If you have your Bibles, be turning to Hebrews chapter 1. Alright, over the past two Sundays we've started this journey through this amazing letter. We have seen much that there is to see here. Again, this is such a rich text, a deep text that there is the ability to park here for quite some time. We're going to park here for a little while as we look at all these descriptions of Christ that are given to us in this text. And it's important to think about what this letter is arguing, that Christ is supreme, that Christ is glorious, that Christ is greater than all the Old Testament shadows that came before that pointed to Him. He's the purpose of the Old Testament. The last Sunday before Hebrews we looked at Romans because Paul says that the law is really fulfilled in Christ. It is the talos of the law, the aim or purpose of the law is Christ. And really you could make that argument about the entirety of the Old Testament. In fact, I think where we're going to see today, you could make this argument about all of creation points to Christ. All of it was for the purpose of Christ. And so we're going to see that. as we look at the text today. So, the eternal plan of God along with all of God's promises find their amen in Christ Jesus. We saw that last Sunday and it's something we need to keep in mind. In Jesus, our Savior, our Lord. So two Sundays ago we looked at this argument the author of Hebrews makes about how God speaks. The God who speaks has spoken to man throughout time. He's spoken to our fathers, the author says. He means the Hebrew people particularly. He's spoken to them at various times and in various ways. And we looked at that and really it means in parts and in ways, in pieces. He spoke to our fathers by servants. Prophets, servants, men called by God to be his spokesmen. And so there's continuity, isn't there? We looked at that. There's continuity. God who spoke to them is speaking to us also. But there's discontinuity. He spoke in former times, now He speaks in the last days. He spoke in part and parcel, now fully and finally. Before through servants, now through His own Son. And we spoke of the significance of that and last Sunday we spoke about the absolute importance of understanding the Incarnation with all of this. Why can He be the perfect prophet that the author of Hebrews is pointing to here? Because a prophet represents God to man. Who better to fulfill that mediatory role than one who is fully God and fully man? Then we went last Sunday into looking at this other thing that's spoken of here. After he gives this great introduction that he has spoken to us fully and finally in these final days in his son, he says, oh, about that son, he, meaning the father, has appointed him heir of all things. Heir of all things. And we spoke about the significance of that messianically as we looked back at the Psalms and saw that He is the one pictured as inheriting the nations. They belong to Him. Now we spoke about the fact that we kind of previewed today's sermon by saying that actually He created the worlds. He created the nations. He created everything that exists. So by the fact that He's God, it all belonged to Him anyway. So this is speaking in some way about his incarnational role here, his mission on which he was sent as the Messiah. And we looked back at the promise made to Abraham as the father of nations and all these various things that we looked at that pointed forward to Christ being the one who would be the heir, the recipient, the rightful owner of all things. Now part of that was based on what we're going to look at today. Because it says that, "...he has appointed him heir of all things, through whom also he made the worlds." He made the worlds. And so we're going to come to this amazing thing today, this amazing truth today about Christ as the Creator. And so again, we want to think about this. Christ, the one who came into the world, the author of Hebrews says, was the creator of that world. The one who stepped upon the earth is the one who created the earth. And we're going to look at all of this today, and try to anyway. It's a big subject. So as we think about it, here the messianic king of Israel has the nations as inheritance. In other words, he's not just coming as David's heir. He is David's heir, David's greater heir. But He's promised something more than just Israel. He's promised all the nations. And as we see today, when you think about what this text is showing us, it's even more than that. He's not just the inheritor of Israel or just the inheritor of the nations. He's the inheritor of everything that exists. He is the heir of all things. He is the one through whom all things were created. And so we want to think about it today as we read this text one more time. God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds." I'm going to read three. We're going to leave four off this time. who being the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high." As we think about this staggering text of Scripture, I want us to think about three points. First of all, an astounding truth. Second of all, a theological truth. And then finally, a glorious truth. And I pray that you'll join with me in prayer that God will speak to us through this because it is a complicated text and a complicated idea and even a complicated concept for us to grasp, our minds to grasp, of this Trinitarian God who is three persons and yet one God. And so we want to think about this today. And that's our astounding truth begins with this idea that Christ is the one through whom all things were made. Now we, as I said, previewed this last Sunday because I wanted to make the point last Sunday in speaking about Christ as the heir of all things that as God it all belonged to Him anyway. So to simply say that Christ is the heir of all things could be confusing because we say, well, Christ is God and He created all things and it all belongs to Him anyway. But this is specifically speaking of a messianic office here. And we wanted to look, by the way, at some other texts that pointed to this as well. And so we went to a couple places we're going to go again today. But we're looking more specifically today at this argument that Christ is the one through whom all things were made. Now that's an astounding truth, isn't it? That Christ is the one through whom all things were made. That the one who came to this earth incarnate in a tent of flesh is the one who created all things." Now, that God created all things is made apparent from the very beginning of the Word of God, isn't it? Genesis 1-1, in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. But that also causes confusion because people think, well, that was the Father, right? God made the heavens and the earth and that seems to contradict what's being said here. But we would remind you that Jesus is God. Jesus is God. There is no contradiction in the Word. There is no contradiction at all. God did create the heavens and the earth and we shouldn't forget this fact. In fact, we're going to come back in our second point to discuss a little further how it can be said that yes, God the Father also involved in the creation of all things. This text makes that clear. We'll come back to it. We want to make sure that we treat this rightly and that means we're going to discuss a little bit of the Trinity and think about how God is working in this way. But today we want to focus our minds on what this is revealing to us. That Christ is the one through whom all things were made. All things were made. All things created by Him and for Him. And we will look at that text as well. So this is not a novel point of theology. This is not something that the author of Hebrews just thought up or came up with. Now let me say this. This is the inspired Word of God, an inspired author. If this was the only place it was found, it would still be true. But it isn't the only place it's found. We looked at this last Sunday. You can turn to the first chapter of John, the prologue of John's Gospel, and it says what? In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him and without him nothing was made that was made." Now what's the significance of that text? What's the significance of what John is telling you from the prologue of his gospel? Well clearly it says that everything was made through him and nothing was made outside of him and that is important. But why is that so important? Because it speaks to the authority of Christ. Nothing was made outside of Him. Nothing that exists in creation exists apart from Him. He created it all. Another way of thinking this is that nothing is independent from His power and authority. Nothing. He created it all. Now, that's a pretty important statement. all things are under His authority. Even if it isn't clear to us by our sight that that's the case, the Scriptures are telling us all things are under His authority. Now Paul confirms that in Colossians 1. He says, for by Him, speaking of Christ, All things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through him and for him." So it's not just that he's the creator, but it's created for him. And my friends, that is one of the most important scriptures in all of biblical theology. If you want to understand how the Bible is revealing what God is doing, right here is a key text. Because it tells you that all things are created not only by Christ, but for Christ. And you would be left to ponder for a moment, as many have before us, what does that even mean? How can we say that the worlds were made for Christ? That humanity was made for Christ? That angels were made for Christ? That heaven was made for Christ? That hell was made for Christ? All these things. How do you reconcile this? How do you understand it? Well, my friends, it's one of the key points of Scripture. All things were made by Him and for Him. The One who governs all these things is the Lord reigning over all these things is the One that we worship today. And one of the interesting things is that it's telling us that Christ reigns over all of creation. All of creation. Now, that brings us back to today's text. If you come back and look at these first two verses again, It says, God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds. Now that word there that's translated worlds, aion in the Greek, is an interesting word. It literally originally meant space and time. But by the time right before the New Testament was written, had kind of taken on a colloquial meaning of world. And you can see this in the Septuagint. That's the Greek Old Testament. It says there in Exodus that God is Lord over the world, and it uses that word, aion. So it's the word that was used for world. But what's interesting in this text is it doesn't say aion, but aions, plural. God is the one who made all spheres that exist, all creation that exists, all worlds that exist, He created. All worlds. F.F. Bruce said, because it's plural, meaning worlds, this is basically like saying He created the universe. He created the universe and everything in it. Time, space, matter, He created all those things. Now that confirms the interpretation of the great Scottish theologian John Brown who said this, Now that is a staggering thing to think about because many of us growing up as children think of like the Father alone creating the universe. And this text is saying to us that Christ is the one through whom all things were made. The universe and everything in it, all matter, all creation, everything that exists materially in time or in space was created by Christ. So that means the only things that weren't created are those things that are not in time and space and that is God Himself. Our Trinitarian God is uncreated. He has always existed. And so everything else is created through Christ. Now that's an astounding truth. If it's been created, it was created by Christ. Nothing that exists, exists other than it was created by Christ. And that brings us to our second point this morning, a theological truth. Because I want to return to a question that I kind of breezed over earlier when I mentioned the Genesis account and that I just referred to a second ago when I spoke about people thinking that the Father is the one who created the world. And there is a way in which we can say that. And this brings us to a very difficult thing here that we have to wrestle with, which is our God. Our God is not easy for us to understand. This is just the reality of it. Our minds are finite. He is infinite. I've mentioned many times that Blaise Pascal, the great mathematician who wrote some very interesting books on his journey of faith and his understanding of theology. He said that for us with our limited finite human minds to try to grasp these great things of God, speaking specifically of the Trinity, is like him trying to teach higher algebra to his dog. You know, there's a point at which we have to recognize our minds are limited in their ability to grasp these truths that transcend our ability to understand. But there are some things that we need to think about. There are truths that the scriptures give us that are for us to know. And so we mentioned that Jesus, the second person of the eternal trinity, created all things. That's true. But that doesn't mean He did it roguely, or apart from the Father, or apart from the Spirit. This is God working together. God in unison. God singular in this sense, right? The God who is creating the world. Now, again, we don't want to use this to diminish what this tells us Christ did. He is the one through whom all things were made. Christ, fully God, created the world. If you want to think about this, the persons of the Trinity carry out specific tasks. Now we could go to salvation, right? God sent forth His Son. That is an act of the Father. God sent forth His Son, who freely came, an act of the Son. He took on a tent of flesh, but even then if you go back and read the accounts, this is a creative miracle of the Holy Spirit. Again now, all three persons of the Trinity already mentioned Christ living His life, right? A sinless life, tempted and tried as all humankind are, yet without sin, goes to Calvary's cross, gives His life as an atonement for sinners. Yet the conviction that leads us to Christ comes from the Holy Spirit. It's trust in Christ that saves us to the glory of God the Father. All one God at work Now is this complicated for us to reconcile in our minds? Of course. It should be. It should be. This stretches our minds beyond anything that we can comprehend in this world. And as we were talking last Sunday night, I think, or maybe the Sunday before that, All the illustrations that we give to try to understand the Trinity are terrible and usually lead us astray from understanding how this works together. Again, while it's complicated, we need to recognize that the different persons of Trinity take on different roles, if you will, in whatever they're doing, in all things that they do. But they are working together cooperatively in perfect love and cooperation. So you can think about creation. Is it right to say the Father was involved in creation? Of course. Of course, all things that happen, happen according to His perfect will. No question about that. And yet, the thing that we need to recognize in this is, this scripture tells us that in His creation of the world, He was created through the Son. That is told to you in this very text. Look at it again. Who is the first subject of the book of Hebrews? God the Father. He's speaking of God the Father when he says, God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He, meaning the Father, has appointed of Christ, heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds. So He made the worlds through Christ. We see that you say, well, it doesn't mention the Holy Spirit. But my friends, we could park here for two Sundays, three Sundays, four Sundays on just the creative work of the Holy Spirit. Go back to Genesis 1 at the creation. What does it say there? The Spirit hovered over the waters. Again, the Scriptures make it clear that there is a creative work of God by each of the persons of the Trinity. In fact, Jewish theologians long before Christ arrived on the scene were talking about the thing that distinguishes God is He's creative. Humans aren't creative. We talk like we are. We say, oh, what did you create? That person is so creative. No, we're not. We take bits and pieces of what everybody else has given us, and we assemble them in new ways. I didn't create music. If I write a song, I'm just rearranging notes that somebody else thought of. I'm rearranging words that somebody else taught me. There's nothing new in what I'm doing. It seems new because we haven't heard that combination. But, you know, I didn't invent lettuce because I make a new salad. Right? I just thought up a new way of arranging vegetables together. It's nothing that creative. In fact, it's not creative at all. Now, God has given us great brilliance to think up things like this, but it's not creative. God alone creates. That means to make something of nothing. Even as powerful as Satan is spoken of in the Scriptures, he's not a creator. He's a corrupter. He takes what God has created and he corrupts it. God alone is one who creates. And my friends, this should have been a great indication to all those who encountered Christ that he in fact was the Son of God. Divine. Because he was doing creative miracles. He was taking things that were marred and creating them new. You can see it over and over again. All these things that we've spoken about in Matthew as we've begun to re-engage Matthew's gospel is what? It says he has authority. But who has authority other than God? He has authority over illness, over all things physical. He has not only an authority in teaching, but an authority over all things. It's going to be made more and more clear as we continue forward, even over nature. Well, of course he would. He created it. But the point of it is recognize that. Recognize that He is the one who made all these things. He has power over all these things. Matthew wants us to understand that. So the roles of the persons of Trinity might vary, but there's no variance in their perfect work, cooperation, unity, and love. That's what we're trying to get at here today. Christ has this amazing role. in the creation of all things, but it is God working to create all things." Now that is, I know, complicated and it's frustrating to me that I can't put it in better language. but it's just the reality of it. But it's also important to recognize that this text is giving us these descriptions of Christ for this very reason, to help us to understand something of the Trinity. Yes, it's limited what we can understand, but to help us understand something about it, Philip E. Hughes, one of the great Anglican preachers of the last century, was speaking about this very text and he said, that the way this is worded is to show us something of the Trinitarian nature of God, and specifically, Christ's participation in it. You see, by saying that He is heir, by saying that He's creator, we're talking about individual roles that Jesus has in these great matters. But by calling Him heir, as the one who receives power over all things, messianically, and even before that has power over all things, as the creator of all things, Who could that be said of except God Himself? So as Philip Hughes was pointing out to us, this very text necessitates an understanding of the Trinity. That Christ is this person who entered the world but is fully God Himself. People say all the time, well where does the Bible say that Jesus claimed to be God? Well we can go to places where He clearly claimed it. They tried to stone Him to death because He said things like, before Abraham was, I am. When you look at it, there are places Christ claimed it, but there is undoubtedly places that the authors of the New Testament inspired by the Holy Spirit make it clear. Here's one. Christ created all things that exist. Who else could that be said of other than God? I think it was one author who said that when you read the New Testament and it makes clear that the Father is God, and the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, that if you didn't have that thread throughout all of Scripture that says God is one, you would think there must be three gods. And yet the cardinal point of theology is there is one God, three persons. And so again, this text is showing us just a glimpse of this glorious truth that is difficult for us to understand. And so that's as far as I'm going to try to dive into that today. But I do want to say this because it is important. We need to recognize this and try our best to wrestle with it and to comprehend it to the best of our ability because it's important that we recognize things like the Father did not come into the world. The Father did not go to the cross. The Father did not die for us. The Son did. Only the Son did. Right? And when you look at all these things the scriptures tell us, it's important for us to try to differentiate because the scriptures differentiate it. But we recognize that we serve one glorious, holy, and righteous God. So that brings me to our final point, a glorious truth. And I want to go back to something we spoke of just a little bit earlier today. And these things are not going to get any easier today because we're talking about things that happened when none of us were there to witness it. There's no video you can watch of these things. They're just glorious things to comprehend that the scriptures are telling us. But it says here that he is the one through whom all things were made. We read a moment ago in Colossians. 116 it says that all things were made by Him and for Him. And I asked you a moment ago or just suggested maybe you wrestle with that a little bit. What does it mean to say all things were made for Him? What does that even mean? Like we just take for granted that the universe is created. We take for granted that it has a purpose. We say things like, well, it's to bring glory to God. And of course that's right. But have you thought about it further than that? What does it mean to say that the world was made for Christ? That mankind was made for Christ? Now, we would start going, well, a lot of the catechisms bring up the chief end of man. That's our purpose, right? What is man's chief end? Man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever. Absolutely true. In what way did God create mankind for that purpose? In what way did God create angels? How did Christ create angels, in other words, for His glory? This is a very difficult question, but when you think about it, this will be a key to biblical theology. If you understand Hebrews and understand the Bible, these are the texts you need to dwell on. You need to really think about them. The world was created for Christ. Mankind created for Christ. It's something I've been thinking about for a while, and there are many great books on biblical theology. Just to make this clear, biblical theology is trying to find the theme of the entire scriptures, if you will, trying to find the thread and understanding the entirety of the revelation of God. That's just to put it in a very quick sense. And so there are many good books on these things, but they often point us back to this idea. that in eternity past, and the scripture tells us this, that Christ was the Lamb of God slain before the foundation of the world, right? Before any of this was created it was already appointed that Christ would come as the Lamb of God. Now that is a complicated thing to think about. So all this creation that is created in some way serves that purpose. And I was wrestling with this as I have been for quite some time. And I read something that I want to share with you. Now, this is speaking of heaven, but you can apply it to earth, anything else that's created. I found a sermon by Spurgeon on Colossians 116, Christ the Creator. And he says this, I want you to listen to this. But it was ordained in the eternal purpose of God that there should be created a race of beings who should not be pure spirits, but who should have bodies made of material substance And it was resolved by Christ that he would become one of these beings, that he would take upon himself their nature, and would become in fact a man. Now, when a spirit becomes linked with a material substance, it must have a place in which to dwell." Now stop and think about that for a moment. That's absolutely true. If Christ is going to take on flesh, he has to have somewhere to exist. Because he existed before this, outside of time, space and matter. Eternally. Space, time, and matter are all created things. So listen to what he says. Now that's a beautiful picture of our eternal destiny with Him. And in fact, really we're going to come back onto a renewed earth. That's what's even more glorious about it. If that's true of heaven, then just walk through the logic of what the argument is there. Earth was created for this purpose. If Christ is going to come into this world and take on a tent of flesh, there has to be a world that exists. If Christ is going to come and take on a tent of flesh, there must be mankind in existence. You say, why would God call Abram, for instance? We don't read particularly that Abram was a particularly incredibly righteous man. God selected Abram. God selected Abram. Called him out of his land, out of the Chaldeans. He called him away from his people and said, go into a land I will show you and there I will make of you a people. I'll give you an heir and many heirs and a land. And you can just walk through biblical revelation, can't you? Isaac, Jacob, the 12 tribes of Israel, a nation of Israel, a king of Israel, all types and shadows pointing to the one who will come in fulfillment of all those things. Again, all of these things are pointing to a truth that's so glorious it's hard for our minds to grasp, that all of this was created for Christ. that He might do this great work of salvation. My friends, when you recognize that, you recognize His glory. By the way, people go, so before mankind was even created, Christ knew that He would have to come into the world. My friends, the Bible tells us over and over, God is not like us. He sees the end from the beginning. I'm trying to see what's going to happen in three minutes, right? Trying to predict what's going to happen this afternoon, I never get it right. That isn't the way God is. God sees the end from the beginning. And it's not hard to figure out when you start thinking about He stands outside of time. Time is a created concept. That itself, wrap your mind around for a little while. Because our only way of comprehending anything is through these things that are created. But again, when you think about the glory this is telling us of Christ, my friends, it ought to put us in awe. Put us in awe of the one that we are serving today, here to worship today, to raise high the name of today. He is the one who came into the world, didn't have to, came into the world by His grace to save sinners. And my friends, if you are His, you have reason to give Thanksgiving today and to be in awe of our King, who's not some mere earthly king who sits upon some earthly throne, but is the one who created all things and in whom all things consist and maintain. We haven't gotten there yet. Don't get me started. We'll get there. We'll get there. But think about the glory of what's being told to us here. Is this hard to understand? Yes. Yes. One day we'll have glorified minds. It'll be easier to understand. We'll never fully grasp it. We're not God. There are some things that belong to Him that are never going to be fully understood by us. How much we'll understand? I don't know. We'll find out one day. And I look forward to that day. But the thing that we need to ask today is, do we recognize who this King is, this glorious King? Are we His? Are we His?