Hebrews 1:3-4 (HCSB)
The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact expression of His nature, sustaining all things by His powerful word. After making purification for sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high. So He became higher in rank than the angels, just as the name He inherited is superior to theirs.
The writer of Hebrews would be hard pressed to write a more startling sentence than his first sentence in this section. Many Jewish Christians had no problem with the concept that Jesus was a powerful witness God and to His majesty and glory. But this writer goes not a step further, but miles further.
The Son does not merely reflect God’s glory to a greater degree than the saints who had gone before Him. He actually IS the radiance of God’s glory shining in his own right, more like the sun than the moon. This was not merely the glory seen by His disciples at the transfiguration. It was a glory that showed in His every word, His every miracle, and His every action.
And Jesus was also the exact expression of God’s nature. That is why he could say to Phillip “The one who has seen Me has seen the Father”. (John 14:9) To look at Jesus was to see God’s very face. To listen to Him was to hear God’s voice. To be touched by Him was to feel his God’s own hand. There was no difference between Jesus and God, because Jesus was not only the Son of God in the flesh, He was and is God the Son, eternally one with the Father and the Holy Spirit.
Jesus also sustains all things in the universe by His own word. He continually demonstrated this in comparatively small ways whenever he healed someone, whenever he raised someone from the dead, whenever he did a miracle that affected the natural order, like calming the storm on the Sea of Galilee. He would repair things that were broken, heal people who were ill, and even create things that didn’t previously exist (like seeing eyes in the man born blind).
Finally, when Jesus finished his work here on earth, He did not simply join the worshiping throng around God’s throne as saints of old did. Instead, he sat down on His own throne at God’s right hand, where He has been receiving worship and praise from both men and angels for who He is and for what He has accomplished.
Father, this really would have been utterly shocking to the Jewish Christians who were taught that Jesus was nothing more than a holy man, a powerful teacher who did some amazing things. But it is just as startling to people today who believe in Jesus as merely a good man, a great teacher, and the founder of one of the world’s great religions. But the Bible doesn’t give us the option of believing that about Jesus, any more than allowing us to believe in You as one God among many. Just as you are the one and only real God, Jesus is the one and only Son of God, literally God in the flesh, who died and rose again to save our souls for all eternity. Thank you for this amazing truth. Amen.
Today's Scripture 