Partakers Christian Podcasts

Highlights in Hebrews 30

Highlights in Hebrews

(with Roger Kirby)

Part 30 - Hebrews 11:8-19 The obedience of Abraham

 

The obedience of Abraham It was by faith that Abraham obeyed when God called him to leave home and go to another land that God would give him as his inheritance. He went without knowing where he was going. 9 And even when he reached the land God promised him, he lived there by faith—for he was like a foreigner, living in tents. And so did Isaac and Jacob, who inherited the same promise. 10 Abraham was confidently looking forward to a city with eternal foundations, a city designed and built by God. Hebrews 11:8-19 (NLT)

A few daft people (like my wife and I used to) love to go trekking and sleep on the ground in a small mountain tent. But that is not most people’s idea of an enjoyable way to spend their holidays. The amazing thing about Abraham is that he not only set out on a long trek, sleeping in tents himself but also persuaded all his family, including his father, to do so. It was, of course, the senior male who was expected to decide what should happen. It seems that Abraham was such a strong and forceful character that he was able to determine what happened. It was a quite remarkable thing to do.

They lived in Ur, one of the greatest and best cities of the ancient world, where they would enjoy all the luxuries that were going. In some way, that is not explained, the Lord spoke to Abraham and instructed him to set out with his whole family on a journey to somewhere - he wasn’t told where. They journeyed north, then west, then south round what is known as the fertile crescent, a great arc of land round the deserts to the south. It proved too much for his father Terah, who gave up halfway and settled in the city of Haran. We can only imagine the big arguments that there must have been between Abraham who had received the direct instructions from the Lord about what they were to do and Terah, who hadn’t. Abraham will have been stuck there until his father died and he had complete control of the family.

It was probably in Haran, when the family was stuck there that he received his great commission from the Lord. He, and his descendants, were given the task of bringing blessing to all the world (Genesis 12: 1 – 3). So much had gone wrong. Adam and Eve had disobeyed the Lord, one of their sons had killed the other, the world had become such an evil place the flood was sent to sort it out and finally the tower of Babel had indicated the arrogance and conceit of mankind. To bring blessing to all that sort of thing was an immense task. In fact Abraham and his descendants, the people of Israel failed. Only when Jesus came as the ideal Israelite was any progress possible. But Abraham was not to know that. His job was simply to obey - as he did. We will probably never get as clear and startling a call as Abraham. Which, you may think, is just as well given how comparatively weak I am! But don’t get too comfortable. My wife and I were into our 50s before we got a call to go to Pakistan. We didn’t hear a voice, but received such an amazing sequence of events that it was quite clear what we were being asked - or was it told - to do. We did not realise that the best years of our lives were in front of us. Abraham can scarcely have enjoyed the call he received as much as we did ours.
If the Lord calls you to some surprising and unexpected venture - do not hesitate, GO

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Highlights in Hebrews 29

Highlights in Hebrews

(with Roger Kirby)

Part 29 - Hebrews 10:32-39 - The power of faith!

Faith shows the reality of what we hope for; it is the evidence of things we cannot see. NLT

With chapter 11 we start into the writer’s great gallery of Old Testament saints. The introductory verse starts off with 2, or is it 3, great words. The most important one is ‘hope’, then to support ‘hope’ we have ‘faith’ but that is not sufficient as just one other word. ‘Faith’ in common usage is often thought to be the same as ‘believe’ but believing all takes place in our heads. The following list of people of faith clearly shows that there is more to it than just what happens between our ears! There is a great deal of activity involved as well. We can call this either ‘endurance’ (10: 36), ‘trustworthiness’ or ‘faithfulness’. Let’s settle for the last of those - which is part of the meaning of the Greek word, which also means ‘faith’ in the more restricted sense.

To see what ‘faith’ has to do with ‘hope’ we must think a bit about what we mean by hope. It comes in three basic varieties. There is the hope of most people that they will be able to live a good and satisfying life. Some people, I suppose, just drift through life without thinking about where it is going and without any long term ambitions - but they are not us, or you wouldn’t be bothering to read these notes! The second sort of hope is our hope for what will happen to us when we die. Have we then a hope? The third and final sort of hope is the small hopes that we have every day. ‘I hope I will soon be rid of this cold’ we say. Or ‘I hope I get such and such a Christmas present’.

Our writer is not at all interested in that third sort of hope, but he is very interested n the first two. In his thinking the two of them are closely woven together. He talks about the way in which Enoch was taken up to God, about how Abraham was looking forward to ‘a city that has foundations’, and how they, and many others, were ‘seeking a homeland’. All these things are closely connected to their lives in this world and particularly their faith and faithfulness. They did not really understand where they were going. We, living after the life, death and resurrection of Jesus have a much better idea of what we are doing, where we are going and what the effects are going to be. We, if we put our trust in the Lord, thus having faith in him, can expect to be accepted by the Lord in the day of judgement and, filled with that knowledge, will strive to live a life of faithfulness throughout our time in this world. Our good and gracious God will accept us on the basis of our faith in Jesus but has also promised to reward us according to our faithfulness in our lives with him, ‘ For no one can lay any foundation other than the one we already have—Jesus Christ. Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials—gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person’s work has any value. If the work survives, that builder will receive a reward. But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss. The builder will be saved, but like someone barely escaping through a wall of flames.’ (1 Corinthians 3: 11 – 16, NLT).

We are sure that this is the way life works because we have read the scriptures, seen how Jesus lived and died, and wondered at the great illustrations of warriors of the faith that we read about in this chapter. We may not have seen these things. But Jesus himself said, ‘Blessed are those who believe without seeing me.’ The people of old were accepted that way - so shall we be! Build for yourself a good foundation so that you will not be ashamed when you appear before the Lord on the day of judgement.

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Highlights in Hebrews 28

Highlights in Hebrews

(with Roger Kirby)

Part 28 - Hebrews 10:32-39 Not everything goes well!

We are holy!

… recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated. For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one. Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised. For, “Yet a little while, and the coming one will come and will not delay; but my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him.” But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls. (Hebrews 10:32-39)

There seems to be a strong tendency, at least in this country, to think that becoming a Christian and setting out to follow Jesus is a cure for all the problems we may otherwise have. That is not the way it works! Life for us is not likely to be as difficult as it was for the people this book is written to. We do not know exactly where they lived or what their background was ,but it is clear from this passage that not everything had been easy for them. They were probably Jews, since the book is called ‘to the Hebrews’ so they may well have had a lot of trouble from other Jews who did not believe in Jesus. Very soon after the foundation of the Christian church there was a lot of conflict between Jews and Christians, Paul being one of the chief culprits. Before long the Christians were thrown out of the synagogues all together. Then the ordinary citizens of the Roman empire will not have liked being shown up for the self centred and unpleasant people many of them were. It sounds as though the early Christians had a ministry to prisoners, which was not well received by other people. They had things stolen from their houses and could get no support from any judicial powers to recover what was stolen. Since this is going out all over the world some things like those may be your experience but that is not all that likely.

Our problems may be much more ordinary and personal. Perhaps they are physical, we simply are not well, or are suffering the products of old age and their tendency to drag us down. They may be social as we struggle with family, friends and enemies. They may be psychological and mental – there is no guarantee we will avoid such things by following Jesus. We should be better off as Christians as we turn away from bad habits of drinking or drugs and seek to follow a generally better life style. But following Jesus is not a general cure for all ills.

Why then should we follow Jesus? If not for our personal improvement, why? The answer is simple and devastating: because he is who he is. He is the Lord. He is the King of the Kingdom. He is the Lord of creation and of this world’s continuing existence. We should set out to follow Jesus because of who he is and not because of who we are. If, indeed, we did start to follow him from purely selfish motives he is a good and loving Saviour who will allow you to learn what your motives should have been and slowly, as you come to understand more, change your motives to those that they should have been in the first place. We can still ‘have faith and preserve our souls’ (10: 39) and receive a ‘better possession and an abiding one’ (10: 34) and receive the ‘great reward’ that ‘is promised’ (10: 35, 36). The necessary ‘endurance’ (10: 36) can be ours even if we did not really start for the best and right motives.

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Highlights in Hebrews 27

Highlights in Hebrews

(with Roger Kirby)

Part 27 - Hebrews 10:26–31

A word of warning

If we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace? For we know him who said, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay.” And again, “The Lord will judge his people.” It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.(Hebrews 10:26-31)

Many countries require a person to have a visa before they are allowed into the country. The visa will often say how long they can stay in the country. If, after entering the country, they sneak back out of the country before the visa is up where there is no entry/exit point and then present themselves to re-enter the country at a proper entry point they would be likely to be in serious trouble.

That is something like what the writer is thinking about here. We received a visa to let us into the Kingdom of God when we first started to follow Jesus. Our writer says we simply cannot leave the kingdom for a while; live in the kingdom of the world; and then return to the kingdom. There is a very important and strong reason why this is so. We may belong to all sorts of clubs: golf, football, book reading or cookery etc., leave the club, cancelling our subscription, and return to it later. But unlike all these clubs the other factor in the kingdom is God himself. On entry to the kingdom we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. He cannot be accepted one minute and returned months or years later just because we want to do something else.

We effectively do that if we continue in deliberate sin. The Old Testament is very definite about this. There are two sorts of sin: unintended and ‘with a high hand’, that is defiantly, quite deliberately and intentionally (Numbers 15: 27 - 31).. The former can be remedied by offering repentance and sacrifice, but for the second there is no such remedy.

Unfortunately there seems to be a great deal of teaching around in this Western world in which God is a kind of benevolent grandfather figure who will accept almost anything from his grand-children merely patting them on the head and saying ‘don’t do that again - it is not nice’ or some such comment. We must not forget that we are dealing with the Creator and Sustainer of this world of ours and all the universe. He is a holy God who does not like - will not accept - impurity.

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Highlights in Hebrews 26

Highlights in Hebrews

(with Roger Kirby)

Part 26 - Hebrews 10:19–25

Our confident approach to the Lord

Therefore, brothers and sisters,] since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.

The old pun on the word ‘therefore’ was that we should always ask what it is there for. That was never more true than the ‘therefore’ we have here in 10:19. In our last study we noted two things: that Jesus sat down at the right hand of Father God thus indicating his superiority over all; and that this is based on the new covenant, the newly declared purpose and will of God towards his people.

For our writer this was all brilliantly pictured in the way that, as Jesus died on the cross, the veil of the temple was torn from top to bottom (Matthew 27: 51). This was the work of God; if a man had been responsible it would have been done from bottom to top. The purpose of the veil had been to keep everyone out of the Most Holy Place, where God was. Only the High Priest went into this presence of God once a year on the day of atonement. That was now redundant. Everyone, or at least all the Lord’s people, now had clear unlimited access to the most holy place, which was Jesus. It is hard to see how the flesh of Jesus can be a way through the curtain. It was his blood shed which was effective. The Jerusalem temple was where God was, more than anywhere else on earth. No longer. Now it was in Jesus that God was to be found and, in the person of the Holy Spirit of Jesus, in every believing person. We have, so to speak, not to travel to Jerusalem to find God, but to reach down into ourselves. That must be counted both a huge privilege and a huge responsibility.

However we need to be careful. The next few verses say, “ let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.” Of those four things keeping our bodies washed would be by far the easiest if it didn’t really mean keeping our souls and spirits clean - nothing to do with soap, I’m afraid!

More significantly, note how the quotation starts with our faith and ends with the faithfulness of the Lord. This is our confidence. It does not have to rest solely on us but draws continuous strength from one who is a great deal more reliable than we tend to be.

When we get to 10:24, 25 we have “And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.” To give a picture of this: you can have a good going fire with many pieces of coal on it. But if you take one red-hot piece out of the fire and place it on the hearth all by itself it will very soon darken, cool, and lose all its heat. So it is with us if we remove ourselves from the company of other followers of Jesus.

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Highlights in Hebrews 25

Highlights in Hebrews

(with Roger Kirby)

Part 25 - Hebrews 10:11–18 Jesus sat down
We are holy!

Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when this priest, Jesus, had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, and since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool. For by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.

The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. First he says: “This is the covenant I will make with them after that time, says the Lord. I will put my laws in their hearts, and I will write them on their minds.”

Then he adds: “Their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more.” And where these have been forgiven, sacrifice for sin is no longer necessary.

Our writer likes to make sure we have heard and understood what he has said. So he repeats himself. Here he repeatstwo things in particular he has already said: that Jesus sat down and that the covenant had been renewed in its new form.

These days a great many people sit down to work and only stand up when it is finished. It was the other way round for them. Nearly everybody stood up most of the time when they were working. It was only at the end of the day, when the work was done, that they were able to sit down. Jesus sat down at the right hand of God - the place of privilege - because his work was done and would never need to be done again 10:12. Unlike the previous sacrifices carried out in the temple every day his sacrifice was complete, perfect, finished. The sacrifices of animals had been but small tokens of the repentance of the person sacrificing and the forgiveness received from God in response to that repentance. The sacrifice of Jesus, the very Son of God himself, had been so far more effective than those it would never need to be repeated. In fact, how could it possibly be repeated? Any further sacrifice could only be the tiniest reflection of what Jesus had accomplished, not really worth the bother!

The sign of the new covenant, the new way in which God was choosing to deal with people, was not to be a sacrifice but a memorial of that one great sacrifice. The sacrifice could not be repeated; only our memory of it could be, and should be, repeated. So Luke says: “he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” And likewise the cup after they had eaten, saying, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood. (Luke 22:19-20).

Sadly it is not always the case that this is how our memory of him is presented. If we call people ‘priests’ we need something for them to do so we invent altars and a sacrifice for them to do on it. There is no beginning hint that that is the right thing to do here in the New Testament and, in particular, in this book of Hebrews.

If you belong to one of the churches where this is the way things are thought about it may not be possible for you to withdraw. If so then you have to attend that sort of service but you need to say to yourself very clearly every time that what you are doing is remembering that great moment of sacrifice when Christ cried ‘it is finished’, a moment never to be repeated, only remembered.
And that is true for all of us.
What is the effect? We are made holy, made acceptable to appear before the Lord God now and at the end of days.

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Highlights in Hebrews 24

Highlights in Hebrews

(with Roger Kirby)
Part 24 - Hebrews 10:10–14
We are holy!

 

“… we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all."

 

Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, and since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool. For by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.”

The dominant word here is ‘holy’, appearing twice. That is difficult because ‘holy’ is one of those words which tends to mean something rather different in our everyday usage from what it means in scripture. Holiness in common usage tends to mean something like being ‘so heavenly minded as to be no earthly use’! That is far away from scripture usage.

‘Holy’ is the prime attribute of God. He is pure; he is perfect love; he is true justice; he is different from everything else; he is wholly other and above and beyond all else. When the word ‘holy’ is applied to somebody or something on the earth it means they, or it. are so close to God that some of that holiness has ‘rubbed off’ onto them.

We need to put together what our writer says here with what Paul says in Romans 12:1-2. To take what Paul says first he is interested in the practical effects of being holy. He says, “Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”

There is no beginning suggestion there, or anywhere else in scripture, that holiness requires withdrawal from every day life. It might be easier if it did! But it doesn’t. We have to live in the world but not in the way of the world. We have to have a different mindset, a different worldview, a different focus of all our endeavours. A different Lord.. We have to please God; we have to let as much of the holiness of God rub off on us as we can. That can only happen if we live in close proximity to him as much as possible. Or, to put it another way, we are to walk hand in hand with the Holy Spirit.

That is Paul’s emphasis. But what about our writer here? He is more concerned with how this can possibly have happened. It is all because of the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. This is the positive aspect of what Jesus achieved. We probably, rightly, think more of the negative, of what he did as securing forgiveness of sin for us, sin past, present and future. Positively he set us on a way, a pathway, which we are to walk with the Spirit. He has perfected us! Perfected us in the sense that we cannot, could not, be any more acceptable to the Lord of All than we are through Jesus. We have reached an end a completion of our lives and characters. Wow!

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Highlights in Hebrews 23

Highlights in Hebrews

(with Roger Kirby)

Part 23 - Hebrews 9:22

Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.

If we have been brought up in a Christian environment it is very easy to overlook the fact that our faith is founded on a human sacrifice! So we cheerfully talk about the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross. For those who have not got that sort of background it can be a real stumbling block to them thinking of Christian faith. Paul recognised that when he said “we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles”. Even when we think about that verse we may well concentrate on the crucified bit and not think that this means the death of a human being. In almost all the world human sacrifice has been rejected from the beginning even where there is no necessary connection to Christian or Jewish thought. Once we have accepted the idea of sacrifice it is not difficult to see meaning in it as we did in our last highlight from Hebrews.

But why sacrifice in the first place? Animal sacrifice comes into the Bible very early. Animal death is necessary for God to clothe Adam and Eve in ‘garments of skin’ in Genesis 3: 21. It is probable that Abel’s sacrifice was accepted by God and Cain’s was rejected because Abel was a herder and brought animal parts as an offering while Cain was a farmer and brought fruits (Genesis 4: 2 – 5; Hebrews 11: 4). Sacrifice was by no means limited to the nation of Israel.

It was commonplace in all the surrounding nations. The crucial difference was that the line of Abraham had a strong and well defined sense of sin and that the purpose of sacrifice was to cover that problem. Other peoples thought of sacrifice basically as an appeasement of capricious gods to try and improve their tempers and get on the right side of them. Biblically sacrifice was about human shortcomings whereas most other thinking was about the gods. Sin in the early chapters of the Bible is all about the breaking of relationships, particularly those with God, rather than with any infringement of a law. In a way nothing much has changed. We still sin because we break relationships with each other or with God. Even the original sin of Adam and Eve was not really about the eating of the fruit so much as disobeying God. it was more a matter of a relationship broken than a wrong action. The penalty for the broken relationship with God was death. Not physical death immediately in the garden of Eden but spiritual death - the death of an unblemished relationship with God. The same principle still applies. How could immediate death be averted? Only by a substitute death - that of an animal substituting for the human being. So throughout the Old Testament animal after animal died to carry the many sins of human beings.

Was there any way that continual death could be averted? Only if something or somebody of eternal worth could die in their stead. And so Jesus went, voluntarily, to his death so that you and I could be forgiven our sins, particularly our sins of breaking relationship with God.

Was there any way that continual death could be averted? Only if something or somebody of eternal worth could die in their stead. And so Jesus went, voluntarily, to his death so that you and I could be forgiven our sins, particularly our sins of breaking relationship with God. People have sometimes died for other people. Like the firefighters who went into the Twin Towers in `New York in 2001 to try to rescue other people. The difference between their action and that of Jesus is that they went in hoping to live even as they took the enormous risk of going back into the towers. Jesus knew he was going to die. He could have walked away from the squad sent to arrest him as he did from the lynch mob in Nazareth (Luke 4: 28 – 30), but he did not. He could have used his superior power over Pilate, but he did not. He could have walked away from the terrible scourging and the mocking of the soldiers, but he did not. He could have nailed the execution squad to the cross in his place, but he did not. Jesus, not just man but also God, died for you and for me, deliberately a human sacrifice for sin. “He did not use his equality with God to his own advantage … he was obedient to death” (Philippians 2: 6, 8). We are forgiven as a result. Worship him.

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Highlights in Hebrews 22

Highlights in Hebrews

(with Roger Kirby)

Part 22 - Hebrews 9:11-14

The blood of Jesus

When Jesus Christ came as high priest of the good things that are now already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not made with human hands, that is to say, is not a part of this creation. He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption. The blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean sanctify them so that they are outwardly clean. How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, cso that we may serve the living God!

Perhaps a summary of the OT (Old Testament) practices that the writer is relying on for so much of his argument is necessary first. This has two aspects found in the books of Exodus, Leviticus and Deuteronomy. Negatively - full of ‘no’ and ‘not’ - are all sorts of instructions about how they were to live and what they were to eat. Our writer is not very interested in these. They comprised the Law. Positively there were detailed instructions about the tabernacle ( a sort of big tent construction) used during their wilderness journey and the practical details of how sacrifices were to be made there and what they accomplished. They thought of the tabernacle as the place where God was much more than anywhere else. Later the same basic idea was transferred to the temple that was to be built in Jerusalem. These sacrifices constituted a recognition that no one is perfect and there would be many involuntary infringements of the Law. These could be remedied through the complex sacrificial system. Not that it was the sacrifices that effected the remedy. They were symbolic of the attitude of the one sacrificing and of the grace of God that accepted his or her contrition.

Even with the help of the Holy Spirit we too are not perfect - we sin - and we need Jesus to remove defilement from us. His death is effective and does remove the consequences of our sin from us. This is the great concern of our writer who explains the effects of the death of Jesus in terms of the OT examples.

Of course this is not really about the ‘blood’ of Jesus. It is what is called a metonymym where a small part of something is used as a name for a whole. (Another example is the way some people will refer to their car as their ‘wheels’.) The ‘blood’ refers to the whole death of Jesus given as a sacrifice for us. In a quite remarkable way the writer uses the practices associated with the temple to explain what Jesus death means for us. He says that the earthly temple was, by Moses instructions (8:5), a copy of the true temple in heaven. So he is able to use the known facts about the earthly temple to indicate the deeper heavenly truths. The central purpose of the temple was as the place of sacrifice for sins and for worship.

There were at least three implications of a sacrifice:
1. It rendered clean those who were not because of their past sinfulness. The OT system, particularly with the annual sacrifice in the innermost part of the temple made by the High Priest once a year, allowed for recovery from sin, that is redemption, Verse 12 uses that picture to explain what Jesus did “he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption. .
2. The Old Testament sacrifice was a symbol that the person making the sacrifice wanted to live in and for the Lord. This becomes what verse 14 says about “serving the living God”;
3. In the giving of the blood of the OT sacrifice it died in place of the one sacrificing. Now Jesus obtains for us an eternal redemption, “ He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption” (9:12). Of course, we must expect that we shall die one day in a physical sense. How then can our redemption be eternal? By the fact that although we shall die in an earthly sense we shall live forever as members of the eternal kingdom.

So we have past, present and future aspects to the meaning of a sacrifice. The Old Testament sacrifices had to be made again and again, daily, monthly and annually. Because Jesus was both human and divine his sacrifice was effective forever and did not have to be repeated.

This then is the great central teaching of the book of Hebrews. Christ was sacrificed to take away our sins (9:28); he sets us the greatest example of how we should live, ‘serving the living God’ (9:14); and he gives us a great hope for the future ‘he will bring salvation to those who are eagerly waiting for him’ (9:28).

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Highlights in Hebrews 21

Highlights in Hebrews

(with Roger Kirby)
Part 21 - Hebrews 8:1; 7:25

What is Jesus doing now?

“Jesus sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven” Hebrews 8:1
“ he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them”. Hebrews 7:25

Jesus was with his Father in heaven, he came to earth (incarnation), he ministered, he died (crucifixion), he rose again (resurrection), he disappeared back to his Father (ascension). Where is he now and what is he doing? These are the two questions these verses answer. His ascension to heaven also enabled the Holy Spirit to start his great work in the hearts and lives of the Lord’s people.

To sit at the king’s right hand was to occupy the position of highest honour, second only to the king. Psalm 110 says ‘The LORD says to my lord: “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.”
The LORD will extend your mighty sceptre from Zion, saying, “Rule in the midst of your enemies!”
The LORD has sworn and will not change his mind: “You are a priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.”

 

Peter used those verses in his speech at Pentecost (Acts 2:34). It is referred to in Philippians 2:9 where Paul says ‘God exalted him to the highest place’. He also said “ he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come.” (Ephesians 1:20, 21) emphasising the great power and authority he now had. Jesus himself, in a prayer that amounts to a clear prophecy said ‘Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began’ (John 17:5).

So it is quite clear where Jesus is now. But our text adds something to those statements, which is of great importance for us. What Jesus is doing is to intercede for us. Paul says this clearly in Romans 8:34 “Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.” John calls Jesus our advocate with the Father (1 John 2:1). An advocate is a law court term for someone who speaks on behalf of someone else). The work of the Holy Spirit is to enable us to pray effectively. Jesus then relates our prayers, perhaps filtering them, to the Father. How he can possibly do that when there must be thousands, or millions, of prayers made every second we will never know. But he is capable of doing that because although he is the man in heaven he can also exercise his divine prerogative at his Father’s right hand.

This is a great encouragement for us. Our prayers are poor, inadequate, things but they are received and polished by our Lord himself before they are presented to God the Father. Hopefully he also fills in for us some of the prayers we should make but fail to do so from laziness or inadequacy. Thank you, Lord.

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