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

Much of this letter is an exposition based on Psalm 110, although the writer does take references from other portions of the Old Testament.  Today’s passage focuses on Psalm 110:4, where the psalmist writes:

You are a priest forever,
in the order of Melchizedek.

He says that this means that the Levitical priesthood, and the Law which established it, could not provide for perfection to be obtained.  If perfection could have been obtained through the law which established the Levitical priesthood, a different order of priesthood would not have been necessary.  The writer then explains that perfection could not be obtained through the order of the Levitical priesthood because those priests had to offer sacrifices for their own sins year after year, and they would all eventually die.  However, Jesus offered a sacrifice once for all time, did not need to offer sacrifices for His own sins (since He did not have any), and, once He was resurrected, would never again die.

I use 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 out by establishing from Old Testament Scripture that Jesus is equal to God.  I would argue that he actually establishes that Jesus is God.  He goes on from there to show that in Jesus, God was made fully human, subject to the same temptation and suffering that every other human experiences.  In the process of making these points the writer tells us that God has chosen to subject the world to come to us.  Everything will be put beneath our feet.  There will be nothing that will not be subject to our rule.  The writer reminds us that this has not yet happened, except that God has already subject everything to Jesus.  The knowledge that God has already subject everything to Jesus encourages the hope in us that He will do the same for us.  So, since Jesus has conquered death, He has saved those of us who put our trust in Him from death.  And when we face temptation we know that Jesus likewise faced the same temptation, which should give us confidence that He can guide us into overcoming that temptation.

I will stop writing here.  I feel that some of what I have written above fails to convey my thoughts as I intended, but re-writing those parts would require re-writing the whole.  So, I will leave it as it stands.

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

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

I find this passage hard to write about because I feel that the writer has done such a good job of putting together the complex argument he is making that I am not sure how to highlight the key points which he makes.  The writer tells us that Jesus is our high priest, but He is not a priest of the Law of Moses.  Those priests were commissioned to serve in the earthly Tabernacle and Temple, which were but copies of the heavenly, eternal place of worship.  Further, those priests only served until their death.  Jesus, on the other hand, serves as high priest in the heavenly Tabernacle and in the direct presence of God.  Jesus also lives forever so there will never be a time when He is no longer high priest.  Jesus will be able to intercede between God and man for eternity.  The writer discusses how in the copy of the Tabernacle which existed on earth there was a veil between the Holy Place and the Most Holy Place, a veil which was torn when Jesus died on the cross.  That veil is no longer necessary because Jesus offered Himself as a sacrifice for our sins and now we can enter directly into God’s presence where Jesus will intercede for us.

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

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

I find the Book of Hebrews challenging because the writer chose to cover some rather advanced theology in his letter.  While Paul covers similarly advanced theology in some of his letters, we have more letters by Paul from which to learn to understand the way he words things.  The writer begins by pointing out that Jesus was distinct from the angels.  Jesus was not a special kind of angel, He was, and is, something completely different.  Angels are spirits sent by God to minister to and to serve those whom He has save by His grace.  The writer goes on from there to answer the question, “If Jesus is not an angel, what is He?”  Jesus became fully human. So, He was human, but He is also God.  More than any other writer in the Bible the writer of Hebrews tackles the fact that human comprehension cannot fully explain God.  We must be left with using metaphors and similes about God which we know do not fully explain any aspect of Him.  When the writer tells us that we need to work on consuming solid spiritual food rather than continuing to subsist on spiritual milk he is alluding to the fact that we must move beyond simple metaphors for God, that we must wrestle with explaining Him in better ways than that.  We may not succeed, but we should strive to wrap our heads around the infinite greatness which is God and His love.

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

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.

As I read today’s passage there were several things which I thought worth mentioning.  We will see how many of them I fit into today’s Bible Study.  The passage begins with the writer referring back to the people of faith about whom he wrote in yesterday’s passage, people of whom the world was not worthy.  To explain how we should act he uses the metaphor of one running a race, such as in the Olympic competitions.  Just as those who wish to succeed in world class athletic competition need to have a great trainer, and need to do what that trainer directs them to do, so to do we need a great spiritual trainer if we want to succeed in the spiritual race in which we find ourselves.  Fortunately, in Jesus Christ we have such a spiritual trainer.  A trainer who has proven their merit as a trainer by winning the highest possible spiritual honor.  In order for a physical trainer to train someone to succeed they must sometimes disciple their trainee when the trainee falls short.   In the same way, God will discipline us when we fall short of the spiritual exercises which He gives us.  God’s discipline is not evidence that He has given up on us.  Rather, it is evidence of His love for us.  So let us accept God’s discipline with joy, since it represents an expression of His love for us.

As you may notice, I did not fit many of the ideas I mentioned at the beginning into this study.

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.

Jesus’ sacrifice once for all time means that we can confidently enter into God’s presence, knowing that our sins are forgiven through God’s grace.  Each time we fail to turn from sin we can confidently pick ourselves up and strive to do good once again.   As long as we put our faith in Christ, and not in our own works, we can be confident that God’s Spirit will dwell in us and transform us into His likeness.  The writer tells us that we must strive to encourage each other to good works and acts of love.  What he is saying is that there are two reasons we should gather with our fellow believers.  On the one hand we should gather so that we can motivate others to do God’s will.  On the other hand we should gather so that we can be motivated to do God’s will.  The writer goes on to give us examples of people who have done great works of faith throughout history.  He reminds us that some achieved great victories by their faith, but others suffered greatly.  However, he tells us that in both cases they changed the world through their faith and that the world was not worthy of them.  Let us strive to be worthy to be footnotes in their stories.

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.

Interestingly, the translators’ notes in the footnotes says that the words translated here as “evil deeds’ literally translate as “dead works”.  Using that makes more sense of what the writer is saying than what they chose here: “So let us stop going over the basic teachings about Christ again and again. Let us go on instead and become mature in our understanding. Surely we don’t need to start again with the fundamental importance of repenting from dead works evil deeds and placing our faith in God.”   The writer appears to me to be telling his audience that they should be past arguing about the importance of rituals and particular actions.  In particular, the writer seems to be discussing the rituals and practices of Jewish Law, although I do not believe his point applies exclusively to them.  He goes on to point out how the high priest under Mosaic Law was so constrained to continually offer sacrifices that he was unable to truly intercede on our behalf with God.  Jesus does not suffer that liability, since His one time sacrifice was sufficient for eternity.  This means that Jesus can function as an advocate before God for us.  Just as each of us will die once, so Jesus died once.  And since Jesus was resurrected, we know that He will be there to bring us before God for resurrection if we put our faith in Him.

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

In chapter 11, which we read yesterday, the writer referred to the many people who did great things, and/or experienced great suffering and persecution because of their faith.  We should be inspired by those people to remove from our lives any thing, thought, or activity which interferes with living a life which pleases God.  Look at your life and get rid of anything which takes away from doing God’s will.  Each and every one of us only has so much time or energy.  Spend that time and energy doing things which show God’s love to others.  If you find yourself sinning, fill up more of your time with doing good and soon you will not have time to sin.  And never allow yourself to feel bitter about anything.  Instead view those negative things which tempt you to be bitter as God’s loving discipline designed to goad you to do better.

Later, as part of his wrap up of the letter, the writer tells us to show hospitality to strangers because sometimes those strangers are God’s messengers.  Paul wrote that we should love one another.  The writer here is reminding us that we do not necessarily know who is, and is not, a member of that “one another”.  Further, the blessings we receive from showing love to those who may never return that love greatly exceeds the cost to us of doing so.