Week 49 Hebrews
Four years ago I read that the book of Hebrews maybe wasn’t a letter…not to begin with. It was a public sermon. So – the guy said – Hebrews might be more understandable if it was read all-at-once (and even out-loud) – just like a sermon.
I tried that before. I’ve got a note in my bible that says I read through Hebrews in 45-minutes in 2017.
This year I decided to read Hebrews all-at-once again (but not out-loud) and so I got a kitchen timer and set it to 60-minutes.
One thing I noticed was that the audience must have been very familiar with the OT. I’d be guessing to say they must have been Jewish but it’s hard to imagine the OT-heavy content grabbing the attention of a non-Jewish group.
The other thing I noticed was that the audience must have been mostly people who believed in the Lord. But – and this is the thing that I kept seeing – some of them had gotten disenchanted with the Lord…disappointed…were having second thoughts.
So part of the discussion in Hebrews was: what happens when I get tired of the Lord?
It’s a pretty important question when you get right down to it. A pretty big decision.
Note: I think I saw the “Hebrews-is-a-sermon” idea in the Catholic Study Bible (I’m not absolutely sure since I’m here and the CSB is sitting on a shelf in the Medicine Hat Public Library). Note 2: my 2021 reading time for Hebrews was 1:00:09.