Scripture Daily

Context No. 832 of 4322 · Hebrews

Context · Reflection

Hebrews 2:1-8: in context

1Therefore we ought to pay greater attention to the things that were heard, lest perhaps we drift away. 2For if the word spoken through angels proved steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just penalty, 3how will we escape if we neglect so great a salvation—which at the first having been spoken through the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard, 4God also testifying with them, both by signs and wonders, by various works of power, and by gifts of the Holy Spirit, according to his own will? 5For he didn’t subject the world to come, of which we speak, to angels. 6But one has somewhere testified, saying, “What is man, that you think of him? Or the son of man, that you care for him? 7You made him a little lower than the angels. You crowned him with glory and honor. 8You have put all things in subjection under his feet.” For in that he subjected all things to him, he left nothing that is not subject to him. But now we don’t yet see all things subjected to him.

The letter to the Hebrews has just spent a chapter showing how much greater Christ is than the angels, and now it draws the practical conclusion, and the conclusion is a warning about something quieter than most people fear. Therefore, it says, we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away. Not lest we rebel, not lest we renounce the faith in some dramatic crisis, but lest we drift. The image is of a boat that was never actively steered anywhere; it simply was not tied up, and the current carried it, a little at a time, until one day it is far from where it started and no one ever decided to leave.

That is the danger the writer wants us to feel. If the law given through angels was binding, and every violation met its penalty, he asks, how shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? The word is neglect, not reject. You do not have to turn against this great salvation to lose your hold on it; you only have to stop paying attention to it, let it slide down the list, quit tending it, and the drift does the rest on its own. Most people who end up far from God did not march away. They loosened their grip by degrees, missed a little here, neglected a little there, and the tide took care of the distance. The remedy Hebrews prescribes is not a heroic act but a steady one: pay much closer attention, hold on, keep the line tied to the dock.

Hebrews warns not against rejecting the faith but against quietly drifting from it by neglect. Am I holding on and paying attention, or have I loosened my grip by degrees and let the current carry me, without ever deciding to go?

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