HEBREWS

The author of the book of Hebrews is unknown; some think it was the apostle Paul, but the text differs from Paul’s writings, and does not have his usual greetings. The Greek of the text is highly polished, even higher in quality than the nearly Classical Greek in the books of Luke and Acts though it does not contain Luke’s normal introductions. Paul wrote in ‘koine’ (common) Greek, but this book has been considered by scholars as a masterpiece of Greek language.

If I was to suspect anyone, I would choose Apollos, a highly trained, educated man from Alexandria, Egypt. Luke says of him;

ACTS 18:24

24 Now a certain Jew named Apollos, born at Alexandria, an eloquent man and mighty in the Scriptures, came to Ephesus.

The book of Hebrews was written to Jewish Christians who were contemplating reverting back to Judaism and the now-defunct Law of Moses in order to escape persecution by the unbelieving Jews and Roman authorities. The purpose focuses on Jesus being the fulfillment of the Law and the Prophets.

HEBREWS 1:1-4

1 God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets,

2 has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds;

3 who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,

4 having become so much better than the angels, as He has by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.

The book starts immediately with Jesus’ divinity with His being the Son of God and Savior of the world the focus here, with emphasis on His power over all Creation and being the visible image of the invisible Father. He is also held up as the fulfillment of the words spoken through the prophets of God’s promise of salvation, being God’s Man and Man’s God.

HEBREWS 1:5-9

5 For to which of the angels did He ever say: “You are My Son, today I have begotten You”? And again: “I will be to Him a Father, and He shall be to Me a Son”?

6 But when He again brings the firstborn into the world, He says: “Let all the angels of God worship Him.”

7 And of the angels He says: “Who makes His angels spirits and His ministers a flame of fire.”

8 But to the Son He says: “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your kingdom.

9 You have loved righteousness and hated lawlessness; therefore God, Your God, has anointed You with the oil of gladness more than Your companions.”

The author of Hebrews reiterates the prophetic Psalms concerning Jesus, where the Father acknowledges Jesus as His Son and commands that the angels worship Jesus as being equal with Himself, for only God is worthy of worship. The Father also refers to Jesus as “God” showing His equality with His Father.

HEBREWS 1:10-14

10 And: “You, Lord, in the beginning laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the work of Your hands.

11 They will perish, but You remain; and they will all grow old like a garment;

12 Like a cloak You will fold them up, and they will be changed; but You are the same, and Your years will not fail.”

13 But to which of the angels has He ever said: “Sit at My right hand, till I make Your enemies Your footstool”?

14 Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for those who will inherit salvation?

Again prophetic Psalms are used to describe Jesus’ pre-existence and eternal nature, showing that He existed before Creation and that all of Creation was made by Him.

As the author of this book said;

HEBREWS 1:1-2

1 God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets,

2 has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds;

This is interesting in that it shows that the author knew about the planets during the time when most of the world thought the planets were gods in the sky watching the affairs of men. The wisdom and knowledge that God gives His servants is shown when Job who lived about 3,000 B.C. knew that the Earth orbited in space;

JOB 26:7

7 He stretches out the north over empty space, He hangs the Earth on nothing.

The Father in Psalms also invites His Son to rule beside Him, above all things, again showing Jesus’ equality with Himself.

HEBREWS 2:1-4

1 Therefore we must give the more earnest heed to the things we have heard, lest we drift away.

2 For if the word spoken through angels proved steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just reward,

3 how shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation, which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed to us by those who heard Him,

4 God also bearing witness both with signs and wonders, with various miracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit, according to His own will?

If we don’t continually refresh our knowledge of God’s Word, Satan will diligently remove it from our hearts. Verse 3 indicates that the author never saw or heard Jesus directly, nor was he one of the twelve apostles, again pointing to perhaps Apollos being the author of the book.

He refers indirectly to Israel’s history in which divine warnings given by angels which were ignored or disobeyed by the hearers were followed by divine punishment. That being the case with angels, how much worse punishment will be given to those ignoring God’s gift of salvation spoken of and performed by His Son and proven by the Holy Spirit?

HEBREWS 2:5-9

5 For He has not put the world to come, of which we speak, in subjection to angels.

6 But one testified in a certain place, saying: “What is man that You are mindful of him, or the son of man that You take care of him?

7 You have made him a little lower than the angels; you have crowned him with glory and honor, and set him over the works of Your hands.

8 You have put all things in subjection under his feet.” For in that He put all in subjection under him, He left nothing that is not put under him. But now we do not yet see all things put under him.

9 But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone.

Man was God’s highest creation before Adam sinned, perfect in every way, made even higher than the angels, created to be companions of God, something which galled Satan no end!  One of Satan’s major sins was his pride which caused him to be cast out of Heaven as he had considered himself to be equal with God. God had said of him;

ISAIAH 14:12-15

12 “How you are fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How you are cut down to the ground, you who weakened the nations!

13 For you have said in your heart: ‘I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will also sit on the mount of the congregation on the farthest sides of the north;

14 I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, I will be like the Most High.’

15 Yet you shall be brought down to Hell, to the lowest depths of the Pit.

Lucifer, like Man was a created being and no creation can be equal or greater than its Creator. He and one third of the angels then apparently tried to overthrow God and God took away their place in Heaven and threw them down to Earth. God then changed Lucifer’s name to Satan (Accuser, Adversary), and sentenced him and his followers to the Lake of Fire at the end of time.

Adams’ sin caused him to become lesser than the angels and his sin nature was passed to all of Creation which is why we suffer disease, age, pain, sorrow and eventual death in this world.

Jesus, in taking on flesh, even though sinless, agreed to be bound by human frailties so that He might understand first-hand what we suffer while in the flesh. He experienced hunger, weariness, pain, sorrow, thirst, tears and every form of temptation we will ever face.

Therefore Jesus, in taking on flesh, humbled Himself to become human, thereby making Himself temporarily lower than the angels, and took back His deity after His atoning death and resurrection.

In Genesis God set Man as the ruler of the Earth;

GENESIS 1:27-28

27 So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.

28 Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

None of the angels were given this honor and authority, their purpose is to protect and assist believers. As the author of Hebrews says of angels;

HEBREWS 1:14

14 Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for those who will inherit salvation?

The apostle Paul says that at the Judgment redeemed believers will judge Satan and his demons;

1 CORINTHIANS 6:3

3 Do you not know that we shall judge angels? How much more, things that pertain to this life?

As I mentioned earlier, this galls Satan no end, as he believes Man to be inferior to himself. He spoke to one of Job’s friends in what I call “Satan’s Temper Tantrum”. As Eliphaz related to Job;

JOB 4:12-21

12 “Now a word was secretly brought to me, and my ear received a whisper of it.

13 In disquieting thoughts from the visions of the night, when deep sleep falls on men,

14 Fear came upon me, and trembling, which made all my bones shake.

15 Then a spirit passed before my face; the hair on my body stood up.

16 It stood still, but I could not discern its appearance. A form was before my eyes; there was silence; then I heard a voice saying:

17 ‘Can a mortal be more righteous than God? Can a man be more pure than his Maker?

18 If He puts no trust in His servants, if He charges His angels with error,

19 How much more those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust,

 who are crushed before a moth?

20 They are broken in pieces from morning till evening; they perish forever, with no one regarding.

21 Does not their own excellence go away? They die, even without wisdom.’

Satan is essentially saying that if God doesn’t trust His own angels but charges them with sin, what chance does sinful Man have of being righteous in His eyes? And if He casts MY glory in the dust, what chance does mortal Man have? He then lies and says that men perish in ignorance and God could care less.

One can definitely see Satan’s bitterness in his words, as well as the lie that God doesn’t care about Mankind. Satan’s hatred and wrath against Mankind knows no bounds and he does his best to destroy everyone he can, especially those who worship God.

Note also here that even Satan acknowledges that angels are God’s servants, yet Jesus calls believers in Him His brethren. As Jesus said of the disciples to the women who saw Him after His resurrection;

MATTHEW 28:10

10 Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid. Go and tell My brethren to go to Galilee, and there they will see Me.”

He also is willing to share His throne with us;

REVELATION 3:21

21 To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.

The Father has ordained that Jesus be the ruler over all things, except for Himself. When He took on flesh Jesus humbled Himself and became completely human, making Himself equal with Mankind and temporarily lower than the angels. But He has risen into glory after His resurrection just as we who believe in Him will at His return.

HEBREWS 2:10-13

10 For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.

11 For both He who sanctifies and those who are being sanctified are all of one, for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brethren,

12 saying: “I will declare Your name to My brethren; in the midst of the assembly I will sing praise to You.”

13 And again: “I will put My trust in Him.”, and again: “Here am I and the children whom God has given Me.”

Suffering seems to be a harsh way to bring about perfection, but if you think about it, it makes sense. Persecution cleans out the “dead wood” out of the churches, namely the hypocrites and forces Christians to evaluate their faith in God. It’s easy to follow God when things are going well, but much harder when being persecuted!

When making pottery and refining metals we subject them to tremendous heat to “burn off” impurities which can weaken the desired product. The same with our faith; hardships and persecutions show us where our faith is weak and the Holy Spirit will help us strengthen our weaknesses.

God is not willing to allow us to suffer alone and Jesus, being persecuted Himself, understands in full measure what we suffer at the hands of Satan’s servants. God promises a safe destination, but never promised an easy journey to get there.

Unfortunately some Christians think that when they accept Jesus, their walk in life will be a flowered pathway when in reality they’re donning a huge bull’s-eye, becoming hated targets for Satan.

In the first two chapters of the book of Job, Satan twice petitions God for permission to test Job. God grants his petition, but sets strict limits as to how far he can go in persecuting him. In the Gospels, Jesus tells Peter that Satan had petitioned God to “sift him like wheat”. As a result Jesus prophesied that Peter would deny Him three times, which indeed happened, showing the weakness of Peter’s faith.

God will test our faith and commitment and will limit what Satan can do in persecuting us. He will not allow us to be tested beyond what we can handle, but only He knows our true limits.

Jesus warned his followers to count the cost of discipleship when following Him. He gave everything for us and expects the same from us in return. And those who die believing in Him, He is willing to consider us as His brothers and sisters and share His kingdom with us for eternity! What an honor!!

HEBREWS 2:14-18

14 Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil,

15 and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.

16 For indeed He does not give aid to angels, but He does give aid to the seed of Abraham.

17 Therefore, in all things He had to be made like His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

18 For in that He Himself has suffered, being tempted, He is able to aid those who are tempted.

God, in order to fully understand first-hand what we as humans suffer in life took on flesh and humbled Himself, setting aside His power and agreeing to be bound by human frailties, suffering hunger, thirst, pain, betrayal, tears, weariness, persecution, temptation and death, just as we do.

The Gospels only record three temptations of Jesus, yet the Gospel of Mark says that He was tempted all 40 days by Satan;

MARK 1:13

13 And He was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan, and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered to Him.

As the author of Hebrews would later say;

HEBREWS 4:15

15 For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin.

God, in order to identify more closely with Man, subjected Himself to being human and faced all of the same temptations that we will ever face. And remember, having eaten nothing during the 40 days He was in the wilderness, He was at the edge of starvation by the time that His temptation was finished. God also limits what Satan can tempt us with, and how far he is allowed to go;

1 CORINTHIANS 10:13

13 No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.

HEBREWS 3:1-6

1 Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, Christ Jesus,

2 who was faithful to Him who appointed Him, as Moses also was faithful in all His house.

3 For this One has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as He who built the house has more honor than the house.

4 For every house is built by someone, but He who built all things is God.

5 And Moses indeed was faithful in all His house as a servant, for a testimony of those things which would be spoken afterward,

6 but Christ as a Son over His own house, whose house we are if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm to the end.

The author is showing Jesus’ supremacy over Moses. Moses brought the Law to Israel at Mount Sinai but it was Jesus who gave it to Moses on the mountain in the first place. And as the Master of the house is greater than the servant in the house, Jesus, as the Son of God is greater than Moses.

This is showing that Jesus is the fulfillment of Moses’ prophecy of;

DEUTERONOMY 18:15

15 “The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your midst, from your brethren. Him you shall hear,

And reiterated in the book of Acts;

ACTS 3:22

22 For Moses truly said to the fathers, ‘The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your brethren. Him you shall hear in all things, whatever He says to you.

Remember also that both Moses and Elijah appeared to Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration showing that Jesus is the embodiment and the fulfillment of both the Law (Moses) and the Prophets (Elijah);

LUKE 9:28-31

28 Now it came to pass, about eight days after these sayings, that He took Peter, John, and James and went up on the mountain to pray.

29 As He prayed, the appearance of His face was altered, and His robe became white and glistening.

30 And behold, two men talked with Him, who were Moses and Elijah,

31 who appeared in glory and spoke of His decease which He was about to accomplish at Jerusalem.

Note that Moses and Elijah spoke only to Jesus, not to Peter, James and John who were with Him!! The dead do not speak to the living!! They are alive to God, but dead to us.

The Roman Catholic Church is rife with stories concerning Mary and the “saints” appearing in visions and speaking to people, but these are demons posing as the dead. And speaking to the dead is known as necromancy, forbidden in the Bible;

DEUTERONOMY 18:9-11

9 When you have come into the land which the Lord your God gives you, you shall not learn to do after the abominations of those nations.

10 There shall not be found among you any one that makes his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that uses divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch.

11 Or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer.

Some point the Old Testament story of Saul using the witch of Endor to call up the spirit of the prophet Samuel who had died shortly before. The author of Chronicles however, notes;

1 CHRONICLES 10:13

13 So Saul died for his transgression which he committed against the Lord, even against the word of the Lord, which he kept not, and also for asking counsel of one that had a familiar spirit, to enquire of it;

It wasn’t Samuel who was called up, but a demon posing as the dead prophet.

HEBREWS 3:7-15

7 Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says: “Today, if you will hear His voice,

8 Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, in the day of trial in the wilderness,

9 Where your fathers tested Me, tried Me, and saw My works forty years.

10 Therefore I was angry with that generation, and said, ‘They always go astray in their heart, and they have not known My ways.’

11 So I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.’ ”

12 Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God;

13 but exhort one another daily, while it is called “Today,” lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

14 For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end,

15 while it is said: “Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.”

God was justifiably angry with Israel when they came out of Egypt. They had seen the plagues He brought on Egypt, had passed through the parted waters of the Red Sea and watched as God then destroyed Pharaoh’s entire pursuing army by drowning them in the Red Sea; they had seen God descend upon Mount Sinai and had heard His voice; they had seen many other miracles as well, yet they whined, complained, tried to go back to Egypt, made a golden calf to worship, and worshiped the gods of the surrounding pagan nations.

God had finally had enough, and sentenced that entire generation to die in the wilderness because of their sin and unbelief. As He Himself said;

NUMBERS 14:26-29; 32-33

26 And the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying,

27 “How long shall I bear with this evil congregation who complain against Me? I have heard the complaints which the children of Israel make against Me.

28 Say to them, ‘As I live,’ says the Lord, ‘just as you have spoken in My hearing, so I will do to you:

29 The carcasses of you who have complained against Me shall fall in this wilderness, all of you who were numbered, according to your entire number, from twenty years old and above.

32 But as for you, your carcasses shall fall in this wilderness.

33 And your sons shall be shepherds in the wilderness forty years, and bear the brunt of your infidelity, until your carcasses are consumed in the wilderness.

And as spoken in Hebrews 3:11 above, that entire generation 20 years and older died in the wilderness and were sent to Hell for their sins while their children wandered in the desert for 40 years before God allowed them into the Promised Land of Canaan.

Even so, we have the promise of Heaven if we remain faithful, but if we turn away just as they did we will die in our sins and will be sentenced to Hell as they were.

HEBREWS 3:16-19

16 For who, having heard, rebelled? Indeed, was it not all who came out of Egypt, led by Moses?

17 Now with whom was He angry forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the wilderness?

18 And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who did not obey?

19 So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.

The term “God’s rest” has been mistaken by some as the land of Canaan, yet David said in Psalms;

PSALMS 95:7-9

7 For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture, and the sheep of His hand. Today, if you will hear His voice:

8 “Do not harden your hearts, as in the rebellion, as in the day of trial in the wilderness,

9 When your fathers tested Me; they tried Me, though they saw My work.

If entering Canaan had been God’s rest, David nearly 500 years later would not have referred to “today” as Israel would have already been at rest, and as history has shown, Israel hardly rested after entering Canaan!!! Hold that thought for a few minutes, the issue will be made clear in the next chapter.

HEBREWS 4:1-3

1 Therefore, since a promise remains of entering His rest, let us fear lest any of you seem to have come short of it.

2 For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them; but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it.

3 For we who have believed do enter that rest, as He has said: “So I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest,’ ” although the works were finished from the foundation of the world.

The promise of rest was written for ALL believers both before and after Israel’s entering into Canaan, therefore the place of rest is in Heaven with God where we will rest and be at peace eternally.

HEBREWS 4:4-10

4 For He has spoken in a certain place of the seventh day in this way: “And God rested on the seventh day from all His works”;

5 and again in this place: “They shall not enter My rest.”

6 Since therefore it remains that some must enter it, and those to whom it was first preached did not enter because of disobedience,

7 again He designates a certain day, saying in David, “Today,” after such a long time, as it has been said: “Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts.”

8 For if Joshua had given them rest, then He would not afterward have spoken of another day.

9 There remains therefore a rest for the people of God.

10 For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His.

Here the issue is cleared up. Joshua led Israel into Canaan but did not lead Israel into the promised rest. David, writing 500 years later still referred to God’s rest as being a future promise to believers, with Heaven being where God rested after creating the Heavens and the Earth and all of history.

Therefore like rebellious Israel, those who do not believe in God’s salvation do not enter into God’s eternal rest but have chosen to pay for their own sins in Hell. As Jesus told the Pharisees and Sadducees of His time;

LUKE 13:28-29

28 There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, and yourselves thrust out.

29 They will come from the east and the west, from the north and the south, and sit down in the kingdom of God.

God will welcome all believers, Jew and Gentile, into His kingdom, but the unbelievers, both Jew and Gentile will be cast out into the Lake of Fire.

HEBREWS 4:11-13

11 Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience.

12 For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

13 And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account.

God’s Word is a spiritual sword, part of the Armor of God given to us for spiritual warfare as found in Ephesians chapter 6. Satan and his demons are spirits and must be fought with spiritual weapons.

It is God’s Word that convicts us of sin, brings us comfort, assures us of salvation, teaches us what God expects of us and is a devastating weapon against Satan’s deceptions and lies. His Word is truth and Satan cannot stand against the truth. Jesus used God’s Word against Satan when He was tempted in the wilderness, saying “It is written..”

Notice that verse 12 above refers to a dividing of the soul and spirit. They are two separate parts of our spiritual nature. Our spirits are identical, made in God’s image and are eternal. Our souls differ from one another and give us our separate personalities. At death, our soul and spirit are joined and we go to our eternal destination, be it in Heaven or Hell.

Animals have a soul but do not have an eternal spirit, therefore their soul perishes when they die.

There is nothing hidden from God, and we will give an account of our actions before Jesus at our Judgment. Scripture is rife with examples of God’s blessings and His terrible wrath, and we inherited the knowledge of good and evil from Adam so we have no excuse for not following God’s commandments.

HEBREWS 4:14-16

14 Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.

15 For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin.

16 Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

The Gospels speak of only three of Jesus’ temptations, but here it is said that He was tempted in every way we will be, but remained sinless as God cannot be tempted by evil. But while in human form He experienced every form of temptation that we will ever experience so that He can understand first-hand what we face from Satan.

HEBREWS 5:1-4

1 For every high priest taken from among men is appointed for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins.

2 He can have compassion on those who are ignorant and going astray, since he himself is also subject to weakness.

3 Because of this he is required as for the people, so also for himself, to offer sacrifices for sins.

4 And no man takes this honor to himself, but he who is called by God, just as Aaron was.

The author here begins building a case as to one of the key reasons why Jesus had to take on flesh, namely in order to be our High Priest. The key thing to note here is that having taken on flesh and understanding pain, thirst, weariness, hunger, sorrow, temptation and the like first-hand, He can fully understand our struggles here on Earth.

Another key is that sin can only attack the flesh. After death we are no longer afflicted by greed, lust, hate, envy, covetousness, wrath, jealousy and so on.

In fact, Paul says;

ROMANS 6:7

7 For he who has died has been freed from sin.

Even though we are free of sin at death, we are not free of the punishment for sin. Therefore Jesus had to take on flesh so that the sins of the world could be contained within His body, and when He died, our sins died with Him.

But the price of sin still had to be paid, therefore He was sent by the Father to the deepest pit in Hell for three days until His just punishment for our sins had been satisfied. And after His death, His tortured body didn’t decay during the three days that He was in the grave which is unusual, but was prophesied;

PSALMS 16:9-10

9 Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoices; My flesh also will rest in hope.

10 For You will not leave my soul in Hell, nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption.

The supremacy of the Father is shown in the fact that Jesus, even though God Himself, could not get out of Hell until the Father determined that His righteous judgment against sin had been satisfied. As David prophesied concerning Jesus;

PSALM 88:6-9

6 You have laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the depths.

7 Your wrath lies heavy upon me, and You have afflicted me with all Your waves.

8 I am shut in, and I cannot get out;

9 My eye wastes away because of affliction.

Therefore the Father exalted Him to be equal with Himself for His obedience, and made Him our sinless heavenly High Priest forever.

Note that God in the Old Testament originally chose Aaron, Moses’ brother to be the High Priest over Israel.

However, in the New Testament God never ordained another priesthood, as with the fulfillment of the Law of Moses in Jesus, there was no further need for a separate priesthood.

The Roman Catholic Church claims that Peter was the first Pope, but that is based on a translation error. Jesus never set up a New Testament priesthood, period. (For more information concerning fallacy of the Roman Catholic priesthood and Papacy, please see the study concerning Peter in his site concerning the issue.)

HEBREWS 5:5-11

5 So also Christ did not glorify Himself to become High Priest, but it was He who said to Him: “You are My Son, today I have begotten You.”

6 As He also says in another place: “You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek”;

7 who, in the days of His flesh, when He had offered up prayers and supplications, with vehement cries and tears to Him who was able to save Him from death, and was heard because of His Godly fear,

8 though He was a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered.

9 And having been perfected, He became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him,

10 called by God as High Priest “according to the order of Melchizedek,”

11 of whom we have much to say, and hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing.

In the Old Testament when Abraham (still known as Abram at that time) returned from miraculously destroying the armies of a 5 king coalition with only 318 men, he was met by a mysterious figure who was listed as a priest to God;

GENESIS 14:18-20

18 Then Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; he was the priest of God Most High.

19 And he blessed him and said: “Blessed be Abram of God Most High, possessor of heaven and earth;

20 And blessed be God Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your hand.”

We’ll learn more about Melchizedek in chapter 7, so hold that thought.

HEBREWS 5:12-14

12 For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God; and you have come to need milk and not solid food.

13 For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe.

14 But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.

The author laments that his audience has stagnated in their faith, content to remain as “babes” in Christ instead of growing and understanding strong doctrine and principles. Unfortunately this still happens today, with Christians reaching their “comfort level” in understanding and remaining there, while looking down at mature Christians as “radicals”. Satan loves these stagnant Christians as they are no real threat to him.

HEBREWS 6:1-6

1 Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let us go on to perfection, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God,

2 of the doctrine of baptisms, of laying on of hands, of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment.

3 And this we will do if God permits.

4 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit,

5 and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come,

6 if they fall away, to renew them again to repentance, since they crucify again for themselves the Son of God, and put Him to an open shame.

The author makes some important points here. First, don’t stop trying to learn more and grow in Jesus!! The Gospels establish the foundations of Christianity, but God didn’t stop there, He created the rest of the New Testament, building on that foundation. In other words, the Gospels are spiritual “milk” and everything after the book of Acts is strong spiritual food for those who hunger after wisdom and knowledge of God.

A very important point stressed here also is that if a person falls away, they cannot re-accept Jesus for that would be like repeating His sacrifice, something He will never do. As the author of Hebrews said later;

HEBREWS 10:14

14 For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.

If we fall away, we can repent and come back to Jesus, confessing our sins committed since we fell away. There is no need to re-confess old sins that were forgiven when we first accepted Him, as they have been forgiven already.

When we celebrate Communion we commemorate Jesus’ atoning sacrifice for us, something that the author of Hebrews says was done once, for all time. As He Himself said, “Do this in remembrance of Me...”

LUKE 10:19

19 And he took bread, and gave thanks, and broke it, and gave to them, saying, This is my body which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me.

The Roman Catholic Church greatly errs in that every time they offer Communion during Mass, they supposedly call Jesus down into the Eucharist (a wafer, representing the Communion bread) at which time the wafer (according to Catholic tradition) becomes the literal flesh of Jesus and the wine becomes His literal blood (called “transubstantiation”).

Then the priest offers the wafer to God as a “non-bloody sacrifice” and those accepting Communion must believe that they are literally eating His flesh and drinking His blood.

Several major problems with this:

First, no human has the power to bring Jesus down from Heaven.

Hebrews 10:12-14

12 But this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God,

13 from that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool.

14 For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.

And as Peter stated;

ACTS 3:19-22

19 Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord,

20 and that He may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before,

21 whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began.

These verses state that Jesus made one sacrifice for all time, never to be repeated, and that He must remain in Heaven until the Father sends Him back to rule the Earth.

Second, believing that they drink the blood of Jesus violates God’s perpetual command against eating blood, something so important that He repeated it;

LEVITICUS 3:17

17 ‘This shall be a perpetual statute throughout your generations in all your dwellings: you shall eat neither fat nor blood.’ ”

LEVITICUS 7:27

Whoever eats any blood, that person shall be cut off from his people.’ ”

LEVITICUS 17:12

12 Therefore I said to the children of Israel, ‘No one among you shall eat blood, nor shall any stranger who dwells among you eat blood.’

James, Jesus’ physical brother and the head of the Jerusalem church wrote to Gentile believers;

ACTS 15:19-20

19 Therefore I judge that we should not trouble those from among the Gentiles who are turning to God,

20 but that we write to them to abstain from things polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from things strangled, and from blood.

Strangled animals do not have the blood drained from them, therefore eating strangled animals is forbidden as anyone eating it would violate God’s command against eating blood.

HEBREWS 6:7-12

7 For the earth which drinks in the rain that often comes upon it, and bears herbs useful for those by whom it is cultivated, receives blessing from God;

8 but if it bears thorns and briers, it is rejected and near to being cursed, whose end is to be burned.

9 But, beloved, we are confident of better things concerning you, yes, things that accompany salvation, though we speak in this manner.

10 For God is not unjust to forget your work and labor of love which you have shown toward His name, in that you have ministered to the saints, and do minister.

11 And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end,

12 that you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.

A warning to unfruitful Christians. If God’s Word, like soft rain, bears spiritual fruit in you for His glory and the edification of His church, you will be blessed greatly by God. But if it does not, and sin in your life grows like weeds and thorns, your end will be eternity in the Lake of Fire. As Jesus said will happen at the end of the Judgment;

MATTHEW 25:41-46

41 “Then He will also say to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels:

42 for I was hungry and you gave Me no food; I was thirsty and you gave Me no drink;

43 I was a stranger and you did not take Me in, naked and you did not clothe Me, sick and in prison and you did not visit Me.’

44 “Then they also will answer Him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to You?’

45 Then He will answer them, saying, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’

46 And these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

Note that in verse 41 Jesus said that the Lake of Fire was created for Satan and his demons. Those who die in their sins have chosen Satan as their master and will receive his eternal punishment.

We need to be diligent so as to not stagnate in our Christian walk with God. We are like a garden, bearing goodly fruits (works of faith) for Jesus. But as in any garden, weeds will appear and try to choke out the good plants. We must be diligent to keep our garden weed-free, or we will become useless and unfruitful before God.

HEBREWS 6:13-20

13 For when God made a promise to Abraham, because He could swear by no one greater, He swore by Himself,

14 saying, “Surely blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply you.”

15 And so, after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise.

16 For men indeed swear by the greater, and an oath for confirmation is for them an end of all dispute.

17 Thus God, determining to show more abundantly to the heirs of promise the immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath,

18 that by two immutable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us.

19 This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the Presence behind the veil,

20 where the forerunner has entered for us, even Jesus, having become High Priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

Men always swear by God, calling Him as witness as they can swear by no one higher. God, wanting to confirm His promises to us, swore by Himself as there is no one higher than Himself. And He has sworn to mankind that those who follow Jesus inherit both salvation and inherit eternal life in Heaven after the Judgment.

HEBREWS 7:1-3

1 For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him,

2 to whom also Abraham gave a tenth part of all, first being translated “king of righteousness,” and then also king of Salem, meaning “king of peace,”

3 without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like the Son of God, remains a priest continually.

Melchizedek as we learned earlier is a mysterious priestly figure who first appeared to Abraham in Genesis, not fully explained, but who appears to have been a pre-incarnate (before He appeared in a physical body) form of Jesus, not having a human ancestry, yet being eternal.

HEBREWS 7:4-10

4 Now consider how great this man was, to whom even the patriarch Abraham gave a tenth of the spoils.

5 And indeed those who are of the sons of Levi, who receive the priesthood, have a commandment to receive tithes from the people according to the law, that is, from their brethren, though they have come from the loins of Abraham;

6 but he whose genealogy is not derived from them received tithes from Abraham and blessed him who had the promises.

7 Now beyond all contradiction the lesser is blessed by the better.

8 Here mortal men receive tithes, but there he receives them, of whom it is witnessed that he lives.

9 Even Levi, who receives tithes, paid tithes through Abraham, so to speak,

10 for he was still in the loins of his father when Melchizedek met him.

Abraham, already an old man, had with 318 servants annihilated the armies of a coalition of 5 Mesopotamian kings who had conquered Sodom and had captured his nephew Lot and his family. After his victory he had been met by Melchizedek, king of Salem who brought bread and wine to Abraham and blessed him, and Abraham, apparently sensing who He was, gave him a tenth of the loot taken from the destroyed armies as tribute.

God later through Moses demanded a tithe of Israel in order to maintain the Temple and allow the Levites who were in charge of the Temple to hire craftsmen for Temple repairs and whatever supplies they needed. God had commanded that the Levites own no property or do any work, their Temple service on behalf of all Israel being their sole livelihood. Their food was supplied by fruit and grain offerings given to God in appreciation of His blessings, and a portion of the animal sacrifices offered to God as burnt offerings.

The fact that Abraham offered a tithe of the spoils to Melchizedek who had no part in the battle shows that as mighty as Abraham was, he considered Melchizedek to be deity, offering him tithes in appreciation and honor for God’s blessing and help in defeating the coalition of kings.

HEBREWS 7:11-17

11 Therefore, if perfection were through the Levitical priesthood (for under it the people received the law), what further need was there that another priest should rise according to the order of Melchizedek, and not be called according to the order of Aaron?

12 For the priesthood being changed, of necessity there is also a change of the law.

13 For He of whom these things are spoken belongs to another tribe, from which no man has officiated at the altar.

14 For it is evident that our Lord arose from Judah, of which tribe Moses spoke nothing concerning priesthood.

15 And it is yet far more evident if, in the likeness of Melchizedek, there arises another priest

16 who has come, not according to the law of a fleshly commandment, but according to the power of an endless life.

17 For He testifies: “You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.”

God through the Law of Moses ordained Moses’ brother Aaron of the tribe of Levi as the High Priest of Israel, with his descendants being priests after him. But the Law required a constant line of priests as they needed to be replaced when a priest or High Priest died.

This priesthood was imperfect in that it had sinful men offering sacrifices to God that could only cover sin, but could not remove sin in God’s sight. Therefore a perfect, eternal High Priest was needed who could offer a perfect sacrifice that would remove sin once, for all time.

With Jesus’ atoning death resulting in the fulfillment and end of the Law, and the destruction by the Romans of the Temple and the priesthood established by the Law, there was no longer a need for a separate, dedicated priesthood. And despite Roman Catholic tradition and teachings, God in the New Testament never ordained or created a separate, dedicated priesthood.

Peter and John state that ALL believers are priests to God, with Jesus being our High Priest. Peter said concerning Gentile believers;

1 PETER 2:9-10

9 But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light;

10 who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy.

John said in his vision of Revelation;

REVELATION 1:4-6

4 John, to the seven churches which are in Asia: Grace to you and peace from Him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne,

5 and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler over the kings of the earth. To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood,

6 and has made us kings and priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.

And;

REVELATION 5:8-10

8 Now when He had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each having a harp, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.

9 And they sang a new song, saying: “You are worthy to take the scroll, and to open its seals; for You were slain, and have redeemed us to God by Your blood out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation,

10 And have made us kings and priests to our God; and we shall reign on the earth.”

If Jesus’ death made us all priests before God, what need is there for a man-made priesthood?

HEBREWS 7:18-22

18 For on the one hand there is an annulling of the former commandment because of its weakness and unprofitableness,

19 for the law made nothing perfect; on the other hand, there is the bringing in of a better hope, through which we draw near to God.

20 And inasmuch as He was not made priest without an oath

21 (for they have become priests without an oath, but He with an oath by Him who said to Him: “The Lord has sworn and will not relent ‘You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek’ ”),

22 by so much more Jesus has become a surety of a better covenant.

The fulfillment of the Law removed the imperfect, physical, Levitical priesthood. The new covenant through Jesus established an eternal one in which God the Father swore to make His Son an eternal High Priest with all believers being priests to God through Him.

HEBREWS 7:23-25

23 Also there were many priests, because they were prevented by death from continuing.

24 But He, because He continues forever, has an unchangeable priesthood.

25 Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.

Under the Law of Moses the High Priest offered sacrifices and interceded directly with God for himself and all of the people, including the priests under his authority. Jesus has become our eternal, sinless High Priest and we are eternally priests to the Father under His authority.

HEBREWS 7:26-28

26 For such a High Priest was fitting for us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and has become higher than the heavens;

27 who does not need daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for His own sins and then for the people’s, for this He did once for all when He offered up Himself.

28 For the law appoints as high priests men who have weakness, but the word of the oath, which came after the law, appoints the Son who has been perfected forever.

Everything on Earth is doomed to destruction because of sin, but God in His wisdom provided a way for believers to dwell in His presence and worship Him in peace and joy for eternity. And what better person to become our eternal High Priest, than a sinless Jesus who is fully God and fully Man, reconciling us to the Father in Himself, being God’s Man and Man’s God?

HEBREWS 8:1-2

1 Now this is the main point of the things we are saying: We have such a High Priest, who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens,

2 a Minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle which the Lord erected, and not man.

This is the fulfillment of the prophecy given by the prophet Nathan to king David when David wanted to build a Temple to the Lord. God had told him he could not build God a house as David was a man of war. However, God prophesied concerning Jesus who would come from David’s lineage;

2 SAMUEL 7:12-15

12 “When your days are fulfilled and you rest with your fathers, I will set up your seed after you, who will come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom.

13 He shall build a house for My name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.

14 I will be his Father, and he shall be My son. If he commits iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men and with the blows of the sons of men.

15 But My mercy shall not depart from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I removed from before you.

Jesus never sinned, but He bore our sins in His flesh, therefore as prophesied He was beaten by men, fulfilling Isaiah’s prophecies of;

ISAIAH 50:6

6 I gave My back to those who struck Me, and My cheeks to those who plucked out the beard; I did not hide My face from shame and spitting.

ISAIAH 53:3-5

3 He is despised and rejected by men, a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him. He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.

4 Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.

5 But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. 

The “stripes” referred to here are lash marks from a whip. Before He was crucified Jesus was severely beaten, first by the fists of the Sanhedrin, then by scourging from Roman soldiers. Scourging was a hideous form of punishment feared even by battle hardened Roman soldiers.

A scourge was a whip with long leather thongs that had a dumbbell shaped piece of lead tied to the ends. This caused the lead ends to strike with tremendous force when swung and caused tearing of skin and muscle tissue and deep internal bruising and hemorrhaging. The victim was whipped from neck to ankles and many died from the trauma of being scourged. It was used as a punishment as well as a way of finding out the truth from suspected criminals as most would confess out of fear when faced with scourging.

The Jews were allowed by the Law of Moses to give a man no more than 39 lashes with a normal whip. The Romans had no such restrictions. The famous Shroud of Turin, very likely Jesus’ burial shroud contains the image of a savagely beaten, crucified man. Photos of the image show that he was scourged by two whips, one with two thongs and one with three. The dumbbell-shaped marks on the body are readily visible and it appears that the victim was whipped at least 120 times!

HEBREWS 8:3-6

3 For every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices. Therefore it is necessary that this One also have something to offer.

4 For if He were on earth, He would not be a priest, since there are priests who offer the gifts according to the law;

5 who serve the copy and shadow of the heavenly things, as Moses was divinely instructed when he was about to make the tabernacle. For He said, “See that you make all things according to the pattern shown you on the mountain.”

6 But now He has obtained a more excellent ministry, inasmuch as He is also Mediator of a better covenant, which was established on better promises.

God had showed Moses the patterns for the Tabernacle (tent) which housed the Ark of the Covenant, the altars and the utensils used in worship, which would also be used later in the first and later, second Temples.

These Earthly things are copies of the real items in Heaven. And as Earthly things are doomed to eventual destruction, there needed to be eternal things which will never perish. And as the Earthly things were destroyed with the fulfillment of the Law and the destruction of the Temple, both were replaced with eternal counterparts, namely eternal salvation and a Heavenly Temple.

HEBREWS 8:7-13

7 For if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second.

8 Because finding fault with them, He says: “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah—

9 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they did not continue in My covenant, and I disregarded them, says the Lord.

10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.

11 None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them.

12 For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.”

13 In that He says, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.

The Law of Moses was never meant to be a permanent Law, as it had no provision for salvation. It identified what was sin in God’s eyes, labeled the punishments for sin, and required that a person follow its dictates (all 613 of them) without fail all of the days of a person’s life. So only a sinless person could be righteous under the Law, something Man could never do. As Jesus’ physical brother and the author of the book of James said;

JAMES 2:10-11

10 For whoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all.

11 For He who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not murder.” Now if you do not commit adultery, but you do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law.

The reason for this was so that Man would not try to be righteous by works alone. All of Creation became corrupted when Adam and Eve sinned, and like adding black dye to clear water sin permeated all of Creation. So trying to attain salvation by corrupt works is like trying to clean yourself with filthy water, it can’t be done.

Therefore by bringing all of Mankind under the condemnation of sin, God could have mercy on all of Mankind with a single act of salvation, which He did through the atoning death of Jesus Christ.

Those who died in obedience to the Law were still sinners, for the sacrifices of the Law could only cover sins, it did not remove them. As king David observed;

PSALMS 32:1

1 Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.

Those who died in faith before the Law of Moses and those who died in obedience to the Law were righteous, but were still sinners. Their sins had been covered, but not yet taken away. Therefore when they died, they went to “the Pit”, a place in the same location as Hell but separated by a huge uncrossable gulf as shown in Luke 16:19-31. Those in the Pit could see those in Hell and vice versa, but neither could travel across the gulf separating the two locations.

The Pit was a place for the righteous dead to go to await their redemption. The Pit is mentioned several times in the Old Testament;

PSALMS 28:1

1 To You I will cry, O Lord my Rock: do not be silent to me, lest, if You are silent to me, I become like those who go down to the Pit.

PSALMS 30:3

3 O Lord, You brought my soul up from the grave; You have kept me alive, that I should not go down to the Pit.

PROVERBS 1:12

12 Let us swallow them alive like Hell, and whole, like those who go down to the Pit;

The fact that no one had yet entered Heaven was shown when Jesus said;

JOHN 3:13

13 No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven.

No one was yet sinless, so no one could enter Heaven until their sins had been removed which happened at Jesus’ resurrection. When Jesus ascended into Heaven, he took the captives in the Pit with Him into Heaven as they were now made perfect.

As Paul stated concerning Jesus’ descent into Hell and His resurrection after suffering for our sins;

EPHESIANS 4:8-10

8 Therefore He says: “When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive, and gave gifts to men.”

9 (Now this, “He ascended”—what does it mean but that He also first descended into the lower parts of the earth?

10 He who descended is also the One who ascended far above all the heavens, that He might fill all things.)

(The gifts referred to in verse 8 are the Gifts of the Spirit)

God replaced the Law of Moses with a better, eternal covenant through Jesus. And He is willing to forget our sins because He chooses to.

HEBREWS 9:1-5

1 Then indeed, even the first covenant had ordinances of divine service and the earthly sanctuary.

2 For a tabernacle was prepared: the first part, in which was the lampstand, the table, and the showbread, which is called the sanctuary;

3 and behind the second veil, the part of the tabernacle which is called the Holiest of All,

4 which had the golden censer and the ark of the covenant overlaid on all sides with gold, in which were the golden pot that had the manna, Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant;

5 and above it were the cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat. Of these things we cannot now speak in detail.

Before the Temple was built, the Ark of the Covenant was housed in a tent, separated into two sections by a veil which represented the barrier of sin between Man and God. This veil separated the tent into two sections, just as a similar veil divided the Temple after it was built.

In the outer court was the lamp stand (menorah) which had seven branches, each topped by a bowl filled with oil, representing the seven spirits of God. The lamp stand was portrayed in a vision given to the prophet Zechariah;

ZECHARIAH 4:1-3

1 Now the angel who talked with me came back and wakened me, as a man who is wakened out of his sleep.

2 And he said to me, “What do you see?” So I said, “I am looking, and there is a lampstand of solid gold with a bowl on top of it, and on the stand seven lamps with seven pipes to the seven lamps.

On the Arch of Titus in Rome, created by Roman Emperor Titus celebrating the destruction of Jerusalem and its Temple, a carving is shown portraying victorious Roman soldiers carrying the seven-branched menorah lamp away as captured treasure.

The showbread table was supposed to have 12 loaves of fresh bread on it daily, representing the twelve tribes of Israel. Each day the loaves were replaced by fresh bread and the removed loaves were to be eaten by the Temple priests.

The other partition contained a censer for the burning of incense by the priests before the Lord at appointed times. This is mentioned in Luke when Zacharias, the future father of John the Baptist was chosen to perform this duty;

LUKE 1:8-12

8 So it was, that while he was serving as priest before God in the order of his division,

9 according to the custom of the priesthood, his lot fell to burn incense when he went into the temple of the Lord.

10 And the whole multitude of the people was praying outside at the hour of incense.

11 Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing on the right side of the altar of incense.

12 And when Zacharias saw him, he was troubled, and fear fell upon him.

According to the book of Revelation, incense represents the prayers of the faithful before God;

REVELATION 8:3-4

3 Then another angel, having a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne.

4 And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, ascended before God from the angel’s hand.

HEBREW 9:6-10

6 Now when these things had been thus prepared, the priests always went into the first part of the tabernacle, performing the services.

7 But into the second part the High Priest went alone once a year, not without blood, which he offered for himself and for the people’s sins committed in ignorance;

8 the Holy Spirit indicating this, that the way into the Holiest of All was not yet made manifest while the first tabernacle was still standing.

9 It was symbolic for the present time in which both gifts and sacrifices are offered which cannot make him who performed the service perfect in regard to the conscience—

10 concerned only with foods and drinks, various washings, and fleshly ordinances imposed until the time of reformation.

Once a year, the High Priest went alone into the second part of the tabernacle (and later the Temple) into the presence of God to offer sacrifices in atonement for both himself and all of Israel to seek forgiveness of sins committed in ignorance during the year.

Remember, the Law of Moses had 613 commandments and it was pretty much impossible for the common people to memorize all of them, resulting in sins being committed unknowingly. Thus once a year all Israel could be cleansed of all sins committed during the year.

As discussed previously the animal sacrifices could never remove sin before God, it could only cover them until the perfect sacrifice of Jesus could remove them. But the animal sacrifices were to constantly remind Israel of the awful price of sin and the price of atonement. Sin had taken a perfect life and it would take a perfect life to destroy it. And that perfect life would be Jesus Christ.

HEBREWS 9:11-15

11 But Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation.

12 Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption.

13 For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh,

14 how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

15 And for this reason He is the Mediator of the new covenant, by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions under the first covenant, that those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance.

The Earthly Temple was a physical symbol of God’s true Temple in Heaven and like everything else on Earth it had to be continually repaired and maintained. The rituals and sacrifices needed for service had to be repeated over and over as they were imperfect and needed to be continually renewed.

But with Jesus’ death and resurrection the focus changed from the physical world to the spiritual world, with the Law of Moses being replaced by an eternal perfect covenant. Jesus now being our High Priest has built an eternal Temple in Heaven in which all believers will worship both Him and the Father forever after the Great Judgment.

HEBREWS 9:16-22

16 For where there is a testament, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator.

17 For a testament is in force after men are dead, since it has no power at all while the testator lives.

18 Therefore not even the first covenant was dedicated without blood.

19 For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and goats, with water, scarlet wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people,

20 saying, “This is the blood of the covenant which God has commanded you.”

21 Then likewise he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle and all the vessels of the ministry.

22 And according to the law almost all things are purified with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no remission.

A Testament is much like a will in that it is a binding covenant upon all who enter the covenant. And like Last Wills and Testaments today, they are not active and binding until after the death of the one generating the covenant.

God, when giving the Law to Moses, used the death of sinless animals as a substitute for Himself, the blood being a graphic reminder of the terrible price to be paid for the covering of sins. Sin had conquered and destroyed a perfect life (Adam) and it would take a perfect life (Jesus) being given to conquer and destroy sin for all time.

HEBREWS 9:23-28

23 Therefore it was necessary that the copies of the things in the heavens should be purified with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.

24 For Christ has not entered the holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us;

25 not that He should offer Himself often, as the high priest enters the Most Holy Place every year with blood of another—

26 He then would have had to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now, once at the end of the ages, He has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.

27 And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment,

28 so Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many. To those who eagerly wait for Him He will appear a second time, apart from sin, for salvation.

Again the author explains that the Earthly instruments and Temple itself were imperfect copies of Heavenly things. The things of Earthly worship are subject to imperfection, aging and destruction whereas the true Heavenly things are eternal. And as Earthly things were purified by the blood of sinless animals the Heavenly things were purified by the blood of sinless Jesus.

The Roman Catholic priests when serving Communion offer up Jesus (supposedly in the Eucharist wafer) back to God as a “non-bloody sacrifice” which means they are constantly sacrificing Him ritually every time they celebrate Mass.

Yet the verses above state that He was sacrificed once for all time, an act never to be repeated. The Christian churches celebrate Communion as a remembrance of Jesus’ sacrifice, not as a “non-bloody” re-enactment of the event. And by continually offering Jesus back to God, it is saying that His first sacrifice was insufficient and needs to be repeated, in direct violation of verse 26 above.

Verse 27 also slams the lid on the “reincarnation” belief, in which some believe that when we die we return as something else (animal, human, etc.). In “reincarnation” what we return as depends on how good or bad we were in our “previous life”. There have been reported cases where a child will suddenly have the memories of a deceased person seemingly supporting reincarnation. However if the deceased person had been demon-possessed and the demon had entered the child, it would have the memories of the deceased person.

HEBREWS 10:1-4

1 For the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with these same sacrifices, which they offer continually year by year, make those who approach perfect.

2 For then would they not have ceased to be offered? For the worshipers, once purified, would have had no more consciousness of sins.

3 But in those sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year.

4 For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins.

Animals are sinless, therefore were a good substitute for the true sacrifice to come, namely Jesus Christ. But as we saw earlier, animal sacrifices, like the Law itself, were imperfect substitutes for true salvation and could only cover sins, they could not remove them.

And being insufficient to remove sins, they needed to be performed continually not only to cover new sins but to remind the sinner of the awful price of sin.

HEBREWS 10:5-10

5 Therefore, when He came into the world, He said: “Sacrifice and offering You did not desire, but a body You have prepared for Me.

6 In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin you had no pleasure.

7 Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come— in the volume of the book it is written of Me— to do Your will, O God.’ ”

8 Previously saying, “Sacrifice and offering, burnt offerings, and offerings for sin You did not desire, nor had pleasure in them” (which are offered according to the law),

9 then He said, “Behold, I have come to do Your will, O God.” He takes away the first that He may establish the second.

10 By that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

In the Law God required whole burnt offerings in which a ram or a young bull was to be killed, the blood drained and poured out, and the entire animal was burned on the altar, representing Jesus’ descent into the deepest pit of Hell after His death on the cross where He suffered in fire until our sins were paid for.

Some have wondered if God was demanding a human sacrifice when Jesus was crucified, but actually it was necessary. Sin can only attack humans and sin had brought death to all of Mankind. Therefore as sin had destroyed a perfect human life (Adam), a perfect life had to be offered for atonement for sin. And as death came through Adam, life came through Jesus Christ.

HEBREWS 10:11-14

11 And every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.

12 But this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God,

13 from that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool.

14 For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.

God waited for 40 years after Jesus’ death and resurrection for the Jews to understand and believe that the old sacrificial system was ended and to accept Jesus as the fulfilment of the Law of Moses. And with the end of the Law, there was no further need for animal sacrifices and no need for a separate dedicated priesthood as we are now all made priests to God with Jesus being our High priest.

The destruction of the Temple and Judea itself accomplished several purposes. First, it put an end to the now-useless animal sacrifices; second, it put an end to the priesthood; third, it destroyed the genealogical records so that no one can lay claim to be of the line of David and claim to be the Messiah; and it scattered the Christians to the farthest ends of the Roman Empire, spreading Christianity everywhere.

Note in the verses above that Jesus was sacrificed once for all time, an event never to be repeated. Therefore any separate, dedicated priesthood today is a man-made office and has not been ordained by God. And the re-enactment of Jesus being offered over and over again as a “non-bloody sacrifice” to God is a Man-ordained sacrifice in direct violation of verse 12 above.

And Isaiah’s prophecy of which Jesus accused the Pharisees of doing still holds true today;

MATTHEW 15:7-9

7 Hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy about you, saying:

8 ‘These people draw near to Me with their mouth, and honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me.

9 And in vain they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ”

HEBREWS 10:15-18

15 But the Holy Spirit also witnesses to us; for after He had said before,

16 “This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws into their hearts, and in their minds I will write them,”

17 then He adds, “Their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.”

18 Now where there is remission of these, there is no longer an offering for sin.

With the establishment of the new covenant there is no need for the elements of the old covenant to be repeated or incorporated into the new covenant. And with our sins being removed and destroyed there is no need for sacrifices and offerings for sin. And with the barrier of sin between Man and God removed, there is no need to come to God through a sinful priest as we can now come directly into the presence of God through sinless Jesus Christ.

As He Himself said;

MATTHEW 11:28-30

28 Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

29 Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

30 For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”

Note that Jesus said, “Come to Me”, He didn’t say, “Go to the priests”!

HEBREWS 10:19-25

19 Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus,

20 by a new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh,

21 and having a High Priest over the house of God,

22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.

23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.

24 And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works,

25 not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.

Jesus has prepared the way for us to worship God in spirit and truth, appearing in the presence of the Father on our behalf. Our hearts have been purified by His blood and through faith and baptism we are made clean in His sight.

We are urged to remain faithful and not lose hope, believing that as He has promised, He will perform. And we are urged to have fellowship with other believers, that we might be one in worship and help support each other as needed.

HEBREWS 10:26-31

26 For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,

27 but a certain fearful expectation of judgment, and fiery indignation which will devour the adversaries.

28 Anyone who has rejected Moses’ law dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses.

29 Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace?

30 For we know Him who said, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord. And again, “The Lord will judge His people.”

31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

This is a frightening warning to those who continue to sin after receiving the truth of God’s Word, for in doing so they mock God, reject Jesus’ sacrifice, and discount the Holy Spirit of the Father. And considering the monstrous price that Jesus paid for our sins, God freely taking His own curse and punishment for sin within Himself, is it any wonder He would enact vengeance on those who reject His selfless, freewill love offering?

Those who reject Jesus have chosen Satan as their master and have chosen to pay for their own sins, and just as Jesus suffered in Hell for our sins, even so will these people suffer the punishment for their sins in Hell and later in the Lake of Fire.

Like it or not, we are in a war, and as in any war, you must chooses sides. There is no “neutrality” in this war, you must choose between serving God and serving Satan. And if you reject God, you will be serving Satan and will follow into his punishment as well.

Choose carefully while you’re still alive, for although you can change your mind after death, that’s all you can do. Your eternal destination is set when you die and you will be there for eternity.

HEBREWS 10:32-39

32 But recall the former days in which, after you were illuminated, you endured a great struggle with sufferings:

33 partly while you were made a spectacle both by reproaches and tribulations, and partly while you became companions of those who were so treated;

34 for you had compassion on me in my chains, and joyfully accepted the plundering of your goods, knowing that you have a better and an enduring possession for yourselves in heaven.

35 Therefore do not cast away your confidence, which has great reward.

36 For you have need of endurance, so that after you have done the will of God, you may receive the promise:

37 “For yet a little while, and He who is coming will come and will not tarry.

38 Now the just shall live by faith; but if anyone draws back, My soul has no pleasure in him.”

39 But we are not of those who draw back to perdition, but of those who believe to the saving of the soul.

Christians tend to forget that when we accept Jesus we instantly become hated targets of Satan. He hates Mankind already as God has placed us above him as His highest creation and his jealousy knows no bounds. But Christians earn his deepest hatred as we will inherit God’s kingdom and live in everlasting glory, while his eternal destination is the Lake of Fire.

God, being just, sometimes allows Satan to test us in order to show us weaknesses in our faith, much as metals used in construction are put through stress tests to pinpoint weaknesses. And no Christian is too insignificant for Satan to overlook. He carefully examines each Christian, looking for weak points to exploit.

We are expected to fight Satan and his demons whenever and wherever God directs us. We are never to pick fights on our own, or we will be fighting with our own strength, without God’s power and backing.

And as in any war, soldiers are expected to fight and endure hardship, as we are fighting a sleepless, malevolent and merciless enemy whose goal is our destruction both physical and eternal. And no commander wants soldiers who break and run when the battle becomes intense.

HEBREWS 11:1-3

1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

2 For by it the elders obtained a good testimony.

3 By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible.

In the beginning God spoke everything in Creation into existence, creating the entire Universe and everything in it from nothing with the power of His word, with the exception of one thing. Man is the only thing in all of God’s Creation that was hand-made by God Himself.

GENESIS 2:7

7 And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.

Creation in the beginning was perfect, and Adam, being perfect, could see and walk with God personally and see Him as He is. But when Adam sinned, he could no longer behold God in His glory and since then God has remained invisible.

Therefore we must believe in faith what the Bible teaches us concerning God’s existence, and while we cannot see Him, He has left plenty of evidence of His handiwork in the very things we see around us.

As our scientific knowledge grows, scientists are coming more and more to the conclusion that the entire Universe was fine-tuned at Creation for life on Earth, and if even one of the values of the “cosmological constants” (gravity, electro-magnetism, energy, etc.) was slightly different, life could not form or exist on Earth.

Our planet is unique in that its orbit is circular, is just the right distance from a sun of the right color and size, has abundant liquid water, with just the right mixture of gases in our atmosphere, and has just the right gravity constant for life.

We have a Moon which stirs the oceans and atmosphere and keeps them from stagnating and the shifting atmospheric and oceanic currents distribute heat across the globe. The atmosphere blocks harmful radiation from the sun but has three “windows” of electro-magnetic transparency allowing heat, light and radio waves to travel through it.

I could fill many pages with proofs of “intelligent design” in Creation, but I think the point has been made. We cannot see God, but we can see His works and He has given us His Word and the rich history of His interactions with men as well as archaeological evidence to prove His existence.

HEBREWS 11:4-6

4 By faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, through which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts; and through it he being dead still speaks.

5 By faith Enoch was taken away so that he did not see death, “and was not found, because God had taken him”; for before he was taken he had this testimony, that he pleased God.

6 But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.

After Adam and Eve were cast out of the Garden of Eden they had a first-born son named Cain. Satan wasted no time in corrupting Cain, in spite of the fact that Cain undoubtedly knew what had caused his parents to be driven out of Eden.

Their second-born son named Abel was faithful, and when both brought an offering to the Lord, Cain being a farmer like his father, brought vegetables while Abel brought one of the best sheep of his flock as an offering. Abel’s offering was accepted by the Lord, Cain’s was not.

GENESIS 4:3-7

3 And in the process of time it came to pass that Cain brought an offering of the fruit of the ground to the Lord.

4 Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat. And the Lord respected Abel and his offering,

5 but He did not respect Cain and his offering. And Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell.

6 So the Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry? And why has your countenance fallen?

7 If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin lies at the door. And its desire is for you, but you should rule over it.”

It wasn’t the offering itself that God didn’t accept, it was the attitude in which it was offered. Abel offered his gift in faith, Cain did not. Note that even then God told us that we have power to resist sin.

Enoch, a descendant of Adam and Eve, pleased God so much that God took him so that he never saw death but was taken to ‘The Pit’, where he would rest with the righteous dead until all of the sins of Mankind were paid for by Jesus’ death on the cross.

Up to Jesus’ resurrection the righteous dead were confined to a place of paradise, located in the same place as Hell but separated by an uncrossable gulf (Luke chapter 16). They were righteous but while their sins had been covered, they were not removed. With Jesus’ resurrection their sins had been removed and they were then made worthy to enter Heaven.

HEBREWS 11:7

7 By faith Noah, being divinely warned of things not yet seen, moved with godly fear, prepared an ark for the saving of his household, by which he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.

Noah was an outstanding example of faith. God had told him to build an ark, a huge boat, because He was about to destroy the Earth with a flood of water. This required a huge leap of faith for Noah as it had never rained on the Earth to this point;

GENESIS 2:4-6

4 This is the history of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens,

5 before any plant of the field was in the earth and before any herb of the field had grown. For the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the earth, and there was no man to till the ground;

6 but a mist went up from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground.

Noah was somewhere between 500 and 600 years old when he built the Ark. It was a masterpiece of nautical engineering as he and his three sons had to cut and haul the trees to the building site, cut and shape the wood and build the Ark from the keel up on dry ground, with primitive tools and without blueprints. Nautical engineers have reported that a boat with the Ark’s dimensions would have easily been able to handle the raging waters of the Flood.

HEBREWS 11:8-12

8 By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to the place which he would receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going.

9 By faith he dwelt in the land of promise as in a foreign country, dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise;

10 for he waited for the city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God.

11 By faith Sarah herself also received strength to conceive seed, and she bore a child when she was past the age, because she judged Him faithful who had promised.

12 Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born as many as the stars of the sky in multitude—innumerable as the sand which is by the seashore.

The story of Abraham is one of monumental faith in God and His promies and only two instances of faith are shown above, Scripture records many other instances where his faith was rewarded by God.

It would take a huge amount of faith for Abraham to up and leave his parental birthplace and go blindly into the wilderness to another land, believing God’s promise that he and his descendants would inherit it, even though he was 75 years old and had no children at the time.

He then waited for 25 years for God to give him a son, having a child when he was 100 years old and Sarah his wife was 90 years old. And he understood that while his descendants would inherit all of the land of Canaan, it would be a long time later and he died in faith that God would keep His promise.

HEBREWS 11:13-16

13 These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off were assured of them, embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.

14 For those who say such things declare plainly that they seek a homeland.

15 And truly if they had called to mind that country from which they had come out, they would have had opportunity to return.

16 But now they desire a better, that is, a heavenly country. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them.

Abraham and his immediate descendants knew that even though God had promised them the land of Canaan, their possession of it would be a gradual event as there were mighty nations in the land and Abraham’s descendants were few. As God told Moses concerning bringing Israel to the Land of Canaan;

EXODUS 23:27-30

27 “I will send My fear before you, I will cause confusion among all the people to whom you come, and will make all your enemies turn their backs to you.

28 And I will send hornets before you, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite from before you.

29 I will not drive them out from before you in one year, lest the land become desolate and the beasts of the field become too numerous for you.

30 Little by little I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased, and you inherit the land.

But Abraham believed God’s promises and rejoiced that God would keep His promises, even if he didn’t see them fulfilled in his lifetime.

HEBREWS 11:17-19

17 By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises offered up his only begotten son,

18 of whom it was said, “In Isaac your seed shall be called,”

19 concluding that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead, from which he also received him in a figurative sense.

Isaac was Abraham’s only son and God had tested Abraham’s faith by commanding hm to offer Isaac as a sacrifice. Abraham prepared to offer Isaac, but God stopped him from doing so and provided a ram for Abraham to sacrifice instead.

Abraham had believed that even if he had followed God’s command, God would have restored Isaac to life in keeping with His promise that Isaac’s descendants would inherit the land. And God greatly rewarded his faith as a result.

And remember, even though God spared Isaac, He did not spare His own Son, but made Him the only offering for sin that God could accept as the price for the removal of sin and for our eternal salvation.

HEBREWS 11:20-22

20 By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau concerning things to come.

21 By faith Jacob, when he was dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph, and worshiped, leaning on the top of his staff.

22 By faith Joseph, when he was dying, made mention of the departure of the children of Israel, and gave instructions concerning his bones.

God blessed the sons of Jacob, the patriarch of the 12 tribes, and Joseph his son believed that God would return Israel to Canaan after their 430 year stay in Egypt, commanding that his bones be brought back to Canaan when Israel returned.

HEBREWS 11:23-29

23 By faith Moses, when he was born, was hidden three months by his parents, because they saw he was a beautiful child; and they were not afraid of the king’s command.

24 By faith Moses, when he became of age, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter,

25 choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin,

26 esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt; for he looked to the reward.

27 By faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king; for he endured as seeing Him who is invisible.

28 By faith he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of blood, lest He who destroyed the firstborn should touch them.

29 By faith they passed through the Red Sea as by dry land, whereas the Egyptians, attempting to do so, were drowned.

Pharaoh (more than likely Ahmose I) had ordered that all male Hebrew children were to be drowned in the Nile River as the Egyptians had recently overthrown the hated Asiatic Hyksos (shepherd-king) invaders who had conquered Egypt a hundred years before.

Israelites, being Asiatic in origin and shepherds themselves would have been hated by the Egyptians and as the Israelites outnumbered the native Egyptians, Pharaoh was paranoid that Israel might take advantage of a weakened Egypt to conquer it for themselves. So they made slaves of Israel for 430 years, keeping them under brutal bondage to keep them in check.

When Moses was born, rather than kill him, his parents put him in a waterproof basket in the reeds of the river where Pharaoh’s daughter bathed, and when she saw him she adopted him as her son.

As Moses grew up he realized his Israelite heritage and at one point he killed an Egyptian taskmaster who was beating an Israeli man. Word of the deed got to Pharaoh who then ordered Moses to be killed. Moses fled to Midian (present-day Saudi Arabia) and remained there for 40 years until God spoke to him from a burning bush and sent him back to Egypt to free Israel.

After devastating Egypt economically with the famous 10 plagues, Pharaoh finally let Israel go, but shortly afterward changed his mind and pursued after them with his army, trapping them between the Red Sea and his army.

God then parted the waters of the Red Sea and Israel fled to the shores of Midian on the other side. When Pharaoh’s army pursued, God closed the waters and drowned the Egyptians to the last man.

HEBREWS 11:30-31

30 By faith the walls of Jericho fell down after they were encircled for seven days.

31 By faith the harlot Rahab did not perish with those who did not believe, when she had received the spies with peace.

Jericho was a heavily-fortified royal Canaanite city with thick walls on a tall mound and could withstand a siege for years if attacked. God ordered Israel to march around the walls once a day for 6 days and the seventh day they were to march seven times and then blow trumpets and shout.

They did so and the walls collapsed outwards, possibly from an earthquake and the collapsed walls made natural attack ramps up into the city. A harlot named Rahab earlier had hidden two Israelite spies who had come to spy out the city’s defenses, and the spies told her that she would be spared the destruction of the city because of her faith, She and her household were the only inhabitants left alive after Israel had destroyed the city.

HEBREWS 11:32-40

32 And what more shall I say? For the time would fail me to tell of Gideon and Barak and Samson and Jephthah, also of David and Samuel and the prophets:

33 who through faith subdued kingdoms, worked righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions,

34 quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, became valiant in battle, turned to flight the armies of the aliens.

35 Women received their dead raised to life again. Others were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection.

36 Still others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yes, and of chains and imprisonment.

37 They were stoned, they were sawn in two, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented—

38 of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, in dens and caves of the earth.

39 And all these, having obtained a good testimony through faith, did not receive the promise,

40 God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us.

The Bible, especially the Old Testament is chock full of rich history of God’s righteous men, women and prophets who despite being persecuted and killed still kept their faith, believing in God’s promises of peace, joy and eternal life after death. In the mean time, their faith allowed them to perform incredible miracles showing the truth of God and giving their hearers and readers hope of better things.

HEBREWS 12:1-2

1 Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,

2 looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Jesus is held up as an example for us, who was able to look beyond the cross to the rewards of perseverance knowing that the trials of this world, though harsh at times, are only temporary. And like an endurance runner we are to keep our eyes on the finish line, determined to finish the race.

HEBREWS 12:3-6

3 For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls.

4 You have not yet resisted to bloodshed, striving against sin.

5 And you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons: “My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord, nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him;

6 For whom the Lord loves He chastens, and scourges every son whom He receives.”

Parents understand this, as we must at times discipline our children for their own good, teaching them that willful wrongdoing can have consequences. The book of Proverbs speaks of this;

PROVERBS 13:24

24 He who spares his rod hates his son, but he who loves him disciplines him promptly.

And;

PROVERBS 22:15

Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child; the rod of correction will drive it far from him.

We have too many “experts” today who equate discipline with child abuse and who equate spanking with beating. Granted, there are parents who do indeed beat and abuse their children but compared to the overall population, they are very few.

Yet many ignorant adults have gone far opposite to the point of where the government has decreed that children can accuse their parents of abuse if the parent tries to discipline them in any way and the parents can be jailed and have their children taken away from them.

It has gone so far that an “expert” in Australia recently stated that a parent needs to ask their babies for permission to change their diapers.

The result has been a present out-of-control generation of young adults who are vicious, violent, disrespectful, greedy, hateful whiners with no solid morals and who feel that the world owes them a living simply because they exist.

Jesus took our sins within Himself on the cross but that does not give us the freedom to continue sinning, nor is it fair to expect Jesus to be punished alone for our sins. God sometimes punishes us to show areas or actions in our lives that are displeasing to Him. He’ll convict us, but if we ignore Him and keep sinning He will punish us in measure to get our attention. And it is better to be punished lightly here on Earth than to face His wrath and be ashamed before Him at our Judgment!

HEBREWS 12:7-11

7 If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten?

8 But if you are without chastening, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate and not sons.

9 Furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much more readily be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live?

10 For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed best to them, but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness.

11 Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

No one likes to be punished. However punishment reinforces the knowledge that bad behavior will not be tolerated and if more parents disciplined their children when young, law enforcement would not need to correct them later.

God is our Father and like a loving Father, He punishes us when He feels that it is needed for our correction but He does not stop loving us. And just like the two quotes from Proverbs above, if we don’t discipline our children when young, we are guilty of neglect.

HEBREWS 12:12-17

12 Therefore strengthen the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees,

13 and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be dislocated, but rather be healed.

14 Pursue peace with all people, and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord:

15 looking carefully lest anyone fall short of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up cause trouble, and by this many become defiled;

16 lest there be any fornicator or profane person like Esau, who for one morsel of food sold his birthright.

17 For you know that afterward, when he wanted to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, for he found no place for repentance, though he sought it diligently with tears.

Again we are told to stay the course, live our lives with patience and diligence, being always watchful for Satan’s tireless attempts to subvert us through subtle sins or foolish decisions like what happened to Jacob’s brother Esau. Satan is a firm believer in “divide and conquer” as divided churches are little threat to him. As Paul stated;

2 CORINTHIANS 2:11

11 lest Satan should take advantage of us; for we are not ignorant of his devices.

HEBREWS 12:18-24

18 For you have not come to the mountain that may be touched and that burned with fire, and to blackness and darkness and tempest,

19 and the sound of a trumpet and the voice of words, so that those who heard it begged that the word should not be spoken to them anymore.

20 (For they could not endure what was commanded: “And if so much as a beast touches the mountain, it shall be stoned or shot with an arrow.”

21 And so terrifying was the sight that Moses said, “I am exceedingly afraid and trembling.”)

22 But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable company of angels,

23 to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are registered in heaven, to God the Judge of all, to the spirits of just men made perfect,

24 to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel.

Again the comparison is made between the physical and spiritual aspect of the covenants made by God. When God gave the physical Law to Israel, He shrouded Himself in thick darkness and commanded that nothing, either Man or beast was allowed to touch the mountain on pain of death. This represented the barrier of sin between a holy God and sinful Man.

But now, with the new Covenant in Jesus, we can approach God directly without fear as the barrier of sin has been removed through the sacrifice of Jesus, and as verse 23 says we are made perfect in Him after death.

HEBREWS 12:25-29

25 See that you do not refuse Him who speaks. For if they did not escape who refused Him who spoke on earth, much more shall we not escape if we turn away from Him who speaks from heaven,

26 whose voice then shook the earth; but now He has promised, saying, “Yet once more I shake not only the earth, but also heaven.”

27 Now this, “Yet once more,” indicates the removal of those things that are being shaken, as of things that are made, that the things which cannot be shaken may remain.

28 Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear.

29 For our God is a consuming fire.

The book of Isaiah speaks of the heavens peeling back like a scroll when Jesus returns. The book of Revelation also speaks of an earthquake so great that there has been nothing like it before;

ISAIAH 34:4

4 All the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled up like a scroll; all their host shall fall down as the leaf falls from the vine, and as fruit falling from a fig tree.

REVELATION 16:18

18 And there were noises and thunderings and lightnings; and there was a great earthquake, such a mighty and great earthquake as had not occurred since men were on the earth.

Isaiah also speaks of the final earthquake when he prophesied;

ISAIAH 24:17-23

17 Fear and the pit and the snare are upon you, O inhabitant of the earth.

18 And it shall be that he who flees from the noise of the fear shall fall into the pit, and he who comes up from the midst of the pit shall be caught in the snare; for the windows from on high are open, and the foundations of the earth are shaken.

19 The earth is violently broken, the earth is split open, the earth is shaken exceedingly.

20 The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall totter like a hut; its transgression shall be heavy upon it, and it will fall, and not rise again.

21 It shall come to pass in that day that the Lord will punish on high the host of exalted ones, and on the earth the kings of the earth.

22 They will be gathered together, as prisoners are gathered in the pit, and will be shut up in the prison; after many days they will be visited.

23 Then the moon will be disgraced and the sun ashamed; for the Lord of hosts will reign on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem and before His elders, gloriously.

The time is soon coming when there will be massive changes to the Universe as we know it. When Jesus returns there will be no sun or moon, no stars either. As John described in Revelation concerning the new Jerusalem;

REVELATION 21:23-27

23 The city had no need of the sun or of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God illuminated it. The Lamb is its light.

24 And the nations of those who are saved shall walk in its light, and the kings of the earth bring their glory and honor into it.

25 Its gates shall not be shut at all by day (there shall be no night there).

26 And they shall bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it.

27 But there shall by no means enter it anything that defiles, or causes an abomination or a lie, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.

According to Isaiah God will punish Satan and his demons as well as the sinners of Earth by casting them into prison (Hell) where they will be held while Jesus reigns on the Earth for 1,000 years. In ancient times prisoners were kept in pits in the ground with a barred lattice on top to keep them there. In similar fashion, Hell is described in the Old Testament as “the Pit”. As Moses told rebellious Korah and those with him who had accused him of deceiving the people;

NUMBERS 16:28-34

28 And Moses said: “By this you shall know that the Lord has sent me to do all these works, for I have not done them of my own will.

29 If these men die naturally like all men, or if they are visited by the common fate of all men, then the Lord has not sent me.

30 But if the Lord creates a new thing, and the earth opens its mouth and swallows them up with all that belongs to them, and they go down alive into the pit, then you will understand that these men have rejected the Lord.”

31 Now it came to pass, as he finished speaking all these words, that the ground split apart under them,

32 and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up, with their households and all the men with Korah, with all their goods.

33 So they and all those with them went down alive into the pit; the earth closed over them, and they perished from among the assembly.

34 Then all Israel who were around them fled at their cry, for they said, “Lest the earth swallow us up also!”

HEBREWS 13:1-6

1 Let brotherly love continue.

2 Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some have unwittingly entertained angels.

3 Remember the prisoners as if chained with them—those who are mistreated—since you yourselves are in the body also.

4 Marriage is honorable among all, and the bed undefiled; but fornicators and adulterers God will judge.

5 Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”

6 So we may boldly say: “The Lord is my helper I will not fear. What can man do to me?”

We always see pictures of angels with wings, yet nowhere in the Bible does it ever describe them as having wings. When God (a pre-incarnate appearance of Jesus) and two angels appeared to Abraham just before the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah looked like ordinary men;

GENESIS 18:1-5

1 Then the Lord appeared to him by the terebinth trees of Mamre, as he was sitting in the tent door in the heat of the day.

2 So he lifted his eyes and looked, and behold, three men were standing by him; and when he saw them, he ran from the tent door to meet them, and bowed himself to the ground,

3 and said, “My Lord, if I have now found favor in Your sight, do not pass on by Your servant.

4 Please let a little water be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree.

5 And I will bring a morsel of bread, that you may refresh your hearts. After that you may pass by, inasmuch as you have come to your servant.” They said, “Do as you have said.”

Note that Scripture says three men stood beside him, no wings or extraordinary appearance about them.

The prophet Daniel saw the angel Gabriel in visions and described him as a man;

DANIEL 8:15-17

15 Then it happened, when I, Daniel, had seen the vision and was seeking the meaning, that suddenly there stood before me one having the appearance of a man.

16 And I heard a man’s voice between the banks of the Ulai, who called, and said, “Gabriel, make this man understand the vision.”

17 So he came near where I stood, and when he came I was afraid and fell on my face; but he said to me, “Understand, son of man, that the vision refers to the time of the end.”

Angels are God’s servants who perform His will and protect believers in Jesus. They are NOT worthy of worship as they are created beings themselves. As the apostle John recorded in Revelation;

REVELATION 22:8-9

8 Now I, John, saw and heard these things. And when I heard and saw, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel who showed me these things.

9 Then he said to me, “See that you do not do that. For I am your fellow servant, and of your brethren the prophets, and of those who keep the words of this book. Worship God.”

Remember the afflicted and persecuted in prayer, even as you would want them to keep you in prayer also.

Flee illicit relationships, remembering that during intimate relations the two of you become “one flesh” before God and if one partner is demon-possessed the demons now have a legal right to inhabit both of you because of your disobedience to Gods commands against fornication and adultery and by becoming “one flesh”.

Do not allow desire for riches to corrupt your relationship with God. Remember the Proverbs prayer;

PROVERBS 30:7-9

7 Two things I request of You (deprive me not before I die):

8 Remove falsehood and lies far from me; give me neither poverty nor riches— feed me with the food allotted to me;

9 Lest I be full and deny You, and say, “Who is the Lord? Or lest I be poor and steal,

and profane the name of my God.

HEBREWS 13:7-9

7 Remember those who rule over you, who have spoken the word of God to you, whose faith follow, considering the outcome of their conduct.

8 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

9 Do not be carried about with various and strange doctrines. For it is good that the heart be established by grace, not with foods which have not profited those who have been occupied with them.

Follow the examples of mature Christians and accept their wisdom. They have much experience and we would be fools to not learn from them so we don’t have to learn the hard way.

Unlike man-made gods Jesus never changes, so what we know about Him from God’s Word is permanent truth, as are His teachings and promises.

Satan always tries to twist and distort the Word of God by having his servants add their own man-made commandments and doctrines to God’s commandments as did the Pharisees and Sadducees. Or those who use the Gospel to enrich themselves (like the “prosperity Gospel” preachers) at the expense of their flocks.

HEBREWS 13:10-16

10 We have an altar from which those who serve the tabernacle have no right to eat.

11 For the bodies of those animals, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned outside the camp.

12 Therefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people with His own blood, suffered outside the gate.

13 Therefore let us go forth to Him, outside the camp, bearing His reproach.

14 For here we have no continuing city, but we seek the one to come.

15 Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name.

16 But do not forget to do good and to share, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.

In the Old Testament Law of Moses if the High Priest sinned he was to sacrifice a young bull, use the blood to atone for his sin and then the entire bull was to be burned to ashes outside the camp. Even so Jesus, our High Priest atoned for our sins with His own blood outside of Jerusalem on Calvary, then was sent to Hell suffering in fire until the price of our sins had been paid.

Offering of praises and thanksgiving to God for His incredible love, mercy and blessings is well-pleasing to God, as He is more than worthy of such praises and thanks.

HEBREWS 13:17-19

17 Obey those who rule over you, and be submissive, for they watch out for your souls, as those who must give account. Let them do so with joy and not with grief, for that would be unprofitable for you.

18 Pray for us; for we are confident that we have a good conscience, in all things desiring to live honorably.

19 But I especially urge you to do this, that I may be restored to you the sooner.

Remember, those set over you have been appointed by God to do that very thing and they have a responsibility before God to be examples to others. As rulers, they are also teachers and must be aware of James’ warning of; 

JAMES 3:1

My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment.

It seems as if the author may be awaiting trial as he is asking for prayer to be restored to his audience, but it is not clear what his situation might be.

HEBREWS 13:20-25

20 Now may the God of peace who brought up our Lord Jesus from the dead, that great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant,

21 make you complete in every good work to do His will, working in you what is well pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.

22 And I appeal to you, brethren, bear with the word of exhortation, for I have written to you in few words.

23 Know that our brother Timothy has been set free, with whom I shall see you if he comes shortly.

24 Greet all those who rule over you, and all the saints. Those from Italy greet you.

25 Grace be with you all. Amen.

It seems that Timothy had been imprisoned, although whether by Roman authorities or by local magistrates is not known. And it seems that the church the author is writing to is outside of Italy as the author states, “Those from Italy greet you”, although the location of the church is also not known.

The fact that Paul always identified himself in his epistles and that identification is missing in this letter and the fact that the Greek used is of such high class, even greater than Luke’s books (Luke and Acts) indicates that the author was highly educated and trained.

And while the author remains unknown, the book is recognized as Scripture and therefore can be trusted as such.

Questions? Comments? E:mail: watchmen_777@yahoo.com

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