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.
Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things that were heard, lest haply we drift away from them.
We have said something earlier about this final speaking of God by the way of His Son. We have pointed out that, in God’s speaking Son-wise, it was not only what the Son said, but God’s speech was the Person of His Son.
What the Son was and is, as an embodiment, representation, and expression of God’s thought—of God’s mind—by way of the living Person, God has made Himself known to men. And that is particularly as to man; that is, God’s thoughts are concerning man.
It might be of some great value if God had just spoken about Himself, about His own character and being. That would be very good, and perhaps wonderful. But we might be left with that, or something in itself. Well, it is a good thing to know that God is in existence and what kind of a God He is.
But God’s making of Himself known is not just by way of information as to His existence and as to His character. The Bible as a whole makes this quite clear: God’s self-revelation is vitally related to man, and man is vitally related to that.
Or, in other words, some of God’s thoughts concern the relationship between man and Himself. And it is in His Son, Jesus Christ, that that relationship is brought about between God and man, man and God.
And it is just there that the first utterance, or expression, of God is found. Why should God become man? Why the incarnation? Why should He take flesh, be made flesh, and tabernacle among us? Why should God speak by incarnation as His first speech, and His final speech, and His full speech?
Everything in the Bible just focuses upon this: that in Christ a union has been brought about between God and man. The Old Testament types and figures and symbols always bear down upon that.
The central thing, for instance, in that great symbolic system of the tabernacle, central to the life of Israel, was the Ark of the Testimony, the Ark of the Covenant. That was central. Everything focused upon that.
You know that it was made of acacia wood, always the type of humanity, overlaid with gold, always the type of divinity. So that there, in that central thing, placed right in the Most Holy Place where God met with man and spoke to him, and man met with God between the cherubim on that mercy seat, which was the lid of the ark, you have this great declaration of God’s thought right at the centre of everything.
The central thing in His whole system is union between Himself and man in Christ. Christ is God’s speech in that sense.
God has spoken in His Son. Formerly, He spoke in various, numerous ways and forms of expression. We have seen: by people, by their offices—prophets, priests, and kings; by their work in sacrifices, altars, and so on; by many symbols and types and figures.
God spoke in multitudes of ways, in fragmentary portions, at different times. One period was the period of priesthood, sacrifice, and mediation. That lasted for a period. It changed to another period of kingship and monarchy, and God spoke again in a different way through kings.
Then that gave place to the period of the prophets, and God spoke now through prophets—not kings and priests, but through prophets. He spoke in divers manners and at different times in the past.
But now He has gathered it all up. Every form of old is now collected, so to speak, and concentrated in one Person who embodies all the speech of God. And there is no more. It is final, at the end of these days.
There is nothing after the end—nothing after the end. Christ is the end of God speaking. If you do not listen to Him, there is nothing more to come. God has spoken at the end in Sonship, His Son.
Because of the transcendent fullness of His speech in Christ, therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things that were heard.
Now this evening, we are going to get a little further into this letter to the Hebrews, which I trust you have open before you. This afternoon we were walking round it, looking at it from the outside. We seek to break into it and get something of its inward message to us.
Taking this phrase, “the things which were heard,” these are the things to which we are to give the more earnest heed. Because, as we said earlier, the whole tone of this letter is so serious, so solemn, so imperative. There is something bound up with this hearing, this spiritual hearing of God speaking in His Son, which is of momentous consequence to the people of God.
“The things which were heard,” or the things that God has said in His Son. I say again, not only through His Son, but in His Son. That is, what does Christ say to us as God’s message? What is He as the message of God to us?
A very comprehensive message. Ah, how, in a brief season like this—two or three days—we can take some of its parts. And we begin at the beginning.
The Apostle Paul—well, whether he wrote this letter to the Hebrews, I am quite sure he had a lot of influence in it. You can trace his finger in it, at any rate. You can find him somewhere very much in this letter. We are not going to argue about authorship, but there you are.
Certainly, he had a lot to do with it. Whether that be true or not true, it does not matter very much. But the Apostle Paul, under the same Holy Spirit who dictated this letter, has given us so much as to the significance of Christ and has helped us tremendously as we seek to enter into this letter.
You notice the movement of this letter right at the beginning. The first chapter—first chapter—a marvellous presentation of the greatness of the Lord Jesus as God’s Son.
There are things here which are altogether beyond us. We need to read, read, and read again, quietly and thoughtfully, and allow every clause to affect us.
God, at the end of these days, hath spoken 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,
and upholding all things by the word of His power.
Do you grasp that? Anyone of those things? These are tremendous things to say. And note: they are said about One who is called His Son.
Having become by so much better than the angels,
as He hath inherited a more excellent name than they.
For unto which of the angels said He at any time,
Thou art My Son,
This day have I begotten Thee?
The answer, of course, to the question is: not one. Michael, or any of the archangels—they were mighty, mighty beings. Think what one angel can do to a whole mighty army of the Assyrians.
One angel went out at God’s command, and the whole army was slain that night. One angel! Look again at all the tremendous things that angels did in the Bible. But not one of them did God say, “Thou art My Son.”
And again,
I will be to Him a Father,
And He shall be to Me a Son.
No, not to the angels, not to any angel. When He again bringeth in the firstborn into the world, He saith, “And let all the angels of God worship Him.”
And of the angels He saith,
Who maketh His angels winds,
And His ministers a flame of fire:
but of the Son He saith,
Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever;
and the sceptre of uprightness is the sceptre of Thy kingdom.
Tremendous, is it not? All this about the Son. Why is that put there at the beginning of the letter? Why is that made the gateway into the letter, the basis upon which the whole letter is founded?
Now read on. Dismiss these figures that men have introduced to divide up the letter into chapters. That is only a mechanical convenience for public reading, and very often an unfortunate division in the narrative. Read on as though there were no chapter divisions.
We ought to give the more earnest heed to the things that were heard.
For not unto angels did He subject the world to come, whereof we speak.
But one hath somewhere testified, saying,
What is man, that Thou art mindful of him?
Or the son of man, that Thou visitest him?
Not unto angels did He subject the world to come, of which we are speaking. But what is man, that Thou art mindful of him? Or the son of man—not God, the son of man—that Thou visitest him?
Thou madest him for a little while lower than the angels;
Thou crownedst him with glory and honour,
And didst set him over the works of Thy hands:
Thou didst put all things in subjection under his feet.
Who is this? To whom did He do all that? Man. Man! That is God’s idea for man. That is why God created man. That was the intention of God where man is concerned.
For in that He subjected all things unto him, He left nothing that is not subject to him.
But now we see not yet all things subjected to him.
To man. But what do we see? We do not see that divine intention concerning man now true in operation where man in general is concerned. But what do we see?
But we behold Him who hath been made for a little while lower than the angels, even Jesus, because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honour, that by the grace of God He should taste death for every man.
Notice the name that is used: the name of His humanity—Jesus. Even Jesus, because of the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour. What does all that say to you?
Clearly, this is what it means. God had this great, this wonderful thought concerning man. In the creation of man: “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness; and let him have dominion.”
God’s great thought for man was to be crowned with glory and honour. “What is man, that Thou art mindful of him?” Thou hast him in mind. “The son of man, that Thou visitest him?” Thou hast marked him out—for that is the literal meaning of the word. Thou hast marked him out for this.
That was the purpose. Then man disappointed God. He disobeyed God. He rebelled against God. He took sides with God’s enemy.
The result is that man is by no means what God intended him to be—that Adam race. What must be done if God is going to reach His end? And He is going to reach it where man is concerned. He must start again with another Adam.
Paul helps us there. He calls Jesus the last Adam. I am always glad that he calls Him the last Adam. There will not be any need for another one—a third one or a fourth one. This One will effect it fully and finally. He is the last speech of God, the last divine expression as to His purpose. He is the last Adam.
He has come to start all over again. Now this letter, you notice, has a lot from the beginning to say about this One, this last Adam, this second Man.
The writer says about believers, “He is not ashamed to call them brethren,” saying, “I will declare Thy name unto My brethren; in the midst of the congregation will I sing Thy praise.” He has started a new family, this last Adam.
And it is the family that is going to come to glory and honour, and to the realization of God’s thought. But it is going to take its character from its First One.
Now, that is what I am going to focus upon, perhaps for the rest of the time this evening. We need not take very long. Go back to Genesis 1:28. The Lord has brought the man and the woman into being. He says, “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and have dominion.”
Why, when God speaks, it is always an act. It is not just a word; it is a fiat. When God speaks, God says, “Let there be light,” and there was light. God’s words are acts.
And He came in the flesh and spoke—something happened, always something happened. When God said, “Be fruitful, and multiply,” He gave the power of procreation, of multiplication, of reproduction. “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.”
In other words, fill the earth with people like yourself, and I give you power to do it. That is the point at which Satan rushed in.
“If I can capture those two, I can fill the earth with my likeness, my seed. Capture that power of multiplication, of reproduction, to fill this earth not with the kind that God wants, but the kind that I want.”
Now I ask you, is that what has happened? You need not look outside of this hall. Look inside yourself. Have you got an old Adam? Yes, that is our trouble, is it not—what we call the old Adam?
That first Adam, in broken relationship with God, whose very nature is not to trust God, not to believe God, to suspect God—it is in every one of us.
We have only got to be pressed hard into some real trouble, where it seems God has left us, and immediately—not from outside, but from inside—we begin to have reservations about the love of God. There is something that rises in our very constitution.
Well, are you against God? Is it true? If you, of course, have not got there yet, you might be able to say, “Yes, you know,” but you will know sooner or later. There is something in the constitution of this Adam race which is rebellion against God in its very nature—question and doubt as to God.
Satan has filled this world with a seed like that. It is an unbelieving world, a God-mistrusting world, and a world very largely in rebellion against God. Satan captured, you see, the race for generation after generation along that line of replenishing the earth.
That is a terrible thing. But what I am getting at is this: the last Adam has come. Hallelujah! Not of that order, not a bit; but a real man, with a real human nature, tested and tried in every way, even more fiercely than the first Adam, but without sin.
And what a victory it is! Here we read this evening: “He tasted death for every man.”
You know what death really is, friends? I do not think you do. I do not think any of us do. No, we do not. And thank God it is not necessary for any of us to really know what this means.
When this Son of God was to come into the world, He was announced by an angel. An angel made the annunciation. An angel came in with the news of the incarnation and initiated this thing.
When He was actually born, heaven was filled with angels singing and glorifying God. When He was in the wilderness and the stress of temptation, with the devil and the wild beasts, it says angels ministered unto Him.
When He was in the garden, in the awful agony of the garden, an angel came and strengthened Him. When He was raised from the dead, angels were there at the tomb.
But when He was on the cross—on the cross—no angel came, no voice, no hand to help, no ministry from heaven; and God Himself turned His face aside.
That is death. That is death on behalf of every man. He tasted it so that we need not taste it.
And He came out victorious, seated at God’s right hand—born from the dead, the firstborn, the first One among many brethren. A family can be reproduced by Him.
God has given to Him, the last Adam, this great power of reproduction: a family after His own likeness, a Christ-family, bearing the likeness of this last Adam.
As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.
Not one of you here tonight doubts or questions that you bear the image of the earthy. That is the old Adam—we do. This wonderful letter is telling us that man was not called to that, meant for that.
What God is going to do with us is to conform us to the image of His Son. He begins that at new birth—your new birth, my new birth—by the reproduction of Christ.
Oh, dear friends, lay hold of that fragment. What a mighty thing that is! It is going to carry us all the way through. What is it that the Christian is meant for? What is a Christian? What does new birth mean? What does it mean to be joined to the Lord? It means the reproduction of Christ.
In a family, in a race, which is going to replenish this earth—the inhabited earth to come, whereof we are speaking. That is the phrase here. It is going to be peopled with people like Christ. That is what we are called to. That is the tremendous thing that we might miss.
That is the tremendous thing that we must carry. That is the thing around which all these warnings and exhortations circle: “We must give the more earnest heed, lest we miss it.”
Leave out all your theological and doctrinal questions and problems for the moment. Here is a book with thirteen chapters, if you like, the whole weight of which comes down upon this: you Christians are called to a tremendous thing. Do not miss it.
Some people have tried to get round it by saying this letter was not written for Christians, but written to Jews. That is trying to get round it. I said this afternoon: you cannot apply this letter in any part to non-Christians.
In Hebrews 6, it says, “Ye have tasted the powers of the world to come.” No non-Christian has ever done that. Many, many other things show this is to Christians.
It is all saying: you are called to His eternal glory. You are called to conformity to His image. You are called to be a part of this people in His creation in the ages to come—an expression of God’s thought concerning man.
Tremendous things are called the inheritance here. We will come back to that some other time. An inheritance is something more than just being in a family. You can be a member of a family because you are born into it, but that does not necessarily make you an heir.
Many people belong to families, but they are not the heirs. This letter has to do with the inheritance. So, leave that for the moment.
Why is Christ presented in this majestic revelation at the beginning? In order that the Holy Spirit should go on and say, “You are called to be fellow heirs with that One, joined with that One, a part of His inheritance, and for the purpose of God in Him to show His glorious intention when He made man.”
You are called to that. You see Him? That is a tremendous thing, is it not?
To hear words like this at the beginning of Hebrews 3—what for?
Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, even Jesus.
Holy brethren, partners in a heavenly calling. Now, all the people who are working for the firm are not partners in the firm. That word here, “partakers” in some versions, “partners” in the original, is this business term.
It is the same word that is used about the disciples when they were fishing, and they were given the miraculous draught. They beckoned unto their partners. Evidently, these two or three families were in a business partnership. That is the word here: partners, fellow sharers, on a basis of mutual relationship in the interests of this business.
Here it is: holy brethren, partners in a heavenly calling. What is this heavenly calling? Partnership with Christ.
The writer will say, “We are made partners with Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our confidence firm unto the end.” Partners with Christ.
I do not want to tie your words up and make a mountain too heavy for you to cope with. My concern, dear friends, is on the one side that we should see how great Christ is. But why? Why the revelation of Jesus Christ in such majestic terms?
It is given to show us what we are called to as Christians: a partnership with that One, with that One, in the ages to come, beginning now by new birth.
Now let me conclude for the moment by coming right back to this focal point. Just as truly as you and I naturally know that that first Adam is in us—powerfully in us, terribly in us, wretchedly—we do know it.
By our new birth, by our union with Christ inwardly, by this that has happened through the last Adam coming and our faith in Him, the thing that has got to be true of us is that, as we know the strength and power and reality of the old Adam in us, we have to know the reality of this last Adam in us.
The reality of Christ in us, as the hope of glory, has got to become more and more real and true in our case. Christ is the solution to all our problems, the answer to all questions.
What is the answer to the great problem of Christian disunity? What is it? Disunity amongst the Lord’s people. It is a big problem, you know, is it not? It is a terrible problem. It seems to be no use for this thing—the old Adam is busy, the old devil through the old Adam busy.
And I have found this: that in every instance, in every case of division amongst the Lord’s people, you will be able to trace the old Adam somewhere. You can see it. You find that somewhere this old man has got in.
Either in his assertiveness, or his ambition, or his determinations, or something—he is in. That is where these divisions come from.
What is the answer to Christian division? Not conferences, discussion. It is Christ. It is Christ, and it is only Christ.
There will be no healing only insofar as there is an increase of Christ. But if there is an increase of Christ, we have got the key to the situation. Christ is not divided. Paul says, “Is Christ divided?” Is Christ divided? Meaning: impossible. Christ cannot be divided.
Therefore, if there is a large measure of Christ, we shall have unity. Terrible to think, is it not, that disunity simply means such a small measure of Christ? A terrible thought, and yet it is.
As it is true of a matter like that, it is true of all other things. Christ is the answer. More of Christ, more problems are solved. More of Christ, more difficulties are got over. More Christ, and you are getting nearer to that where the earth shall be full of the glory of the Lord.
Christ in you is the hope of that glory. This is a rebuke to us, and yet it is a great call to us. This letter is founded on this: Christ.
More Christ. More Christ.
What are you praying for most? What are you concerned about mostly? Perhaps you are praying the Lord will use you to lead souls to Himself, for the salvation of souls. Perhaps that is something you are praying about.
Well, I do not say pray less about that. Pray more about that if you can. It may be something else you are praying for, but let me tell you this: the thing above all these other things to pray for is that we may be more like Christ—that there shall be more Christ in us.
God speaks to the world in a Person, not firstly in words. It is in a Person. If He could get this one new man conformed to His Son, what a tremendous impact He would make upon this world.
If we were more Christlike, we would have to say less. Our testimony would be far more powerful. Well, that is the sort of talk that we are used to, but that is different.
I can only say to you, this is what has borne in upon me tremendously: that the Lord would call His people, call us His people, to look again at His Son, see how great His Son is, get a new conception of the greatness of Christ, and then say to our own hearts, “There is nothing, nothing that we could imagine of greater honour than to be joined to that Son.”
A member of Christ, a partner with Him in the heavenly calling.
When I consider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers,
The moon and the stars, which Thou hast ordained;
What is man, that Thou art mindful of him?
And the son of man, that Thou visitest him?
My wife and I went to the London Planetarium recently. You are shown, in this marvellous way, these constellations. You just shrivel and become so small in your own eyes as you contemplate those heavenly bodies.
David the psalmist stepped out one night under those heavens. He was looking after his sheep. “When I consider Thy heavens, the works of Thy hands, what is man, that Thou art mindful of him? The son of man, that Thou visitest him?”
How do you interpret that? Do you interpret that as meaning this: the universe is so vast, man is so small, so insignificant in this universe; here is the greatness of God, and man—well, God made man, but man is so small? Is that how you read it?
David thought just the opposite. God’s power and wisdom in the universe have put man right at the centre of it. He is the most important, most important part of His creation: man.
What is man, that he should be in God’s mind? More important than the world, more important than the heavens. He is the key to everything.
Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of Thy hands;
Thou hast put all things under his feet.
It is not putting man down in a smaller place in God’s universe; it is putting him there in the highest place. And God’s thought, you see, is realized in His Son. All the sun and moon and stars must worship Him.
When He again bringeth into the world His Son, His only begotten, what does that refer to? The coming again of the Lord—no doubt about it. The coming again of the Lord. He will say, “Let all the angels of God worship Him.”
Revelation shows you that actually happening. But see: it is the Son of Man in that position—the Son of Man. That is a term, a designation, that brings Him into relation to mankind.
Oh, what a calling! It is too big for us, too wonderful. But, dear friends, do you not think we need to get a bigger idea of Christ and of what it means to be a Christian?
Read again this letter to the Hebrews in the light of that. You see how tremendous it is and how it bears down upon us. So, do not miss your calling. Do not be careless about this great calling, this on-high calling, this heavenly calling.
Let us go on. It is the greatness of this matter. Let us go on to full growth. Leave it there for the time being.
Lord, work upon Thy Word. Give to our hearts the very impression Thou dost want us to have.
We pray that the words, the language, the effort to convey truth, may not in any way hide the truth itself. Bring that to our hearts: that it is no small thing to be called to be fellow heirs with Thy Son, heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ.
Thou hast put all things under His feet, gave Him to be Head over all things, appointed Him heir of all things. Fellow heir with Jesus Christ—what a calling, what a calling!
Lord, bring the weight of this to bear upon us, to move us to a new outreach, a new abandonment, a new readiness to suffer the loss of all things to gain Christ.
Cover Thy Word. If anything has been said that should not have been said, just let it die; let it have no power with us. But what has been true according to Thyself, confirm it, strengthen it, hold it, preserve it.
Be with us now. Cover us in our going. May we be blessed of the Lord with His peace this night. For the sake of our Lord Jesus, we ask. Amen.