READINGS ON HEBREWS (2)
READINGS ON HEBREWS (2)
AFM Do you connect these four opening verses with chapter 1?
JT Yes, the word ‘Therefore’ would suggest that. “If the word which spoken by angels was firm, and every transgression and disobedience received just retribution, how shall we escape if we have been negligent of so great salvation, which, having had its commencement in being spoken [of] by the Lord, has been confirmed to us by those who have heard”. There is the greatness of the Speaker and the speaking, which latter is final.
FL That was His speaking when here upon earth, and then the continuance of it through those that heard Him, in connection with the presence of the Holy Spirit; would that be so? I suppose it would be of all importance that each one should listen in this age to the speaking.
JT The speaking had its commencement in the ministry of the Lord, and was confirmed to the Jews by the ministry of the twelve, God had also borne witness with them by signs, wonders and acts of power. This was evidently special, and added peculiar force to the writer’s warning.
ARS It is not contemplated here that these saints were in ignorance of what was said, they had heard. I suppose the trouble with us is that we are not in ignorance of what is said, but we need to heed it.
JT In view of possible apostasy, “Lest ... we should slip away”, he says.
ANW What is the force of all that had been said being condensed in the word ‘salvation’, or am I right in saying it is condensed in [p. 17] that?
JT I think the reference is to Israel under Moses. The Jews were very intimate with the idea of salvation. All that the Lord spoke is summed up in that word.
FL In that connection it is important to see that it is, “Lest in any way we should slip away”; the heeding is emphasised, lest we should drift away.
ARS Are “the things we have heard” here, the same as His “word” in Revelation — keeping His word and not denying His name; Revelation 3:8.
JT There is correspondence. The things spoken are taken up according to their true value; they were final, and hence the warning to take heed to them.
AFM How does the end of chapter 1 agree with what we have been saying: the angels are sent out as ministering spirits for service on account of those who shall inherit salvation; then you have the thought of slipping away. How do you reconcile the two ideas?
JT Slipping away refers to the position taken up. The Hebrews were regarded as having taken up a position answering to what was spoken, hence you have possible apostasy before the writer throughout the whole book.
AFM It does not alter the fact of inheriting salvation. That would be the complete thing, would it not?
JT Yes, and it is the sovereign side. Those who inherit are those brought in sovereignly like Isaac.
AFM How about chapter 9, “Christ ... shall appear to those that look for him the second time without sin for salvation”, Hebrews 9:28?
JT That would be a question for the Hebrew Christians to answer, as to whether they were looking for Him or not.
JEH Their attitude of looking would be a proof that they were in the good of His sacrifice.
[p. 18] JT Yes, it is a sort of reward for looking. It is “to those that look for him” (Hebrews 9:28) He appears. It is an immense thing to have Christ before you in this character. The reward includes what the remnant will get at the Lord’s appearing.
FL All through there are warnings addressed to those who have taken a certain public position in connection with the name of Christ; no one is sifted out; they have taken that position, and there are certain warnings all through the epistle, and only those that are real could value them.
JT Isaac was an inheritor, this would bring in the sovereign side; Jacob also inherited, but Esau did not, and so he is brought in at the end as typical. The inheritance was there, but he slipped away, so to speak, he sold his birthright for a mess of pottage, proving he did not value it, and then lost the blessing.
ARS The epistle to the Hebrews is one of contrasts. With Israel many did not get into the land, and so did not come into God’s full purpose. They knew what deliverance from Egypt was, but never got into the land. So with us, the “great salvation” is not only shelter by blood, but includes our entering the land.
JT Yes. Not only is there deliverance from Egypt, but also from the earth. The “great salvation” would involve both.
JMcD What would you understand by the land?
JT It is the heavenly thing: God’s purpose for us in Christ.
BTF “Confirmed to us by those who have heard”; are the things spoken found in Christianity?
JT All that the great salvation involved is included in Christianity. It was what the Lord had spoken, and was confirmed by the Spirit, through those who were with Him. At Pentecost the Holy Spirit confirmed. Peter said, “to you is the promise and to your children”, Acts [p. 19] 2:39.
BTF it is not the old dispensation, but the Lord’s voice introducing what is now.
JT “Which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him”. It was the ministry of the Lord and of the twelve, so the Jews had a full testimony; it was for them to appropriate it, otherwise they would drift away and become apostate, and that is what is happening in the Christian profession now. The apostle warned the Gentiles that they stood by faith, and “If thou shalt abide in goodness, since otherwise thou also wilt be cut away”, Romans 11:22. It is looked for among the Gentiles.
AFM There was no escape for the Jew, and there is none for the Gentiles.
JT There is no escape from the judgment of God. “Behold, ye despisers, and wonder and perish”, Acts 13:41. The judgment rests on the Jews, but it will also rest on the Gentiles.
FL As the gospel is universal, so is the consequence of apostasy, upon Jew and Gentile alike.
AFM In chapter 12 it says, “If they did not escape ... much more we”, Hebrews 12:25. This, I suppose, would be parallel with “How shall we escape?” Then there is the solemn statement: “Our God is a consuming fire”, Hebrews 12:29.
JT Yes. We are so accustomed to the gospel that we forget that feature of God.
FL The second epistle to Thessalonians affords abundant warning of all that is around us. God leaves us under no delusion; it pictures in a most earnest and insistent manner the consequence of not knowing God, and obeying not the glad tidings.
JT Here, “we should give heed more abundantly to the things we have heard”. There are the things we are hearing, but our responsibility also is in regard to what we have heard. We read later in the epistle of “those who have spoken to you the word of God”, Hebrews 13:7. Speaking of the present time, we are responsible for what we have heard. A wonderful ministry has been raised up by God during the past century, which has placed great responsibility on the people of God at the present time so that we do well to take heed to what we have heard.
BTF There is what is alluded to as “distributions of the Holy Spirit”. We do not have the power of apostolic days now, but the distributions of the Holy Spirit go on.
JT Yes. We were speaking of what we have heard, past ministry, and what we are hearing now. We must accept the responsibility of this. In chapter 4 it says, “whose carcases fell in the wilderness”, (Hebrews 3:17) etc., because they did not hearken to the word; “the word” is the test.
ANW Is there nothing between negligence and treading under foot?
JT Negligence would mark the initial stage of apostasy, treading under foot the final one; other things might come between such as, “forsaking the assembling of ourselves together”, Hebrews 10:25,26.
ANW One is struck with the severity of the opening words of our chapter they are not expressive of grace.
JT The stronger the language the better in order to effectually warn them. That would be the point here. He wants to warn them of approaching danger. The Jews were on the verge of a precipice. We, too, should see the danger, and heed the warning.
WLP If they kept on that course, they would be eternally lost. The beginning of the course is neglect. We may not fully apprehend the force of that word ‘neglect’.
JT When you begin to neglect you are on the road to destruction, so that the more pronounced the warning, the more the grace exhibited in seeking to save those in danger.
DMR “Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord we persuade men”, 2 Corinthians 5:11.
CAM It is put in the form of a question here; people are asked where they are going to; you could hardly have it put in a more powerful way; hence you see the divine wisdom of it.
JT And hence, “If the word which was spoken by angels was firm, and every transgression and disobedience received just retribution, how shall we escape?”
AFM What you were emphasising earlier is very important. The value, not only of present but past ministry. It is salutary that we should be exercised in respect to that which has been given.
JT Many have not only neglected that which has been given, but criticised and positively rejected it. It is the result of a course, and God will doubtless come in governmentally regarding such.
WLP Is there a phase of apostasy in that?
JT It is on the road to it; any rejecting is the sad fruit of neglecting.
FL Error is made to look very plausible and attractive at times. Materialism leads to treading under foot the Son of God. Christian Scientists are an example of what we are speaking of. There is urgent need of warning lest there be the neglecting, which leads on to despising, which is apostasy; so that the Spirit of God warns us in this way.
WLP This comes before chapters 6 and 10.
JT This is the first danger signal. If this is ignored the others will probably be also. The warnings are intended to arouse from indifference.
BTF Give us an outline of the chapter; a certain object is before the writer.
JT In chapter 1 it is the Speaker and the name He inherits. In our chapter, the first four verses are a warning, and the instruction proper comes in at [p. 22] verse 5, by calling attention to the place God has given Christ.
BTF Then we have praise to God. What is your thought about that?
JT The writer begins at verse 5 by saying, “He has not subjected to angels the habitable world which is to come, of which we speak”. Then he goes to the Psalms to show that all things are subjected to the Son of man. This chapter shows that Christ was God, and that in becoming Man He was made some little inferior to angels, having in view the position of being our Leader and High Priest in resurrection.
FL So that really the thing immediately before us is the new world and the Man of glory that gives it character, the great theme of the whole epistle is found in this chapter.
JT Chapter 1 is on God’s side, but this chapter is on our side, so that we might see with what a great system we are connected. Psalm 8 is brought in to show the unique place this Man has who came from God.
CAM To show what centres around Him as Son of man.
JT Yes. It is the place that God has given Him as such, so it says, “What is man, that thou rememberest him, or son of man that thou visitest him? Thou hast made him some little inferior to the angels; Thou hast crowned him with glory and honour, and has set him over the works of thy hands. Thou hast subjected all things under his feet”.
Now we see the mind of God clearly, that everything is in subjection to Christ, but that is not what he is going to develop. He just brings that in. What the writer desires to advance is the new system God has built up, and these Hebrew Christians had part in that system; so that he wants to lead them outside [p. 23] of what they had formerly been connected with into the reality of Christianity.
AFM The priestly place He occupies before God is of moment, as that in which we are represented.
JT We do not see the position described in Psalm 8 yet, so he is going to enlarge on what we have now. In chapter 1 of our epistle it is the inauguration of the system; in chapter 2 we are linked with Him in it, so that He is the Leader of praise in the midst of His brethren, and we are also the children. This is what he is bringing in; he wants to develop this great system, and to show that the saints have part in it.
ANW He presents the Person, without whom their writings as well as the position spoken of would be empty.
FL The Jewish mind was so habituated to angels, and the ministration of angels, but God ever had man in mind.
JT “We see Jesus, who was made some little inferior to angels on account of the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; so that by the grace of God he should taste death for everything. For it became him for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory”. At the present moment this is what God is doing: “Bringing many sons to glory”. That is what was in the mind of God. The One who inherits the name will effect all this for God.
BTF Would you say that when that touch is given “to make perfect the leader of their salvation through sufferings”, that it really takes in the thought of priesthood — that the Captain of our salvation and the Priest are connected?
JT That would come out later. It is the great fact that He is the Leader. The word is “Leader”, He is made perfect through sufferings.
BTF That perfecting came about through [p. 24] suffering. I thought perhaps the suffering was alluded to in a reverential way, the Lord entered into all that through which we pass.
JT Well, it is. As brethren, His identification is with us in this chapter, so that we might see that we have a place in the new system and be in it; the sons are marked by suffering, and in order that He should be our Leader He is perfected through suffering.
AFM In our chapter it is what became God. In chapter 7, it is “Such a High Priest became us”, Hebrews 7:26. It is striking that it became God to do this.
JT It shows the position in which we are and what it entails. In Ephesians we are taken up to heaven by one stroke of divine power; chapter 2:4 - 7. But in Hebrews, we are brought into accord with Him through suffering. No one can escape it. It is God’s way of bringing the many sons to glory.
AFM He is the Leader of salvation and we are the followers, but in suffering.
ARS God made the Leader perfect through sufferings and is bringing many sons to glory by the same way.
JT We are connected with Christ the Leader, and so must be subject to this leading, the purpose of God is to bring the many sons to glory through suffering; so Christ had to go that way, and we have to go the same way. He has gone through the sufferings, so that His perfection, in this sense, is that He was the Sufferer.
ARS We are brought to glory here as sons. In 1 Thessalonians the Lord Himself takes the saints there; here it is God bringing the many sons.
JT The apostle had delivered the gospel to the Thessalonians through much tribulation. The Thessalonians also suffered, imitating those in Judaea in Christ Jesus. The rapture does not involve suffering,
[p. 25] but all those who will be caught up must have suffered — no one can escape it.
TH How do we suffer, in spirit or in body?
JT In both. Looking at a great Old Testament example of one brought through, namely, Jacob, he says, “God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk, the God who fed me all my life long unto this day, the Angel which redeemed me from all evil”, Genesis 48:15,16. God takes a man up as he is, like Jacob, and adjusts him. To bring this about a set of workers is brought in — “tribulation worketh patience; and patience experience; and experience, hope”, Romans 5:3,4. We are brought to know God as our Justifier, then sufferings come in immediately; in chapter 8 we find that “All things work together for good”, so that the adjustment leads on to purpose.
FL What you speak of has in view the world to come in manifestation; that answers to suffering on this side — glory in the world to come. Christ has been that way, and the sons have also to go by the same.
JT No one can escape it. It is as much God’s way that we should suffer, as it was His pleasure to save us out of Egypt.
CAM It is God’s way; it did not come about by accident. Referring to Israel in Exodus 3, it was a marvellous descent, on Jehovah’s part, “I am come down to deliver them”, Exodus 3:8.
DMR Speaking of perfection, Jacob had reached it according to the mind of God, for he worshipped, leaning on the top of his staff.
JT God came down to deliver them out of Egypt, and led them out that He might bring them in. After forty years of discipline, Moses was equal to being Israel’s leader. God showed him a bush burning; it was really a bramble, and yet it did not consume. That, I suppose, refers to a people in despicableness and suffering; but God was in the [p. 26] midst of that people, and they are not consumed. The fire burned in their midst; also for forty years in the wilderness.
Ques. What was the fire?
JT It prefigured the discipline of God. He could not go on with them without discipline. Think of what came upon Paul in Asia; “we despaired even of life”, (2 Corinthians 1:8) he says. That was not for nothing. Paul meant to convey to the Corinthians that he himself was in the school of discipline, and could write to them now as a disciplined man, that is the “forty years”. At the end of Israel’s forty years, God speaks through Balaam, and the word was, “according to this time it shall be said of Jacob and of Israel, What hath God wrought!” Numbers 23:23. Jacob typifies the Christian as in Romans, and Israel the Christian as in Ephesians, but in either case it is what God has wrought.
FL The burning bush answers to the suffering through which we pass, so that the discipline of God, and what comes in, is never withdrawn. In passing through these things we are not consumed, and one has the knowledge that He is with one.
JT “In all their affliction he was afflicted”, Isaiah 63:9. It became God that our Leader must go through suffering, in view of bringing the many sons to glory; normal Christianity supposes that you are suffering all the time.
JS Because of what we are and the character of the world.
JT The more the suffering the fuller and fresher ministry you give.
AP You brought in bodily suffering as well?
JT We have to learn things from Paul. In the epistle to the Philippians, already referred to, you get Christianity worked out practically in the saints in its effects and results; see chapter 1:27 - 30.
DMR “I will leave in the midst of thee an afflicted and poor people” (Zephaniah 3:12); that suggests suffering.
JT The Lord also discriminates in certain instances: He says to the remnant in Thyatira, “I will put upon you none other burden” (Revelation 2:24); at the same time, He will see to it that you have your share of suffering.
TH “Whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it”, 1 Corinthians 12:26.
CAM If you do not suffer, it is questionable whether you are a son.
JT We get the truth, not from our own experience, but from the Scriptures. In 2 Corinthians Paul recounts his sufferings; they probably go beyond those of any other man; and if you look at that epistle you will be struck by the number of references he makes to himself; he set himself before them as a model of those who followed the Lord; so if you want to see normal Christianity in a man, you look at Paul.
WLP Suffering is always connected with a godly life; 2 Timothy 3:12.
FL There is “the fellowship of his sufferings”, Philippians 3:10. Think of the preciousness of Christ to God! How could we go through this scene and not realise pain and sorrow? There is the losing of our life in this world for Christ. We may be endowed with things here from which we gladly withdraw for the companionship of Christ.
ANW Would you make a distinction here, as Peter does in his first epistle, between suffering for righteousness and suffering for sin?
JT No, in this scripture it is just suffering — the thing itself. Verses 11 and 12 show how He is identified with us. They are well known to us, and come in in a forceful way as laying the basis for the assembly; they show what He is to us in the assembly.
ANW I suppose there would be no song at all [p. 28] if there were no suffering. The greater the suffering the sweeter the song.
AFM This section supposes His rejection by Israel, from verses 11 to 13, does it not? He had lost Israel, but God gave Him the assembly. He has brethren and they are the children.
DMR In speaking of the Lord’s identification with His brethren, I suppose it is complete in declaring the Father’s name.
JT It is a wonderful word; “he is not ashamed to call them brethren”. In the gospels we get the characteristic of the brethren, but here it is, the Sanctifier and the sanctified are all of one, which places us on a very high plane — the same as that on which Christ is.
BTF It is an immense point that the children should be set as free as the Captain of their salvation; through His death they are delivered from the bondage of death, and brought into liberty.
JT Quite so. In view of which He took hold of the seed of Abraham, but before that you have the sons and the brethren and the children. Sons refer to what we are for God — purpose; the brethren are for Christ — His companions; the children are for His comfort. “Behold, I and the children which God has given me”. In the time of His rejection He had them. The Lord has His comfort in those that God gave Him in the time of His affliction outwardly.
ANW A further view in which the Lord sees that company, is that of “the assembly”.
JT That I think is what He has for God. God is pleased to take the children. Joseph’s children were a comfort to him; Genesis 41:50 - 52. Jacob later said of them; “thy two sons ... are mine” (Genesis 48:5) showing undoubtedly that the sons share in what is their father’s so that the children here merge into what is for God, but are given to Christ at the time of His affliction. Jacob gave them their place, not [p. 29] Joseph; so while we are a comfort to Christ, we get our place sovereignly from God. The assembly is a present comfort to Christ, but it all leads up to God and His purpose.
CAM The way we are brought in in these relationships all contributes to the greatness of Christ.
JT Yes, and issues in what He has for God.
CAM Our position is not so much in view, but what God gets.
ANW We often put emphasis on the children, but the word is “Behold, I and the children which God has given me”.
DMR There is a difference between this scripture and what we have in Ephesians. Here it is, praises in the assembly; in Ephesians, glory in the assembly.
JT In verse 16 we see it is the seed of Abraham of which He takes hold. He is fully identified with us in so doing, having in view His complete service for us, as verses 17 and 18 show.
AFM He did not take hold of angels by the hand, but man in view of purpose.
JEH It is a remarkable expression. Would you say that God took Israel by the hand when He led them out of Egypt?
JT Yes, He led them out by the hand of Moses and in by the hand of Joshua. It is “the seed of Abraham” — flesh and blood in contrast to angels. He is thus identified with all the families the Father names.
JS This is not a slight on angels.
AFM They are higher in order than man, some had fallen, but He did not take them by the hand.
FL The ways of God are perfect; we can only take account of man having fallen. He took hold of the seed of Abraham. As to fallen angels, we know little; all this would sober us.
AFM The allusion to angels in both chapters is to bring forward their greatness, I suppose, rather [p. 30] than that they fell. In becoming Man He has, through redemption, raised us to a position so much greater than that of angels.
JT This would enhance man’s place, especially in the Jewish mind. The Lord became Man in connection with that people.