But the God of peace, who brought again from among [the] dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, in [the power of the] blood of [the] eternal covenant,
Hebrews closes with a prayer that gathers up the whole letter: God is the God of peace, He has raised Jesus as the great Shepherd, and the blood of an eternal covenant is the ground of both. So why is God called "the God of peace," what makes this Shepherd "great," and how does blood shed in death lead to resurrection?
This title rests on something already done. It settles how God now stands towards those who believe.
God is known here as the God of peace. What a title! The blood of Christ has purchased peace. God's glory, righteousness, holiness, and love all stand on our side. Not one attribute is against us, and all His almighty power is for us. So He is the God of peace, and His attitude toward us is always peace — a peace that is eternal, because it rests on the finished work of Christ. God has declared that He accepts that work by raising Him from the dead. This is the only direct reference to our Lord's resurrection in this letter.
One writer contrasts this name with a name God never takes:
He is never called the God of joy. Joy goes up and down and can be disturbed. There may be reason for joy, yet trouble may stop the heart enjoying it. Peace is what nothing can disturb; it is calm as the throne of God!
The verse says God brought Jesus back from the dead, and it links that act to the blood He had shed. Commentators read the resurrection as the just outcome of what His death was worth.
The blood shed by Jesus gave Him the right to rise from death with the same efficacy for others.
The prayer meets readers who were troubled:
For troubled Hebrews there was a God of peace. He had laid the firm basis of peace by raising from among the dead the One whose heart was that of a faithful Shepherd — great indeed also in the power of resurrection life. And this resurrection matched how precious His death was. The blood of the eternal covenant was so valuable that resurrection was the righteous result.
Scripture gives Jesus three shepherd titles, and each belongs to a different moment in His work.
Scripture speaks of the Lord Jesus as (1) the Good Shepherd (John 10:14); (2) the Great Shepherd (Heb. 13:20); (3) the Chief Shepherd (1 Peter 5:4). He is the Good Shepherd in giving His life for the sheep. He is the Great Shepherd in His glorious resurrection. He is the Chief Shepherd in His second coming, when He will reward the under shepherds.
The word "great" also answers a question these Jewish readers would have felt. How does Jesus compare with the leaders their nation had always honoured?
Here in this letter (Heb. 13:20) He is called the great Shepherd, surely marking His excellence as surpassing Moses and Aaron. Long ago God had led His people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron (Psalm 77:20). Would their countrymen remind them of that? The Hebrews could point to a Shepherd who far surpassed both, the Lord Jesus Christ, at once the great, the good, and the chief Shepherd.
"Covenant" here does not mean a bargain struck between two equal parties.
Covenant in Scripture means something different from covenant in ordinary language. It is the way God deals with man. It is not an agreement between God and man, or man and God… "The blood of the everlasting covenant" in Hebrews 13 is finished and done with. It will go all the way through, and it is available for all. The blood will never lose its value. It is the groundwork of all God's dealings with man in all ages.
The covenant is eternal, so what it secures is eternal too.
They see the proof and pledge of this in our Lord Jesus, whom God brought up from the dead. He is not only the "good" and "chief" Shepherd but "the great Shepherd of the sheep." His blood belongs to no temporary covenant but to an eternal one. It secures the present redemption and heavenly nearness of those who believe. It is also their sure title to be brought up from death in the same way at His coming.
- Blood — The cross purchased peace. The blood of the eternal covenant is the ground of everything else in the verse, and it never loses its value.
- Peace — Because of that blood, no attribute of God stands against the believer. He is "the God of peace." Joy can be disturbed; this peace cannot.
- Resurrection — God raised Jesus not in spite of His death but because of its worth. Resurrection was the righteous result. It is also the only direct mention of the resurrection in this letter.
- Shepherd — Good in dying, great in rising, chief at His return. The risen Shepherd surpasses Moses and Aaron, who once led God's flock.
- Sheep — What happened to the Shepherd is the pledge for the flock. The blood that raised Him is their title to rise at His coming.
perfect you in every good work to the doing of his will, doing in you what is pleasing before him through Jesus Christ; to whom [be] glory for the ages of ages. Amen.
Hebrews ends with a prayer, not a last command. The writer asks God Himself to produce the obedience he has been urging on his readers. That raises three questions: what does the prayer ask for, whose work is it, and why does it end in praise?
The verse names good works as the goal, yet the writer speaks to God, not to the readers. One writer explains why the prayer runs in that direction.
God's people work His works. But the strength of their effort is the grace in which they stand. Faith is the instrument by which they do things that please God. The apostle's desire was his brothers' perfection in every good work. He looks to the God of peace for that desire to be fulfilled. For God is the Doer of His people's acceptable works. By His Spirit He brings about in them compliance with His will. To own this truth, and act on it in faith, is the perfection of obedience. Jesus has led us in this faith. "The Father who dwells in Me does His works" were His words. He spoke them when He was about to complete in death, for our sakes, the work of that obedience through which we stand blameless before the God of peace (John 14:10).
Where the ESV has "equip you," other translations read "perfect you in every good work." One writer explains the picture behind that word.
We are perfect when we are adjusted to the will of God — joined to that will, not out of joint with it. This is the meaning of the word perfect here. Then how good the works will be that we do — works that will last. They are our answer to all that God has done for us and all that Christ is to us.
Being handed over to another's will sounds like loss. The same writer meets that fear head on, and shows why the second half of the verse works from the inside out.
And what a perfection this will be if it is His work. We may have our standards, our notions of what we would like to be; let us drop them, and give ourselves wholly to God. He will patiently work in us with His own standard in view, which is conformity to Christ. Let us not be afraid of the will of God. Before we knew the God of peace, our hearts naturally thought His will must be against us. But it is not so… He brings good works out of us by working in us. What is external is the result of what is internal. He would have our hearts, our secret inward life, pleasing to Himself, for He desires truth in the inward parts. It is His work to produce the motives within us that are well-pleasing to Him.
If God is the one working, then any gap between the prayer and our lives has only one possible source.
There is never any failure on God's side. He has given us all things that pertain to life and godliness. There are unbounded stores in Christ, but we fail in using them.
The phrase is easy to read as a polite ending. It is the same channel through which everything else in the letter has come.
The prayer is that we may be made perfect in every good work: it is "to do His will." … It is all "through Jesus Christ," the blessed One who has accomplished everything. If it is redemption, it is through Jesus Christ. If it is access to God, it is through Jesus Christ. If it is worship as priests, it is, "Through Him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God." If it is service, if it is doing the will of God, it is still through that same precious One.
The closing praise is not a flourish. One writer reads it as a return, at the letter's close, to the truth stated in its opening chapter.
The writer desires that God would perfect them in every good work … working in them what is well-pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ. To Him — the Son, as we have seen, and the Heir of all things, and by whom the worlds were made — be glory forever and ever. We read of His person as Divine at the start of the letter, and we are reminded of the same truth at its close. For to what mere creature would the Spirit of God ascribe glory forever and ever, and stress it with the word Amen?
- Prayed, not ordered. The verse asks God to produce the obedience. Owning that He is the Doer of His people's acceptable works is itself the perfection of obedience.
- Fitted, not flawless. "Perfect" means adjusted — joined to God's will rather than out of joint with it, and the works that follow last.
- Inward before outward. He works the motives first, because what is external is the result of what is internal.
- Supply, not shortfall. There is never any failure on God's side. The stores in Christ are unbounded; we fail in using them.
- Through Christ, to His glory. Redemption, access, worship and service all run through the same One. The prayer ends by giving Him glory forever.