I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Hebrews 12-13.

    Just like when running a race, we need to put aside those things which do not help us serve the Lord. This includes sin, but not just sin. If there are things in our life which do not help us do God’s work, we need to cut them out of our lives. If we do not, God will do so for us. Like any good father, or coach, God will discipline us so that we become more disciplined (see what I did there?). When we become tired and are tempted to give up we need to keep our eyes on Christ and remember the suffering He experienced before He received His glory from God. We have not yet given our lives in service to God, we can “run” a little longer, we can carry the burden a little further. God is like an experienced coach. He knows exactly how much training we need to put in. He knows what we need to be eating (both physically and spiritually). He knows when we need to take some time to rest and recuperate from our training (both physically and mentally). When we do not do as He instructs, He will punish us with exercises which will make us better able to win the “race” for which He is preparing us.

    As the writer concludes his letter he makes a series of small points which are not directly connected, but which in a way form a coherent whole. I am not quite sure how I am going to get these various statements into a single thought. We are instructed to work at living in peace with everyone and to work at living a holy life. Further the writer tells us to not let bitterness grow up within us, or among us. These three are pretty easy to put together. Bitterness will lead us into conflict with others, and conflict can engender bitterness, either in ourselves or in those with whom we have conflict (or both). However, the writer is not just telling us to not be bitter, he is telling us to root out bitterness among our fellow believers. If we see bitterness taking hold among our fellow believers we need to work at getting rid of it.
    As I wrote that last sentence I realized how all of these fit together because much of the rest of what he writes here amount to instructions about how to keep our fellowship clear of bitterness. If we look after each other, love one another, and show hospitality to strangers we will nip bitterness in the bud whenever it starts to crop up. If we are satisfied with what we have we will not become bitter about those who have more. If we remember those who are in prison or being mistreated as if we were suffering the same, we will not take actions which will cause others to be bitter. If all of our interactions with those around us are rooted in love, we will help them to not be bitter about those who may have failed to act out of love.

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Hebrews 10-11.

    As a consequence of Jesus offering Himself as a sacrifice for our sins we can boldly enter into God’s presence. This confidence should inspire us to acts of love and good works, performed both for their own sake and to motivate our fellow believers to such acts as well. In order to motivate other believers, and to be motivated by them, we need to meet regularly with them. Regularly meeting with our fellow believers will both encourage us to perform acts of love and good works and inspire us in new ways in which we can do such things. The more we do such things, the less time we will have to be susceptible to temptation.

    I am always inspired by this writer’s compendium of the people of faith from before Christ. He lists out many of the people of faith whose accounts we find in the Old Testament and how their faith inspired their actions and brought them miraculous results. He reminds us that the number of people who accomplished great things through faith is too long to list them all. He also reminds us that some faced terrible trials and persecutions because of their faith (usually because of the good works to which their faith inspired them). The faith of these people to whom he refers earned them a good reputation, whether they overcame mighty foes through their faith, or were persecuted by mighty foes. Those who gained great victories did not do so from their own might, neither did those whose faith stood firm in the face of persecution. Let us be inspired to have a similar faith in God’s great power.

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Hebrews 6-9.

    The writer tells us that those who once knew God’s salvation through Christ and have turned away can never be brought back to repentance. He is not talking about those who gradually fell back into sin after coming to know the Lord. I do not even think he was talking about those who came to know Christ at a young age and were later talked out of it by someone they respected. No, he is talking about those who, of their own volition, made a conscious decision to reject God. Those who rejected God because continuing to accept God meant accepting that there was someone they answered to for their actions. The thing about such people is that, once they have made such a decision, they will never be willing to consider the possibility that they were wrong to do so. I will say that we have to be careful not to assume that someone falls into this category because I have known people who I thought did who turned to the Lord.

    The rest of this passage is very intellectual (just like yesterday’s passage). One of the key things I get from this passage is that we no longer need any priest aside from Jesus. Jesus is our High Priest, who offered Himself, once and for all, as a sacrifice for sin. There is no longer a need for priests to offer sacrifices on our behalf, nor to act as intermediaries between ourselves and God. This means that the distinction we often make between the clergy and the laity is a false one. The creation of clergy is serves two purposes. It allows some people to lift themselves up as superior to others. And it allows many people to not hold themselves to the standard which Christ sets for us. We are all called to live by the standard of “priests” and if you think that you are better than others, you have missed the point.

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Hebrews 1-5.

    The writer of Hebrews starts off by addressing a false teaching which exists to this day, that Jesus is just the first of the angels. Actually, this passage contains the most detailed Christology in the Bible and is the primary basis for the doctrine of the Trinity (although there are other New Testament passages which point in that direction).
    What does the writer tell us about Jesus?

1. He has the same character as God
2. Everything is sustained by the power of His command (compare with John 1:1-3)
3. He is greater than the angels
4. He became flesh and blood (note “became”, not “was”)
5. He was greater than Moses

When we take points one and two and combine them with the beginning of the Gospel of John, we get that Jesus was one with God. Point three tells us that angels are a different category of being from Christ, and the arguments the author makes to support this point show us that angles are a different category of being from mankind. The fourth point indicates that, while Jesus was truly human, He was not a human who was elevated to Godhood. Point five follows from the previous points, but needed to be stressed in order to show that, where we see conflict, Jesus’ teachings superseded those of Moses.

    If all of that seems rather cerebral to you (and it does to me), the writer explains at the end of this passage why these characteristics of Jesus are important. Jesus faced the same temptations which we did but did not sin. Because He did not sin, He is able to counsel us on how to resist temptation and put sin behind us. Because He faced the same temptations and struggles which we dace, He is able to sympathize with our weaknesses and failings. We know that God will have mercy for us because of Christ, and that we will receive grace to face temptation from Christ. The writer describes Jesus’ role as Intermediary between God and man (and between man and God) as being that of heavenly High Priest, but not a priest of the order of Aaron rather a priest of the order of Melchizedek.
    The Book of Hebrews is probably the most intellectual of the books of the Bible. It can be hard to understand and the temptation is always there to just gloss over it and move on. However, the writer reminds us that there comes a time when we need to think about the more involved aspects of our faith. As we start to teach others how to be followers of Christ, some of them are going to ask questions which are more difficult. We need to be prepared to answer them. We need to be prepared to deal with questions such as “What makes Jesus different from the angels?”