Hebrews: Jesus Is Better – Draw Near and Hold Fast
Lift your eyes to Jesus, see the greatness of who He is and what He has accomplished, and discover why knowing Him changes the way you endure, trust and draw near to God.
Welcome to Hebrews
Hebrews begins without the usual greetings of a New Testament letter.
There is no introduction of the writer.
No naming of the recipients.
No gentle opening conversation.
Instead, the book begins with God.
“Long ago God spoke to our ancestors by the prophets at different times and in different ways. In these last days, he has spoken to us by his Son.”
Immediately, our attention is lifted to Jesus.
He is the appointed heir of all things.
Through Him God made the universe.
He is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact expression of His nature.
He sustains all things by His powerful word.
He made purification for sins.
And He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.
Everything that follows flows from this vision of Christ.
Hebrews was written to believers who needed endurance. They had already suffered. Some had experienced public reproach and affliction. Some had stood alongside others who were mistreated. Some had endured the confiscation of their possessions.
But now they were in danger of growing weary.
Hebrews does not respond by pretending their hardship is insignificant.
Nor does it promise that following Jesus will make their circumstances easier.
Instead, it repeatedly turns their attention towards the greatness, sufficiency and faithfulness of Christ.
Jesus is greater than the angels.
He is greater than Moses.
He is the great High Priest.
He has entered the true heavenly sanctuary.
He has offered the once-for-all sacrifice that the repeated sacrifices of the old covenant could never accomplish.
He has inaugurated the new covenant promised through Jeremiah.
He has opened the way for His people to draw near to God.
And He is seated at God’s right hand.
Therefore:
Pay attention.
Do not harden your heart.
Hold firmly to your confession.
Draw near.
Encourage one another.
Run with endurance.
Look to Jesus.
Worship God with reverence and awe.
Hebrews does not separate profound theology from transformed living.
The writer shows us Christ – and then repeatedly asks what becomes possible, necessary and urgent because He is who He is.
Before You Begin
Hebrews does not identify its human author.
Various suggestions have been made throughout Christian history, including Paul, Barnabas, Apollos and others, but the evidence does not allow us to identify the writer confidently.
It is better to leave unnamed what Scripture leaves unnamed.
The original recipients appear to have been Christians deeply familiar with Israel’s Scriptures, worship and history. They understood the tabernacle, priesthood, sacrifices, covenant, wilderness generation and figures such as Abraham, Moses and Melchizedek.
They had also experienced suffering because of their association with Christ.
Hebrews therefore speaks into a situation where believers knew Christian truth but were under pressure to endure faithfully.
One important safeguard is necessary before reading.
Hebrews contrasts the old covenant with the new covenant established through Christ, but it should not be read as though the Old Testament was a failed religious experiment or as though God had made a mistake and later replaced His plan.
The writer sees continuity within God’s unfolding purposes.
The tabernacle, priesthood and sacrifices were real parts of God’s covenant dealings with Israel, yet they also pointed beyond themselves. They could not provide the final cleansing and access accomplished through Jesus.
Christ brings God’s redemptive purposes to their intended fulfilment.
A second safeguard concerns the warning passages.
Hebrews contains some of the New Testament’s strongest warnings.
They should not be softened until they say nothing.
Nor should sensitive readers immediately turn every warning into anxious speculation about whether one moment of weakness means they have irreversibly lost salvation.
The warnings function within the writer’s call to perseverance.
Hebrews repeatedly summons its hearers to continue trusting Christ, to resist hardening their hearts and to remain together in faithful endurance.
The warnings are serious because Christ is precious.
The answer Hebrews gives to spiritual weariness is not endless inspection of yourself.
Again and again, it directs your attention towards Him.
The Message of Hebrews
Hebrews moves between majestic explanations of Jesus and urgent calls to respond to Him.
The writer shows who Jesus is.
Then says: therefore, pay attention.
He shows Jesus as the faithful Son.
Then says: therefore, do not harden your heart.
He explains Jesus’ priesthood.
Then says: therefore, draw near.
He explains Christ’s sacrifice.
Then says: therefore, hold fast.
He remembers those who lived by faith.
Then says: therefore, run with endurance.
Hebrews is theology moving towards perseverance.
Truth about Jesus is meant to become stability in the heart and faithfulness in life.
Movement 1 – God Has Spoken in His Son
Hebrews 1:1-2:18
What Happens Here
Hebrews opens by contrasting the many ways God formerly spoke through the prophets with the climactic revelation given in His Son.
The Son is presented in extraordinary terms.
He is heir of all things.
Creation came through Him.
He perfectly reveals God.
He sustains creation.
He accomplished purification for sins.
He sits at God’s right hand.
The writer then draws extensively from the Old Testament to establish the Son’s superiority to angels.
Jesus is not merely another heavenly messenger.
He is the enthroned Son.
This leads directly to Hebrews’ first warning: if the message spoken through angels carried consequences, how much more seriously should believers regard the salvation announced through the Lord?
Chapter 2 then turns towards the astonishing humanity of Jesus.
The One exalted above angels was, for a little while, made lower than the angels.
He tasted death.
He shared in flesh and blood.
Through death He broke the power of the one who held the power of death – that is, the devil – and freed those held in slavery by the fear of death.
Jesus is also described as a merciful and faithful High Priest.
Because He Himself suffered when tempted, He is able to help those who are being tempted.
Hebrews begins, therefore, with both majesty and nearness.
The eternal Son is exalted beyond anything created.
And that same Son truly entered human suffering and death.
What to Notice About God
God has made Himself known decisively in His Son.
Jesus does not merely bring information about God from a distance.
He is “the radiance of God’s glory and the exact expression of his nature.”
If you want to understand God’s character, Hebrews directs your attention towards Jesus.
Yet His greatness does not make Him remote.
The Son who reigns is also the Son who shared human flesh and blood.
He knows suffering from within human experience.
The greatness of Christ and the compassion of Christ are not competing truths.
Hebrews asks us to hold them together.
A Thread to Follow
One of Hebrews’ great themes begins here:
Pay attention to Jesus.
Spiritual drifting does not always begin with deliberate rejection.
Hebrews 2:1 warns believers to pay closer attention so that they do not “drift away.”
Drifting is quieter.
Attention moves elsewhere.
Confidence weakens.
Other voices become louder.
Christ becomes less central.
Hebrews responds by repeatedly bringing Him back into view.
Pause & Notice
- What does Hebrews 1:1-4 establish about the identity and work of Jesus?
- Why does Hebrews hold together Christ’s exalted divine identity and His genuine participation in human suffering?
- What currently receives so much of your attention that the greatness and sufficiency of Jesus can begin to recede from view?
Movement 2 – Consider Jesus and Do Not Harden Your Heart
Hebrews 3:1-4:13
What Happens Here
The writer addresses his readers as holy brothers and sisters who share in a heavenly calling and tells them:
“Consider Jesus.”
Jesus is compared with Moses.
Moses was faithful as a servant within God’s house.
Christ is faithful as Son over God’s house.
The writer then turns to Psalm 95 and Israel’s wilderness rebellion.
The wilderness generation had seen God’s works, yet hardened their hearts in unbelief.
Their story becomes a warning.
“Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.”
Hebrews urges believers to encourage one another daily so that none becomes hardened by sin’s deception.
The discussion then develops around God’s “rest.”
The generation that left Egypt did not enter the promised rest because of unbelief, yet Psalm 95 – written much later – still speaks of entering God’s rest “today.”
The writer therefore sees a deeper rest still open to God’s people.
Chapter 4 closes with the declaration that God’s word is living and effective, penetrating deeply and exposing the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
Nothing is hidden from God.
Everyone stands exposed before the One to whom they must give account.
What to Notice About God
God desires a response of trust.
The wilderness generation’s problem was not simply that they experienced fear.
They allowed unbelief to harden into resistance.
Hebrews reveals a God who speaks and calls His people to hear Him.
His Word reaches beneath outward appearances.
It exposes what is happening within the heart.
That can sound frightening until we remember where Hebrews goes next.
The God who sees completely has provided a High Priest through whom His people may confidently approach Him.
Exposure before God is not an invitation to hide.
It becomes part of the reason we need grace.
A Thread to Follow
Notice the repeated word:
Today.
Hebrews does not want yesterday’s faith to become a substitute for present trust.
Nor does it encourage endless anxiety about tomorrow.
“Today, if you hear his voice…”
Faithfulness is lived in the present.
Trust Him today.
Listen today.
Encourage one another today.
Do not let small compromises slowly become hardened patterns.
Pause & Notice
- What does Hebrews identify as the reason the wilderness generation failed to enter God’s rest?
- What does the description of God’s living and effective Word reveal about His ability to see beneath outward behaviour?
- Is there anywhere you recognise the beginnings of hardness, resistance or unbelief in your own heart that you need to bring honestly into God’s light?
Movement 3 – Jesus Our Great High Priest
Hebrews 4:14-7:28
What Happens Here
Hebrews now develops one of its central truths.
Jesus is our great High Priest.
Because He has passed through the heavens, believers are told to hold firmly to their confession.
Yet this High Priest is not unable to sympathise with human weakness.
He was tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin.
Therefore believers may approach the throne of grace boldly to receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
The writer explains the role of a high priest and then identifies Jesus as the priest appointed by God.
Psalm 110 becomes crucial: Jesus is a priest forever “according to the order of Melchizedek.”
Hebrews then pauses for a serious warning about spiritual immaturity and apostasy before offering encouragement based upon God’s faithfulness to His promise.
Chapter 7 returns to Melchizedek, the mysterious priest-king who appears briefly in Genesis 14 and is later referenced in Psalm 110.
The writer uses these Scriptures to explain that Jesus’ priesthood is different from the Levitical priesthood.
Levitical priests were prevented by death from continuing indefinitely.
Jesus lives forever.
Therefore His priesthood is permanent.
“He is able to save completely those who come to God through him, since he always lives to intercede for them.”
What to Notice About God
God has not merely told His people to approach Him.
He has provided the Priest through whom they may come.
And Jesus is not reluctant.
He sympathises with weakness.
That does not mean He participated in sin.
Hebrews explicitly says He was without sin.
His compassion arises not from sharing our rebellion but from truly entering human vulnerability, suffering and temptation while remaining faithful.
The throne believers approach is astonishingly called the throne of grace.
God’s holiness is not diminished.
But because of Christ, needy people are invited to come for mercy rather than flee in terror.
A Thread to Follow
Hebrews repeatedly joins two commands:
Hold fast.
Draw near.
When people feel spiritually weak, ashamed or weary, the instinct can be to withdraw.
Hebrews points in the opposite direction.
Because Jesus is the great High Priest:
Hold fast.
And because Jesus is the great High Priest:
Come near.
Pause & Notice
- What qualities of Jesus’ priesthood give believers confidence to approach God?
- Why is Jesus’ permanent priesthood greater than a priesthood continually interrupted by death?
- When you become conscious of weakness or failure, is your instinct to move towards God for mercy and grace, or to hide from Him until you feel more worthy?
Movement 4 – A Better Covenant
Hebrews 8:1-10:18
What Happens Here
The writer now reaches the heart of his argument.
Jesus is the High Priest seated at the right hand of God’s throne.
He ministers in the true sanctuary established by God rather than merely the earthly tabernacle.
Hebrews explains that the earthly sanctuary and its ministry served as a copy and shadow of heavenly realities.
Then the writer quotes extensively from Jeremiah 31.
God had promised a new covenant.
Under this covenant He would put His laws into His people’s minds and write them on their hearts.
He would be their God.
They would be His people.
They would know Him.
And He would remember their sins no more.
Chapter 9 considers the tabernacle and its worship.
Under the old covenant, priests repeatedly entered the earthly sanctuary, and the high priest entered the Most Holy Place once each year with blood.
Christ, however, entered the greater and more perfect sanctuary through His own blood, obtaining eternal redemption.
The writer explains that the blood of animals could provide ceremonial cleansing within the old covenant system, but Christ offered Himself without blemish to God, cleansing the conscience from dead works to serve the living God.
Chapter 10 emphasises the contrast between repeated sacrifices and Christ’s single sufficient offering.
The law possessed a shadow of the good things to come.
Its sacrifices were repeated because they could not finally perfect the worshippers.
Christ offered one sacrifice for sins and sat down at God’s right hand.
His work does not need to be continually repeated.
What to Notice About God
God’s answer to human sin reaches deeper than external regulation.
The promise of the new covenant is astonishing:
“I will put my laws into their minds and write them on their hearts.”
God does not merely stand outside His people giving commands.
He works within them.
Through the new covenant, relationship with God involves an inward transformation in which His ways increasingly become known, loved and lived from the heart.
This does not mean believers instantly obey perfectly.
The New Testament clearly continues calling Christians to growth, correction and perseverance.
But obedience under the new covenant is not intended to be merely external conformity.
God is forming a people who know Him.
A Thread to Follow
Watch what Jesus does with the problem of sin.
Hebrews does not present sin as something God simply decides no longer matters.
Sin is serious enough to require sacrifice.
Yet Christ’s sacrifice is sufficient enough that it does not need repeating.
This matters profoundly for the conscience.
If you live as though Christ’s sacrifice must somehow be supplemented by your own self-punishment, spiritual performance or repeated attempts to make yourself acceptable, you have lost sight of what Hebrews is showing you.
The sacrifice has been offered.
Christ has sat down.
Pause & Notice
- What contrasts does Hebrews draw between the repeated old covenant sacrifices and Christ’s sacrifice?
- What does Jeremiah’s new covenant promise reveal about the kind of relationship God intends to have with His people?
- Are there ways you still attempt to make yourself acceptable to God through performance, self-punishment or striving rather than resting in the sufficiency of Christ’s finished work?
Movement 5 – Draw Near, Hold Fast and Encourage One Another
Hebrews 10:19-39
What Happens Here
After explaining Christ’s priesthood, covenant and sacrifice, Hebrews reaches a great “therefore.”
Because believers have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place through Jesus’ blood, and because they have a great Priest over God’s house, they are given three closely connected exhortations.
Draw near.
Hold on to the confession of hope.
Consider one another in order to provoke love and good works.
Christian perseverance is both personal and communal.
Believers are warned not to neglect gathering together but to encourage one another.
A severe warning follows concerning deliberate persistence in sin after receiving the knowledge of truth.
The writer then reminds his hearers of their earlier endurance.
They had experienced suffering and public humiliation.
They had stood alongside others who suffered.
They had accepted the confiscation of their possessions because they knew they possessed something better and lasting.
Now they must not throw away their confidence.
They need endurance.
What to Notice About God
God has opened the way into His presence through Christ.
The extraordinary access described here would have been almost unimaginable against the background of the tabernacle.
The Most Holy Place was not somewhere ordinary Israelites simply entered.
But Hebrews says believers now have confidence to enter because of Jesus.
This confidence is not confidence in ourselves.
It rests entirely upon Him.
A Thread to Follow
Notice again that Hebrews does not respond to suffering with promises of immediate escape.
These believers had suffered before.
They may suffer again.
The writer’s answer is endurance.
Biblical hope is not optimism that earthly circumstances will soon improve.
It is confidence rooted in the faithfulness of God and the lasting reality He has promised.
Pause & Notice
- What three responses follow the “therefore” of Hebrews 10:19?
- Why is Christian community important to perseverance according to this passage?
- When circumstances become difficult, where are you tempted to place your hope if you are not consciously grounding it in the character and promises of God?
Movement 6 – Living by Faith
Hebrews 11:1-40
What Happens Here
Hebrews 11 gathers a long line of people who trusted God.
Abel.
Enoch.
Noah.
Abraham.
Sarah.
Isaac.
Jacob.
Joseph.
Moses.
Rahab.
Gideon.
Barak.
Samson.
Jephthah.
David.
Samuel.
The prophets.
Faith is described as confidence in what is hoped for and assurance about what is not seen.
These people acted because they trusted what God had revealed.
Abraham went without knowing where he was going.
Sarah considered God faithful to His promise.
Moses chose identification with God’s people rather than the temporary pleasures and status available in Egypt.
Others conquered kingdoms, administered justice and received promises.
But Hebrews does not allow faith to become a formula for earthly victory.
The chapter suddenly turns.
Others were tortured.
Some endured mocking and flogging.
Some were imprisoned.
Some were killed.
Some wandered destitute, afflicted and mistreated.
All are included within the same account of faith.
That is crucial.
Faith is not proven by whether circumstances turn out comfortably.
Faith is continuing to trust God whether obedience leads through visible deliverance or costly suffering.
What to Notice About God
Faith depends upon God’s trustworthiness.
Hebrews 11 is sometimes read primarily as a gallery of extraordinary human beings.
But beneath every act of faith stands a conviction about God.
He exists.
He rewards those who seek Him.
He is faithful to His promises.
He can raise the dead.
He has prepared something better.
Biblical faith is not confidence in the strength of your own believing.
It is confidence directed towards the God who is trustworthy.
A Thread to Follow
Do not miss the people who suffered.
They protect Hebrews 11 from becoming a prosperity formula.
Some trusted God and experienced dramatic deliverance.
Others trusted the same God and died without receiving earthly deliverance.
Scripture calls both groups faithful.
That means the question is not:
“Did faith produce the outcome I wanted?”
The deeper question is:
“Will I trust God because He is faithful, even when obedience does not produce the circumstances I hoped for?”
Pause & Notice
- What do the examples in Hebrews 11 reveal about the relationship between faith and action?
- Why is it important that the chapter includes both dramatic deliverance and severe suffering?
- Has your confidence in God ever become tied to receiving a particular outcome? What would it mean to trust His character even when you cannot control the result?
Movement 7 – Run With Endurance, Looking to Jesus
Hebrews 12:1-29
What Happens Here
Having remembered the witnesses of chapter 11, Hebrews turns directly to its readers.
Lay aside every hindrance and the sin that so easily entangles.
Run with endurance the race that lies before you.
And above all:
Keep your eyes on Jesus.
He is the pioneer and perfecter of faith.
He endured the cross, despising its shame, because of the joy that lay before Him, and He sat down at the right hand of God’s throne.
Believers are told to consider Him so that they will not grow weary and give up.
The chapter then discusses God’s fatherly discipline.
Using Proverbs 3, the writer teaches that discipline is part of God’s loving formation of His children.
This passage requires care.
It does not mean every hardship is a specific punishment from God for a particular sin.
The emphasis is on God’s purposeful fatherly training of His people, not permission to interpret every painful event as divine retribution.
The chapter then urges believers to pursue peace and holiness, warns against rejecting God’s grace and uses Esau as a sobering example.
Finally, Hebrews contrasts Mount Sinai with Mount Zion.
Believers have not come merely to the terrifying mountain associated with the giving of the law.
They have come to Mount Zion, the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, countless angels, the assembly of the firstborn, God the Judge of all, the spirits of righteous people made perfect and Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant.
The chapter ends with reverence:
“Our God is a consuming fire.”
What to Notice About God
God is both Father and holy King.
Hebrews refuses to separate His tenderness from His holiness.
He trains His children.
He gives grace.
He provides Jesus as mediator.
And He remains worthy of reverence and awe.
Knowing God as Father does not make Him small or casual.
Knowing Him as holy does not make Him inaccessible to those who come through Christ.
Hebrews holds both truths together.
A Thread to Follow
The central instruction is beautifully simple:
Look to Jesus.
Not because circumstances are unreal.
Not because suffering does not hurt.
Not because believers should suppress emotion.
Look to Jesus because endurance requires a greater reference point than the difficulty immediately in front of you.
He endured.
He finished.
He reigns.
Pause & Notice
- What does Hebrews 12 tell believers to lay aside, pursue and keep their eyes upon?
- How does the chapter hold together God’s fatherly care and His holiness?
- When you become weary, what tends to capture your attention most strongly – the difficulty itself, your own ability to cope or the character and faithfulness of Jesus?
Movement 8 – Let Your Life Reflect the Kingdom You Have Received
Hebrews 13:1-25
What Happens Here
Hebrews concludes with practical instructions.
Continue in brotherly love.
Show hospitality.
Remember prisoners and those who are mistreated.
Honour marriage.
Keep your life free from the love of money.
Be content.
Remember faithful leaders.
Do not be carried away by strange teachings.
Go to Jesus outside the camp, willing to bear reproach with Him.
Offer continual praise to God.
Do good.
Share with others.
Respect faithful spiritual leadership.
The great theological heights of Hebrews lead directly into ordinary life.
Then comes one of Scripture’s beautiful benedictions.
The God of peace, who brought Jesus our Lord from the dead, the great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, is asked to equip believers with everything good to do His will, working in them what is pleasing in His sight through Jesus Christ.
What to Notice About God
The God who calls His people to faithfulness is also the God who equips them.
Hebrews does not end with:
“Try harder.”
It ends with God working in His people.
The same God who raised Jesus from the dead is able to equip believers for lives that please Him.
Transformation is neither passive nor self-generated.
Believers are repeatedly called to act.
Yet beneath their faithful response is the gracious work of God.
A Thread to Follow
Hebrews 13 brings theology into ordinary places.
Hospitality.
Money.
Marriage.
Compassion.
Leadership.
Generosity.
Worship.
Christian truth is meant to become embodied life.
The greatness of Jesus should eventually become visible in the way His people treat others, handle possessions, endure rejection, worship God and practise love.
Pause & Notice
- What practical areas of life does Hebrews address in its final chapter?
- What does the closing benediction reveal about God’s role in forming faithful lives?
- Which ordinary area of your life most needs to come into deeper alignment with what you say you believe about Jesus?
See Hebrews as a Whole
Hebrews begins with God speaking through His Son.
It ends with the God of peace equipping His people through that same Son.
Between those points, one great invitation continues to appear:
See Jesus clearly – and keep going.
He is greater than angels.
Greater than Moses.
The faithful Son.
The merciful High Priest.
The priest forever.
The mediator of the new covenant.
The once-for-all sacrifice.
The One seated at God’s right hand.
The pioneer and perfecter of faith.
The mediator whose blood speaks a better word.
The great Shepherd of the sheep.
Hebrews does not magnify Jesus merely so that readers will possess more theological information.
The writer knows something about the human heart.
We live from what we believe is most real.
When pressure becomes intense, whatever we trust most deeply begins to show.
That is why Hebrews repeatedly connects vision with endurance.
See Jesus.
Therefore pay attention.
See Jesus.
Therefore hold fast.
See Jesus.
Therefore draw near.
See Jesus.
Therefore encourage one another.
See Jesus.
Therefore run.
See Jesus.
Therefore do not grow weary.
The Christian life is not sustained primarily by repeatedly telling yourself to become stronger.
Hebrews directs exhausted believers towards Someone stronger than they are.
Seven Great Threads to Carry With You
1. God Has Spoken in His Son
Christian faith begins with God’s self-revelation.
We do not invent God according to preference.
God has made Himself known.
Hebrews directs us towards Jesus as the climactic revelation of who God is and what He has done.
The clearer our view of Christ becomes, the less room there is for constructing God merely from fear, imagination or human assumption.
2. Jesus Is Both Exalted and Compassionate
Hebrews gives us no small Jesus.
He sustains the universe.
Angels worship Him.
He sits at God’s right hand.
Yet He also shared flesh and blood.
He suffered.
He was tempted without sin.
He sympathises with weakness.
Majesty and compassion meet in Him.
You do not need to make Jesus less holy in order to believe He understands you.
Nor do you need to make Him distant in order to honour His greatness.
3. Through Jesus You May Draw Near to God
One of Hebrews’ most repeated invitations is astonishing:
Draw near.
Not because you have performed well enough.
Not because you have made yourself clean enough.
Not because you have finally overcome every weakness.
Come because you have a great High Priest.
The confidence belongs not in the person approaching but in Christ through whom the approach is made.
4. Christ’s Sacrifice Is Sufficient
The old covenant sacrifices were repeated.
Jesus offered Himself once for all.
Then He sat down.
Hebrews wants this truth to reach the conscience.
The believer does not live perpetually attempting to repay God for forgiveness.
Obedience grows from reconciliation; it does not purchase it.
There is an enormous difference between living for acceptance and living faithfully because, through Christ, you have been given access to God.
5. Faith Is Trusting God, Not Controlling Outcomes
Hebrews 11 dismantles the idea that strong faith guarantees comfortable circumstances.
Faith conquered kingdoms.
Faith also endured suffering.
Some escaped the sword.
Others were killed by the sword.
What united them was not outcome.
It was trust.
Biblical faith is not a technique for persuading God to produce the future you want.
It is entrusting yourself to the God who remains faithful when the future is still unseen.
6. Perseverance Happens Together
Hebrews repeatedly speaks to a community.
Encourage one another.
Do not neglect gathering together.
Pursue peace.
Show hospitality.
Remember those who suffer.
Christian endurance is not designed to be entirely solitary.
Sometimes God’s means of strengthening a weary believer is another believer who helps them remember what is true.
7. Keep Looking to Jesus
This may be the thread that gathers all the others.
The Christian life can become crowded with self-analysis.
Am I doing enough?
Am I believing enough?
Am I strong enough?
Am I progressing quickly enough?
Hebrews certainly calls believers to examine their hearts and take sin seriously.
But its great centre of gravity remains outside ourselves.
Jesus.
Look to Him.
Consider Him.
Remember Him.
Approach God through Him.
Hold fast because of Him.
Run towards Him.
Where Hebrews Leads
Hebrews gathers enormous portions of the Old Testament and shows how they reach their fulfilment in Christ.
The tabernacle anticipated greater access.
The priesthood anticipated a greater Priest.
The sacrifices anticipated a sufficient sacrifice.
The covenant anticipated the promised new covenant.
The wilderness generation became a warning about unbelief.
Melchizedek provided biblical categories for a priesthood beyond Levi.
Psalm 110 pointed towards the enthroned priestly Messiah.
Jeremiah promised a covenant in which God’s law would be written upon hearts.
All these threads converge upon Jesus.
Hebrews therefore helps us read the Bible as one unfolding story without flattening the differences between its covenants.
The Old Testament matters.
Its institutions, promises, warnings and patterns belong within God’s real dealings with Israel.
Yet Hebrews teaches Christians to understand these realities in light of their fulfilment in Christ.
Jesus does not merely add another chapter to the old system.
He brings the decisive accomplishment towards which it pointed.
Through Him, sinners have access to God.
Through Him, consciences are cleansed.
Through Him, the new covenant has been established.
Through Him, believers receive a kingdom that cannot be shaken.
And because He remains forever, His priesthood never ends.
Before You Leave Hebrews
Hebrews asks a deeply revealing question without ever phrasing it quite this way:
What happens inside you when following Jesus becomes difficult?
When prayers seem unanswered.
When circumstances remain painful.
When obedience costs something.
When other paths appear easier.
When you feel spiritually tired.
When you cannot see what God is doing.
When faith no longer feels emotionally effortless.
Hebrews was written for that territory.
And its answer is not:
Pretend you are not tired.
It is not:
If your faith were stronger, your circumstances would improve.
It is not:
Everything painful will soon make sense.
The answer is:
Look again at Jesus.
Consider who He is.
Remember what He has accomplished.
Remember where He is.
Remember that His sacrifice is sufficient.
Remember that His priesthood is permanent.
Remember that He understands weakness.
Remember that the throne is a throne of grace.
Remember that God’s promises do not depend upon your ability to control circumstances.
Then draw near.
Perhaps you have spent years approaching God as though His welcome rises and falls with your performance.
Hebrews challenges that instinct.
Your confidence to approach Him does not originate in how well you performed yesterday.
It rests upon Jesus.
Perhaps you have been carrying guilt that Christ has already dealt with, repeatedly punishing yourself inwardly because you believe continued shame somehow demonstrates sincere repentance.
Hebrews does not minimise sin.
It magnifies the sufficiency of Christ’s sacrifice.
Repentance turns from sin towards God.
It does not require you to compete with Jesus by trying to provide an additional payment through self-condemnation.
Perhaps your faith has quietly become tied to outcomes.
You trust when circumstances appear favourable.
You question God’s goodness when they do not.
Hebrews 11 invites you into something deeper.
Trust anchored not in what happens next, but in who God is.
Perhaps you are simply weary.
Hebrews understands weariness.
That is why it says:
“Consider him who endured such hostility from sinners against himself, so that you won’t grow weary and give up.”
There is no shame in recognising that you are tired.
But do not let tiredness quietly become distance.
Draw near.
Do not let disappointment become hardness.
Draw near.
Do not let weakness persuade you that God only welcomes strong people.
Draw near.
Do not let fear make tomorrow larger than Christ.
Look again.
And do not attempt to endure entirely alone.
Hebrews repeatedly brings believers back to one another.
Encourage.
Gather.
Love.
Remember.
Share.
Strengthen.
Christian perseverance has a communal shape.
Perhaps the most transformative truth Hebrews can leave in your heart is beautifully simple:
You do not need a smaller problem nearly as much as you need a clearer view of Jesus.
Circumstances matter.
Pain matters.
Questions matter.
But none of them is Lord.
Jesus is.
Pause Before You Continue
- When you consider Hebrews as a whole, what aspect of Jesus’ identity or work most changes the way you understand your relationship with God?
- Why does Hebrews repeatedly connect seeing Jesus clearly with perseverance?
- When you feel weak, ashamed or spiritually tired, what do you instinctively do – draw near to God, withdraw from Him, try harder to prove yourself or become absorbed in analysing yourself?
- Is your trust in God currently attached to a particular outcome you believe must happen? What would it look like to entrust that outcome to Him while continuing to believe what Scripture establishes about His character?
- Where might Hebrews be inviting you to stop living from fear, self-reliance, performance or spiritual isolation and instead draw near, hold fast, encourage others and keep your eyes upon Jesus?
Now Open His Word
Now return to Hebrews itself.
Do not rush.
Hebrews contains arguments that unfold across several chapters, so allow the writer to build his case.
Begin with Hebrews 1.
Before looking for application, simply look at Jesus.
Write down everything the opening verses say about Him.
He is heir.
Creator.
Radiance.
Exact expression.
Sustainer.
Purifier.
Enthroned Son.
Let Scripture establish who He is before asking what it means for you.
Then continue into chapter 2.
Notice the warning against drifting.
Ask what relationship exists between Hebrews 1 and Hebrews 2.
The writer has just shown the greatness of the Son.
Therefore His message deserves serious attention.
Then watch the movement from Christ’s majesty to His humanity.
Stop at Hebrews 2:14-18.
Notice why Jesus shared flesh and blood.
Notice what His death accomplishes.
Notice the connection between fear of death and slavery.
Notice that His suffering enables Him to be a merciful and faithful High Priest.
Then enter chapters 3 and 4.
Watch the repeated references to the wilderness generation.
Do not immediately turn Israel’s story into a metaphor for your circumstances.
First understand the writer’s point.
They heard.
They saw.
Yet they hardened their hearts through unbelief.
Then hear the repeated urgency:
“Today.”
Stop at Hebrews 4:12-13.
Let God’s Word search rather than merely inform you.
Ask:
What is Scripture exposing about the thoughts and intentions beneath my outward behaviour?
But do not stop there.
Read the very next verses.
Hebrews 4:14-16.
The God before whom everything is exposed has given you a great High Priest.
Therefore:
“Let us approach the throne of grace with boldness.”
Notice the sequence.
Exposure does not end in hiding.
It leads the believer towards mercy and grace through Christ.
Then spend time in chapters 5-7.
The discussion of Melchizedek can initially feel difficult.
Return to Genesis 14 and Psalm 110 if helpful.
Notice that Hebrews’ central concern is the permanence and superiority of Jesus’ priesthood.
Human priests die.
Jesus remains forever.
Therefore He is always able to intercede.
Then move slowly through chapters 8-10.
Read Jeremiah 31:31-34 alongside Hebrews 8.
Notice exactly what God promises in the new covenant.
“I will put my laws into their minds and write them on their hearts.”
Do not reduce this merely to knowing biblical rules more clearly.
God is describing an inward work producing a people who truly know Him.
Then watch the repeated contrast between the old covenant sacrifices and Christ.
Repeated.
Repeated.
Repeated.
Then Jesus offers Himself.
Once for all.
And sits down.
Pause there.
Ask whether your relationship with God reflects the sufficiency of what Christ has done, or whether you continually live as though acceptance must be re-earned.
Then reach Hebrews 10:19.
Watch another great “therefore.”
Because of everything the writer has just established:
Draw near.
Hold fast.
Consider one another.
Do not separate these commands from the theology supporting them.
Christian obedience grows out of what Christ has already accomplished.
Then read Hebrews 11 carefully.
Do not read only the victories.
Read the whole chapter.
Notice those who escaped suffering.
Then notice those who did not.
Both lived by faith.
Allow that to correct any assumption that God’s faithfulness can be measured by whether your circumstances unfold as you hoped.
Then turn the page.
“Therefore, since we also have such a large cloud of witnesses…”
Hebrews 12 belongs with Hebrews 11.
You have seen what faith looks like.
Now run.
Lay aside what hinders.
Deal seriously with sin.
And fix your eyes on Jesus.
When you reach the discussion of discipline, resist the temptation to label every hardship as God’s punishment for something you have done.
Read the passage in its own context.
The emphasis is God’s fatherly formation of His children towards holiness.
Then stand for a moment at the end of chapter 12.
“You are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken.”
So much of life can shake.
Health.
Finances.
Relationships.
Plans.
Reputation.
Comfort.
Security.
Hebrews does not promise that these earthly things will remain untouched.
It gives believers a deeper security.
A kingdom that cannot be shaken.
Finally, read chapter 13.
Notice how the majestic theology of the previous twelve chapters enters everyday life.
Love people.
Welcome strangers.
Remember prisoners.
Honour marriage.
Refuse the love of money.
Be content.
Praise God.
Do good.
Share.
And then finish with Hebrews 13:20-21.
Let the final emphasis fall not upon your ability to transform yourself but upon God.
The God of peace equips His people.
He works in them what is pleasing in His sight through Jesus Christ.
That is a fitting place to leave Hebrews.
Not staring at yourself.
Not measuring whether you are strong enough.
Not pretending the road will always be easy.
But looking to Jesus.
Drawing near through Jesus.
Holding fast to Jesus.
Running with your eyes upon Jesus.
And increasingly allowing the truth of who He is to shape the way you see God, understand yourself, face uncertainty, endure suffering, love others, resist sin, worship, trust and live.
Continue Your Journey Through Hebrews
The Overview has helped you see the magnificent sweep of Hebrews.
Now step closer.
Walk slowly through its thirteen chapters and watch how carefully the writer builds each truth upon what came before.
Notice every “therefore.”
Follow the Old Testament quotations.
Watch the repeated invitations to draw near, hold fast and endure.
And above all, keep noticing Jesus.
The better Priest.
The better sacrifice.
The mediator of the better covenant.
The pioneer and perfecter of faith.
The great Shepherd of the sheep.
→ Explore Hebrews Chapter by Chapter
Or, when you are ready to continue along the shelves:
→ Continue to James