Hebrews 2:9

0:00 Good evening church. We'll be in Hebrews chapter 2 this evening, that's page 1001 in the Red Pew Bible, and I actually urge you to look there or on your device if you've got one and not on your bulletin. That's actually not an ESV translation, and I pulled from an ESV translation, so it's actually going to factor in somewhat importantly in what we have to say tonight. So back when I was in college years ago, I was selected to be part of my school's homecoming court, right? I was not the king. I did not win that. In fact, it was really just a time for me to get dressed up in a fancy suit, be given an award, and not much else than that. So really not that big of a deal. Fun enough, but not that big of a deal. Well, several years later, as Cindy and I were just beginning to start dating long distance, we actually, we existed in a time before FaceTime. I'm not sure if many of you know what that world was like, but we had to make phone calls to one another. And if we wanted to see one another or see of one another, we actually had to like send pictures by email, which is also something you

1:03 may not be familiar with. So not texting, we could not do that. So I sent her a picture of me from this homecoming court and she saw it. It was me with some family members and she said, well, what is this a picture of? And I explained to her the situation, oh, this was, you know, homecoming years ago. I was in the homecoming court. It's just not that big of a deal. And she thought, no, that's really cool. That's really neat. Wow, that is so awesome that you were part of that. And I just kept trying to downplay it and finally said something like, look, it's just, it's not that big of a deal to be given this award. After all, it's just a, it's just a popularity contest. That's it. Well, of course, she took that to mean me saying, I'm very popular. That's not that big of a deal. Completely backfired. That's not exactly what I was trying to communicate. I was trying to communicate that if, if people knew you, they voted for you. It just didn't work over phone.

1:53 Well, my foolishness aside in the matter, isn't that how we often view royalty in this world? It's based on popularity. It's based on something that's chosen by the masses. So maybe not actually the king of England, right? He's not elected to that. But those that we would esteem as royalty in our culture, don't they get that because of something that we see in them that's valuable or something that we like about them or something that we wish were true of ourselves even? I mean, I think that's how our view of famous people and celebrities works.

2:27 Well, that's not how all rulers are crowned, though. In our verse tonight, we're going to see another way that a ruler is crowned. Our king is crowned for an altogether surprising and unexpected reason. Let me read our verse for tonight. Hebrews chapter 2, verse 9 says, But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus. crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. So the main goal of Hebrews as a book is basically this. It's to show that Jesus is better, right? Jesus is better than the priesthood. Jesus is better than the law. Jesus is better than the angels. Jesus is better than Moses. Jesus is better. And in this verse this evening, it's showing that he's also the best man. He's the greatest man. He's better than any other man that's ever existed. He, in fact, is the true man. Humanity finds its true

3:29 representation as we look at Jesus. And that's all kind of done so in an interesting and complex way, even in just this one verse. But that's really the point of what we're getting at. So the main point for the rest of our time together this evening is this. Jesus, the true man, rules as we should have by suffering as we should have. Jesus rules as we should have by suffering as we should have. We'll just kind of break that apart into two different sections. He rules by suffering, but each one of those is going to raise an important question or series of questions that we'll consider as well. So first, he rules. So as we've looked at Genesis in just these past few Sunday mornings, we've seen that the focus of much of the creation account has been to show that human beings are the crown jewel of all of creation, right? We see that, in fact, they're not just the crown jewel. We're not just the crowning achievement of the Lord's creation. We're also given a specific task. What was that task? We saw it very clearly this morning. It's to exercise

4:33 dominion over creation, right? We're to rule over all that God has created. Well, here in Hebrews 2, The author is pointing us to another place in the Old Testament where that's the case, where we see that same exact thing. And right before our verse, if you scroll back up or kind of look back up within the context, you see that he's quoting from Psalm 8. That's what those few verses are set apart there from, just above it. Psalm 8. And in Psalm 8, he's showing that man, that psalm is teaching that man is crowned with glory and honor.

5:05 Man has dominion over all of God's creation. Man is the one to whom everything is subject. Everything should be in subjection to this crowning achievement of God's creation. Well, that's all very straightforward. You can see it from those texts. This is how God designed the world to operate. We saw that this morning in Genesis 2. But in our passage tonight, the author introduces a problem that we all know to be true. right we can logically piece all that together but we know there's a problem with it right it's it's like he's saying look if creation is fully subject or to be fully subject to this righteous rule of man and that's not what we see when we look around what do we do with that what are we supposed to make of that well he doesn't just swat the problem away and say ah it doesn't really matter you know just kind of squint your eyes and move along. No, he actually peels back another layer for us

6:05 instead. So we don't see everything in subjection to him, to man, right? That's what it says. But we do see him, the one that Psalm 8 is talking about. So we don't see everything in subjection to him, but we do see him. But it's a surprise here who he's actually talking about, right? notice, this is why we're looking at the ESV and how this lays this out, it's a surprise who he's talking about. He's not talking about, the author's not just talking about a mere human here, like you or like me. No, who is he talking about? He's talking about Jesus. And that's Jesus here in this text. And what is Jesus doing? Well, he's crowned with glory and honor. It's the language of Psalm 8, and that's ruling language. Only kings are crowned, right? Only kings wear the crown. It's like the author here flips on a switch for us and shows us that that entire psalm, Psalm 8, and then even this passage, what it's been pointing to all along is Jesus. The one who's lower than the angels,

7:06 well, that's Jesus in his incarnation, right? The eternal second person of the Trinity. He takes on flesh. He comes down from the throne of the royal throne room in the universe, and he is the one who's crowned with glory and honor. Well, that all raises a few questions for us then, or it should. Number one, where can I go to see this? He says we see him. Where do I see this? Right? Do I go to a place? Well, that seems to be an objection that the author knew would be raised.

7:41 I mean, just look at the logic again. Watch how it all unfolds. So, the end of verse 8, just right before our verse. We don't see subjection happening, right? It's chaos. It's a chaotic, sinful world. Things are not subject, but we do see Jesus, and we do so spiritually. That's what he's saying there, which by that he means that, look, people would have understood the message of the gospel. People knew who Jesus was. They knew of his work. So we don't see subjection. We do see Jesus, and then when we see him, we're actually seeing ruling taking place. That's the logic that the author's laying out for us. Now, that's a spiritual reality. Even to this day, that's a spiritual reality. Jesus's kingdom and rule is not a geopolitical, geographical rule. You can't go to a place to see this is where Jesus rules over this physical land. Now, to be clear, he rules over the entire universe, even right now. But it's revealed in and it's demonstrated through his people

8:43 gathered. Friends, that's where Jesus's rule becomes clear to the world. It's when we as Christians gather as a church. That's why we take seriously who comes into this church in membership and what happens if they begin to no longer proclaim the gospel and live out the gospel. They're no longer citizens or no longer proclaiming to be citizens of that kingdom. And Jesus' rule over them means something. But maybe an even more important question, and one that kind of drives it home for us.

9:19 What do you see? If you're working through this text, if you're just kind of laying this logic out for your life, and you, at the end of verse 8, you're very familiar with the chaos of a world that's not in subjection to our Creator yet or doesn't appear to be. What is the beginning of verse 9 for you when it says, but we do see Him? What do you see? What does He mean by saying that to us? I think this passage is so helpful because it's so honest about our typical experience in this world.

9:56 We don't yet see the world rightly subjected to God. There's chaos. There's suffering. There's sisters suffering with brain cancer. There's young men suffering with sin that they should be able to kick but have not. There's pain. There's finally death. In our present age of the world not yet visibly subjected to Christ's rule, Where are we to go to find hope?

10:28 We don't look to circumstances. That's what he's making very clear to us. We don't look around us because the end of verse 8 is our reality right now. No, instead, we look to Christ. He says our eyes are to be on Christ because he is ruling. Brothers and sisters, your hope for the time being isn't that somehow tomorrow you would wake up and that your circumstances would be better. That's not what your hope is as a Christian. No, your hope is simply to look at the king who's already ruling and to trust that one day they'll be better.

11:05 Maybe that's tomorrow. Maybe the Lord in his kindness and his providence will heal you tomorrow. Maybe he'll give you strength in that area tomorrow. Maybe he'll make things better tomorrow. But even if he doesn't, even if he doesn't, brothers, sisters, he's still ruling. He's still the one who is ruling on high. And that seems to be something the author here wants us to see. Even when we don't see things in subjection to him yet, we do see him.

11:42 But remember how we started. We said our king is crowned for a reason that's different than we'd expect. How is it that he's even ruling? Okay, he's ruling, but how? Why does he wear the crown? So point number two, he rules by suffering. So Cindy and I finally finished the Netflix series, The Crown. Can't recommend it for some things, and it can recommend it for its general, I don't know, Britishness about it, whatever that even is.

12:14 It sucked us in, and we watched the entire thing. And one of the things that becomes evident as you watch and think about the monarchy, the British monarchy, is that it's obvious that they don't wear the crown, that the next successive person who wears the crown doesn't wear it just because of suffering. No, they wear it because they were just born into it, right? They just happen to be the one who was born into it, next in line, and so they wear the crown, and that's it, period. And so it is for basically all monarchs everywhere. They're born into it.

12:46 That's not the case here. Jesus wasn't just born into it. The text seems to point us in an entirely different direction. Look, only this far into the verse, if you were just reading this verse for the first time, you should be surprised. We don't see everything being ruled as it one day will be. That's the end of verse 8. But then we're told that Jesus wears a crown. That's royal language. How are those two going to go together? How does this even work? If he's wearing the crown, then what path did he even take to get there if things aren't yet subjected to him?

13:22 The answer is one of the most shocking answers in the entire universe. Jesus assumes that crown, not through a glorious coronation, not because there's pomp and circumstance. No, he's crowned through his suffering. Do you see that? He's crowned because of the suffering of death. It's not in spite of his suffering, it's not kind of in parallel to his suffering, it's not even the fact that maybe his suffering was just incidental.

13:53 No, it's precisely through his suffering that Jesus is crowned. He not only took on our flesh, became like us, and as the theologians would say, he condescended and was humbled, humiliated to become like us. No, he then tasted death for us. And friends, do not be confused. That does not mean that he got a little bit of the flavor of death on his tongue. No, he tasted fully of the essence of death because he actually and completely died for us.

14:25 That's the kind of suffering that he faced. And it's that kind of suffering that the verse says led directly to his coronation. He's a king who suffered to the uttermost for his people, unlike any other king. Look, if Psalm 8, and then more precisely this passage, if they're teaching us about true humanity and about what we as humans should have done, that we should have ruled and we should have exercised dominion like Adam did in Genesis 2, then what does this show us about the path to that now?

14:59 How does one get there? If Jesus is finally the one who's crowned with glory and honor, He wears that crown and he obtains it himself through suffering. What does that mean for us? We too should expect to walk in that same path. That's what it means. It's not a parallel path as though our sufferings earn our own glory, even a lesser in degree. No, it's in his path. It's aimed toward his cross.

15:29 It's hearts set on his glory and on his honor. Friends, some of you in this room are suffering immensely right now. There are sufferings that we know about and we've prayed about even this evening. There are sufferings that we don't know about. And maybe you're suffering kind of privately. But there are deep, extraordinarily painful hurts in a congregation this size. And it takes very little time walking that path of suffering to want to get off of that path. To ask the Lord to take you off of that path. But this verse puts a tough, a really tough but important question right in front of you, if that's you.

16:09 Friend, what did you expect your life to be like? For you as a Christian, when you're honest with yourself, what do you expect from your life and from our God? Do you expect health? Do you expect to live many, many long years of very easy relative health and then just kind of die and go away at the end? Do you expect enough money to live comfortably, maybe even lavishly? Do you expect friends, a spouse, children, maybe enough friends, maybe the right spouse, maybe godly children?

16:45 What do you expect? I certainly can't tell you the specifics of what the Lord is going to bring your way, but I can tell you this much from this verse alone. Our king's life was marked by suffering. And the scripture sells time and time and time again to expect that ours will be no different than his. Like that won't mean the same degree or even the same kind of suffering for each one of us. Your suffering might be extreme and the person right next to you might be almost unnoticeable.

17:17 But the point is that Jesus is the one who is crowned with all glory and all honor over the entire universe. He is one who suffered. And as our forerunner, we will follow in that same path as our king. Friend, if your suffering is deep and it threatens to overwhelm you, even this evening, remember that your king is familiar with suffering. The fact that you're walking through this trial right now does not mean that the Lord has abandoned you or has forgotten you or doesn't care about you.

17:50 And when your heart tells you otherwise, It's not the reality of your situation that needs to change so that everything can kind of align with God's word and his promises. No, it's your own expectations of what this life is going to be that needs to change so that everything will align with God's word. In this life, there will be suffering. But the good news is that your king is leading you through it all, and he will not abandon you. But the text says more. Why did he taste death?

18:24 Okay, he suffered, but that doesn't have to mean death. Why did he taste death? And then through that was given a crown. Why did he do this? Well, what the rest of that passage, and more so what the rest of the Bible seems to make very clear, and certainly makes very clear, is that we have broken God's law, that we have sinned, and because of that, we deserve a death. And yet, it's this same king who rules as we should have, but are not able to do, and certainly don't do consistently.

18:55 He is the one who then suffers for us as well, so that we don't have to suffer. Friends, that's the good news of the gospel. You have a king who rules as you should have, but you're not. And you have a king who suffered for you, so that you don't have to as well. That's why he tasted death, to save his people. that's Jesus, that's the one who's crowned through his suffering, and he can save you tonight as well. If you are not a part of his people, if you're hearing this, if you're a guest in here this evening and you're going, I don't understand much of what you're saying, understand this, this gospel message is for you as well. This same hope of being a part of a people who has been saved by their king is made available to you as well. The thing you need to do to be a part of that people is simply turn to the Lord and trust him. It's that simple. But brothers and sisters, I assume most of us in this room, I think the thing that we need to take away from here is this, that in the downtime of

19:56 life and in the mundane, even in the rest of your evening, this message needs to be at the forefront of our minds, kind of playing like a soundtrack over and over again, that Jesus takes to death for you so that you don't have to face the wrath of God. It's a simple gospel message. It's rehearsing the gospel to yourself. He suffered in your place, and friends, maybe even more hope-filled, Jesus is now ruling. When you look around and you think, there is nothing that can make sense of my life or what I see in this society, friends, that's not true. Jesus is ruling.

20:36 Jesus is ruling because he suffered in your place, and because he suffered in your place, And because he knows suffering, he is with you in your suffering. Oh, brothers and sisters, take heart in that. Find hope in that this week. Our king is ruling. Let's pray. Our Father in heaven, we thank you that we have a king on high who is ruling. We know from your word that you desired for us to rule and have dominion over this world.

21:07 And yet, because of our sin, we've shown that we are not able to do that on our own. Oh God, thank you for sending your son so that he would show us what the true man does, what the one who rules does, and even more than that, that he would suffer in our place so that we can be united to him by faith and be given eternal life. Oh God, tonight we pray that you would remind us that our king is ruling and that we would take heart in that. We pray all of that in Jesus' name. Amen.