No one can go back to the starting line in the race of life. Many have struggled with the pain. Others have put their past behind them. We can be freed from the weight of guilt, regret, and bitter heartache. There is hope.
Genesis 1-2 makes the point that human beings were made to function originally as God’s vice-regents over the entire creation. Psalm 8 reiterated this same point. In the New Testament, Psalm 8 is recited by the author of Hebrews in Heb. 2:6-8 and points out, “we do not yet see everything under our feet”, as Genesis 1 and Psalm 8 envisage. Why? The Fall has taken place, sin and death has taken a toll.
But what do we see? “We see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, now crowned with glory and honor because he suffered death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone” (Heb. 2:9). By Christ’s identification with us and by his death, he becomes the first human being to be crowned with such glory and honor, as he brings many sons—a new humanity—to glory. Both the one who makes human beings holy—Jesus himself—and the human beings who are made holy are of the same family. That is why Jesus is not ashamed to call us brothers (Heb. 2:11).
Since we have flesh and blood, he shared in our humanity (Heb. 2:14). His humanity was not intrinsically his, but something he had to take on (the eternal Word “became flesh,” John 1:14). He did this so that by his death (something he could never have experienced if he had not taken on flesh and blood) “he might destroy him who holds the power of death … and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death” (Heb. 2:14, 15).
Jesus did not take on the nature of angels (Heb. 2:16) He became a human being with a human ancestry, ancestry of Abraham (Heb. 2:16). He was to serve as mediator between God and human beings, “he had to be made like his brothers in every way” (Heb. 2:17). He already was like God in every way.
What is entirely “fitting,” for Jesus is that God should make the author (Jesus) of our salvation “perfect through suffering” (Heb. 2:10).
There is hope. Notice how "hope" occurs in Hebrews:
3:6 But Christ is faithful as the Son over God’s house. And we are his house, if indeed we hold firmly to our confidence and the hope in which we glory.
6:11-12 We want each of you to show this same diligence to the very end, so that what you hope for may be fully realized. We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised.
6:18-20 God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope set before us may be greatly encouraged. We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain, where our forerunner, Jesus, has entered on our behalf. He has become a high priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.
7:18-19 The former regulation is set aside because it was weak and useless (for the law made nothing perfect), and a better hope is introduced, by which we draw near to God.
10:23 Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful.
11:1 Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for.
What hope! The Son became a man to suffer death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone (Heb. 2:9). By his identification with us and by his death, he becomes the first human being to be crowned with such glory and honor, as he brings many sons to glory. Seize Hope this Christmas.
-Pastor Seboe