Hebrews 1:1-14--The Supremacy of God's Son

​Hebrews 1 English Standard Version (ESV)
The Supremacy of God's Son
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.
5 For to which of the angels did God ever say,
“You are my Son,
    today I have begotten you”?
Or again,
“I will be to him a father,
    and he shall be to me a son”?
6 And again, when he brings the firstborn into the world, he says,
“Let all God's angels worship him.”
7 Of the angels he says,
“He makes his angels winds,
    and his ministers a flame of fire.”
8 But of the Son he says,
“Your throne, O God, is forever and ever,
    the scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom.
9 You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness;
therefore God, your God, has anointed you
    with the oil of gladness beyond your companions.”
10 And,
“You, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning,
    and the heavens are the work of your hands;
11 they will perish, but you remain;
    they will all wear out like a garment,
12 like a robe you will roll them up,
    like a garment they will be changed.
But you are the same,
    and your years will have no end.”
13 And to which of the angels has he ever said,
“Sit at my right hand
    until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet”?
14 Are they not all ministering spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation?

---

'm going to use the book of Hebrews as a transition from the non-Pauline epistles to the Pauline epistles.  We don't know for sure who wrote Hebrews and the authorship really doesn't matter.  What does matter in the reason I've chosen this book now is that it still focuses on the main themes that we've been going over while still making a shift to teach more doctrine and to lay out the case why God's New Covenant is "more excellent"--especially in the person and work of Christ--than the Old Covenant.  We've spent a lot of time talking about that those who genuinely love God will be lovers of God, lovers of God's people and lovers of God's Law.  That's not going to go away as we move forward, but many of Paul's epistles will focus more on being lovers of God's grace and mercy.  The Book of Hebrews seems to be a good pivot point for us and strikes that right balance to show how the Old Covenant isn't bad but in and of itself was insufficient and God made a better (more excellent) way.  Today's passage is kind of lengthy, but it addresses the main point of the book--The Supremacy of Christ.

What exactly do we mean when we say "The Supremacy of Christ"?  In what way or ways is He supreme and in comparison to who or what?  The author to the Hebrews starts of by telling us how and why Jesus is superior to the prophets of the Old Covenant.  God sent many prophets as representatives and He put His words in their mouths, but in these days, God the Son (Jesus Christ) came Himself in the form of Man to speak His won words to us and to live among us.

The next way that we see Jesus being more excellent is that He is the Creator and King of everything.  He is God in the flesh and He makes all of God's invisible attributes like the glory of God visible to us in some way that no prophet ever could.  Not only is Christ the creator of all things, but He is the sustainer of all things and He "upholds the universe by the word of His power."  (Remember that Jesus is called "The Word" in the gospel of John and some of John's epistles, and this is the idea of what "The Word" means).

Christ is greater because He has finished the work of purification that no priest ever could.  We haven't looked at the Old Testament description of the Tabernacle or temple yet, but when we do, you'll see that there was no place for the priest to sit down because he was always to be about the work of sacrifice and prayer to make intercession for the people of God.  And He didn't just sit down anywhere, but in the very throne room of God at His right hand--a position of privilege and power and authority (this is the position of the crown prince in whom the king has given all of His power authority to rule His kingdom and its subjects).  No one, not even an angel, has had this kind of power and authority--though not for lack of trying (recall that part Satan's greatest boast that led to him being cast out of heaven was this,

You said in your heart,
    ‘I will ascend to heaven;
above the stars of God
    I will set my throne on high;
I will sit on the mount of assembly
    in the far reaches of the north;
I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;
    I will make myself like the Most High.’
(Isaiah 14:13-14, ESV)

The author to the Hebrews then focuses in on this idea of being supreme to the angels because angel worship seems to have been a big thing for the culture this author was writing to.  While the collective of all the angels is sometimes called the Elohim and generically referred to as "the sons of God" by some translators, not a single angel has the privilege of being equal with Jesus in being the Son of God.  There are even cults today that claim that Jesus is related to Michael the archangel (or maybe even is the same person) or that Jesus and Satan are brothers and this somehow puts them on equal footing to each other and denies the divinity of Christ (or maybe tried to ascribe that same amount of divinity to Satan to create a system where there is an evil force strong enough to actually do battle with God....ridiculous.  We know from the Bible that the only power Satan has is what God allows him to have and his dominion and kingdom are temporary, but God's dominion is over all people in all places and all times--His kingdom is forever.  If you want to see more on this, look up "Ancient of Days" in the Bible and see how God is described, then turn to the book of Revelation and see that Jesus is described exactly the same way and in Revelation it is Jesus who is sitting on the throne because as He said in the Great Commission, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me."

Another way that Jesus is superior to the angels is that God tells us to worship Jesus.  The "good" angels in the Bible would never accept worship because they knew that was something only God deserved.  Satan's mission is to steal the worship that only God deserves and claim it for himself because He believes himself to be an equal with God (or maybe even superior to him...you'll see this if you read the rest of the passage I quoted from Isaiah 14).  The angels are simply "ministers of God" and may appear to be as uncontrollable as wind and fire, but  their orders come from the throne of God and which the Father has given to the Son--my kingdom is your kingdom, and my scepter is your scepter

Next item we see very briefly is that Jesus is more excellent than the prophets or the angels because He was able to keep the Law of God perfectly and be declared righteous by His own works and by His very nature.  Don't miss this--"You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness; therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your companions." (verse 9).  To what mere man could God say that we have loved righteousness and hated wickedness?  Notice that the scepter was called the scepter of God's uprightness (that's another word for righteousness).  None of us are righteous and therefore none of us are worthy to hold that scepter--only Christ is worthy.

The author then returns to the idea of Jesus being both creator and eternal.  Jesus created all things, is before all things, and is in control of all things.  Let's look at a similar passage for a minute from the book of Colossians to reinforce this point.

15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18 And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. 19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.
21 And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, 22 he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, 23 if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister.
(Colossians 1: 15-23, ESV)

Last, but certainly not least, the author returns to the image of Christ sitting on the throne and reminds us that like priests, angels do not sit on thrones because they are simply ministers there to serve God and those who have been saved by God.  We know from other passages in the Bible that one day at least some of the saved will sit on thrones in judgement over both men and angels, but we'll get to those passages later as this passage is talking about the supremacy of Christ.  No angel has ever shared God's throne with Him, but Christ does because He is no angel, and He is no mere prophet or priest.  He is the Son of God, the Word of God and the visible manifestation of the glory of God that is worthy of all worship, dominion, and authority both now and forevermore.