Consider Jesus

Therefore, holy brothers, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, the apostle and high priest whom we confess.

Hebrews 3:1

In this passage we are told to consider Jesus. The word “consider” means to bring one’s mind in all its capacity to bear upon something. It is what a young man does when he is dating. He is thinking very seriously about who the woman is. After careful consideration, he confesses that he loves her and they marry, and continue in the married state until death. Today we want to look at what it means to consider Jesus, confess Jesus, and continue in Jesus.

Consider Jesus

We need to consider Jesus because Christians are tempted to forsake Christ when they face troubles such as sickness, poverty, and persecution. They are also tempted to abandon their faith when they experience material prosperity. Remember how the church of Laodicea boasted, “I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing” (Rev. 3:17). Oh, what tragedy!

The church of the Hebrews was facing persecution for its faith in Jesus Christ and was tempted to go back to Judaism to avoid troubles. These people were probably feeling pressure to consider Moses superior to Jesus, as the unbelieving Jews did, who revered Moses because he gave them the law and saw God face to face. But in Hebrews 3:1-6 the author directly appeals to the congregation to persevere in the faith, exhorting them to exercise their minds to know Jesus and his infinite superiority, not only over angels, but also over Moses.

Christianity demands acute mental activity, not hollow enthusiasm. Verse 1 begins, “Therefore, holy brothers. . . .” “Therefore” means there is a reason. In the preceding chapters, the author told us that Jesus Christ is the Son who brought us the final revelation of God. He is the radiance of God’s glory, the creator, upholder, and heir of all things. After providing purification for our sins, he is now seated as the King of kings. He is superior to angels; in fact, angels worship him as God. He is crowned with glory and honor, for he tasted death in our place and regained what Adam lost. He is our elder brother, our kinsman-redeemer, our Boaz, who by his incarnation became our perfect high priest and perfect victim, making atonement for our sins so that we could worship God. By his propitiatory death, this Jesus destroyed the devil and liberated us once for all from the fear of death. This Jesus Christ is able to help his brothers, who are being tempted daily.

Notice the phrase “holy brothers.” These people are brothers of Jesus and of one another because they belong to the family of God. They are holy because Jesus Christ the Sanctifier consecrated them so that they can have access to God in the name of Jesus. In Hebrews 13:24 they are called “saints” or “holy ones.”

The writer says these believers “share in the heavenly calling,” a calling from heaven to heaven. God took the initiative in their salvation, inviting them to eternal fellowship with him. God is calling us to enter heaven through his Son Jesus; we are to turn away from all idols to the true and living God. Paul calls it “upward calling.” It is a calling to a heavenly country, to a heavenly city, the new Jerusalem. What a privilege it is to be invited by God himself to his great eschatological feast! Have you shared in this heavenly calling? Have you become a member of his church, his ekklêsia, the company of those who are called out from the world?

The Greek word katanoeô means to “fix one’s thoughts on something.” Either we fix our thoughts on ourselves or on Jesus. Those who are unhappy and complaining refuse to fix their thoughts on Jesus. Instead, they always think about themselves and their problems. This word is used by Jesus in Matthew 7 about people who are careful about noticing the speck in others’ eyes but refuse to consider the huge beam in their own eyes. Jesus also used this word when he said, “Consider the ravens” and “Consider the lilies” (Luke 12:24, 27). He was encouraging his people to study carefully how God feeds the ravens and clothes the lilies in beauty that transcends all the glory of Solomon.

When we bring all our mental powers to bear upon the Lord Jesus Christ, we will discover him to be all-sufficient. Notice, it is a command. We must bring our minds to focus on Jesus intensely to know him fully. It means to meditate on the Scripture so that we can know the person and work of Christ, that we may love him, treasure him, worship and serve him only, and be completely satisfied with him. Faith comes by hearing the gospel, and faith in Jesus increases by considering Jesus as revealed in the Scripture.

We are commanded to love God with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind. Those who become apostate are mindless people, like the first three soils in the parable of the sower. Mindless Christians are weak and become easy prey for Satan. They would not say, “It is written.” When our minds are renewed, we love Jesus with all our mind.

Consider Jesus! In Hebrews 2:9 the writer says, “But we see Jesus,” and in Hebrews 12:2-3 he exhorts, “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith. . . Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men.” Consider him! Know him! Think about him! Know his person and work! Know that he is our high priest! Know this, so that we will not grow weary and lose heart. The antidote to backsliding is to consider Jesus.

What are you considering? Are you thinking about the world, or about the Savior of the world? Consider Jesus, and you will truly be happy. The psalmist tells us, “His delight in the law of the Lord, and on his law he mediates day and night. . . .Whatever he does prospers” (Ps.1:2-3). The writer of Proverbs says, “My son, pay attention to what I say; listen closely to my words. Do not let them out of your sight, keep them within your heart; for they are life to those who find them and health to man’s whole body” (Prov. 4:20-22). We cannot consider Jesus and remain confused, miserable, and depressed.

Confess Jesus

Those who consider Jesus will also confess him: “Fix your thoughts on Jesus, the apostle and high priest whom we confess” (Heb. 3:1). Confession has two parts. We can confess, “God is our God,” but it means nothing unless God also confesses, “You are my people.”

Jesus is the apostle and high priest of our confession. “Apostle” means he is the ambassador from God the Father who comes with authority and a mission. He is the final revelation of God. Jesus Christ did not glorify himself; he glorified his Father, fulfilling God’s purpose of accomplishing redemption by his substitutionary, penal, and propitiatory death on the cross. Isaiah said God’s purpose would prosper in his hand (Is. 53:10). He took away the sin of the world.

As the Apostle of all apostles, he declares the gospel of our eternal salvation. Who is this apostle? He is God’s Son, the creator and upholder of all things. God the Father sent Jesus Christ into the world to declare the gospel because he is the gospel. Having accomplished redemption on the cross, he now commissions others to go into all the world to preach repentance and forgiveness of sins. In John 17 he said, “Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do. . . .As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world” (vv. 3, 4, 18). In John 20:21 Jesus told his disciples, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.”

This apostle Jesus saves his people from their sins. Have you confessed him as your Savior and Apostle? Did you recognize his person, power, and purpose? In Jesus Christ, God the Father is speaking. To deny Jesus is to deny the Father and be judged by him on the last day. He who receives him, receives the one who sent him.

This Jesus is also our sinless, God-man high priest, who offered himself as an acceptable sacrifice for our sin. Have you considered this aspect of his person and his work? Because he dealt with our sin problem once and for all, now in Jesus we can fearlessly approach the throne of grace with a pure conscience cleansed by the sprinkling of the blood of Christ. Now the Father will receive us and give us the heavenly blessings of mercy and grace.

The author tells us to consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession. Do you confess this Jesus as your high priest? Have you trusted in his propitiation to take away your sins forever from the sight of God? Have your sins been covered by the shed blood of Jesus our high priest? Have you confessed him before the church and before the world?

Let us look at this idea of confession. In 1 Timothy 6:12 we read, “Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made your good confession.” Romans 10:9 says, “If you confess with your mouth ‘Jesus is Lord’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” First Corinthians 12:3 tells us no one is able to make this confession except by and through the Holy Spirit: “Therefore I tell you that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, ‘Jesus be accursed,’ and no one can say, ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Spirit of God.”

We are to confess Jesus Christ in the presence of God’s people, but we must also confess him before the world: “Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will acknowledge him before the Father in heaven. But whosoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven” (Matt. 10:32-33). When the apostles were commanded not to confess Jesus Christ and preach in his name, they told the Sanhedrin, “We cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:20).

This confession causes trouble. When Jesus healed the blind man, the man’s parents said they did not know who healed him: “His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews, for already the Jews had decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Christ would be put out of the synagogue” (John 9:22). This tells us right away why we are very quiet in the world: we are afraid. (PGM) When the blind man spoke favorably of Jesus, the Pharisees told him, “You were steeped in sin at birth; how dare you lecture us!” and threw him out (v. 34). Acts 5:41 tells us what happened when the apostles confessed Jesus before the Sanhedrin: “The apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name.” They had been severely flogged for their stand for Christ.

In Hebrews 10 we read what these people themselves experienced in their earlier days because of their confession: “Remember those earlier days after you had received the light, when you stood your ground in a great contest in the face of suffering. Sometimes you were publicly exposed to insult and persecution; at other times you stood side by side with those who were so treated. You sympathized with those in prison and joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property, because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions” (vv. 32-34). In Hebrews 11 we read about others who suffered for their confession: “Some faced jeers and flogging, while still others were chained and put in prison. They were stoned; they were sawed in two; they were put to death by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated-the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground” (vv. 36-38).

If you consider Jesus and his gospel, you will confess him. Most people refuse to confess Christ because they refuse to consider him. They suppress the truth of Jesus and exchange the gospel for a lie. But if you fix your thoughts on Jesus, you will confess him as your apostle and high priest. First Corinthians 1:30 tells us, “It is because of [God the Father] that you are in Christ Jesus who has become for us wisdom from God-that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption.” This Jesus is wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption for us; thus, we confess him.

The psalmist was miserable until he went to the temple of the Lord. Then he confesses: “Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever” (Ps. 73:25-26). This man was a realist. He acknowledged that his flesh and heart would fail, but he also believes in resurrection unto eternal life. The psalmist believes in celestial, everlasting felicity with God. He agrees with Paul that to be absent from the body is to be present with Christ.

The prophet Habakkuk was not a fair weather Christian. He declares, “Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Savior” (Hab. 3:17-18). What a terrible thing to teach prosperity through Jesus! Such teaching leaves no room for problems and persecutions. Jesus told Martha that only one thing is needful. Jesus is all we need. When we consider him, we will confess him, and we will discover him to be sufficient for all our needs. Can you say Jesus is the apostle and high priest of your confession?

Continue in Jesus

If troubles begin the moment you confess based on your consideration, will you continue? This Jesus is the faithful one who is infinitely superior to faithful Moses. We must not stop following Jesus because of persecution. If we do, we will be proving that we have nothing to do with him and that he never confessed about us, “You are my people.”

The writer to the Hebrews was telling this church, “If you fix your thoughts on Jesus, you will not quit and go back to the shadow of the Mosaic economy of bloody sacrifices and external ceremonies.” The Jews adored Moses and rejected Jesus. But this is the wrong way to think of Moses. Moses is not the final revelation of God to man; rather, Moses was pointing to the future coming of the Messiah. Moses pointed to Jesus, and Jesus pointed to himself, saying, “I am that I am. I am the light of the world. I am the bread of life. I am the good shepherd. I am the resurrection and the life. I say to you, ‘You have heard it said,’ but I say to you.” He is the final revelation. It is utterly foolish to adore Moses and refuse to worship Jesus, who is the Creator, God, and Savior of Moses.

Moses himself was looking forward to Christ: “He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt because he was looking ahead to his reward” (Heb. 11:26). Jesus says, “If you believed Moses, you would believe me for he wrote about me” (John 5:46). In Deuteronomy 18:15 Moses demands, “The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own brothers. You must listen to him” (Deut. 18:15). This was fulfilled on the Mount of Transfiguration when the Father declares of Christ in the presence of Moses and Elijah, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!” (Matt. 17:5).

Referring to Jesus Christ, the apostle Peter asserts, “All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name” (Acts 10:43). Peter did not say “everyone who believes in Moses.” Like John the Baptist, meek Moses would say, “Do not believe in me; believe in the one coming after me. Let me decrease and let him increase, because he is my God and my Savior. Christ is the one I wrote about and am expecting to come into the world and save sinners.”

Hebrews 3:1-6 speaks six times about a house being built. This is speaking about the church, the body of Christ, the people of God. God builds his temple with living stones (cf. 1 Pet. 2). The church is not a place where people come and go independently and autonomously. It is a house of living stones, with each one connected to God and to each other. It is the family of God.

In this house of God, Moses served as a steward faithful to God. Here again we see the point that Jesus is superior to Moses, and so it would be foolish for these Hebrew Christians to go back to Moses and Judaism. The writer says that Moses was faithful as a servant in the house of God, but Jesus was faithful as a Son over the house of God. Jesus was the builder of God’s house; Moses was part of the house he built. The author was saying, “Do not be infatuated with Moses and Judaism and its rituals. Do not be tempted to forsake the reality of Jesus for the shadow of Judaism. Jesus Christ is of greater glory than Moses. If you go back to Judaism to avoid persecution, you are proving that you are not heirs of salvation and your confession is false.”

Here again, then, we are exhorted to think clearly. Moses is part of the house; Christ is the builder of the house. Moses was faithful in the house; Jesus is faithful over the house. Moses was a servant in the house; Jesus was a Son over the house. Moses loved God; Jesus is the God whom he loved. Moses was sinful and in need of salvation; Jesus was sinless and he saves sinners. Moses brought his people out from the bondage of Pharaoh; Jesus is bringing his people out from sin, death, and the devil. Moses was a creature; Jesus is the Creator.

This Jesus builds the house of his church. He owns it, rules it, and provides for it. Moses was faithful as a servant; Jesus is faithful as a Son. Then we read, “And we are his house, if we hold on to our courage and the hope of which we boast” (Heb. 3:6). The idea here is that we must be faithful to continue in the confession we made after considering carefully the person and work of Christ.

Consider Jesus and live out your confession, in spite of persecution, and you shall inherit a heavenly city. Persevere to the end as Jesus did and sat down in glory. The writer says, “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood” (Heb. 12:2-4). In other words, we may even die for the sake of our faith in Jesus Christ.

Only perseverance can prove the authenticity of one’s consideration and confession. F. F. Bruce says, “The doctrine of the final perseverance of the saints has as its corollary the salutary teaching that the saints are the people who persevere to the end” (F. F. Bruce, The New International Commentary on the New Testament: The Epistle to the Hebrews (Revised Edition), [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1990], 94). I do not believe in a teaching of eternal security where a person does not persevere. I believe that the saints will persevere to the end, enabled by our God.

If a person fails to be faithful to God till death, he never was a part of the house Christ is building. A true Christian will hold on fearlessly to his confession. Such a person will carefully apply his mind to consider Jesus and will freely boast in the hope of the glory of God. He will defy death for the sake of his confession that Jesus is Lord and will rejoice in tribulations. He knows that tribulation produces perseverance, perseverance character, and character hope, a hope that does not make us ashamed-a hope in the glorious return of the Lord. We shall then be made like him, for we shall see him as he is.

We must continue in our confession. Remember Lot’s wife, and take warning. Remember Judas. Remember Demas, who was a fellow minister of the apostle Paul, but abandoned the gospel toward the end of his life, having loved this present world. Of such people John writes, “They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us” (1 John 2:19). Heed the words of Jesus to the church of Smyrna and all the martyrs of the church: “Be faithful, even to the point of death, and I will give you a crown of life” (Rev. 2:10). Our boast is in Jesus Christ and the glory of God. Do not be ashamed or timid: “God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline” (2 Tim. 1:7).

Above all, remember Jesus, who endured the cross, scorning its shame, and died and rose from the dead. See him as the Sovereign Ruler of the universe, crowned with glory and honor. Consider Christ by the full application of your renewed mind. Confess Christ before the world in proclamation and by proper conduct. Continue in the faith till death with fearless, death-defying confidence in the sure hope of the glory of God.