Thankfulness and Praise in Hebrews 1:3

“And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high…” (Hebrews 1:3).

I am thankful that to see God, I need only to look to the Son. When I look at the Son, my spiritual sight is then drawn to the Father Who sent His Son (John 1:18; 14:9). When I look at the Son, I do so by the Son-given Spirit Who also inspired the Word which reveals the Son. Glorious Trinity! The “doctrine of the Trinity is the foundation of all our communion with God, and comfortable dependence on Him…religious worship is to be given to God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and to Him alone” (1689 Baptist Confession, 2.3; 22.2). Praise Him with great praise! If 1:1 is the Old Testament, then remember that 1:2 is the God’s final all-sufficient Word the Son in the New Testament. There Jesus is revealed to us fully, and He is all we need to see to see God. We also learn how we are to live and the people of the Son. Praise Him for this full life in the glory and nature of God!

I am thankful that He “upholds all things by the word of His power.” The Son as mediatorial Creator is not a single past-time event. It is continual. Nothing exists outside of the unceasing creative power of the Son Who is the Word of God (Psalm 33:6; John 1:1-3). He, being fully God, is infinitely greater than this entire universe. I remember reading Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time long, long ago. The goal of his work as a theoretical physicist was to construct a picture of “a universe with no edge in space, no beginning or end in time, and nothing for a Creator to do.”[1] Nothing new there. Aristotle (384-322 B.C.) also believed in an eternal creation, making creation the Absolute instead of any Creator. The apostle explains it this way a few centuries later: “…since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures. Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, Who is blessed forever. Amen” (Romans 1:20-25). The response to an unimaginably large and complex and varied creation is to be utterly awed by the Absolute and infinitely greater Creator… to “honor Him as God” and “give thanks.” Praise Him with great praise, for all that is exists derivatively from the One Who is Being. Not only that, but if the Word of God Who is eternally One with God continuously creates this universe, what can His perfectly-inspired written Word do in our lives by the power of the Spirit He has given us?

I am thankful that He has fully accomplished the “purification of sins.” This is the sixth day of Christmas (“geese a-laying” day), the sixth day celebrating His coming. The Son is the Law-Giver.[2] All of us have violated that Law. He came to this world to pay the penalty for the lawlessness of His people (Matthew 1:21). “Everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness. You know that He appeared in order to take away sins; and in Him there is no sin” (1 John 3:5). This Good News is built on the foundation of God’s speaking in Hebrews 1:1. The Fall, the Law, the sacrifices for violations of that Law, the Promise of a final Prophet, Priest, and King…all of these are in the revelations God made “to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways” (1:1). And this points to my infinitely-heavy debt to God for violating His Law. He is worthy of praise in the Big Story and in my personal Small Story, for He is the Resolution of my greatest problem: lawlessness before the Law-Giver.

I am thankful that when I consider the power and authority over the entire universe, I rest in the fact that He is also the One “Who loved me and gave Himself up for me” (Galatians 2:20). The more and more I read the Book, the more and more I see His absolute sovereignty revealed to us. It is on the first page, where being made by the plural Him in His “image” and “likeness” is immediately followed by the decree “let them rule” (Genesis 1:26) – His image is sovereignty. It is on the last page, where “the root and the descendant of David” (Revelation 22:16) is prayed to (showing His divinity) with the supplication, “come, Lord Jesus” (22:20), and is the Source of all we need, “the grace of the Lord Jesus be with all” (22:21).[3] He is sitting down at the highest place of authority in the universe. He is “far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And He put all things in subjection under His feet” (Ephesians 1:21,22). “He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet” (1 Corinthians 15:25). The resurrected Lord tells the eleven on that hill in Galilee, “all authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth” (Matthew 28:18). Resting by faith in this truth is the greatest praise I can offer Him this day.

Antelope on the run.

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[1] Hawking, Stephen, A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes (New York: Bantam Books, 1988), x.

[2] “…Jesus Christ the true Messiah and only law-giver” (1689 Baptist Confession, 19.3).

[3] Jesus as Fulfillment of the Davidic covenant is a massively important and relevant doctrine that I’ve only really awakened to in the last few years. He is identified in the first words of the New Testament as “Jesus the Messiah, the son of David” (Matthew 1:1), and, as I cited above, He is identified according to the Davidic covenant on the last page of the New Testament. The Davidic covenant is invoked in one of Paul’s earliest works (Romans 1:3) and one of his latest (2 Timothy 2:8). It is relevant because Christians are so obsessed with the earthly rulers and powers that I fear they spend very little time resting in the only eternal King and His current absolute power.

Keeping the Cross in Sight

I meet on Thursday mornings at a local coffee house with a group of guys. We’re reading through Louis Berkhof’s Systematic Theology. Not always the most exciting reading, but I’ve found it good in my life to always be reading something that’s not easy to read. Kind of like exercise for the brain.

This morning I was driving down the hill from my house toward the highway. We’re at that time of year that I leave before sunrise on Thursdays. A woman was walking up the hill on the sidewalk. I watched as a coyote crossed the road just behind her. She stopped, suddenly realizing that something was behind her. Looking, but not seeing it, she looked back to me and waved. Always good to have company when you suspect something’s stalking you in the twilight. She kept walking. I stopped just past her and watched the coyote for a few moments before heading on to the coffee house. Something ghost-like about a coyote's ability to disappear into the dusk. I thought about the thousands of miles I have run on the trails near our house. I’ve seen several coyotes and snakes and javelina...I wonder what I haven’t seen that has crossed the path just behind me?

This morning we discussed Christ’s atonement for our sins. When we talk about our sin being an offense to a holy God and Christ dying for our sin, sometimes people get the idea that the Father’s an angry old grump and Jesus forced Him to like us. That’s not scriptural.

Berkhof says: “According to Scripture the moving cause of the atonement is found in the good pleasure of God to save sinners by a substitutionary atonement. Christ Himself is the fruit of this good pleasure of God. It was predicted that He would come into the world to carry out the good pleasure of God, ‘and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand,’ Isaiah 53:10. At His birth the angels sang, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men in whom He is well pleased,’ Luke 2:14. The glorious message of John 3:16 is that ‘God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish, but have eternal life.’ Paul says that Christ ‘gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us out of this present evil world, according to the will of our God and Father,’ Galatians 1:4. And again, ‘For it was the good pleasure of the Father that in Him should all the fullness dwell; and through Him to reconcile all things unto Himself, Colossians 1:19,20” (italics original).

All those Scripture verses the old Dutchman mentions show us that God the Father loved us and therefore sent His Son to atone for our sins.

More Berkhof...this time his “proofs” for the necessity of the atonement:

1.      It would seem to be the clear teaching of Scripture that God, in virtue of His divine righteousness and holiness, cannot simply overlook defiance to His infinite majesty, but must needs visit sin with punishment. We are told repeatedly that He will by no means clear the guilty, Exodus 34:7; Numbers 14:18; Nahum 1:3. He hates sin with a divine hatred; His whole being reacts against it, Psalm 5:4-6; Nahum 1:2; Romans 1:18...the justice of God should be maintained.

2.      This leads right on to the second argument. The majesty and absolute immutability of the divine law as inherent in the very nature of God made it necessary for Him to demand satisfaction of the sinner. The transgression of the law inevitably carries with it a penalty.

3.      The necessity of the atonement also follows from the veracity of God, who is a God of truth and cannot lie. “God is not a man, that He should lie; neither the son of man, that He should repent; hath He said it, and shall He not do it? or hath He spoken, and shall He not make it good?” Numbers 23:19. “Let God be found true,” says Paul, “but every man a liar.” Romans 3:4. When He entered into the covenant of works with man, He decreed that death would be the penalty of disobedience. That principle finds expression in many other words of Scripture, such as Ezekiel 18:4; Romans 6:23. The veracity of God demanded that the penalty should be executed, and if sinners were to be saved, should be executed in the life of a substitute.

4.      The same conclusion may be drawn from the nature of sin as guilt...negatively, it is lawlessness, and positively, transgression of the law of God, and therefore guilt, 1 John 3:4; Romans 2:25,27, and guilt makes one a debtor to the law and requires either a personal or a vicarious atonement.

5.      The amazing greatness of the sacrifice which God Himself provided also implies the necessity of the atonement. God gave His only-begotten Son, to be subjected to bitter sufferings and to a shameful death.

These are all worthy proofs. Concerning #4, it strikes me if people don’t “feel” like sinners, they don’t think they are sinners. “Sin” is determined by a purely horizontal standard, and the horizon these days is as shifty as a mirage. Berkhof reminds us in his fourth proof that God’s Law (as revealed in Scripture) is the standard, not the culture or mass opinion of humanity.

Proof #5 is the most profound. Who, looking at the Son of God on the cross, can feel self-righteous and pure? Despite the foolish “the cross shows our worthiness,” it shows just the opposite. This is why the Gospel of the cross of Jesus Christ is so offensive. You and I were so sinful and unable to save ourselves that it took the giving of the sinless, glorious, beloved, and eternal Son of God in our place to save us. He Who had done no wrong had to entire into our sinful separation from God, crying out on the cross, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” (Matthew 27:46//Mark 15:34).

The atonement exalts the Trinity’s great justice and love at the same time.

Berkhof gives this example that highlights both at the same time: “...all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; Whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness...for the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus” (Romans 3:23-26).

I’ve always preferred a verse a few chapters later to illustrate this same point: “...God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him” (Romans 5:8,9). Love and wrath. Together. No contradiction. No paradox. Both held together in the cross of Christ.

Through the eyes of the Law, the Prophets, and the Apostles, stop and take a good look at the cross. Often. Don’t get so busy in your schedule that the scriptural depths of its meaning become just a whisper of a ghost behind you while you’re about your daily business.