The Heir of All Things (Hebrews 1:2)

Kootenai Church

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of the Gnostical is offensive to the Jew, and it is foolishness to the

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Greek. To the Jew, it is an utterly offensive message, and to those who are not Jews, to the Greeks, it is, or to the

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Jew, it is an offensive message. To the Greek, it is utter foolishness. It's stupid. Imagine going to a first -century Jew, and this is what you tell them.

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I have good news for you. Here's the good news. The long -awaited king of our nation, your nation, the one who was promised to David, the one who all the

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Old Testament prophets predicted, the one that we have been waiting hundreds if not thousands of years for, in great anticipation that he would come and rule the nations, he has been born.

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But he has been born to a poor couple in a backwater town in the northern part of the nation.

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He grew up and lived in poverty and in complete obscurity. He was cut off from the religious life of the nation in terms of not growing up anywhere near the religious center of the nation or the political center of the nation.

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He was not trained by the best rabbis. He was not educated in the best schools. He was not discipled by any of the

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Pharisees. He didn't grow up in that culture. He spent most of his time outside of the city of Jerusalem.

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And not only that, but his arrival was kind of sudden. I mean, his birth was shrouded in mystery. Remember that his mother was a virgin when she conceived him.

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It's not all that believable, is it? But his mother was a virgin when he was conceived and she gave birth to him and he grew up as a carpenter's son, really in an obscure area of the nation.

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And his arrival was kind of sudden. It was announced by only one prophet who did no miracle, his cousin, can we get that?

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They were even considered to be a herald for a king.

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He lived his days out in the wilderness dressed like Grizzly Adams, eating locusts and wild honey.

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Some people might think he was a bit special, a bit touched in the head, but that was the one who heralded the coming of this king.

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And then, after only three years in ministry, he took up no sword against Rome. He led no revolt against Gentile powers at all.

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And instead, he was crucified by the Roman government, a Gentile power, he was hung on a cross, he was mocked and he was taunted and he was ridiculed.

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He hung on a cursed tree inside the city of Jerusalem, having offended and been rejected by all of the political leaders and all of the cultural leaders and all of the religious leaders of the nation, the nation that was supposed to recognize him when he came, rejected him and crucified him instead.

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And then, he was so poor that he was placed in another man's tomb and then he rose from the dead and went back to heaven.

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Oh, and this one who was born in such circumstances, who died under such a curse, was

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God in human flesh. He was the divine and eternal son, taking upon himself humanity and coming here and living among us.

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He was relatively unknown outside of the boundaries of his own nation, his own land.

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But I'm here to tell you that you must now, because of what he has done, you must turn your back on all of your feasts and all of your festivals and all of your traditions and the temple and the priesthood and the sacrifice and everything that God gave to our nation.

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And you have to be able to recognize and be willing to admit that being a Jew gives you no righteousness before God whatsoever.

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The fact that you are Abraham's descendant means nothing. You have no righteousness.

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In fact, you have violated the very law that you were given to keep that should lead you to this one who is the

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Savior. You have violated that law. And now, all of your hope of righteousness and right standing before God rests upon him and him alone.

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And you must turn from your sin and believe upon him and him alone for this salvation or you will perish.

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That's a hard sell, isn't it? To a first century Jew? The fact that any first century

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Jew believed the message of the gospel shows that it was accompanied by divine power because that is not the type of message that would go over well in first century

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Judaism or with the Greek. They would consider it foolishness. The Jew would consider it an offensive message.

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And yet we believe that veiled in flesh, the Godhead we see, that this one who was born in that manger was himself

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God in human flesh. And we believe that he was special, that he was unique in all of humanity, that he is the combination of humanity and deity, that he was fully

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God and that he was fully man and that everything scripture affirms of him is completely true. That this one who was born to poor parents in the northernmost part of the nation of Israel in a backwater village that was overlooked and ignored by everybody of the day, that that one is indeed the son of David, the

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Savior of the entire world. That's the message that we preach. It would have been offensive to a first century

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Jew. They wouldn't have wanted to believe that, but that is exactly what scripture teaches. By the way, there are people who say that the message of Christianity and the message that the religion of Christianity was fabricated and made up by men after Jesus died at some point.

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And they did this in order to exercise power over people and gain followers and lots of money. If you were gonna fabricate a message, don't you think you would come up with something that is marginally more believable than what

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I just laid out for you? Don't you think? If you believe that, you have more faith than I do. It wasn't fabricated, this is by divine revelation.

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And so we affirm the glory and the majesty of Christ, and that brings us to Hebrews chapter one, where the author of Hebrews is setting forth before these first century

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Jewish Christians, the glories of Christ and the majesty of his greatness. And so we're in Hebrews chapter one, and last time we were looking at verses one and two, and we saw that this

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Jesus is the one who is the revelation of the father. We looked at the supremacy of Christ as the revelation of the father and of God over the

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Old Testament. The Old Testament spoke to us in parts and in portions, in little portions here and there. And it was a veiled revelation, it was intentionally vague in many ways, as God revealed a little bit after a little bit after a little bit, giving more revelation as time went on.

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But then in the New Testament, in the revelation that is in Jesus Christ, we see the fullness of who the father is put before us in human flesh.

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And so in terms of the clarity, the brightness, and the perfection of that revelation, the person of Christ supersedes, he is greater than the

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Old Testament, that's what we saw. But now that raises for us the question or presents the question to us, what qualifies him to be that revelation of the father?

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What qualifies him to be, to tell us about who the father is and what the father has done, and what qualifies him as the better revelation?

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And that is what Hebrews sets out to answer. And one answer after another is given to that question.

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He is qualified to be a better revelation of the father because of who he is, because of what he has done, because of his priesthood, because of his sacrifice, because of his blood, because of the salvation that he gives.

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He's better than all of those Old Testament things. So the author of Hebrews wants to lay out for us that Jesus is better than, and the first thing is better than the

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Old Testament revelation. And so now why? So we come to Hebrews chapter one, we've looked at verses one and two, and we've looked at the revelation that Christ is.

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And now in the remainder of these verses, taking us through verse four, the author gives seven statements about the person of Christ, showing his majesty, his glory.

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It is difficult to imagine, let alone to put into words a more glorious description than what we have in these seven statements.

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And I want you to just let your eyes sort of fall down over these seven statements and count them out with me. He says in verse two, in these last days, he has spoken to us in his son.

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Now here are the seven statements. Number one, that he has been appointed as the heir of all things.

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He is the one who has made the world. He is the radiance of his glory, that's number three. He is the exact representation of his nature, that's number four.

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He upholds all things by the word of his power, that's number five. He has made purification for sins, that's number six.

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And he has sat down at the right hand of the father. Seven statements. It is, and that takes us from eternity past to eternity future, and covers all that he is and all that he has done.

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It is a magnificent summary of the person and the work of Christ in those seven statements. Now interestingly, the rest of Hebrews chapter one, beginning at verse five and going through that list of Old Testament quotations that you see there that take us down to the end of verse 13.

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The author quotes from seven Old Testament passages, all of them except one from the book of Psalms.

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All of them except one are quotations from the Psalms. He quotes from seven Old Testament passages. All of those

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Old Testament quotations are intended to prove to us that what he has said in verses one through four is in fact what the

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Old Testament taught about the person of Christ. So he has laid out the case in the first four verses.

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These things are true of him. He's the heir of all things. He's the creator of all things. He's the radiance of God's glory, the exact representation of his nature, et cetera.

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All of those things. And then he quotes from the Old Testament, and each of these Old Testament quotations is intended.

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It can be drawn back to some statement that he has made in the first four verses. So he is showing us the case.

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So seven statements about Christ, and then seven quotations from seven different Old Testament passages. And since we're dealing with things that are kind of interesting or curious about this opening chapter of Hebrews, here's another one.

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In all of this description about Jesus Christ, the name Jesus Christ isn't even mentioned. In fact, this

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I found interesting. We don't even come across the name Jesus until chapter two, verse nine.

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So all of this information about the divine son, the author gives to us without ever even identifying who the divine son is.

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It's almost as if he assumes that the readers would know of whom he is talking. But the very first time that he mentions the name of Jesus in chapter two, verse nine, and this is interesting, there it is in connection with his humiliation, that he was made for a little while lower than the angels.

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So he describes there the humiliation of the Lord, and he uses his earthly human name for Jesus. The very first time we read the name

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Christ, the title Christ, is not until chapter three, verse six, where the author uses it to say that he is greater than Moses.

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So he uses the term Jesus the first time to describe his humility. He uses the title Christ the first time to describe his greatness, that he is greater than Moses.

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So for all of this first chapter, if we didn't already know with whom he is speaking, we would think that he, of whom he is speaking, we would think that he is talking about God himself.

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And yet he is talking about the divine son. All right, so that kind of sets up where we're going this morning with this discussion about the one who is the heir of all things.

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We're just gonna talk about the implications of that statement. And now you're thinking to yourself, Jim, are you gonna draw out each one of these single seven statements into its own sermon?

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Today, we're just looking at he who is the heir of all things. And we'll save the answer to that question for some time in the future.

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I don't know, I haven't decided yet. But there's so much that is tied into what it means that Christ is the one who is the heir of everything.

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So we're just looking at that statement. He who, in his son, verse two, whom he has appointed the heir of all things.

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The he that is being described there is God the father. It is God the father who has done this appointing, and he has appointed the son to be the heir of all things.

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Now, what does that mean? What are the implications of that? That's what we're looking at this morning. I want you to notice, it's interesting to me how the author starts with the heirship of Jesus.

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I don't know if that's a word, but it should be, or it is now. The heirship of Jesus, the fact that he is the heir of everything.

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That's not the most logical place to start. It's not even the most chronological place to start. It might have been far more logical for him to start with the pre -existence of Christ.

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The author could have backed us up to eternity past and said, understand that this one who is the son who has revealed the father to us, he existed before anything else existed.

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He has always been. This is how John argues in John chapter one, when he says that the one in the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was

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God. Take your mind back as far into the past as you can possibly go, to the stretches into eternity past, as far as your mind can reach back at that point, and even an eternity before that, he was the word.

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And that word was with God. That is, he was side to side or face to face, intimate relationship with God, the word was, and that word was

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God. And that identifies both his oneness of essence and his distinction in persons. That the son was God, and it was in relationship with the father, who is also

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God. One essence and two persons, two individual persons. And then John in chapter one verse 18 says, no one has seen

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God, that is the father, at any time, but the one, the only begotten God, who is in the bosom, in close relationship with the father, he, that is the son, has revealed the father to us.

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So when John wants to tell us that the best revelation of the nature of the father is in the person of the son, he takes us back into eternity past and said, he is qualified to tell us who the father is, because he has always existed in intimate, familial fellowship and relationship with the father.

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He knows the father because he has always been with the father as the divine son. And so now he has stepped into time, and the word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory as of the only begotten of the father, full of grace and truth.

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He has stepped into time and reveals the father to us, the one who was in the bosom of the father. He has explained the father to us.

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So it would have made sense for the author of Hebrews to do the same thing, to begin with the pre -existence of the son. The fact that he had always existed, but he doesn't begin there.

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He begins with the heirship of the son, or it might've even made sense for him to begin with the fact that the son is the creator of all things.

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I mean, there has to be an all things before he can inherit all things, right? It would have been logically consistent for him to begin with creation.

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And to say this one who is the son, he created all things, and he upholds all things, and he has been appointed the heir of all things.

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That would have been chronologically or more logically consistent, but he doesn't begin with that. He doesn't begin with his pre -existence.

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He doesn't begin with his act of creation. Instead, he really projects us forward to an event in the future, when he will assume all things as his inheritance.

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He takes our mind there, while at the same time telling us that in eternity past, he was appointed the heir of all things.

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Why does he begin with the heirship? I think it is because the idea of an heir is intimately and inseparably connected with the idea of the son.

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He's already told us that in times past, God spoke through prophets and in these various means, and now he has spoken to us in son.

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Remember, the article isn't there. We looked at that two weeks ago. The article isn't there, so the emphasis there is upon the nature of this communication.

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The communication or the revelation in Jesus Christ is a son communication. He is revealing to us who he is, not by means of prophets and visions and people related to God or called by God, but in one who is in the very essence and nature who is

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God in human flesh. That is the nature of that communication. So having raised the issue that Jesus is the divine son, what would be the most natural way to start, at least for the author?

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The idea that he is also the heir of all things. Now in the Jewish mind, this would make sense because in the Jewish mind, the firstborn son had all of the rights of inheritance.

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The firstborn son got everything. He got all the responsibility, the land, the obligations, everything that was the father's belonged to the son by virtue of the fact that the son belonged to the father and that he was the firstborn son.

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So when the author of Hebrews describes Jesus as being the son and being the heir of all things, he's not suggesting that Christ gets everything when the father dies because the father is not going to die.

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He's not going to pass away, but rather what is being described is this. It was the intention and purpose of the father in eternity past to bless and glorify the son by giving to the son everything that belonged to the father.

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So the son who created all of these things, the father has given all of that to the son and has appointed the son as the heir of everything.

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So by virtue of the fact that he is the son, he obviously gets everything that is the father's, right?

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Imagine that you are, maybe some of you are an only child. Everything when your parents die goes to you.

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All of the obligations, all of the debts, all of the land, everything that they have, it is all turned over to you.

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Now in my house, I have four kids who all fight over everything that I have and I want, right? And they're constantly already bidding on who gets to take.

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I think I'm a little young to already be auctioning off my estate, but they seem to delight in this from time to time. Now if there's only one child, then when the father dies, the child gets everything.

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That one child gets everything. And that is the way it is with the son. But the nature of sonship, being related to him being the heir of all things, this speaks to his deity.

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Now I will tell you why. In order for the son to be the heir of everything that belongs to the father, he must be of the same nature as the father.

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He cannot be just a mere man. It is not as if the father just picked somebody out of humanity and said, he's a spiritual guy,

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I'll give him everything. That is not how it works. He must be one who shares the very nature of the father.

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Because for him to exercise authority and control and dominion over everything that belongs to the father, he must share the same nature as the father.

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I cannot give exercise of my entire estate over to a dog, a pet,

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I can't do that. Because the pet doesn't share my nature. I can only turn over everything that I have to somebody who is able to manage and control and inherit everything that I have.

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So the very fact that he is the heir of all things speaks to his divine nature. The father has appointed him the heir of all things.

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Now that raises for us another question. When did this happen? At what point did this happen?

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And this is where our minds kind of go, they start to short circuit. Because we are really talking about something that is true due to the nature of the one whom we are talking about, the

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Lord Jesus Christ. And it is true of him because he has always been this.

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So we're talking about something in a past tense. It is obviously something that is passed to us, this appointment. It is past tense to the author of Hebrews because he says he appointed him the heir of all things, not he will appoint him, or is appointing him the heir of all things.

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So when did this happen? The father didn't need to wait until the Lord Jesus Christ was born and observe his faithfulness and observe his worthiness and then make a decision to go ahead and appoint him to be the heir of all things.

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He is the heir of all things by virtue of the fact that he is the son. How long has he been the son? Was there a point in time when he became the son?

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Now when we're speaking of the nature of God, there is no point in time when he became the son. He has always been the son.

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As long as God has existed, which remember that little mental trip we took back in time a few minutes ago?

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You go all the way back to that and an eternity before that and then go back in eternity before that. As long as God has existed, which is always, he has existed as a triune

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God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. There was no point at which the son came into being or there was no point at which the son became the son.

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And there was no point at which the son then became the heir. This is where the language of time for us time -bound creatures becomes very confusing because we are describing something that is true of him because of his nature.

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That has been true of him forever. So we describe it as something that happened in the past and it did happen in the past, but there was never a time when it was not true.

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By virtue of who he is, the father has given to him everything. That was the intention of the father, to glorify and bless his son for the glory of the triune

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God by committing to the son everything that is and by giving it all to him and making him the heir of everything.

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So this happened in eternity past. It's sometimes difficult for us to, we have to think in terms of those things because there are things that we say happened in eternity past that have always been true for eternity past.

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It has always been this case. There was never a point when God learned this or when the son learned it and said, oh, I'm the heir of all things?

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Well, I didn't know that. That could not have happened. It could never have happened. So he has, in that sense, always been the heir of all things.

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One of the challenges with taking some of these statements that we have, like he has been appointed the heir of all things. He's the creator of all things.

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He made purification for sins. He sat down at the right hand of God. One of the challenges of taking each one of these statements in isolation from the others is that each statement can really only be appreciated in connection with all the other statements.

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So it's kind of like we're looking at one side of a diamond this morning. So we look at one side of that diamond and we observe its beauty and its majesty and its glory, but we cannot really observe the one side of the diamond without at the same time recognizing that there are other sides of that diamond that all make the diamond perfect as it is, right?

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We're just looking at him being the heir of all things, but that's connected to all these other six statements. He's the heir of all things because he's a creator of all things.

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And he's the heir of all things because he upholds all things by the word of his power. And he's the heir of all things because he has made purification of sins and by his blood he has purchased all men and the right to all of this creation.

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He's the heir of all things because he sits at the father's right hand. He's the heir of all things because he is the radiance of his glory and the exact representation of his nature.

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So we're looking at him being the heir of all things, but keep in mind that there are other sides of this diamond and we're gonna turn them one by one and look at each one of these seven things, but know that the beauty of the diamond is beautiful because it all ties together.

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You can't have one of these things without being the other. He can't be the heir of all things if he is not also the creator of all things, the sustainer of all things, the one who purchased all things and the one who sits at the father's right hand.

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All of these things are true, that's the beauty of it. All right, now let's look at a couple of Old Testament passages that describe this and describe how this is going to come to pass and what

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God means, what the word means when they refers to him as the heir of all things. We understand the Jewish concept of one being given everything because he is a son and he has a right to that and that is what the father has done in appointing him the heir of all things.

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I would turn back to a passage, I'm not gonna ask you to turn there, you can if you want, to 2 Samuel chapter seven, but there's a passage in the

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Old Testament where some of this begins to crystallize in Old Testament revelation as to who

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Christ is and what he has come to do and it was a promise given to David. Now 2 Samuel chapter seven,

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I mentioned a few moments ago that in this passage in chapter one that is all the Old Testament quotations, there are seven passages quoted, all of them are from the

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Psalms except for one passage, the one passage that is not from the Psalms is 2 Samuel chapter seven and that's quoted in verse five where he says, and again, it's the end of verse five,

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I will be a father to him and he shall be a son to me. That quotation comes from the promise that God gave to David.

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Now God had called David to be a king, he had made David king over all of the land of Israel and then God promised to David that he would raise up from the house of David, from the lineage of David, one who would have a right to rule over David's house, over the kingdom of Israel and that he would be made a king and that his kingdom would endure forever.

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That's the gist of it. Now we get that from 2 Samuel chapter seven, beginning of verse eight, where the

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Lord said, I think it is to Nathan, yeah, to Nathan, the Lord said to him, now therefore, you shall say to my servant

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David, thus says the Lord of hosts, I took you from the pasture from following the sheep to be a ruler over my people Israel.

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I've been with you wherever you have gone and have cut off all your enemies from before you, I will make of you a great name, like the names of the great men who are on the earth.

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I will also appoint a place for my people Israel and will plant them that they may live in their own place and not be disturbed again, nor will the wicked afflict them anymore as formerly, even from the day that I commanded judges to be over my people

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Israel and I will give you rest from all your enemies. The Lord also declares to you that the Lord will make a house for you.

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When your days are complete and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up for your descendants after you who will come forth from you and I will establish his kingdom.

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He shall build a house for my name and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be a father to him and he will be a son to me.

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When he commits iniquity, I will correct him with the rod of men and the strokes of the sons of men, but my loving kindness shall not depart from him.

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As I took it away from Saul whom I removed from before you, your house and your kingdom shall endure before me forever.

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Your throne shall be established forever in accordance with all these words and all this vision, so Nathan spoke to David.

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Now you'll notice there are elements of that promise that God gave to Nathan or to David through Nathan. There are elements of that promise that apply obviously to the

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Lord Jesus Christ. There are also elements of statements in that promise that cannot apply to the

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Lord Jesus Christ, like he will be a son to me and when he commits iniquity, I will discipline him with the rods of men.

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Okay, so there are statements in there that are true of Jesus. There are statements in there that are not true of Jesus, but are true of other kings that would come from David's line who would come between David and the son of man, the

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Lord Jesus Christ. Those things were true of those other kings. There are statements in there that we can glean.

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Well, I should say it this way. It became obvious very quickly after David died and Solomon assumed the throne.

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It became very obvious very quickly within a couple decades that Solomon was not the perfect son being spoken of here, whose kingdom would endure forever.

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Because even when after Solomon died, 40 years after David died, when Solomon died, the kingdom was split into the

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Northern kingdom and the Southern kingdom. And it was never reunited again. It never came back together again.

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And so there are statements here that are obviously true of the Lord Jesus, obviously true of Solomon, some that are obviously true of men who came between Solomon and Christ, kings who came from David's line.

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But the promise was that God would raise up from among the descendants of David, a man who would assume that throne, who would reign over the house of Jacob and his kingdom would have no end.

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That was the promise. And so then we have a glimpse of this further on in Old Testament prophecy in Isaiah chapter seven, a verse that we think of quite frequently at this time of year.

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Verse 14, therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son and she will call his name

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Emmanuel. What does Emmanuel mean? God with us. This one who would be born of a virgin would be called

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God with us. We'd be recognized as the divine son with us. Isaiah chapter nine, this is further prophecy regarding this child, verses six and seven.

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For a child would be born to us, a son will be given to us and the government will rest upon his shoulders. And his name will be called wonderful counselor, mighty

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God, eternal father, prince of peace. There will be no end to the increase of his government or a peace on the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on.

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And forevermore, the zeal of the Lord of hosts will accomplish this. Now that promise was given 300 years after David.

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300 years after David when the line of kings had fallen into disrepute and immorality, when the nation itself had disregarded the covenant that God made with it, they were steeped in disobedience and rebellion and had violated the covenant and didn't deserve any of those promises.

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And along comes Isaiah and says, even though the kingdom and the Davidic line is in such a state of disrepair,

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God will still raise up this one whom he has promised. The promise to David will come to pass, it cannot fail.

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And so God has promised that he will do this. There will come a child, the government will rest upon his shoulders. He will rule over the house of David just as was promised.

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And any Jew in Isaiah's day would have said, how can this be? The whole line is corrupt. The kingdom is corrupt.

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The people are disrespectful and rebellious and disobedient to the covenant.

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How can this possibly be? And Isaiah's answer is the Lord of hosts will accomplish this. It won't be by might.

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It won't be by power. It won't be by human engineering. Yes, the line has fallen. Yes, the kingdom has fallen. But God will still accomplish what he promised to David.

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He will set a descendant of David over David's throne to rule and to reign. And that rule and that reign will last forevermore.

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And then we read in Luke chapter one, verses 30 to 33. The angel said to Mary, do not be afraid, Mary, for you found favor with God and behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son and you shall name him

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Jesus. He will be great and will be called the son of the most high and the Lord God will give him the throne of his father,

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David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever and his kingdom will have no end. In Matthew chapter two, when the

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Magi showed up, what was the question they asked? They said, where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.

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And then Herod asked the scribes, where was the Messiah supposed to be born? This king, this king of the Jews, the one who will rule on David's throne, just as all the

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Old Testament prophets predicted. Where is he to be born? And the scribes said, they quoted Micah chapter five, verse two, as for you,

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Bethlehem Ephrathah, too little to be among the clans of Judah. From you, one will go forth for me to be a ruler in Israel, his goings forth from long ago from the days of eternity.

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That was the promise. Now that promise given to the nation of Israel was not restricted just to the nation of Israel. Remember, he's the heir of all things, not just the nation of Israel inside of its boundaries, he's the heir of all things.

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How would that happen? Well, Daniel revealed that. Daniel chapter seven, verse 13. I kept looking, Daniel says, in the night visions and behold, with the clouds of heaven, one like a son of man was coming and he came up to the ancient of days and was presented before him.

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And to him was given dominion, glory, and a kingdom that all the peoples, nations, and men of every language might serve him.

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His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which will not pass away. And his kingdom is one which will not be destroyed.

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Daniel chapter seven, verse 27. Then the sovereignty, the dominion, and the greatness of all the kingdoms under the whole heaven will be given to the people of the saints of the highest one.

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His kingdom will be an everlasting kingdom and all the dominions will serve and obey him. Daniel was looking forward to something that is yet future to us.

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And he is saying that this son of man will stand before the God who is the highest of all and the father will give him that kingdom.

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That is yet future to us. And this will happen and he will reign over the house of David, just as the

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Old Testament promised. And he will reign forever and forever and forever on David's throne, in David's line, as the king who comes from David.

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That's the promise. That's what God has promised. Now, these Old Testament passages that are quoted, if you're not back in Hebrews chapter one, you should be in Hebrews chapter one.

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Those Old Testament quotations that are quoted, the very first quotation comes from Psalm two. Psalm two is a

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Davidic kingly Psalm. And in Psalm two, we read about the nations who are raging and the people's mocking

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God and plotting a vain thing and standing up against God and wanting to thwart his power and parading in their wickedness.

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And Psalm two, verse four says this. He who sits in the heavens laughs, the Lord scoffs at them. Then he will speak to them in his anger and terrify them in his fury saying, but as for me,

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I have installed my king upon Zion, my holy mountain. I will surely tell of the decree of the Lord.

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He said to me, you are my son. Today I have begotten you. Ask of me and I will surely give the nations as your inheritance and the ends of the earth as your possession.

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You shall break them with a rod of iron. You shall shatter them like earthenware. Where will this happen?

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In Jerusalem. It'll happen in Jerusalem. Now, a couple of weeks ago, the president of the

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United States made, caused quite a kerfuffle by recognizing that Jerusalem is the eternal capital of Israel.

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And he made that statement and the God haters and leftists came out of the woodwork to have an apoplectic fit publicly.

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You think that's controversial statement? Let me tell you something. There is a son of David who is waiting to take a throne in the city of Jerusalem and he is going to establish his throne.

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And the mosque that is on the Temple Mount will be no more. And there will be no Israeli Arab conflict.

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You know why? Because he will shatter his enemies like an earthenware vessel. And he will rule with a rod of iron.

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When our King comes back, he is coming back to go to war. He's not a pacifist. He is gonna put down all rebellion and all opposition and he will reign and rule over all things.

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That is what has been promised to him. He has the right to it because he is the son. He has the right to it because he has made purification for sins.

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And he has the right to it because he sits at the father's right hand. And he will assume all of it. And he will take control of all of it.

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And he will subject everything to himself, all of his enemies. He will make a footstool for his feet and he will rule and reign over the house of David forevermore.

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You think it's controversy to say that Jerusalem is the capital city of Israel? Man, you haven't seen nothing yet.

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It's gonna be the capital city of the entire world. All of the nations will do homage and obedience to him.

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By his resurrection, he has secured this everlastingly for us. This is Paul's argument in 1 Corinthians chapter 15, where Paul says,

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Christ is the first fruits and after those who are Christ's is coming. Then comes the end when he hands over the kingdom to God the father.

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When he has abolished all rule and all authority and power, for he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.

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The last enemy that will be abolished is death, for he has put all things in subjection under his feet.

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But when he says all things are put into subjection, it is evident that he is accepting him who put all things in subjecting to him.

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In other words, the father is not subject to the son. The son has brought everything into subjection to himself, but not the father.

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And then Paul says, when all things are subjected to him, that is the son, then the son himself also will be subjected to the one that is the father who subjected all things to him so that God may be all in all.

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It's a beautiful picture of redemption, having purchased the birthright of the entire nation. It is of the entire world.

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It is his. All of creation is his having purchased all of that by his blood. He then rules and reigns until he puts every enemy under his feet.

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The last one to be destroyed is death. And then having made everything subject to him, not the father, but everything else subject to him.

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The son turns around and hands all of that to the father because he loves the father. And we are included in that all things being subject to him.

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He turns us all over to the father. The father has given everything to the son so that the son may rule and reign and be glorified.

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And then when it's all wrapped up and all into subjecting to him, he turns and hands all that inheritance back over to the father. And so the father and the son share this massive inheritance and guess who else gets to share it?

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We do, because we are it. We are part of it. The father has appointed him to be the heir of everything.

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He gets everything. Is that not magnificent? It all belongs to him. Every star, every nebula, every black hole, every universe yet to be discovered, all the angels, all the demons, every man, woman, and child,

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Satan himself, every creature, all the wealth, all the nations, every square inch of this planet, every square inch of this universe, however vast it is, it all belongs to him.

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The father has already determined in eternity past everything that he has created. I'm giving it all back to the son.

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It all belongs to the son. He has the right over all of it. Now, what are the implications of this for us?

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There are three of them. Well, there are more than three. There are a ton of them. I'm just gonna try and summarize them under three headings.

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The first one is this. Christ has promised to share all that is his with all who are his.

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That is magnificent. Romans chapter eight, verse 16 and 17 says, "'The spirit himself testifies with our spirit "'that we are children of God, and if children, heirs also.

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"'Heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, "'if indeed we suffer with him, "'so that we may also be glorified with him.'"

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Romans eight, verse 32, "'He who did not spare his own son, "'but delivered him up for us all, "'how will he with him not also freely give us all things?'

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Everything is ours. Because it belongs to him and we belong to him, he has already determined to share it all with us.

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We get the kingdom. First Corinthians chapter three, Paul says, "'Whether it is Paul or Apollos or Cephas "'or the world or life or death or things present "'or things to come, all things belong to you.

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"'And you belong to Christ and Christ belongs to God.'" He's the heir of all things. And we are that inheritance. We share in that inheritance with the saints in life.

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So here's the purpose of the father. In eternity past, he appointed the son as the heir of all things.

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He created everything. He has redeemed everything. He has purchased the right to everything. It all belongs to him. And after he has brought everything under subjection to his feet, guess what he's going to do?

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He's gonna turn that over to the father and then we get to share it. We get the kingdom. By virtue of the fact that we belong to him, he shares his kingdom with us.

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Now, by virtue of the fact that we are adopted children of God in relationship with Christ because of what

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God has done, we get the kingdom. So let me ask you, what are you worried about? You get the kingdom.

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You're worried that the government's not gonna have enough money to take care of you after they've been taking it from you all these years? Social security is gonna be defunct?

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Yeah, I'm a little worried about that too. But guess what? We get the kingdom. Everything in the world to come is ours.

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Are you worried that God can't protect you, provide for you, care for you, look out for you? We get the kingdom. Everything that is his belongs to us.

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Eventually, every atom in the universe, every far -flung galaxy, it all belongs to the saints who get to inherit that in life.

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He has already determined that by virtue of the fact that he has redeemed us and we belong to him, everything that he has, and that's everything, he is going to share it with us.

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I was trying to come up with an illustration of this this morning, and I think that this is the best way to illustrate it. It is as if you know somebody who is the son of a great king, and this king has a dominion that just blows your mind, and he has wealth that is beyond imagination, and the king possesses this, and that son, who happens to be your best friend, is gonna become the heir of it, and then imagine that that son, who becomes the heir of all of those things, turns to you and says, look, when it all gets handed over to me at the end of time, after everything becomes mine and I have exercise over,

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I'm gonna share it equally with you so that everything that is mine is yours. Everything. You have access to all of it.

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You get all the benefits of it. Everything that belongs to me belongs to you. We will share it just as if you have the same right to it that I do.

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That is what Christ has promised us. Here's the second implication. This is a solace to a suffering believer.

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Now, these Hebrew Christians to whom the author is writing here, they were suffering. They had already suffered the seizure of their property.

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They had been horribly treated, we find out in chapter 10. They were suffering some mild persecution because of their

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Christian profession and their allegiance to Christ. They had been ostracized from their family. They were suffering.

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All of the results of that would have meant to be kicked out of a believing community, and for some of these

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Christians, it would have been very easy to make all of that suffering go away just like that. You know what they had to do?

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Just turn away from their profession of Christ and go back to that Old Testament system.

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That's all they had to do. All they had to do was keep Jesus in one hand and just kind of secretly go back to what they had before.

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And all of the ostracization, all of the persecution, all of that would have gone away.

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It would have become really easy for them. So the author is here reminding them, the one in whom you have trusted owns everything.

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Yeah, you've suffered the seizure of your property. Your Savior is the heir of all things. How are you gonna better that? What are you gonna turn to that is better than that?

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He's the heir of everything. He possesses it all, and he's promised you the kingdom. You're gonna turn away from that for what?

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So you can get a little bit of earthly property back when you get the kingdom? The third implication is this. All people are eventually gonna bow the knee to this king.

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That's what we have to remember. So the question is not whether you will bow or not. The question is when you will bow and on what terms you will bow.

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Because he has already promised, God has, by Philippians chapter two, verse nine, says, for this reason, the

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Father has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which is above every name so that the name of Jesus, every knee will bow. Those in heaven and those on earth, under the earth, every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is

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Lord to the glory of God the Father. That will happen. And so the only question is not, the question is not will you bow?

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The question is when will you bow and on what terms will you bow? Will you bow before the Savior whose eyes are aflame with grace and mercy and love and kindness who even now beckons you to come and offers you forgiveness of sins, eternal life, a cleansed conscience, and the kingdom?

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Or will you continue in rebellion and end your days impenitent and hardened and bow before the judge whose eyes are aflame with righteousness and holiness and justice who knows your every thought, your every word, your every deed, and has promised to make all of his enemies a footstool for his feet?

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When and where will you bow? You can bow before the Savior and receive the kingdom or you can bow before him as your judge and be made a footstool for his feet, but you will bow.

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All of us will bow. And so we must heed the encouragement of Psalms, Psalm chapter two,

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Psalm two, when the writer says this, and this is the one we quoted from earlier, do homage to the Son, that is to worship, to obey, do obedience to the

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Son so that he not become angry and you perish in the way, for his wrath may soon be kindled. How blessed are all who take refuge in him.

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See, the very one whose wrath we fear is also the very refuge from that wrath. And so the psalmist says, obey the

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Son, worship the Son, love the Son, because he may become angry with you. And when he kindles his wrath against you, you will perish in the way, but you can find refuge in him.

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So all men will bow. Bow before him as your Savior or bow before him as your judge, but you will bow.

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That's good news for those who bowed before him as their Savior, because we get the kingdom. So, receive the kingdom or be made a footstool for his feet as he brings every enemy into subjection to his mighty power.

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Let's pray together. Father, these are sobering words that we have considered this morning, but they delight our hearts in the joy and the truth of what

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Christ has done. They make us to think of all that you have given to us and all that you have promised to us.

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Our minds are not even able to wrap themselves around the glory that is ours, the glory that belongs to those who are yours.

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We thank you that you have brought our hearts into subjection to that great truth. And that for those here who have believed and are believing, we thank you that you have subdued our rebellious will and opened our eyes and our hearts to respond to the message of the gospel so that we might inherit the kingdom.

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We look forward to stepping into glory and hearing well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of the

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Lord. We long to hear that and we look forward to the day when we will inherit everything that is Christ.

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We thank you that he is the heir of all things. And it is our desire that any who are here who do not know Christ may bow before him as savior, that they may lay down their rebellion and their arms and their treason and to embrace the benefit and the blessing and the mercy of Christ the

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King. Do that work in the hearts of people, we pray that you may be glorified and that Christ may receive them as a reward for his suffering.