Hebrews 1:1-4 "God Speaks"

I may have shared this story before with some of you, but it is an important one to share. I grew up in a Lutheran church in Washington State. One fall our youth group went to a weekend camp up in Bellingham. It was an awesome experience. The gospel was shared like it only can be at camp and a number of people in my youth group who had never been at all interested in their spiritual lives let them shine forth in a new way. The camp was only three days long, a Friday evening, Saturday, and Sunday morning. At the Saturday evening service an altar call was given. It was a powerful one. About three fourths of my youth group went forward. I was rejoicing as I watched so many from my youth group get up and go to the front of the room to pray with someone and ask Jesus into their lives. Those of us who did not go forward went back to our cabins. Our cabin, which normally had eight people in it, only had three of us because the rest were praying for God to enter their hearts. One of my friends, Mike, asked me why I didn’t go forward with everybody else. I responded by telling him that I had already asked Jesus into my heart and did not need to do so again. I then asked him why he didn’t go forward. His response was to say that he wanted to get to heaven the normal way: going to church, being good, he didn’t want to do anything weird.

And for the first time I found myself in the position of trying to explain what Jesus was really about to someone who was already religious, who was going through the motions of faith without really understanding what they were really about. More about that night later.

1. God: So Much Greater

The book of Hebrews is one of the least read books in the New Testament. It isn’t written by Paul, the author of it isn’t even named, and it talks about weird things like a priest that lived during the time of Abraham named Melchizedek who seemed to live forever. But when you get past the odd things you find in the book of Hebrews you discover that it is mostly about faith… faith in Jesus. Hebrews tells us what it is that Jesus did for us and why we should follow Jesus today. Hebrews talks to a group of religious people and tries to explain to them why they need Jesus. It tells them that the rituals, the sacrifices, the worship that they do is not enough. Instead, the true center of what they are called to is faith in Jesus.

The book of Hebrews goes on to tell us that we have direct access to God, not through rituals we do, not through saints we pray to, not through congregations we belong to, but through Jesus. Hebrews tells us that because of Jesus, who he was and what he did, we can enter God’s presence; we can come before the Lord and Creator of the universe and he will hear us. This is truly an awesome concept, but one that we take for granted, I think. We take it for granted that when we lift up a prayer God actually stops and listens to us. But when you think about it, this is an amazing reality. God, who is responsible for this whole world around us; he gave us this world, he set the sun, moon and stars in the sky, he sends rain to nourish the world, you’d think he might be a bit too busy to spend time focusing on us.

You know, I always wonder why certain heresies and misunderstandings of our faith come about. One strange one that entered the Catholic Church pretty early was the idea that people couldn’t go directly to God. Instead, if they wanted something, they would pray to a dead saint who would then get God’s attention for them. In many ways this seems kind of silly, but in other ways it sort of makes sense. Why would God spend time listening to us. Wouldn’t it make much more sense to get the attention of someone else up there who might hold some sway over God and have them speak to God on our behalf. In my earthly logic, in my human reasoning, this actually makes some sense. But the book of Hebrews tells us that we don’t need anybody to come between us and God. Jesus has done this for us so that now we can enter God’s presence, now we can experience God’s rest. Like I said, this is a truth of our faith that I don’t think we really take as seriously as we should.

2. Jesus’ Credentials

And so Hebrews begins in chapter 1 by giving us Jesus’ credentials. It is all about telling us why it is that we should listen to what Jesus had to say and why it is that what Jesus did on the cross has power in our lives, even today. Now the letter of Hebrews spent time telling people of the day why Jesus was important by tying him to the things they already believed in. The people of the day, particularly the Hebrews or Jews of the day, believed in Old Testament prophecy. They believed that God had spoken through the prophets throughout time. And so Hebrews begins by acknowledging that very thing. “In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son.” This is really, truly a powerful statement. God used to speak to us through prophets and preacher, but now has sent his very Son to speak to us. I guess this is why we take the words of Jesus so seriously. I guess this is why we have red-letter editions of the Bible where Jesus’ own words are highlighted for us in a different color than the rest of the Bible. This is important here, pay attention; God is speaking to you through his Son. But this Son who God speaks through was also involved in the creation of the universe, and he is also the heir of all things. Fancy words and concepts to say something pretty simple. Before anything on this earth was created, Jesus was there, with God, creating. And after this world ends, Jesus will be there, with God, in control of all that God has given him. The first chapter of Hebrews continues to give us Jesus’ resume. “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word.” Not only was Jesus there at the beginning, and not only will he be there at the end, he is here right now, sustaining this world, holding it together. Hebrews 1 tells us that Jesus is now sitting at God’s right hand in heaven. Oh, and by the way, think of the greatest created thing in the universe. Out of all the things that God has created, what is the most spectacular? Some of you might say dinosaurs. Others might describe whales. Hebrews goes one better: angels. Here are these amazing creatures that we only catch a glimpse of in scripture but who are truly fantastic and don’t seem to need to play by the rules of nature. Well, Jesus is even greater than them.

Now this might all seem natural to us. Of course Jesus is greater than the angels. Of course Jesus was with God at creation and will be with him at the end of time. But you see, for us, Jesus lived 2000 years ago. He lived in a different time and a different culture and we don’t really see him as human. But the people sitting and hearing Hebrews when it first came out probably thought of Jesus as a man. He had walked the earth with them. They had had conversations with him. Sure he did some pretty impressive things during his life, but God’s prophets often did do impressive things. It is easy for me to say that someone who lived 2000 years ago was God. It would be much less believable for me to say that someone who lived 20 years ago was God incarnate. But this is what the letter of Hebrews was proclaiming. Jesus was more than just a great man. He was something special. The people who walked with him and talked with him didn’t truly know what it was that they had. Here they were, walking and talking with the creator of the universe, and they were busy worrying about who got to sit at his right hand. And so, Hebrews is about introducing Jesus, God incarnate, the Savior, to people who need to know him.

3. Introducing Jesus

We are called to do the same thing that Hebrews is doing. But I’m not sure that quoting from Hebrews is necessarily the way to go about doing this. You see, we live in a different world today than existed back then. We don’t have people who necessarily follow the Old Testament rituals and activities but not the New. Well, I guess we do, they’re the Jews, but here in Albert City we don’t run into many of them. But what we do have here is people who go to church, who participate in church activities, who try their best to be good people; people like my friend from youth group, Mike. These people believe that we are called to earn our way into heaven and that we don’t have that direct access with God that we could truly use. The rituals of our faith are not bad, but they aren’t what brings salvation. Salvation comes from knowing Jesus. Salvation comes from believing in Jesus. Salvation comes from following Jesus. In the coming weeks we’re going to be looking closely at sections of Hebrews. We are going to watch as the book tells us a bit about what Jesus did for us, why it is important, and what faith really looks like. I’ll give you a hint: faith looks a lot like faithfulness. We are also going to see throughout the book that God promises us rest if we follow him. Hebrews is pretty eloquent. It is also pretty detailed and even at times confusing, especially when it begins to talk about Old Testament priests and the aforementioned Melchizedek. But its message is an important one that can change your life. Don’t just go through the motions of faith. Instead truly follow Jesus. A great future awaits you if you do.

I’m not nearly as eloquent as the writer of Hebrews was. But on that night in high school, I tried to tell my friend that going to church and trying to be good was not the “normal” way to get to heaven. Instead, what God was looking for was a commitment as we turn our lives, our whole lives, over to him. I believe that Mike went to bed thinking on this very thought.

The next day there was a morning service and the speaker spoke again. He didn’t build up to an altar call as he had the night before, but after he spoke he asked whether anybody did want to speak to him after worship who might not have come forward the night before. Mike went forward. Again I found myself praising God for being so great. Here is the creator of everything and he wants a relationship with you. Wow. Maybe you can relate to Mike. Maybe you feel like you are going through rituals and motions but there is nothing behind them. Maybe you have believed that all you needed to get to heaven was an attendance sheet from church. I’m telling you now what I told Mike. God wants relationship with you. God sent his Son for you. God asks you to follow him, to accept him as your Lord and Savior. If this is the case, if you have been going through the motions and want something more, I would like to talk with you after church. So when the service ends I’m not going to go to the back and start shaking hands. Instead I’m going to stay up here and if you’d like to ask Jesus to become the center of your life, I invite you to come forward and talk with me.