Hebrews 2

Verses 1-6. He next shows that Christ is greater than any man; He is the man of God's purpose, higher than any other that ever was. Verses 7, 8. This is a quotation from Psa. 8 The Son of man, not the Son of God. As Son of God all things are for Him; as Son of man they are all put under Him. Verses 9, 10. Now he turns aside to see how He gets the " fellows." It is like the high priest going up on the day of atonement. The priests went up with him to a certain point, and there they lost him, but we do not; we go on with him. There is no such thing in Hebrews as communion; it goes no further than being of one company; but I belong to Christ; I feel that I belong to Him, and that I am going on with Him. We have a Captain; we are the troop-those who are of His company. It is not " Perfect by sufferings," as some read, but " Perfect through." It is not the thought of a man being battered into a thing, being molded by the circumstances; it is showing out His perfection through them, in them. He might say: I can well lead you, for I have gone through all the difficulties of the road myself.
Verses 11-18. Then comes out the way the "fellows " are formed. It is a new company; it is not the Jewish company; it is those of whom the Lord says in John 20, " Go to my brethren." He never had brethren till He rose from the dead; we hear of His mother and His brethren, but that was as man speaks. They are " all of one;" that " one " must be left large enough to take in all which it is; so it is left " one " only. If you limit it to a noun you spoil it; of one glory limits it to glory; of one stock, to stock; but it is simply " of one " that it may be everything that Christ is. And He " took part of the same," that He might deliver them from all the difficulties that they were in. He is the Man who is to come by-and-by with all power, but, before doing that, He has been down into the lowest place that He might there take our place.
Turn to John 12:24. What is the simple meaning of these words? That Christ was a unique person; there was never anyone like Him. Where is the man who could say there was never any sin in him? But, says Christ, I want to have a people of my own stamp; and, if I die, I shall rise up, and have a harvest of the same grain as myself. It is not merely that people are saved, or that grains have been improved, but that there are a great many grains like this one. It is " new creation," not " new creature," as is generally read in 2 Cor. 5 It is wonderful how much mischief has been made out of this " new creature." A butterfly is a new creature; it is an immense alteration from a caterpillar; it could not be a greater; but it is not a new creation. New creation is a new thing altogether. People talk of conversion - say, " So-and-so is an altered man; " but you cannot alter new creation; it cannot be better than it is; so John insists on nothing but new creation. He says, " Whosoever is born of God sinneth not; but he that is born of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth hint not " so that we might keep ourselves from sin. I am not saying a word as to being united to Christ; it is merely that you are a new creation, that you are fellows of Christ.
Verse 18. He was tried by Satan, and now He can succor others who are tried; and that not in a temptation to badness, but in the way a godly person would suffer in the presence of a temptation, not a bad one. Satan tempted Him, but there was no response in the Lord to his temptations. But when we are tempted, as the Scripture says, we are " Drawn away of Our own lust and enticed." Suppose a child come into the room and see an apple on the table; it will look round, and if no one be there, it will take it. Now the Lord was never tempted in that way. The fact that a thing was not His own was enough for Him; it would have been pleasant to Him to have the apple, but it would have been no pleasure to Him to take it. Not so with us; to us it is a pleasure to. If he had let in any thought of this kind He could not have made atonement for us. Now I have an evil nature in me just the same as I had before I was converted. I am a tender flower with bad air all round me, and He says, I will put a screen about you to keep it all away; for when I was in flesh and blood I never let any of it in. The presence of God acts in two ways upon the soul that is in it. It first acts upon me, and then it occupies me with Himself. Some meetings are quite spoiled through getting hold only of the first of these actions and never rising beyond it. People say, "What a delightful meeting! the word cut me right and left." Certainly the disciples going to Emmaus had a grand time of it, but they did not know the One who was acting on them. It is quite right to have the word act on me: I need it. But that is not all. Having put me right it would occupy me with the Person who speaks it-with the Lord Himself. If I come into a lit up room, I do not want the light to be occupied only with me; I want to be occupied with what is in the room. I remember a person in a picture gallery saying, " At first I had this lighted up so beautifully that when I came in I could look at nothing but the light-at the glory of it. And I said, This will never do; so I had to have the light reduced until I could look at the pictures."