Jesus is my homeboy.

Or, at least, that’s what a popular t-shirt reads.  They sell them not at Christian bookstores, but at places like Urban Outfitters, right next to ones that say things like: “Jesus surfs without a board.”  But Jesus isn’t just relegated to a t-shirt slogan.  Rap artist Kanye West made waves a few years ago when he appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone wearing a crown of thorns.  And—most recently—“Jesus” has actually appeared onstage at Kanye’s performances, offering forgiveness and love.

Today’s world has a genuine fondness for Jesus.  It’s just that they fear his message has been perverted and corrupted by institutional Christianity—an organization that has co-opted Jesus’ message and bent it for a personal and political agenda.

The love for Jesus fits broadly into a post-everything world, one wear “spirituality” has more fashionably superseded “religious” as a means of describing oneself.  A generation or so ago, we lived in a modern world.  We asked modern questions, like: “Should I believe in Jesus or not?”  Scholars told us of a “Christ of history,” so different from the “Christ of faith” we grew up admiring.  These two “Christs” were separated by what one scholar called “an ugly, broad ditch.”  But in a postmodern world, we’re asking different questions.  We’ve crossed that “ugly, broad ditch” only to find ourselves standing in a hall of mirrors.  If yesterday’s question was: “Should I believe in Jesus or not?” today’s question is: “What kind of Jesus should I believe in?”  We long for a vision of Jesus that is not merely a distant shadow cast by the dim light of religious tradition.  We want a Savior that can empathize directly with our experience.

Appearing in http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/5318718/Jesus-in-jeans-sculpture-unveiled.html

We’ll find this Jesus in Sussex, England.  Above the door of a church hangs not a panel of stained glass but a seven-foot-tall statue of Jesus sporting a pair of jeans.  Many—including journalist Steve Case—readily identify with this “Jesus in jeans.”

“I’d like to have a cup of coffee with Jesus someday,” Case writes.  “Not the guy in the clean white robe who speaks in King James English…just a ‘guy.’  A son of God who laughs, hangs out with the outcasts, breaks the rules that need breaking, and calls the finger-pointers on the carpet.”

For Case, this earthy version of Jesus is essential to the future of faith.

“If we can find a way for people to see and touch and hear and smell Jesus, it might make it a little easier when we ask them to have faith in a Jesus that is beyond our senses.  Yes, what Jesus did…was an act of immeasurable compassion and love.  But isn’t it easier to hug someone whose arms aren’t nailed down?”

The writer of Hebrews gives special attention to explaining who Jesus is to his readers.  After his introduction (Hebrews 1:1-4) he turns his focus to the splendor and majesty of Christ.  More specifically, the author of Hebrews takes the time to explain that Jesus is superior to the angels.  Why?  Some have speculated that the original readers had become preoccupied with the worship of angels.  Others have speculated that maybe—in their confusion—they might have suspected that Jesus had been an angel.  But we really don’t have any historic basis for either suggestion.  Instead, we can read between the lines to see that the author of Hebrews is simply trying to further reveal the incredible supremacy of Jesus.  And he does so in two distinct ways.

THE SON OF GOD

First, the writer uses scripture to point to the reality of Jesus as the Son of God:

5 For to which of the angels did God ever say,

“You are my Son,
today I have begotten you”?

Or again,

“I will be to him a father,
and he shall be to me a son”?

6 And again, when he brings the firstborn into the world, he says,

“Let all God’s angels worship him.”

Mind you, “Son of God” was a term used frequently of ancient kings.  In neighboring cultures, kings saw themselves as either the gods’ representatives or some sort of demigod come to earth (if you saw the film 300, the Persian King Xerxes was an example of this—even in spite of Hollywood’s creative license).  But here the author of Hebrews cites three specific passages (Psalm 2:7; 2 Samuel 7:14; and Deuteronomy 32:43) to directly point to Jesus.  Even if kings like David had ever been “sons of God” in some political sense, only Jesus is the “Son of God” in the divine sense.  Even the term “firstborn” is heavy with meaning, showing that Jesus is the emphatically eternal revelation of God.

THE KING OF ISRAEL

Secondly, the writer points to the reality of Jesus as the true King of Israel:

7 Of the angels he says,

“He makes his angels winds,
and his ministers a flame of fire.”

8 But of the Son he says,

“Your throne, O God, is forever and ever,
the scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom.
9 You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness;
therefore God, your God, has anointed you
with the oil of gladness beyond your companions.”

10 And,

“You, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning,
and the heavens are the work of your hands;
11 they will perish, but you remain;
they will all wear out like a garment,
12 like a robe you will roll them up,
like a garment they will be changed.
But you are the same,
and your years will have no end.”

13 And to which of the angels has he ever said,

“Sit at my right hand
until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet”?

14 Are they not all ministering spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation?

This section begins and ends with a brief reflection on the nature of angels.  Yes, he says in verse 7, they are powerful and devoted servants (he quotes Psalm 104:4 to illustrate this), but they pale in comparison to the king of Israel.

So in verses 8-13 the author again draws from the wealth of scripture to reveal that Jesus is the ruler of all (Psalm 45:6-7; Psalm 102:25-27; and Psalm 110:1).  Psalm 110—the last psalm quoted—is a favorite among writers of the New Testament to emphasize Jesus’ superiority.

CLOTHED IN HIS GOSPEL

In one of his works on the life of Christ, N.T. Wright devotes considerable attention to the ways that the early Jews longed for two specific things to happen.  First, they longed for a day when God would physically be among them.  Second, they longed for the day when—once again—a King from the line of David would rule over them.  But, Wright observes, in the years surrounding the arrival of Jesus, no one seemed to ever expect that both of these expectations would be fulfilled in the same person.

Why should this matter?  Because Christianity insists that the identity of Jesus is anchored not in popular imaginations or t-shirt slogans, but instead it is deeply embedded in Israel’s history.  When we open the pages of Scripture, we find not a “Jesus in jeans” but instead what John Calvin once called a “Christ who is clothed in his gospel.”  The good news for folks like Steve Case is that we still get a Savior who identifies with us, who shares in our every human experience—both bad and good.  But if Jesus identifies with me it’s not because he’s “just another guy.”  I don’t want just another guy I can have coffee with.  Left to my own devices, I can only make my life a greater disaster.  I need a Savior with the capability and desire to lift me from the ruins and expand my vision of his Kingdom.  I need a Jesus clothed in his gospel.

“We’re never gonna win the world,” sings contemporary blues artist John Mayer.  “We’re never gonna stop the war.  We’re never gonna beat this if belief is what we’re fighting for.”  Mayer’s 2006 song resonates with much of America’s contemporary spiritual state.  With so many religious and spiritual voices out there, why even bother trying to unite everyone under one belief system?

The irony, of course, is that much of America has at least begun to unite in their beliefs—the only difference is that we’re largely unwilling to give it a name.  According to data from 2012, roughly 1 in every 5 Americans is “religiously unaffiliated”—though the number will soon skyrocket, as roughly 1 in 3 Americans under 30 also considers themselves “unaffiliated.”  Mind you—these people believe earnestly in God; they’ve just lost their faith in traditional religion.  For many, religion is the problem—not the solution—to our social problems.

What we’re left with is what New York Times columnist Ross Douthat calls our “populist creed”—the beliefs that largely unite those who’d prefer to label themselves “spiritual” than overtly “religious.”  In Douthat’s 2012 book Bad Religion, he says that this “populist creed” takes the following form:

• No religion offers a complete picture of God. Therefore God is not experienced through manmade teachings, but personal encounters.
• God is everywhere—but he is best encountered by looking inside oneself. Self-discovery marks both the means—and the destination—of man’s spiritual quest.
• Sin and evil—if they exist—will one day be reconciled, rather than defeated. Douthat cites Elizabeth Gilbert’s bestselling memoir Eat, Pray, Love, in which she writes: “There is no such thing in this universe as hell, except maybe in our own terrified minds.”
• Perfect happiness is available right now—not in some distant heaven. What’s important is taking care of the world we currently inhabit.

Understandably, Christianity runs against the current of today’s culture.  Christianity teaches that only in Jesus do we see a complete picture of God.  God is found not within ourselves, but in the Truth he reveals most specifically in the Bible, and in Jesus.  Christianity teaches that sin and death are realities defeated through the work of Jesus, and that perfect happiness awaits us when God finally sets the world right.

This is hardly the first time in which Christianity has experienced conflict with the broader culture.  As we explore the book of Hebrews, we begin to see the ways in which early Christianity generated conflict with the culture around them.

You may recall that in the first century, the Roman government tolerated the Jews—but only barely.  So when Christianity emerged, it did so under threat of persecution from the Romans (who didn’t tolerate this new faith) and from the Jews (who feared a new faith would upset their uneasy peace with Rome).  At one point, Rome reacted against this “Jewish cult” by expelling Jewish Christians from their homes.  But regardless of whether any particular incident sparked the writing of Hebrews, one thing is certain: the early culture—one that placed high value on the categories of honor and shame—generated enormous external pressure for early Christians.

This culture pressure gave birth to two dangers addressed in the letter to the Hebrews.  First was spiritual burnout—that the time seemed long between God’s promises and fulfillment.  What joy was there to be found in being social outcasts?  Second was functional atheism—that is, believing that God is real, but acting as if he’s not.  The early church struggled with those who abandoned the gospel for a life of pleasure-seeking.

Sound familiar?  Today we face similar kinds of cultural pressure.  It’s tough standing for the gospel in a world that sees Christianity as a social threat.  We may similarly face spiritual burnout—after all, is there any real value in going to church these days?  Aren’t I just as well-off staying home with my family?  Alternately we may face our own form of functional atheism.   We go to church faithfully, but our lives are ruled by devotion to the lesser gods of career, sexuality, money, power, and so on.

Thus the message of Hebrews is as clear as ever: endure.  But how?  Over the years a long litany of solutions have been raised, all of which seem to focus on technique.  But in his book God in the Wasteland, David Wells observes that this focus has been woefully inadequate:

“[T]he fundamental problem in the evangelical world today is not inadequate technique, insufficient organization, or antiquated music, and those who want to squander the church’s resources bandaging these scratches will do nothing to staunch the flow of blood that is spilling from its true wounds.  The fundamental problem in the evangelical world today is that God rests too inconsequentially upon the church.  His truth is too distant, his grace is too ordinary, his judgment is too benign, his gospel is too easy, and his Christ is too common.”  (David Wells, God in the Wasteland, p. 30)

What we need, then, is an “uncommon” Christ.  A Savior that transcends the boundaries of rationality and inward-gazing spirituality.  So it’s only fitting that the letter of Hebrews opens by directing our full attention at the person of Jesus:

Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, 2 but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. 3 He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, 4 having become as much superior to angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs. (Hebrews 1:1-4)

In his commentary on Hebrews, Paul Ellingworth takes note of how the author opens with “an interweaving of themes, as in musical composition.”  There’s music to be heard here, if we listen closely enough.  What is the writer saying?  He’s saying that the Bible serves us well in its ability to reveal God—but now that we have Jesus, we no longer see God embedded in a text, but embodied in flesh and blood and sinew.

Of course, this cuts both ways.  Why?  Because it also tells us that if Jesus is the perfect embodiment of God, then it doesn’t render our scriptures obsolete.  On the contrary; it infuses them with new meaning, because they all point to this magnificent Son.

To know Jesus is to know God, and what you think about Jesus you also think about God.  The original Greek here uses the term charakter—translated in verse 3 as “the exact imprint of [God’s] nature.”  It’s easy to see where we get the English word “character” here, though in the ancient world they also used the term to refer to the stamps on coins.

The whole passage resonates with other early Christian thought, such as that of Paul in writing to the church in Colosse:

¹⁵ He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. ¹⁶ For by^[f]him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. ¹⁷ And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. ¹⁸ And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. ¹⁹ For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, ²⁰ and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. (Colossians 1:15-20)

Barry Taylor—artist and professor at Fuller Seminary—has observed that today’s world seems bent on “rescuing” Jesus from the clutches of religious conservatives “who, the consensus s seems to say, have done Jesus a grave injustice by making him out to be just like them – uptight, overly religious in the pejorative sense, lacking a sense of humor, and disconnected from the way things really are.”  (Barry Taylor, Entertainment Theology, p. 153)

But in the world of the New Testament we find a Jesus who is fully and emphatically God.  In the sixteenth century Philip Melancthon—one of Luther’s students—wrote that “God indeed dwells in other holy people, but dwells spiritually.…But in Christ he dwells bodily…the very divine nature has poured itself into the flesh, with all its power.”  He eternally exists.  He is intimately involved in creation.  He holds authority over his followers—the church.  And only through his saving work can man find his way back to God.

Douglas Coupland is best-known for coining the term “Generation X” back in the 1990’s.  But he has also written a number of other books, including Life After God, a collection of short stories of what life looks like through the eyes of an atheist.  But at the book’s conclusion, he startles readers by revealing his “secret:”

“My secret is that I need God—that I am sick and can no longer make it alone. I need God to help me give, because I no longer seem to be capable of giving; to help me be kind, as I no longer seem capable of kindness; to help me love, as I seem beyond being able to love.” (Coupland, Life After God, p.359)

Do you need God?  Then read on.  The book of Hebrews may have something significant to say to you…