A Better Priest

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall; All the king’s horses, And all the king’s men, Couldn’t put Humpty together again.

The first record of this nursery rhyme appeared in 1797 and stories abound about the meaning of it…name of an adult beverage, slang for a short and clumsy person, to King Richard III falling off his horse named Wall...

Now I don’t know the truth about the origin of this rhyme but I do think that if we consider the words carefully it becomes an illustration of man and his horrible condition... (Explain)

Man was created by God and placed on “a wall” to watch over, to care for, and have dominion over creation as God’s representative…he was the pinnacle of all creation being crowned with glory and honor to rule in God’s place…but, because of sin...Man falls off the wall, and he falls hard…wrecking havoc in every aspect of our lives....in spite of all our efforts to put ourselves back together again and restore ourselves to our Creator, we are helpless…we cannot put ourselves back on that wall…we cannot represent God to His creation the way He intended...

We are helpless, but not hopeless...there is someone who can change all that...

With those thoughts in mind please turn to Hebrews 2:10-18.

Before we get started examining our text, I want to piggy back a little on a couple of things Pastor Matthew said last week...

There is no way we can expound every depth of every verse in every context in just a short amount of time…we do our best to break it down for you and assemble it back together in a palatable way so that your soul is spiritually nourished every Sunday…there is a lot of reliance on the Holy Spirit to take our inadequacies of explaining the text more fully and bring them home to your heart!

I know there is not a single person in this room, or watching us online that only eats 1 physical meal on Sunday and then says “I’m good to go for the rest of the week” on that 1 meal…

However, I would venture to guess that some, if not many here, will rely on this 1 “meal” of spiritual food to sustain you through the week…you won’t pick up your Bible again until next Sunday… so I want to challenge you to think about this...

If your spiritual appetite consists of only one meal per week, you will soon become one who is spiritually weak.

So let me encourage you to take what you hear, digest it, and then go after it even more ON YOUR OWN…(all of our messages are recorded and stored on our website; if you are a techy and want a good Bible study program for your tablet, phone or PC, I can point you to one…library…)

Something else Pastor Matthew reminded us of last week was the existence of tensions in the Scripture...

God is sovereign…Man is accountable.

The noetic effect of sin impacts our minds to such a degree, we want to wrestle with concepts like that and we want satisfactory answers out of our sense of pride to believe we can explain God…part of what makes God, God is the fact that we can’t explain him.

Sadly, some of those tensions spark debates that needlessly create rifts and separations of great men and women of God...

There are just some things we have to accept by faith...that God is good and loving and just and sovereign and we are His creation with limited ability to comprehend all things...

God has it all worked out in His plan, and our job is not to debate those issues, our job is to be obedient and faithful to proclaim Christ to EVERYONE, and let God be God.

As we journey through Hebrews we will see some of those tensions...

The writer of Hebrews is continuing to build his argument that Jesus is better than everything, specifically in this context, better than angels...

Remember the historical data of Hebrews is that these believers, because of intensifying persecution were being tempted to go back to Judaism…they were in danger of drifting away from what they heard and believed to be true…

The writer has established the Divinity of Jesus in Chapter 1…now in chapter 2, he is establishing the Humanity of Jesus...

Beginning in verse 6, the writer expounds Psalm 8:4–6 “What is man that You take thought of him, And the son of man that You care for him? Yet You have made him a little lower than God, And You crown him with glory and majesty! You make him to rule over the works of Your hands; You have put all things under his feet,”

What we have in that Psalm is God appointing man with the privilege of dominion over creation as His representative…

Man is placed a little below God himself…to rule the world on his behalf…

God placed the world to come under the authority of human beings, not angels…

but because of sin, Adam failed to represent God as God intended and at present, not everything is subject to man.

The writer of Hebrews understands that concept and interprets Psalm 8 as a a more direct reference to Jesus.

He is going to introduce us to the role of Jesus as a priest (he will fully develop it later)…and in this text he will point to Jesus humanity to prove his point…

Main Point: Jesus is Better Because He Is the Perfect Savior.

So after expounding Psalm 8, the writer now moves into considering the practical implications of Jesus becoming human.

We want to answer the question here this morning of what makes Jesus the Perfect Savior?

4 accomplishments of Jesus humanity that make him the Perfect Savior....

He fulfills God’s goal for humanity (10).

Hebrews 2:10 “For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things, and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to perfect the author of their salvation through sufferings.”

His death was part of God’s plan.

for it — refers back to verse 9 in Jesus tasting death for everyone…yes, Jesus died for everyone…this is one of the tensions in Scripture I will be happy to talk to anyone about AFTER the service.

was fitting — for the Jewish mind, a suffering Messiah was a horrible concept, yet in God’s gracious plan He sent Jesus to die our death, to pay for our sin, to take our judgement upon Himself...

God could have left us in our sin, needing to find a way to reconcile ourselves to him…for us to bridge that huge divide between us and our creator caused by sin...

but because of grace, God sent Jesus, and Jesus willingly came knowing He was going to die...

We need to remember that everything God does is always right and fitting…Jesus’ death was part of that.

The purpose of his death was to bring “many sons to glory”

This is an allusion to God bringing the nation of Israel out of bondage in Egypt into the Promised Land

…that is the keynote event in the entire OT…explain

that whole transaction was not complete until under Joshua they crossed the Jordan and conquered the land.

Just like God led them through the desert into the promised land, Jesus is leading us into our promised land…an eternal glory with Him in heaven.

God wanted to bring lost humanity into sonship…but as long as sin was left unchecked, it could not happen.

Our salvation is not merely a rescue mission…it is the positive fulfillment of the glory and honor for which humanity was first created…Psalm 8:5 “Yet You have made him a little lower than God, And You crown him with glory and majesty!”

Our glory and honor comes with the sharing of authority and glory of the living God…for whom everything exists.

God wants us to experience glory…2 Corinthians 4:17 “For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison,”

He is the only one qualified to do so.

author = is a term that means “leader”, “originator”, “pioneer”…

Not only does Jesus make salvation possible, he has gone ahead and prepared the way...

if Jesus had not done that, there was no one else who could...

Jesus work was essential for God to offer salvation to the whole world.

but to do that, he had undergo suffering on our behalf.

it is through that suffering that he becomes “perfected”

by using this term the writer is not communicating that Jesus was somehow imperfect, lacking in something, like moral character...

being made perfect...God qualified Jesus to be the perfect (complete) Savior by his death…He completely represents God to us and completely reconciles us to God... Jesus provided the perfect example of obedience…he experienced suffering like we do so he could be the perfect person to help us in our time of need.

Every aspect of God’s plan of redemption is COMPLETED in Christ alone!

Jesus did what Adam could not…because of His humanity, Jesus fulfilled the destiny of all humanity, because he was made lower than the angels, he can identify with man and represent man and God fully!

By accepting the status of humanity, Jesus has achieved the glory and honor God decreed for humanity.

He sanctifies His own (11-13)

Hebrews 2:11–13 “For both He who sanctifies and those who are sanctified are all from one Father; for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying, “I will proclaim Your name to My brethren, In the midst of the congregation I will sing Your praise.” And again, “I will put My trust in Him.” And again, “Behold, I and the children whom God has given Me.””

He sets us apart for God’s purposes.

sanctifies — means to be holy…this is another purpose of our salvation...

not only does God desire us to experience glory...

He also desires us to be holy, set apart from sin to him...

This doesn’t mean we are without sin, it means we have been designated as those who can and ought to do His will.

He can do this because both he and we belong to the same family.

He is not ashamed to identify with us.

There is a real sense of awe being described here...

On one hand, God as perfectly holy and full Deity is separated from us...

On the other hand, because Jesus is both fully God and fully man, we now share in that divine nature...

We are one with him, that distance between us and God is vanquished, and Jesus is now our elder brother...

He comes to us, not as some angelic being, but as one of us!

Then the writer turns to OT passages to illustrate this familial relationship we share with the Messiah...

The writer attributes these to Jesus saying them..

Psalm 22:22 “I will tell of Your name to my brethren; In the midst of the assembly I will praise You.”

Jesus made this Psalm his own when he quoted it while on the cross…He quoted Psalm 22:1 “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me? Far from my deliverance are the words of my groaning.”

For centuries, we have recognized that as describing the agony Jesus experienced...

The section the writer of Hebrews quotes are from the last part of that psalm where the sufferer gives thanks to God for rescuing him.

The speaker here was Jesus.

He was lifting God’s praises to other believers, my brothers.

The word for “congregation” (ekklesia) is the term for “church.”

Jesus has shouted God’s praises to fellow Christians, calling them brothers, thus showing that he was one with them.

He suffered for them and was a part of them.

Isaiah 8:17 “And I will wait for the Lord who is hiding His face from the house of Jacob; I will even look eagerly for Him.”

This shows the attitude of Jesus in putting his trust in God the Father, demonstrating that he is like other human beings who must live by faith in the Father.

Trusting and obeying represented the only principles for living life for Jesus and for us, his followers.

Isaiah 8:18 “Behold, I and the children whom the Lord has given me are for signs and wonders in Israel from the Lord of hosts, who dwells on Mount Zion.”

Isaiah recognized that his own children were signs given by God.

Here the writer of Hebrews understands Isaiah’s words about his children as the words of Christ about his people.

Jesus affirmed his closeness with his people by calling them children.

In John 17:6, Jesus describes his disciples as “those whom you [God] gave me out of the world.”

Jesus was making a close identification with human beings.

He disarmed Satan and delivers us from death (14-16)

Hebrews 2:14–16 “Therefore, since the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and might free those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives. For assuredly He does not give help to angels, but He gives help to the descendant of Abraham.”

These three verses are packed full of great theology...

Jesus is fully human.

Up to this point, the writer has clearly stated how Jesus is superior to angels because He is God.

Now he states that Jesus is equally human.

At Christmas we celebrate the birth of Jesus…why?

It was at the point, that Jesus became what He had never been…human…he was and always will be God…He also became a human being...

We call the God-man.

He hungered, thirsted, cried, experienced agony, was born as a baby, died a real death.

No one who merely appeared to be human could meet our needs.

Jesus is a real person…He can meet our needs.

Jesus destroyed the power of Satan.

Jesus death was not a defeat…it was a triumph over sin and death.

Sin always causes death…Romans 5:12 “Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned—” …our sin caused Jesus’ death…not his, for he knew no sin.

“destroy” does not mean “annihilate,” for it is obvious that Satan is still alive and busy.

The word means “render inoperative, make of none effect.”

Satan is not destroyed, but he is disarmed.

Jesus frees us from the fear of death.

The text here says Satan had the power of death…in what sense?

We know the final authority of death is in the hands of our God (Deut. 32:39; Matt. 10:28; Rev. 1:18).

Satan can do only that which is permitted by God (Job 1:12; 2:6).

But because Satan is the author of sin (John 8:44), and sin brings death (Rom. 6:23), in this sense Satan exercises power in the realm of death.

Satan uses the fear of death as a terrible weapon to gain control over the lives of people.

His kingdom is one of darkness and death (Col. 1:13).

We who trust in Jesus Christ have once and for all been delivered from Satan’s authority and from the terrible fear of death…

The writer is not saying we won’t die…he is stating that we don’t fear death!

The death, burial, and resurrection of Christ have given us victory! (1 Cor. 15:55–58)

4. Jesus minsters to our needs.

Abraham’s descendants —

by human birth, Jesus is Jewish making him a descendant of Abraham...

He also showed by his obedience to be the spiritual offspring of Abraham...

The Scripture is very clear that Gentile believers can lay claim to being the seed of Abraham in the spiritual sense…writing to Gentile believers, Paul says in Gal 3.29...

Galatians 3:29 (NASB95)

And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to promise.

Jesus did not come to minister to angels…he came to minister to us, his brothers and sisters, his own flesh and blood...

The word help is really kind of a weaker translation…it literally means “to take hold of”…it picks up the idea of verse 10 of Jesus grasping his people to take them to glory.

He is a sympathetic high priest to His people (17-18)

Hebrews 2:17 “Therefore, He had to be made like His brethren in all things, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.”

Once again we have great theological truths packed into these two verses...

v 17 is a restatement of verse 14 that Jesus had a complete, perfect humanity.

Jesus “had to be incarnated” so that He could become a merciful and faithful high priest.

Mercy is directed towards man —

Jesus represents man before God, averts God’s wrath (talk about this in just a moment), heals the brokenhearted, lifts up the fallen, and ministers to the needs of his people...

Jesus’ own suffering allowed him to be sympathetic to others and thus to show mercy.

Faithful is directed towards God —

In his priestly role, Jesus represented God perfectly.

Jesus remained steadfast to the end without flinching.

He was completely trustworthy in everything God called him to do.

Jesus “had to be incarnated” so that He could propitiate sin.

This is talking about Jesus priestly role to atone for sin...

The OT concept of atonement is that by faith the OT saints had their sins covered through the substitutionary sacrifices…it was a continual process of covering… Explain Day of Atonement.

Propitiation is an important theological word for us to understand…and it goes much further than simply an atonement.

It means “to conciliate” or “satisfy.” …it relates to putting away divine wrath.

When we speak of atonement, we are really speaking of Jesus propitiating sin which means He fully met and put away God’s wrath toward sin.

This is a huge theological concept we would do well to know and appreciate...

When people sin, they arouse the wrath of God (Romans 1:18) and become enemies of God (Romans 5:10).

The wrath of God is not to be viewed as a loss of temper…when we speak of God’s wrath we are referring to His constant opposition to sin.

God’s wrath was the cup Jesus prayed would pass from him…but he accepted it willingly

The Old and New Testaments reveal God is a completely holy God whose holy nature demands wrath against all sin.

Wrath is the reverse side of his holiness.

God cannot set aside his wrath toward our sin and remain holy.

This is where the propitiating love of God comes in.

To obtain our salvation for us, God himself met the demands of his holiness in Christ, which, because of the oneness of the Trinity, means he met the demands of his holiness himself.

God’s love is as constant as his wrath.

God showed his love in that he took the initiative to send Christ as the atonement for our sins (1 John 4:10).

When Jesus hung on the cross and cried out in agony why have you forsaken me, he was bearing the wrath of God for us so we would not have to…Jesus fully satisfied God’s just demands…so God’s wrath is turned away from us...

His death makes it possible for sinners to be reconciled to a holy God (2 Cor. 5:18–21).

Without the propitiating work of Jesus, fellowship with God would not possible!

Jesus saved us in a way that kept God’s holiness intact making it possible for sinful man to have relationship with Him.

Jesus suffered when tempted so He could help us in our temptations.

Hebrews 2:18 “For since He Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted.”

This verse insists on the real humanity of Jesus. It also contains an important application of that real humanity.

Because Jesus was a true human being and because he suffered, he can help us in our temptation.

How could the sinless Jesus receive temptation? Was he tempted in the same way as human beings?

The writer will address these questions later in chapter 4.

Three important thoughts confront us here.

Jesus suffered.

He suffered as our Savior physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

His suffering was a source of temptation

The sufferings were so intense that Jesus could have decided that enduring them was not worth the pain which they inflicted.

He never considered that, for he said, “Not as I will, but as you will” (Matt. 26:39).

Enduring suffering allowed him to help us.

His victory over temptation and sin allowed him to guide us through the dangerous rocks of temptation.

Jesus has great ability to help us.

His ability is not based on his experience with sin.

His ability is based on his experience of the temptation to sin.

Only someone who is sinless can know this experience fully.

Lesson for Life — Cling to Jesus the Only Perfect Savior.

Thinking back to our illustration of Humpty Dumpty...

Jesus is the One who can take the shattered, scattered fragments of your life and put them back together again.

If you are not yet a Christian, it is Jesus who can forgive your sins and create you anew. If you are a Christian, but your life is in disarray, he will restore things to order.

Jesus is the only one who restores God’s purpose for us…whose goal is to bring us to glory.

Jesus is the one who Sanctifies us...He never stops working on us to set us apart from sin and useful for God’s purposes…

Jesus is the one who defeated death and Satan…He conquered the fear of death and the power of Satan to destroy our lives...

Jesus is the one who serves as a perfect Mediator ...

because he was made like us in every way (not simulated humanity but real humanity), is merciful to us and faithful as he ministers to the Father on our behalf.

Jesus is the one who propitiated God’s wrath over sin... we are no longer under the wrath of God.

We may experience hardship, even discipline, but never the wrath of God. Because of Jesus’ great propitiating work, we are ever under love. Let this be an anchor for your soul.

Jesus is the one who helps us in every way…

He experienced sufferings in the course of temptation that scarred his soul with sympathy.

And thus “He is able to help those who are being tempted” to take the easy way out.

What a Savior, what a High priest we have!