Angelic Conflict part 137: Human history – Heb 3;12:1-3; Num 12:3, 7-8; 16:41; 21:4-5; 25:2-3; Eph 2:19-22; Rom 15:5; Col 1:9-14; 2Pe 1:3-13

Title: Angelic Conflict part 137: Human history - Heb 3;12:1-3;  NUM 12:3, 7-8; 16:41; 21:4-5; 25:2-3; EPH 2:19-22; ROM 15:5; COL 1:9-14; 2PE 1:3-13.

 

Heb 3 contrasts the celebrityship of Christ with the breakdown of faith rest. Is Christ your celebrity?

 

Satan’s world system has a bunch of stumbling blocks already in place designed to make the believer fear that the daily manna isn’t enough and that God will not take them to the Promised Land as He promised. Those who fall into these pits without recovery desire more than manna and want to go back to Egypt.

 

 “One cannot fight a satanical force with morality and humanity alone.” [Eric Voegelin]

 

HEB 3:1 Therefore, holy brethren, partakers [partners] of a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of our confession.

 

The word for “partakers” is translated “partners” in LUK 5:7 in reference to fisherman. James, John, Peter, and Andrew were partners.

 

We are partners in a heavenly calling, our election in Christ Jesus, through the baptism of the Holy Spirit at salvation, which makes each believer members of His body. The Bible also uses this word to state that we are each partners with the Holy Spirit, and even partners with divine discipline.

 

 “consider Jesus” - katanoe,w[katanoeo] = kata - down; noeo - perceive with the mind. To understand fully, to consider closely, to intensely think about, or to be occupied with.

 

The prefix “kata” literally would mean to think down or to bear down on something with your mind and so to be occupied with or intensely thinking about someone.

 

HEB 3:2 He was faithful to Him who appointed Him, as Moses also was in all His house.

 

There was never a time when Christ was unfaithful to the Father and there will never be a time when He is unfaithful to any believer.

 

Jesus is the Celebrity while Moses is a hero because he was a man oriented to grace.

 

NUM 12:3

(Now the man Moses was very humble, more than any man who was on the face of the earth.)

 

There is one Celebrity and many heroes who are occupied with Him.

 

NUM 12:7-8

He [Moses] is faithful in all My household;

With him I speak mouth to mouth,

 

HEB 3:3 For He has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses, by just so much as the builder of the house has more honor than the house.

 

In human life celebrities come and celebrities go, but here we have the perfect tense [counted worthy] to show that Jesus Christ always was and there never will be a time when He is not a celebrity.

 

 “house” - not a literal house, but the nation and dispensation of Israel of which Moses was a part, but not the builder.

 

Who gave Abraham and Sarah the ability to conceive? Who promised Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? Who delivered Israel through Joseph? Who called Moses? Who sent the ten plagues? Who split the Red Sea? Who brought them through the desert? None of us build anything. We are parts of the house and as sons we remain in the house of the Church and can be heroes, but no one ever takes the place of the Celebrity.

 

EPH 2:19 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God's household,

 

EPH 2:20 having been built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone,

 

EPH 2:21 in whom the whole building, being fitted together is growing into a holy temple in the Lord;

 

EPH 2:22 in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit.

 

God’s household is not an earthly dwelling. Christ’s kingdom is not of this earth. Liberal progressives are the new paganism who are hyping up the population in the belief that there is an earthly redemption, kingdom, and salvation.

 

Christopher Dawson, an English Catholic intellectual wrote in the mid nineteen hundreds… “this determination to build Jerusalem, at once and on the spot, is the very force which is responsible for the intolerance and violence of the new political order … if we believe that the Kingdom of Heaven can be established by political or economic measures - that it can be an earthly state - then we can hardly object to the claims of such a State to embrace the whole of life and to demand the total submission of the individual … there is a fundamental error in all this. That error is the ignoring of Original Sin and its consequences or rather identification of the Fall with some defective political or economic arrangement. If we could destroy the Capitalist system or the power of the bankers or that of the Jews, everything in the garden would be lovely.”

 

HEB 3:4 For every house is built by someone [therefore, someone had to establish the dispensations], but the builder of all things is God [deity of Christ].

 

HEB 3:5 Now Moses was faithful [dependable and stable] in all His house as a servant [not doulos - a noble servant], for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken later [communicated later];

 

Moses, the noble servant, stands as a testimony to the fact that even a genius can submit to God and greatly prosper spiritually.

 

Being a genius is one of the greatest handicaps there is to the spiritual life.

 

HEB 3:6 but Christ was faithful as a Son over His house whose house we are, if we hold fast our confidence [all outspokenness] and the boast of our hope firm until the end [faithful son as opposed to unfaithful].

 

The son has a higher position than the servant and this Son is also the builder of the house.

 

Moses was described as a noble servant, but Christ is an adult son.

 

JOH 8:35-36

"And the slave does not remain in the house forever; the son does remain forever. "If therefore the Son shall make you free, you shall be free indeed.

 

 “if we hold fast” - preposition evan[ean] plus kate,cw [katecho] = prefix “down” and echo - to have and to hold. To hold fast, to secure possession of, or to have in full.

 

In verse 1 we had katanoeo for occupation with Christ which is the goal and katecho is the means or the journey. Katecho is also used as a nautical term as in bearing down on a course or steering in order to maintain a course. The rudder is doctrine, and course is your endurance of confidence in Christ and your destination is occupation with Christ.

 

Take full possession of your confidence (all outspokenness) [katecho] in Christ so that He will become the Celebrity that you are occupied [katanoeo] with.

 

The subjunctive means that this is a third class condition, meaning maybe you will or you won’t secure the possession of your confidence in Christ. Confidence comes from trust. God gives the believer time to perceive God’s faithfulness and power so that the believer will trust in Him.

 

Hold fast gets us right back to our old friend of late, endurance.

 

 “endurance” - u`pomonh,[hupomone] = endurance based on confidence in Christ.

 

HEB 12:1 Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside [recovery] every encumbrance, and the sin [OSN] 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 [Prince Ruler] and perfecter [completor] of faith, who for [in the place of] the joy set before Him endured [hupomeno - verb] the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

 

HEB 12:3 For consider Him who has endured [hupomeno] such hostility by sinners against Himself [He didn’t stop walking towards His destiny], so that you may not grow weary and lose heart.

 

This word (the noun) is used 32 times and the verb is used 17 times in the NT and it refers not to a passive waiting it out until circumstances change, but an active application of faith rest and other pertinent doctrine while under the circumstance of difficulty and persecution.

 

It is also closely related to the word “hope” which is a happy expectation of future deliverance, therefore it is also related to confidence in the Lord as High Priest, protector, noble prince, and provider.

Endurance is not something you gain through the flesh. It comes to the believer by his unmerited decision to be a student of the word of God. 

 

Endurance comes from God:

 

ROM 15:5

Now may the God who gives perseverance and encouragement [paraklesis - to comfort] grant you to be of the same mind with one another according to Christ Jesus;

 

COL 1:9 For this reason also, since the day we heard of it [your faith, hope, love, and fruit], we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding,

 

COL 1:10 so that you may walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God;

 

COL 1:11 strengthened [present passive participle] with all power, according to His glorious might, for the attaining of all steadfastness [hupomone] and patience [makrothumia]; joyously

 

The passive participle reveals that the believer receives the strength to attain endurance and patience (synonyms) and verse 10 shows the condition - walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, have motivation to please Him, and continue doctrinal intake.

 

Walk is a lifestyle and not perfection, while motivation is a direct result of priorities in the conscience.

 

COL 1:12 (joyously) giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified [made sufficient] us to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.

 

As we noted in 1CO 9:27 there is a certain portion of deposited inheritance that we can become disqualified from if we never gain the maturity needed to be under testing for proofing the divine glory of God’s power within.

 

COL 1:13 For He delivered us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son,

 

COL 1:14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

 

Furthermore, endurance generates further confidence in God and so compounds its own interest, 2PE 1:6.

 

2PE 1:1 Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ:

 

2PE 1:2 Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord;

 

2PE 1:3 seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence.

 

2PE 1:4 For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, in order that by them you might become partakers of the divine nature [through trust], having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust [exodus].

 

2PE 1:5 Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence [virtue], and in your moral excellence, knowledge;

 

2PE 1:6 and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance [hupomone], and in your perseverance [hupomone], godliness [literally - well devoted; separated unto Him in time];

 

2PE 1:7 and in your godliness, brotherly kindness [philadelphia], and in your brotherly kindness, love [agape].

 

2PE 1:8 For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge [epignosis] of our Lord Jesus Christ.

 

2PE 1:9 For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted [cannot see far off, i.e. only sees in front of him and is a reference to the visible and not the spiritual], having forgotten his purification from his former sins.

 

2PE 1:10 Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choosing you; for as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble;

 

2PE 1:11 for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you [no disqualification].

 

2PE 1:12 Therefore, I shall always be ready to remind you of these things, even though you already know them, and have been established in the truth which is present with you.

 

2PE 1:13 And I consider it right, as long as I am in this earthly dwelling, to stir you up by way of reminder,

 

Endurance is always related to inheritance and reigning with Christ just as those who endured in the wilderness, the second generation, entered the Promised Land.