God's revelation in His Son is superior to His previous communications through the prophets. The sermon emphasizes that Jesus is the final and ultimate word from God, unlike the prophets who were God's servants and spoke deviously. Jesus, as God's Son, speaks directly and uniquely, being the radiance of divine glory, the impress of God's being, and the upholder of all things. His superior name, intimate relationship as God the Son, exalted position, and redemptive work demonstrate His supremacy over angels, offering believers salvation, sanctification, security, and a reason for song.
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I'm just going to read the first three verses but I'm hoping that we can touch upon the first two chapters. Now you'll recall that in the outline of this morning we suggested dividing the epistle into three parts. I'm not going to recap right now but the first part was a presentation of the Lord Jesus as a revelation of God. better than the prophets, and better than the angels. Let's read from chapter one and verse one. God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by or in his son whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds or the ages, who being the brightness of his glory and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when
he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the majesty on high. I realize that there's a semicolon there, and I hope we'll go a little further than that this evening. But let's have a word of prayer together again, shall we. Our Father, once again we want to thank thee for the theme of this epistle. We want to thank thee for the wonder of its opening verses that we've just taken upon our lips. Grant that in freshness again. The word of God may come to our heart.
These are familiar verses. These are verses that many of us could recite without difficulty from memory. Yet, Lord, we realize that the Word of God is quick and powerful and it is refreshing and it is fresh. Grant, Lord, that this might be our experience with these well-known verses tonight. In Jesus' name. Amen. God who at sundry times and in diverse manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets have in these last days spoken unto us in his son.
I'd like to analyze the early part of these verses and I wouldn't be at all surprised if somewhere in the ten past years or the past ten years our stone has skipped across and hit this part of the surface of the lake because this is a beautiful section and I'm sure we must have touched on it somewhere along the way. I have no record and so I don't know. But I'm always struck whenever I read these verses with three words that are a little separated from each other by other words.
The first is God, and the second is Half, and the third is Spoken. Now I suppose the reason why this particularly grabs my attention is because in my early days in the work of God and I had had no opportunity to go to Bible school, I was seventeen when I came out into the work and come the sixth of May I'll be celebrating my fiftieth anniversary in the work. But I knew that I needed to know much more about the Bible.
And so I remember signing up with London Bible College for some correspondence courses. And one of them was entitled, God Has Spoken. Its subtitle was, How We Got Our Bible. I don't know whether you've ever studied it. but it was to me a most fascinating subject. So much so, and I little thought of it in those days. The days came when it became my responsibility for several years to teach biblical introduction at Imeus Bible School when it was in Toronto.
And I never lose the sense of amazement that God has spoken. the God of the universes, God Himself has deigned to speak to human hearts. I don't know whether we take that for granted. I don't know whether we appreciate the wonder of it. If we do, then we read the Word of God. and we make sure that we spend time with the Word of God because it is through this Word, particularly that He speaks to our hearts.
Have you not noticed in your own daily devotions how often the things that you read just fit and dovetail into that particular day? You have that experience time and time again. during the Boxer Rebellion in China, missionaries used to read from a little book called The Daily Light. I have a copy of that, and I read it from time to time. It is simply the Scripture, connected Scriptures from different parts of the Word of God. And the missionaries spoke with wonder in those days of hatred, In those days of grave danger, in those days of martyrdom for not a few, of how remarkably that little book which contains simply the word of God met their need day after day, and that specifically.
God hath spoken. Now God speaks, we all know, through creation. The Bible tells us that. How many times do you stand or sit in that new seat there where we removed the two-story house and look over the lake on a nice warm afternoon and say to yourself, it's beautiful. Now you have to appreciate that view. That's our million-dollar view, you know. But please leave a little of it for somebody else. When you're looking out over it, there creeps into your heart a realization that God must be very good to provide us with such pleasures as these.
We look at the mountains, we look at the lakes, we look at the trees and the flowers, and God speaks through creation. Sometimes God speaks through catastrophe. I've told some of you about that man that I went to visit to try to be of help to him, who had in his earlier days fallen in a sawmill onto a twenty-four inch circular saw and lost both of his arms and both of his legs, and so was bedridden from that time on.
I went to see him. He said to me, Mr. Woodhouse, please don't sympathize with me. This is what God had to do with me before I would listen to his voice. And he said, I thank God for the loss of my arms and my legs because I'm confident I would never have come to know the Lord Jesus without that accident. God speaks in catastrophe. The tragedy is, you know, that sometimes God tries to speak without tragedy and people turn away and will not listen and so because he loves them so much he says there is no other way I have no other choice this I must do and so his voice comes to us in catastrophe God speaks to us also through conscience Now many of us from time to time have had some uncomfortable hours with our consciences because we knew that God was speaking to us through them.
But when we read here that God hath spoken, it's not a reference to His speaking through creation, or speaking through catastrophe, or speaking through conscience, this is This is speaking of a specific revelation. God hath spoken. And that revelation is progressive. We are going to be talking about the shadow and the substance. I made mention of them this morning. Now in the Old Testament we find the shadow. In the New Testament We find the substance.
In the Old Testament we find the old. In the New Testament we find the new. In the Old Testament we find that which passes away. In the New Testament we find that which replaces it. Now again I have to say it was not because the old. was not sufficient. For its day God made it sufficient, but it was meant to be a step. And eventually the Lord Jesus came into this scene and the shadow passed away and the substance was ours.
In the Old Testament he spoke through the prophets. That's what it says here. In the New Testament he speaks in his son I want you to notice the verse that follows those three that we read because we're going to come to this too tonight being made or having become And this is the one who sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high, and looking back the writer says, Having become so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they, for unto which of the angels...
said he at any time thou art my son this day have I begotten thee and again I will be to him a father and he shall be to me a son. In the next verse it says, And let all the angels of God worship him. There can be no question about the superiority of the Lord Jesus over the prophets and over the angels. But let's go back to our first three verses. Let's go back to the first verse. Let me read it to you. God, who at sundry times and in divers manners, spake in time past under the fathers by the prophets, have in these last days spoken unto us in his Son.
I want you to notice, first of all, that here we are told that the prophets were God's first word. But the Lord Jesus was God's final word. God has nothing more to say to this old world than he has said already in the person of the Lord Jesus. The prophets were God's first word. The Lord Jesus was God's final word. He's better than the prophets. Let me read it again.
God who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, having these last days spoken unto us in his son. The prophets were God's word to a nation, the fathers. But the Lord Jesus is God's word to a world. He has spoken unto us. He's so much better than the prophets. But let me read it again to you. God who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past under the fathers by the prophets have in these last days spoken unto us in his son.
The prophets were God's servants. The Lord Jesus was God's son. So much better than the prophets. But let me read it again. God who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets hath in these last days spoken unto us in his Son. Through the prophets God spoke deviously, but through the Son God has spoken directly. If we sum up the verses we could well say that the prophets were God's mouthpieces, but the Lord Jesus was God's message.
Better than the prophets And do notice, won't you, the plural. He spoke to the fathers by the prophets. But he has spoken unto us in his Son. And there's the singular. For he stands absolutely unique. None can compare with him. Didn't we sing it? Who can compare with thee? There is not one who can hold a candle. to the Christ of God. He's better than the prophets. But now let's go to the verses that follow after simply making mention of seven things that are spoken about the Lord Jesus that I'm not going to touch upon this evening.
Seven is the perfect number you know. It's the number of perfection. and it says here of the Lord Jesus that he was the heir of all things and that means all things it says he was the maker of the world or the ages actually it means all of the universes he's not only heir to everything he made everything and then we are told that he is the brightness and you know that word effulgence our word radiance probably gives the thought the radiance of divine glory do you remember when the three disciples were on the mount of transfiguration with the Lord Jesus they fell asleep but they wakened up in time to see something they had never seen before and never saw again in time.
They will see it in a coming day. They saw the glory of the Lord Jesus. He was transfigured before them. Now don't imagine that as the Lord Jesus stood on the mountaintop and talked with Moses and Elias that he had a visitation of glory from heaven. It was not like that. All he did was draw aside the curtain that he had so willingly drawn over his life and for an instant allowed his own intrinsic glory to shine out.
He is the radiance of divine glory. It says so here. It also says that he's the impress of God's being. And you know, of course, The thought there is of a die, one half of which fits perfectly into the other, so that anything that's stamped by it bears the impress of both sides. It is simply saying that he is God. Then it says that he is the upholder of all things. Do you remember that verse in Colossians? It's been mentioned during the conference, and I've mentioned it before, where it says, And by him all things consist.
And that word is cohere. I remember telling you a story about a day when I had a call from Brookhaven Laboratory on Long Island from one of my friends out there. He was one of five Christian scientists who worked at that laboratory. I'd better change that and say he was one of five Christians who were scientists at that lab, just in case you get the wrong idea. He was calling me to let me know that they had closed down their big cyclotron. And he said, I know that you're interested.
If you want to come over, you'll never have a better opportunity of seeing it. and while you're at it we'll show you our atomic reactor and so on and I was thrilled I dropped what I was doing I got into my car I drove across the George Washington Bridge and a way out onto Long Island to Brookhaven Laboratory and lo and behold they had a nice lunch waiting for me and then I began my voyage of exploration they took me first of all into a little room which they called the gun room. There was no evidence of any pistol or rifle or cannon or anything like that but they assured me that that's precisely what it was.
There was a breach for the gun and there was a barrel for the gun which couldn't be seen but which was made out of a magnetic field and he said what we do we put an isotope into the breach of the gun and then we fire a little bunch of neutrons down that that barrel that magnetic field into the circumference of the cyclotron. We went out of that little room and into the area covering several acres of the cyclotron.
I came to one big machine It was actually a huge electromagnet. It had a sign on it, radioactive, do not linger. I didn't linger. There was a second one and a third one and a fourth one and a fifth one all the way around this wide area. These things were evenly spaced. I was fascinated, but I was puzzled. What happens to your little bunch of protons when they come out of the muzzle of the gun. Well, they go right into this circle. They hit over this machine first, and what it does is increase the speed of travel, just a fraction.
When they get to the next one, it does exactly the same thing, and then the next, and the next, and the next, until it gets back to the first one, and that keeps it going faster until at last. That little bunch is traveling in single file and then at a given instant we fire one of those protons at a target and we photograph the instant of impact. They showed me some of the photographs and we who once believed you couldn't split the atom have found out you can even split the particles of the atom and they had photographic proof.
I said, how much did this big thing cost? And they rolled, you know, the thousands of millions off their tongues like scientists do. And with bated breath I asked who paid for it. And my worst fears were confirmed. So I said, since I'm a taxpayer, I hope it's producing and making a profit. They said it has no practical use at all. You spend my money like this and it has no practical use. What's its purpose? Well, he said, when you went to school, do you remember that your teacher suspended two magnets in your physics class and you learned a law that unlike poles attract, and like poles repel.
Oh, I said, I remember that. I remembered taking two things like that and watching them jump together and then turning one of them around and finding I couldn't bring them together. They insisted on shoving each other apart. They said, now that is a fascinating thing because that principle is suspended in the atom. It does not operate. If it did, there wouldn't be any atom. and if there was no atom there would be no matter because all matter is made up of atoms we want to know why that law which pertains everywhere else does not operate within the atom why the atom doesn't disintegrate I said I wish you'd asked me I got to save you all that money it says in Colossians chapter one By him all things coheres.
And that's the thought here. Take away the Lord Jesus and everything flies apart. Everything disintegrates. It cannot exist apart from the Lord Jesus. He's the upholder, the consistor of all things. He's the purger of our sins we are told here. And he, and this is where it finishes, is the enthroned one. Seems to me we've had that subject a number of times lately, the Lord Jesus on the throne. I was thinking this morning in our breaking of bread, when we read in Isaiah six, in the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord high and lifted up on his throne and his train filled the temple.
It's very significant that Uzziah is mentioned there, you know. because Osir was the king who insisted, because he was king, on going into the temple and taking a censor and demanding to be allowed to do the priest's job. You know what happened to him, he was struck with leprosy because he was not able to link the throne and the temple. But here is one. who sits on the throne and his train fills the temple. The enthroned one. Little wonder that we read and let all of the angels of God worship him.
Very quickly, let's look this down, shall we? The Lord Jesus, who is better than the angels, is... pointed out as being so in a dual fashion in this portion and in chapter two. The writer writing by the Spirit of God says, Now I want you to see the ways in which the Lord Jesus Christ is superior to the angels. And then he says, I want you to see the ways in which the angels are inferior to the Lord Jesus. There's a positive on the one hand, and there's a negative on the other.
I want you to look at them. Verse four, Having become so much better than the angels as he hath, by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. I want you to notice that phrase. For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my son this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a father, and he shall be to me a son. And again, when he bringeth in the first begotten into the world, he saith, and let all the angels of God worship him, and of the angels, he saith, who maketh his angels' spirits, and his ministers a flame of fire, but unto the son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever.
A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of thy kingdom. Thou hast loved righteousness and hated iniquity. Therefore God, even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows. I'd like to read the rest in that chapter and on into chapter two, but I'm not going to do so. Here is the positive. verse four his name is more excellent he must be better than the angels and that phrase just don't lose your place in chapter one but turn over to chapter eight will you chapter eight of Hebrews and let's notice the same phrase.
Verse six, but now have he obtained a more excellent ministry. Do you know that the phrase there in the original language is not used anywhere else. It is used only of the name and the ministry of the Lord Jesus. That is to underscore His uniqueness and the uniqueness of his name and the uniqueness of his ministry. He is better than the angels because his name is more excellent. Look at the next verse. Unto which of the angels did God say at any time, Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee?
The Lord Jesus is better than the angels, not only because his name is more excellent, but because his relationship is more intimate. He is the Son of God. He is God the Son. Look at verse six. And again, when he bringeth in the first begotten into the world, he saith, and let all the angels of God worship him now that could read and when he again bringeth a first begotten into the world he says and let all the angels of God worship him he's better than the angels in that his name is more excellent and his relationship is more intimate and also his future is more glorious and then finally In verses seven, eight and nine, we see that his position is more exalted.
Let me read again. Unto the Son, he saith, Thy throne, O God is forever and ever. I don't know how Jehovah's Witnesses get away from that one and deny that the Lord Jesus is God the Son. That is also emphasized in the verse nine, which can be read, and Mr. W.E. Vine is my authority for saying this, and he was a very fine Greek scholar. It could be read justifiably in this fashion. Thou hast loved righteousness and hated iniquity.
Therefore, O God, thy God hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows. Nobody's going to argue about the fact that the Lord Jesus is better than the angels. Those are the positives. Let's go to chapter two and take a look at the negatives. Verse five of chapter two reads like this. For unto the angels have he not put in subjection the world to come whereof we speak. But one in a certain place testified, saying, What is man, that thou art mindful of him, or the son of man that thou visitest him, thou madeest him a little lower than the angels, thou crownest him with glory and honour, and did set him over the works of thy hands.
Unto the angels have he not put into subjection the world to come. Now the angels are inferior to the Lord Jesus. in that they lack dominion. Now the writer goes on to tell us, man had it, man lost it, but man in the God-man is going to regain it. But the angels never knew it. They are inferior to the Lord Jesus in that they lack dominion. Look at verse nine, that well-known verse in chapter two. They are inferior to the Lord Jesus. in that they lack experience. Look at the experience of the Lord Jesus in this verse.
But we see Jesus who was made a little lower than the angels. You know what that is? That's incarnation. He became a man. And the earlier verse said, man is lower than the angels. That's the incarnation. He was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death. Now there's crucifix. He was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death. But we see him crowned with glory and honor. There's exaltation. And then finally, that he, by the grace of God, should taste death for every man.
And there is substitution. and that fourfold experience was never known even by the choicest of the angels they are inferior to him in that they lack experience look at the verses ten through thirteen and see that they are inferior to him in that they lack saving power let me read these verses to you again verse eleven Both he that sanctify us, and they who are sanctified are all of one, for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren.
Notice that word. Saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren in the midst of the church. Notice that word. Will I sing praise unto thee? And again, I will put my trust in him. and again behold I and the children notice that word which God hath given me and finally verse fourteen for as much then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood he also himself likewise took part of the same that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death that is the devil and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.
Now did you notice the word brethren? The verse before that mentions the word sons. I didn't read it. It became him for whom are all things and by whom are all things in bringing many sons unto glory to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. Now the word sons is followed by the word brethren which is followed by the word church which is followed by the word children now all of those apply to you and me but if you look again very closely closely you'll find the word sons is associated with the word salvation the word brethren is associated with the word sanctification the word church is associated with the word sung and the word children with the thought of security.
Now all of this in the person of the Lord Jesus and none of it in the person of any angel. Here then is the Christ of God. As a revelation of God superior to the prophets and better than the angel. I hope you're rejoicing in the fact that you're a son or a daughter. I hope that you're enjoying the salvation with which that is associated. If you're not saved, you're not a child of God, you know. If you've never been born again, you cannot truthfully look up into the face of God and pray as I used to do before I was saved in the Church of England.
Our Father. which art in heaven. How many, many times I prayed that prayer and it wasn't true of me. I wasn't a child of God until I became a son of God by receiving the Lord Jesus Christ into my heart. I hope that as one of those he calls his brethren, your life is a sanctified life. God expects that. And that's a word that simply means to be set apart. And God's intention for every one of us who have put our faith and trust in the Lord Jesus is this, that our lives should be set apart for God.
separated from the things that grieve and displease and dishonor him, set apart from the things that would interfere with our spiritual progress. And the word sons, I hope you know what it is to sing. In fact, I know you know what it is to sing. I listen to you night after night in the conference. I know the members of the choir know how to sing. They demonstrated it last night. But isn't it wonderful that God associates sonship with song? The world has no right to sing.
Song doesn't belong to the world. That's the reason why when it sings, so often its songs are in a minor key. The world has to sing about things that are sad. because it has no way of singing about things that are joyful. But the believer is to be a man of song, a woman of song. He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the myri clay, put my feet upon a rock, established my goings, and he have put a what? A song into my mouth.
And then when he speaks about children, although the word is not mentioned, he says, Behold, I and the children whom God hath given me. That's security. The Lord Jesus said, No man can pluck them out of my hand. I and my father are one. No man can pluck them out of my father's hand. Every believer is held securely in a double class. And yet some Christians go through their lives fearful that they're going to sin and lose their salvation. The Word of God is opposed to that and teaches the antithesis of that.
The moment you got saved, you were born into God's family and you can never be unborn. Rejoice in the family. I'm so glad I'm a part. of the family of God. And I'm glad that I have a Savior who was a revelation of God so much better than the prophets and so much better than the angels. Shall we pray? Lord Jesus, we have been thinking earlier this evening of the wonder that our hearts should have heard the voice of God.
And Lord Jesus, we look up into thy face, and we thank thee that we heard that voice speaking in thee, so that we responded to thy call, and tonight are saved by thy grace. Lord Jesus, we love thee. We appreciate something of what thou art, what thou art. and the things that are going to be thine in a coming day. We want our lives to measure up to these things, and may our day to day and what we listened to last night have a part in making our lives such.