Hebrews: The Daily Discipline of a Devoted LifeSample

In this closing passage, the writer invites his readers to contrast the present ‘Jerusalem’ they are living in, with the future ‘Jerusalem’ they are actually part of. Life in this world will always be full of false religion and alienation for Christians who are truly following Christ, but our rejection of false religion and our alienation from the culture are signs that we truly are children of the New Jerusalem. 

The passage begins by talking, quite obliquely, about false teaching, which has something to do with ceremonial food laws. The coming of Christ has meant that following food laws and particular religious rituals to make you right with God has been replaced by God’s grace in Christ: ‘It is good for our hearts to be strengthened by grace, not by ceremonial foods’ (v. 9). False religion will always tell us to fulfill certain rituals as the way to be right with God. But we are children of grace, accepted by God already on the basis of Christ’s sacrifice, and we need to shun any teaching that drags us back into a world of empty ritual. That’s part of the Old Jerusalem, but we now have New Jerusalem passports. 

Of course when we dance to the tunes of grace rather than ritual, we will not be welcome, and the writer reminds his readers how Christ himself was crucified ‘outside the camp’ (v. 11). Outside the city walls of Jerusalem, rejected by the Judaism of his day, Christ died in shame. But the writer says we must go to him ‘outside the camp’, and be willing to face the shame and reproach he experienced. We don’t belong to this world anymore: ‘we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come’ (v. 14). 

Our eyes are not fixed on the short-term joys of this world. We are now active citizens of the world to come: Mount Zion packed with a multitude of angels in joyful assembly. That’s where we belong! So we live life today according to the values of Zion: ‘let us continually offer to God a sacrifice’ – not of bulls and goats, but ‘of praise … And do not forget to do good and to share with others’ (vv. 15-16). The sacrifices God really appreciates, now that Christ’s blood has been shed ‘once for all’, are lips that praise God and lives that pursue good works, loving our brothers and sisters. We are children of the future, living as a signpost of the age to come. 

Reflection

Are you living for this world or the next? How do you know?