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To read:
Hebrews 2:1-9
Therefore we must pay greater attention to what we have heard, so
that we do not drift away from it. For if the message declared
through angels was valid, and every transgression or disobedience
received a just penalty, how can we escape if we neglect so great a
salvation? It was declared at first through the Lord, and it was
attested to us by those who heard him, while God added his testimony
by signs and wonders and various miracles, and by gifts of the Holy
Spirit, distributed according to his will.
Now God did not subject the coming world, about which we are
speaking, to angels. But someone has testified somewhere, “What are
human beings that you are mindful of them, or mortals, that you care
for them? You have made them for a little while lower than the
angels; you have crowned them with glory and honor, subjecting all
things under their feet.” Now in subjecting all things to them, God
left nothing outside their control. As it is, we do not yet see
everything in subjection to them, but we do see Jesus, who for a
little while was made lower than the angels, now crowned with glory
and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of
God he might taste death for everyone. |
To think about:
Each time I hear this passage from Hebrews, it feels like I’m back
in grade school, and having a daydream cut short by the snapping
sound of a ruler cracked against a desk. A sharp voice commands,
“Pay attention, John,” and I am jarred back to reality: “We must pay
greater attention to what we have heard, so that we do not drift
away from it.”
So writes the author of Hebrews to folks hearing worldly siren
songs’ enticements or cacophonies.
Voices that flatter: “You don’t need God.”
Voices that enflame: “Do your own will.”
Voices that terrify: “You’re all alone and unlovable.”
Yet, there abides that one voice, the one calling through and above
the din, crystallizing for us our place in creation: “Forgiven sons
and daughters touched by God’s healing love.”
It’s a beautiful voice that calls to us and bids us to be more and
more embraced by mercy so profound that words fail to paint such
gracefulness in vivid hues. It’s the same voice that says, “Fear
not,” and “Be still and know that I am God.” From a stable, from
mountains of wrestling, from filthy roadsides cluttered with human
brokenness cleansed by divine love, from a tree stained with
precious blood, and a cave now vacated the voice calls to us. What’s
more, it continues to cut through our lives coming to us again and
again. |
