Daily Liturgy and Scripture

Having established Jesus as the High Priest, the writer of Hebrews now comes back to the very thing that forms God’s people: the covenant. Jews draw their identity from that covenant, formed through Abraham and sealed by Moses. But that one was never meant to be the last word. The first covenant was about the people being faithful, and could never be fully effective. The second covenant was about God’s faithfulness, and that can never be broken.

The history of priests sort of winds back and forth in this passage, but this is the gist: Jesus’s priesthood connects uniquely across Israel’s history. He is in the order of a priest that came before the covenant with Abraham, but he is also of the line of Abraham. While priests typically came from the tribe of Levi, Jesus comes from the tribe of Judah. He is a new line of priest, and the ultimate high priest. He is our perfect high priest, because he became like us. Jesus is integral in Israel’s history, and our present.

Continuing the journey through Israel’s history to show its connection to Jesus, we come to Abraham. Again, Abraham isn’t replaced, but the whole plan is shown to fit together. As God found nothing greater to swear by than himself, he used his own name as the seal. And Jesus as high priest is identified with Melchizedek, who was Abraham’s priest. All these historical markers center around Abraham as a central figure, and all of them show how Christ is connected.

Today’s verse from Hebrews falls on a perfect day to remember the cross. Jesus was a high priest, but he did something no other high priest ever did: he became the sacrifice. He was both the perfect sacrifice, but he was also the only one qualified to be an eternal high priest as both God and man. As the writer of Hebrews continues to connect the Hebrew tradition to the new Kingdom of Christ, this is further fulfillment of that promise.

A LOT of talk about resting today. Don’t we need that? God certainly offers that option, and this section of Hebrews talks about three different options: The first is the seventh day, observed in the Sabbath, where God took a rest from his work and calls us to do the same. The second was the land of promise, a land given to his people to provide them with a rest from wandering in the wilderness, a home to call their own. Then there is the long-term rest: the Kingdom of Heaven. This one breaks into our Sabbaths if we let it, and hopefully other sections of our lives as well. This is our true citizenship, and God’s eternal gift is to dwell in him without worry. (Easier said than done!)

For Jesus to be part of the plan God had enacted through Hebrew history, he needs to fit into that history and its figures. Today, we see how Moses fits. Moses has not been ejected or replaced, he holds his place in Israel’s history. But Moses lived in the house of God, and that house belongs to Christ. In that context, Christ was present, participating in Moses’ prophetic role.

For a book to be written to the Hebrew people, it would have to contain a deep awareness of Hebrew scripture. In chapter 1 and 2, we have already heard the scripture from Samuel, Isaiah, and Deuteronomy applied directly to Jesus. We’re not done yet! The Old Testament isn’t a failed idea, it’s the first part of God’s plan, and the plan is incomplete without it. In Jesus, we see that plan come to life.

Hebrews is a very Jewish book, and will pick up some references to Jewish practice and history along the way. (Sorry, spoiler alert!) The author of Hebrews is unknown, but they definitely have an agenda: helping a Jewish audience understand that Jesus and the new Kingdom do indeed fit into the covenant already established with Israel.

As Paul concludes this letter to the Ephesians, he takes them two very different ways: one of submission, and one of defense against the darkness. It’s interesting that the action he asked them to perform was only in submitting to one another. For the armor of God, he really didn’t ask them to go about, wielding the sword of the Spirit, at all. He said to put on “God’s armor,” which means that the defense is still really up to God. And if the Spirit is our sword, how can we possibly hope to control that? We are armored with God himself.

This passage about wives submitting to their husbands is often argumentative. I believe that we often miss the two halves of what Paul says: the husband / wife relationship, and then the Christ / church relationship. Did Christ ever demand to be treated like a king by anyone? Did he ever fail to love, even in the face of persecution and death? Submission is the wife’s role, but she is not the only one. For a man to love as Christ did, he must also submit. And if we’re following the humble example of Christ, husbands should go first.