Pastor Jonah Sage preached from Hebrews 2:14-18. Jesus is our hero who conquered death, liberator who freed us from the fear of death, and priest who took away our sins. Lector: Lisa Tant
Pastor Jonah Sage preached from Hebrews 2:14-18. Jesus is our hero who conquered death, liberator who freed us from the fear of death, and priest who took away our sins.
Lector: Lisa Tant
We titled these past 6 weeks Matchless: seeing the wonder of God’s word.
Our first series was called Breaking the Silence, soaking in the miracle that God speaks to us at all. We can hear him, and he speaks to us in ways we understand.
We learned that Jesus Christ is God’s ultimate, final, clearest revelation.
He is the word of God. Which brought us to Matchless…which in many ways is the big point of Hebrews. No one is like Jesus.
Jesus is matchless.
Unrivaled. Unmatched. Beyond comparison, unsurpassed, second to none. Matchless
Diminishing Jesus, or distorting the Bible’s picture of Jesus, is one of our enemy’s most frequent attacks against the church.
In other words, enemies of the church twist who Jesus is. Why?
Well…we are called to imitate Jesus. He is our model. As Sam preached, our hero!
And we become like the things we love, especially people.
So if I can make you think Jesus is something other than he is, you’ll become like that thing in the name of Jesus, even if that thing is not Jesus.
So we’re ending this series trying to give a crystal clear picture of who Jesus is, which will lead us into our next series: the rest of the church. The rest of us. Who are we?
What is the church? What are we to do?
Now…definition. If you want to know the Bible’s teaching on who Jesus is, why he is matchless, three images I want you to think of. Hero. Liberator. Priest.
He is a hero who wins a battle. A liberator who sets us free. A priest who makes us clean.
If you only have one of those, you’ll distort the Scripture’s picture of Jesus.
Must have all three. Pastor Sam talked some already about Jesus as hero, so just quick recap. Hebrews 2:10
It was only right that [God] should make Jesus, through his suffering, a perfect leader, fit to bring them into salvation.
-Hebrews 2:10
“Leader” here is often translated as “hero”. Outside the Bible it’s a word often used to refer to Hercules.
Some have tried to turn Jesus into a warrior of violence and rage.
In the name of Jesus, they call people to take up weapons of war.
But listen again. Jesus was made a perfect hero through suffering.
He is a hero who wins a battle, and he did so through suffering.
We worship a hero who willingly suffered and sacrifice.
So we do not believe the voice that tells us to violently assert our rights in the name of Jesus. Those voices are not coming in Jesus’ name, or they are deceived.
We do not listen to the voices that tell us following Jesus will make our lives easier or less painful or more impressive with greater influence.
Jesus is the perfect hero, the only fit to bring us into salvation, because he suffered.
Jesus did not assert his rights as the hero of our souls. He sacrificed his rights and accepted suffering.
Now…why? Why win this way? We must understand his enemy
that gets us to today’s text, and the second image of Jesus:
He is a liberator who sets us free
Because God’s children are human beings—made of flesh and blood—the Son also became flesh and blood. For only as a human being could he die, and only by dying could he break the power of the devil, who had the power of death. Only in this way could he set free all who have lived their lives as slaves to the fear of dying.
-Hebrews 2:14
Notice we have children and an enemy here. Children are human beings. Us!
Wonderful reminder of who we are. God has come as a hero to rescue his kids.
And what was it he came to rescue us from? The fear of death.
So, our hero becomes flesh and blood, so that he could die. Incredible.
He comes into occupied territory in order to die. Because only through his death could he absorb the power of death itself. Jesus is a liberator who came to set us free from death.
A hero who wins the battle over death through suffering, so that through suffering he could set us free from death.
We worship a liberator who suffered to set others free.
How many of us spent years, maybe decades, around Christian’s who made us feel more dead, not more alive?
More guilty, more afraid, more insecure?
Here is some of the paradox of Christianity:as we participate with Christ in the sufferings of Christ we are actually healed.
In other words…if anyone wants to SAVE their life they must…lose it.
Let me give you another verse:
God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.
2 Timothy 1:7
Some voices will tell you to pick up a weapon and fight for your rights
We say “no, we lay down our rights, embrace hardship, because that’s what Jesus did”
Other voices will say, “stop stop stop! No no no! You’re bad and wicked and awful!”
They’ll fill your life with rules and disappointments and burdens.
But listen: the Spirit of God does not make you afraid, and does not make you timid!
We are to be a calm, confident, powerful people. What does that look like?
Love: willing the good of another. Self-discipline: true freedom.
Control over our urges and impulses.
Jesus came to set free. Wherever you see people coming under bondage in the name of Jesus, that’s not the Spirit of God.
Right now, in our country, there are prominent Christians arguing that white people shouldn’t marry black people because that would lead to one huge mixed race, and Jesus came to save every race. And if we don’t keep races separate, we ruin God’s mission! Separate but equal! Have you heard of this? It’s anti-christ.
We don’t listen to those who spread fear in the name of Jesus.
Rather, we become like those in bondage, so that through love and sacrifice, we might set them free from bondage…because that is what Jesus did for us.
He came, did you see verse 16? To HELP US.
Not to condemn or criticize…to set us free, to help us, by rescuing us from the power of death.
And listen: this kind of love, self-sacrifice for the good of another, cannot be done at a distance.
You can’t be a parent from far away. You can’t love your neighbor from across the street. Love is concrete. It’s practical, it’s near and familiar.
Therefore, it was necessary for him to be made in every respect like us, his brothers and sisters, so that he could be our merciful and faithful High Priest before God.
-Hebrews 2:17
It had to be this way, because love is this way.
Jesus is a hero who liberates you from the fear of death by taking away our sins.
That’s what he has done. Look how verse 17 continues:
Then he could offer a sacrifice that would take away the sins of the people.
-Hebrews 2:18
I want to talk about “take away” here. Hilaskomai. Say it with me. beautiful sound.
This is not the same as saying “I’ll take away that toy!” Or ordering food for take away.
When this word is referencing Jesus as high priest, it means to eliminate impediments that alienate God. (BDAG entry on hilaskomai).
It means to wipe out sin, remove or expiate sin. So here’s the idea…
God is on one side of the canyon. You’re on the other. You’re supposed to be on God’s side. But you’re not. On God’s side, no one dies! On our side, we are fearful and timid.
On God’s side, we are powerful, filled with love and self-control. But there’s a canyon!
To cross that canyon, we must be free of sin, a people that love God more than anything else, who only worship God, who keep an entire day of our week holy before him. We have to be a people who obey and honor our parents, whose hearts are free of hate and vengeance and lust and greed. We have to be honest and trustworthy. And we have to be all this all the time…that’s the Ten Commandments. Do you see?
You can’t be that, I can’t be that, we are not be that. Therefore, it was NECESSARY for him to be made in every respect like us, so that he could be our merciful high priest.
Jesus himself would become the bridge to cross the canyon.
We cross on the obedience of Jesus, the perfection of Jesus, the faithfulness of Jesus, the blood and wounds of Jesus. He is our priest who takes away every impediment between us and God.
If you are home with God, what else is there to be afraid of?
Your citizenship is in the land where death is no more. Your destiny secured, and because that is so, look now:
Since he himself has gone through suffering and testing, he is able to help us when we are being tested.
-Hebrews 2:18
So, if anyone ever tells you to follow a Jesus who is not a hero who suffered for you, a liberator who set you free, and a priest who made a way for you to come home to God, reject that distortion.
Come, worship the Matchless Jesus. He is able to help you today. He is with us today.
Our hero who conquered death
Our liberator who freed us from the fear of death
Our priest who took away our sins.
He is matchless…and I hope you come back next week to learn about the wonder of what it means to be his church. Let’s pray.