HEBREWS –PART TWO—LESSON ONE

“How Will I Ever Understand Hebrews? There is a Way”

Kay Arthur, Teacher

How can I ever understand Hebrews? Is that what has been going through your mind and through your heart as you read through that book, especially if you just started Hebrews with us, especially if you haven’t been in Hebrews 1? Have you been ready to throw up your hands? I understand; that has happened to me many times as I have been studying Hebrews. I want you to know that as I have prepared these lessons, and as I have written the course, I have literally spent hundreds of hours, several hundred hours, in this book, and I feel like I am just beginning to get a handle on the book. You say, “Kay, then there is no way.” There is always a way. How can I ever understand Hebrews? There is a way, and we are going to help you so you can learn precept upon precept, so that you can take it in, so that you can live it out. In this first session with you, I want to pray with you, because I want you to know how earnestly I am praying with you. I want God to minister to you, and I want you to persevere.

Let’s pray. Oh Father, we come now boldly to the throne of grace. We thank You, Father, that as we enter in through the rent veil of the flesh of your Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, that we see at Your right hand our great High Priest, a priest who abides forever, and a priest who is able to save forever those who draw near to you. Oh Father, I thank You that He is the Mighty Conqueror, that He is the One who has conquered death and the power of Satan, and who has wrought the victory for man so that we can walk as more than conquerors. Father, I pray for each one, not only those here in this auditorium right now, but for all those out there that are watching by video tape, that are listening by audio tape. I pray for them, Father. I pray for the ones in the years to come that will be listening to these messages. I pray, Father, that You would cup their face in Your hands and that You would speak to them face to face by Your spirit. I pray that You would take the veil off of their eyes, so that they might see all that is theirs through the mediator of this new covenant, the Lord Jesus Christ. I pray, Father, that you would put such a will within them to persevere through faith and patience to inherit the promises. I pray, Father, that they will so understand this message of Hebrews, that when the trials and sufferings come for the sake of the gospel of Jesus Christ that they will rejoice within, knowing, Father, that this is for the perfecting of their holiness, without which no man will ever see the Lord. I pray, Father, that they would say to You, “Oh, Lord, I have ears to hear, and I want to hear what You are saying to me, part of Your church, and I want to listen to it, and I don’t want to drift away from it. I want to hold it fast. I will not refuse You who is speaking to me, but I will listen, and I will show my gratitude to You for this kingdom which cannot be shaken. I will serve You with all my being.” Oh, Father, in this course, would you take them all the way through—when people are tempted to stop, when they are tempted to give up, when they are tempted to walk off the course, and not finish the race that is set before them? Oh, Father, would you remind them that they are to run with endurance? Father, for those that are encumbered and unable to run because they are so weighted down, would You show them the weight, the sins that do so easily beset them, so that they might set them aside, Father, and looking unto Jesus, to persevere. Oh, Father, I look to Thee to make this study a time of worship, a time of fastening our gaze upon Thee, looking unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith; and enduring, as seeing Him who is invisible. Father, I thank You that You are going to use this course to equip the saints to do Your good will, and I thank You, Father, that You are going to do it through the Great Shepherd, the Lord Jesus Christ, the one who brought forth the eternal covenant. Oh, Lord, we look to You now, and we thank You, Father, that those that look to You will not be disappointed. In Jesus’ holy name. Amen.

I want to show you how you can understand the book of Hebrews, and I want to take you through that book today in a special way. I realize that some of you are only halfway through the book. You have read through the book, and you are in the process of titling every chapter. Yet, because of the depth of Hebrews, because Hebrews is a book that is not easily understood, people shy away from it. They run away from it. I want to give you all the help that I can give you without preempting you. That will be a little difficult, but I think that it will help you tremendously. I want to tell you that if you are struggling with this book, if you think that you are just about to get a handle on it, and then the understanding of it seems to slip through your fingers, even though you have done Hebrews 1, I understand. I told you that I have spent literally several hundred hours in this book, and it has taken that for me to really understand it so that I could write the course for you. So do not be discouraged, but persevere.

Go to Hebrews 13:22, where we see that Hebrews is a word of exhortation. You will want to write this down. I want to move slowly enough through the book with you so that you can get all this down, and then you go back and go over your notes. I would suggest that you go over your notes every week after I finish teaching, that you set aside some time during the week to review those notes. Review, review, review! In Hebrews 13:22, the author of Hebrews tells us his purpose in writing the book. (22) “But I urge you, brethren (and sistern?), bear with this word of exhortation, for I have written to you briefly.” [This author’s “briefly” is like my “briefly”. It is a little long. He says, “This is a word of exhortation, and I want you to bear with this. I want you to listen to it; I want you to heed it.”]

#1. It is a word of exhortation that directs the readers to Jesus Christ. As it directs our attention to Jesus Christ, it causes us to focus on Him. You see this focus mentioned later on in the book. You see it mentioned in Hebrews 11:24-27, when he points backwards to the Old Testament and shows that the way the Old Testament saints made it was by looking unto Jesus. He gives us Moses as an example. (24) “By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter; (25) choosing rather to endure ill-treatment with the people of God, than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin; (26) considering the reproach of Christ…” [In Hebrews 13, he talks about us going outside the camp and bearing His reproach.]

“reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt; for he was looking to the reward. (27) By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king; for he endured, as seeing Him who is unseen.” [The King James Version says, “as seeing Him who is invisible.”] So this word of exhortation is an exhortation to these people. (I am not going to tell you about those people or their circumstances yet, for that is next week’s homework.) These people were told that they were to look unto Jesus.

He brings this out also in Hebrews 12:2. He talks, not this time about the Old Testament saints that made it by looking unto Jesus, but he talks about them and what they are to do. (2) “Fixing your eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of your faith.” It is a word of exhortation that immediately directs our attention to Jesus. You see that when you begin in Chapter 1, because in the first three verses of Ch. 1, God establishes who Jesus is. He says, in 1:1, “God, in times past and in diverse ways, spoke to us through the prophets, but in these last days He has spoken to us through His Son.” In the first three verses, He establishes who the Son is, and immediately He directs your attention to Jesus Christ.

It is a word of exhortation that says, “I understand.” The author is saying to his readers, “I understand where you are, and I understand your conflict, what you are going through. I understand your suffering.” I will give you that much about these people—they were enduring a conflict. They were enduring suffering. Hebrews is a book that says, “Put your eyes on Jesus; I understand where you are.”

#2. It is a word of exhortation that says, “I understand, but you have Jesus. I understand that you are suffering; I understand your conflict, but you have Jesus.” Then, in the book, he says, “and because of who He is (and He is going to show us who Jesus is), because of what He has done, because of where He has been, and because of where He is right now, you can make it. Now watch, he says, “It is a word of exhortation.” He directs his readers to Jesus, and he says, “I understand, but you have Jesus who…” In the first two chapters, he shows you that Jesus is God (Chapter 1). He shows you that Jesus is man (Chapter 2), and he shows you that Jesus is faithful (Chapter 3) as our high priest. In the first three chapters, he establishes that Jesus is God, He is man, and He is a faithful high priest. He says, “But you have Jesus, who is these things…” Now, what has Jesus done? He establishes the fact that Jesus (who is God) has become man. He establishes His reincarnation. He establishes His death as the sacrifice (or the propitiation) for our sins. He does that in Chapter 2. And then, he establishes His exaltation, and that is going to come on where He is.

So, you come down, you have Jesus. Who is He? He is God; He is man; and He is a high priest. What has He done? He has become man; He has died for our sins, and He has been resurrected. Where has He been? He has been a man like you have been; he has suffered like you have suffered. He has been tempted like you have been tempted; He understands what you are going through. Where is He now? He is exalted to the right hand of the throne of the Majesty on high, and because He is exalted to the right hand of the Majesty on high, He has made it. And because He has made it, you can make it. No matter what you are going through, the book of Hebrews is showing you that God understands; Jesus understands; He has been there, but you can make it because He has been there and He has made it. It is a book of great, great hope.

The second thing that I want you to see about his book is that it is a book of exhortation. If you want to go through those exhortations and make sure you have them all, you can go back to our Hebrews, Part One series (in our first tapes), and look at those exhortations.

#3. Hebrews is a book of worship. Do you know what the church needs today? The church needs to learn to worship God. The reason that sometimes our services seem so dead in church, or our relationship with God seems so cool or so aloof is because we have not learned how to worship God. Hebrews is a book of worship. When we talk about worship, what are we talking about? When you worship someone, you look at their worth-ship. Worship comes from two words: worth and ship. If I am going to worship someone, I look at who they are; I look at their value; I look at those qualities and characteristics that belong to them that make them who they are or what they are. So, if I am going to worship God, or if I am going to worship Jesus Christ, if I am going to worship the Holy Spirit, I am going to look at each one of the trinity, and recall or rehearse who God is. I feel like God wants me in the prophets, and this year I am spending time in the prophets. (I have the whole Bible on tape. It is the New International Version, and it has noise in the background; if a woman speaks, a woman’s voice comes out; if a man speaks, a man’s voice comes. If there is a battle, there are swords clashing in the background. There is music, and it is great. It is just wonderful!) I have been listening to Isaiah, over and over and over again, just focusing on God and worshipping God.

As a matter of fact, the other day, Meg, our only granddaughter, (after having all sons it is really an adventure to have a granddaughter) spent the night. She in into little play make-up and stuff like that (she is 4 ½ years old). She said, “Mimi, can we put on our make-up together?” I said, “Yes, Honey, we can put on our make-up together.” I said, “When Mimi puts on her make-up, she usually has something hot to drink. Shall we have a tea party while we do this?” So we went into the kitchen, and got this pretty tea set, and had a tea party. We put it on a doily, put the little flowers on it, and brought it into the bathroom. We poured two tiny little cups to tea to have a tea party, and I said, “You know, the other thing that Mimi has learned is this, that there is an outside beauty, but that is no good if we are not beautiful on the inside. God wants us beautiful on the inside. Then, even if we are not terribly pretty on the outside, that inside beauty just comes out. As we put on our make-up for our outside beauty, we need to put on things for our inside beauty. Do you know what makes us beautiful on the inside? It is God’s word, and it is worshipping God.” We were doing all this, and I said, “Mimi, also, when she puts on her make-up, listens to the Bible on tape. Do you want to listen to the Bible on tape?” She said, “Yes.” We are right in the middle of Isaiah, and I have Isaiah going in the background. All of a sudden, they are saying, “Who knows? Who sees what we are doing?” And Meg is standing there, powdering, and she says, “God does. He knows everything.” I thought, “Oh, Lord. Four and a half years old!” The tape is just going, and you just don’t know what is going in.

If you will begin to use Hebrews as a book of worship, if you will not let its difficult passages drive you away, but if you will take those things that you are reading and learning about Jesus Christ, and turn them into anthems of worship and praise, I promise you that it will make you beautiful. It is a book of worship. It causes us to look at Christ’s worth, and then act accordingly.

It is filled with “Let us…” This is something that you did in your homework. I would like to take these “let us” passages, and look at them. The first “let” (it is not the first “let us”) is found in Hebrews 1:6, and I think it is very appropriate. (6) “And when He again brings the first-born into the world (speaking of Jesus), He says, ‘And let all the angels of God worship Him.” [Hebrews begins with letting us see Jesus as God, high and lifted up, sitting at the right hand of the throne of God, and it says, “Let all the angles of God worship Him.” If all the angels of God are going to worship Him, then how much more we ought to worship Him?

The first “let us” begins in Hebrews 4:1. “Therefore, let us fear lest, while a promise remains of entering His rest, any one of you should seem to have come short of it.” [So the first “let us” is a warning. It says, “Let us fear that we might come short of entering into His rest.” Let us be careful that we walk by faith (and we are going to look at Hebrews 3 and 4 next week). He is talking about entering His rest, and he says, “You don’t want to miss that rest.] (1) “Therefore, let us fear lest, while a promise remains of entering His rest, any one of you should seem to have come short of it.”

In 4:11, we have the second “let us”. (11) “Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest,” [In the Scripture, he says, “He who has entered God’s rest has rested from his own works,” so therefore, “Let us be diligent to enter that rest.”] “lest anyone fall through following the same example of disobedience.” (Then he gives us an example of how the children of Israel missed the rest of God.)

In 4:14, it says, “Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.” [You have confessed Him; you have said that He is your Lord; you have said that He is your savior. Now, hold fast that confession.]

In 4:16, it says, “Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace…” [Why am I to draw near with confidence to the throne of grace? Because I have a great high priest. So I am going to worship Him by acting accordingly. All these “let us” phrases are things that you are to actively do, but that activity that you do is an activity of worship. You have looked at God; you have said, “I believe what You are saying, and therefore I am going to act accordingly. I believe that He is who He says He is; therefore I am going to live accordingly.