HEBREWS: CHRIST is the FINAL REVELATION

Christ is the final revelation

Text: 1:1-3a – God who speaks

The passage has two main “parts”: (1) Scripture; (2) introduction of the Son to the discourse. 

First, let’s talk about Scripture. More than ones we will see a “coin of…” Example chapter 11 – coin of faith – here we have a coin of God’s speech – if He speaks, then no wonder that He listens.

Spoke in the prophets. Two aspects:

(1) speaking as delivering a message

(2) we have Prophetic writings. This means that the Word is not going to change, we can fully rely on it. We’ll talk about this later.  

Same God has spoken to us by His Son. Jesus’ incarnation is vital to the story of salvation – for the Cross reason, but also for the reason of God’s speech to be delivered. John puts is most beautifully – the Word became flesh (1:14a – see more later 1:14b).     

Scripture has three main qualities:

Holy – separate, unlike other writings, God’s word  

Written – therefore, can’t be changed, meaning that God limited Himself to the Word left to us. Proverbs 25:2.  

Inerrant – has no mistakes, not only in its content, but in its formation, we confess closed canon.   

Liturgical usage of the phrase: Evening Prayer, LSB p. 247, which – after a reflection – concludes the readings of the Scripture from both the Old and New Testament.   

Challenge of the Red-Letter Bibles. In the context of Heb. 1:1-3a, what is the problem with?

(2) Then the author introduces Son as a person. He comes up with 5 “basic” features that wi;; be important for the rest of the “letter.”

 

God appointed Him as the heir of all things – Nicene creed, whose kingdom will have no end  

 

Through whom the world was created – Proverbs 8:22-31; Nicene creed, by whom all things were made.

Radiance of God’s glory – John 1:14b 

Exact imprint of His nature – Philippians 2:6-11  

Son upholds the universe by the word of His power – we are coming back to the speech/word of God, John 1:1-3. It is the Word that sustains the universe, therefore being unthankful to the Word is being unthankful to the Creator (a thought to ponder when we discuss weekly Eucharist [Thanksgiving] or the Lord’s Supper).