We are going to ask a very important question, no matter what the season, that is, Why Jesus? And of course, the answer is provided, He is Better.
Turn in your Bibles to the book of Hebrews. We're going to begin a series dealing with this very topic of Why Jesus, and we're gonna answer it with He's better. The book of Hebrews is filled with examples and reasons why Jesus is better. We'll get into that in just a little bit.
In most situations and circumstances that we find ourselves in, we want to be associated with those that are better than we are. Do we not think about it in this context? If you're on a team or you're playing a game that is a team-based game, it really doesn't matter what the game is, you hope that your teammate is better. Better than what? Maybe better than you if you're not familiar with the game. Certainly better than the opposing team because there's a desired outcome that you want, right? And you wanna be on the winning team. You want someone that is better on your team to give you the greatest advantage possible.
Think about it this way, when you set out to learn something, some discipline, it really doesn't matter what discipline is this applies to whatever it is you're trying to learn, you sit at the feet of those who have more knowledge and experience in whatever that topic is that you're trying to learn than you do. We don't willingly submit ourselves and our time and our talents to someone to sit and instruct us who does not have the ability to provide us with anything.
Now, most of us above a certain age have had some college education. I would imagine. We've sat through some of those classes where we've hung our heads and we've come home and we've said, mom, dad whoever's there living with you, that person doesn't know anything and they're a professor. I had one in particular that I didn't learn a thing in her class. She didn't even show up half the time. So that might have had something to do with it.
In the business world, we don't willingly hook our cart necessarily to somebody else that's going to bring our business down.The desire is you hook your cart to somebody who's exceeding where you currently are, and they can help bring you up if you do the things that they did that were successful. We want to work with those that are better than we are.
So we ask the question again, why Jesus? And the answer is very simple —He's better. What we're going to do beginning this morning is we're going to explain how it is that Jesus is better.
Background for Why the Hebrews Writer Built a Case that Jesus is Better.
We look at the New Testament book of Hebrews. We don't know who the physical author of the book of Hebrews was. There's many theories you could probably poll a hundred individuals. You'd probably get about a dozen names, about a dozen names. And we have no way of proving that one is more right than the other. I think there's some things that we can learn not to narrow it down necessarily to an individual, but to rule out certain individuals, a certain group of people. However, that's not really the focus of our study this morning.
Consider who the book is written to, it says Hebrews. It's very specifically written to a particular class or group of people known as the Hebrews. Even though this is after the establishment of the church it has been in existence for at least 30 years, and we come to the writing of this particular book. So you might ask yourself, why is a New Testament book in the time of the church that is for the Jew and the Gentile, why is this book written only to the Hebrews? Maybe the date has something to do with it.
In the sixties, there was a particular Roman Empire who was not a friend of Jewish Christians, not really a friend of Christianity at all, but they hated the Jews. His name was Nero, who would begin to afflict and persecute the population of the Hebrews regardless of them being Christian, but certainly as being a Christian society, those that believed in God.
Hebrews is a fascinating book, but when you realize that the writer of the book of Hebrews is writing this particular letter, and there's evidence to support the idea that Hebrews was an oration originally and written, or transcribed later, that's not any less inspired, but it was spoken, originally.
My brother, in fact put it this way, he's teaching the book of Hebrews right now in Alabama, and he said, it doesn't matter if your favorite orator is the gentleman's last name is Scoby. He was very popular as an Old Testament reader, and he's read all the Bible or James Earl Jones.I've got CDs of James Earl Jones reading the Bible. Then that's just fantastic to go to sleep to that wonderful baritone, monotone voice that James Earl Jones had is great. It doesn't matter who it is, that's reading. Have someone read the book of Hebrews to you all the way through from beginning to end, it'll take 45 minutes and see if it doesn't strike you differently than reading it one chapter at a time. A few verses at a time. One specific topic at a time. And we're getting off track a little bit, but that's okay.
We need to understand a little bit about the book of Hebrews in order to explain why this writer is going to ask and answer the question of “Why Jesus?”, because He's better.
He's dealing with second generation Christians at this point. If the book is written in the mid-sixties A.D. and the church was established in A.D. 33., then you are dealing with a bunch of people that weren't in Jerusalem when the church was established.
You have a handful of people, a very small portion of the population that this book was written to that was alive when Jesus walked the earth. When the church was established, when the apostles had the inspired message given to them directly, by the Holy Spirit, they spoke it and they wrote it. There's only a handful left that ever heard any of them.
You have a second generation of Christians that are wondering because of maybe this Roman emperor that is in place right now, Nero, who's beginning to persecute them for being in what Rome considered an illegal religion. See, Judaism was legal according to the Roman way of thinking. It was legal to practice Judaism. But they considered it categorically illegal to practice Christianity. And now you have second generation Christians that are wondering maybe… is it not better for us to go back into Judaism where we can avoid the persecution of the Roman Empire and we can worship the way our ancestors did, and we don't have to worry about being put to death.
And the writer says, Let me tell you about Jesus. They're asking the questions. The Hebrew population is asking the questions, why? Why Jesus? Why should I worship Jesus? Why should I remain a Christian? And these are Christians. The book is very clear. These are Christians that are struggling with this idea of, do I remain with Jesus and potentially be persecuted to the point of losing my life?
Or can I simply just go back to the old law and worship that way? In the first three verses of Hebrews chapter one, the answer is given to us.
Why Jesus is Better
- Hebrews 1:1-3
The writer of the book of Hebrews gives us the answer to the question why Jesus in the first three verses of the book, and he is gonna spend the next 12 chapters and a half laying out the various arguments. And the reason for the conclusion that he's drawn. That's what we're going to look at until we're done for the next few weeks.
We're going to look at this idea of Why Jesus? He's Better, this morning.
In verse 4 it tells us that Jesus is better than the angels. Why is it that Jesus is better than the angels.
Jesus's Exalted Position: Prophet, Priest, and King
First of all, Jesus, is exalted. He is exalted. How is he exalted? He holds a place and he fills a position that nobody else can fill. It's not specifically laid out by the Hebrews writer that Jesus is prophet, priest, and king, but that's what he said in the first three verses. Let's walk through that together for a few moments.
Jesus is a Better Prophet (Spokesperson for God)
How is it that we define a prophet? We might say someone who is a spokesperson or a mouthpiece for God.
Thayer defines the word prophet this way,
"One who is moved by the spirit of God, and hence his organ and spokesman solemnly declares to men what he has received by inspiration. Especially concerning future events and in particular such as relate to the cause and kingdom of God and to the human salvation." —Thayer's Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament
In short, a prophet is a spokesperson for God. The Hebrews writer comes out at the beginning of the chapter and says, "God, who at sundry times", meaning different periods of time, going all the way back to the beginning of creation, Genesis chapters one and two and in many different ways "has spoken unto our fathers by the prophets."
Have you ever considered maybe stop to, to jot down at some point, and it might be something good to do after this lesson? How many different ways did God speak to the people of the Old Testament?
We know it was more than one. We know God spoke directly to the heads of families going all the way back to the patriarchal dispensation or timeframe when God would tell the families, the heads of the families, what he wanted them to do, and they either did or didn't do what God spoke through.
Moses is considered to be a prophet of God, and the law was written during the time of Moses' reign as being a prophet of God and leading the people out of Egyptian bondage and toward the Promised Land. God set aside particular laws for this particular group of people, but at various times and in various ways, the writer says, God has spoken to our fathers, our Hebrew fathers, by the prophets. He had his mouthpieces throughout history from the beginning of time, even until the writing of this particular book.
- Hebrews 1:1-2
He says, and has in these last days—so now we're not talking about the fathers, the forefathers of the Hebrew nation anymore. He's coming down to where they are in history—and he has in these last days, or since the time of the establishment of the church, since Jesus was in existence and when he walked on the earth, he died on the cross, and from that time on—Acts chapter two—they were in what is considered the last days, the last dispensation that's ever going to be known by mankind is the Christian age or world or dispensation. It's not going to be another one. We'll be able to prove that concretely through this study.
- Deuteronomy 18:15-18
Going all the way back to the writings of Moses, it was prophesied by God that there would be another prophet like unto Moses and that God would speak to the people through him. Here in Hebrews chapter one, the writer is saying, that's exactly what's happened. God has fulfilled his promise going all the way back to Moses to bring another prophet that of course we recognize as being Jesus that is the Christ.
Jesus is a Better Priest (The Great High Priest)
But Jesus is also described here in verses one to three as one who is a priest. We see that very clearly when we understand the office of a priest and the priesthood in particular is of great discussion by the Hebrews writer. And there are many chapters and verses dedicated to understanding why the new priesthood is better than the old priesthood.
We're going to talk about that. I don't want to get too far into that material, but we need to define the main duties and responsibilities of a priest. What is it that a priest was responsible for doing for the people? Very simply, they really had just a couple of primary functions. They offered worship to God for the people and they offered sacrifices for the people.
Now they had a ton of different kinds of sacrifices. You go back to the book of Leviticus and you're going to read about a lot of those being established and what they were required to do at certain times, and what they were supposed to offer at certain times and that's not the point of this lesson either, but when we think concerning the main focus of the priest, it was to offer sacrifices for sins for the people.
The high priest in particular, every year on the Day of Atonement, would offer to God many sacrifices so that the sins of the people could be rolled forward another year. But first they had to do something in particular—they had to offer sacrifices for themselves. Why? Because they were flesh and blood. They were mankind. They were mortal, just like the people that they were offering the sacrifices for.
Jesus is our great high priest because he didn't have to offer any sacrifices for himself. Jesus was sinless in every aspect, in everything, and he is our priest. It says here in Hebrews chapter one that not only is he a spokesman for God, not only is he a prophet, but toward the end of verse three, it says, when he had by himself purged our sins.
Jesus is a Better King (The Ruler)
- Hebrews 1:3
And as the priest, as the one who then forgave us of our sins, what is it that the Hebrews writer says that Jesus does? He sits down at the right hand of the majesty on high. You don't get to sit on the right hand of majesty if you're not royal yourself. And Jesus was sitting at the right hand of the Majesty on high because he is royalty. He is the king.
When you go to just define the king, it is the leader of people, a prince, a commander, lord of the land, or king, according to Thayer's definition of the word. This would fit very aptly with what Paul writes concerning Jesus.
- 1 Timothy 6:15
Paul recognized Jesus as king. So here the answer is given. We made mention in our introduction that the writer of the Hebrews letter answers the question that they had: Why Jesus? He's prophet, priest, and king. He holds an office. He has done something that no one else throughout history has been able to accomplish.
Jesus is Prophet, Priest, and King all at the same time.
He's a prophet, our high priest, and king, all at the same time. Now, this was physically impossible to accomplish during any other dispensation or period of time among God's people. It could not happen. There was a tribe that was set aside—there was going to be a tribe of the kings, was there not? Judah. There was a tribe set aside by God that was going to be those that brought about the priests and those that offered the sacrifices and those that offered worship to God, who served God more than anything else—Levites from the son Levi of Jacob. And then there were prophets that which didn't specifically have a tribe designating that they came from a certain place or a certain area. God spoke to whoever God spoke to in the Old Testament. But the Old Testament is done away with, is what is going to be argued by the Hebrews writer.
If you'll allow me to jump ahead just for a moment—all of that has been done away with, and now because the old law has been fulfilled, there had to be a change in the priesthood. And Jesus then had the ability to be our great High Priest because he is the one that offered himself a sacrifice for our sins, who had no sins to be forgiven of himself. He is our king because he is the one in his own words.
- Matthew 28:18
- Ephesians 4:5
- John 12:50
I hope that you'll plan to be with us through this series, though we didn't even get into the main point of our topic this morning. You see how well this is gonna go. I'm glad that you were here. I hope that you'll be back with us this evening as we look at Jesus being better than the angels, and we'll move forward as time will allow us to.
But maybe you're one who's a member of the body of Christ, but you've fallen prey to this idea that maybe there's something other than Jesus out there that I can be saved by. Maybe there's some other system that I can find or develop or subscribe to that will allow me to have my sins washed away but I don't have to suffer for the name of Jesus. I don't have to change my life in order to be pleasing to him. Oh, there's only one Lord and ruler of our lives and that is Jesus. He has the authority to tell us how we must live in order to be pleasing with him.
I would encourage you to consider the question that these Hebrew Christians were receiving the answer to: Why Jesus? Jesus is better than all the rest. Where could I go? There's a song in our songbooks with that particular title. “Where could I go? Oh, where could I go?” The answer is we can't go anywhere but turn to Jesus.
Maybe you're one who's outside the body of Christ this morning. I hope it is that you're thinking, am I in a right relationship with God? Am I saved right now as I sit in these pews? And if you don't know the answer to that question, you know the answer to that question. If you can't prove through reasoning of the scriptures that you are a child of God, that you've done the things that God said should be done in order to be added to his kingdom—Acts chapter two in verse 47—we would encourage you to come forward this morning and we can assist you in becoming a child of God today.
Are you ready to profess your belief in God, belief in Jesus, repenting of your sins, and turning away from a lifestyle that put Jesus on the cross and come to him in humble obedience, submitting your soul to the waters of baptism where you come in contact with his blood and he washes away your sins?
If we can help you in any way, we encourage you to contact us. We would be honored to study with you and help you find God's truth for your life.
