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Reading Hebrews 2:5 and reviewing the previous verses as we consider the gloriousness of the gospel and whom it was meant for. Visit wwutt.com for all of our videos!
The law was given to us by angels. The gospel came from God himself, who put on flesh and dwelt among us, fulfilling the law and dying for us. So we better not neglect so great a salvation when we understand the text.
This is When We Understand the Text, a daily Bible study in the word of Christ, that men and women of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. Tell your friends about our ministry at www .utt .com.
Here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe.
Thank you, Becky. We're back to our study in the book of Hebrews. We've been in chapter 2 this week. If you have a Bible, open it up and join with me there. As with yesterday, I'll begin by reading verses 1 -8 out of the Legacy Standard Bible.
This is the word of the Lord. For this reason we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away. For if the words spoken through angels proved unalterable, and every trespass and disobedience received a just penalty, how will we escape if we neglect so great a salvation?
That salvation, first spoken by the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard, God also testifying with them, both by signs and wonders, and by various miracles, and by gifts of the Holy Spirit, according to His own will.
For He did not subject to angels the world to come, concerning which we are speaking. But one has testified somewhere, saying, What is man, that you remember him, or the son of man, that you are concerned about him?
You have made him for a little while lower than the angels. You have crowned him with glory and honor, and have appointed him over the works of your hands. You have put all things in subjection under his feet.
For in subjecting all things to him, he left nothing that is not subject to him. But now we do not yet see all things subjected to him. So yesterday we were talking about the word of God that was delivered to the people of Israel through angels.
When we read about God speaking from Mount Sinai in Exodus chapter 20 and giving them the law, according to what is said by Stephen in Acts chapter 7, the word that the Israelites heard were the words of angels, thousands upon thousands of angels, who were the voices for God, speaking the law to the people.
God's voice would have been so great, the people would not have been able to stand it. So He spoke to them through angels, which itself was terrifying enough. The people were scared of what it was that they heard, and they asked Moses, hey, can we go back to the arrangement where you go up on the mountain and you talk to God and then you come down and tell us?
So they couldn't even handle the voices of angels, let alone being able to listen to the voice of God. So this was the word that was spoken that proved unalterable. That is referenced there in verse 2.
And every trespass and disobedience received a just penalty. So this is how authoritative that word was. The word that was spoken was the word of God. It was the law. And if you disobeyed the law, there was a penalty for that.
So now let's consider the gospel. What would be the penalty for not listening to this message of salvation that has come to us? This is a message of grace. This is even better than the law, for Christ has fulfilled the law and He has accomplished all things that the law requires.
He has also made substitute for us. We sinned against God. What we deserved is death. But Christ died in our place, taking all of our sins upon Himself. Same way we read the method of sacrifice in Leviticus.
Whenever an animal was sacrificed, it starts talking about blood sacrifices right there at the beginning of Leviticus in chapter 1. When an animal was sacrificed, then the head of the household, so usually the father or the husband, he would place his hand on the head of the animal as the priest slaughtered it.
And what that represented was the sins of the father or the household being passed upon the animal, and then the animal dying in place of the one who had sinned against God. So blood is being spilled as a sacrifice, and that symbolism of putting a hand on the head is the sins being transferred or the trespasses transferred to the animal that's being slaughtered.
And so Christ is the one who is the pure lamb, the spotless lamb, he who has made atonement for sins. As we read back in chapter 1, verse 3, he accomplished cleansing for sins and then sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high.
So Christ is the lamb of God. That's right at the beginning of John, where John the Baptist sees him and says, behold, the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. So all who believe in Christ, our sins have been paid for by his blood spilled on the cross for us.
What a great message, no longer a message of you have to do all these laws in order to be saved for as Hebrews is going to go on to explain, we could not have been saved that way anyway. We were already imperfect because of the sins that we had committed.
And even the blood of bulls and goats was not enough to atone for our sins. It needed an even greater sacrifice. And it turns out all of this sacrificial system that was established for Israel in the law was types and shadows that was pointing to a greater one who would come and he would be the one to take away sins, not the blood of bulls and goats, but the precious blood of Jesus.
And so Christ has come fulfilling those things. We have this wonderful message of the gospel of Christ having accomplished all of this perfectly. And so we believe by faith and we are saved, justified by faith, not by our works, but by him who loves us.
And so having heard this gospel proclaimed to us, how will we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? The question that is posed in verse three, that salvation first spoken by the Lord. Where did the message of the law come from?
That was first spoken by angels, angels proclaiming the law of God. This message of salvation, the gospel was first spoken by the Lord himself. We go back to Hebrews one, one, God having spoken long ago to the fathers and the prophets in many portions and in many ways in these last days spoke to us in his son whom he has appointed the heir of all things.
So God himself has given us this gospel. It was spoken to us by the Lord and was confirmed to us by those who heard referring to those disciples, apostles who are with Jesus and his earthly ministry, heard him speak.
These things saw him risen from the dead, heard him speak to them again in the 40 days between his resurrection and his ascension. Check it out in Acts chapter one. After Jesus rose from the dead, he was with his people for 40 more days, 40 days between his ascension or sorry, yeah, but between his resurrection and his ascension into heaven, he was with his disciples for 40 days.
And we have that testimony from the apostle Paul in first Corinthians 15, that hundreds of brothers, over 500 brothers saw him alive in that period of time. So there were hundreds of eyewitnesses to the resurrection of Christ and had also heard in that time the teachings of Christ.
We read in Luke 24 that it was in that time he opened his disciples eyes to understand what the law and the prophets said about him. So he taught them, he taught them the gospel that they would therefore go and spread it around the world.
Consider the commission that he gave to them in Acts chapter one, verse eight, you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth. And so we read about that in the book of Acts.
And even to this day, we continue taking the gospel to the ends of the earth. This gospel that was spoken first by the Lord and was confirmed to us by those who heard. How was it confirmed? Verse four, God also testifying with them.
So it wasn't just taking the word of these apostles who said we saw him crucified and risen again from the dead, although those eyewitness accounts would have certainly been compelling. But God even testified to the authenticity of this message as being from him, from heaven above, from the Lord.
God testified by signs and wonders and by various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit, according to his own will. So the miracles that the apostles performed, it wasn't merely out of love for people that they would heal their diseases and even raise the dead, although it was certainly a love and an affection for people that they healed their diseases.
But it was primarily the main purpose for the miraculous signs and wonders, including speaking in tongues, prophecies and other things. The main reason for the miraculous signs was to confirm, to authenticate that the message being spoken was not the message of man.
It was a message that was from God. This was the gospel of God that we continue to proclaim today. And we know it is the gospel of God because it's been confirmed. You and I have not seen any miraculous signs and wonders.
You may think you have, but not on the level of the apostolic signs that they did to confirm the authenticity of the gospel as having been from God. We've not seen such signs and wonders because there was a particular time and place in which those wonders were done in order to verify the message.
Now that the message has been verified, remember, we have Peter saying in 2nd Peter, chapter one, we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed. So now that it's been authenticated, there's not a reason for that ongoing miraculous sign or wonder.
It's not happening in Pentecostal and charismatic churches every time that they gather. Hate to break it to you, but all of that is, is feelings driven. It's a desire of the flesh. It's actually not a work of the Holy Spirit that many of these charismatic churches think that they're doing.
What they call speaking in tongues is not the miraculous gift of speaking in tongues. It's just uttering gibberish. This, I believe, Hebrews 2, 4 is the best verse to argue for cessationism. Cessationism is the idea that the apostolic sign gifts have come to an end, not the gifts of the spirit.
We still have gifts of the spirit. You can read about gifts of the spirit in Romans 12 that are not miraculous sign gifts, but we're talking specifically about those apostolic giftings that confirm the message that came from God.
The apostle Paul said to the Corinthians, 2 Corinthians 12, I believe it's verse 12, where he says, the signs of true apostleship were performed among you. You saw the signs and the wonders. So these were gifts that were given to the apostles to verify we've been sent by God.
This is not just us trying to start our own religion. This is the message of the gospel that has come to you, sent from God for you, for your salvation. And then the miracles that accompanied that message so that they would know it truly came from the Lord.
All the eyewitness accounts then that followed that to say, yeah, we saw the miracles, would also verify that these writings that we have in the New Testament came from those who saw such things, the eyewitnesses to those things.
We have some books that were written from the apostles themselves. John was an actual apostle of Jesus. Matthew was an apostle. Luke was a disciple of Paul's, who was an apostle. Mark was a disciple of Peter's, who was an apostle.
So sometimes it's secondhand. But those guys still witness. They saw the miraculous signs that were performed by the apostles. Every single book in the New Testament was written in the time period of people who could have seen either.
They saw Christ himself. They saw him crucified and risen again. Some of those persons wrote the New Testament. James, the half brother of Jesus, he saw Christ risen from the dead, though he did not believe that Jesus was the son of God during his earthly ministry.
James would later come into that belief. Same with Jude, who is likely also a half brother of Jesus. Then you have apostles like Peter and Matthew and John, as was mentioned. But these are people who saw these things in the time in which they happened.
All of the New Testament comes from the first century. There was nothing that was written generations later by anybody who didn't see and testify to these things. So being said here in Hebrews 2 .4, God testified with them by signs and wonders and by various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit according to his will.
And it was confirmed to us. So we've been witness to those things. That was what was said there at the end of verse three. Now, right there at the conclusion of verse four, where it says gifts of the Holy Spirit according to his own will.
Sometimes we attribute his own will to the Holy Spirit, to the Spirit's will. That's not necessarily incorrect, because after all, the Holy Spirit is God and the Spirit is not in contradiction with the Father.
But because God is the subject of the sentence at the start of verse four, his own will is probably in reference to the Father, or it could just be a reference to the Godhead altogether, but not explicitly or exclusively, rather, to the Holy Spirit, as mentioned there in verse four.
Nonetheless, we have this statement that the gifts of God were sent by him to authenticate the message, and it was done for a specific purpose. That purpose has been accomplished. And so there is no longer a reason for those miraculous sign gifts to be present today.
The apostolic age ended with the death of John at the end of the first century. He died in Turkey somewhere around 90 or 95 A .D., I believe that it was. He was the last apostle to die. John, or sorry, Paul was the last apostle appointed.
That's 1 Corinthians 15, 8. But John died of old age. All the rest of the apostles were martyred. John died of old age, and he was the last one to die at the end of his life was the end of the apostolic age.
So there's no longer a reason for those miracles to have continued. That doesn't mean I don't believe in miraculous signs and wonders, that God won't do something miraculous even in our days, but it's going to be very, very rare, hence being a miracle.
There's no such thing as a faith healer. There are no modern prophets, unless you're talking about a pastor being a prophet in the sense that he prophesies the word of God that we have in the Bible. And there are things that have not yet been accomplished in the Bible.
Whenever you proclaim the book of Revelation, you're prophesying prophecy that has not yet come to fulfillment or even things that Jesus talked about concerning his return. That's prophecy. Also, whenever we hear the word of God, we're being sanctified.
Remember that Jesus said in John 17, 17, we are sanctified by the word of God. And Paul says in Ephesians five, we're sanctified by a washing of water through the word. We also have the understanding of Philippians one, six, I am confident of this very thing that he who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it at the day of Christ.
So we're continuing to be sanctified until the day of Christ. Every time you proclaim the Bible, every time you quote scripture, you are proclaiming the word of God. You are prophesying something that is accomplishing something.
It is either turning a lost sinner to Christ. So he who is lost is now found once blind, but now I see and Christ has drawn him to himself, which is the greatest miracle that we can observe today. When a lost sinner becomes a saint, you are seeing the dead brought back to life.
Whenever you witness somebody become a Christian, that is, that's, that's the greatest miracle that we can observe on this side of heaven. Praise God for that. So when the word of God is proclaimed, either you're seeing a sinner become a saint or you're seeing a saint become sanctified.
But something is being accomplished through the declaration, the prophesying of the word of God. It is prophecy being fulfilled in the sanctification of God's people. So you might refer to a prophet in that way, a pastor being a prophet, but there's no more modern day prophets.
That was said right at the beginning of Hebrews. Long ago, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son. And by the way, we are living in the last days.
So these two verses, let me argue this again. These two verses, I believe, are the greatest argument for cessationism. The regular occurrence of apostolic sign gifts or miracles have come to an end. That's Hebrews 1, 1 and Hebrews 2, 4.
Those two verses, I believe, or three and four, because I guess four begins in the middle of a sentence anyway. So it's Hebrews 1, 1 and 2 and Hebrews 2, 3 and 4. Those two passages right there, I believe, are the best argument for cessationism.
Now, in today's lesson so far, I've just been reviewing or expounding upon what I read yesterday. We were in Hebrews 2, verses 1 through 4. Let me add in verse 5 and make one more comment about this. And then we're going to pick up there tomorrow with the Old Testament reference, Psalm 8, that's referenced here, starting in verse 6.
But let me read verse 5. For he did not subject to angels the world to come concerning which we are speaking. Now, that world is talking about our present world, the age in which we live with the Holy Spirit dwelling with us.
We who have believed in the gospel. This is not talking about heaven, that age that is to come. We're talking about the world to come at the present. The previous world was the people of God who were under the law.
The world now, as talked about in Hebrews 2, is the world in which the gospel is being spread. This world has not been subject to angels because, again, angels are ministering spirits sent to serve those, to render service to those who will inherit salvation.
That was Hebrews 1 .14. So let me make this point to close, and tying this back in with believing the gospel, as talked about in verse 3. God has no plan to redeem the angels. Do you understand that? Do you understand what I mean by that?
So consider, again, Hebrews 1 .14. The angels are ministering spirits sent to render service for the sake of those who will inherit salvation. Who inherits salvation? We do. Who does not inherit salvation?
The angels. The angels serve those who will inherit salvation. That's mankind, not fallen angels. Fallen angels will not be redeemed. They were with God in his holy heaven. They rebelled against God, though they had seen him in all his glory, yet they rebelled against him and were cast out of heaven.
A third of the angels, as often talked about, a reference that comes from Revelation. So a third of the angels were cast down with Satan. They will never be redeemed. They will not turn from their rebellion and beg to get let back into heaven.
They will not submit themselves or subject themselves to the worship of God. They are forever damned. They will not be redeemed. The message of the gospel and God's plan of salvation, the redemption that he gives in Christ Jesus, is meant for us.
God does not redeem the angels, but he does redeem us when we believe in Jesus. So, hence, the statement that's there in Hebrews 1 .14 and this statement in Hebrews 2 .5. He did not subject to angels the world to come, concerning which we are speaking.
It is we who have been the recipients of the gospel and will be the transmitters of the gospel, taking the gospel to the world. It is we who will inherit salvation. Praise God for his glorious grace. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this word today.
We thank you for the word of the gospel that was given to us. And may we not neglect so great a salvation, but the same word that we have heard and now put our faith in Jesus Christ to be saved. May we take this message of the gospel to the world, for there is no other name under heaven by which man can be saved except the name of Jesus Christ.
There is no other gospel for any other people. The gospel has been proclaimed to us. It is this gospel that must go out into the world, for all who turn from their sin to the Lord Jesus Christ will be forgiven and will be saved.
For this reason, we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away. Keep us near to you, Lord Jesus. In your name we pray.
Amen. Pastor Gabe keeps a regular blog, sharing personal thoughts, alerting readers to false teachers, and offering commentary on the church and social issues. You can find a link to the blog through our website, www .utt .com.
Thank you for listening and join us again tomorrow as we continue our study in God's word when we understand the text.