Recently, I’ve seen a number of articles and videos warning users of Amazon’s Kindle Books and E-readers about a dramatic change in the terms of service. You have probably experienced something similar. Credit card companies, banks, loan companies, internet and phone providers, and other businesses often send out email and letters to let us know that they have changed the terms of service, that if you want to continue using their service, new terms apply.
The writer of the New Testament book of Hebrews gave the early church a similar warning when he wrote: “We must pay the most careful attention, therefore, to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away” (Hebrews 2:1). Why pay attention? Because new terms apply. As the name of the letter tells us, he is writing to Hebrew Christians, people who grew up with a Jewish faith, heirs of God’s covenant with Abraham. However, as Christians, the church needed to remember that they were living under a new covenant relationship with God. That’s where the letter begins:
In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. (Hebrews 1:1-3)
While these Hebrew Christians had grown up with an understanding of the old covenant as it had be communicated through the prophets, God had updated the terms through Jesus who fulfilled God’s promise to Abraham through his death, burial, and resurrection, which made him “the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him” (Hebrews 5:9).
Honestly, the terms haven’t changed all that much. When it comes to salvation, everyone who has ever been saved and who will ever be saved will be saved by God’s grace through faith; that’s the gist of Ephesians 2:8. All that has really changed are the details of payment and receipt.
The Good News is that Jesus paid the debt of our sin, as we read in Mark 10:45: “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” By his grace, God sent Jesus who died on the cross to forgive our sins and who rose again to give us new life, eternal life. How do we receive it? Through faith in Jesus, as evidenced when we believe that Jesus is the Son of God, the Messiah; when we repent, turning away from our old sinful life and turning back to God; when we confess that Jesus is Lord of our lives; when we join with Jesus in our own spiritual death, burial, and resurrection by being baptized for the forgiveness of our sins (Luke 13:3; John 1:12; Acts 2:38; 8:36-38; Romans 6:3-5; 10:9-10; 1 Peter 3:21).
God’s purpose remains the same; he wants to have a relationship with us (Leviticus 26:12; 2 Corinthians 6:16). God’s plan remains the same; he offers forgiveness and new life by his grace to all who will put their faith in him (Numbers 14:18; Jeremiah 31:33-34; Ephesians 2:8-9). The payment remains the same, through a divine substitute (Isaiah 53:3-5), but the details have been updated; Jesus offered himself to be that substitute (Ephesians 5:2; Hebrews 7:27; 9:22-26). The terms of receiving God’s grace remains the same, faith credited as righteousness (Genesis 15:6; Romans 4:3-5), but the details have been updated, our faith is in Jesus (Acts 20:21; Romans 3:21-28).
Maybe that’s a lot of details, like the fine print of those updated terms of service. However, God has revealed it through Jesus, through the Scriptures, through the teaching and life of the church. Since we have received this Good News, Church, let us be faithful: “We must pay the most careful attention, therefore, to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away” (Hebrews 2:1).