From the foregoing cluster of O.T. quotations this conclusion is drawn—
“ Therefore we ought to pay the more earnest heed to the things that were heard, lest haply [or, ever] we should slip away. For if the word spoken through angels proved steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just retribution, how shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation? Which having begun to be spoken through the Lord was confirmed to us by those that heard, God also bearing witness with [them] both with signs and wonders, and varied powers, and distributions of [the] Holy Spirit according to His own will” (ver. 1-4).
The danger set before the Hebrews is of the gravest. They had known the Jews' religion originally. They had now professed to believe the gospel. Woe to such, above all men, if they slipped away from Christ; for the truth of God and the blessing of man center only in Him. Christianity and Judaism are as different as heaven from earth; but as the heavenly things are not yet displayed, all enjoyment of them must be by faith of God's revelation, crowned by the standing facts that Christ is come, has accomplished redemption as far as remission of our sins is concerned, and so glorified God in it, that He has now glorified the Son of man in Himself, the Holy Spirit being already given the believer as unction, seal, and earnest. If the believer look away from Christ, he is like his forefathers in the desert without the living God, with nothing but the barren sand. Now a Jew naturally expected a bright path of honor and prosperity on earth. The cross stumbled him when Messiah came. “We have heard out of the law that Christ abideth forever; and how sayest Thou, The Son of man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of man?” (John 12:3434The people answered him, We have heard out of the law that Christ abideth for ever: and how sayest thou, The Son of man must be lifted up? who is this Son of man? (John 12:34).) If they got occupied with trial and disappointment, not only did murmuring set in but faith was imperiled. And if self-judgment did not work restoration of communion, what could the end be but total drifting away? What did this mean? How could it be otherwise?
God had spoken fully and finally in a Son, the Heir and Creator of the universe, to Whom even the preparatory testimonies of His word bore witness as His Son, God, and Jehovah; Whose position after He made purification of sins was unique in heavenly glory, the object of angelic homage according to God's will and word. The greater His grace and glory, the more solemn the responsibility to heed the testimony. For this only it is as yet: the time is not yet arrived, nor can it be under the gospel, for His power to compel absolute submission, as it will by-and-by (Phil. 2:10, 1110That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; 11And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:10‑11)). It is the day for obedience of faith. But the word was nigh them in their mouth and in their heart, the things read as well as heard. To grow light, cool, or listless, exposed them to the danger of slipping away, not the truth only, but themselves also. God would not be mocked in His Son and in His grace. To have once owned His glory binds the soul ever to heed His word and person.
Here again angels are introduced as the foundation of a stronger call. “For if the word spoken by angels was made steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received just retribution, how shall we escape if we have neglected so great salvation” (ver. 2, 3)?
The Jews were not mistaken in boasting of the singular honor God had put on the law, introduced as it was by angelic ministration. The N.T. is as clear in this attestation as the O.T. Nor were they wrong in maintaining the inviolability of the law in itself. How could its authority waver if it was God's law? It is not only in great things but in small, as man would think and say, that we see God vindicating it. Every transgression and every refusal to hear received righteous requital. Other ways of God came in no doubt, whereby mercy could rejoice against judgment; but unsparing judgment of evil was the principle proclaimed and enforced throughout. It was a ministry of death and condemnation.
Incomparably more serious is it to despise grace brought in by the Head of all glory. No notion more contrary to truth than that grace makes light of evil—that the gospel is a sort of mitigated attenuated law. It was when man, and man under law, was proved wholly bad and irreparably rained, that God sent His Son and laid on Him the entire burden. Salvation is the fruit for him that believes. There is and can be for sinners no other way. It is entirely Christ's work, exclusively His suffering. His blood cleanses from every sin—if not from all, from none. Such is the grace of God that has appeared in Christ, and especially in His death. But man is the enemy of God through listening to an older and mightier rebel than himself; and grace is far more alien and offensive to man than law. In the law his conscience cannot bow to righteousness, even though he is himself righteous; but he knows and approves what is right, while he follows what is wrong. Grace is beyond all his thoughts, all his feelings, all his hopes, because it is divine love in God. rising above all His hatred of evil which He lays on the only sacrifice capable of bearing it before Himself and taking it away righteously.
This the gospel proclaims, not promises only but preaches, because the Savior has come and finished the work given Him to do on behalf of sinners to God's glory. And hence the supreme danger of neglecting so great salvation. For its immensity is proportionate to His dignity Who came to save sinners, and to the unparalleled work in suffering at God's hand for all our sins what they deserved. His divine person gave Him competency to endure as well as infinite efficacy to His work. He became indeed man to suffer for man; but He never ceased to be God.
Such is the doctrine here, and uniformly in scripture where it is treated. It is a salvation on which the Holy Spirit never wearies of expatiating. And how gracious of God toward those who have His word and yet are in danger of neglecting “so great salvation"! not only neglecting to receive it but negligent of it when professed. This snare of a religions people like Israel is just the danger of Christendom now.
It will be observed that “we” is emphatic in the first part of ver. 3, and that the writer includes himself too in its occurrence before the close. This is one of the stock arguments against Paul's authorship of the Epistle. But it appears to be only superficial and an oversight of its character. For, supposing Paul to he the writer, this merging himself with the Hebrews he was addressing outside his special apostolic province is precisely in keeping with his task in hand. To make this inconsistent with Gal. 1:1212For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ. (Galatians 1:12) seems petty indeed; for the latter is distinctively personal, and Heb. 2:3, 43How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him; 4God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according to his own will? (Hebrews 2:3‑4) has evidently a studious generality. He is setting forth the claim of that word which began to be spoken by the Lord Himself in contrast with the law of old, august as its introduction may have been, which he would have been the last to deny. But the Lord was here in the midst of the Jews to bring us not the law that kills lithe guilty, but His own great salvation for the lost. The first person does not at all mean that he had heard it, but that when it thus began to be spoken it was confirmed “unto us” by those that heard. Indeed, he distinguishes himself rather from those ear-witnesses, without at all branching off to his own peculiar and long subsequent privilege outside Damascus. But he does identify himself with those whom the Lord addressed at the beginning without in the least implying that he had himself heard Him. Was he not a Hebrew of the Hebrews To cite Eph. 3:2, 32If ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to you-ward: 3How that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery; (as I wrote afore in few words, (Ephesians 3:2‑3) is therefore wholly beside the mark. Both are true, and manifestly so.
The great aim of all indeed is to put forward the Lord as the Apostle no less than High Priest of the Christian confession, as He is styled in ch. 3:1. This accordingly leaves out not only himself born out of due time, but the twelve as apostles. In presence of Him they are only “those that heard.” The Lord began the word of this salvation; they heard and confirmed it to the people responsible to receive the Christ of God; and God also bore witness with them in all way beyond all example. The object in view excluded all mention of the extraordinary Gentile apostleship, to say nothing of the grace in Paul that sought to meet the Jews, as God did, and to disarm their prejudices.
Nor can any description be conceived more exact and guarded than the language here used, while at the same time intended to impress the believing Jews with the superiority of the gospel to the law, “Which [salvation] having begun to be spoken through the Lord was confirmed unto us by those that heard, God also bearing witness with [them], both by signs and wonders and varied powers and distributions of [the] Holy Spirit according to His own, will” (vers. 3, 4).
Salvation took only a beginning of publication in the days of His flesh. For the work of atonement was not yet touched, as it was and could only be accomplished by His death at the close. Yet salvation assuredly began to be spoken of, when the Lori entered on His public ministry. Of this Luke 4:1616And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up: and, as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the sabbath day, and stood up for to read. (Luke 4:16) et seqq. is the beautiful witness, founded on His reading on the sabbath in the synagogue of Nazareth Isa. 61:1, 21The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me; because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound; 2To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all that mourn; (Isaiah 61:1‑2), and stopping with the acceptable year of Jehovah. The day of vengeance, surely to come in its season, was not to be till He comes again. It was salvation now. “To-day hath this scripture been fulfilled in your ears.” Earlier still Simeon saw in the Babe the salvation of God. Now a further step was taken. The Lord had begun to speak of it. For indeed the Spirit of Jehovah was upon Him, and He was anointed to preach good tidings to the poor. Jehovah had sent Him to proclaim release to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those that were bruised, in short, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. And so to weary, heavy-laden souls He gave rest in His grace from first to last, as the cross itself testifies.
Certainly when in due season Christ died for the ungodly, when He rose with “peace be unto you.” and again “Peace” in sending by Him, that salvation was confirmed by those that heard. Nor did God fail to bear His joint testimony, if those sent out were weak indeed. The Spirit given was of power and of love and of a sound mind. And His operations were such as, to arrest the most careless and even hardened, while they did not, as they could not, fail to awaken unbelievers however prejudiced. Such was the effect of the Pentecostal signs and wonders and manifold powers and distributions of the Holy Spirit according to His own will. The tongues of scattered man's speech were spoken in a moment, as the Lord had promised (Mark 16), not only a “wonder” but a “sign” to Jews gathered to the feast from all nations; as the “varied powers” were displayed in healing the sick, casting out demons, and the like. “Distributions of the Holy Spirit” find their explanation in such a scripture as 1 Cor. 12. They all were forms of divine attestation that accompanied or rather followed the great salvation confirmed by those that preached it.