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Lesson 03: Christ's Superiority to the Angels

Ellet J. Waggoner

The Present Truth : July 22, 1897

 Let us take a brief glance at what we have passed over. God has spoken, and still speaks. He speaks to us in His Son, that only begotten Son—the Lord—who was in the beginning with God, and who was God. This Son through whom God speaks to us is the heir of all things, because in Him were all things created. Moreover He is the image of the invisible God (Colossians 1.15), the very impress of His substance, and the shining of His glory; and because He is all this, and because He bears in His own life all creation with the sins and the curse of the whole world, He has by Himself, and for His own sake, made a reconciliation, a cleansing, of sin, and is seated “on the right hand of the Majesty on high; being made so much better than the angels, as He hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.” Hebrews 1.4

“Being made so much better than the angels.” How much better?—So much better as to have a seat on the right hand of the Majesty on high, a place that is infinitely higher than that occupied by the highest angel; and this place He has by right, because “He hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.”

The “More Excellent Name.”—What is the “more excellent” name? It is a name that He has “by inheritance,” and must therefore be the Father’s name. God the Father Himself addresses the Son as God, saying, “Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever.” He is as much more excellent than the angels, as the Creator is above the thing created. In Christ were the angels in heaven created (Colossians 1.16), so that it is impossible that any angel should ever equal the Son in rank and power. The place which He occupies He has by right of inheritance, as the only begotten Son of God.

“For unto which of the angels said He at any time, Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to Him a Father, and he shall be to Me a Son?”