Focal Passage: Heb. 1:1-6, 10-14; 2:1-4
The teacher had given her art class an assignment to draw anything they wanted to draw. As she walked around the room, observing their work, she stopped at the desk of a girl working intently on her drawing.
"What are you drawing?" the teacher asked.
The little girl replied, "I'm drawing a picture of God."
The teacher, trying to be careful not to belittle the girl's efforts, responded, "But, honey, no one knows what God looks like."
The girl, now somewhat annoyed at the interruption, answered, "They will when I get finished!"
The recipients of the letter to the Hebrews were Jewish Christians. As such, they would have had nothing depicting the likeness of God. God was too great to be captured on paper, canvas, wood, or even in the imagination of humans. Whether they admitted it or not, the people who received and read the letter to the Hebrews must have imagined what God was like.
We can know something about a person by the things he or she has made. From the works of great artists to crayon drawings on a refrigerator, art becomes an expression of the person who created it. The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands (Ps. 19:1). God has revealed His power and divine majesty in His creation, so that men are without excuse (Rom. 1:20).
We can know something about a person through the things he or she has written. The Bible was written so that we might know God and what He is like. "But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in His name." (Jn. 20:31) Still we leave our Bibles on the shelf at home or on the pew at church. How can we know God if we do not study His word?
The writer of Hebrews makes his point when he says, but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son." (Heb. 1:2) God was not content to leave us to decipher the etchings of His hand in creation. He was not satisfied with a book that could be set aside and forgotten. He came to earth as a human being so that we might get to know Him face-to-face. Jesus said to those who would listen, "He who has seen me has seen the Father." (Jn. 14:9)
How shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation (Heb. 2:3)?