Hebrews 11:40a
"God having provided some (what’s the next word?) better thing for us,…"
This world is nothing compared to what God has in store for us. Nothing. Whether it was the Old Testament living back in antiquity, or if it’s us living today, the comparison is the same. The things of that or this world are nothing compared with the eternal that’s waiting for us. But for the here and now God wants to instill His character by the essence of His Son ie...the Spirit of Christ within the yielded receptive being, for is for freedom that Christ set us free. Freedom from the sting of death and the freedom to worth-ship God through the freedom from under religion or the sin nature. By the willingness to die, put to death the sin nature of mans spiritual slavery in Satan's grip as a natural man. Through the entry into God's salvation which is an ongoing process within the re-genesised spirit of man. Man then becomes the creature that God had intended him to be, a creature in His likeness through receptivity of His divine activity. The secret Isra-El of God with the character and nature of Christ (the Elohim of God) restored to man. For God has provided something better.
Hebrews 11:40b
"…that they without us should not be made perfect."
In other words, brought to the place of spiritual completeness. And so history is replete with believers who suffered and died for their trusting His faithfulness, never having received that which they were looking for. For they saw Christ's day as in a vision, a shadow of what was to become. We're all to become all that God had intended and brought into existence in and then through His Son. But, oh it’s still out there. It’s still coming. This is what we hear within religion as if it is not for us in the here and now. But again its for freedom that Christ set s us free. If we become the response to His ability, for the church world says this we to have responsibility for our actions. But God says it is how we respond to His ability that matters. We're never to lose sight of that.
All right, now we’ll go on into Hebrews chapter 12 and here we want to take a moment of time to clarify something that even good men have completely muddled the thinking of thousands if not millions of people with. Paul uses the Septuagint LXX Greek Old Covenant and Psalm 94 for his narrative. Verse 1 of chapter 12, it’s going to ring a bell as soon as you see it.
Hebrews 12:1a
"Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses,…" In other words, all of these heroes of the trust, are referred to as a "cloud of witnesses." It’s because of the two different Greek words that we have to compare in looking at this verse.
Hebrews 12:1a
Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses,…" Now the Greek word for witnesses here is "martyras." It’s the same Greek word that is referred to in John chapter 1 verse 7. John chapter 1 verse 7, the same Greek word is used.
John 1:7a
"The same came for a witness, (John the Baptist, he was a martyras) to bear witness of the Light,…"
Now that didn’t mean that John the Baptist was sitting up there in the stands someplace watching Jesus, but what was he? He was proof that Jesus was the Christ. He bore witness to the fact that Jesus was who He said that He was, John was the testimony of Christ, just as the Old Testament or Covenant is the witness of. Just as Jesus said to the scribes Pharisee's and Sadducee's you search the scriptures thinking that you'll find Life in them but it they that testify of Me (John 5:39 paraphrased). That’s what it meant to be a witness of who he was.
Hebrews 12:1a
"Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses,…" Making reference of course, to all those that have been mentioned in the great faith chapter 11. When you stop to realize that, this is what we are to be. But we want to stop here to cover this "cloud of witnesses" around which there is so much confusion. How many times have you heard or have you read that all those that have gone on before are up there like in an amphitheater watching us. Horror of horrors! That wouldn’t be Heaven. That couldn't be anything but! If they’d have to be up there seeing what’s going on down here – no way. The witnesses, is from the Greek word "martyras," whereas the word if it meant spectators then it would be "autopisis" from which we get autopsy. What do you do at an autopsy? You look at it. That’s the Greek word, but the Greek word here in chapter 12 is "martyras." So the usage is correct we're to be witnesses of God's actions within us who have become His through the death of Satan's influence within our spirit wherein we become Son's of God having God's character restored to us. That which is of Faith and His activity alone.
Now let’s go back to John’s Gospel chapter 1, where John the Baptist is a witness of the ministry of the Lord Jesus. John’s Gospel chapter 1, starting at verse 6.
John 1:6-7
"There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all through him might believe."
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