Hebrews 2:9-17 | The Grace of the Promise

This sermon was recorded at Faith Evangelical Free Church in Grand Forks, North Dakota.

Good morning.

Welcome.

Glad to have you with us this morning.

I want to give a special thanks to John Paul Snyder for filling in as Webb is away at a wedding this week.

Appreciate all of the talented musicians that we have in our fellowship that are able to lead us to the Lord in worship.

And we want to do that together this morning in God's Word from the book of Hebrews.

If you have your Bible or if you'd like to use a pew Bible in front of you, encourage you to open it to the book of Hebrews in chapter 2.

As Scott said to us earlier, we are going forward in the next few weeks, looking at God's promise of a Redeemer.

And we're looking at that from two different directions.

On the one hand, we're going to be reading some passages of Scripture from Isaiah in each of our services that anticipates the coming of the Redeemer, that looks at God's promise, at what he said he would do.

And then as we dive into God's word together, we'll look at the fulfillment of that promise in different ways.

And Hebrews is not a book often considered at Christmas, but our text for today is directly applicable because it shows us the grace of God's promise.

And I'd like to read in chapter two of Hebrews, beginning in verse 9 through verse 18, if you would like to follow along.

Again, that is Hebrews 2, beginning in verse 9.

But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.

For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering.

For he who sanctifies, and those who are sanctified, all have one source.

That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers, for he says, I will tell of your name to my brothers, in the midst of the congregation I will sing your praise.

And again I will put my trust in him, and again, behold, I and the children God has given me.

Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, so that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.

For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham.

Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

Amen.

In his book entitled Miracles, CS Lewis wrote, The central miracle asserted by Christians is the incarnation.

They say that God became man.

Every miracle, then, every other miracle, prepares the way for this or results from this.

Lewis then went on to call the incarnation the grand miracle.

And if we think about it, that first Christmas was full of miracles, wasn't it?

I mean, it's not every day that angels appear to people.

And angels appeared to Mary and to Joseph.

It was a miracle that a virgin expected a child.

There was a mysterious star.

Angels appeared to shepherds.

And that doesn't even begin to touch on all of the fulfilled prophecies concerning the birth of the Messiah.

But the miracle of miracles, that grand miracle, was God becoming man.

Have you ever thought about why God became man?

Why would God do such a thing?

Why would God leave the glories of his throne to come to earth?

He didn't need to do that.

He has everything.

It's not like he needed us.

He didn't need to obtain a planet or a following.

It wasn't as though he needed to become man to get something or to gain something.

So why did God become man?

By answering that question, we will see the amazing grace in God's promise of a Savior.

And I think we can answer that question from this passage in Hebrews chapter 2.

Hebrews 2 · chapter mention

And as we do that, I'd like you to first note that this is about the incarnation.

That's just a big theological word referring to God taking on human form, wrapping himself with human flesh.

Specifically, God the Son becoming man.

And so we read in verse 9, but we see him.

We see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus.

Crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.

Now that might be a bit confusing, especially without having looked first at the first chapter of Hebrews.

So I'd like you to flip back to chapter 1 with me for a moment and look at a few verses.

And in verse 4 of chapter 1, it says that Jesus has become as much superior to angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs.

In other words, Jesus is superior to angels.

That's how the author of Hebrews begins this argument that he's making.

Jesus is superior to angels because he sits at the right hand of God the Father.

And in fact, he is God in every way.

Therefore, he is greater than angels.

And then the author of Hebrews proceeds to prove that by quoting Scripture over and over again.

First in verse 5, he quotes Psalm 2, verse 7, about the relationship between the Father and the Son.

Psalms 2:7

God the Father says, Today, you are my son.

You are my son.

The relationship between God the Father and God the Son is set in eternity past.

And to be the Son of God is to be equal with God.

That's why the Jews tried to kill Jesus by stoning him in John chapter 5, verse 18.

John 5:18

Because he claimed to be equal with the Father.

Then in verse 6, it says again when he brings the firstborn into the world, he says, Let all God's angels worship him.

Angels worship Jesus.

And then Scripture calls him the God who reigns, the God who rules.

And down in verse 10, it calls him the one who created everything.

You, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning, and the heavens are the work of your hands.

That's quite interesting.

A few weeks ago, Ligonier Ministries, along with Lifeway Research, released a survey of evangelicals in the United States of America.

They're following up on a 2016 survey that they did.

And one of the questions in this year's survey was Do you believe that Jesus is the first and greatest created being?

Do you believe that Jesus is the first and greatest being created by God?

The responses were astounding.

Seventy-three percent of those who claim to be evangelical say that yes, Jesus is the greatest being created by God.

When in fact, the book of Hebrews tells us that it is Jesus who did the creating, not the one who was created.

According to Hebrews chapter 1, angels, not Jesus, are among the created.

Hebrews 1 · chapter mention

Angels, in fact, at the end of this chapter, in the very last verse, verse 14, it says they are ministering spirits sent out for the sake of those who believe.

The first chapter of Hebrews shows that Scripture demonstrates that Jesus is God and therefore greater than angels.

That is an important thing to understand when we get to chapter 2, because now in chapter 2, verse 9, it tells us now we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels.

That's astounding.

That's astounding.

For a period of time, the creator of all that is was made a little lower than one of the creatures that he created.

Now don't misunderstand that.

He didn't stop being God.

Jesus didn't cease his deity.

He voluntarily set aside some of his divine prerogatives and submitted himself to the will of the Father.

And so in becoming man, he voluntarily put himself lower than the angels that he created when he walked this earth.

That refers to his humanity.

And that wasn't a mirage.

He actually became man so much so that he died.

When it says he tasted death, that's an idiom meaning he died.

He suffered through death.

Later in verse 17, it tells us that he had to be made like his brothers in every respect.

Even in dying.

That points to his humanity.

In every way, God the Son, the one who is greater than the angels and who reigns and rules over all, became one of the creatures who lived and died on this ball of dirt we call home.

So you can see how this is about Christmas.

The essence of Christmas is that grand miracle of the eternal God coming to earth to take on flesh and live among human beings.

Isn't that what we've just sung?

What we sing every Christmas in the song that Charles Wesley wrote?

Veiled in flesh, the Godhead see.

Hail the incarnate deity.

Pleased as a man with men to dwell.

Jesus, our God with us.

We must see that grand miracle.

But we still have this massive question.

Why?

Why would the eternal God outside of time step into time and become a human being?

Listen, if the Queen of England, that elderly lady who is a symbol of class and character and status, were suddenly to ditch her palace, leave behind her wealth, her status, her clothing, her chauffeurs and her butlers, and move to the poorest community in India to live as a starving beggar on the streets, we would wonder what went wrong with her.

If she moved to the driest desert of Africa to struggle through dehydration, we would wonder what possessed her to do such a thing.

How much more then should we wonder why the God of heaven would leave his throne to come to this ball of dirt?

We have not properly grasped the grace of Christmas until we answer that question.

This Jesus, the one for whom and by whom all things exist, was crowned with glory and honor.

We can get that, right?

We can get that a king, the ruler of the universe, was crowned with glory and honor, but look at the glory and honor with which he was crowned.

He was crowned with the glory and honor that comes through the suffering of death.

What an irony.

The act that crowned the majesty of our Creator with glory and honor was the miracle of the incarnation, the miracle of God becoming man so that he could die.

And that only strengthens our question, I think.

Now it's not simply why would the eternal God become man?

Now it's why what would possess the living God to come to this earth in order to suffer death?

That makes no sense.

It's so much bigger than Queen Elizabeth leaving her palace to live as a beggar.

What Jesus did is simply incomprehensible in comparison.

Why would God do that?

What would make God even consider such an act?

Well, it's easy to miss, but the answer is given to us in verse 10.

God the Son left the glory of heaven and took on the form of a man to die a death by which he would bring many sons to glory.

The Apostle John wrote, excuse me, in John, in John 1.12, but to all who did receive him, he gave the right or the authority, the authorization to be called a child of God.

Again, C.S.

Lewis in Mere Christianity wrote a paraphrase of that verse.

His paraphrase said, The Son of God became man to enable men to become sons of God.

That is the grace of God's promise.

God came so that he might lead many sons to glory.

Jesus came in order to lead children, sons and daughters to his eternal glory.

Now there's likely, likely some importance here to the use of the word sons.

Look back again at chapter 1.

Verse 1.

Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets.

But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his Son.

The Son that He has appointed to be heir of all things, and through whom He also created the world.

Verse 5, quoting Psalm 2, you are my Son.

The end of verse 5, I will be to Him a Father, and He shall be to me a Son.

Those statements point directly at Jesus, God the Son.

He is the Son, incomparable, unmatchable among all sons.

And yet it was the grace of God that the eternal living Son should die to bring many sons to glory.

See, God the Father desired more children.

And God the Son came in order to lead more sons to the Father.

There is only one Son of the Living God.

But that Son came so that there would be many more sons of the Father.

And any human being who comes to the end of themselves in their sin and throws themselves upon the grace of that Son of the Living God has the authorization from the Father to be called a Son of God.

Don't miss the irony there.

Jesus was crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death.

He received glory through death so that all of God's children might be brought to the glory of God in heaven.

He suffered through death so that we might receive his glory.

That is the grace of Christmas.

Jesus came to lead many sons to glory, and that wasn't possible without other actions taking place.

We see here three other actions that were involved in Jesus' coming to bring sons to glory.

The first one is that God, the Son, became one of us to experience humanity, to experience suffering and temptation.

Jesus knows what you endure because he endured it.

Jesus knows what you suffer because he has suffered.

Jesus knows how you are tempted because he was tempted.

The emphasis here on family is really quite quite astounding.

In verse 10, all who come to Christ are called sons.

Then in verse 11, Jesus is not ashamed to call us brothers.

We see the same designation in verse 12.

And then in verse 13 and 14, we are called children of God.

And then in verse 17, there's a return to brothers.

The emphasis here is on a familial relationship between Jesus and those who have placed their faith and trust in Him for salvation.

In chapter 1, it's all about Jesus as God the Son, exalted far above the earth, far above even angels.

He is incomparable, unmatchable, in many ways unexplainable.

But through his death, those who come to him in faith become children of God and brothers and sisters of Jesus.

We become adopted children of God.

That's why adoption pictures the gospel.

Even though, even though we are created beings, Jesus is not afraid to call us brothers and sisters.

Since therefore, we read in verse 14, the children share in the flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things.

You and I experience everything related to our humanity.

We experience that groan that comes when you first step on your feet out of the bed in the morning.

We experience the fatigue that comes from pushing through.

We experience pain.

We experience disease.

We experience heartache.

We experience grief.

All that we experience on a daily basis, we experience in our flesh, in our bodies, and the fact that we are living beings by means of blood that courses through our veins, all of that was experienced by the Lord Jesus.

He came to experience the suffering that we endure as a result of our humanity.

And this passage speaks particularly of the suffering of death, as we see in verse 9.

In verse 10, it may be expanded to other kinds of suffering.

And then in verse 18, we see that he experienced the suffering of being tempted in all ways that we are tempted.

That is why it can be said, Jesus was made like his brothers in every respect.

There is nothing of humanity, the kinds of things that we endure that Jesus did not go through.

Now he didn't become some mutant creature, half human and half divine.

He's always fully God and fully man.

And in the same way that he was fully God, he was fully man, and so he was tired and worn out.

He needed rest.

He needed time away.

He was hungry and thirsty.

He was overcome by grief when his best friend died and he wept.

He was tempted.

He suffered through pain, pain that was more unbearable than anything we will ever endure.

Jesus came to bring us to glory, but to do that, he first had to experience all the frailty that we go through as human beings.

Now the second action involved in Jesus leading us to glory is found in verses 14 and 15.

He became a human being in order to free us from slavery to sin and death.

Verse 15.

And deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.

See, there's this power that death has over us, and that death is controlled by the devil, therefore those who are enslaved to death are enslaved to the devil.

And slavery implies an owner or a master.

It also implies a level of bondage or enslavement.

So to be a slave means that you are owned.

You have a master, you are not your own.

To be a slave means you are not free.

You are under subjection to a master.

Slavery to death in the devil.

And it's lifelong.

You know, free will is a popular theme among human beings.

We like to say that we are free to choose whatever we desire, whenever we desire, and however we desire.

We like to think that our wills are entirely our own.

It's true that our wills are entirely our own.

It is not true that our wills are entirely free, at least in the way that we popularly think about it.

If you look carefully at verse 15 again, those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.

Subject.

Subject slavery.

If you are a slave who is subject to another who is your master, are you free?

Are you free to do as you desire?

Not in the way we think.

We are only free to do what our master desires.

And apart from Christ, our master is sin and the devil.

Without Jesus, we are free to choose.

We are free to choose, but because we are slaves to sin and death, we freely choose what leads to sin and death.

We are free, but only free to do what our master, the devil, desires, because without Jesus we are slaves to sin and death.

So let me ask you this.

If you are a slave to sin and death and the devil, if you are a slave to sin, death, and the devil, are you free to choose righteousness and holiness and godliness?

In other words, are you free to choose Christ?

Sadly, no.

Slavery does not allow that.

We are only allowed to please our master, the devil.

And that means we must be freed.

Who then, the Apostle Paul asks, will free us?

The answer?

Our brother, the true Son of God, who took on flesh, partaking of the same things that we endure, so that through death he might destroy the power of the one who orders death.

That is, the devil, and to deliver, to deliver all those who were subject to lifelong slavery.

Or, in the Apostle Paul's words, thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord.

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Why?

Because the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.

Those whom God has called to be his children through faith in his son cannot be led to glory without being freed from slavery to sin and death and the devil.

And our brother Jesus came to do that.

The third action involved in leading many children to glory is in verse 17.

Jesus took on flesh so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in order to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

Now there's an entire message in that one statement.

You would be greatly enriched if you on your own studied what it means for Jesus to be a merciful high priest, and what it means for him to be a faithful high priest.

But for now I'd like you to consider the last phrase to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

That points back to what those Hebrews, those Jewish Christians, would have understood very well.

Each year, the Jewish high priest would enter into the temple, to go into the curtain, behind the curtain, into the holiest of holy places, carrying blood in order to offer a sacrifice of blood for the sins of the people.

He had to atone or to satisfy the wrath of God for the sins of the people.

He says, now it was not to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own, because then Jesus would have to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world.

But as it is, he has appeared once for all, at the end of the ages, to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

To put away sin by being a sacrifice himself.

Do you see it now?

From the very beginning pages of Scripture, from the very first pages of Genesis, God promised a redeemer to his people to rescue them from the problem that Adam and Eve brought into this creation.

That promise of a redeemer is fulfilled in Jesus.

The grace in that promise is God becoming man so that he might lead many children to glory.

To do so, he had to become like you and like me.

He had to free us from our former master.

He had to satisfy the Father's wrath against our sin by offering himself so that his blood would cover our sin.

Grasp that, and you will know the grace of the Father's promise to send a Savior.

How appropriate is it then to begin our focus on Christmas with the Lord's table.

By coming together before the Lord in this way, we are celebrating the grace of God's promise.

Jesus, made like his brothers and sisters, was crowned with glory and honor through his death.

And his body and his blood become symbols then of our adoption as children, as brothers of Jesus.

And we celebrate then being led into the glory of God by the founder of our salvation because he has satisfied the Father's wrath.

That is the grace of God's promise.

And that's what we gather together to celebrate this morning.

Would you pray with me?

Lord Jesus.

We come and we bow before you in honor of you.

We cannot but begin to grasp what you did.

It just boggles the mind to know that we can call you brother.

And the grace that is evident in what you've done is simply astounding.

We are not worthy.

So we come and we bow our hearts and minds and souls before you, asking you to forgive our sin because of the shed blood of you and your humanity.

But you rose again.

But you are alive today, interceding for us.

For us, your siblings, in the faith.

Now as we come and we gather to celebrate that by eating and drinking symbols of your body and your blood, we do that celebrating what you have done.

Leaving the glories of heaven to take on flesh, to die, even the death on the cross for us.

We look forward to that day, Lord Jesus, when we will fully be led into the glory of God in heaven.

Amen.

That concludes this sermon from Faith Evangelical Free Church.

Our mission is to declare the Word of God and disciple believers into mature, devoted followers of Jesus.

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