Obedient even to the point of Death - Hebrews Part 10 - Jason Willis

Morning, everybody.

Welcome to Week 10 of Hebrews. Today we're going to be picking up where we left off last week. And as I was preparing this lesson today, I realized that in previous weeks I have somewhat been cannibalizing the passages that we'll be looking at today.

What I mean is that in previous weeks I've been skipping forward to a lot of the verses we'll be looking at today and using them as supporting text for previous lessons. So we're going to hit each verse, but on some of them, instead of rehashing them, I might just breeze through them or breeze past them. And for those who may be listening to this online, you can go back to previous lessons and hear the full thoughts on those. For those who are in the room stuck in a reality that can't rewind to previous lessons, you'll just have to do your best to tap into your memory banks. And I can already hear Andre, "But Jason, I missed four Sundays, four Sunday schools."

Shame, shame, shame. Can't be missing Sunday school. But in all fairness, he was actually teaching the children Sunday school, and he had some sick children for a few weeks, so we can give him a pass on that. Last week we talked about entering into God's rest, and at the very end of the lesson we discussed what this rest of God is actually referring to. And very briefly, I mentioned that the rest was referring to heavenly rest.

And then during the comments, someone mentioned—I don't remember exactly who; I think it may have been Michael—someone mentioned this idea that this rest, that there may be some earthly application to this, something on this side of heaven, and maybe there is a different or dual application. And so I was thinking about that this week, and I did a little bit more digging into it, and I found that there may be a potential earthly application to that.

Philippians 4:5-7 says, "Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your request be known to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your heart and mind through Jesus Christ." Now I can see how this verse could possibly be an application to the rest of God, being something that we may experience here.

When you've reached the human limits of being able to comprehend something, when based on the circumstances in life it makes absolute zero sense for you to have any peace whatsoever, when by all accounts you should be falling apart at the seams, yet for some reason, somehow there's peace and a peace that transcends understanding, this would indeed seem to be a type of God's rest that we can experience.

Wondering if this could be an application, I decided to look up both the Greek word for peace in this verse here in Philippians, and then the Greek word for rest in Hebrews 3:11, which we were looking at in the previous weeks, and compare the two. I was thinking, "Hmm, I wonder if maybe these are the same words that were just maybe translated or rendered differently because of the context."

So within about 120 seconds or so, I had both of them pulled up on my screen in the interlinear Bible. And this thought came to my mind that it is amazing that just so quickly, a few clicks of a button, we can have all this information accessible to us, that someone who was 40 years old back when I was 10 had to go to a bookshelf and look through a real book. Who would do that? Who would want to do that? But in just mere moments, I have all of this information accessible to me, so we should not take for granted this amazing time that we live in. Many of you in this room already know how to look into words like this and study them, but there may be some of you in the room who haven't yet in their lives.

So instead of me just telling you what I found, I figured I would take a few extra minutes and walk you through how I looked into these words, just to give you something a little practical that you can take home with you today. And I'm doing this for two reasons. One is to show you how easy these things are to look into, and two is to show you how little I actually know about this stuff. I use these resources that I'm about to show you all the time. I say, "Well, this passage in Greek, it means this," or, "The meaning of this Greek word is blah, blah, blah." But in reality, I don't know Greek.

I'm totally unstudied in it. So if I ever say something like that and you're thinking, "Well, I don't know, that doesn't quite seem right to me," then in a case like this, I want to know that you know, that you can follow through and look up these things yourself. So this is how it works. First, you go to Google and you just do a search for interlinear Bible. And as you will see, you don't even have to know how to spell it. You just have to try your best, and Google will finish your thought for you. Once you click on it, this will load. Now, odds are the top option will be what you're looking for.

Sometimes it doesn't always come up that way. So the one that I use is the biblehub.com. So when you see biblehub.com, click on that, and the site will load. Now, in a situation like this where I'm going to be comparing two different words, what I like to do is I like to open it up twice. So I'll come up here to the link, and I copy it, and then I'm just going to open up a second tab and paste it in there. So now I can have two of the same website opened up at the same time. And then because we want to look at these words side by side, I like to put them side by side on the screen.

So I will drag one of the tabs out to make its own window and drag it off the screen, and that'll snap it to half the page. And then I'll open up the other side. So now we're in a position to look at both words. We got them side by side here.

Next, we simply type in the passage over here on the left. Philippians 4:7 is the first one we want to look at. And then over here to the right, we'll look up Hebrews 3:11 and give that a second to load.

So now we can see both of these passages in English and in Greek, and we can click on each of the words and drill down to what definitions are available and what usages there are. So let's look at these two words in comparison. Over on the left-hand side of the screen, we have the word used in Philippians for peace, and then over on the right-hand side of the screen, we have the word used in Hebrews for rest. Now, the next step that I did here was to look to see if the same word is being used. In this case, these clearly seem to be different words. Peace is the word irony, and rest is the word cataposan.

But before you conclude that these are different words being used, you first want to look at these little numbers that are above each word. Here we have 1515, and over here we have 2663. The fact that these are different numbers means that these are actually two different words.

Now, if I'm not mistaken, these numbers are the strong coordinates word numbers. Each word is assigned a number. And so sometimes when you're looking at the words themselves, they may not look identical, so they will appear to be different words. But then when you look at these numbers, if you see that they're the same, then you're actually looking at the same word. What this means is that they're the same words, but they may be used in different tenses. Maybe one's in present tense, one may be in the present continual or past tense. But once you see that they're different numbers, you know that you're looking at two different words. So in this example, we see that these are two different words.

And so to dig deeper from here, we simply click on each of these numbers. On the left-hand side, we'll click on the 1515 itself, and on the right-hand side, click on the 2663. Now, there's a lot of data on this page.

On the right-hand side, you can see every instance where the word is used in all of Scripture, and you can just, if you want to look into them, you can click on them to read the verses. Over to the left-hand side, we have the strong concordance, which is what we'll be focusing on here. Let me blow it up a little.

So here to the right, and right here, and right here, we have the definitions of the words. And this is the example of Hebrews 3:11. Now, notice that for this word, there's only one definition, one possible definition that's given here, and that's rest, nothing else.

Down here at the bottom, you will see the usage. In this example, the usage is the Old Testament reference to the rest attained by entering into the promised land, which we've been talking about. It could also be used as resting, but also look at this. It could also be used for dwelling or habitation.

And so this brings in the idea of possibly being a heavenly application. That is to say that if God's rest is meaning being in God's dwelling or God's habitation, then this may be the heavenly application. And this may be the way that Chrysostom was looking at it when he came to his conclusion that it was discussing heavenly rest. Now, let's look at these two words, the words in Philippians.

Notice that for this word, instead of it just being one possible definition, we have four possible definitions. This word could mean one, or peace, or quietness, or check this out, it could mean rest. So what does this mean? It means that it's possible that this verse in Philippians, the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, could possibly render the rest of God, which transcends all understanding. This verse may have a connection with an idea of the rest that we can enter being something that can apply to our earthly existence.

And if you look at the verse just before it, this makes clear that this passage is definitely referring to this side of heaven. Why do I say this? Because this verse says to be anxious about nothing, and being anxious about things doesn't seem like a description of heaven to me. So maybe there is a dual application to what Hebrews is speaking of about us entering into God's rest. That being said, let's pick up with our text for today. "Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience." This was the verse that we got through last week.

Now, the next verse, we're going to see at least one reason why Chrysostom concluded that the rest of God being spoken of in Hebrews here is referring to heavenly rest, or at least that it is primarily speaking of that. The next verse, "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.

And there is no creature hidden from his sight, but all things are naked and open to the eye of him to whom we must give an account." So do you see how just after Paul exhorts us to enter into the rest, he immediately follows this up with a warning to not be disobedient, for judgment is coming?

Chrysostom says, "To avoid anyone thinking that by not entering his rest, that one will simply be deprived of rest alone," Paul adds also the punishment by saying, "For the word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword and pierces even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joints and of marrow, and is the discerner of thoughts and the intents of the heart." Here he is speaking of hell and of punishment. "It pierces," he says, "into the secrets of our hearts and cuts apart the soul."

Here it is not referring to the falling of carcasses nor of being deprived of a country. Instead, he speaks of either being deprived of a heavenly kingdom or being delivered to an everlasting hell, to an undying punishment and vengeance. He says, "Look, we're not merely talking about dying here. We're not talking about not being able to enter into some earthly kingdom." Paul's showing in verses 12 and 13 that to enter into God's rest or to not enter into it is to enter into either the eternal kingdom of God or into everlasting punishment.

When this all takes place, when we move into this rest of God, the king will be there ready to judge you with the sword in his mouth, and his judgment will cut you. It will pierce into you. His judgment will descend so deep into you that it will create a division between your bones and your marrow. It will not stop even there, though. It will go beyond that which is physical into that which is spiritual, and it will divide your soul and your spirit.

But even this is not the end of its descent. It will go even deeper into your thoughts, and it will pierce even them. It will judge even the motives that undergird the thoughts that you have. Paul immediately follows up this discussion of God's rest with a clear picture of judgment, and this is a clue that tells us that this rest being spoken of is heavenly rest. And that brings us to the conclusion of chapter 4. Now, let's move on to chapter 5. We're going to look at verses 1 through 10. "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 sin.

He can have compassion on those who are ignorant and going astray, since he himself is also subject to weakness. Because of this, he is required also, as for the people, so also for himself to offer sacrifices for sins. And no man takes this honor on himself, but he who is called by God, just as Aaron was. So also, Christ did not glorify himself to become a high priest, but it was he who said to him, 'You are my son. Today I have forgotten you.' And he also said in another place, 'You are priests forever, according to the order of Melchizedek, who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplication with fervent cries and tears to him who was able to save him from death and was heard because of his godly fear.

Though he was a son, yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered. And having been perfected, he became the author of salvation to all who obey him, called by God as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek, of whom we have much to say and hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing." So let's go back to verse 1 and dig in. "For every high priest is taken from among men." So this word, every, it means there's no exclusions. "For every high priest taken from among men is appointed for men." And appointed means to be decided on beforehand or designated.

And to say appointed for men is to say that it is on behalf of men in things pertaining to God, and pertaining meaning related to or applicable to. So for every high priest is taken from among men is appointed on behalf of men in things related to God. And then we are told that this is done for a reason. And the reason is that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins. And we have covered this in multiple previous lessons. So let's go to verse 2. "He can have compassion on those who are ignorant and going astray." In at least two previous weeks, we discussed how our king and high priest is able to sympathize with our weaknesses.

And we talked about how him, and we talked a lot about how him suffering as a man positioned him to be able to do so. This word compassion, it touches on this same idea again. Notice that it did not use the word empathy. Instead, he used the word compassion.

Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another. Many people say that empathy is the ability to put yourself in someone else's shoes. If you have empathy, then you're able to understand to some degree what someone else is feeling or experiencing, not because you have experienced the same thing necessarily, but because you're empathizing with them. Some people have empathy, some people don't.

Compassion, on the other hand, is having sympathetic pity or concern for the sufferings or misfortune of others. So compassion involves seeing the sufferings or misfortunes of someone else and having pity on them and concern for them. And God has designed this world so that when one man shares in another man's suffering, it breeds compassion. When we have tasted the same suffering as another man, just as our king has tasted the suffering of this prison of flesh, compassion flows unhindered.

I've never had a child of my own, so obviously I've never lost one. If I were to walk into a room and there was a father who was weeping because he had just lost his child, I might be able to cry with him. I might be able to empathize with him and to imagine what he's experiencing, and this might bring me to tears. But you bring a man into that room who has also recently lost his own son, and the two of them can weep together in unity, unhindered.

So when someone is going through a tough situation, the one who has been through the same situation is often the best person to be able to console that person. It's just a part of God's design. When we experience the same thing, the same suffering as another man, it breeds in us compassion.

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

And this means that he himself was also subject to sin. Now, keep in mind that this passage here is referring to the earthly high priest. It's not referring to Jesus at this point. Because of this, because of his own sin, he is required, as for the people, so also for himself to offer sacrifices for sin. Now, again, we have discussed this in prior weeks, so let's just move past this.

Verse 4.

"And no man takes this honor to himself, but he who is called by God, just as Aaron was." So we just saw in verse 1 where it said that the high priest was appointed to things pertaining to God, and now we see the same thing again. Here it says that the high priest is called by God, which is a similar way of saying appointed. Now, in verse 5, he's going to explain how Jesus is the same.

That is not to say that Jesus was with sin like the earthly high priest, but that Jesus was also appointed. Verse 5 reads, "So also, or in the same way, Christ did not glorify himself to become a high priest."

Then in the next verse, Paul points out the time in history where Jesus was actually appointed as high priest. He says, "You are priests forever according to the order of Melchizedek." Now, this passage, Paul is quoting Psalms 110. Let's read that together. It says, "The Lord has sworn and will not relent." And then this is the following is the prophecy of Jesus. "You are priests forever according to the order of Melchizedek." So number one, the high priest is appointed. Number two, on behalf of men. Number three, in things pertaining to God. Number four, the high priest has compassion because he's also subject to sin. Five, every high priest is appointed. And six, Jesus is no different in that he was appointed just as it says by the prophets that he was a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

So now let's look at verses 7 through 9. "Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with fervent cries and tears to him who was able to save him from death and was heard because of his godly fear.

Though he was a son, yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered. And having been perfected, he became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey him." Now, in this passage, there was one particular thing that was confusing to me. Let's read it again. "Who in the days of his flesh," okay, this is clearly talking about Jesus, "when he had offered up prayers and supplications with fervent cries and tears to him who was able to save him from death." So this is, I'm pretty sure this is Jesus in the garden crying out to God and was heard because of his godly fear. Okay, so Jesus, here he is praying to God, and God hears him.

But wait a minute, that doesn't seem right to me. When Jesus was crying to the Father who was able to save him from death, Jesus was asking for his cup to pass, but it didn't pass. So what does this mean? That he was heard.

"Though he was a son, yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered." Wait, what's the connection here? What does Jesus, being a son who learned obedience through suffering, how does that have anything to do with the prayers that were heard, even though it doesn't even seem like they were heard?

Finally, after quite some time of staring at this, I realized that the reason that I wasn't getting it was because I am not an English major. I have officially crowned Paul the king of run-on sentences. Even though technically it's the fault of the translators with no punctuation in the original language, regardless, Paul is the king in my book of run-on sentences. When I write something, a sentence, you might get two commas and a period, an exclamation point if I'm excited.

But here in this one sentence from Paul, we have a statement followed by a comma, followed by another statement, and then a colon, and then a quote, followed by a statement, followed by another quote, followed by a semicolon, and then a who comma, flesh comma, supplications comma, death comma, fear comma, son comma, and finally, he learned obedience to the things he suffered, period.

One sentence. Me, comma, comma, period, Paul. So it's a little difficult to wrap my head around. I really did look at this for a long time. So let's look at verse 7 together a little bit. Verse 7 starts with the word who. You can see that's the first word there. "Who in the days of his flesh," and then it's followed with three different descriptions of Jesus, but this is the key.

These descriptions, they're not connected in thought. Once I started to realize this, it started to clear things up for me. Let me explain what I mean. Let's say that I asked Daniel to come up here on stage with me, and I say, "This is my brother Daniel, who is the father of five children, the husband of Casey, the editor of Sound Faith, and the faithful witness to Christ." You see, the idea of him being the editor of Sound Faith has nothing to do with him being the husband of Casey or a faithful witness to Christ.

At work, one of my job functions that I do is a kind of software design, but I'm not a programmer. So what I do consists of typing up detailed instructions on how I want the software to behave, and then I give those instructions to an actual programmer, and then he builds it. Now, the programmer that I work with, he's Chinese. English is his second language. So when I'm typing up these instructions, I have to be very careful about how I structure my sentences and keep it in the most basic, rudimentary English level.

This is how I might write this sentence right here to make sure that he would understand it. "This is my brother Daniel, who is the father of five children, who is also the husband of Casey, who is also the editor of Sound Faith, and who is also a faithful witness to Christ."

And this is the same type of thing we have going on in this passage. First, we have the word who, then followed up with three descriptions. But in the scripture, they didn't rewrite the who in front of each description. So who, and then description number one, this thought number one, and then who, and then thought number two, and then who, and then thought number three.

So as I was reading this passage and trying to understand it, I added the extra who's in there. But I was still super confused, especially about verse 7, which talks about his prayers being heard. So I turned to Chrysostom's homily. And I realized that he was seeing something that I wasn't seeing. And then it dawned on me that the reason that I was missing it, or a big reason, was because of the numbering of the verses. The same type of issue we were having last week with it being challenging for me to understand something because of the chapter divisions, but this was a case where the verses being numbered was getting in the way of me understanding it.

What I realized was that in Chrysostom's homily was that where I was seeing three descriptions, Chrysostom was actually seeing four. This is how Chrysostom read it. And notice right in the middle of the verse, 7, a new description begins.

The verse's numbers cause me to read all of that as one single description. When he read this and was heard because of his godly fear, Chrysostom did not read this as being a continuation of the previous thought, in the same way that Daniel, being the husband of Casey and the editor of Sound Faith, don't have anything to do with each other. Chrysostom did not see Jesus' prayers in the garden have anything to do with him being heard by God because of his own godly fear. Instead, he read this as a description of Jesus who is heard by his people, or more specifically by the disciples.

Not as Jesus cries in prayers being heard by the Father, but instead because the disciples saw the godly fear of Jesus that they listened to him and they heard him. Chrysostom said, "For since they had not yet the right opinion concerning Jesus," Paul said that he was heard, and this is Chrysostom's statement about this word heard in this exact passage. "For since they had not yet had the right opinion concerning Jesus." When he says they here, he's referring to the disciples, and we'll see that on the next slide.

He, Jesus, was being heard by they, the disciples. He continues, "Just as he himself also was consoling his disciples, saying, 'If you love me, you would rejoice because I go to the Father, and the Father is greater than I.'" So again, we see that he did not read this passage as being heard as a description of Jesus being heard by the Father, but as a description of Jesus being heard by his men.

Now, that's not really a big deal. I looked at it a long time to come up with that little conclusion, but I figured after looking at it so long, I was going to teach somebody that.

So anyway, let's move on to verse 8. "Though he was a son, yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered." Remember some weeks ago we talked about the Son of God becoming man because he couldn't give us what he did not have.

We needed to suffer and surrender to smitten to die, but none of these things were in God's nature. And I think that the Son here in this passage, learning obedience by the things that he suffered, is another example of this exact same thing.

Listen to how Origen describes the Christ taking on flesh in order to learn obedience. He says, "The Son of God, taking the form of a bondservant, was made obedient to the point of death." Here, Origen is quoting Philippians, which says, "But he made himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant and coming in likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of a cross."

So the Son of God, taking the form of a bondservant, was made obedient to the point of death, and then he adds, "so that he might teach obedience to those who could not obtain salvation other than by obedience." So that's an amazing picture to me. And this is talking about after baptism, and I won't get too far into that for time's sake. So Christ is seeing us, and he's willing to give himself as a ransom to purchase us with his blood, and seeing that through his death and through us being buried with him in baptism, that we will be washed of every stain. And then seeing from that moment forward, in order for us to remain on the vine, that there would be no other way other than through obedience.

But as rebels, we needed to learn obedience. We needed to be taught obedience, but he could not give us what he did not have. So he put on flesh, and the Son of God, taking on the form of a bondservant, was made obedient to the point of death so that he could teach obedience to those who could not obtain salvation other than by obedience.

Though he was a son, yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered. Verse 9. "And having been perfected, he became the author of salvation to all those who obey him." Some weeks ago, we discussed Jesus being made perfect through suffering. We also discussed him becoming the author of our eternal salvation. Both of these ideas are echoed here again in this passage, along with one more call for us to obey. "And having been perfected, he became the author of eternal salvation for all who obey him."

Is Jesus the author of eternal salvation for the whole world? In some sense, yes, but in some sense, no. What I mean is that he did die for the whole world, but the whole world does not inherit eternal salvation. According to this verse, the author of eternal salvation is only there for those who obey him. So we see Paul continuing to pound this theme of obedience continually. Every time we turn into a new page or a new chapter, it's obedience, obey, obey. Next, verse 10 and 11, "Called by the God as high priests according to the order of Melchizedek, of whom we have much to say and hard to explain since you have become dull of hearing."

And this is where we will end today. Next week, we will begin here with verse 12, where Paul begins to chastise the Hebrews for being dull of hearing. Paul here is saying, "Look, we have a lot to say about this, but we can't go into these things because they're hard to explain and you've become dull of hearing.

I can't even begin the conversation with you." Next week, we will learn what exactly this means. We will see that it is not that they were not able to comprehend it, but that with them being dull of hearing, that it wouldn't be appropriate for him to go into additional teachings.

Real quickly, what I'd like to do is give you a glimpse of the future. The next two weeks, we're going to be looking into chapter 5, verses 12, through chapter 6, verses 6. We'll read them quickly. "For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracle of God. And you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. 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.

Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let us move on to perfection, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith towards God, of the doctrines of baptisms, of the laying ons of hands, of the resurrection of the dead, and the eternal judgment. And this we will do, if God permits, for it is impossible for those who have once been enlightened and have tasted the heavenly gift and have been partakers of the Holy Spirit and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, if they fall away, impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they crucify again for themselves the Son of God and put him to an open shame."

These next two weeks, we have some very interesting passages to look into. Next week, we're going to look at chapter 5, verses 12, and we're going to get through 6:3. And then the following week, we will look specifically at chapter 6, verses 4 through 6. And just a heads up, these next two weeks, the lessons are very tightly knit together. So I want you all to encourage to make both weeks if you can, because like I said, we got some very interesting things that are going to be going on in these next passages.

So that'll wrap it up for the day. Open up, anyone has any questions or comments or anything you want to add to the lesson? Yeah, I'm going to add something to add. On the Hebrews 5:7, I don't see it as a problem being that in Greek, the word fear is reverence also, and that he heard of it because of his reverence for him or whatever.

But an example would be my son, he gets a big cup, and I get a bottle of alcohol, and I say, "I got to pour this alcohol on the cup." And then my son says, "Will you please not pour it on my cup?" I heard it.

I'm not turning a blind eye to him, but he obeyed me because of his reverence for me. And I said, "No, I need to do this, regardless if he understands why." That's why I'm going to do it and pour it on him to save his limb.

When I read that, my mind doesn't see a problem with God hearing him and not doing what he wants in his fleshly moment or whatever. Yeah, that's a very—I did not think of it in that terms in any way. And that actually is a pretty clear way of thinking about it there. That actually also clears up the confusion there. So thank you, Daniel.

Awesome. Well, thank you all for your time. See you next week.