This is the reason why it is so much the more needful to hearken t the word
spoken, in order that they should not let it pass away form life and
memory.
God had maintained the authority of the word that was communicated by means
of angels, punishing disobedience to it, for it was a law. How then shall
we escape if we neglect a salvation which the Lord Himself has announced?
Thus the service of the Lord among the Jews was a word of salvation, which
the apostles confirmed, and which the mighty testimony of the Holy Ghost
established.
Such is the exhortation addressed to the believing Jews, founded on the
glory of the Messiah, whether with regard to His position of His Person,
calling them away from what was Jewish to higher thoughts of Christ.
We have already remarked that the testimony, of which this epistle treats,
is attributed to the Lord Himself. Therefore we must not expect to find in
it the assembly (as such), of which the Lord had only spoken prophetically;
but His testimony in relation to Israel, among whom He sojourned on the
earth, to whatever extent that testimony reached. That which was spoken by
the apostles is only treated here as a confirmation of the Lord's own word,
God having added His testimony to it by the miraculous manifestations of
the Spirit, who distributed His gifts to each according to His will.
The glory of which we have been speaking is the personal glory of the
Messiah, the Son of David; and His glory in the time present, during which
God has called Him to sit at His right hand. He is the Son of God, He is
even the Creator; but there is also His glory in connection with the world
to come, as Son of man. Of this chapter 2 speaks, comparing Him still with
the angels; but here to exclude them altogether. In the previous chapter
they had their place; the law was given by angels; they are servants, on
God's part, of the heirs of salvation. In chapter w they have no place,
they do not reign; the world to come is not made subject to them-that is,
this habitable earth, directed and governed as it will be when God shall
have accomplished that which He has spoken of by the prophets.
The order of the world, placed in relationship with Jehovah under the law,
or "lying in darkness," has been interrupted by the rejection of the
Messiah, who has taken His place at the right hand of God on high, His
enemies being not yet given into His hand for judgment; because God is
carrying on His work of grace, and gathering out the assembly. But He will
yet establish a new order of things on the earth; this will be "the world
to come." Now that world is not made subject to angels. The testimony given
in the Old Testament with regard to this is as follows: "What is man, that
thou art mindful of him; or the son of man that thou visitest him? Thou
hast made him a little lower than the angels; thou hast crowned him with
glory and honour; thou hast set him over the works of thy hands; thou hast
put all things under his feet." Thus all things without exception (save He
who has made them subject to Him), are, according to the purpose of God,
put under the feet of man, and in particular of the Son of man.
When studying the Book of Psalms, we saw that which I recall here, namely,
that this testimony in Psalm 8 is, with regard to the position and dominion
of Christ as man, an advance upon Psalm 2. Psalm 1 sets before us the
righteous man, accepted of God, the godly remnant with which Christ
connected Himself; Psalm 2, the counsels of God respecting His Messiah, in
spite of the efforts made by the kings and governors of the earth. God
establishes Him as King in Zion, and summons all the kings to do homage to
Him whom He proclaimed to be His Son on the earth. Afterwards we see that
being rejected the remnant suffer, and this Psalm 2 is what Peter quotes to
prove the rising up of the powers of the earth, Jewish and Gentile, against
Messiah. (Acts 4:26) But Psalm 8 shews that all this only served to enlarge
the sphere of His glory. Christ takes the position of man and the title of
Son of man, and enjoys His rights according to the counsels of God; and,
made lower than the angels, He is crowned with glory and honour. And not
only are the kings of the earth made subject to Him, but all things,
without exception, are put under His feet. [see note #8] It is this which the
apostle quotes here. The Christ had already been rejected, and His being
established as King in Zion put off to be accomplished at a later period.
He had been exalted to the right hand of God, as we have seen; and the
wider title had accrued to Him, although the result was not yet
accomplished.
To this the epistle here calls our attention. We see not yet the
accomplishment of all that this Psalm announces, namely, that all things
should be put under His feet; but a part is already fulfilled, a guarantee
to the heart of the fulfillment of the whole. Made a little lower than the
angels in order to suffer death, He is crowned with glory and honour. He
has suffered death, and He is crowned in reward for His work, by which He
perfectly glorified God in the place where He had been dishonoured, and
saved man (those who believe in Him) where man was lost. For He was made
lower than the angels, in order that, by the grace of God, He should taste
death for all things. It appears to me that the words "for the suffering of
death," and "a little lower than the angels" go together; and "so that by
the grace of God" is a general phrase connected with the whole truth
stated.
This passage then, which is thus applied to the Lord, presents Him as
exalted to heaven when He had undergone the death which gave Him a right to
all in a new way while waiting till all is put under His feet. But there is
another truth connected with this. He had undertaken the cause of the sons
whom God is bringing to glory, and therefore He must enter into the
circumstances in which they were found, suffer the consequences thereof,
and be treated according to the work He had undertaken. It was a reality;
and it was fitting that God should vindicate the rights of His glory, and
should maintain it with reference to those who had dishonoured Him, and
that He should treat the one who had taken their cause in hand, and who
stood before Him in their name, as representing them in that respect. God
would bring the captain of their salvation to perfection through
sufferings. He was to undergo the consequences of the situation into which
He had come. His work was to be a reality, according to the measure of the
responsibility which He had taken upon Himself, and it involved the glory
of God where sin was. He must therefore suffer; He must taste death. It is
by the grace of God that He did so-we, because of sin; He because of grace
for sin.
This shews us the Christ standing in the midst of those who are saved, whom
God brings to glory, although at their head. It is this which our epistle
sets before us-He who sanctifies (the Christ), and they who are sanctified
(the remnant set apart for God by the Spirit) are all of one: an
expression, the force of which is easily apprehended, but difficult to
express, when one abandons the abstract nature of the phrase itself.
Observe that it is only of sanctified persons that this is said. Christ and
the sanctified ones are all one company, men together in the same position
before God. But the idea goes a little farther.
It is not of one and the same Father; had it been so, it could not have
been said, "He is not ashamed to call them brethren." He could not then do
otherwise than call them brethren.
If we say "of the same mass" the expression may be pushed too far, as
though He and the others were of the same nature as children of Adam,
sinners together. In this case He would have to call every man His brother;
whereas it is only the children whom God has given Him, "sanctified" ones,
that He calls so. But He and the sanctified ones are all as men in the same
nature and position together before God. When I say "the same," it is not
in the same state of sin, but the contrary, for they are the Sanctifier and
the sanctified, but in the same truth of human position as it is before God
as sanctified to Him; the same as far forth as man when He, as the
sanctified one, is before God. On this account He is not ashamed to call
the sanctified His brethren.
This position is entirely gained by resurrection; for although in
principle, the children were given to Him before, yet He only called them
His brethren when He had finished the work which enabled Him to present
them with Himself before God. He said indeed "mother, sister, brother;" but
He did not use the term "my brethren," until He said to Mary of Magdala,
"Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend to my Father and your
Father, and to my God an your God." Also in Psalm 22 it is when He had been
heard from the horns of the unicorn, that He declared the name of a
Deliverer-God to His brethren, and that He praised God in the midst of the
assembly.
He spoke to them of the Father's name while on earth, but the link itself
could not be formed; He could not introduce them to the Father, until the
grain of wheat, falling into the ground, had died; until then He remained
alone, whatever might be the revelations that He made to them and in fact,
He declared the name of His Father to those whom He had given Him. Still He
had actually taken the human position, and He Himself was in this relation
ship with God. He kept them in the Father's name, they were not yet united
to Him in this position; but He was as man in the relationship with God in
which they also should be, when brought in by redemption into association
with Himself. That which He does in the latter part of the Gospel by John
is to place His disciples-in the explanations He gave of the condition in
which He left them-in the position which He in fact had held in
relationship with His Father on earth, and in testimony to the world, the
glory of His Person as representing and revealing His Father being
necessarily distinct. And, in seeking t associate with them, He associated
them with Himself and Himself with them when He ascended to heaven,
although no longer corporeally subject to the trials of their position.
[see note #9]
He was not ashamed to call them brethren, saying, though risen, yea, only
when risen, "I will declare thy name unto my brethren, I will praise thee
in the midst of the assembly." And speaking of the remnant separated from
Israel, He says, "Behold I and the children whom God hath given me are for
signs unto the two houses of Israel;" and again, "I will put my trust in
him"-another quotation from Isaiah 8. So in the Psalms, especially in Psalm
16, He declares that He does not take His place as God-"my goodness
extendeth not to thee," but that He identifies Himself with the excellent
of the earth-that all His delight is in them. This is again the remnant of
Israel called by grace.
Christ associates these sanctified men, godly men on earth, with Himself.
In the passage quoted it is still His place on earth: His sufferings, His
exaltation, future glory, divinity are, as we have seen added here.
Having taken this place as of, but at the head of, the chosen band-their
servant in all things, He must conform Himself to their position. And this
He did: the children being partakers of flesh and blood, He took part in
the same; and this, in order that by death He might put an end to the
dominion of him who had the power of death, and deliver those who, through
fear of death, had been subjected all their life to the yoke of bondage.
Here also (the apostle seeking always to display the glorious and
efficacious side, even of that which was most humbling, in order to
accustom the weak heart of the Jews to that portion of the gospel) we find
that the Lord's work goes far beyond the limits of a presentation of the
Messiah to His people. Not only is He glorious in heaven, but He has
conquered Satan in the very place where he exercised his sad dominion over
man, and where the judgment of God lay heavily upon man.
Moved by a profound love for man, the Son-become the Son of man-enters in
heart and in fact into all the need, and submits to all the circumstances,
of man in order to deliver him. He takes (for He was not in it before)
flesh and blood, in order to die, because man was subjected to death; and
(in order to destroy him who exercised his dominion over man through death,
and made him tremble all his lifetime in the expectation of that terrible
moment, which testified of the judgment of God, and the inability of man to
escape the consequences of sin) and the condition into which disobedience
to God had plunged him. For verily the Lord did not undertake the cause of
angels, but that of the seed of Abraham, and in order to proclaim the work
that was necessary for them, and to represent them efficaciously and really
before God, He must needs put Himself into the position and the
circumstances into which that seed were found, thought not the state they
were personally in.
It will be remarked here, that it is still a family owned of God, which is
before our eyes, as the object of the Saviour's affection and care-the
children whom God had given Him, children of Abraham after the flesh, if in
that condition they answered to the designation of "seed of Abraham" (this
is the question of John 8:37-39), or his children according to the Spirit,
if grace gives it them.
These truths introduce priesthood, As Son of man, He had been made a little
less than the angels, and, crowned already with glory and honour, was
hereafter to have all things put under His feet. This we do not yet see.
But He took this place of humiliation in order to taste death for the whole
system that was afar from God, and to gain the full rights of the second
Man, by glorifying God there, where the creature had failed through
weakness, and where also the enemy, having deceived man by his subtlety,
had dominion over him (according to the righteous judgment of God) in power
and malice. At the same time he tasted death for the special purpose of
delivering the children whom God would bring to glory, taking their nature
and gathering them together as sanctified ones around Himself, He not being
ashamed to call them brethren. But it was thus that He was to present them
now before God, according to the efficacy of the work which He had
accomplished for them; He would become a priest, being able through His
life of humiliation and trial here below, to sympathize with His own in all
their conflicts and difficulties.
He suffered-never yielded. We do not suffer when we yield to temptation:
the flesh takes pleasure in the things by which it is tempted. Jesus
suffered, being tempted, and He is able to succour them that are tempted.
It is important to observe that the flesh, when acted upon by its desires,
does not suffer. Being tempted, it , alas! enjoys. But when, according to
the light of the Holy Ghost and the fidelity of obedience, the Spirit
resists the attacks of the enemy, whether subtle or persecuting, then one
suffers. This the Lord did, and this we have to do. That which needs
succour is the new man, the faithful heart, and not the flesh. I need
succour against the flesh, and in order to mortify all the members of the
old man.
Here the needed help refers to the difficulties of the faithful saint in
fulfilling all the will of God. This is where he suffers, this is where the
Lord-who has suffered-can succor him. He trod this path, He learn in it
what which can be suffered there form the enemy, and from men. A human
heart feels it, and Jesus had a human heart. Besides, the more faithful the
heart is, the more full of love to God, and the less it has of that
hardness which is the result of intercourse with the world, the more will
it suffer. Now there was no hardness in Jesus. His faithfulness and His
love were equally perfect. He was a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief
and weariness. He suffered being tempted. [see note #10]
