Deeper Waters

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters. I’ve just had a great evening with an excellent Christian apologist who I shall leave unnamed, but a lot of what he said really resonated with my soul. I appreciate all that he’s done for apologetics and for myself. I do still ask for your continued prayers. Moving on, we are going to skip to the fourth chapter of Hebrews tonight and discuss what it means for Jesus to be our great high priest. We’ll be looking at Hebrew 4:14-16.

¹⁴Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. ¹⁵For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. ¹⁶Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

This is the first reference to the high priest, which happens to be the next mediator in the line of Alexandrian thought at the time. Jesus is said to be this high priest. The major functions of the priestly ministry of Jesus will be discussed as we go further through the epistle so we shall save them for when we get to them.

Jesus is the one who has gone through the Heavens. For those who are wondering if Jesus is still flying through the cosmos after his ascension, no. Yes, for any who are wondering, I have actually seen a number of skeptics use this line and ask if Jesus is traveling at supersonic speed or something. Jesus’s work is done.

This high priest is not just anyone. This high priest is the Son of God. He is also referred to by the name of Jesus, so that the writer wants us to be sure who we are talking about. As we will see later, he was not just chosen by random, but he was rather appointed by God. The new high priest that mediates for us before God is the very Son of God.

Interestingly, this high priest is not aloof from the people. He is able to sympathize with our weaknesses. The writer tells us that Jesus was tempted in every way but was without sin. As we have said earlier, this does not mean that Jesus was tempted with every single sin known to man. It means Jesus was tempted in every kind of way one can be tempted to each kind of sin.

Yet Jesus was without sin. However, because he was tempted, he understands what it means to be tempted and he is able to give us grace. He knows what it means to resist temptation. If we fail, he knows what it means to forgive. If we are struggling, he is able to give us the grace we need so that we can go on and avoid the sin. He can do this because he is the perfect and righteous Son of God.

Or rather, he has the nature of God himself.

 

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters. I thank everyone again for their prayers and I ask that you keep them up please. Things seem to be on an emotional roller coaster here. I don’t want to give too many details, but I’m just waiting for things to get back to a joyous way I remember. Anyhow, let’s get back to the text. Tonight, we’re going to start Hebrews 3. We’re going to be looking at verses 1-6.

¹Therefore, holy brothers, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, the apostle and high priest whom we confess. ²He was faithful to the one who appointed him, just as Moses was faithful in all God’s house. ³Jesus has been found worthy of greater honor than Moses, just as the builder of a house has greater honor than the house itself. ⁴For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything.⁵Moses was faithful as a servant in all God’s house, testifying to what would be said in the future. ⁶But Christ is faithful as a son over God’s house. And we are his house, if we hold on to our courage and the hope of which we boast.

I said at the beginning that in the church the writer of the Hebrews was addressing, they had a system of mediators set up who interceded for them with God. Angels were one such group of mediators. Another one was Moses. The writer moves on to tackle this one.

Jesus is here seen as the high priest and apostle. This is the only time he’s called an apostle, which means a sent one. Jesus was sent by God. High priest will be a theme played throughout this book and it will be one addressed further later on.

Now a comparison is made to Moses. Jesus was found faithful to YHWH just as Moses was. However, Jesus is worthy of even greater honor than Moses. The writer makes the comparison to the builder of the house being greater than the house that is built.

If there is a house, it is built by someone. God, however, is the builder of everything so what about Moses? It is obvious that God is greater than the house that is built since a builder is greater than the house as the Hebrews writer has said. (The writers of the New Testament were quite logical in their argumentation.)

Moses was faithful in all of God’s house. In other words, Moses was a servant of YHWH, but his position was just limited to being within the house. However, it is at this point that we find the distinction between him and Christ.

Christ is the one who is not a servant in the house, but he is rather over the house, which could be referring to him as builder of the house as well. The writer then tells us that we are members of that house which also would include Moses. The point in the comparison is that Jesus is not just a servant of the house. He is not even a member of the house. He is put in charge of the house and so is therefore greater than the servants in the house, including Moses.

Conclusion then: Do not reject the mediator of Jesus for that of Moses. Jesus is far greater.

 

Hello everyone. Welcome back to Deeper Waters. We are going through our Trinitarian commentary on the Bible now and in the New Testament and more specifically, in the epistle to the Hebrews. I also thank you all for your continued prayers as I am working on learning more in an area that I need to learn more in. Keep them up please. Going to the text however, we’ll be looking at chapter 2, verses 14-18.

¹⁴Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil— ¹⁵and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death. ¹⁶For surely it is not angels he helps, but Abraham’s descendants. ¹⁷For this reason he had to be made like his brothers in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people. ¹⁸Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

In the work of salvation, those who Christ came to save have flesh and blood. In order to save them then, he became like them. Note that he became like them in that he was fully human but he was also without sin. It is not essential to being human that we be sinners. We just all happen to be. Jesus is the one who lived a truly human life in that he acted the way a human is supposed to act. The rest of us act less than human.

He came to save those who were held in slavery by their fear of death. Death has always been scary as its been the unknown. It is because of Christ that we can say that it is no longer the unknown but rather the known. Now we do not know it yet in the way of personal experience, but we do know it in the way of having information from one who has been there, which would be Christ of course.

Christ does not help angels but Abraham’s descendants, indicating that angels are beyond salvation. That’s because angels do not share a common essence. Humans do. Each angel is its own species essentially. Michael exhausts all that it means to be the archangel Michael. For Christ to save angels, he would have to become each angel. For us, he can partake in a common essence as we can be differentiated by matter.

It is because of this that he is able to be a high priest for us. He took on the temptations that we face every day and yet, he overcame them. Now this doesn’t mean that he faced every temptation, but rather that he faced every kind of temptation that there is. He overcame and because he did such, he is able to help us when we are being tempted. He is also able to make atonement for us for he alone is the pure and spotless one.

And that should be a comfort to all of us.

 

Hello everyone. I hope everyone enjoyed going through old blogs while I was away and I do see that several of you appreciated my tribute to the Curtmudgeon. We all miss him and we’ll see him again someday, but I am sure if there’s one thing he’d want, it’d be for me to keep going on my blog and teach the Trinity. He was always caring for others after all. I thank you all for your prayers as well as I’m having to overcome a lot of self-doubt and fear and anxiety and other such things. I ask for your continued prayers as I overcome this greatest hurdle in my life. For now, let’s get to the Trinitarian text for tonight, Hebrews 2:10-13.

¹⁰In bringing many sons to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering. ¹¹Both the one who makes men holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers. ¹²He says,
“I will declare your name to my brothers;
in the presence of the congregation I will sing your praises.” ¹³And again,
“I will put my trust in him.” And again he says,
“Here am I, and the children God has given me.”

Perfect through suffering? It’s a thought we don’t like to think about. When you are going through suffering, it isn’t always comforting to know that this will be used for good. Many of us would say “Forget the future good and just end my pain now!”

But how is Jesus made perfect? Jesus is made perfect not in an ontological sense but in the sense that he is entirely human and undergoes the gamut of human suffering. He is the one who truly lives a human life and he lived one of intense suffering. The very Son of God in Isaiah 53 after all is described as a man of sorrows.

We are also of the same family as we are called the brothers of Christ. Now this is not in the sense of brothers by nature but brothers by adoption. He is holy and we are made holy. He is holy by his nature as the Son of God and we are made holy by participating in his holiness.

Jesus is seen as the missionary here as it were coming to his brothers and saying that he will declare God’s name to them. Jesus was the only one who could truly do this because he is the only one who truly knows the name of God.

The next two verses go together. They are from Isaiah 8 calling the people of Israel to remember that their God is the one they are to regard as holy. Holiness as we will see is a constant theme throughout the book of Hebrews as it should be a theme throughout the life of the Christian. It is by putting our trust in YHWH that we are made holy and then are made children of God that come before him through Christ.

We shall continue with more in Hebrews tomorrow.

 

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters. I hope everyone has had a fine day today and again, I thank you for your continued prayers. We’re going through our Trinitarian Commentary still and we’re in the book of Hebrews and so far, we’ve touched on every verse in the book. What can I say? This is a book that is heavily bathed in who Jesus is. Tonight, we’re going to be looking at Hebrews 2:5-9:

⁵It is not to angels that he has subjected the world to come, about which we are speaking. ⁶But there is a place where someone has testified:
“What is man that you are mindful of him,
the son of man that you care for him?
⁷You made him a little lower than the angels;
you crowned him with glory and honor
⁸ and put everything under his feet.”In putting everything under him, God left nothing that is not subject to him. Yet at present we do not see everything subject to him. ⁹But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, now crowned with glory and honor because he suffered death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.

The Hebrews writer continues the path he has been going down to tell his readers about the supremacy of Christ. The world to come has not been made subject to angels, but it has been made subject to the Son. Thus, the Son is greater than the angels and again, we dare not ignore him.

The writer does grant that for a season, Jesus did take on a lower position, but he has been exalted. The reference is to Psalm 8. Originally spoken of about humanity, the writer in his inspired commentary sees it ultimately being about the one who is the ultimate Son of Man, Jesus Christ, and how he was made a subject.

Note especially however that everything has been put under him. That means that there is not anything that is not under him. Now Paul when he wrote on a similar theme in 1 Cor. 15:24-28 pointed out that this obviously does not include God himself, but this does place Jesus within the Godhead as being the one that all creation submits to.

The writer realizes that this is not a complete reality at this point however in that not everything has been placed under him. Paul sees this as reaching full fruition when the resurrection of the dead takes place and we can reasonably conclude that since the Bible speaks with one voice ultimately, that the Hebrews writer likely has the same time in mind.

However, he does say that Jesus is now crowned with glory and honor. This is also the first time in the book that the name of Jesus is used. Why is Jesus crowned? Because he suffered death. Jesus took submission all the way to the limit by paying the ultimate price he did not have to pay, the price that was the most contrary to his nature.

The Hebrews writer sees no contradiction between this and anything he said in the first chapter. Neither should we.

We shall continue tomorrow.

 

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters. I’m having a really good day today as it looks like the sun is starting to break through the dark clouds I created. I do appreciate your prayers for my continued wisdom in a particular area in my life. I also think Jin-Roh for his comments. No. Not everything is about the Trinity, but we’re going through the Bible to see what it says and I am thoroughly enjoying it. Actually, I’m looking forward to Revelation as I’m reading that now and realizing how much it says about Jesus. We usually go there for eschatology, but it says much about who Jesus is.

Tonight, we’ll be in the second chapter however of Hebrews and we’re going to read verses 1-4:

¹We must pay more careful attention, therefore, to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away. ²For if the message spoken by angels was binding, and every violation and disobedience received its just punishment,³how shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation? This salvation, which was first announced by the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard him. ⁴God also testified to it by signs, wonders and various miracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will.

We’ve been warned not to ignore this great salvation we have. The message that came through angels was binding. The message that comes from the Son who is superior to the angels then is even more binding upon us.

Note however that we have strong Trinitarian interplay going on in this passage. In speaking about the salvation, to which we should recognize that the question of salvation is inextricably tied in with who Jesus is, such that you cannot have a Jesus who is less than deity and still have so great salvation.

This salvation was first preached by the Lord. Note that the Lord is so easily used to refer to Jesus. We’ve already noted that the author has used the term Kurios to speak of Jesus and did so in a way that indicated his sovereignty over creation. At this point, the name of Jesus hasn’t even been mentioned. He is either the Son or the Lord or God.

While the eyewitnesses who heard Jesus confirmed the message, God himself testified to it by the working of miracles. Miracles are not events done in a vacuum. They are done to display a message and confirm it. The message I believe in the miracles was what the kingdom of God would be like in its fruition. For instance, there were healing miracles because sickness and suffering will be absent when the kingdom is fully realized.

However, that is not the end of the testimony. The Lord announced, God testified, and the Holy Spirit distributed gifts of the Spirit as an agent of God to show the truth of the message. It is the work of the Holy Spirit that brings about the continued preaching of the gospel message.

Thus, all the persons of the Trinity are involved in the good news of the gospel. This is a Trinitarian passage that fits in with the model that we have seen before. We cannot have a full gospel without having the Trinity.

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters. Tonight, we’re going to be continuing our look at Hebrews 1. I’d first like to thank everyone for their continued prayers. I think I’ve made some major breakthroughs in that area in my life. Let us hope that the sun is once again beginning to shine. Going back to the Trinitarian commentary, tonight we’re going to finish up our look at Jesus in the first chapter of Hebrews by reading verses 13-14:

¹³To which of the angels did God ever say,
“Sit at my right hand
until I make your enemies
a footstool for your feet”? ¹⁴Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation?

As far as I know, Psalm 110:1 is the most quoted Old Testament Verse in the New Testament and it’s no shock it’s used here. None of the angels were ever promised to either sit at the right hand of God or that he would make their enemies a footstool.

The verse is so important because it captured the deity of Christ to the early church and it showed his position as Messiah. This was the Messiah in the lineage of David who has ontological equality with the Father and is the judge of all the world.

This is done in contrast to the angels. The angels are but servants sent to those who will inherit salvation. Now Jesus did wash his disciples’ feet, which was the position of a servant, but he did so in a way that he showed was unnatural to one in his position. The angels however have been placed in a position where they are servants to us. In fact, we are told in 1 Cor. 6 that we will judge the angels. If we judge the angels, then in some way we are superior to them.

Of course, this is not to lower angels. I think angels are a fascinating topic of discussion and they are great creations of God, but something that I believe distinguishes us from them is that we are never told that angels have the image of God. We are definitely never told that Christ died for the sins of angels. The emphasis in Scripture is on God restoring men to him and not angels.

However, the contrast here is not about angels and ourselves but angels and the Son. In the system that the writer was writing to, angels were seen as mediators, which is understandable seeing as in Galatians 3 Paul says that the Law was mediated to us by angels. There was always a great tendency however to look to the means of something as being an object of worship, such as the bronze snake Moses made that later became an idol. I dare say most of us would be tempted to worship an angel if we saw one, but we must not do so.

However great these beings are, the writer wants one thing to be clear to his readers. Christ is greater. This is one of the explanatory passages in the book. Tomorrow, we shall begin looking at an argument that follows from this that counts as one of the warning passages and see what more we can learn about the Trinity from there.

 

Hello everyone and welcome back to Deeper Waters where we are continuing our Trinitarian commentary.  I also thank you for your prayers as it seems the light is breaking through in some ways now. This has been a learning and growing experience for me and I am a better man for it. Enough about me however. Tonight, we are continuing on our Trinitarian commentary in the book of Hebrews. I said last night that saying “Jesus is God” is not the pinnacle the Hebrews writer reaches in that first chapter. Let’s go to that pinnacle in verses 10-12:

¹⁰He also says,
“In the beginning, O Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth,
and the heavens are the work of your hands.
¹¹They will perish, but you remain;
they will all wear out like a garment.
¹²You will roll them up like a robe;
like a garment they will be changed.
But you remain the same,
and your years will never end.”

How is this greater? God implies the concept of being deity, but remember that the Jews would have known about a Greek pantheon with several deities so being one in the class of deity, while impressive, would not be the end-all.

When we come to this passage, we reach something that includes deity in it, but is a more exclusive way of putting it. The word in this case is Kurios. In the previous verse, the word was Theos which was a normal word used for God. However, Kurios implies sovereignty with it as well. To be Kurios is not just to be deity, but rather to be a sovereign deity. When the Greek Septuagint translated the Hebrew into the Greek, they would translate YHWH into Kurios, showing just how highly the word is used.

Where does the quote come from? It comes from Psalm 102. I invite the reader to go to the Psalm and read it for himself. This is a Psalm about creation and praising YHWH for it. What the writer is saying is that this applies to Jesus.

Now in earlier verses, we could have said that kingship applies to Jesus without making him deity. In a sense, that is correct, although the wider context suggests otherwise. However, in this passage, we do not have kingship but the state of being the creator.

Note as well that the creation is described as the work of his hands. A study of the texts in the Old Testament reveals that whenever the term is used, it does refer to something that the person was directly involved in. In saying that creation is the work of the hands of Jesus, it is saying that Jesus was directly involved in creation. In saying that he is kurios, it is saying that he is the sovereign over the creation. If Jesus is the sovereign over the creation, then he is God.

Thus, we find that the Hebrews writer has been building on a pinnacle. Now he has reached his grand creation. Jesus is more than an angel. He is more than a king. He is more than just a god. He is the sovereign Lord of all that is. Indeed, let not just all God’s angels worship him, but all creation as well.

 

 

Hello everyone and welcome to Deeper Waters once again. I thank everyone again for their continued prayers as there is a lot to be learned in a certain area and I believe I will learn it. Tonight, let us continue our Trinitarian Commentary. Last time, I left us on a cliffhanger of sorts saying that the Son was superior to the angels in a certain way. What way is that? Well let us go to our text tonight. We will be looking at Hebrews 1:8-9. Let’s go:

⁸But about the Son he says,
“Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever,
and righteousness will be the scepter of your kingdom.
⁹You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness;
therefore God, your God, has set you above your companions
by anointing you with the oil of joy.”

The Psalms were a favorite book for the New Testament writers to quote and the writer of the epistle to the Hebrews was no exception. This passage is also like Psalm 2, a passage to honor the king, yet all of a sudden in the text, we find the reference to God. What is going on?

Naturally, an Old Testament king was not God, however, they were in essence to have a godlike function. I believe the same is being said of the judges of Israel in Psalm 82. They were to lead Israel as God’s chosen person to sit upon the throne. There was also the Davidic promise that one of David’s descendants would forever sit on the throne.

The Trinitarian is fully prepared for the true fulfillment of this passage as while the others did function as gods, in the end, it truly is God who sits on the throne in the person of Christ. This is a psalm that ultimately is Messianic and looks forward to the age of the Messiah when the true king of Davidic descent would sit on the throne and as we saw in the question Christ stumped the Pharisees with on if the Messiah was the Son of David, this does end with the fulfillment of a human descendant of David who is both man and God.

How does a group like the Jehovah’s Witnesses handle this. They’re quite good at changing the Bible when it doesn’t fit with their doctrine. Here is what the New World Translation says:

But with reference to the Son: “God is your throne forever and ever, and [the] scepter of your kingdom is the scepter of uprightness.

There is no doubt the Witnesses are in the minority among Greek grammarians throughout the ages (Of course, I don’t believe any Greek grammarians really worked on the text of the NWT). It would be more likely however that if this was meant to be read in that way, that Ho Theos, for God, would have appeared first. The idea of interpreting it as “God is your throne” has been called a grotesque interpretation.

I would also point out that I find this concept makes no sense. In what sense is God a throne? God is not a place for another to sit. God will not relinquish his rulership to another forever and ever. The Christian concept does have explanatory power, it fits in with sound theology in the church for ages, and it has had the backing of grammarians for ages.

But the question is asked “If this is saying Jesus is God, then haven’t we reached the pinnacle? Wouldn’t this best be saved for last?”

We shall answer that tomorrow.