HEBREWS – PART ONE – LESSON 4
“Oh, Beloved, Fix Your Eyes On Him And You’ll Survive”
Kay Arthur, Teacher
Today we want to talk about looking at Jesus, because when you look at Him, no matter what the circumstances are that surround you, you will make it. You will survive; you will be more than a conqueror, and you will not be kept from offering to God that one thing that He wants—that is an acceptable service, even if it means going outside the camp and bearing His reproach.
As we look at the book of Hebrews, I want to give you an overview one more time, just so that you make sure that this book is anchored in your heart. The first part of Hebrews, in Chapter 1, all the way through 10:18, deals with doctrine. Then as you look at 10:19 through Chapter 13, you see duty—how I am to serve God in the light of who Jesus Christ is. Now, this first section on doctrine has a division in it; it has a pivotal part. (I didn’t share this with you last week, because I ran out of time.)
Go to Hebrews 8:1, and you will see the pivotal point in this doctrinal section. (1) “Now the main point in what has been said is this: we have such a high priest, who has taken His seat at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens,” [Hebrews 1 opens up talking about this high priest who has sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty on high. It doesn’t mention Him as a priest in Chapter 1, but we see that He does a priestly thing. He performs the purification of our sins. We see in Chapters 1-7 the person of Christ—or the person of our priest. We see what our priest is like. We see that He is better than angels; He is better than Moses, and all these things.
Then in Chapter 8-10:18, we see the performance of our priest—or the performance of our Christ—or the performance of the Son of God. We see two things in this performance: #1. He is a mediator of the new covenant. That is what he tells us first. Then, as the mediator of the new covenant, #2. He offers one final sacrifice. In offering that final sacrifice, therefore, He is able to sit down. This is what we see in the first part of the book of Hebrews.
What is our duty in the light of this? Our duty in the light of this is to hear Him, to draw near to God and to offer Him an acceptable service. (All of those phrases are from the book of Hebrews.) We are to hear Him, and we are to draw near and offer to God an acceptable service. When you look at the book of Hebrews, you see these people encompassed about with lions, so to speak, with difficult things, with situations and circumstances and people that would seek to devour their faith—to keep them from going on, to keep them from knowing the Lord Jesus Christ.
When I was a young girl growing up, I didn’t know the Lord. But I had a grandmother (she was a step-grandmother). My father’s mother left him as a young baby. She just walked away. So when my grandfather came back from World War I, he married Grandma Louise. I loved to go to their house, a simple little old house, but there were pictures all around the house—pictures of my childhood. This was one of the pictures, and I want to use it to illustrate to you what God is saying to us today. This is picture of “Daniel in the Lions’ Den.” You remember that those lions were meant to devour Daniel, to destroy Daniel, because Daniel was standing for Jesus Christ. Anytime you go to stand for Jesus Christ, anytime you belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, you can know that your adversary is walking around as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. He is going to come in all sorts of sufferings and persecutions and trials.
When that happens, where are you to put your focus? You will notice that when Daniel stands in the lions’ den, he is not looking at the lions; he is looking out the window. As he looks out the window, you see the light coming in. I believe that he is looking unto God in the midst of this lions’ den. I believe that this is what Hebrews is telling us. Hebrews is telling you and me that we are to keep our eyes on Jesus--that this is to be our focus. I believe that he takes us immediately and focuses us on the Lord Jesus Christ, and he gives us a body of truth—truths about Jesus Christ, so that, no matter what kind of a situation you find yourself in, you will not drift away. You will not fall back; you will not turn away; you will not give up; but you will look unto Jesus.
I want to make these very, very practical. Go to Hebrews 1:1-4. “God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, (2) in these last days has spoken to us in His Son.” [It is not “by His Son”. The only correct translation here is “in His Son.” In other words, in everything that Christ is, God has spoken to us.] “whom (His Son) He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world. (3) And He (the Son) is the radiance of His glory (God’s glory) and the exact representation of His nature (God’s nature), and upholds (the Son) all things by the word of His power. When He (the Son) has made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high: (4) having become as much better than the angels, as He has inherited a more excellent name than they.”
I want to show you eight truths about the Son. The first thing I want you to see is that God has spoken in the Son, who is different than the prophets. If you want to summarize it, “The Son is different than the prophets.” This is a final revelation, and it is revelation that has come in the Son. In 1:2, it says, “God has spoken to us in His Son.” “His” is added, and the Greek reads, “God has spoken in a Son.” (There is no definite article.) It is not “the” Son. He is saying, “Before, I spoke to you by prophets. Now I am speaking to you by one who is My very Son.” That is what He is saying. “I am giving you a revelation, and I am showing you that this Son is My Son.” I am showing you the relationship between Jesus Christ and the Father, and this is a very significant relationship. We are going to see why in the days to come, as we study Hebrews.
Look at Hebrews 2. Since He has spoken in a Son, since it was not just a prophet, but it is the filial relationship between Father and Son, (1) “For this reason we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it. (2) For if the word spoken through angels proved unalterable, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense, (3) how shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? After it was at the first spoken through the Lord,” [Who is the Lord? The Lord is the Son.
So He wants us to see that He has spoken through the Son. The Son is very, very important all the way through the book of Hebrews. “Son” is used many times.]
Look at Hebrews 3:6, and you will see “a Son” again. (6) “But Christ was faithful as a Son over His house (over God’s house.) Look at 5:8, “Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered.” Look at 7:28. “For the Law appoints men as high priests who are weak, but the word of the oath, which came after the Law, appoints a Son, made perfect forever.” [The thrust of Hebrews, beloved, is “Our Priest.” It is the priesthood of Jesus Christ. And yet, Christ could not be a priest if He were not a Son. So the Sonship of Jesus Christ is linked to the priesthood; it is bound up in the priesthood of Jesus Christ.]
Look at Matthew 17:5. When Jesus was here on earth, God could not contain Himself. He had to constantly stoop down to the people, and confirm who Jesus was. (5) “While he was still speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them;” [This was at Jesus’ transfiguration.] “and behold, a voice out of the cloud, saying, ‘This is My beloved Son, with whom I am well-pleased; listen to Him!” [Hear Him; hear Him; hear Him. Hear what I am saying in My son. Hear the message that I have for you in My son.” This message that God brought was not a brand new message. It was a fulfillment of the old message.]
Let’s go back to Hebrews 1:1, and put this together so that you understand. (1) “God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, (2) in these last days” [And there are no more days after these days. These are the final days—the final revelation, the final days.] “God has spoken to us in His Son.” [We need to see that the Scriptures give us a progressive revelation. When God spoke in His Son, that was part of that progressive revelation, but it was also the culmination of that revelation. In other words, God began telling us things through the prophets in the Old Testament. He told us more and more and more and more. He taught us precept upon precept; He taught us line upon line. He kept giving us truth and truth and truth until, finally, here was His Son, the Son of God, the very begotten of the Father, the only son of God, and God spoke to us in Him. Then He shut His mouth; He has no more to say beyond what He has said in His Son. Finally, the revelation is complete. So in the Old Testament, we move from shadow to substance. We move from promise to fulfillment. We need to see that this revelation was progressive. They didn’t understand everything that you and I understand at this point, but it was progressive, and it was according to God’s time, according to God’s plan.
Galatians 4:4 says, “But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman.” So when God says that He spoke long ago in the prophets, now He has spoken in His son, He is not saying that when He spoke in His prophets, that was unreality, or less true than what we have now. It was simply the beginning of a progressive revelation. If you ever understand that, it will open the eyes of your understanding as you move through the Scriptures. It is not two revelations (and this is what the Jews needed to know); therefore, you make a choice. Therefore, if you want to, you can stay in the Old Testament and not move on to the New. Oh, no! The Old Testament is constantly pointing to the New, and therefore, if you don’t go on to the New, you miss the whole purpose of the Old Testament. And you miss the salvation that God has for you that He began back here in the Garden of Eden, and that He brought to fulfillment in His Son. So, if you are a Jew, and you just go from Genesis, all the way up through Malachi 4, and you stop there and dig in your heels, you do not have that salvation that God is talking about.
This is what the prophets were pointing to. This is all that the prophets were proclaiming. In various ways, in diverse prophets, and in diverse manners God kept speaking, but He was speaking about one thing that was coming—and that was the salvation, the redemption of man—that would be effected only by the Son of God who by Himself made purification of our sins, and then sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high. He wants us to know that you have got to constantly look at Him. “This is My beloved Son; hear Him. I have nothing more to say. You need nothing more. This is it!”
The thing that distresses me today, even among Christians, is that we don’t bow the knee, and say, “God, You have spoken, and that is enough. I am going to listen, and I am going to hear what you have to say. I am going to study it; I am going to devour it; and I am going to get to know Your Son intimately.” But what are we doing? We are running around, looking for a “new word,” looking for a new prophecy, looking for a new experience, when we don’t need anything new. We have got it all; God has spoken in these last days through His Son. This is the revelation. The thing that distresses me, and you see it sometimes in ministries, is that they always have to keep coming up with something new.
I was just with Irwin Luetzer(?), who is the pastor at Moody Church, and I stayed in the home of Rebecca and Irwin while I was there speaking at Moody Church. As we talked, we were talking about a particular ministry that, if I named it, it would absolutely horrify you. You would fall on the floor, and then probably get up with stones to stone me—if I told you what was going on in that ministry. All I could say to him was, “I believe it is your responsibility, and the responsibility of other Christian leaders, to expose this, because it is turning into a cult. But the reason it has happened is this, to keep this ministry going, they are coming up with new (and kinda weird) things out of the word of God that are not in the word of God. They are Scripture, twisted and distorted.
Go to Hebrews 13, and even when you come to the end of Hebrews, you find him saying, (8) “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today, yes and forever. (9) Do not be carried away by varied and strange teachings, for it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace, not by foods, through which those who were thus occupied were not benefited. (10) We have an altar, from which those who serve the tabernacle have no right to eat.” [Then he goes on and says, “That altar is to partake of the Lord Jesus Christ and what He has wrought.” We need to see how vital it is that God has spoken in His Son, and the whole thrust of your life, precious one, is to be devoted to knowing the Son. Daniel 11:32b says, “The people who know their God will be strong, and they will do exploits.” I think, in Christendom, our focus comes off of the person of Jesus Christ into all sorts of other teaching. We go into, “What is this going to for my self image? How is this going to help me to attain, or be prosperous, or be healthy, or be all these things; when the focus is not on that. The focus is to be on the Son.
What does he lay down for us in this first chapter? These are eight truths about the Son. #1. The Son is different than the prophets. He is the very Son of God. #2. He has been appointed heir of all things.
(v. 2). The Son is the heir of all things. Everything belongs to the Son. (This is Psalm 2:8.) In the first chapter (and you know it, because you have done the homework) he quotes Psalm 2:7. But the implication goes on in Psalm 2:8, because he talks about the Son being the one who is on the throne, and as the one on the throne He is the heir of all things.