Hebrews

Hebrews Study Bible, click here

Below is a brief summary of what I found in Hebrews concerning each of my four questions. The full evidence and commentary are available in the Hebrews Study Bible linked above.

Summary: Insights from Hebrews

1. Who is God?

God is the ultimate source, Creator, Father, Judge, and living God to whom Jesus continually relates and through whom Jesus receives his authority, position, perfection, and saving mission. Hebrews says that God speaks through His Son, appoints Jesus heir, acts through him, anoints him, exalts him, appoints him High Priest, gives him children, and subjects the world to come beneath him. Jesus trusts God, prays to God, offers himself to God, appears in God’s presence for humanity, brings people near to God, and sits at God’s right hand. Hebrews even calls God Jesus’ God: “God, your God, has anointed you.”

Hebrews also explicitly calls God “the living God” and “the Judge of all,” while distinguishing Him from Jesus, who is the mediator of the new covenant. In my reading, Hebrews most commonly identifies this God with the Father—the One from whom Jesus and his brothers and sisters ultimately come and the One to whom Jesus brings humanity. Yet Hebrews also gives powerful evidence that the Holy Spirit shares God’s identity. Thus, within the theology developed in this commentary, God is the Father and the Holy Spirit; Jesus is God’s uniquely exalted human Son, Messiah, and mediator.

Specifically, who is the Holy Spirit?

Hebrews provides strong evidence that the Holy Spirit is both personal and God. Hebrews 3 introduces Psalm 95 with the words “the Holy Spirit says,” and the quotation that follows is God speaking in the first person: “your fathers tested me,” “saw my works,” “I was displeased,” and “I swore in my wrath.” In other words, Hebrews attributes Yahweh’s own speech directly to the Holy Spirit. The same pattern appears again in Hebrews 10, where the Spirit “testifies” and then speaks words from Jeremiah 31 that are spoken by Yahweh in their Old Testament context. In my understanding, this is powerful evidence that the Holy Spirit does not merely carry messages from God—She speaks as God because She is God.

Hebrews further calls Her the “eternal Spirit” through whom Christ offered himself to God (Hebrews 9:14), while Hebrews 10 calls Her the “Spirit of grace” and says that She can be insulted—language that presents the Spirit as a personal divine presence rather than an impersonal force. Thus, Hebrews itself gives substantial evidence for both the personhood and deity of the Holy Spirit. However, Hebrews does not specifically identify the Spirit as Mother or develop Her femininity. My understanding of the Holy Spirit as the divine Mother therefore depends on the larger biblical evidence developed elsewhere, while Hebrews itself strongly supports the more foundational conclusion that the Holy Spirit is personal, eternal, and God.

2. What is God's plan for the world?

Hebrews presents God’s saving purpose as extending to everyone through Christ, while also containing severe warnings concerning judgment and apostasy. Although Hebrews does not state universal reconciliation as explicitly as a passage such as Colossians 1:20, it contains important evidence supporting the universal scope of Christ’s saving work. Most strikingly, Hebrews 2:9 says that by God’s grace Jesus tasted death “for everyone.” God is the One whose grace stands behind this saving act, while Jesus is the human Son who gives his life for everyone. Hebrews then immediately speaks of God “bringing many children to glory” through the pioneer of their salvation.

Hebrews also contains some of Scripture’s strongest warnings concerning judgment and apostasy, particularly Hebrews 6:4–8 and 10:26–31. I do not believe these warnings should be minimized. However, neither do I believe they require the conclusion that God’s judgment is eternally irreversible or that some of His children will remain beyond His redemptive purpose forever. In my commentary on Hebrews 6, I distinguish severe divine judgment from final, permanent condemnation: the passage warns of devastating consequences for apostasy, but it does not explicitly say that God can never ultimately restore those people. Thus, I believe Hebrews’ severe judgment passages can be held together with the wider biblical case for universal salvation rather than being treated as proof against it.

3. Who is Jesus?

Jesus is God’s uniquely exalted human Son, Messiah, King, Savior, Apostle, great High Priest, mediator of the new covenant, and pioneer of humanity’s salvation—not God Himself. Hebrews gives Jesus extraordinarily exalted language: God appointed him heir of all things and made the ages through him; Jesus is the radiance of God’s glory and exact imprint of His nature; angels bow before him; he has been exalted above the angels; he sits at God’s right hand; and the coming world is subjected beneath his feet. Yet throughout these descriptions, Hebrews continues to distinguish Jesus from God. God appoints Jesus, works through him, anoints him, gives him an inheritance, exalts him, perfects him, designates him High Priest, and places him at His right hand. 

Hebrews also emphasizes Jesus’ complete humanity and genuine development. He was made lower than the angels, shared flesh and blood with humanity, was made like his brothers “in all things,” suffered when tempted, trusted in God, prayed to the One who could save him from death, learned obedience through suffering, was made perfect, became a merciful and faithful High Priest, and ultimately became the source of eternal salvation. By the time he offered himself, he was holy, guiltless, undefiled, and without blemish. In my reading, Hebrews therefore presents Jesus as a genuinely human Son who was brought by God through suffering, obedience, and perfection into the glorious position he now occupies. In my reading, Jesus ultimately became fully free from sin and was brought to perfected righteousness; Hebrews does not require the conclusion that he possessed completed moral perfection from the beginning of his human life, nor does it define his perfection as moral impeccability. 

Hebrews also contributes to the larger biblical case that Jesus genuinely preexisted his earthly life. Hebrews 1:2 says that God made the ages through His Son. I do not think that extraordinary statement should be explained away. At the same time, preexistence does not itself establish deity, and neither does being the one through whom God creates. Hebrews consistently presents God as the ultimate source and actor: God appoints the Son, works through him, gives him an inheritance, anoints him, perfects him, and exalts him. Thus even if Hebrews 1:2 includes God’s original creative work through Christ, the statement still distinguishes the God who creates from the Son through whom God creates.

4. Who are Christians?

In Hebrews, Christians are God’s children being brought to share the glorified human destiny pioneered by Jesus. Jesus is the perfected Son whom God has crowned with glory and honor, but Hebrews immediately places him within the same family as redeemed humanity: God is “bringing many children to glory”; Jesus sanctifies them; they are all “from one”; and Jesus is not ashamed to call them his brothers and sisters. Jesus therefore represents not an entirely different category of being from Christians, but the glorified human Son whom his brothers and sisters are being brought to follow.

Hebrews’ repeated language of perfection and holiness makes this especially clear. Christians are told to “press on to perfection”; maturity includes training in righteousness and discerning good and evil; God disciplines His children so that they may “share in His holiness”; and Hebrews finally speaks of “the spirits of righteous people made perfect.” In my understanding, God’s goal is therefore not permanent moral imperfection but complete transformation into holiness, righteousness, obedience, love, and godly character. Jesus himself learned obedience and was made perfect, and God’s children are likewise being brought toward perfection. Through the Holy Spirit and faithful obedience to God, genuine Christlikeness is therefore attainable.