Seven Statements about the Son: Upholder of the Universe

Hebrews 1:2b-3 give us seven statements about Christ, the Son of God. So far, I’ve posted something on the first four statements, and this post is on to the fifth: he upholds the universe by the word of his power. As in the other posts, I’ve divided the statement into phrases, which I’ll look at individually.

• Upholds the Universe
  It is because of Christ that the universe continues to exist. Paul makes a similar statement in Colossians 1:17 when he says that it is by Christ that “all things hold together.”
   
  The word upholds means “sustains” or “maintains”, and the verb tense tells us that Christ is continually upholding “all things.” Right now, as I write, and right now, as you read, everything in the universe continues to exist because Christ is sustaining or maintaining it. That the laws of the universe continue to be laws we can count on is through Christ’s upholding work. The gravity that coheres everything is here because Christ continues throughout history to sustain it’s existence.
   
  Do you think of God’s relationship to the creation as something like a watchmaker’s relationship to a watch? The watchmaker puts the pieces together and then winds the watch and lets it run. This statement tells us that Christ’s relationship to his creation is much different (and more involved) than that of a watchmaker. There is no “letting it run” with Christ; He continually keeping things in the universe running by his own power.
  
   
  But there’s even more to it than that. Leon Morris says that the thought is that Christ

  is carrying [the universe] along, bearing it toward an important goal. Creation is not aimless: it is part of God’s plan and the Son is continually bearing creation along toward the fulfillment of the plan.¹

  Previously in this text, we learned that Christ is the creator of the world: what’s here is here because he made it. Now we learn that Christ is the upholder of the world: what’s here continues to work because he continues to run it.
    
• The Word of His Power
  Christ’s word—his powerful word—is the means by which he upholds all things. Later on, in Hebrews 11, our writer tells us that the universe was created by God’s word, and it’s the same word for word used in both places. In Hebrews 11, it is God’s word that creates everything, and here it is Christ’s word that carries everything along toward God’s goal for it.  This is a perfect time to use the word fiat, which is a command that accomplishes something on the basis of that command alone.  Christ’s powerful word is an effective command, and that’s exactly the idea in this phrase. Christ created it all by fiat and he sustains it all by fiat. Christ commands and the universe responds. 

If you were around me in real life, you’d find that this statement is a piece of scripture that I quote fairly often. I like it a lot. There is something about those words that intrigues me, even though I can’t quite put my finger on it. It’s very comforting to think that the universe is nothing like a watch winding down; but rather, there is a rational and personal will keeping it together, and a rational and eternal energy source carrying it along. It’s also exciting to think that God’s command, which is able to bring thing into existence out of nothing, is not simply something that was used once in the past at the creation. It is something that is used for every nanosecond of time itself, and for every nanosecond of my life and every small detail in it. God’s command called up the sprouting seeds in my garden.

 

This statement is quite closely related to the second statement in this text, the one telling us that Christ is the creator of the world. That one was an affirmation of Christ’s diety, and this one is too. (Do I sound a little like a broken record?) Having the sort of authority that comes with an assuredly effective  command, like the creative command of the second statement and the sustaining command of this one, is authority that belongs to God alone. 

 

What does the statement that Christ  upholds the universe by the word of his power mean for us?

• It should cause us to worship him.
• No matter what our circumstances, we can view our lives and everything in them as being sustained by God’s powerful word, and know that he is carrying everything along toward his own perfect goal.

¹ Leon Morris, Hebrews: Bible Study Commentary, page 20.

Can you think of other things to add to the list of what this statement means for us? Is there anything else you’d like to add or discuss?

Recipe Round Up Information Page

I’ve added a Recipe Round Up Information Page and linked it from the Recipe Round Up graphic in the side bar.

Update on Monday, June 11, 2007 at 8:43AM by rebecca

Speaking of the Recipe Round Up, don’t forget that the next one is this coming Thursday, June 14 at Simply a Musing Blog. Category: Desserts.

Sunday's Hymn: Reader's Choice

This week’s hymn is chosen by Carla of Reflections of the Times. Abide with Me is written by the Scottish minister Henry Lyte. The most commonly told story of this hymn is that Henry Lyte wrote it when he was dying of tuberculosis, but at the Center for Church Music, the suggestion is that it is more likely that

he wrote this hymn in 1820, after visiting a dying friend, who, on his death bed, kept murmuring the passage from Luke 24:29, where the disciples who were traveling to Emmaus asked Jesus to “abide with us, for it is evening and day is almost spent.”

If so, he would have been in his twenties when he wrote it.

Abide with Me

Abide with me; fast falls the eventide;
The darkness deepens; Lord with me abide.
When other helpers fail and comforts flee,
Help of the helpless, O abide with me.

Swift to its close ebbs out life’s little day;
Earth’s joys grow dim; its glories pass away;
Change and decay in all around I see;
O Thou who changest not, abide with me.

I need Thy presence every passing hour.
What but Thy grace can foil the tempter’s power?
Who, like Thyself, my guide and stay can be?
Through cloud and sunshine, Lord, abide with me.

I fear no foe, with Thee at hand to bless;
Ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness.
Where is death’s sting? Where, grave, thy victory?
I triumph still, if Thou abide with me.

Hold Thou Thy cross before my closing eyes;
Shine through the gloom and point me to the skies.
Heaven’s morning breaks, and earth’s vain shadows flee;
In life, in death, O Lord, abide with me.

Listen: Voice, piano, or organ. 

Other hymns, worship songs, etc. posted today:

• Arise, My Soul, Arise at The Happy Wonderer
• Art Thou Weary at Above the Clouds
• The Awakened Sinner, from The Valley of Vision  at The Thirsty Theologian
  
• From Greenland’s Icy Mountains at John Dekker’s Journal
• Master, Speak! Thy Servant Heareth at Seasonings of the Heart
• A Mighty Fortress is Our God at joythruChrist
• The Collect for The First Sunday after Trinity at Magic Statistics
• It is Well with My Soul at Thoughts from the Teahouse
• There is A Higher Throne at Hiraeth
• In Christ Alone at Jam and Books
  

Have you posted a hymn this Sunday and I missed it? Let me know by leaving a link in the comments or by emailing me at the address in the sidebar and I’ll add your post to the list. If you’d like to see your favorite hymn featured as a Reader’s Choice hymn, go here and leave a comment. Just tell me your favorite hymn and a little bit about why you like it and I’ll feature your hymn when your turn comes.