The first 6 verses of chap. 3 present an important teaching that lays a foundation for the exhortation that is in this chapter.  It has to do with Moses and comparing him to Yeshua.

Moses is esteemed by our people as far above any other Jew who ever lived.  God had miraculously protected him as a baby and personally provided for his burial.

He was the man to whom God spoke face to face.  He had seen the very glory of God and, in fact, even had this glory reflected in his own face for a brief while. Israel could not endure that glory upon him in their presence and requested he wear a veil to cover his face. 

It was Moses who led Israel out of Egypt.  As Paul stresses in Rom. 2, our fathers had and continue to have great confidence in Torah given to Israel by Moses.  

The Mitzvot, the commands given by Moses, remain for our people to this day as our supreme priority, and Moses and the Torah are synonymous.

Moses not only brought us the Ten Commandments but he also wrote the Torah the first 5 books Scripture.  Those books lay out the sacrificial system and other laws that governed everything in the Jewish community.

It was Moses who wrote down the plans given to him for the Tabernacle and the Ark of the Covenant.  Moses was indeed great, but as we have been told in the first chapter of Hebrews, Yeshua is greater.  In that chapter He is described as greater in His office, His work, and in His Person.

Jesus is described as the Apostle, the unique “Sent One” and as High Priest. in His work He is the Builder of the House, In His Person He is the unique Son of the Living God of Israel. 

The writer of Hebrew wants us to know and understand that as great as Moses was and is, Yeshua is far greater.

I.  Yeshua is superior in His Office.

Yeshua is the Apostle and High Priest of our confession.  Though Moses was never called an Apostle, he could be considered an Apostle of the Tanach.  Apostolos means “sent one” and was a title often used for official ambassadors.

In this sense Moses was God’s Apostle; He was a sent one to bring God’s chosen people the Word and the covenant.  But Yeshua was both an Apostle and High Priest.

Though Moses could be considered a type of apostle, he was not a priest, and not a high priest.  Yeshua is superior in office because He had two offices, where Moses had only one.

Even in the office of Apostle Yeshua is superior.  First because he brought a greater covenant.  And Secondly because He Himself was the sacrifice that made the promised New covenant effective.

Yeshua is the foremost sent one from God.  He is the one whom Moses and the prophets wrote, who would be the ultimate deliverer of Israel.

What are the characteristics of an apostle or ambassador?  First he has the power and the authority of the ruler who sends him.  Jesus came sent by and endowed with the power of God.

Yeshua came with all of God’s grace, His love, His mercy, all of God’s justice, and all of God’s power.  

Secondly, an ambassador speaks completely on behalf of the one who sent him.  Yeshua said, (John 12:49)  “For I did not speak on My own initiative, but the Father Himself who sent Me has given Me a commandment as to what to say and what to speak.

Yeshua was the perfect Ambassador, the perfect Apostle, sent from God.  He is also our great High Priest.  But since His role as High Priest is dealt with in such detail in Heb. 4 & 5, we will look at this more carefully later.

Suffice it to say that He is the High Priest, The Mediator between God and Man.  He is the whom God the Father sent to Bridge the Gulf between God and man.

II. Jesus is superior in His Works: As a Builder.  

(Hebrews 3:2-4)  He was faithful to Him who appointed Him, as Moses also was in all His house. {3} For He has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses, by just so much as the builder of the house has more honor than the house. {4} For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God.

Here we have a brief comparison of the work of Yeshua with the work of Moses.   First the writer of Hebrews deals with their similarities.  In Numbers 12:7-8 we read:

“…My servant Moses, He is faithful in all My household.  With him I speak mouth to mouth, even openly, and not in dark sayings, and he beholds the form of the Lord…”

He carried out God’s plan.  He led Israel out of Egypt to Mt. Sinai.  He was a faithful servant who responded completely when God refined him.  

It took 40 years to make Moses usable to God, and then for 40 more years Moses faithfully served God and Israel. When he came to the Red Sea, Moses believed God’s promise of deliverance and in faith saw the waters part.  

He was faithful in the wilderness journey. There were several times when Moses did falter.  When he struck the rock in anger instead of speaking to it as God had commanded. 

But unlike most men, Moses was faithful.  And it’s his faithfulness that the Spirit of God is emphasizing here.   Just as Moses was faithful so was Yeshua, only more so.

Yeshua was completely faithful to the Father.  “He who speaks from himself seeks his own glory, but He who is seeking the glory of the one who sent Him, He is true, and there is no unrighteousness in Him”. John 7:18.

In other words Yeshua was saying, “you can tell that I am a true apostle because I do not seek My own glory.  I seek only the glory of the One who sent Me.”

From childhood He had always been about His Father’s business.  Yeshua always did the Father’s will.  He was faithful. Faithful, is such a wonderful word.  This is the chief qualification of an Apostle.

Jesus said, “If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe me.” The writer of Hebrews also reminds us that he was trustworthy in His House.

House in the original language here means “household” and refers to people, not a building or dwelling.  Israelites and proselytes were God’s household.

God was and is the owner of the house of Israel. Moses was a steward, a manager of God’s house.  He was entrusted to give Israel the truths, commandments, requirements, and promises God had committed to him.  In this he was faithful.

Messiah was also faithful in His house, which included Israel, the congregation of Believers, of which Gentiles were now part of by their faith in Israels promised Messiah.

“So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God’s household.” Eph 2:19 and as Peter taught:

“And coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected by men, but choice and precious in the sight of God, you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house” 1 Pet. 2:4-5

As believers we are called to be stewards in God’s house, though in a lesser sense.  We have been given gifts, and resources that are entrusted to us to utilize in God’s house.

We like our Messiah are called to be faithful Stewards in God’s house.  As we are faithful God will fulfill His words through His Messiah, “you will do greater things than I..”

Moses was faithful, but he was a part of the house.  Yeshua made the house.  That is the difference, and of course it’s a great difference.  Yeshua created Israel and the Church which is His Body. He also created and holds the world in His hands as well.

” For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.” Col. 1:16-17

Yeshua is superior in His Office as Apostle and High Priest.  He is greater in His works, because He is the builder of the House.  And He is greater …

III.  In His Person: As Son   (3:5-6)

(Hebrews 3:5-6) Now Moses was faithful in all His house as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken later; {6} but Christ was faithful as a Son over His house–whose house we are, if we hold fast our confidence and the boast of our hope firm until the end.

In this passage we see that Moses is described as a servant, while Yeshua is described as a Son.  There is quite a difference between a servant and a son.

The classic foreshadowing of this difference is found in Genesis 24 where we learn of Abraham sending his servant to seek a bride for Isaac.  In all likelihood this servant was Eliezer of Damascus, who was going to be Abraham’s heir if a son was not born.

Eliezer was faithful as a servant, but it was the son who was given the rights and inheritance.  It was also that son, Isaac who was brought to Mt. Moriah to be sacrificed.

We think of the illustration that Yeshua used to describe the Father who sent His servants to His Vineyard, of which Israel is.

(Mark 12:1-11)  And He began to speak to them in parables: “A man PLANTED A VINEYARD AND PUT A WALL AROUND IT, AND DUG A VAT UNDER THE WINE PRESS AND BUILT A TOWER, and rented it out to vine-growers and went on a journey. {2} “At the harvest time he sent a slave to the vine-growers, in order to receive some of the produce of the vineyard from the vine-growers. {3} “They took him, and beat him and sent him away empty-handed. {4} “Again he sent them another slave, and they wounded him in the head, and treated him shamefully. {5} “And he sent another, and that one they killed; and so with many others, beating some and killing others. {6} “He had one more to send, a beloved son; he sent him last of all to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ {7} “But those vine-growers said to one another, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours!’ {8} “They took him, and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard. {9} “What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the vine-growers, and will give the vineyard to others. {10} “Have you not even read this Scripture: ‘THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED, THIS BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER stone; {11} THIS CAME ABOUT FROM THE LORD, AND IT IS MARVELOUS IN OUR EYES’?”

Moses’ faithfulness had an important and special reason: to be a testimony of those things which were to be spoken later.  He paved the way for the Messiah who was to come.

Yeshua said quite accurately in John 5:46 “If you believed Moses, you would believe Me, for he wrote of Me.”

“But Messiah was faithful as a Son over His house whose house we are.  We who are believers are God’s house.  He dwells in us.  How can we know that we really are God’s house?

By holding fast our confidence and the boast of our hope firm until the end.  This doesn’t mean we are saved only if we hang on until the end.  We can neither save ourselves or keep ourselves saved.

The meaning is that continuance is the proof of reality.  We can tell if we really are the house of God because we stay there.  “If you abide in my word, then you truly are disciples of mine.”

Those who truly possess eternal life, will find themselves in the crucible of God‘s workmanship. They will experience, at times what seems to be unpleasant, and unfair. 

However, Yeshua God’s Messiah has been appointed as our high priest, and he comes to minister to us as no one else can. 

Genuine Believers turn to him when the bottom drops out. Such a Response in the midst of a test reveals that one is truly his, and that their salvation is not shallow and without substance.

So as important as Moses is to Israel Yeshua is greater. Greater in His mission, greater in His priestly role interceding for us and greater in the Covenant He brought.