Prepare: What is it that keeps you faithful to Christ? Have there been times when you’ve felt that you weren’t? God and man There’s clear concern here for the readers, who like a boat coming loose from its moorings and floating slowly away on the tide might drift away from the knowledge of salvation (vs 1–4). The author of Hebrews, as well as portraying Jesus’ divinity, also wants to stress the importance of his humanity. Jesus is God himself, but readers are reminded that he is also a man who came to earth and died, tasting death for everyone and receiving glory, honour and authority. Living with sin Although the Father has given all authority to Christ, human beings are rebellious and don’t always submit to it. We live with the tension between seeing that, although Jesus was and is victorious over sin and death, the world is still full of it, and we have to deal with the effects of it day by day in ourselves and others. In the face of evil our own moorings can easily come loose. We can become angry or disillusioned or feel hopeless, especially if the kind of work we do exposes us to things we’d rather not know about. Being in the world but not of it isn’t easy but with Jesus it’s always possible. Respond: Pray about any struggles in faith you or anyone you know is having. Ask the Lord for a sense of his presence and upholding. We must pay the most careful attention, therefore, to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away. For since the message spoken through angels was binding, and every violation and disobedience received its just punishment, how shall we escape if we ignore so great a salvation? This salvation, which was first announced by the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard him. God also testified to it by signs, wonders and various miracles, and by gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will. It is not to angels that he has subjected the world to come, about which we are speaking. But there is a place where someone has testified: “What is mankind that you are mindful of them, a son of man that you care for him? You made them a little lower than the angels; you crowned them with glory and honor and put everything under their feet.” In putting everything under them, God left nothing that is not subject to them. Yet at present we do not see everything subject to them. But we do see Jesus, who was made lower than the angels for a little while, now crowned with glory and honor because he suffered death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. (Hebrews 2:1-9 NIV)
Posted on: Wed, 22 Jan 2014 12:03:07 +0000
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