Ephesians 1:21–22

The meaning is clear. Whatever the rank or dignity of any of the heavenly orders or beings, God has set Christ as the glorified Man above them all. Among the vast number of heavenly beings He is absolutely supreme. The rendering "far above" may not be exactly justified by the word used. But we cannot doubt that our translators seized its spirit. They sought to express that there was no second to the glorified Christ, and that His exaltation is so far beyond words that all the highest ranks of angelic beings are far beneath His feet.

Chapter 6:12 shows that principalities and powers (or authorities) belong to the spiritual realm — angelic beings, evil in nature in that case. But chapter 1:21 includes all spirit beings, good or evil.

Nothing declares the majesty of God's power and the sovereign supremacy of His will to the whole intelligent creation so strongly as this: the Man Christ Jesus lifted to the throne of heaven. For the natural place of man is earth. The first man was not heavenly. He was of the earth, made of dust... He stood on a level essentially different from, as well as lower than, the heavenly beings. Angels are greater in power and might than man. But Jesus is now made higher than the heavens. God gives Him not only supremacy of place, but supremacy of name as well. The name of Jesus is now named in heaven as well as in the church below, with the worship due to God alone.

Scripture uses no such strong expressions when it is a question of raising the millions who will share the bliss of the first resurrection. The reason, no doubt, is that raising them is a simple matter. It is not complicated by all those tremendous questions of sin, death and Satan's power that were at work in the case of Jesus. Then the real battle was fought. Then every opposing power, whether human or satanic, rose to its highest expression and combined in one last effort to hold the Saviour in the dominion of death. Then the might of God's power rose up. It flung back every assault, confounded the full power of the enemy, and raised Him from the dead, and up until, seated at His own right hand, He is above — and not only above, but "far above all principality and power."

The distinction this verse draws between the present age and the age to come is very marked. It is not a comparison of time with eternity, but of one limited period with another. The subject here is the appointed supremacy of Christ, and this relates in a special sense to the present age and the age that follows it at once. This description of Christ's position at the right hand of the Father presses one truth on our minds. God has given Him a name and place of such universal pre-eminence that every claim to independent power or action takes on the definite character of rebellious enmity against God. Whether He is confessed or denied, He is "the Head of all principality and power."

In that place of conferred glory, the church is associated with Him. He is not only "head over all things" but "head over all things to the church." The very same power that worked in Christ to set Him on high works in us to set us along with Him there.

The truth that matches the lifting up of Jesus is the subjection of all created things to Him as Lord of all. This is now stated by a quotation from Psalm 8, a passage mentioned elsewhere in the New Testament for a similar purpose (1 Cor. 15:27; Heb. 2:8). The subjection spoken of here is by the same hand that raised up Jesus from the dead.

So the writer of the letter to the Hebrews explains the eighth Psalm to his readers and says, We see now that this has not yet been fulfilled. This is not a contradiction of Ephesians, where the same Psalm is quoted. In Ephesians we have the counsel of God. That counsel is that all things are to be put under the feet of the glorified Christ, and when God takes a counsel it is as good as accomplished. But here in Hebrews 2 the writer speaks about the time aspect. So he says that at present the Lord Jesus is at the right hand, as in Ephesians, but we do not yet see all things put under His feet in a visible, practical way.

Notice here two headships of a very different character. That He is the Head of the Church is obvious, because the Church is spoken of as His body. But besides this, God presents Him to the Church as "Head over all." God has already exalted Him and set Him in the highest place at His own right hand. God will make Him Heir of all things, the acknowledged and undisputed Head of the whole universe. In this character, as Head over all things, He has joined the Church to Himself. She is not part of the realm over which He reigns, but part, so to speak, of Himself — "the Church, which is His body."

But the apostle says, "Head over all things to the Church": why and how "to the Church"? That cannot mean to limit what is absolute. No, this headship over all shows the fulness of His resources for that to which He is Head in such a way that it is His Body. The Head over all is Head to a people so united to Him by the Spirit that they are one with Him as a body is with its head.

It does not make much difference. He gave Him to the church, that is, gave Him as Head to the body. That, at any rate, is the sense of it. It is the character in which He has been given.

The church is not to be a glorious people only, over which Christ is to reign. We are heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ — not just heirs under Christ, but heirs with Him. This matches the picture given at the very beginning of man's history. Adam had the glory of being head over this lower world, and his wife shares the dominion because of her union with him. The church is the spiritual Eve of the Lord Jesus, the bride of the last Adam.

The church exists today, and her Head is the One who — though "over all, God blessed forever" — is over all things, the ascended and glorified Man. So the church does not have to wait to receive gifts. They are hers today, and have been hers since she came into being. They have reached her from her exalted Head. Every one of them exists to maintain His interests and to do His work in the world, and this world is the scene of the enemy's power. Every one of them is a witness to the triumph of our Head.