“The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact expression of his nature, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After making purifications for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high.”
-Hebrews 1:3
Oh, this verse is just dripping with glorious truth about God, about Jesus, this verse is one of the clearest pronouncements of both the humanity and deity of Jesus, I should say the full humanity and the full deity of Jesus. He’s not just somewhat man and somewhat god or kind of man and kind of god, he is fully god, he is the radiance of the glory of God, the exact expression of his nature.
He sustains everything by his powerful word. We think God sustains everything by his word. Yes, and Jesus is God. So we see his full deity here at the same time we see his full humanity, he made purifications for sins. How is that possible? This is basically just a summary and a phrase of how Jesus came to the world, fully man, lived a sinless life and then offered himself as a sacrifice for sins as a substitute for sinners and in this way he made purifications for sins as a man. In fact, his ability to do that was dependent on being a man.
The One who upholds the universe took on human flesh and lived the life we could not live. He died for sinners, ascended on high, and sat down having finished the work He came to do.
Hebrews 1:3 Reminds Us of the Trinity
As fully man, he is able to identify with men and women in our sin as fully God, he’s able to take the full divine payment due sin, his humanity and deity make him uniquely able to save us from our sins. We see that here in this verse and then this triumphant reality that Jesus sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high. So here we are seeing that yes, Jesus is god.
At the same time, we are seeing different persons in God, what we see throughout the Bible that there is one God revealed in three persons, God the father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, a trinitarian God. Oh, we could go on and on and on, but just Hebrews 1:3 brings us to our knees before God, before Jesus, before the Father, Son and Holy Spirit in awe and we pray.
God Is Above All
Oh God, you are greater, more glorious, than our minds can even fathom. Your nature is ultimately mysterious and yet majestic in a way that we can know. Oh Jesus, we praise you, for your full deity and your full humanity. We praise you that you are like us and yet you are the exact expression of the nature of God, sustaining all things by your powerful word as God.
We praise you as the God man, unlike anyone else in all the world and all of history, uniquely able to provide purification for our sins. God we worship you, we glorify you, we praise you. Oh God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, one God, we bow in awe, in reverence before You. We worship You, we exalt You, we praise You, we love You, we want to honor and glorify You in our lives. Oh God, we bow our heads in awe and we pray. Be honored in our lives today. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
