Hebrews Chapter Three, Faithful In The Father's House

 

Hebrews 3:1b consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, Christ Jesus, [2] who was faithful to Him who appointed Him, as Moses was faithful in all His house.

 

The author commends us to consider (reflect on or contemplate) our Apostle and High Priest, Jesus. In Hebrews 2:17 Jesus was previously referred to as High Priest. We know from the Old Testament that the high priest was charged with the responsibility of atoning for the sins of Israel on the Day of Atonement. That day, and that day alone, the high priest would go behind the veil of the Holiest of All to the Ark of the Covenant with blood, shed on behalf of his people’s sins, him included.

The high priest was a mere man, chosen from the lineage of Levi, to present the blood offering to atone for (cover) the people. With Christ the High Priest He entered the Holiest of All, not a copy on earth, but the genuine in the heavens, with the offering of His own blood in payment for sin. Since we know Jesus was sinless, without spiritual defect in the same sense the animal used in the priestly ceremony was without physical defect, He did not need to atone for Himself. He expressly executed His office of High Priest on behalf of others.

 

The atonement offered in the Old Testament was first for Aaron and his household, and then for “the people…all the assembly of Israel,” Leviticus 16:15, 17. The high priest sprinkled the blood upon the mercy seat within the Holy of Holies for all the people, as well as himself. Take note that this imagery, which clearly typifies the atonement Jesus Christ would make by the sacrifice of Himself, was for all the people, not an elect predestined to eternal life. The blood was offered even for those who did not become partakers of its efficacy. Then it became not whether one was a sinner or not, but what their relationship toward Yahweh, their covenant God, was.

 

Christ Jesus is also our Apostle, or more precisely, both Apostle and High Priest of our confession. What is our confession? “That if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved,” Romans 10:9. This makes for a good companion passage to the gospel Paul defines in 1 Corinthians. We read: “that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures,” 1 Corinthians 15:3, 4. The confidence of our faith rests in the authority of the gospel; and the authority of the gospel rests in the historically accomplished prophecies foretold in the Old Testament. Jesus is their subject; He is the object of our faith. Hebrews 2:9, 10 explained how our Apostle set Himself apart for the sake of His people, and what He accomplished by doing so. Jesus, in His prayer to the Father, said, “As You have sent Me into the world (the word “apostle” means “sent out one”), I also have sent them into the world. And for their sakes I sanctify (set apart) Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth,” John 17:18, 19. The Bible is God’s revealed truth, John 17:17. The Father’s first Apostle then was Jesus, God the Son. In turn, when He knew His time to depart had come, He promised the Holy Spirit as another Comforter, and sent His disciples out in the same manner the Father sent Him. Peter and the rest, and all who learned from their witness and words, became the inheritors of Christ’s apostleship and its attendant power.

 

Verse 2 likens a contrast between Christ and Moses. The first two chapters of Hebrews reflected upon the nature of angels and the person of our Lord and how they differed. Rather, it focused on the superiority of Jesus to the angels, who are commanded to worship Him. There is a similarity between Moses and Jesus. Both were faithful in God’s house. Moses challenged Pharaoh for Israel, led them out to the Red Sea, and then to Canaan’s border. Though he sinned and died before entering the Promised Land, God permitted the prophet and friend of God to see it. Jesus attended to God’s people ceaselessly and tirelessly. His ministry was about preaching the kingdom, healing the sick, defeating the enemy in spiritual contests, and fulfilling all that was written of Him in the Prophets. Of course, that meant His death on the cross for the sins of mankind, which was why He incarnated to begin with.