Israelite not seeking the Lord, David sending the ark off to Obed-Edom. It had been Israel’s, and thus humanity’s downfall. Turning to the Lord is the first act of obedience, from which all else follows and all else is possible. Hebrews concentrates all its effort on stirring us to do this one thing, not out of disinterest in the larger life of righteousness that characterizes full covenantal life (Heb 5:11–14; 6:7; 12:4–17; 13:1–17) but precisely because the rest is contained in it.
In truth, drawing near, through Christ, is not a burden (1 John 5:3; Matt 11:28–30). There is no greater good or beauty to be desired than the Lord (Exod 15:11; Pss 27:4; 34:8; 50:2; 89:8). With him there is perfect satisfaction (Pss 103:5; 107:9). Yet we recoil, wander, and flee due to our own falsity and defilement. The Scriptures witness to our inability to stand in the presence of the holy God apart from Christ and the terror of its threat when it appears (Exod 19:12–13, 20–24; 20:18–21; 33:20; Isa 6:5; Luke 5:8; Heb 10:31; 12:29). And it was for our preservation and salvation that his holy grace kept us at a distance while showing us the way to dwelling with him (Heb 9:6–10)—the way of the word of promise, first spoken to Abraham and then kept in his seed, the way that is the Son in and as whom God speaks.
Hebrews, in fact, is finally about the ways and the way of God, the very themes that had carried through God’s speech in the prophets (Isa 11:16; 35:8; 40:3; 57:14; 62:10; Jer 6:16; 21:8; 31:21; 50:5). Have we known his ways (Heb 3:10)? Will we travel his way (Heb 12:1, 12–13)? Will we avail ourselves of the new and living way (Heb 9:8; 10:20)?
Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.
“Today” he has spoken (3:1–19). The promise remains (4:1–11). It is simple unbelief, disobedience, faithlessness not to hold fast to the word and obey the command. There are no excuses, least of all our weakness. There is also some urgency.
Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.
That day is drawing near (10:25), which means that God no longer keeps us at a distance but in his holiness approaches, and escape is impossible.
Yet a little while, and the coming one will come and will not delay.
Heaven is reclaiming earth. He comes in his gracious act of atonement in the Son, so that the very thought of escape is the height of irrationality. Yet sin’s fear and enmity run deep. Faith alone, looking into the face of this approaching holiness, makes bold to approach in obedience. But he comes either way in his holy love. In his holy love.
See that you do not refuse him who is speaking. “Yet once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.” This phrase, “Yet once more,” indicates the removal of things that are shaken—that is, things that have been made—in order that the things that cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.
1. This was an insight of Hughes, Hebrews and Hermeneutics.
2. Laansma, “Hebrews: Yesterday, Today, and Future,” 1–6, 26–32.
3. Mesa, “Tim Keller and Don Carson?”
4. For other examples, see Laansma, “Hebrews: Yesterday, Today, and Future,” 1–2. Calvin is a good exhibit (see Institutes, II.7.16; II.9.4); Barclay, Paul and the Gift, 120; Allen, “The Perfect Priest,” 120–34.
5. Among the proposals, see Guthrie, Structure of Hebrews, and Westfall, Discourse Analysis of Hebrews.
6. This more-or-less arbitrary number of expositional units stems from the form of the series for which the commentary was originally composed.
7. Koester, Hebrews, 48–50.
8. See Laansma, “Hebrews and the Mission,” 328–34.
9. Ellingworth, Epistle to the Hebrews, 78–80.
10. The canonization of Hebrews is treated in all good commentaries and elsewhere. Koester, Hebrews, 19–63, is particularly helpful and expands considerably on our summary of Hebrews’ place not only in the canon but the church’s life and thought through the ages.
11. Language like this in 1:2–3 cannot be tossed to the side as an outlier sentiment nor treated as a literary code for some other idea entirely, for instance, that Jesus is being thought of as wisdom personified.
12. One helpful discussion is that of Svendsen, Allegory Transformed. His exegesis of Hebrews itself is not a strong part of his argument, in my judgment.
13. Nothing said here or elsewhere in this commentary takes a dim view of the value of historical investigation or excuses shoddy work in that regard; disregarding such work would represent a shallow view of what canonical speech is. The exposition to come will draw heavily on the spade work of historians, albeit in ad hoc fashion. Yet in doing so we must receive Hebrews for what it is: divine-human speech.
14. I owe thanks to Daniel Treier. Through personal conversations about his work on Christ as mediator (forthcoming), my rethinking of that category and its relationship to the other names and titles was stimulated.
15. Even so, it is interesting that the writer can say that is is Jesus who was made lower than the angels (2:9; cf. Phil 2:5), identifying the one known as blood and flesh with the Son in his personal movement from pre-incarnation to incarnation. This, of course, does not need to contradict the doctrine of the “enhypostasis” of Christ, namely, the idea that the human person Jesus had subsistence only in union with the Logos. Hebrews affirms personal unity and continuity in the movement from pre-incarnate to incarnate existence but is not otherwise observing the later technical distinctions in its language.
16. If we were inclined to press points, we could insist that his priestly role also had a termination, namely, when he sat (10:12–13), though this does not comport with other statements (e.g., 4:14–16; 10:19–25).
