The word which came to us in these last days is distinguished above all former messages in that it came through God's own Son. The new covenant--more wonderful, more perfect than the old--could not be intrusted into the hands of servants. God is a close economist. He wastes nothing. As long as men or angels are sufficient to accomplish a certain task, God gives it to them. The fact that the new message, and the work of redemption connected with it, was given into the hands of the Son, argues that there was no other being in the universe wise enough and mighty enough and great enough to bear it. Incidentally it shows how utterly ruined mankind must have been if the reclaiming and saving of the race required such an Agent. "God so loved the world, that [15] he gave his only begotten Son." Any gift less than that could not have sufficed, but without the Son the human race would have been left in sin and misery without hope.

      The inspired writer gives us some details concerning the Son, lest we pass on without duly understanding who he is that came to speak to us. He is the "heir of all things." Everything will revert to him. The worlds, visible and invisible, are his inheritance and his possession in the day when the Father shall sum up all things in Christ. (Eph. 1:10.) He is the last. He is also the first; for through him God made the worlds. (See John 1:3.)

      It may be well here to spend a few moments in contemplation of Christ's existence before he came to the earth in our behalf. We find one passage in 1 Cor. 8 that speaks of his estate in eternity; two, very impressive, in John 17; and one in Phil. 2. What share did he have in the creation? (John 1:3.) Did he create the world on his own plan or under the direction of the Father? Note the distinction between the two little words "of" and "through," which the American Revised Version brings out in such passages as John 1:3; 1 Cor. 8:6; Heb. 1:2. "Of" denotes authorship here; and [16] "through," the agency, medium, channel. God, the Father, created the world, but he did it through Christ.

      The Son was and is always the medium of expression through which the Father manifests himself. As such, he is the brightness, the outshining, of the Father's glory, and the very image of his substance. To know Christ is to know God. (John 12:44, 45; 14:9.) But to know God is the great need of man. That alone will bring him back into the divine fellowship and communion. Therefore did God speak to men, at first in the messages of the prophets, but now in the person of his Son--his very Image. Christ himself is now the message. In all he is, does, and says, he is the revealer of God. (John 1:18.) He brought the invisible God within the range of our knowledge, that we may know him that is true. (1 John 5:20, 21.) That means nothing less than eternal life. (John 17:3.)

      As we have seen that the Son was the first, the beginning of all things, and that he is the last, the heir of all things, we learn now the additional fact that he is in the middle also, for he continually sustains all things by the word of his power. Note how these three points are set forth in Col. 1:16, 17--first, that all things, in heaven or on earth, visible or invisible, thrones, [17] dominions, principalities, powers, have been created through him; secondly, they have been created "for him," "unto him;" and, thirdly, "in him all things consist," or, as the margin tell us, "in him all things hold together."

      Now this great and exalted Being, moved by his Father's good will and his own love toward us, took upon him the work of purging us from our sins. It was a dirty task; his putting his hand on filthy lepers or washing the disciples' feet would hardly offer the faintest comparison to it. It was such a piece of work as only love could do gracefully. He could not do it at a distance. It required himself--his personal presence. Christ took our sins and uncleannesses and all the horrors of our moral leprosy and death upon himself, and was made a curse for us. And having finished this work of love, he sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high--not, however, to leave us to ourselves. There, at the throne of God, he makes perpetual intercession; and thence his intercession brings to us the redemption of the new covenant in its incipiency, so now no less a person than Jesus would be able to sustain and uphold us day by day in our Christian warfare. [18]

      Before the greatness of thy power and glory, O God, and yet more before thy love, which passes all knowledge, we bow ourselves into the dust and praise and bless thy holy name. We thank thee for that greatest of all gifts--thy Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. We thank thee that he was so faithful in his work of redemption that he did not shrink back even from the cross, but drank all the cup for our sakes. And now we would draw nigh to thee through him, and, by virtue of his sacrifice, kindle anew our hope of eternal life, seeing he is able to save to the uttermost them that draw nigh unto God by him, for he ever lives to make intercession for us. In every temptation, perplexity, and time of need may his intercession supply to us the needed grace, and may his power and love transform us, that we also may become images of God to reveal him to others. In Jesus' name. Amen.

      The next lesson will be Heb. 1:4 to 2:4. Why does he emphasize the superiority of the Son over the angels? What did angels have to do with the former dispensation? Note, item by item, the excellencies of the Son as they are brought out here. Study over the meaning and [19] import of the last verse of chapter 1. See what is told us of ministering angels in Ps. 34:7; 91:11; what bearing 2 Kings 6:14-19 has on this point; what angels did for Daniel; in the New Testament, for Zacharias, for Joseph, for the women and disciples of the Lord, for Peter, for Paul, for Jesus himself.

      Let the first four verses of Heb. 2 sink into your heart. What great danger does he mention? What preventive? What unanswerable question? What words are to be emphasized in verses 2 and 3? Who first began to speak that great salvation? Who confirmed it to us? When? Is this passage important in "dividing the word of God?" To whom is this warning chiefly addressed--to Christians or outsiders? [20]

[LOH1 15-20]