While Hebrews urges us to fix our hearts and hopes on Jesus, who sits at God’s right hand in heaven (Heb. 12:1–2), our preacher is vividly aware of the faith-threatening challenges that confront his hearers on this sin-sick earth. The original congregation had endured the loss of social acceptance, property, physical safety, and freedom (Heb. 10:32–34; 13:3, 11–14). In the face of ongoing pressure to return to tangible and familiar old covenant rites, they needed encouragement to endure in their trust in Christ (Heb. 10:35–12:13). The trials of Israel in the wilderness, between exodus from slavery and entrance into God’s rest, soberly foreshadowed the trajectory of the new covenant church from slavery to sin and our final entrance into God’s rest (Heb. 3–4).

The Only Mediator

The theology of the book of Hebrews is distinct in that it draws together so many of the greatest truths revealed in God’s word to address the deepest of human needs. Hebrews introduces us to the only mediator who can reconcile sinful human beings to the infinitely holy God. Specifically, Hebrews displays the superiority of Jesus’s priestly ministry and his once-for-all sacrifice of himself, which cleanses our consciences and opens access to the presence of God. Hebrews orients us to the flow of God’s agenda for history, alerting us to how his covenantal bond with his people structures the outworking of his redemptive plan. As Hebrews unveils the connection between redemptive accomplishment and revelatory completion, this book shows us how to interpret the Old Testament as believers living in “these last days” in which God has spoken, climactically, in his Son. To Christians experiencing misgivings in the face of social rejection, financial loss, and physical threat, Hebrews offers the remedy of robust theology, calling them to “consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession” (Heb. 3:1) and to look to Jesus, “the founder and perfecter of faith” (Heb. 12:2).

The Letter That Is a Sermon

In our New Testament, Hebrews is grouped among other “general epistles” (James, 1 and 2 Peter, 1–3 John, and Jude). In fact, it is neither “general” nor, precisely, an “epistle.” It is addressed to a specific congregation whose history and present situation the author knows well and to whom he hopes to return (Heb. 6:9–12; 10:32–36; 13:23). Unlike an epistle, it opens not with the names of author and audience nor with preliminary blessing and prayer but with an elegant prologue that draws us into the theme: the superiority of the Son in whom God has spoken in “these last days” (Heb. 1:1–4). (Admittedly, Hebrews concludes as apostolic epistles often do, with assorted exhortations, prayer requests, travel plans, and benedictions [Heb. 13].)

The author calls Hebrews a “word of exhortation” (Heb. 13:22)—the term used by a synagogue leader when, after Scriptures were read, he invited Paul to present a discourse (a sermon) (Acts 13:15). Paul’s “word of exhortation” explained Old Testament texts and issued an exhortation to trust in Jesus (Acts 13:15–40). Although Acts includes digests of the apostles’ evangelistic sermons to the unbelieving audiences, Hebrews is the only post-Pentecost sermon to a Christian congregation in the New Testament.

Consistent with its character as “exhortation,” Hebrews interweaves indicative and imperative throughout. Repeatedly, robust doctrinal truth issues in heart-searching application: Since the Son is better than angels (Heb. 1:4–14), we must pay attention to the message of salvation spoken in the Son, which is even greater than the law spoken through angels (Heb. 2:1–4). Since the Son is better than Moses (Heb. 3:1–6), we must hear and heed his voice (Heb. 3:7–4:13). Since Jesus’s priesthood is superior to Aaron’s (Heb. 7) and his sacrifice cleanses more thoroughly and permanently than animals’ blood (Heb. 9:13–10:18), we must draw near to God’s throne of grace in confidence and reverent worship (Heb. 4:14–16; 10:19–39). Paul’s epistles typically “frontload” doctrinal instruction (for example, Rom. 1–11, Eph. 1–3), after which he draws ethical implications from gospel truths (Rom. 12–15, Eph. 4–6). Hebrews, one the other hand, applies each aspect of Jesus’s superiority—in revelation, in reconciliation, as the champion who leads us into God’s rest—with step-by-step in exhortations, all along the way.

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