1Keep on loving each other as brothers and sisters. 2Don’t forget to show hospitality to strangers, for some who have done this have entertained angels without realising it! 3Remember those in prison, as if you were there yourself. Remember also those being mistreated, as if you felt their pain in your own bodies. 4Give honour to marriage, and remain faithful to one another in marriage. God will surely judge people who are immoral and those who commit adultery. 5Don’t love money; be satisfied with what you have. For God has said, “I will never fail you. I will never abandon you.” 6So we can say with confidence, “The LORD is my helper, so I will have no fear. What can mere people do to me?”
7Remember your leaders who taught you the word of God. Think of all the good that has come from their lives, and follow the example of their faith. 8Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. 9So do not be attracted by strange, new ideas. Your strength comes from God’s grace, not from rules about food, which don’t help those who follow them. 10We have an altar from which the priests in the Tabernacle have no right to eat. 11Under the old system, the high priest brought the blood of animals into the Holy Place as a sacrifice for sin, and the bodies of the animals were burned outside the camp. 12So also Jesus suffered and died outside the city gates to make his people holy by means of his own blood. 13So let us go out to him, outside the camp, and bear the disgrace he bore. 14For this world is not our permanent home; we are looking forward to a home yet to come. 15Therefore, let us offer through Jesus a continual sacrifice of praise to God, proclaiming our allegiance to his name. 16And don’t forget to do good and to share with those in need. These are the sacrifices that please God. 17Obey your spiritual leaders, and do what they say. Their work is to watch over your souls, and they are accountable to God. Give them reason to do this with joy and not with sorrow. That would certainly not be for your benefit.
18Pray for us, for our conscience is clear and we want to live honourably in everything we do. 19And especially pray that I will be able to come back to you soon. 20Now may the God of peace—who brought up from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great Shepherd of the sheep, and ratified an eternal covenant with his blood— 21may he equip you with all you need for doing his will. May he produce in you, through the power of Jesus Christ, every good thing that is pleasing to him. All glory to him forever and ever! Amen. 22I urge you, dear brothers and sisters, to pay attention to what I have written in this brief exhortation.
23I want you to know that our brother Timothy has been released from jail. If he comes here soon, I will bring him with me to see you. 24Greet all your leaders and all the believers there. The believers from Italy send you their greetings. 25May God’s grace be with you all.
Hebrews 13:1-25
I have given you my choice of the section breaks but you will notice that I have refrained at this point from giving them a title until I have had time to analyse each section and decide what holds it together in terms of theme or point. Some of you who took the time to try dividing the sections for yourself commented on how hard it was to decide. Well join the club. Below I have given you examples from the various printed versions I have in my library, as to how they have divided the text. It is curious to say the least. As I said in the last Gem, there are some who think the conclusion comes in Chapter 12, while Chapter 13 just coasts to the end in bland blah. The sectioning in the Bibles I have chosen below are a mixture which don’t actually add anything to enlighten us by the breaks they have made nor the titles they have given each section.
One Title Fits All (Joiners)
These Bibles lump all of Hebrews 13:1-25 under one heading.
- Warnings and Requests (KJV)
- Jesus Doesn’t Change (MSG)
- Concluding Exhortations (NIV)
- Concluding Words (NLT)
- Exhortations to Various Duties (Thompson’s Chain Reference -4th Improved Edition)
Other Approaches (Splitters)
- CEV – Service that Pleases God (1-19); Final Prayers and Greetings (20-25)
- NASB – The Changeless Christ (1-14); God Pleasing Sacrifices (15-19); Benediction (20-25)
- NLT – Sacrifices Pleasing to God (1-19); Benediction (20-21); Final Greetings (22-25)
- RV – General Christian Obligations (1-6); Warning Against Apostasy (7-17); Request For Prayer (18-19); Benediction (20-25)
- TPT – Live Pleasing to God (1-19); Apostolic Blessing and Conclusion (20-25)
Two Strange Divisions
Jerusalem Bible – APPENDIX: Final Recommendations (1-6); Faithfulness (7-16); Obedience to Religious Leaders (17-19); EPILOGUE: News, Good Wishes and Greetings (20-25)
Scofield’s New & Improved Edition (1917) – Warnings and Instructions (12:25-13:9); Christian Separation & Worship (10-14); The Believer-Priest’s Sacrifice (15-16); The Believer-Priest’s Obedience (17); Conclusions: The Apostolic Benediction (18-25)
I am sure you will see from my summary of the above divisions you can be confident that whatever you came up with is just as valid as any of the above. Firstly, it is all so subjective and secondly this is a difficult section to subdivide. Hence me waiting until I have a firm handle on the sections I have chosen before I give them a title.
Have you worked out what the author is referring to by his words “this brief exhortation” in verse 22?
Did you come across any difficulties in the passage? I would imagine you did; there are some knotty problems in this closing chapter of Hebrews.
Kevin Ward focused on verse 13, and the verses either side: Hebrews 13:12-14. Notice the three-fold repetition of ‘outside the camp (gates)’.
Michael Martens (a translator colleague with Wycliffe) drew attention to Hebrews 13:10. “Heb. 13:10 is a most difficult verse to interpret and to understand. and therefore difficult to translate meaningfully. ‘We have an altar from which those who serve the tent have no right to eat.'”
Ross Robertson queried the last three verses. You will note I have separated them. Ross’ difficulty with these closing verses are due to the fact that it sounds like Paul, but he recalls I claim Hebrews was not written by Paul. “So what’s the story Ian?”
There are some other difficulties I will comment on as we work through our investigation of this closing passage. You still have a chance to add any further difficulties you find or questions you want to ask. Some see the reference to Jesus in Hebrews 13:20 as problematic or a puzzle as it is the only reference in the New Testament to Jesus as “the great Shepherd of the sheep”.
There are many complexities hidden in the words we read and just take for granted or attribute to those words a special spiritual power because ‘the text is written with Bible words’. I have told you before the text of the New Testament was written in KoinÄ“ Greek, the everyday language of the market place at the time. It is not sacred language. It represents the words people used in their everyday lives. But it is also fair to say that many of those words were given new meaning. So we need to pay careful attention in our attempt to understand the words in context.
Read through the above text again and make sure you ask yourself about any word or collection of words that is still bothering or confusing you. I will attempt to cover all words, phrases and questions you my readers come up with in my handling of the remainder of the letter to the Hebrews, the Jewish Christians at the onset of Nero’s persecution. So this is your chance to have any questions you may have answered, hopefully to your satisfaction. Believe me when I say there are some knotty problems. I am sure I am going to need some help. Who do you call on when you need help?
The best translation is when you translate the Word of God into your daily life. You ought to be a living Bible.
Rick Warren
It ain’t those parts of the Bible that I can’t understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand.Â
Mark Twain
‘Classic.’ A book which people praise and don’t read.” Mark Twain – Don’t let your Bible become a classic!
Ian
You can learn from ANYONE if you ask wise questions; You can learn more from the Bible too by asking wise questions.Â
Ian