Thank you for loving each other so well.
The 8:00 AM where we still do the greeting of peace, Right?
Let's dive into God's Word now together.
Our text this morning is Hebrews 2, starting in verse 5 and going
through verse 18. For it was not to angels that
God subjected the world to come, of which we are speaking.
It has been testified somewhere. What is man that you are mindful
of Him, or the Son of man that you care for Him?
You made him for a little while lower than the angels.
You've crowned Him with glory and honor, putting everything in
subjection under his feet. Now in putting everything in
subjection to Him, He left nothing outside His control.
At present we do not yet see everything in subjection to Him,
but we see Him who for a little while was made lower than the
angels, namely, Jesus, crowned with glory and honour because of
the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God He might
taste death for everyone. For it was fitting that He for
whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to
glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect
through suffering. For he who sanctifies and those
who are sanctified, all have one source.
That is why He is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying, I
will tell of your name to my brothers in the midst of the
congregation. I will sing your praise, and
again I will put my trust in him.
And again, behold, I and the children God has given me.
Since therefore, the children share in flesh and blood, He
himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death
he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the
devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were
subject to lifelong slavery. For surely it is not angels that
He helps, but He helps the offspring of Abraham.
Therefore, he had to be made like his brothers in every
respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high
priest in the service of God to make propitiation for the sins
of the people. For because he himself has
suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being
tempted. Friends, this is the word of the
Lord. Thanks be to God you may be
seated. Father, we thank you for your
precious word, and we thank you for Jesus, the Word made flesh.
And we pray, Holy Spirit, this morning that you might shine
your light on Jesus in this passage of your word and shine
your light in our hearts, that we might see the glory of God in
the face of Jesus Christ and be drawn to him.
We pray in his name, Amen. Christmas is polarizing.
Know if you feel that, but on one side we have people like
Charles Spurgeon who said, and I just saw this last night, my
wife showed it to me. Spurgeon said, I like Christmas.
I wish it came 6 * a year. I would not stop a smile.
And on the other side we have people like Billy.
You remember Billy the little child in The Polar Express.
He was one of the last to get on the train and he stayed to
himself and he was sad and he was cynical and Billy says
Christmas just doesn't work out for me.
It never has. A lot of people see Christmas
like Spurgeon, but I think a lot of people see Christmas like
Billy, too. They see the lights, hear the
songs, watch the celebrations. But Christmas just doesn't work
out for them. They don't see the point.
They don't think Christmas really helps.
Sure, you might say Christmas helps retailers or Christmas
helps families and friends come together.
And whether that's good or bad, maybe the jury's out, depending
on your family. But on the morning of December
26th, how many people will really say Christmas helped?
So during Advent, we focused on the incarnation.
We've talked about the fullness of the incarnation, the
preeminence of the incarnation, how Jesus is true God and true
man. Today I want to talk about the
help of the Incarnation. When we really understand
Christmas we see it's the greatest help because when God
became man he brought the help we need most.
So the first thing I want us to see is the incarnation means the
help of the last Adam. Hebrews is a great book for
Advent because the author's message is really simple.
It is this Jesus is better, better than all the angels and
the things of the Old Testament, the people who have come before,
better than all the institutions and all the symbols and all the
shadows. Jesus is better.
He is the substance. And so Hebrews, if you look at
chapter 1, it opens with the prologue that you could say it,
it rivals it's it's at least in the running with John 1 and
Colossians one, it opens long ago at many times and in many
ways God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last
days he's spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir
of all things, through whom also he created the world.
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. So Hebrews 1 spotlights the
supremacy of Christ. Jesus came not as just a
reflection of God's light, but as the actual radiance of His
glory, the exact imprint of his nature.
And when you think about it and what that means about this baby
who was born, it takes your breath away.
So in chapter 1 Hebrews overwhelms us with pictures of
Jesus glory. And then in chapter 2, Hebrews
comforts us with pictures of his humanity and His humility.
So we see in chapter one that he's superior to the angels.
And yet we see in in chapter 2 he was willing to become man and
enter our world. And that brings us into our text
this morning. The author of Hebrews takes us
back to God's original intention at creation.
He says, for it was not to angels that God subjected the
world to come. And what he means is God didn't
intend for angels to rule the world one day.
It's an interesting thought. And then he quotes Psalm 8 to
reinforce his point. What is man that you're mindful
of him, or the Son of Man that you care for him?
You made him for a little while lower than the angels.
You've crowned him with glory and honor, putting everything in
subjection under his feet. So in this ancient Psalm, David
marvels at the beauty of creation, looks around and just,
it's breathtaking. He considers the glories of the
world and then he looks at himself and he's dumbfounded
that God would make man and give him such a noble task.
God made Adam and Eve to rule and reign over creation, to have
dominion. We see this at the end of
Genesis One. We were made a little lower than
the angels, but God crowned us with glory and honor and put
everything it says under our feet.
And we don't talk about this enough, but this was and is
God's plan. He desires for His image bearers
for people to rule and reign in His name.
So of course the question is, how's that going?
And the obvious answer is not very well.
Ever since our first parents sinned and turned away from God,
our relationship to our God-given task has been broken.
We fall short of God's beautiful vision for us to be fruitful and
multiply, to fill the earth and subdue it, to have dominion.
And so instead we dominate and abuse, or we abdicate and
neglect. God created us to be Princess
and princesses of creation. But like most royal families,
there is great dysfunction and we feel it.
Whether it's at the individual level or at the family level or
at the geopolitical level, our relationship with the planet and
its animals and its people is broken.
It's like God gave us this huge ball to carry and we fumble it
at every turn. So when we read in verse 8, at
present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to Him.
To me, it sounds like a comical understatement.
God put us in charge of everything and we can't even
manage ourselves. So we don't see God's original
intention unfolding as He planned.
But what do we see? Look at verse 9.
But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the
angels, namely, Jesus crowned with glory and honor because of
the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God, he might
taste death for everyone. So we all share in the first
Adam's failure. But that's not the end of the
story. Our passage says we see Jesus,
the last Adam, come to win back what Adam lost.
So when God made humans a little lower than the angels, that was
our glory. It was an honor for us to be
made as men and women in his image.
But when Jesus put on flesh and became a little lower than the
angels, that was his humiliation.
We see it in Hebrews, and we see it in Philippians 2.
Jesus went from the highest of highs to the lowest of lows to
dwell with us, to live with us, to die for us.
Jesus humbled himself and therefore God has exalted him to
the highest place and given him the name that is above every
name and says Jesus is now crowned with glory and honor.
Why? Because he was willing to suffer
and to die. He was willing to taste death
and to conquer it for all of his people.
So in Jesus life, death and resurrection, in his ascension,
reign and promise return, what do we see?
The renewal of humanity. The renewal of God's original
mission. Jesus is the image of the
invisible God. He came to usher in God's
Kingdom on earth. He came to renew God's people in
his image so that they might again rule and reign with him
now and forever. The incarnation means we have
the help of the last Adam. Jesus has come to conquer all of
our enemies and invite us back into the mission.
Now, until he returns, we'll continue to live with this
tension that Jesus has already conquered, but we do not yet see
everything in subjection to him. But one day we will.
And even now, he's winning the hearts of his people and he's
changing the world, one person, one family, one church at a
time. And by God's grace, we're
empowered to be part of this remarkable mission.
He comes to make his blessings flow far as the curse is found.
So the last Adam came to help us get on board with his mission to
renew this world this Christmas. That's the kind of help we need,
someone who can come and rescue humanity and restore us to the
mission that God has for us. That's the first thing.
The second thing is the incarnation means the help of an
older brother. How do you respond when you read
in verse 11? He's not ashamed to call them
brothers. Jesus is not ashamed to call us
his siblings. Now, the family language in the
Scriptures is really astounding. In the Old Testament, and
particularly in the prophets, we hear a lot about God referring
to himself as a faithful husband to an unfaithful bride or wife.
And it's easy to see the brokenness in that relationship
between God and the people of Israel, how far God's people
wander from the love of their heavenly bridegroom.
And we can relate to that too. But don't miss it.
God actually calls himself a husband, for your maker is your
husband, he says in Isaiah. He loves his people with that,
never stopping, never giving up, unbreaking, always and forever
love. Then we turn to the New
Testament and that picture is still here.
Jesus is the true bridegroom. He loved the church and gave
himself up for her. And what are we longing for?
The marriage supper of the Lamb one day.
But in addition to this marital picture, we get other family
language. Jesus addressed God as ABBA
Father and his contemporaries were shocked that Jesus would
call God his own father. But don't miss this.
Jesus invited us to do the same. Pray then like this, our Father
in heaven, hallowed be your name.
So we recently hosted a Christmas event at our home, was
during the day and then when my son Will came home from school I
was wearing a light up Christmas jacket, some of you have seen
it, and a cowboy hat. And when Will saw me he
immediately began to move in the opposite direction away from me.
So I thought I looked festive. Will disagreed and in that
moment he was ashamed to be called my son.
But the father is not ashamed to call us sons and daughters, and
Jesus is not ashamed to call us brothers and sisters.
Everyone doesn't have a biological older brother.
I have an older sister. But we can all imagine the
benefit of having a good older brother.
Who wouldn't want a brother who loves us, who's with us, and who
protects us? And then when our older brother
succeeds in school or sports or work or marriage, we're
encouraged and empowered to follow in his footsteps.
Jesus is the perfect older brother.
Not cold, distant, judgmental like the brother in Luke 15.
No, Jesus is warm and near and gracious.
He runs after us when we're wandering.
He embraces us when we're grieving.
He strengthens us when we're weak.
It's not surprising when we choose to use the word brother.
Athletes love to say that they played for their brothers, or
soldiers call themselves a band of brothers.
As pastors, we refer to one another as brothers because
life's hard and there's suffering and their battles to
fight. Proverbs 1717 says a friend
loves at all times and a brother is born.
For what? For adversity.
In moments of adversity, we need a brother, and brothers shine in
those moments. And no brother ever shined
brighter than Jesus when he suffered to bring his people to
glory. So people don't always like the
notion of God putting on skin and suffering and dying.
I think they don't like what it says about God, but maybe
without realizing it, they don't like what it says about them and
what they really needed. But Hebrews says this was
fitting. It was good.
It was God's plan. Jesus is our older brother, and
in that he is the pioneer or trailblazer of our salvation.
He goes before us. He was willing to die that we
might live. He was willing to experience our
shame so that we might enjoy his glory.
And by faith, we're united with Christ, our older brother.
He became like us so that we might become like Him.
And He united himself to us. We're united to Him by faith, by
faith united with Christ our older brother, as verse 11 says.
For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one
source. Because we are in Him, He is in
US, and he's not ashamed to be our brother.
So, friends, the incarnation means we have the help of the
best older brother in Christ. We're welcomed into the most
amazing family. Do you know the joy of having
Jesus as your brother? The Third Point I want to make
is the incarnation means the help of a high priest.
In the Old Testament, you'll remember, priests served as
mediators between God and the people.
They would teach God's law to the people, and they'd offer
sacrifices on behalf of the people.
Priests could help. Because of their relationship
with God and the people. They could relate.
They knew God, but they also knew what it meant to be man.
So on Friday, my sister-in-law had a baby girl.
Very exciting. It's a great joy to our family.
But I also have to say, as a man, I am not helpful when it
comes to childbirth. I've witnessed it, but I haven't
done it. I've seen it, but I haven't felt
it. But my wife has a very different
perspective. And she was standing by all
week, ready to go at a moment's notice, ready to take pictures
in the delivery room. My wife's been pregnant.
She's delivered two boys. So Anne was a very helpful
resource to her sister this week.
I also read about soldiers who go through that most intense
training. Think about the Navy Seals and
others like them, and do you know who can help them the most?
It's the soldiers who have recently completed the very same
training because they've been there, they understand, and they
made it through. And this is really what Hebrews
is saying about Jesus. He's been where we are,
experienced what we experienced, felt what we feel.
Look at verse 14. Since therefore the children
share in flesh and blood, He himself likewise partook of the
same things. And then verse 17, He had to be
made like his brothers in every respect, in every respect, like
you and me. Why?
So that He might become a merciful and faithful high
priest. But Jesus is actually far
greater when it comes to being a high priest than the men who
served in the Old Testament. Think about it.
The Old Testament priest was a sinful man standing between God
and the people. Jesus is a sinless man standing
between his Father and his people.
And the Old Testament priest was an imperfect teacher, sharing
the Word with God's people. Jesus was the Word made flesh,
teaching the Word perfectly but also fulfilling it perfectly in
his own life. And the Old Testament priest
offered the blood of bulls and goats as a temporary sacrifice.
Jesus offered his own blood as the final sacrifice.
So as the great high priest, Jesus is perfectly positioned to
help us. We could talk for hours about
all the ways he's done this, but let's just consider what we find
in Hebrews 2. Our high priest came to destroy
death. Our passage says that Jesus
became like us so that through death he might destroy the one
who has the power of death, that is the devil, and deliver all
those who through fear of death, were subject to lifelong
slavery. Ever since the fall, the devil
has used death to terrorize people.
And people often ask, what's your greatest fear?
And what do we say? Spiders.
Snakes, sharks, sharing my feelings, etcetera.
But you know what our greatest fear really is?
It's the one thing we won't even talk about.
Our greatest fear is dying. We fear the pain, the
separation, the unknown. Will we cease to exist?
The judgement. Friends, Jesus knew the power of
death, and He knew our great fear of death.
And as our high priest, he came to destroy the devil and to
deliver us from all fear. In Christ, we can live with the
confidence that death has actually been defeated.
We can know that death is not some journey into the great
unknown, but a doorway into more abundant life.
With Jesus Christ. We can have peace that Jesus has
already paid for our sins. So death will not mean God's
rejection, but his embrace and his welcome.
Our high Priest also came to make propitiation for our sins.
A propitiation is an old word, but it has a deep meaning.
Some translations try to change it or remove it, but we're wise
to hold on to it because when you change the word, you lose
the point. Because propitiation refers to a
sacrifice that takes away or appeases wrath.
The Bible is clear from start to finish.
God is holy. We are opposed to God and our
sin, and God is opposed to us in His Holiness.
And as sinners we deserve God's displeasure and wrath.
No one will get to heaven without a perfect righteousness.
That is God's standard perfect holiness, conformity to His law.
Do you have a perfect righteousness?
I don't. The beauty of propitiation is
this. Jesus has offered himself as the
sacrifice to take away God's wrath.
He paid the price on the cross. He experienced the judgement
that we deserve. God's wrath is appeased so that
we can have peace with God. So when we look to Jesus by
faith and trust in His sacrifice on the cross, God actually looks
at us as if we had never sinned. He imputes to us the
righteousness of Christ. We have a new position, a new
status, and then that leads to a whole new life.
Have you accepted Jesus as the sacrifice for your sins?
Friends, this is the help that we most need, and He offers it
even today. Trust in Christ as your great
High Priest, receive his forgiveness, be filled with His
Spirit, and walk in His ways. Finally, our high priest can
help us when we're tempted. He's able.
It says in our text. Some people think Jesus can't
help us when we're tempted because he never sinned.
I want you to think about a bridge for a second.
Do you want the bridge that caves in as soon as a big truck
goes over it? Do you want the bridge that has
stood strong, had cars passing over it for years and years, and
it's still standing? The mistake to conclude that the
sinless person can't help us in temptation because the only the
sinless person knows the true strength of temptation.
When we give in to temptation, the struggle's over.
We've already lost. But the man who never gives in
faces greater and greater temptation.
So no human has endured more temptation than Jesus.
And think about what that means for us.
Whatever your temptation, think about what you're tempted with.
Even now, think about it. Jesus knows it.
He experienced it. He resisted it.
He took the devil's best shot and never gave it.
He's the last Adam who succeeded where we fail.
He's our older brother who won the war and now shares his
victory with us. And he's our high priest who
sympathizes with our weaknesses. So in all three of these roles,
we see the breathtaking humility of Jesus.
From the highest of highs. He came down, down, down from
heaven to the womb of a virgin, engaged to a Carpenter.
And then the humiliate humiliation continue.
Why would the second person of the Trinity voluntarily take
this journey? Listen to what CS Lewis writes
when they think of a diver first reducing himself to nakedness,
then glancing in mid air, then gone with a splash, vanished,
rushing down through green and warm water into black and cold
water, down through increasing pressure, into the death like
region of ooze and slime and old decay.
Then up again back to color and light.
His lungs almost bursting till suddenly He breaks the surface
again, holding in his hand the dripping precious thing that he
went down to recover. That's the wonder of the
incarnation. Jesus stole down into the depths
of our drowning and dying humanity, and he came back up
holding a rescued and renewed humanity in a nail pierced hand.
In Hebrews 725 we read He is able to save to the uttermost
those who draw near to God through Him, since He always
lives to make intercession for them.
And what's so beautiful about this is this first brings God's
help into the present tense. It's easy to look at it and say,
oh, Jesus is the last Adam. He won the victory 2000 years
ago. Jesus is my older brother.
He went ahead of me 2000 years ago.
But when you say he's the high priest who lives to make
intercession for me, that help is now December 21st, 2025.
So if Christmas has never worked out for you, I encourage you
today to turn to Jesus, consider the child in the Manger and
realize this is no ordinary baby.
This is the last Adam and he invites us into his mission.
This is our older brother and he welcomes us into his family.
And this is our High priest who sacrificed himself for us.
No one is more qualified to help that.
No one is more eager to help. Let's pray, Father, we're in awe
of Jesus coming. We're in awe of the help that he
brought. So we pray today that wherever
people are, whatever help they need, that they would have the
grace to turn to Jesus and find in him the help that we need in
our moment of need. Thank you for the glory of the
gospel. Thank you for this good news and
thank you for the sacrament which pictures these things and
makes them tangible for us. And so Lord, come and be with
us, we need you. We pray in Jesus name, Amen.