Messages from the Epistle to the Hebrews

FECT, AND

b.

has brought us to the true Tabernacle and true Sacrifice, to the better and final Covenant, to the supreme High Priest. The teaching has left us, as the ninth chapter closes, "looking up steadfastly into heaven," recollecting where the Lord is and why He is there; thinking how we, His Israel, "have

efuge to the hope set before them." But they are to take it, as those who feel beneath

way before, particularly in the preceding three chapters of the Epistle. But he must emphasize it again, for it is the inmost purport of his whole discourse. And he must do it now with the urgency of one who has in view a real peril of apostasy. His readers are hard pressed, by persuasion

g, the propitiation, had to be done again. Year by year accordingly the worshippers were treated as "not perfect" (ver. 1); that is to say, in the clear light of the context, they were not perfect as to reconciliation, th

due to revelations from many quarters of the character of the Lord Jehovah, and not least, assuredly, to the conviction-how could the more deeply taught souls have helped it?-that this vast and death-dealing ceremonial had a goal which alone could explain it, in some transcendent climax of remission. But in itself the ritual emph

ally propitiatory of themselves. Yet the God of Israel had commanded them; they could not be mere forms therefore. What could they be then but types and suggestions of a reality which should at last justify the symbolism by a victorious fulfilment? Thus was an oracle like Isa. liii. made possible. And thus, as we are taught expressly here (verses 5-7), the oracle of Psalm xl. was made possible, in which "sacrifices and offerings," though prescribed to Israel by his King, were not "delighted in" by Him, not "willed" by Him for their own sake at all, but in which One spe

passage, in the Sp

he roll of the book" had spoken, as the supreme doer and bearer for us of the will of God. His sacred Body was the Thing indicated by the prophetic altars of Aaron. When He "offered" it, presenting it to the eternal Holiness o

s the burthen and message of the whole passage (verses 11-18). "Once for all" (?φ?παξ), "once for ever," the holy Body has been offered (ver. 10). "He offered one sacrifice for sins in pe

. It has done this "in perpetuity, "ε?? τ? διηνεκ?? (ver. 14); that is to say, they will never to the very last need anything but that sacrifice and offering to be the cause and the warrant of their place within that home. "Their sins and their iniquities" their reconciled Father "will never remember any more" against them (ver. 17), in the sense that the sacrifice once presented on their behalf will be before Him every moment in the person of the Self-Sacrificer, who sits beside Him, "appearing for us." They are the Israel of the great New Covenant. And that covenant, as we have already remembered (viii. 7-13), provides

pure water," the baptismal sign and seal of the covenant blessing, is to behave as what he is-the child at home. That home is the Holy Place; it is the very Presence of his God; but it is home. He is to pass into that sanctuary, along the pathway traced by the blessed blood, not hesitating, but with the "boldness" of an absolute reliance, perfectly free while perfectly and won

To leave it, to turn back from it, to be a renegade from covenant joys, is no mere exchange of the best for the less good. It means multiplied and capital rebellion. No legal shadow-sacrifices will shelter now the

n full view of the coming crown. Let them grasp afresh the glorious privilege of "boldness" (ver. 35), reaffirming to themselves with strong assurance that they are "sanctified," "perfected," at home with God in Christ. Let them rise up and go on in that noble "patience" (ver. 36) which "suffers and is strong." It is only "a very little while" before the High Priest will re

severance to the end. "Rejoice in the Lord; for you it is safe" (Phil. iii. 1). The "boldness" of a humble assuranc