"We have an altar from which those who serve the tent have no right" to eat (Hebrews 13:10).

This allusion to the Day of Atonement draws a contrast between the Old Covenant sacrifice and the sacrifice we enjoy in Christ. The priests could not eat the sacrifice offered on the Day of Atonement, for it had to be burned outside the camp (Leviticus 16:27). Christians, however, partake of Christ, who Himself said, "unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood," you have no life (John 6:53). Those who remain under the Old Covenant Law cannot share in the Christian altar, because it is by grace through faith. And the sacrifice we offer is not a continual, annual burnt offering for sin but a sacrifice of praise to God and thanksgiving to His name. What we partake of is a better sacrifice — the body and blood of Christ. What we give is a better offering — thanksgiving to God through Christ Jesus our Lord.

So, friends, as we look toward the new year, let us remind ourselves of the one sacrifice of Christ that covers all our sins. Let us continue to partake of Christ, which we do through faith in His name, offering the sacrifice of thanksgiving and pursuing every good work through Him. There is nothing better and nothing greater. With eyes fixed on Jesus, let us persevere in our faith, living out all that God has called and gifted us to do until our salvation is completed when His glory is revealed.

AI-Expanded Reflection

Hebrews 13:10–14 develops the Day of Atonement imagery in a striking direction. Because the sin offering's body was burned "outside the camp" (Leviticus 16:27), the writer notes that "Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people" through His own blood (13:12). Then comes the application: "Therefore let us go to him outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured" (13:13). For the letter's first readers, tempted to retreat into the safety of the temple system, this was a call to accept the social cost of following a crucified Messiah — with the promise that "here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come" (13:14).

The "sacrifice of praise" the comment mentions is the writer's own phrase: "Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God" — and he immediately adds a second offering: "Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have," for such sacrifices please God (13:15–16). Praise and practical generosity are the two sacrifices Christians now bring, made acceptable through the one sacrifice of Christ.

"Obey your leaders and submit to them," for they keep watch over your souls as those who will give an account (Hebrews 13:17).

The writer to the Hebrews exhorted his readers to obey their leaders. But which leaders did he mean? It is unlikely he had civil leaders in mind, for they would hardly be described as those who "keep watch over your souls" or who will "give an account" before God. The leaders in view were most likely spiritual leaders. But we must go further and ask which spiritual leaders were in view. Some Jewish teachers were trying to persuade these readers to continue trusting in the Law. Since the whole book contends with these teachers and their teaching, it is unlikely that this group is whom the writer had in mind. But there were leaders commended to them: remember those who led you and spoke to you the word of God; consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith; "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever"; do not be led away by diverse and strange teachings, for it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace, not by foods, which have not benefited those devoted to them (a paraphrase of Hebrews 13:7–9).

There were leaders who spoke the word of God to them. These stood in contrast to the teachers who tried to carry them away "by diverse and strange teachings," which had to do with foods — representative of the regulations of the Mosaic Law — rather than the grace of God.

The commendable leaders taught them about Jesus. And the message about Jesus that they taught had not changed, and never would. So the readers should be wary of anyone who came to them with a new or different doctrine.

The writer of Hebrews exhorts his readers to obey the teaching and follow the example of these commendable leaders, who from the first taught them God's Word in truth. They were to submit to their teaching rather than to the teaching that would lead them astray.

Friends, two important applications may be drawn from this text.

First, the writer of Hebrews is not simply giving a general exhortation to obey every spiritual leader. Those who faithfully teach the Word of God in truth are the ones the readers should obey. These are the leaders who should be encouraged and supported, for they are the ones God has appointed as watchmen over believers' souls. Those who distort God's Word ought to be corrected or avoided, depending on one's own competence in handling God's Word.

Second, the expression "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever" has, in this context, less to do with Jesus' unchanging divine nature than with the unchanging message of those who first preached the gospel to them. The context bears this out, as the writer warns against "diverse and strange teachings." A parallel thought appears in Paul's warning to the Galatians: he is astonished that they are so quickly deserting Him who called them in the grace of Christ and turning to a different gospel — not that there is another one, but some are troubling them and want to distort the gospel of Christ; even if he or an angel from heaven should preach a contrary gospel, let him be accursed (a paraphrase of Galatians 1:6–9).

Paul was concerned that the Galatian believers were being led astray by those who brought a different gospel than the one he preached. His point was that the gospel had not changed. They had not begun with a gospel that came by the Spirit, grace, and faith, only to move on to a new gospel that came by the Law (cf. Galatians 3:1–5).

In the same way, the writer of Hebrews argued that Jesus had not changed. The same Jesus preached to them when they first heard the gospel in faith is the Jesus they needed to keep following. And they did not need to worry about having to believe something different later, for the message of Jesus would remain the same forever.

AI-Expanded Reflection

Hebrews 13:17 is balanced in the text itself. Leaders are to be obeyed, but they are described as those who will "give an account" — accountable to God for how they care for souls. And the verse ends with a pastoral reason: "Let them do this with joy and not with groaning," which would be no advantage to you. Peter adds the complementary warning to leaders: shepherd the flock "not domineering over those in your charge, but being examples" (1 Peter 5:2–3). Scripture never commends uncritical submission; the Bereans were called "more noble" precisely because they examined Paul's preaching against the Scriptures (Acts 17:11).

On Hebrews 13:8, most interpreters would hold both senses the comment distinguishes. In context, the verse certainly supports the unchanging message about Christ — that is its function between verses 7 and 9. But the statement itself is about Christ's own constancy, which is the ground of that unchanging message, and it echoes the letter's earlier declaration that He remains and His years "will have no end" (1:11–12, quoting Psalm 102). Because Jesus does not change, the gospel about Him does not change either.

Keep on loving one another as brothers and sisters. Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it. Continue to remember those in prison as if you were together with them in prison, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering (Hebrews 13:1–3).

Friends, this is an exhortation to believers about other believers. The reference to strangers, those in prison, and those who are mistreated are believers in view of the first admonition to love "one another." It is by this kind of love that we show to one another the unbelieving world will know that we follow Christ:

A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another (John 13:34–35).

But do we relate to one another in this way? It is not simply sympathetic love, but empathetic love. Just as Paul also wrote, "Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn" (Romans 12:15).

I know that I have dreamed that we can share this kind of love in our Martial Arts Association, such that everywhere we go, where there is a member of our organization, no one needs to be afraid of being without a place to eat or sleep. And where there is a school, any one of us can freely go to that school and train while we are there.

Our church should certainly have this kind of concern for believers everywhere. Our outreach to South Dallas in partnership with Cornerstone is but a small token of this kind of care. We can certainly do much more. I pray that God will raise up leaders in this endeavor.

AI-Expanded Reflection

Hebrews 13 turns the endurance described in the preceding chapters toward the practical life of the community. Brotherly love must continue, strangers must be welcomed, and prisoners and mistreated people must be remembered with costly solidarity. These are not unrelated acts of kindness appended after theology. They show what it means for a people to seek an enduring city while living vulnerably in the present one. Faithfulness to God becomes visible in whether another person can find care among those who bear his name.

The reference to hospitality toward angels likely recalls narratives such as Genesis 18–19, where visitors prove more significant than their hosts initially understand. The instruction does not require us to suspect that every visitor is secretly supernatural. Its force is that the worth of welcome exceeds our ability to assess a stranger’s importance. We should not reserve generosity for people whose status or usefulness is already apparent. The unknown guest is received because hospitality is good, not because an extraordinary reward has been detected in advance.

The original understands the passage particularly as care for fellow believers. The letter’s earlier reference to solidarity with prisoners in Hebrews 10:32–34 supports the importance of persecuted Christians in its setting. Yet the term stranger should not be narrowed automatically to exclude everyone outside the faith. The command begins with brotherly love but expands the reader’s attention beyond familiar companions. The wider New Testament likewise joins particular responsibility toward believers with doing good to all (Galatians 6:10). A strong Christian family should make compassion more practiced, not make indifference toward outsiders respectable.

Remembering prisoners as though imprisoned with them goes beyond a fleeting sympathetic feeling. It asks us to imagine the practical dependence created by confinement and the social cost of being associated with the accused. Remembering the mistreated as people who share our embodied vulnerability similarly challenges emotional distance. We are not invulnerable observers dispensing favors downward; we belong to a human community in which need can become our own. That recognition gives assistance the character of solidarity rather than patronage.

The martial-arts association example makes this vision concrete: belonging could mean that a traveler knows where welcome, food, and companionship may be found. A church can cultivate that same reliability while attending wisely to circumstances and the dignity of everyone involved. Good intentions become durable through shared responsibility, clear communication, and people willing to undertake ordinary tasks. The call is not merely for someone else to emerge as a heroic leader. Each member can help create a community in which love has a recognizable address, an available chair, and time for the person who arrives in need.

Hebrews 11 gives us the nature of faith and a list of Old Testament examples of faith. Faith is a confident expectation of a better, unseen future. The Old Testament is chock-full of people who exhibit this kind of faith.

However, Hebrews 11 does not answer the question of where this faith comes from or who sustains this faith to the end or the essential content of this faith (but Hebrews 11:26 hints at it), all of which are necessary for salvation. For this we must come to Hebrews 12, where Jesus Christ is presented as both the Author and Finisher of faith:

Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God (Hebrews 12:1–2).

The expression "author and finisher" is very similar to the notion "alpha and omega" (i.e. the a to z of the Greek alphabet), where representative items are given to represent the beginning, ending and everything in between. This is called a "merism" in literature. It is a figure of speech "by which a single thing is referred to by a conventional phrase that enumerates several of its parts, or which lists several synonyms for the same thing" (Wikipedia):

Merisms are conspicuous features of Biblical poetry. For example, in Genesis 1:1, when God creates "the heavens and the earth," the two parts combine to indicate that God created the whole universe. Similarly, in Psalm 139, the psalmist declares that God knows "my downsitting and mine uprising", indicating that God knows all the psalmist's actions (Wikipedia).

Again, in Psalm 1:2, the expression "day and night" represents not simply two times during the day but the whole day long.

So also in today's reading the expression "author and finisher of faith" does not mean that Jesus is the One who simply starts and ends our faith. The two extremities are given to indicate that Christ supplies every aspect of faith.

Therefore, friends, in all our speaking and in all our doing, let us continually declare Jesus, the Author and Finisher, the Pioneer and Perfecter, the Alpha and Omega, of our faith. It is only by Him and through Him and in Him that people are saved.

AI-Expanded Reflection

The original uses merism—the expression of a whole through representative parts—to explain “author and finisher.” Its examples help readers see how language can communicate more than a list of separate actions. “Day and night,” for example, describes sustained meditation in Psalm 1:2. The comparison encourages believers to see Christ's significance throughout the life of faith rather than only at its beginning and end.

The analogy should not replace attention to the actual words in Hebrews 12:2. The term often translated “author” can carry the sense of a leader, founder, or pioneer; the term translated “finisher” or “perfecter” concerns bringing to completion. The verse immediately explains Christ's endurance of the cross and his present place at God's right hand. He is not merely an abstract source of confidence but the one whose obedient course has reached its goal. Read Hebrews 12:1–3.

There is also a grammatical caution: the Greek does not explicitly include “our” before faith, although some English translations supply it. The verse can be discussed in terms of Jesus' relation to believers' faith and his own exemplary faithful endurance. The merism analogy alone cannot settle every question about how faith originates or the precise sequence of regeneration and belief. Those broader theological claims require broader argument.

The race imagery gives the doctrine its practical shape. Readers lay aside impediments, endure the course before them, and look to Jesus when opposition threatens to exhaust them. The witnesses of Hebrews 11 testify through their lives to the worth of trusting God; Jesus supplies the decisive focus. Confidence in his sustaining work therefore encourages perseverance rather than passivity. Looking to him means learning to judge present shame, difficulty, and delay in light of the joy and vindication God has set beyond them.

Friends, Hebrews 11 is known as the great chapter on faith — but faith isn't its only emphasis. The examples given aren't cases of faith sparked by a sign, miracle, or fleece, but faith grounded in hope for a better future. Faith, as the chapter opens, is "the assurance of things hoped for" (Hebrews 11:1). Because hope, by nature, concerns the future and remains unrealized, it's presently invisible. As Romans teaches, hope that's already seen isn't really hope at all — who hopes for something they already have? But hoping for what we don't yet have means waiting for it patiently (a paraphrase of Romans 8:24–25). So faith grounded in hope is "the conviction of things not seen" (Hebrews 11:1).

Why does this matter? It's a warning to anyone too satisfied with present reality and too invested in earthly pursuits. We're all familiar with "immediate gratification" — an expression capturing an American cultural instinct diametrically opposed to faith grounded in hope. Immediate gratification craves what's visible and wants it now; hope remains unseen and future. Chasing immediate gratification will prevent us from living the life of faith God desires, and may keep us from realizing the hope He's prepared for us.

But living by faith means we won't be overly preoccupied with our present experience, easy or hard. Even in the hardest seasons, we can say with Paul that our present sufferings aren't worth comparing to the glory that will be revealed in us (a paraphrase of Romans 8:18). We wouldn't be living for the "now," which fades like a vapor (cf. James 4:14), but for a better, eternal future (cf. Hebrews 11:16, 26, 35).

Why does this matter for us today? If we keep living encumbered by immediate gratification, we'll be ineffective servants and witnesses — salt without flavor, light hidden away (cf. Matthew 5:13–16). Hebrews 11 concludes with Hebrews 12:1–3, encouraging us to lay aside the weight of immediate gratification, run the race of faith grounded in hope, and fix our eyes on Christ, faith's preeminent example — surrounded, as we are, by such a great cloud of witnesses, laying aside every weight and the sin that so easily entangles us, running with endurance the race set before us, our eyes fixed on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who endured the cross for the joy set before Him, despising its shame, now seated at God's right hand — so that considering Him, who endured such hostility from sinners, we won't grow weary and lose heart (a paraphrase of Hebrews 12:1–3).

Friends, heading into a new year, and as you consider your own resolutions, I'd encourage you to shape them around faith grounded in hope rather than immediate gratification.

AI-Expanded Reflection

The specific examples Hebrews 11 chooses actually reinforce this comment's own point better than a quick read might suggest — nearly every figure listed dies without seeing the promise fulfilled (Hebrews 11:13, 39), which the chapter treats not as tragic failure but as the very definition of faith working correctly. If Abraham, Sarah, and the rest had received immediate gratification of God's promises in their own lifetimes, their stories wouldn't function nearly as well as models of hope-grounded faith — the incompleteness this comment identifies as central to genuine faith is written directly into the biographical details of every person the chapter actually names.