Heb 2:5–18
For it was not to angels that God subjected the world to come, of which we are speaking. It has been testified somewhere, “What is man, that you are mindful of him, or the son of man, that you care for him? You made him for a little while lower than the angels; you have crowned him with glory and honor, putting everything in subjection under his feet.” Now in putting everything in subjection to him, he left nothing outside his control. At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him. But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering. For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source. That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying, “I will tell of your name to my brothers; in the midst of the congregation I will sing your praise.” And again, “I will put my trust in him.” And again, “Behold, I and the children God has given me.” Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery. For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham. Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.
There is a sense of comfort and assurance provided by sibling relationships (brothers and sisters) that is perhaps unmatched in our human experience. As a famous quote goes “Sibling relationships...outlast marriages, survive the death of parents, resurface after quarrels that would sink any friendship.”
That is not to say that the relationship between brothers and sisters are impervious or indestructible. It is not rare to see or hear of siblings who are not on talking terms with each other, often due to inconsiderate behaviour, sometimes due to actions by one that are seen as an embarrassing or shameful to the family - it does not take too much to become the black sheep of the family, so to speak.
With that in mind, Hebrews 2:11 has to be one of the most amazing verses of reassurance and comfort in the whole of Scripture. The writer of Hebrews is writing to a community that is besieged from all sides. They had joyfully left their old religion behind and put their faith in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. They had come together as a fellowship to worship Him and to live their lives in the expectancy of His soon-coming. But now things were different. He had not come yet; instead they were facing persecution and ridicule for their faith. They were ostracized from their culture and tradition. The joy of fellowship was waning and even the simple things of the faith, like prayer and meeting together, were becoming a chore. The families they left behind were ashamed of them. Perhaps, they were ashamed of themselves too.
It is to this community that the writer says in verse 11 “He (Jesus) is not ashamed to call you His brothers and sisters.” No matter how many times you read that, it is hard not to get blown away by the immensity of what this writer is claiming. This Jesus is the Son of God, the Word of God, the mediator of a great salvation, the heir of all things, the One for whom and by whom the universe was created, the radiance of the glory and character of God; He sits at the right hand of the Majesty on high, destined to rule till His enemies become a footstool for His feet. And He is not ashamed to call them His brothers.
In our passage for today, the writer is expounding upon the majesty of the incarnation. At the incarnation, the eternal Son of God (the second person of the Trinity) took on a human body and nature (as John 1:14 says “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us”) and became both man and God in His person. The incarnated Son of God was the one who was born in Nazareth, ministered in Galilee and Judea, crucified on the cross at Calvary and indeed, the one rose from the grave and ascended to heaven; these were events in human history that were attested to by multiple eyewitnesses.
The writer is not necessarily concerned with explaining the mechanics of the incarnation. For him, the foremost question to be answered is the paradox of the incarnation with reference to Jesus’ already established superiority over the angels. If Jesus Christ is human, and human beings are inferior to angels, does that not raise an obstacle to the character of Christ’s pre-eminence? The writer shows that this is far from the case; in fact, the incarnation is one of the reasons why Christ is superior to the angels. But more than that, the glorious truth of the incarnation provides many reasons for these Hebrew Christians to continue holding onto their commitment to Him.
Heb 2:5 "For it was not to angels that God subjected the world to come, of which we are speaking."
The Jews believed that God had entrusted the administration of the present world to angels (based primarily upon Deut 32:8 in which is said that God ‘established boundaries for the nations according to the number of angels.’). In Daniel, we see another evidence of this assertion: the angelic princes of Greece and Persia are mentioned in chapter 10 while the archangel Michael is shown to be the great champion of the people of Israel.
But this world has been superseded by the world that is to come, which is the new reality that has been put in place by the resurrected Christ. This world is passing away and He reigns over the world to come, not the angels, from His throne at the right hand of God. While the world to come has already been inaugurated, it awaits its final fulfillment on the day when Christ will return to gather His people.
But why did Christ have to come as a man, and even more pertinently, why did he have to die?
Heb 2:6–8 "It has been testified somewhere, “What is man, that you are mindful of him, or the son of man, that you care for him? You made him for a little while lower than the angels; you have crowned him with glory and honor, putting everything in subjection under his feet.” Now in putting everything in subjection to him, he left nothing outside his control. At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him."
The writer now reflects on the present condition of mankind versus God’s original intention for the human race by drawing his listeners’ attention to Ps 8:4-6. ‘It has been testified somewhere’ is not a reflection of the writer’s carelessness with Biblical references but it is an indicator (as with the rest of the OT references in Hebrews) of his conviction that it is the Holy Spirit that is the ultimate author of Scripture and thereby, the identity of the human writer is ‘relatively unimportant’ [O’Brien].
Psalm 8 begins by saying
Psalm 8:1 - "O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens."
The psalmist is overcome with praise as he reflects on the majesty of God. As he looks up and marvels at the vastness of God’s created universe, the beauty of the moon and the stars and everything else in the skies, he casts his mind upon his own condition.
Man is so insignificant compared to the rest of God’s universe but God has given him a remarkable dignity; He is mindful of him and He cares for him. His position of being ‘a little lower than the angels’ is one of high honor; the angels minister in the presence of God and are at the top of God’s heavenly hierarchy and yet, earth-bound man is just a little lower than them. In fact, God has crowned man with glory and honor, putting all of creation under his feet. This Psalm is based on the account of man’s creation from Genesis 1:28.
Gen 1:26 "Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”"
It is this contrast between man’s insignificance (in light of the vastness of the universe) and the God-given position that he has been ordained to hold that has captured the heart of the Psalmist. The writer of Hebrews adds an emphatic addendum in the first half of Heb 2:8 - ‘he left nothing outside his control.’
But alas, this proclamation of man’s glory stands in opposition to the truth of our human experience. Yes, it is true that man was God’s treasured creation but then, sin entered the world, and with it, the spectre of death. Instead of ruling over creation, man now fights to subdue it to his will. His earthly days are filled with toil, labor, struggle and suffering - all of which seem futile under the shadow of death. Wordly pleasures can only provide momentary relief from the grind of existence; even the small joys of family and relationships have to be left behind when he enters the grave.
‘At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him’ - That is not only true but it is perhaps an understatement in our world today. All we see is the dominion of sin that prevents us from attaining the glory God wanted us to have. Our bodies are healthier than ever before in the history of the world and yet, our minds and hearts are sadder than they have ever been. We have subdued the elements and built hedges of protection separating us from the wild but we cannot prevent our families from breaking apart. We can bring children into the world more safely than anytime in the past and we are debating whether it is right to kill them while they are yet in their mother’s womb. And for all the wealth and comfort and longevity of life that modernity has provided, it still has not found a way to remove from us the fear of death and what lies beyond.
Is this all there is to the story of mankind?
Heb 2:9–10 "But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering."
‘But we see him...’ God has intervened in history to bring about a new beginning for mankind, by sending His Son into this world, Jesus (the first time we see the name mentioned in Hebrews.) He was made lower than the angels for a little while - while being lower than the angels was a position of honor for man, it is a condescension for the eternal Son. Yet it is something He willingly undertakes in obedience to the Father, for no angel will suffice to redeem man. Indeed as Heb 2:16 says later, it is not angels that he seeks to help but the sons of men. For that purpose, the Son of Man has come down in human flesh.
He was born to ordinary parents in an ordinary neighborhood. He was given a name that was common to many of his peers (though he brought its meaning to fruition in a way none of them could have!). He was brought up to have an unremarkable profession (that of the neighborhood carpenter.) Nothing in his circumstances or his appearance marked him out as being anything other than ordinary. He was not immune to the anguish and perils of life, the hunger, the tiredness, the trials and the poverty that are the constant companions of the common folk.
And yet, this Jesus lived the most extraordinary of lives - a life lived in full submission to the will of His Father - and died the most extraordinary of deaths. Verse 9 says he experienced the suffering of death. He did not run from it and though His soul was troubled, He did not say ‘Father, save me from this hour’ but rather ‘for this reason I have come’ (Jn 14:27) - to die for His people so that he could take away their sins and glorify the name of the Father.
And what a death it was! He tasted death on behalf of everyone; he did not sip from the cup of sorrow but he drained it whole. It was an unnatural death, a vile and cruel death reserved for those upon whom society had no pity. Think of the physical agony, the nails in the hands and feet, the struggle of the body to keep itself functioning while resisting the downward pull of gravity, the pain of the the still fresh wounds sustained from the whips of the Roman soldiers, the thirst… Think of the spiritual and mental agony, the humiliation, the incessant mocking, the utter and desperate loneliness of being suspended between heaven and earth. And to think that not only did he not deserve it but this was the Son of God who was dying on the cross, dying the death that was the result of every human sin, the death that was the consequence of every human lifetime spent in rebellion against God.
And when he died, they took him down from the cross and put his body in the tomb. And that seemed to be end of the story. But then he rose on the third day, victorious over the grave and swallowing up death itself, so that sin no longer has dominion over his people and death no longer has the final say. And this risen Christ has ascended to the heavens and God has crowned him with glory and honor, marking him supreme over the angels and indeed, over all creation.
Phil 2:6–11 "who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."
Here is one of the great achievements of the incarnation; Jesus has not only taken on humanity but he has transformed what it means to be human. The story of humans from the time of Adam onwards was ‘intended for glory, but destined to die in humiliation and futility’. But Jesus died in humiliation and now he reigns in glory in the presence of God. He has become everything that God wanted man to become. And in his victory, he has made it possible for us to follow his example.
In Hebrews 2:10, the writer refers to Jesus as the ‘founder of salvation.’ The word translated ‘founder’ can be read as ‘leader’ or ‘pioneer’ or ‘captain’. Jesus has not just blazed the path of salvation for his own sake but he is the leader who steps out ahead of us so that we can follow in his footsteps. There is nothing lacking in him. He has been made ‘perfect through suffering’ - this does not mean that he was lacking in perfection before his incarnation, far from it! He is eternally perfect in his being, his morality and his sinlessness. Rather, it means that he has become fully qualified to be the saviour of men and women. The writer of Hebrews asserts confidently that Jesus suffered and that it was in his enduring of the fires of afflictions that he has become a perfect saviour for mankind. He was perfect in his lifestyle - he only sought to do God’s will regardless of circumstance. He was perfect in obedience to the Father. He was perfect in his identification with us, becoming like us in his humanity and sharing our human experience. Finally, he was perfect in his victory over sin and death.
And those of us that follow him and believe in his name are given the right to become the sons and daughters of God (John 1:12). And as the children of God, our captain has ensured that our story does not end with the grave. Our destiny is to reign with him in eternity, for God is bringing his sons and daughters to glory. That is the destination to which we aspire to as we submit our lives to the Son of God, the Man of Calvary.
Such a great salvation! And none of this is based on our merit or our wisdom. It is the grace of God (as we read in verse 9). It is also the wisdom of God, for it was fitting for God to do things in this manner (verse 10.) And there are many in the world who will question God’s wisdom and the need for the incarnation, the suffering and the death of the Son. But as FF Bruce once said “The person who says, I could not have a high opinion of a God who would (or would not) do this or that, is not adding anything to our knowledge of God; he is simply telling us something about himself.”
God’s wisdom is foolishness in the eyes of the world but his Word is clear; there is only way to salvation. There is only founder of salvation, one leader who is able to bring his people into glory. But for those that reject his message and his final messenger, the Lord Jesus Christ, there is not only the expectation of a futile existence here on earth but also an eternal existence away from the presence of God, in hell, an eternal turmoil to which the sufferings of this world will pale in comparison.
But for us, the incarnation of Jesus Christ is not just a matter that provides hope for the future but gives us several reasons to rejoice in even at the present.
Heb 2:11–13 "For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source. That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying, “I will tell of your name to my brothers; in the midst of the congregation I will sing your praise.” And again, “I will put my trust in him.” And again, “Behold, I and the children God has given me.”"
Because Jesus Christ shares our human nature, just as we are human, and because we are the sons and daughters of God, as he is the Son of God, Jesus and us have one source (or literally ‘are from one’.) We are thus one family whereby he is not ashamed to call us his brothers and sisters.
But there is more - Jesus has sanctified us i.e we are set apart for God as his holy people, ready to be used by him in his service. We have already been purified and cleansed so that nothing hinders us from entering into the presence of God.
Once again, it is Jesus who leads us into the presence and service of God. The writer uses three OT quotations here to point this out to us. Psalm 22 is a familiar psalm to all of us; on the cross, Jesus expressed his anguish by crying out ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me’? The entirety of the first half of that psalm is a testament to the suffering of Christ on the cross, and some of its language is found in the gospel narratives. But the second half of the psalm is a public thanksgiving to God, in which the righteous sufferer praises God for his deliverance. It is from this portion (Ps 22:22) that the writer of Hebrews quotes first.
The exalted Christ is shown here to be praising God in the midst of his brothers, making known to us the glory of God by proclaiming his name. When we meet in the name of Christ as an assembly (congregation), he is the one who leads our worship. It is through him that we offer up our songs and offerings of thanksgiving to God.
Moreover, it is his example of faithfulness to God in the midst of suffering that we are called to emulate. In a time of despair for God’s people during the time of the prophet Isaiah, God promises the prophet that a time is coming when his faithfulness will be vindicated whereby God will preserve and restore a remnant of the people. So the prophet puts his trust in God (Isaiah 8). Similarly, Jesus put his trust in God in the darkest hour of his life when he bore our sins on the cross, looking forward to his exaltation and the salvation of those who are members of his family. May we also be found faithful to God at all times, putting our trust in him and singing his praises.
Heb 2:14–15 "Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery."
The ugliest consequence of sin is death, and the devil uses the fear of death to hold the people of the world in his grip. The fear of death influences their priorities, their affiliations and their lifestyles. It is the threat that causes some to toil away at their jobs, and others to lose themselves in meaningless pleasures. Many try to transform it into a positive influence, talking in terms of legacy and such but that is also a reflection of death’s utter finality. Everyone is scared to die.
But the resurrection of Jesus has transformed the meaning of death for Christians. He has destroyed the works of the devil, including the fear of death that is used to intimidate us. For the Christian, death is nothing but a momentary hiccup on the road to eternity. There is nothing left to dread in the grave and beyond but rather, there is much to look forward to.
We do not need to be afraid anymore because Jesus has already undergone our death and emerged victorious. May it be that like Paul, for us to live is Christ and to die is gain.
Heb 2:16–18 "For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham. Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted."
Jesus came to help the children of Abraham - i.e the people of faith (Gal 3:7). And he continues to help them by virtue of his high priestly ministry. The theme of Jesus as the High Priest is found only in Hebrews in the NT, and this is the first time the writer makes mention of this fact.
The high priestly ministry of Christ is a present reality for the people of God. He serves on our behalf in the presence of God because he is one with us, having been made like us in every respect apart from sin. He identifies with us because he knows what it is to be human; hence, he is merciful and faithful to us, even in our weaknesses. Through his death on the cross, he has made atonement for our sins, removing the stain of guilt that haunts men and women who do not share the privilege of salvation with us.
But more than that, because he himself has been tempted, he is able to help those of his brothers and sisters who are being tempted. Jesus’s temptations were tied to his mission and specifically to the suffering and agony he endured on his path to the cross. He did not experience every kind of human temptation. He definitely did not face the temptation to cheat on a citizenship test or lie in a job interview; but then, I have not faced the temptation to turn stone into bread or throw myself off a cliff knowing that I would be caught by angels. He endured the testing that was uniquely his, the intensity of which makes it more painful than ordinary suffering: as Westcott has said “[Jesus’] sympathy with the sinner in his trial does not depend on the experience of sin but on the experience of the strength of the temptation to sin which only the sinless can know in its full intensity. He who falls yields before the last strain.”
In all of his trials, Jesus never wavered in his faith and in his obedience to the Father. Ultimately, all temptations are the same: they attempt to weaken our faith and make us act in a way that is against the will of God. Whatever your temptation is, you can bring it to Jesus knowing that he has been tempted too and that the strength of your temptation does not match what he endured. Bring it to him in prayer with the sure confidence that he sympathizes with you and that he is able and willing to help.
The Bible has no solution to the struggles of human life apart from one: look to Jesus. He is the Son of God who took on human nature and was exposed to the sorrow and suffering of human life. He knows how you feel. He went to the cross and willingly tasted death on our behalf. He rose victorious from the grave and made it possible for humanity to once again enjoy the favor and dignity with which God created mankind. He is the pioneer of salvation, our leader who brings us into the presence of God. He reigns exalted over all things and we wait in anticipation of the day when he will return to take us to be with him in glory.
In the journey of life with its toils, trials and temptations, it is easy to lose sight of this hope, to get lost in the depths of despair and desperation, to chase after the wisdom and pleasures of the world . But the world has nothing to offer us apart from futility; instead let us look to Jesus.
Verily God, yet become truly human,
Lower than angels to die in our stead;
How has that long promised “Seed of the woman“
Trod on the serpent and bruised his head!
How didst Thou humble Thyself to be taken.
Led by Thy creatures and nailed to the cross.
Hated of men, and of God too forsaken,
Shunning not darkness, the curse, and the loss.
How hast Thou triumphed, and triumphed with glory,
Battled death’s forces, rolled back every wave!
Can we refrain then from telling the story?
Lord, Thou art Victor o’er death and the grave.
He is our merciful high priest and we are his family; he is not ashamed to call us his brothers and sisters.