Written to Hebrews, the book assumes a knowledge of the Hebrew Bible. As such, it presents Christ entirely from that perspective.
Hebrews 1-2, Son of God, Son of Adam
The writer first establishes from the Psalms that the Christ is not an angel and is, in fact, the Son of God. He also establishes that He is fully human and has experienced what all men experience - including death. As one of us, He is able to understand what we go through and treat us sympathetically.
Just as God rested from His work in creation, there is a rest available to the people of God. This rest is from fear and striving to be good enough to merit salvation. Once we trust in Him, we may enter His rest. This is in contrast to the wilderness generation who were not able to muster that trust and so perished without entering the land.
Having established that Christ is not an angel, but is the human son of God, and that He is able to understand our frailties, the writer then goes on to establish His priesthood. In this, since He is not a descendant of Aaron, the writer must use a different priestly order; that of Melchizedek.
The Covenant made as Sinai was defective in that one of the parties - Israel - was unable to live according to its terms. That made a New Covenant necessary. Although God's terms are the same for both covenants, the new one is to be written on the heart instead of on tablets of stone. The New Covenant like the one at Sinai must be ratified with the blood of a sacrifice. In this case, the blood was that of the Messiah.
The sin offerings made in the tabernacle were only for unintentional sin and had to be repeated annually, because the people's hearts were not changed. Under the New Covenant God's law will be written on hearts of flesh instead of on tablets of stone. Thus, the offering Messiah made with His own blood needs only to have been done one time, since those cleansed by that offering will have had their hearts circumcised.
Faith is the spiritual quality that allows us to act in the present. Since the future is unknown, we must have faith that the thing we are about to do will have the results we want. This especially applies to our relationship with God. He has promised certain things and we are to live our lives in the trust that those promises are reliable.
After having described the often unpleasant process of character development, the author returns to the theme that this world is not our permanent home. Rather, there is a better and permanent home for those who are disciples of Y'shua.
