We turn again to the Letter to the Hebrews, with one word as our key to the whole letter: companions.
“Holy brethren, companions of a heavenly calling.” We are become companions of Christ if we hold fast the beginning firm unto the end.
This, we have said, is the key to the whole letter. This letter is an appeal for companions of Christ—an appeal for companions of the heavenly calling.
We have also said that this letter is a summary of the whole New Testament. In making that statement, of course, we provide you with a very large field for consideration. We simply have to say that all that is in the New Testament is gathered, in some way, into this Letter to the Hebrews.
God is seeking companions for His Son in a heavenly calling.
Now, this morning, we are going to dig more deeply into this Letter to the Hebrews, with this one thought in mind: it is companions of Christ who are in view.
We need to say one brief word about the point of view taken by this letter. We understand that this letter was written and given to these Hebrew Christians at a time of very serious crisis.
It was at the time when a whole system, which had existed for many centuries, was about to pass away. The whole system of the Old Testament, from Moses onward, was about to pass away.
After the writer had put down all that is in this letter, he put over it a quotation from the Old Testament:
Yet once more I will shake not the earth only, but also the heaven.
And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that have been made,
that those things which are not shaken may remain.
In quoting that Scripture and putting it at the end of this letter, he indicated that this was just about to take place. And he proved to be right.
It is evident that this letter was written just before the year A.D. 70. It may have been that already the Roman legions were gathering round Jerusalem.
We know from history what happened. Jerusalem was destroyed. Not one stone of the temple was left standing upon another. The whole land was desolated. The priestly service and all the functions of the temple came to an end.
The whole country was put into a state of utter desolation. From that day onward, even until now, that system ceased to be.
The Lord knew what was going to happen, and because the time had come in the Divine plan, this letter was written. Always read this letter in the light of that great historic crisis.
That was the dark side of the story. But you will notice that the letter is concerned with that better thing which was going to take the place of the earthly system.
We shall be dwelling upon that better thing as we go on. The earthly people and the earthly calling were being set aside, and this great letter of a heavenly calling was presented to them.
Before we go further with the letter, let us remember that this message applies to us. It would be a very blind person today who could not see that another such event is very near.
There has been built up on the earth another great system of Christianity. It is very aptly described as a system.
Just as with the Jews, their hearts were very much bound up with their system, so in our time multitudes of Christians are bound up with historic Christianity.
I do not claim to be a prophet, but there is much in the Word of God that points to the time when this old system will go.
It is very impressive that in our lifetime we have seen this happen in a small way. When churches have been destroyed and congregations scattered, it has not been possible to go on with the old forms. People have had to find the Lord for themselves without any earthly help. They have had to get their help from heaven and not from earth.
In a comparatively small way, we have seen this happen on at least two occasions. It is not difficult to see that it could happen on a much bigger scale, and that event may not be very far off.
Of course, we Christians think of the coming of the Lord. That is our hope. That is our foundation.
But we must remember that the coming of the Lord is going to be accompanied by this terrible judgment upon the earth. Everything that is not heavenly is going to be shaken—shaken until it collapses.
And so this letter has a real message for us. As it said to the Jewish Christians at that time, “Your whole system, in which you are so bound up, is going to pass away,” so this letter says to us today: all the earthly system is going to be shaken and taken out of its place.
But there is a better one coming. God has some better things.
That is the standpoint of this letter. I am sure we can see that it is very applicable to our time.
We are not just studying a book of the Bible which relates to many centuries ago. God is the eternal God, and He speaks to all times. But the message is intensified as we get nearer the end.
Now we are going to see further this transition from the earthly to the heavenly: in the terms of the New Testament, and of this letter in particular, the transition from an earthly, historic Israel to a heavenly, spiritual Israel.
We are going to look at the beginnings of Israel in both cases. You notice how the letter begins? It begins with one word: God.
Put a big ring around that word: God. Over the whole content of this letter stands God. “In the beginning, God.”
Everything in this letter must be viewed from God’s standpoint. This is not to be viewed from man’s standpoint. It is not to be viewed from the world’s standpoint. It is God Who is speaking, and all that is here is what God is saying.
God stands over all that this letter contains. As we move through the letter, we have to say constantly to ourselves, “God is saying that.” This is not the interpretation of man; this is God speaking.
This great transition which is marked by this letter is God moving forward. God is going on. God is in charge of everything.
The companions of the heavenly calling are those who are moving on with God. So the appeal of the letter is repeatedly: “Let us go on,” because God is going on.
The whole of the old system was something that had settled down. In a very real sense, it had gone to sleep.
Our brother said to us at prayer time this morning that God does not come down to us when we go to sleep. Of course, he meant spiritually, not naturally.
The appeal to Israel was, “Awake, thou that sleepest.” That system had gone to sleep. It had settled down. It had become an end in itself. It was not moving on with God.
That was the trouble in the days of the prophets. God is going on, and the companions are those who are going on with God.
You remember this, dear friends: a true, living Christianity is a going-on Christianity. It will never stop going on, neither in this life nor in eternity.
Of His kingdom there shall be no end.
So we begin with God, and we move on with God.
Now, this letter is God expressing Himself. That is in the very first statement in the letter:
God, having of old time spoken unto the fathers in the prophets by divers portions and in divers manners,
hath at the end of these days spoken unto us in His Son.
We meet with a God Who is expressing Himself. He is here declared to be a speaking God.
He is a God Who speaks. He is not a dumb God. He is not a silent God. He is a God Who has always been speaking and is speaking now.
So this letter, right at the beginning, declares God to be a God Who speaks.
To analyse it further, God is spoken of as being a God Who speaks with a purpose. He is a God of purpose, and He is speaking concerning His purpose.
He spoke in times past in the prophets by divers portions. He speaks now in His Son.
Here are two very important things to note. In times past, He spoke in many parts. He said this thing through one prophet and this thing through another. All the prophets were parts of God’s speaking.
You can look into the prophets and see that every one of them had a specific aspect of God’s purpose. “In many parts” is the meaning of the word.
Now His final speech in Christ is the gathering up of all the parts into completeness. God’s Son is the consummation of the things of God. All the parts are brought together in Him.
He is the full speech of God. That gives this letter a very great place, does it not?
This letter says that now God is speaking in fullness in His Son. Alongside of that, the appeal is to give the more earnest heed, because this is so much fuller than anything that God had ever said before.
In times past, God spoke in many ways—not only in different portions, but in different manners. It would take too long for us to go back to the Old Testament and see all the manners in which God spoke.
Sometimes He spoke by words, and sometimes by acts. His manners were indeed diverse.
But the statement here is that at the end He speaks in one way—an all-inclusive way. His Son is God’s all-inclusive way of speaking at the end.
On the one side, no one is going to get anything from God apart from Jesus Christ now. God will absolutely refuse to speak other than in His Son. If you want to know what God wants to say to you, you have got to come to His Son.
On the other side, we have all that ever God wants to say in Jesus Christ.
Now I want to say that especially to young Christians. You know, when we are young Christians, we can get very conceited spiritually.
I know I did. After I had been a Christian for a little while, everything was so wonderful. The Bible was so wonderful.
I went along, and I did not realize what I was doing, but I was saying continually, “Hallelujah!” I was having such a good time with the Lord inside.
I remember that my sister was walking by my side one day. I had forgotten she was there. I was having such a good time with the Lord, and I said, “Oh, hallelujah!”
She looked up at me and said, “It does do me good to hear you say ‘Hallelujah.’”
There was a foolish side to it. I thought I knew everything that was in the Bible. I was in danger of becoming unteachable. I thought I had got it all, and that I knew it all.
Of course, that is a mark of youth. David said, “I have more understanding than all my teachers.” Someone said, “David must have been a very young man when he said that.”
Well now, I am not a young man. It is a good many years since those days. I have been reading and studying my Bible all through the years.
And I tell you quite honestly, friends, I can say that this Book is altogether beyond me. I would never come back to this Letter to the Hebrews if that were not true.
I have preached and lectured on this letter for years, but today it is far, far beyond me.
Should I say, “This Letter to the Hebrews”? It would be more correct to say, “The Lord Jesus Who is revealed in it.”
We have more of God speaking in His Son than we have yet come to understand. We have nothing apart from Jesus Christ, and we need nothing apart from Jesus Christ.
We said that this letter presents God as a God of purpose, and it goes on to show that God’s purpose is centred and summed up in His Son.
At the beginning of the letter, this is set before us in three ways, especially in the person of His Son. Just look at this:
At the end of these days spake unto us in His Son,
whom He appointed heir of all things,
through whom also He made the worlds;
Who being the effulgence of His glory,
and the very image of His substance.
This whole first chapter is occupied with presenting the Son. God is speaking concerning His Son as to Who His Son is.
What a great Son this is.
Then it presents the Son in terms of redemption:
Having made purification of sins.
That is just one phrase, but many chapters follow to explain what that redemption is. All these chapters on priesthood and sacrifice have to do with that one clause: “Having made purification of sins.”
God is speaking in His Son concerning redemption.
In the third place, He is speaking in His Son concerning glory. The Son is the effulgence of His glory, and the Son is going to bring many sons to glory.
Because the Son, having made purification of sins, has sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high, God speaks in a Son Whom He has now glorified and set at His own right hand—the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens.
But God does not cease to speak in His Son only. You will notice that in Chapter 2 He brings man into this. This letter has this wonderful message for man.
All that God has put in His Son is for man. God speaks in this letter of the finished work of Christ—the work which is made complete for man.
Here is something that you and I must dwell upon. Personally, I am constantly learning that I have not yet learned thoroughly to believe what I believe in.
I believe in the finished work of Christ, and yet sometimes I am just as miserable about myself as any man could be. I am often almost at the point of giving up because of what a wretched kind of thing I am.
If there is anything in this world that would cause me to give up the Christian ministry, it is myself. You understand what I mean?
Oh, how we are discouraged by what we find in ourselves. We believe in the finished work of Christ, and that God puts all the finished work of Christ to our account, but we do not really believe it.
God does not see us in ourselves. He sees us in Christ. He does not see us; He sees Christ in us.
If we really believed that, we would be delivered from ourselves. We would indeed be triumphant Christians.
Of course, that does not mean that we can just behave anyhow. We may speak wrongly and act wrongly, but there is, for every true Christian, a refuge.
It has not got to be made; it is there. There is the precious blood. There is a High Priest making intercession for us. There is everything that we need.
The word is “finished.” It is complete. Oh, we Christians have got to believe our beliefs. We have got to take hold with both hands of the things which are the things of our Christian faith.
Now, I know you have problems when I say this. You say, “What about this old man?” Unless you are one of those people who believes that sin has been absolutely rooted out of you and that it is quite impossible for you to sin.
Well, if you believe that, the Lord bless you. I think you may be tripped up someday and find that there is an old man there after all.
I am leaving that aside. Most of us do know that there are two things in us. There is the spiritual man and there is the natural man. The natural man is a very troublesome fellow.
What about him over against the finished work? This letter tells us all about this. It says that God deals with you as with sons.
God loves sons. Are you a child of God? Has there been in your history that deep transaction of new birth? Have you received the Lord Jesus?
The Word of God says:
As many as received Him, to them gave He the right to become children of God.
If you have received the Lord Jesus, you are a child of God. The Spirit of sonship has come in and dwells in you.
Now this letter says that God loves His sons, and because He loves them, He chastens them. He disciplines them.
No chastening, says the letter, for the present is pleasant. God’s dealings with His own family are not always pleasant.
When they are unpleasant, there is a little demon sitting on your shoulder, and he will whisper in your ear, “You see, God does not love you. He would not deal with you like that if He loved you.”
The devil is always out to turn the loving works of God into evil things. But God is dealing with us as with sons. It is discipline.
The letter says it is not for the present pleasant. Indeed, the letter might have said that it is very unpleasant.
“What son is there whom his father does not chasten?” says this letter.
Here is the statement: it is a totally unkind father who never chastens his child. Have you seen children who are never chastened, never corrected?
Those children are going to have a bad time in this world. People are not going to like them, and they are going to discover that people do not like them. Their parents have spoiled them.
This letter says that God’s love is expressed in His using the rod with His children. God does not always put His good things, His best things, into nice forms.
I heard the other day of a little boy who had to take some medicine. It was not very nice. But his father said that there were many vitamins in that medicine.
The little boy said, “Daddy, why must all the good things be put into nasty things? Why cannot they be put into ice cream?”
The Lord does not always put the good things into ice cream. Sometimes the vitamins are in the nasty medicine.
That is exactly what this letter says. God is not condemning us when He deals with us like that. He is working to deliver us.
God never delivers us by a sermon. If you think that sermons are going to save you, you are making a mistake. They are only to explain what God is doing.
God never saves by theory. You may read everything that has ever been written on Christian doctrine and still be the same man or woman.
God’s ways are very practical. He teaches us by experience, and the experience is sometimes very difficult. It is hard training for the sons.
Well, proving again what I said about never getting to the bottom of things, I have only just begun to say what I want to say about this one matter.
But it will not be in the amount that I say that the benefit is done. We just take a little and take it to the Lord. Apply it to our hearts; it will do its work.
So I think that I will stop there for this morning. If the Lord wills, I will pick it up again at that point tomorrow morning. The evening will be on another particular aspect of this whole matter, because there are a number of friends who can only be here in the evening.
May the Lord impress our hearts again with these things. God is still speaking in His Son.
His speaking is in order to get companions of His Son—companions of the heavenly calling. The companions of Christ will go into hard schools. They have to learn many hard lessons.
But in so learning, they will come to understand how great is their inheritance in the Lord Jesus.
I may add this: my experience is, dear friends, that no one really has spiritual knowledge without suffering. I am not speaking about head knowledge. I am speaking about real knowledge of the Lord in the inner life.
I do not know anybody who has come into that knowledge apart from suffering. I know it is a depressing thing to say, but there it is: it is a law in God’s Word.
We have this treasure in vessels of fragile clay.
How poor this vessel is, we learn through trial and affliction. But then we learn how wonderful the Lord is.
The letter says that afterward chastening yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness. What a wonderful phrase: “the peaceable fruit of righteousness.”
Those fruits come along the lines of chastening, by way of suffering. So let us ask for that grace which the apostle had: to rejoice in suffering.