¹ Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, ² but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son, whom He appointed the Heir of all things, through whom also He created the world. ³ He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of His nature, and He upholds the universe by the word of His power. After making purification for sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, ⁴ having become as much superior to angels as the name He has inherited is more excellent than theirs.

Hebrews 1:1-4

The world doesn’t want to hear about supremacy. It rebels against authority. Our flesh presses against anyone or anything that tells us that we can’t do whatever we want to do. This is the nature of sin. And because we are sinful, and full of sin, we must hear from someone who is not laden with our condition in order to even understand that there is a life apart from the burden it brings. 

Imagine being born and raised in a swamp with no understanding of the outside world. Your life is water, mud, trees, tall grasses, biting insects, dangerous creatures lurking in the water, and that water is never, ever, safe to drink. That which contains life will only bring sickness and death if you consume it. Life is hardship, fear, and struggle. You learn to live with the dangers, but you can never get away from them.

But one day, you hear a humming sound in the distance, and over time it grows louder. You begin to hear “splash, splash, splash” as if something is repeatedly smacking the surface of the water. And after a few more minutes, you see someone seated in a flat boat with a large fan behind them, propelling them across the surface of the water. It’s a visitor, driving an airboat, and they are tanned, kissed by the sun you only see peeking through the treetops. They’ve lived a life you’ve never experienced, and you can tell this just by looking at them. And as they approach you, you see a smile on their face as they come bearing good news. 

They’ve come to take you away from here, and to…anywhere else. Someplace where the water is safe. Someplace where there is sun to fall on your limbs. Somewhere you don’t have to fight and struggle to survive. Somewhere that mosquitoes don’t call their home. Somewhere with air conditioning, and easy access to good, healthy food. 

You might not believe that any of those things exist. You’ve never seen them or experienced them, and you may even be frustrated that this person hasn’t lived with the hardships you’ve had to endure. Their ease may upset you, and the fear of this new, unknown life may leave you reeling in disbelief. It is real, but it isn’t real to you. You must make a choice.

In Hebrews 1, we jump straight into a description of Jesus that sweeps us off our feet, and into things that we’ve never experienced, but know to be true. As Christians, we believe all these things, but we’ve never seen them. We know they are infinitely better than what we’ve experienced here on earth, and while we know we will see them one day, we have very little personal context outside of faith itself that allows us to identify with what we’re reading.

But, if we believe it to be true, then what we read here changes absolutely everything. This information rocks our world, our mindsets, our worldviews, and draws us into a place of awe, wonder and absolute subjection before the One whom we are hearing about. We are reading things that are more wonderous than we can imagine, and if we take the time to actually pause and consider the contents of Hebrews 1, in its entirety, we will find very quickly that our human imaginations fall remarkably short in understanding or comprehension. But we do, in faith, hear and believe.

Let’s look at just the first four verses before we address the declarations the author launches into in the following verses over the next few entries. 

^“1 Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke…”

This is the voice that shares the news we never knew. This is the hand reaching through the fog. This is the life that came to our dead ears and hearts. If God never spoke, then we would never live. We would have remained dead in our sin, lost in the swamps of our own sorrow and guilt. This is a grace beyond measure. If we pause and think about this singular fact, knowing who we are, what we are capable of, and how our guilt leaves us hopeless before His righteousness, justice and wrath, we would understand just how significant it is that HE speaks to us. 

Blessed Father, thank You for speaking to us.

“…but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son…”

The time is running short. The days are numbered. There will be a reckoning, and without Him, we are on the losing side, exposed in our guilt and shame. But, at just the right time, God speaks to us through Jesus Christ. He reveals His heart for us. He displays the plan set forth from before the beginning of time that would be for His glory, and He does so in a way that our tiny, finite, human minds can relate to, blessing upon blessing. He takes on our flesh, so we know He understands us. He suffers like we do, hurts like we do, bleeds like we do, deals with sorrow, betrayals, emotional torments, like we do. He knows us, and we experience this in a way that makes sense to us through Him.

Holy Son, thank You for knowing us, and speaking into our hurts.

“whom He appointed the Heir of all things, through whom also He created the world.”

This is where we immediately walk from faith and understanding to raw faith. We think we know what it means when Jesus is declared the “heir of all things” but I don’t think we really can understand it completely. We have no perception of eternity, let alone the breadth of our own galaxy that He created. We know the numbers of how big our scientists say it is, but we cannot comprehend that in our minds. 105,700 light years doesn’t register in our minds, it’s far too big. I can comprehend a mile. So, how many miles is that? Answer: 6.2137 × 10^17 miles. That’s 6,213,700,000,000,000,000,000 miles just to cover one side of the Milky Way galaxy to the other, and our galaxy is just a tiny, tiny part of the universe as we can currently comprehend it. Jesus Christ is the heir to all things, and all things were created through Him. We simply cannot wrap our minds around the enormity of this statement, and this peek into His place as God. 

Infinite, matchless, and righteous God, we stand in awe of You.

^“3 He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of His nature,”

Again, we think we understand this, and in His grace, God has allowed us, in faith, to grasp at the hem of His garment on this one, as well. We must grapple with His Godhood, approach Him as He invites us to, and examine the depth of His being as He reveals it to us, but we must own the bedrock, foundational fact that we simply cannot wrap our minds around Him. Who of us has seen the fullness of the glory of God? Who among us has a proper and complete comprehension of His nature? We stand in awe of Him. We fall short of Him. We read quickly over these words, we try to gain ownership over what is being revealed to us here, but when we discuss the deity of Christ, which the author is so quick to establish, we are forced to wrestle with thoughts and understandings that are so far beyond what we can ever imagine, and they are expressed so quickly, that we must come back and pour over these words. We must chew on them, digest them, pray over them, and beg God to help us grasp what we are reading in a way that our hearts can fathom…and that, in His grace, will not leave us laid out on the floor from the sheer enormity and wonder of it all. 

Father, thank You for revealing Yourself to us through Christ. We can wrap our minds around a ministry, teaching, and even some miracles, but we know You are so far beyond us, and beyond the words we could use to describe You. Thank You.

“and He upholds the universe by the word of His power.” 

In case we didn’t figure this out yet, the author reveals this final proof: the atoms, electrons, quarks, and particles that make up our being are held in existence simply because He wills it to be so. If God forgot us for a moment, we would simply cease to be. Let that one soak in for a bit.

Father, thank You for remembering us, and for Your righteous will that sustains us. 

“After making purification for sins…”

The entire Gospel is shared in these 5 words. This, again, is a rushed explanation, by the way of an introduction, to help us understand the fullness of the deity of Jesus the Christ. This is part of Who He is, but not all of Who He is. Yes, He is our Savior, but He is also our Lord and our God. It’s huge to us, but it doesn’t encompass everything. This is a work that our God has done, but His majesty extends beyond it. Again, let that one soak in for a bit.

Jesus, thank You for saving us, all those whom You call to Yourself, for Your glory.

” He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,”

Again, the author is banging the same drum “Jesus is God. Jesus is God. Jesus is God.” and if we didn’t hear it the first time, he says it again for the people in the back “JESUS IS GOD.” His work complete, His glory intact after defeating our sin, and even death itself, we see Jesus reigning as He always has.

Jesus, we praise Your holy Name, and gladly bow before Your majesty.

“…having become as much superior to angels as the name He has inherited is more excellent than theirs.”

There is none like Him. Rest in that knowledge today. Let His express sovereignty, His exact imprint of the Father, His righteousness, His glory, His atoning work…let it all rest on your heart today as the author of Hebrews intended for it to do. Our rushed, western mindset tells us to finish the verse, then the chapter, and then the book…always rushing forward. But these things that begin the book of Hebrews are too great for us to comprehend. They deserve the time it takes to grapple with them, and to marinate in the fullness of what these statements reveal. We could spend the rest of our lives in these four verses, and not give them enough time. But don’t rush through them. Come back to them. Read and re-read them, and let the Sovereignty of Christ, and His revelation of the Father to us, just engulf your heart and mind today. Be blown away by Jesus, and be okay with being small, and insufficient. He is our “enough.”