only in the future. But it is “are receiving,” and that speaks of something that has already begun, is now in progress and will one day be complete.

It pleases God to give us His kingdom. That must have something to do with faith, since without faith it is impossible to please Him (Hebrews 11:6). We receive this kingdom by faith, that is, by believing what God has said and living by it. As we do, it will begin to manifest more and more in our lives and in the world. The author of Hebrews, in his context, shows us something of what this kingdom means:

You have come to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God (the heavenly Jerusalem), to myriads of angels in festive gathering, to the assembly of the firstborn whose names have been written in heaven, to God who is the judge of all, to the spirits of righteous people made perfect, to Jesus (mediator of a new covenant), and to the sprinkled blood, which says better things than the blood of Abel. (Hebrews 12:22-24 HCSB)

• We have come to Mount Zion. This is where God has chosen to dwell and manifest His presence among His people.
• We have come to the city of the living God. This is the city Abraham was seeking, the city “which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God” (Hebrews 11:10). Now we have come to that city and Paul reminds us, “You are the temple of the living God” (2 Corinthians 6:16).
• We have come to the heavenly Jerusalem. Heavenly Jerusalem speaks of a higher realm. In the Jewish mind, this represented the expectation of a future age. Now we have come to that city and the reality of heaven is already breaking into the world.
• We have come to myriads of angels in festive gathering. The angels of God are now gathered together in a joyful convocation, a festival of praise because God has done what He promised, King Jesus has come into the world to redeem humanity and creation, and has ascended to the throne of God.
• We have come to the assembly of the firstborn whose names are written in heaven. “Firstborn” shows that we have a Father, God, and that He has an inheritance for us, which is His kingdom. It is not just for us individually, but together as an assembly, a community of faith. Our names are written together on the citizen rolls of heaven. Paul says, “Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God”: (Ephesians 2:19). “Our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ” (Philippians 3:20).
• We have come to God who is the judge of all. “Judge” speaks of God’s sovereign rule and authority over all. He is the one who sets all things right in the world and that is what His kingdom is about.
• We have come to the spirits of righteous people made perfect. This speaks of our communion together, a connection stronger than death, even with those who have gone before us and no longer walk this planet. While we are still in the process of reckoning ourselves dead to sin but alive to God (Romans 6:11), they have been made thoroughly and completely perfect in Jesus the Messiah. “Perfected at last!” is the sense of the text.
• We have come to Jesus, mediator of a new covenant. Jesus is the reason for how we have come to all these things. All the blessing of the kingdom is summed up in the new covenant, of which He is the mediator.
• We have come to the sprinkled blood, which says better things than the blood of Abel. This is the heart of the covenant: the shedding of blood, demonstrating the surety of the promise. In the new covenant Jesus mediates for us with the Father, Jesus is the sacrifice — He gives us Himself. This covenant, and the blood by which in which it was cut, speaks incomparable things for us, more than any other blood ever could. The blood of Abel cried out for revenge, but the blood of Jesus speaks of the redemption and restoration of humanity and all creation.

Regardless of what is happening in the world, the kingdom of God, which we are now receiving, cannot be shaken. Rather, it is already breaking into this present age to shake the world, as God sets things right in and through those who believe Him and receive King Jesus by grace through faith.

It is the Father’s good pleasure to give us His kingdom, and those who receive the king receive the kingdom.

Walking with God

Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him. (Genesis 5:24)

The author of Hebrews comments on this unusual primeval event:

By faith Enoch was taken away so that he did not see death, “and was not found because God had taken him”; for before he was taken, he had this testimony, that he pleased God. (Hebrews 11:5)

The Greek word for “taken,” used in all three instances in this verse, means to transfer, transport, or translate. In other words, Enoch walked with God and ended up very differently than when He began. He was not just changed as to his spiritual condition, he even experienced a change in his physical state. God, who is Spirit, created the material universe, so physical reality is essentially a manifestation of the spiritual realm.

The Septuagint, an early translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek, uses in Genesis 5:24 the Greek verb for “pleased” in place of the Hebrew word for “walked.” It signifies that Enoch did not merely happen to be accompanying God in this journey, but he actually pleased God in doing so — he was a delight to Him.

God had wanted to walk with Adam in this way. He came walking in the Garden in the “cool of the day,” looking for him (Genesis 3:8-9). But of course, Adam had already disconnected from God by his rebellion. It is significant that the “hall of fame of faith” in Hebrews 11 does not begin with, “By faith Adam …” Adam acted as he did precisely because he did not believe God.

But that is what pleases God — faith! As Hebrews goes on to say, “Without faith, it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6). Faith is believing that God is, and that He rewards those who seek Him out. That pleases God, which is exactly what Enoch did. He walked with God in faith — and it changed his entire existence.

There is a way of walking in this world that can transport you into a higher reality, a new realm of living, a delightful fellowship with God. It is the way of faith — believing God.

The Bold Confidence of Faith

Who through faith … quenched the violence of fire. (Hebrews 11:33-34)

Hebrews 11 has often been called the “Hall of Fame” of faith. It begins with this definition: “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (v. 1). It describes a solid confidence that is rooted, not in what is seen but in what is unseen.

The ones who by faith quenched the violence of fire are, of course, Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-Nego, the three young Hebrews who refused to bow down to the image of Nebuchadnezzar. Consider the deep confidence of their faith as Nebuchadnezzar confronts them:

Now if you are ready at the time you hear the sound of the horn, flute, harp, lyre, and psaltery, in symphony with all kinds of music, and you fall down and worship the image which I have made, good! But if you do not worship, you shall be cast immediately into the midst of a burning fiery furnace. And who is the god who will deliver you from my hands? (Daniel 3:15)

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego boldly answer:

O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. If that is the case, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and He will deliver us from your hand, O king. But if not, let it be known to you, O king, that we do not serve your gods, nor will we worship the gold image which you have set up. (Daniel 3:16-18)

Notice the elements of their answer:

1. “We have no need to answer you in this matter.” It was immediate and direct. They needed no time to reconsider. They had taken their stand and they were sticking with it. “We’ve already done what we’re going to do. Now you go ahead and do what you are going to do.”
2. “If that is the case.” This is a conditional statement. Not about their action but about the action of the king. They had already made their decision. Now they were laying out, in logical fashion, the king’s choices and what would happen with them.
3. “Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace.” They had no doubt that God was quite capable of protecting them from the fire.
4. “And He will deliver us from your hand, O king.” Here is where the confidence of their faith is fully seen. It is one thing to speak theoretically about what God is able to do, quite another to declare what He will do.
5. “But if not.” This is another conditional statement. It is important to understand that this if not statement corresponds to the earlier if statement.
6. “Let it be known to you, O king, that we do not serve your gods, nor will we worship the gold image which you have set up.” Whatever Nebuchadnezzar decided would make no difference at all to these young men. Either way, they were not going to bow down and serve his gods.

Here is where a lot of preachers and Bible interpreters get it wrong. They think the answer of the young Hebrews runs like this: “If you throw us into the fiery furnace, our God is able to deliver us, and he will deliver us. But if He does not, we still won’t serve your gods or bow down.” It sounds like a very valiant faith, trusting in God even if He does not come through and deliver them.

The problem, however, is that the text does not say, “But if He does not.” Some translations will render it that way (the NASB and the NIV, for instance) but in the Hebrew text, it is simply, “But if not.” That is why it is important to notice points 2 and 5 above. They are both conditional statements. One says if, the other says if not. They correspond to each other. The if statement means, “If you cast us into the fiery furnace ...” The corresponding if not statement means, then, “If you do not cast us into the fiery furnace …” In other words, the if not statement is not about whether or not God would deliver them but about whether or not Nebuchadnezzar would toss them into the furnace.

Besides the corresponding nature of the if and if not statements, there is another simple reason why the if not statement refers to the king’s actions, not God’s. It would be completely unnecessary for them to point out that, if God did not deliver them from the fiery furnace, they would not serve Nebuchadnezzar’s gods. It would be exceedingly obvious. If God did not deliver them, they would be instantly killed by the flames — and dead men don’t bow to anything, not even to the king and his gods.

But hear the boldness of their answer and the confidence of their faith. In context, it runs like this: “O Nebuchadnezzar, if you cast us into the fiery furnace, our God is able to deliver is — and He will deliver us! But if you do not cast us into the fiery furnace, know this: We still will not serve your gods or bow down to your image.”

As we know from Daniel 3, Nebuchadnezzar did throw them into the furnace — and God did indeed deliver them, just as they had declared. Their response was not based on that which was seen, Nebuchadnezzar’s threats or the reality of the fire, but on that which was unseen, the faithfulness of God. They trusted not just in the ability of God, but just as important, in the faithfulness of God to deliver His people. They may have been uncertain about what the king was going to do, but they had no doubt what God was going to do.

Bold and confident faith in the faithfulness of God is able to work miracles. It goes beyond saying, “God can deliver me,” to declaring, “God will deliver me!”

We Have a Confession to Make

Consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, Christ Jesus. (Hebrews 3:1)

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. (Hebrews 10:23)

God has given many wonderful promises and benefits for those who know, love and serve Him, and they are all found in Jesus Christ, the Apostle and High Priest of our confession.

The Greek word for “confess” is homologeo and means, “to say the same thing” (homo, same; logeo, to speak or say). To confess is to speak in agreement with something. Jesus is the Apostle and High Priest of our confession. He is the one we confess, speak in agreement with and about. To confess Him is to declare our faith in Him.

• We confess that Jesus Christ is Apostle. The word “apostle” refers to one who is sent. By confessing Jesus Christ as Apostle, we agree that He is the one who is sent by God. He represents the Father before us. “He who has seen Me has seen the Father,” He said (John 14:9). All other apostles are apostles of Jesus Christ, sent by Him, but Jesus Christ is the Apostle of the Father, the One sent by God.
• We confess that Jesus Christ is our High Priest. The role of the High Priest is to represent God to the people and the people to God. Jesus Christ is uniquely qualified to do that because He is fully divine and fully human, Son of God and Son of Man.

As High Priest, Jesus Christ has made complete atonement for us, taking our sins upon Himself and nailing them to the Cross. He has cleansed us from all guilt and shame. As High Priest, He is the mediator of a “better covenant, which was established on better promises” (Hebrews 8:6), a covenant cut in His own blood (Luke 22:20). As wonderful as the promises of the Old Covenant were, this covenant is even better, adding to those promises.

When we confess Jesus Christ as Apostle and High Priest, we are agreeing that He is the one sent by the Father to us. In confessing Him, we also confess the covenant He has mediated for us, for He completely fulfills all the requirements of both the old and new covenants. He has done all that is necessary; our part is to commit ourselves to Him by faith.

With that in mind, I have written two confessions based on two passages from the old covenant. I chose these because they are wide-ranging and form a good foundation for laying hold of what God wants to do for us in this life. I believe they will be an encouragement to you, especially in these difficult times. Do you confess Jesus as your Lord? Are you trusting Him with your life? Then these confessions are for you, too.

Be bold when you make these confessions. Years ago, I began making confessions like these, based on similar Scriptures. I was in a very difficult time in my life and I knew I needed a strong, bold faith in God if I was going to get the turnaround I needed. So I printed out a number of Scripture promises, cast them in the first person, in the form of personal confessions, and began speaking them out. I did not just read them silently to myself — I knew I had to get these down deep into my heart. So I read them out loud. It was awkward at first, but I kept at it. I paced back and forth in the hallway of my house, reading and repeating these promises and confessions out loud, over and over. Before long, I began to speak them out louder and louder. I got to where I was shouting them out regularly.

What was I doing? Letting them fill my eyes, my mind, my mouth and my ears, and before long they began to fill my heart. You might say I was defibrillating, shocking my heart back into the rhythms of faith with the Word of God, recalibrating my thoughts and emotions with the promises of God, realigning my will with the heart of God. After about a month, I began to see breakthrough. My life has been different and I have walked in a deeper level of faith, and joy, ever since.

It seems to me that now is a good time to pick up these “defibrillating” paddles once again and reinvigorate our faith with the promises of God. I invite you to join me in these confessions:

All the blessings of God come upon us and overtake us, because we obey the voice of the LORD our God. We are blessed everywhere we go, in the city and in the country. We are blessed with increase in every area of our life — at home, in business, in ministry. We are blessed in all our comings and goings — when we go out, we go out in safety; when we come home, we come home in safety. The LORD causes all our enemies to be defeated — they scatter from before us in every direction. The LORD commands His blessing on us in our storehouses, and in all we set our hand to. The LORD establishes us as holy unto Himself, to fulfill His plans and purposes for our lives — He leads us into our destiny. The LORD gives us plenty of goods and abundance of prosperity. The LORD opens His treasury to bless all the work of our hands. We shall lend to many and shall never have to borrow. (from Deuteronomy 28:1-14)

We are blessed by the LORD, because we delight in His commandments. Our descendants will be mighty on the earth. Wealth and riches are in our house. Light arises for us in the darkness. We are gracious, full of compassion and righteous. We deal graciously and lend, and we guide our affairs with discretion. We will never be shaken. We will be in everlasting remembrance. We will not be afraid of evil tidings. Our hearts are steadfast, trusting in the LORD. We are established in heart, and we will not be afraid. We shall look in triumph on our foes. We are generous and share our gifts abroad. We remember to give to the poor. Our righteousness (the righteousness of Christ now at work in us) endures forever, and we will be exalted with honor. (from Psalm 112)

Jesus is our High Priest, and in Him, we have many wonderful promises to confess.

Discerning a Heart of Faith

For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. (Hebrew 4:12)

This verse is often quoted out of the blue, as if it were not related to a context. But the word “for” at the beginning of this verse alerts us to the fact that it is connected to the idea of the previous verse: “Be diligent to enter that rest.” The “rest” in view is the rest God has for His people. In the larger context, the author illustrates his point by reminding us that the children of Israel died in the wilderness instead of enjoying the Promised Land, the rest God had prepared for them.

What does this have to do with the Word of God being living and powerful and discerning the thoughts and intents of the heart? Everything. Because it has to do with faith. The children of Israel did not enter God’s rest because of their unbelief, even though God had promised He was giving the land to them.

It is not that they were unable to believe. No, they were unwilling to believe. Had they been willing, they would have been able because faith comes by hearing the Word of God (Romans 10:17). Every promise of God carries with it the faith to believe that promise. The children of Israel heard the promise but they did not give any room for faith to arise in them to believe it. The word of promise tested them and found they had rejected faith.

The Word of God offers us many wonderful promises and gives us the faith to believe. But it also probes us with surgical precision to see whether we will lay hold of that faith. There is no fooling God. He discerns the thoughts and intents of our hearts to see whether we are willing to believe Him.

In the wilderness, God promised the children of Israel that He was giving them the land of Canaan, and that promise tested them: Were they willing to believe God above all else? Would they believe the truth of His Word more than the facts of their current circumstances? More than the giants in the land? More than their own eyes?

As we know, out of all that generation, only Joshua and Caleb choose to believe God. They were not unaware of the circumstances, and they had certainly seen the giants in the land, just as the other spies had. But they understood that the truth of God’s promise was far greater than what they experienced with their senses. As the author of Hebrews tells us, “By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible” (Hebrews 11:3). The greater reality is not that which can be seen or felt but is apprehended by faith. That is why Paul teaches us, “We walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7).

The same Word of God by which faith comes also discerns our hearts. It cuts through all our rationalizations to reveal whether we are willing to believe the promise of God. Those who are willing enter into His rest.

The Diligence of Faith

Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience. (Hebrews 4:11)

Be diligent to enter into rest. Sounds like a paradox. As verse 10 said, “For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works a God did from His.” To enter the rest of God, we must cease from our own works just as God rested from His on the seventh day of creation. Still, there is a diligence to which we must attend. But what is it?

Earlier, the author of Hebrews used the illustration of the children of Israel, who wandered in the wilderness for forty years and did not enter the rest God had for them, the Promised Land. “So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief” (Hebrews 3:19). “For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them; but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it” (Hebrews 4:2). Nevertheless, the promise of rest remains, even though “those to whom it was first preached did not enter because of disobedience” (Hebrews 4:6). Put simply, the disobedience of Israel in the wilderness was their failure to believe the promise of God. They were not diligent to believe God; therefore, they did not enter His rest.

To see how this happened, go back to Numbers 13. The Lord said to Moses, “Send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the children of Israel” (v. 2). Notice the promise: God was giving the land of Canaan to Israel. Moses believed the word of God and sent out twelve men, one from each of the twelve tribes, on a reconnaissance mission.

Ten came back and reported, “We went to the land where you sent us. It truly flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. Nevertheless, the people who dwell in the land are strong … There we saw the giants; and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight” (vv. 27-28, 33).

The other two spies, Joshua and Caleb, having seen the exact same things the ten had, came back and said, “Let us go up at once and take possession, for we are well able to overcome it” (v. 30). The ten answered, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we” (v. 31).

The children of Israel were persuaded by the report of the ten and, in their fear and unbelief, rose up against Moses, Joshua and Caleb. Joshua and Caleb exhorted them to be diligent in their faith and believe God.

If the LORD delights in us, then He will bring us into this land and give it to us, “a land which flows with milk and honey.” Only do not rebel against the LORD, nor fear the people of the land, for they are our bread; their protection has departed from them, and the LORD is with us. Do not fear them. (Numbers 14:8-9).

Israel persisted in fear and unbelief. Except for Joshua and Caleb, that entire generation never entered the Promised Land but died in the wilderness. Joshua and Caleb, however, were privileged to lead the next generation into the land forty years later.

What made the difference? Diligence. Diligence in what? In believing the word of God. The same promise was given to all, but only a few believed. Joshua and Caleb were diligent in faith. The fact that God had promised them the land of Canaan settled the matter for them. Their focus was sustained on God. They saw the same giants the ten had seen but they did not let that, or anything else, distract them from what God had said. Their hearts were lined up with the promise, and when they spoke, their words overflowed from the abundance of their hearts and they spoke in accord with what God had spoken. They were diligent and focused in their faith to believe what God said, so they entered into the rest of God.

Faith is simply believing the Word of God. When we are diligent to believe what He says, we enter into His rest. When we move away from believing His Word, we get back into our own works, our own strength, and end up wandering in the wilderness of fear.

What We Have Tasted

Enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come. (Hebrews 6:4-5)

Though the thrust of this verse goes in another direction, it gives us a brief but amazing picture of what it means for us to know Christ.

• We have been enlightened. This is a work of the Holy Spirit, who convicts the world of sin, righteousness and judgment (John 16:8). In other words, He reveals to us the Lord Jesus Christ, the Light of the World (John 1:4-9). The Spirit reveals the things of God which would otherwise be unintelligible to us (1 Corinthians 2:9-14). Early Church Fathers saw in this a reference to baptism, the sign of initiation into the truth of the gospel and the body of Christ.
• We have tasted the heavenly gift. To taste is to experience. We experience the heavenly gift. “Gift” means that it is not earned by us or owed to us. It is given freely to us as an act of divine grace and we receive it simply by faith. It is not of this age but of the next. It does not come from earth but from heaven. It is the kingdom of God breaking into the present age, the will of God being done on earth as it is in heaven (Matthew 6:10). Early Church Fathers saw in this a reference to the Eucharist, the Table of the Lord, the continuing sign of Christ’s presence in the world.
• We have become partakers of the Holy Spirit. “Companions” of the Holy Spirit is how the HCSB puts it. This is divine fellowship with the One by whom we cry out joyfully, “Abba, Father” (Romans 8:15). He reveals and works in us everything that belongs or pertains to Jesus (John 16:15). He brings forth in us divine fruits, the character of Christ (Galatians 5:22-23). He gives us manifestations of divine power by which He works miracles among us (1 Corinthians 12:1-11; Galatians 3:5). He ministers to us the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of the Father.
• We have tasted the good word of God. This is the message of the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, in whom all God’s promises to us are fulfilled in every way. No good thing does He withhold from us who have become the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ (Psalm 84:11; 2 Corinthians 5:21).
• We have tasted the powers of the age to come. The Greek word for “powers” is dunamis, often translated as “miracles” (for example, 1 Corinthians 12:10 and Galatians 3:5). It is the miracle-working power of God. It is not of this age but of God’s kingdom age now breaking into the world. It is the power of the Holy Spirit by which Jesus healed all who were oppressed of the devil (Acts 10:38). It is the power Jesus promised His disciples would receive when the Holy Spirit came upon them (Acts 1:8). Paul said that God is “able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us” (Ephesians 3:20).

Though we live in this present age, as believers in Jesus Christ, we are part of the next. We are not relics of the past but agents of God’s coming kingdom. Jesus taught us to pray, “Kingdom of God, come! Will of God, be done on earth as it is in heaven.” The tense of the Greek verbs speaks of a continuous action. We are not waiting for the kingdom of God to begin — it has begun already! We pray for it to increase until it is present in all its fullness. As John said, “The darkness is passing away, and the true light is already shining” (1 John 2:8).

Jesus also taught us to pray, “Give us this day our daily bread.” This has usually been taken to be a request to meet today’s need with today’s substance. But the Greek word for “daily” actually speaks of “the coming day.” What day is that? The day of God’s kingdom fullness, the day when His will is completely done on earth as in heaven.

We have tasted the bread of this present age and it does not sustain. There is no life to it. It is full of darkness and is already passing away. The provision we need is the substance of God’s kingdom, the will of heaven manifest on earth — the bread of that coming day. The prayer is that God give us that bread today. It is a prayer God has been answering ever since Jesus taught us to pray it and will continue to answer until heaven and earth are one.

God gives us that bread today so that we may experience, in this life, the heavenly gift, the good word of God, the powers of the age to come and fellowship with God by His Spirit. Christ gave His body and shed His blood — tasted death for us — that we might taste these things (Hebrews 2:9).

Where We Have Come

For you have not come to what could be touched, to a blazing fire, to darkness, gloom, and storm, to the blast of a trumpet, and the sound of words. (Those who heard it begged that not another word be spoken to them, for they could not bear what was commanded: And if even an animal touches the mountain, it must be stoned! And the appearance was so terrifying that Moses said, I am terrified and trembling.)

Instead, you have come to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God (the heavenly Jerusalem), to myriads of angels in festive gathering, to the assembly of the firstborn whose names have been written in heaven, to God who is the judge of all, to the spirits of righteous people made perfect, to Jesus (mediator of a new covenant), and to the sprinkled blood, which says better things than the blood of Abel. (Hebrews 12:18-24 HCSB)

What the author of Hebrews writes here is true of every believer in Jesus Christ. We are in an amazing place. Notice that he does not say, “You are going,” as if he is just talking about our destination some day when we die. No, he says, “You have come.” This is about present reality, not future hope. It includes future hope, but the future is breaking into the present. It is now and we are there.

Yeah, it is different from the way we are used to thinking, the way we have been taught by the world and even by religion. We thought it was about us and what we could do, and we were painfully aware that we were very far from measuring up.

That is where we were, but where we have come is very different. It turns out that it’s not about us after all — never was — but about the reality of Jesus Christ, who He is and what He has done. That changes everything! We are no longer limited to the reality of earth but now free to partake of the reality of heaven. Consider where we have now come:

We have come to Mount Zion. This is in contrast to Mount Sinai, the place where the Law of Moses was given, the law that inevitably led to condemnation (see Romans 7 for Paul’s experience on that). Mount Zion, however, was the place where God chose to dwell and manifest His presence among His people. The author of Hebrews is not speaking of natural geography, though; he is talking about spiritual reality.

We have come to the city of the living God. In the natural, Mount Zion was the city of God, the place of His temple, His habitation. But again, the author is speaking of spiritual reality. He has noted already, in Hebrews 11, that Abraham was seeking “the city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God” (v. 10). Indeed, of all the saints of the old covenant, he says, “But now they desire a better, that is a heavenly country. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them” (v. 16). Now we have come to that city and Paul reminds us, “You are the temple of the living God” (2 Corinthians 6:16).

We have come to the heavenly Jerusalem. Earthly Jerusalem was situated on Mount Zion and was a type, or shadow, of heavenly Jerusalem. Heavenly Jerusalem speaks of a higher realm and in the Jewish mind represented the hope of a future age. Now we have come to that city and the reality of heaven is breaking into the world. It is just as Jesus taught us to pray, “Kingdom of God, keep coming! Will of God, keep being done on earth as it in heaven” (that is the sense of the Greek verbs). It is not a singular event but a continuous action, already begun, and will ultimately align earth with the reality of heaven.

We have come to myriads of angels in festive gathering. The angels of God are not gathered together to execute judgment on us but to celebrate Jesus, who endured God’s judgment in our place. It is a joyful convocation, a festival of praise, and Revelation 5:11-12 gives us a glimpse:

Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne, the living creatures, and the elders; and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice: “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom, and strength and honor and glory and blessing!”

We have come to the assembly of the firstborn whose names have been written in heaven. “Firstborn” shows that we have a Father, who is God. It speaks of the “double portion” we receive of Him, the very best of inheritances. Paul says that we are “heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ” (Romans 8:17). “Joint heirs” means that everything the Lord Jesus receives from the Father we receive also. As David declared, “O Lord, You are the portion of my inheritance and my cup; You maintain my lot. The lines have fallen to me in pleasant places; yes, I have a good inheritance.” (Psalm 16:5-6).

Not only are we heirs of God, our names are written on the citizen rolls of heaven. Paul says, “Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God”: (Ephesians 2:19). “Our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ” (Philippians 3:20). This citizenship we have received gives us every blessing and benefit heaven has to offer. We can now live out of a higher reality.

We have come to God who is the judge of all. “Judge” speaks of God’s sovereign rule and authority over everyone. He is the one who sets all things right. His judgment on our sin was poured out on the Lord Jesus. As Paul says, “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Corinthians 5:21). “The chastisement for our peace was upon Him” (Isaiah 53:5).

We have come to the spirits of righteous people made perfect. This speaks of communion, connection stronger than death, with those who have gone before us and no longer walk this planet. While we are still in the process of reckoning ourselves dead to sin but alive to God, they have been made thoroughly and completely perfect in Christ. “Perfected at last!” is the sense of the text. It is a perfection that could never be achieved under the Law of Moses or by any work of our own, but is received only in Jesus Christ, through faith in Him.

We have come to Jesus, mediator of a new covenant. Jesus is the reason for all our coming, and all the blessing is summed up in the new covenant, of which He is the mediator. “Now He has obtained a more excellent ministry, inasmuch as He is also Mediator of a better covenant, which was established on better promises” (Hebrews 8:6). What could not be accomplished by the old covenant of law, and all our striving, is fulfilled by the Lord Jesus in the new and better covenant.

We have come to the sprinkled blood, which says better things than the blood of Abel. This is the heart of the covenant. In the Bible, no covenant was made without the shedding of blood, demonstrating the surety of the promise. In this new covenant of grace Jesus is the sacrifice—He gives us Himself. On the night before He was crucified, He took the cup after supper and said, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is shed for you” (Luke 22:20). This covenant, and the blood by which in which it was cut, speaks incomparable things for us than any other blood ever could. The blood of Abel cried out for revenge. The blood of Jesus speaks of our redemption, restoration and all the blessing that entails.

In Jesus Christ, we have come to a place we have never been before, a place we could never reach apart from Him and new and better covenant He cut for us in His own blood. Now we have access to heaven, and it is enough to change the earth when His will is done here just as it is there.

Holding on to Confident Rejoicing

Christ [is] a Son over His own house, who house we are if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm to the end. (Hebrews 3:6)

The author of Hebrews is writing to a group of people who were up against severe persecution. As Jewish believers in Christ, they were getting it from two sides — from Jewish leaders who had rejected Christ and from the Romans who, oddly enough, view Christians as atheists because they did not worship Caesar and bow to the Roman pantheon. It was tough for them, no question about it.

In the midst of that, the author of Hebrews encourages/exhorts them to hold on to their faith in Jesus the Messiah because He is the Anointed One who fulfills all the promises God has made. Moses was faithful as a servant in the house God was building, and certainly to be greatly honored (Hebrews 3:2, 5). But Jesus is faithful as the Son of the house. The house is all those who believe the promises of God and receive His Anointed Son.

There is a great confidence we can have in that. The Greek work for “confidence” means courage, boldness, outspokenness. It speaks of the right of access we have before God. That is why the author says in the next chapter, “Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:16). The Greek word for “boldly” in 4:16 is the same as the word “confidence” in 3:6.

Under Moses, the people of God were afraid to approach God. In Jesus, we can come boldly before God:

For you have not come to the mountain that may be touched and that burned with fire, and to blackness and darkness and tempest, and the sound of a trumpet and the voice of words, so that those who heard it begged that the word should not be spoken to them anymore. (For they could not endure what was commanded: “And if so much as a beast touches the mountain, it shall be stoned or shot with an arrow.”And so terrifying was the sight that Moses said, “I am exceedingly afraid and trembling.”)

But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are registered in heaven, to God the Judge of all, to the spirits of just men made perfect, to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel. (Hebrews 12:18-24)

That is the confidence we have now because of Jesus Christ, the confidence the author of Hebrews encourages us to hold onto. It is that faith which can see us through great difficulty.

The word for “rejoicing” means to glory in, boast in or brag about. It is the same root word Paul uses when he says, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9). See, this boasting is not about who we are and what we have done — there’s nothing to brag about there and certainly no reason to have confidence. No, the boasting Hebrews speaks of is about Jesus Christ, what He has done for us and the boldness we can now have in Him.

How do we hold on to this confidence and rejoicing and manifest the household of God in turbulent times? There are a number of keys the author of Hebrews gives us which will be of great help to us (you can search these out in the book of Hebrews), but it all comes down to this, found in Hebrews 3:1. “Consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, Jesus Christ.” It is only as we keep our focus on Him that we are able to continue walking in the victory He has won for us. (See The Table of Considering Him)

Yes, things may be getting difficult for you right now, but hold to your confidence and boasting in Jesus Christ and you will make it through.

The Table of Considering Him

Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, Christ Jesus. (Hebrews 3:1)

In Hebrew 3, the author compares the Lord Jesus to Moses. Moses was the “apostle” of the Old Testament. The Law and the pattern for the Tabernacle were given through him. As John notes, “The law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ” (John 1:14). The Lord Jesus is the Apostle of the New Covenant. Not only the Apostle, but also the High Priest, for as the author of Hebrews later tells us, “He has obtained a more excellent ministry, inasmuch as He is also Mediator of a better covenant, which was established on better promises” (Hebrews 8:6). Indeed, He is the sacrifice on which that covenant is based, as He declared at the Last Supper: “This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is shed for you” (Luke 22:20).

It is this Jesus whom we are called to “consider.” The Greek word speaks of a fixed attention to Him. It is not a passing thought or acknowledgment but a sustained focus. In Him, we are made “holy brethren” (to be holy means to be set apart for God’s will and desire). In Him, we are partakers of the “heavenly calling.” For we were born, “not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:13). We belong to Him.

He is called the Apostle and High Priest of our confession. The Greek noun comes from the verb homologeo, which means to speak the “same word.” It is a word of agreement. In this case, it is about agreeing with God about Jesus Christ. Everything He has promised is fulfilled for us in Christ, who is the mediator of the new and better covenant we have with God.

At the Table of the Lord, we focus all our attention on the Lord Jesus, His body and blood given for us, and with it, all the blessing and promise of God. We confess Him, that He is our Lord, our salvation, our resurrection and our life. In Him, we are made holy and called brothers. In Him, we partake of the heavenly calling, which speaks of divine initiative and living life on a new and higher basis — the reality of heaven becomes ours.

Come to the Table of the Lord and consider, in a sustained and sustaining way, the Apostle and High Priest whom we confess as our own.

Bringing Many Sons to Glory

For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of our salvation perfect through sufferings. For both He who sanctifies and those who are being sanctified are all of one, for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brethren. (Hebrews 2:10-11)

“It was fitting,” the author of Hebrews says, for the Captain of our Salvation (Jesus) to be made “perfect through sufferings.” Made “perfect” does not refer to Jesus in His own nature or being, as if He was somehow flawed. Rather, it is about His role in our salvation. The word “perfect” refers to completion. In order for Him to make our salvation complete, it was necessary for Him to suffer.

Why was it fitting that the Lord of all and Creator of everything should come and suffer anything? Would it not be a disgrace for the Most High to become so low, and that for the sake of sinful man? Yet we are told that it was indeed fitting, appropriate for Him to do so.

But why? God did not do this for any of the angels who fell in satan’s rebellion, but He immediately moved to do so when Adam sinned. Why for us and not for the angels?

Look back in Hebrews 2:5. “For He has not put the world to come, of which we speak, in subjection to angels. But one testified in a certain place, saying” [here the author quotes Psalm 8:4-6]:

What is man that You are mindful of him,
Or the son of man that You take care of him?
You have made him a little lower than the angels;
You have crowned him with glory and honor,
And set him over the works of Your hands.
You have put all things in subjection under his feet.

Then the author of Hebrews makes this observation: “For in that He put all in subjection under him, He left nothing that is not put under him” (v. 8).

Consider carefully what he has just said: The world to come is not placed in subjection to angels, but God has created and cared for man and place all things in subjection under his feet.

Wow!

See, God created man in the image and likeness of God (Genesis 1:26). This was never said of angels, or of any other creature except man. Then God blessed them — male and female — and gave them dominion over all the earth, to subdue it, that is, to bring it into line with the plan of God. That is what David was talking about in Psalm 8.

When Adam sinned, the image of God in us was marred, but God’s purpose remained. That is why the Son of God “became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). He is the perfect man who fulfills Psalm 8 and God’s purpose for mankind. In Him, we are made complete, perfected in the salvation for which He suffered.
Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil. (Hebrews 2:14)

Jesus partook of human nature — flesh and blood — but not the nature of angels. Why? Because man was created in the image and likeness of God; angels were not. God created man, not angels, to have dominion, with all things in subjection to him.

So it was fitting, quite appropriate, that Jesus would come and suffer for our salvation. It was not a matter of divine necessity, but of divine grace. For there was no necessity upon God to create man in the first place, much less to give him dominion over His creation. That was pure grace. Then God graciously restored and fulfilled that plan at the terrible price of the Cross.

Man was created in the image and likeness of God, and Jesus became human, partaking of flesh and blood in order to redeem us and “bring many sons to glory.” This glory is not about a place we go to but a state of being in which we exist, the glory of God we were originally created to bear. We are, by this, true sons of God and the brothers of the Lord Jesus. As the author of Hebrews says, “For this reason, He is not ashamed to call them brothers.”

Jesus partook of human nature that we might partake of the divine nature (2 Peter 2:4) as sons of God restored to glory.

Faith is Reality

Faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen.

(Hebrews 11:1 HCSB)

Last week a bought a new little pocket Bible (it was on sale). I got it, not only because it was a handy size and with a comfortable font, but also because it was a version I did not have, the Holman Christian Standard Bible. I flipped through it a bit, checking out how it rendered some of the passages I am very familiar with, and I was impressed with how it translated Hebrews 11:1, “Faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen.”

Faith is the reality. Other versions have it as

• Faith is the substance. (KJV)
• Faith is being sure. (NIV)
• Faith is the assurance. (NASB, ESV)
• Faith is a well-grounded assurance. (Weymouth)
• Faith is … a confidence. (Young’s Literal Translation)
• Faith is … the firm foundation. (The Message)
• Faith is the assurance (the confirmation, the title deed). (AMP)
• Faith gives substance. (Revised English Bible)

The Greek word is hypostasis, a compound of hypo (“under”) and stasis (“state”). The English word “substance” captures this well: sub (under) and stance (position); what is positioned underneath. Hypostasis, substance, is the underlying stance or state of a thing, or as I have called it elsewhere, the underlying reality of a thing.

The HCSB picks up on “reality,” and I think captures the Greek word very well. “Assurance” and “confidence” and “being sure” are all pretty good, but they seem to have more of a subjective element to them. But “substance” and “reality” speak of something more objective. Faith is not just about how I think about something or the sense of confidence I might have toward it. Faith is about that which is substantively real quite apart from what I might think or feel.

In biblical terms, faith is about the Word of God. As Paul said, “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.” Faith is believing what God has said. The Word is true, not because I believe, but because God has spoken it.

Faith is based on reality, and reality is based on the Word of God. “By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen has been made from things that are not seen” (Hebrews 11:3). Everything that exists exists because God has spoken it into existence.

Reality is not based on what can be seen or experienced with the senses, but on what cannot be seen or felt. With out natural senses, we can see the manifestation of reality, but the reality itself lies beneath the manifestation we experience in the natural realm, in the Word of God. It is because God says it is, and faith is believing what God says.

Faith taps into the reality of what God has said. Because it is real, we can expect it to manifest. Faith is the proof, or evidence, of what cannot be seen. That is, faith is not about what can be seen, but about what God has said. Faith is the reality, and that brings great assurance.

Pleasing God: Faith

But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. (Hebrews 11:6)

Faith pleases God; without faith, it is impossible to please Him. Faith begins with believing that God is, that He exists. Paul addresses this in Romans 1, where he shows what it means to be without this kind of faith:

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man — and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things. (Romans 1:18-23)

Faith acknowledges who God is and responds to Him with glory and gratitude. The author of Hebrews takes it a step further: Faith is not only properly acknowledging that God is, it is also believing that He rewards those who diligently seek Him. As Paul noted, we can know that God is, and even understand His attributes and power, by the witness of His creation. But the knowledge that He rewards those who seek Him comes to us by the revelation of His Word.

But from there you will seek the Lord your God, and you will find Him if you seek Him with all your heart and with all your soul. (Deuteronomy 4:29)

Seek the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near. (Isaiah 55:6)

And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. (Jeremiah 29:13)

To diligently seek God is to seek Him with all your heart. When you do, He promises that you will find Him, and that is the reward. “After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, saying, ‘Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward’” (Genesis 15:1). This resulted in great blessing for Abraham, and for all the world through him.

Faith pleases God because it comes by hearing the Word of God (Romans 10:17). How could God be pleased with us when we don’t believe what He has said? Faith is receiving the Word of God and believing that everything He has said is true and will come to pass. God has no pleasure in those who doubt Him and His Word.

So Jesus answered and said to them, “Have faith in God. For assuredly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that those things he says will be done, he will have whatever he says.” (Mark 11:22-23)

But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord. (James 1:6-7)

The Greek word for “doubt,” diakrino, literally means to be of two judgments. Part of you says Yes, part of you says No — it is a mixed signal that adds up to unbelief. Some Christians try to sanctify their doubt as a sort of godly humility. To them, the certainty of faith is an arrogant thing. However, the Scriptures teach that God rewards those who seek Him with the whole heart, believing they will find Him, just as He promised. But there is no guarantee for those who doubt; they should not expect to receive anything from the Lord.

Fortunately, when we find ourselves in doubt, we can turn to the Lord, just as the father of demonized boy did. Jesus said to him, “If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes.” The man answered, “I believe; help my unbelief.” We can take our doubts to Jesus and ask Him to do something about them. We can get into the Word and ask the Holy Spirit to reveal to us the mind of Christ. Faith will come, and that pleases God.

Faith — believing God and His Word — pleases God. Seek Him with all your heart, and you will receive the reward: You will find Him.