Each in His Own Rank

Anyone who honestly thinks each of these things through will recognize how great the gifts are that were given through him. For from him came the priests and all the Levites who serve at God’s altar. From him came the Lord Jesus, so far as the flesh is concerned. From him came kings and rulers and governors in the line of Judah; and his other scepters are held in no small honor, since God promised, “Your offspring will be like the stars of heaven.” So they were all glorified and made great — not through themselves, or their own works, or the right they did, but through his will. And so we too, called through his will in Christ Jesus, are not counted righteous through ourselves, or through our own wisdom or intelligence or godliness, or through works we have done in holiness of heart, but through faith — the faith through which the Almighty God has counted righteous everyone from the beginning of the age. To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen. [a]

What, then, shall we do, brothers? Shall we go slack at doing good and give up love? May the Master never let that happen among us! Let us hurry instead, with all our strength and eagerness, to finish every good work. For the Maker and Master of all things takes delight in his own works. By his immense power he fixed the heavens in place, and by his understanding — which no mind can take in — he set them in order. He separated the earth from the water that surrounds it and settled it on the firm foundation of his own purpose. The living things that move about on it he commanded into being by his own arrangement. He made the sea and the creatures in it ready beforehand, and shut them in by his own power. Above all this, with his holy and faultless hands he formed the most excellent of his works, and the greatest in mind — man, the stamp of his own image. For this is what God says: “Let us make man in our image and likeness. And God made man; male and female he made them.” When he had finished all this, he approved it and blessed it and said, “Increase and multiply.” Let us see, then, how all the righteous were adorned with good works — and how the Lord himself, adorning himself with good works, was glad. Since we have this pattern, let us come to his will without hesitation, and work the work of righteousness with all our strength. [d]

The good worker takes the bread he has earned with his head up; the lazy, slack one cannot look his employer in the face. So we have to be eager to do good, for everything comes from him. He tells us in advance: “Look, the Lord is coming, and his reward goes before him, to pay back each person according to his work.” So he urges us — we who trust in him with our whole heart — not to be idle or slack for any good work at all. Let our boast and our confidence be in him. Let us submit to his will. Let us consider the whole host of his angels, how they stand by him and carry out his will. For the Scripture says: “Ten thousand times ten thousand stood beside him, and a thousand thousands served him, and they were crying out: Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole creation is full of his glory.” So let us too, gathered together in harmony and of one conscience, cry out to him earnestly as with one mouth, so that we may share in his great and glorious promises. For it says: “No eye has seen and no ear has heard, and it has never entered the human heart, what the Lord has prepared for those who wait for him.” [g]

How blessed and astonishing God’s gifts are, dear friends! Life in immortality, brightness in righteousness, truth in open speech, faith in full confidence, self-control in holiness — and all of this already lay within reach of our understanding. What, then, are the things being prepared for those who wait? The Maker and Father of the ages, the all-holy one, knows himself how many they are and how beautiful. So let us struggle to be found among the number of those who wait, so that we may receive our share of the promised gifts. And how will this happen, dear friends? If our mind is fixed on God in faith; if we search out what pleases him and is welcome to him; if we carry out what belongs to his faultless purpose and follow the way of truth, throwing away from ourselves everything wrong and wicked — greed, quarrels, spite and deceit, whispering and slander, hatred of God, pride and bragging, empty conceit, and a refusal of hospitality. For the people who do such things are hateful to God — and not only those who do them, but those who approve of them too. For the Scripture says: “But to the sinner God said: What business have you telling out my statutes and taking my covenant on your lips? You hated discipline, and threw my words behind you. When you saw a thief, you ran along with him, and you threw in your lot with adulterers. Your mouth overflowed with evil, and your tongue wove deceit. You sat and spoke against your brother, and set a trap for your own mother’s son. You did all this, and I kept silent; you supposed, you lawless man, that I would be like you. I will convict you, and set you in front of your own face. Understand this, you who forget God, or he will snatch you away like a lion and there will be no one to rescue you. A sacrifice of praise will glorify me, and there is the way by which I will show him the salvation of God.” [j]

This, dear friends, is the way in which we found what saves us — Jesus Christ, the high priest of our offerings, the champion and helper of our weakness. [m]

He “is the radiance of God’s majesty, and is greater than the angels by as much as the name he has inherited is finer than theirs.” For this is what is written: “He makes his angels winds, and his servants a flame of fire.” But about his Son the Master said this: “You are my Son; today I have fathered you. Ask me, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance, and the ends of the earth as your possession.” And again he says to him: “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.” Who, then, are his enemies? The worthless — the ones who set themselves against his will.

So let us serve as soldiers, brothers, with all our strength, under his faultless orders. Consider the men who serve under our commanders — with what order, what practiced discipline, what obedience they carry out what they are told. Not everyone is a prefect, or a commander of a thousand, or of a hundred, or of fifty, and so on down the line; but each one, in his own rank, carries out the orders of the emperor and the commanders. The great cannot exist without the small, and the small cannot exist without the great. In everything there is a blending, and that is where the usefulness lies. Take our own body. The head is nothing without the feet, and in the same way the feet are nothing without the head. The smallest parts of our body are necessary and useful to the whole of it. All of them breathe together and keep to one submission, so that the whole body is kept safe. [o]

So let our whole body be kept safe in Christ Jesus, and let each person submit to his neighbor according to the gift he was given. Let the strong take care of the weak, and let the weak show respect to the strong. Let the rich man supply what the poor man lacks, and let the poor man thank God for giving him someone to fill up what he needs. Let the wise man show his wisdom not in words but in good works. Let the humble man not bear witness to himself, but leave it to someone else to bear witness to him. Let the man who is pure in the flesh not brag about it, since he knows that it is someone else who supplies him with his self-control. [q]

So let us think, brothers, about what stuff we were made of — what sort of people we were, and who, when we came into the world; out of what grave and what darkness the one who molded and made us brought us into his world, having prepared his good gifts beforehand, before we were born. Since we have all this from him, we ought to thank him for everything. To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

Senseless, thoughtless, stupid, uneducated men mock us and sneer at us, wanting to lift themselves up in their own minds. But what can a mortal do? What strength has anyone born of earth? For it is written: “There was no shape before my eyes; I heard only a breath and a voice. What then? Can a mortal be clean before the Lord? Can a man be blameless for what he has done, when God does not trust even his own servants, and has found something crooked in his angels? Not even heaven is clean in his sight. Let it go, then, with those who live in houses of clay — and we ourselves are made of the same clay! He struck them like a moth; from morning to evening they are no more. They perished because they could not help themselves. He breathed on them and they died, because they had no wisdom. Call out, then, and see whether anyone will answer you, or whether you will find any of the holy angels to look to; for anger destroys the fool, and jealousy kills the man who has gone astray. I have seen fools putting down roots, but their household was eaten away at once. May their sons be far from safety; may they be knocked about at the doors of men beneath them, and may there be no one to pull them out. What was prepared for them, the righteous will eat; and they themselves will not be taken out of their troubles.” [t]

Since all this is clear to us, and we have looked into the depths of the divine knowledge, we ought to do everything in order, all that the Master commanded us to carry out at the appointed times. He commanded that the offerings and the services be performed — not carelessly or out of order, but at fixed times and hours. Where they are to be done, and by whom, he determined himself by his own supreme purpose, so that everything done in holiness and with his approval would be welcome to his will. So those who make their offerings at the times laid down are welcome and blessed, for they follow the Master’s rules and do not go wrong. The high priest is given his own services; the priests are assigned their own place; the Levites have their own duties laid on them; and the layman is bound by the rules laid down for laymen. [u]

Each of us, brothers, should please God in his own rank, keeping a good conscience, not overstepping the fixed rule of his service, and behaving with dignity. Not everywhere, brothers, are the daily sacrifices offered, or those for vows, or those for sin and for going wrong, but only in Jerusalem — and even there they are not offered just anywhere, but in front of the sanctuary at the altar, after the offering has been inspected for blemishes by the high priest and the ministers named earlier. Anyone who does something outside what God’s purpose requires has death as the penalty. You see, brothers: the more knowledge we have been counted worthy of, the greater the danger we are in. [w]

The apostles received the good news for us from the Lord Jesus Christ; Jesus the Christ was sent out from God. So Christ came from God and the apostles from Christ; and both of these happened in good order, by God’s will. So they received their instructions, and were made completely certain by the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, and were confirmed in the word of God; and they went out with the full assurance of the Holy Spirit, announcing the good news that the kingdom of God was about to come. Preaching from country to country and city to city, they appointed their firstfruits — after testing them by the Spirit — as overseers and deacons of those who would come to faith later. And this was nothing new, since overseers and deacons had been written about long ages before. For this is what the Scripture says somewhere: “I will appoint their overseers in righteousness and their deacons in faith.” [y]

And is it any wonder that men who were entrusted by God with such a work in Christ appointed the men just named? Even the blessed Moses — “a faithful servant in all his house” — wrote down in the sacred books everything he was ordered to do, and the rest of the prophets followed him, bearing witness along with him to the laws he laid down. [aa]

When jealousy fell over the priesthood and the tribes were in faction over which of them should be adorned with that glorious name, Moses ordered the twelve chiefs of the tribes to bring him staffs, each one inscribed with the name of its tribe. He took them, tied them together, sealed them with the signet rings of the tribal chiefs, and put them away in the tent of witness on the table of God. Then he shut the tent and sealed the keys the same way he had sealed the staffs, and said to them, “Men and brothers, whichever tribe’s staff blossoms — that is the tribe God has chosen to serve as priests and to minister to him.” When morning came he called all Israel together, six hundred thousand men, showed the seals to the tribal chiefs, opened the tent of witness, and took out the staffs. And Aaron’s staff was found not only to have blossomed, but to have fruit on it. What do you think, dear friends? Did Moses not know in advance that this would happen? Of course he knew. But he did it this way so that there would be no disorder in Israel, and so that the name of the true and only God would be glorified. To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

Our apostles knew too, through our Lord Jesus Christ, that there would be strife over the title of the office of overseer. For this very reason, having received perfect foreknowledge of it, they appointed the men just named, and afterwards gave a further rule: that when these men had fallen asleep, other tested men should take over their service. So we do not think it right that men appointed by the apostles, or later by other men of standing with the whole church agreeing, men who have served Christ’s flock blamelessly, with humility, quietly and without grasping, and who have been spoken well of by everyone over a long time — that these men should be thrown out of their service. It will be no small sin for us if we throw out of the office of overseer men who have offered the gifts blamelessly and in holiness. [ab]

Blessed are the elders who went on ahead of us: their departure was fruitful and complete, and they have no fear that anyone will move them from the place set for them. But we see that you have removed some men who were conducting themselves well from a service they had held blamelessly and with honor.

You are competitive, brothers, and full of zeal about the things that belong to salvation. You have looked into the sacred Scriptures — the true ones, the ones given through the Holy Spirit. You know that nothing unjust or counterfeit is written in them. You will not find righteous people thrown out by holy men. The righteous were persecuted — but by the lawless. They were put in prison — but by the unholy. They were stoned by lawbreakers, and killed by men who had taken up a foul and unjust jealousy. And going through all that, they carried it gloriously. [ad]

For what shall we say, brothers? Was Daniel thrown into the lions’ pit by men who feared God? Were Ananias and Azarias and Mishael shut into the fiery furnace by men who practiced the magnificent and glorious worship of the Most High? Never! Then who was it who did these things? Men full of hate and every kind of wickedness, worked up to such a pitch of rage that they put people who served God with a holy and faultless purpose to torture — not knowing that the Most High is the defender and the shield of everyone who serves his name, the name above all excellence, with a clean conscience. To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

But those who endured in confidence inherited glory and honor. They were lifted up, and God entered their names in his own record, forever and ever. Amen.

We too, brothers, must hold fast to examples like these. For it is written: “Hold fast to the holy ones, for those who hold fast to them will be made holy.” And again, in another place, it says: “With an innocent man you will be innocent, and with a chosen man you will be chosen, and with a crooked man you will go crooked.” So let us hold fast to the innocent and the righteous — and these are the ones God has chosen. [ag]

Why are there quarrels among you, and outbursts of temper, and divisions, and splits, and war? Do we not have one God, and one Christ, and one Spirit of grace poured out on us, and one calling in Christ? Why do we pull apart and tear at the parts of Christ, and raise faction against our own body, and come to such madness that we forget we are parts of one another? Remember the words of the Lord Jesus. For he said: “Woe to that man. It would have been good for him not to have been born, rather than trip up one of my chosen ones. It would be better for him to have a millstone tied around him and be sunk in the sea, than to lead one of my chosen ones astray.”

Your split has turned many aside, has thrown many into discouragement and many into doubt, and has brought grief on all of us. And your faction goes on.