There are also greater trials and greater consequences in the real world. If we miss class or get a bad grade, we might get detention or probation. In the real world, if we miss too much work or fail at a project, we might get demoted or even fired. If we misbehave in school, we might get expelled. In the real world, if we misbehave, we might get arrested, fined, or even go to prison. Neglecting the rules and doing whatever we want when we’re young may mess up the rest of our lives, but if we live wild and careless in the real world, it can lead to an early death.
The followers of Jesus in the mid to late first-century knew their Bibles. They knew that the people of God had often made bad choices as God sought to lead them out of Egypt to the Promised Land and give them instructions for how to be God’s people. The generation that entered the wilderness was not the generation that made it out and into the Land. Those who transgressed God’s law and disobeyed God’s instructions received judgment. The tabernacle was a busy place as the priests continually offered sacrifices for the sins of the people.
Now that we have experienced the beginning of the end of the age through Jesus, along with the outpouring of God’s Spirit on all people, shouldn’t we take even greater care about how we maintain our allegiance to God? In this section of Hebrews, we are admonished to persevere (2:1), warned about being neglectful (2:2–3a), and we are reminded exactly what this salvation is that we have received (2:3b–4).
Admonition to Perseverance (2:1)
Since what God has spoken recently at this end of the age is through the Son, it is necessary that we give a greater degree of attention and concern to that message, otherwise we might be drawn away from it (2:1). This idea is reiterated later in Hebrews 13:9: “Do not be carried away by all kinds of strange teachings; for it is well for the heart to be strengthened by grace, not by regulations about food, which have not benefited those who observe them.” If we aren’t careful about what we’re doing, we might drift away from where we meant to go.
Driving a car is that way. I sometimes think I ought to just open up a driver’s training school. I trained my two oldest daughters to drive, and now I need to begin training the next two. I like to give pointers about driving, sort of the Zen of driving. For instance, we should learn to drive defensively, always looking ahead to what’s happening a distance in front of us. Not everyone knows before they learn to drive that people have a tendency to drive in the direction they look. I learned that riding a bicycle. When riding a ten-speed bike twenty miles per hour down a highway with only a few inches of roadway, it’s crucial that you keep going straight even when you turn your head to look behind you. The tendency is to veer to the left a little when you turn your head around to the left. It could be a deadly mistake. Even driving a car, if we turn our attention to the left to check traffic behind us when changing lanes, we have a tendency to drift in the direction we are looking.
The same holds true when steering our lives. We get distracted in life by those things around us. When we watch too much TV or the wrong kinds of TV, our values begin to be shaped by what attracts our attention. We may hang around with people that don’t have the same worldview we do. We want to get along with people and be liked, so we begin to talk and act like they do. Fellow travelers in life are sometimes driving toward places that emphasize selfishness and pleasure, and we are drawn into that flow of traffic. Before we know it, our spirituality and our morality has been left to the side and we are heading for a collision. We can’t lose site of what God has done in this dawn of the kingdom brought about by Jesus and the presence of God’s Spirit.
Warning against Neglecting Salvation (2:2–3a)
The author of Hebrews warns about the dire consequences of ignoring this salvation. The author wants us to consider two things about what people experienced in the Old Testament. First (2:2a), we shouldn’t forget God gave the Israelites the law. In fact, Jewish teaching was that angels were involved in the giving of the law. The book of Acts mentions this: “You are the ones that received the law as ordained by angels, and yet you have not kept it” (Acts 7:53). Second (2:2b), the record of the books of Moses is that the Israelites always received a just punishment for transgression of the law and disobedience of God.
Since these two things were true about what we read in the Bible, how can we expect to escape from due judgment if we neglect such a great salvation that has been offered to us (2:3)? This same message is repeated in 12:25: “See that you do not refuse the one who is speaking; for if they did not escape when they refused the one who warned them on earth, how much less will we escape if we reject the one who warns from heaven!” The author of Hebrews wants them to understand the real danger inherent in disobeying God and being led astray.
This danger does not seem real to us. Nowadays kids have video games that simulate exciting adventures. When I was a kid, the most exciting kind of a game was to play cops and robbers or play war games. I remember one time I was playing cops and robbers with this girl. We were visiting her family in another town, so I was making the best of the day. She and I were on the same side and we were pretending to be in a gun fight. We were huddled down behind some furniture in the family room. There we were, pinned down. I’m sure I was deep into the game and my little heart was pounding. I was going to make a run for it. As I began to make my move, I told her, “Cover me!” Instead of a hail of gun fire from her, she picked up a blanket and put it over me. That completely spoiled my ability to imagine any real danger.
The story goes that there was a boot camp that was having trouble getting proper weapons for war games. Instead of real rifles they had toy guns. The guns didn’t have bayonets, so they cut off broom stick handles and strapped them to the end of the gun barrels. A soldier asked the drill sergeant, “How are we supposed to use these things.”
The sergeant replied, “For now, just go ‘bangety, bangety’ when you’re firing your weapon.”
“But what about the bayonet,” the soldier asked.
“Well, just say ‘stabby, stabby,’” were the instructions. The time for training arrived and the two teams faced off in their bunkers. As the one team was advancing, the soldier noticed a man on the opposing group coming towards him without any weapon. He fired at him with his toy rifle, “Bangety, bangety.” The man kept coming closer to him. He wasn’t falling down as though shot. When he got close enough, the soldier used his bayonet, “Stabby, stabby,” he yelled. No effect on him. The other soldier kept walking straight toward him, stepped on his toes, ran right in to him, knocking him down. As the soldier lay on the ground, his enemy walked over the top of him. As the man stepped off his chest, the soldier could hear him muttering in a low voice, “Tankety, tankety, tank.”
The experience of the Israelites was real enough. God promised to bring them out of Egypt, through the Red Sea, across the desert, and into the Promised Land. Moses had gone up the mountain at Sinai to listen to God’s instructions, to give the new people of God a constitution, a set of laws for how to live together and how to be God’s people. When Moses returns to the people, he finds that they have abandoned the worship of the one God and are having a wild party worshipping a golden calf. In the ensuing years, time after time, they are led astray. “We’re too hungry; we’re too thirsty. We’ll never make it. Moses, are we there yet?” God had told them what to do. When they transgressed and disobeyed, the consequences were real. But now, the author of Hebrews is saying, we’re not just talking about obtaining rest from a long journey. We’re talking about our ultimate destiny, the very immortality of our souls. This isn’t your father’s or your grandfather’s school of life, this is life that schools us for eternity.
Reminder of the Validity of the Gospel (2:3b–4)
Jesus preached the saving gospel, according to the second part of verse three. The first generation of Jesus’ followers confirmed the validity of the gospel (2:3b). The audience of Hebrews were people who heard the apostles talk about what Jesus had said and done. The apostles and others attested to it.
