JESUS BORN TO DIE.
Hebrews 2:5-12.
The writer to the Hebrew Christians has been demonstrating, from Scripture, Jesus’ superiority to the angels. Of the angels he says, ‘Are they not all ministering spirits being sent forth for service on behalf of those being about to inherit salvation?’ (Hebrews 1:14). The writer picks up the thread here in Hebrews 2:5 - “For not to angels did He subject the habitable world-which-is-to-come, of which we speak.”
Having established this superiority, the emphasis shifts from Jesus as the eternal Son to Jesus as the incarnate Son; from Jesus as Son of God to Jesus as “THE Son of man” (Hebrews 2:6; cf. Psalm 8:4).
The New Jewish Publication Society of America translates Psalm 8:5, ‘For thou hast made him a little less than divine’. The Hebrew word is doubtless, ‘Elohim’ which reads as God, or gods, or even ‘heavenly beings’. “Angels” is the preferred translation of Psalm 8:5 in the Septuagint (LXX), the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament. This appears to be the translation quoted in the Greek New Testament (Hebrews 2:7; and Hebrews 2:9).
Jesus is the ultimate “Son of man” (Hebrews 2:6), and in the incarnation He is “made a little lower than” He had been. Or, in an alternative rendering of the phrase, “is for a little (while) made lower” (Hebrews 2:7; Hebrews 2:9). Either reading is consistent with the New Testament view of the incarnation (cf. Philippians 2:6-7).
In Christ, man’s dignity and authority is renewed. He is crowned; He is set over the works of God’s hands; all things are put in subjection under His feet - but we don’t see it yet (Hebrews 2:7-8).
“But we see Jesus, on account of THE suffering of THE death, crowned with glory and honour, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone” (Hebrews 2:9). And Jesus did not just “taste” the cup of His suffering (Matthew 26:39) - He drank it down to the very dregs. This is the ultimate substitutionary sacrifice for the sins of mankind.
The Father deemed it an appropriate method, and not out of character with Himself, to secure our salvation by sending His Son into this world to be one with us (Hebrews 2:10-11). This was determined from all eternity and was not some kind of afterthought (John 3:16). Jesus came willingly, knowing what must be done (Hebrews 10:5-7).
The pioneer of our salvation was “made perfect through suffering” (Hebrews 2:10). This does not imply that Jesus was ever anything other than perfectly moral: but it suggests a level of experience which we all go through (sufferings) being experienced voluntarily by the divine Son. Given the vicarious nature of His sufferings, He thereby “brings many sons into glory” (Hebrews 2:10).
Jesus sanctifies us - sets us apart for God - by becoming one with us and making us one with Him (Hebrews 2:11). ‘The Word became flesh and dwelt among us’ (John 1:14). He drew us into the family of God, counting us as brethren (Hebrews 2:11-12).
The quotation of Psalm 22:22 in Hebrews 2:12 reminds us, from its context, that we are drawn into the family of God only through the furnace of Jesus’ own sufferings.
Jesus became one with His own people. ‘He came unto His own, and His own received Him not. But to all the people who received Him, He gave the right (the power, the authority) to be sons of God: to everyone who trusts in His Name’ (John 1:11-12).
