Joshua and Judges: Crossing the Jordan - Obeying God's delegated authority, part 28. Jos 1:16-18; survey of Heb.

Title: Joshua and Judges: Crossing the Jordan - Obeying God's delegated authority, part 28. JOS 1:16-18; survey of Heb.   

 

Announcementsopening prayer:

 

 

This is our fifth passage for consideration in the book of Hebrews.

 

HEB 12:1 Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us [not looking but gone before us], let us also lay aside every encumbrance, and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,

 

HEB 12:2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

 

Jesus is the supreme example to which his readers should look as they run life's race.

 

REV 1:5

Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the first-born of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.

 

"fixing our eyes on" - avfora,w[aphorao] = "to turn the eyes away from other things and fix them on something." Our spiritual eyes are turned away from all else and concentrate on Jesus.

 

What a lesson in Christian running technique we have in that little preposition apo "off, away from," which is prefixed to this verb. The minute the Greek runner in the stadium takes his attention away from the race course and the goal to which he is speeding, and turns it upon the onlooking crowds, his speed is slackened. Rowers have a phrase, "mind in the boat". It is so with the Christian. The minute he takes his eyes off of the Lord Jesus, and turns them upon other people and things, his pace in the Christian life is slackened, and his onward progress in grace hindered.

 

HEB 12:2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

 

"author" - avrchgo,j[archegos] = originator, prince, ruler. Christ originated our faith and was the supreme example of it. He took the lead in faith and furnished the ultimate example.

 

Yet, if the OT saints came before Him and displayed this faith then how can we say that Jesus is the originator or pioneer of the faith?

 

Paul states this explicitly.

 

1CO 10:1 For I do not want you to be unaware, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea;

 

1CO 10:2 and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea;

 

1CO 10:3 and all ate the same spiritual food;

 

1CO 10:4 and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock which followed them; and the rock was Christ.

 

1 Co 10:5 Nevertheless, with most of them God was not well-pleased; for they were laid low in the wilderness.

 

1 Co 10:6 Now these things happened as examples for us, so that we would not crave evil things as they also craved

 

 

1 Co 10:13 No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it.

 

They didn't really go before Him. He went before them. It was He who called Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It was He who delivered them from Egypt and gave them victory in the Promised Land. He spoke and revealed Himself as a theophany.

 

It was He who taught Adam and Eve and their two sons how to sacrifice an animal as a type of the coming redemption to mankind. He called Noah and gave him the instructions for an ark. He has led all in faith as well as being the One who gave them the ability to have faith.

 

COL 1:15 And He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation.

 

"first-born" - prwto,tokoj[prototokos] = preeminent, priority over, not in the sense of being the first to be born. Used also for His resurrection - preeminent over death. It is a word for His relationship with the Father as in "only begotten."

 

COL 1:16 For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities —  all things have been created by Him and for Him.

 

COL 1:17 And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

 

HEB 12:2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

 

He is envisaged here by the word author or Prince as having led all the people of God, from earliest times, along the path of faith, although since His incarnation and passion, His personal example makes His leadership available to His people in a way that was impossible before.

 

The writer clearly regards Jesus as the One to whom all the prophets and martyrs bore witness, from Abel onward. And so it is He who provided them with the incentive and encouragement that they needed in running their own race. Everyone who has ever run the race of faith have done so by His incentive. All owe to Him the means by which they have run and the faith that they used.

 

What saved you, your faith or the work of Christ? If the cross didn't happen, man could have faith that God would save him, but that faith wouldn't save him. So then, Christ by fulfilling the payment for all sin on Calvary makes our faith effectual and so in reality it is Him who gave us that faith. We make the choice to believe in Him but the worthiness of salvation is not found in our faith but in Him who gave us something very real to believe in.

 

The perfecter can also mean completer. Not only is Jesus the pioneer of faith; in Him faith has reached its perfection.  

 

Our Lord in His life of faith on earth, became the perfect or complete example of the life of faith. He is one who has in His own person raised faith to its perfection and so set before us the highest example of faith.

 

In fact, when in the moment He brought faith to His ultimate perfection and completion, His hecklers, unbeknown to them, got it exactly right.

 

MAT 27:43

"He trusts in God; let Him deliver Him now, if He takes pleasure in Him; for He said, 'I am the Son of God.'"

 

This fulfills prophecy, written 1,000 years earlier.

 

PSA 22:8

"Commit yourself to the Lord; let Him deliver him;

Let Him rescue him, because He delights in him."

 

The whole life of Jesus was characterized by unbroken and unquestioning faith in His heavenly Father. The pinnacle of this was in Gethsemane and onward to His death.

 

It was sheer faith in His Father that carried Him through the taunting, the scourging, the crucifying, and the bitter agony of rejection, desertion, and being forsaken. "Come down from the cross and we will believe," they said to Him. If He had come down by supernatural power they would have had nothing to believe in. 

 

HEB 12:2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

 

"for" - anti which predominantly means "instead of". "instead of the joy then present with Him"

 

It should be noted that some very good scholars believe his use of the word for refers to those whom He would save. This may well be the meaning since it would not imply that the Lord enjoyed the cross. By combining both interpretations we still maintain the integrity of the passage in that His present joy that was fellowship with the Father was broken when He was judged for our sins, and His eyes were always upon those whom He would save, which after it was finished, His joy would be returned and that joy would be made full in them.

 

HEB 12:16 that there be no immoral or godless person like Esau, who sold his own birthright for a single meal.

 

His personal joy was the glory that He had with the Father before the world was. It was His fellowship with the Father during the incarnation. He was always, from all eternity, in the bosom of the Father, and this joy He exchanged for the cross of shame.

 

The heroic character of His faith appears ultimately when He exchanged His joy with the Father for shame, sin, and spiritual death so that we could have life and joy by means of that same faith.

 

Php 2:5 Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus,