Now this is the main point of
the things we are saying, or as you read in the King James
Version, the sum of it. The writer here is speaking of
the seventh chapter of the epistle to the Hebrews, the preceding
chapter. In that chapter, he sets forth
Jesus Christ as a superior priest than that of the order of Aaron
and of the Levites. He particularly deals with Christ
being called a high priest after the order of Melchizedek. Melchizedek is a character in the Old Testament
who appears in the history of the Old Testament only once. Our father has gone off on a
military conquest. The Lord has blessed him and
he returns. And as he returns, he is met
by this man named Melchizedek, Prince of Salem and a priest
of God. A priest of God before the Levitical
priesthood was established. He's a mysterious character.
We know nothing about him. Where was he born? We're not
told. Where did he die? We're not told. He just shows
up. And Abraham paid the tithe to him. And here Jesus Christ
is said to be a high priest after the order of Melchizedek. And it is a higher priesthood
than that of the Levitical order or the order of Aaron in Israel. So the writer here is saying
we have summed up everything we have read in that chapter,
chapter seven. And this is the main point of
what we here are saying. We have such a high priest who
is seated at the right hand of the throne of the majesty in
the heavens. Well, no priest of Aaron ever
did that, sat down at the right hand of God. In fact, if you
will look in the tabernacle, you will observe there was no
chair, an altar, lampstand, table, incense altar,
labor for water, a mercy seat, cherubim, no chair. The priest never sat. All day
long he stood in an altar. But this priest, the one we now
consider Yeah, he sat down at the right hand of the throne
of the majesty in the heavens. The word majesty means God. He is the majesty. This priest
of whom we now speak made one sacrifice for sins forever and
sat down at the right hand of God. Therefore, he is a better
and a greater priest than Aaron, and all the other priests who
served with him and succeeding him. That's the point we're saying
here, the writer says. Our priest is seated at the right
hand of God in the heavens. A minister of the sanctuary,
the holy place, he's a minister of the true tabernacle. All right, we've got to look
at this phrase, true tabernacle. What is a tabernacle? It's a
tent. It's what the word means. It
is a tent. Our body is called a tabernacle. Both Peter and Paul speak of
the tent in which we live. You see me up here? This is my
tabernacle. It's my tent. It's where I live. The tabernacle then the wilderness
that the Lord told Moses to build was God's dwelling place. He
said, build me a tent, a tabernacle so that I may dwell among my
people. You'll do it this way. God gave
very explicit instructions and Moses had that tabernacle, that
tent built. It's just a tent. The only glory
of that tent was God was living inside. That was his dwelling
place on this earth. But that tabernacle, God's dwelling
place in the wilderness for now on to 40 years, that tabernacle
was not the true tabernacle. It was only a copy of the true
tabernacle. What is the true tabernacle? We're reading of it. Our priest
is a minister of the sanctuary or of the holies and he is the
minister of the true tabernacle which the Lord erected and not
man. The true tabernacle. What is
the true tabernacle? It is the body of Jesus Christ. And by extension, his humanity. He is the true tabernacle. This is the tabernacle, this
is the tent, this is the body that man did not make. God made
this tent, God made this tabernacle. Jesus Christ in this epistle
to the Hebrews is gonna be quoted as saying, a body you have prepared
for me. And sure enough, God prepared
a tabernacle, a body, a tent for Jesus Christ. In the gospel of John, first
chapter, John makes this statement, and the word became flesh, and
our English version says he dwelt among us. The word became flesh
and dwelt among us. But if you'll look at the word
in the original text, It is tabernacled among us. And the word became
flesh and tabernacled among us. The word became flesh and dwelt
in a tent among us. That's the true tabernacle. He
is the minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle, which
the Lord erected and not man. For every high priest is appointed
to offer both gifts and sacrifices, and they did. Sin offering, peace
offerings, trespass offerings, other gifts and offerings that
they gave, that's what they did. Therefore, it is necessary that
this one, this new high priest also have something to offer.
Well, he did. He did. He offered his blood. The offering of this priest was
his blood. And it was himself. Look in chapter
nine, verse 14. How much more shall the blood
of Christ, who through the eternal spirit offered himself without
spot to God? So the priests, the high priests
of the old covenant, They had their offerings, they had their
sacrifices. This man who came to minister
in the true tabernacle, he also had a sacrifice. He also had
an offering. He also had a gift to make, and
it was his own blood. No other priest ever did that
before. He offered his own blood. For
if he were on earth, he would not be a priest. since there are priests who offer
the gifts according to the law. Why would he not be a priest?
He was born of the wrong tribe to be a priest. In Israel, a
priest had to be of the tribe of Levi. No man born of any other
tribe could be a priest. You had to be a Levite. Jesus was born of Judah. That
was the tribe of the kings. No Levite could be a king because
the king had to be of Judah. And no man of Judah could be
a priest because it had to be of Levi. So under the law, Jesus
could not be a priest. He was of the wrong tribe. If he were on earth, He would
not be a priest. They serve, verse five, they
serve the copy and shadow of the heavenly things, as Moses
was divinely instructed when he was about to make the tabernacle.
For God said, see that you make all things according to the pattern
shown you on the mountain. When Moses built that tabernacle,
or had it built, It was built exactly and precisely the way
that God said so. The blueprint, as it were, was
handed to him. But now he, verse six, he, Jesus,
has obtained a more excellent ministry inasmuch as he is also
mediator of a better covenant. A better covenant. If you'll
look at this book of Hebrews, you'll find that it shows Jesus
Christ to be a better this and a better that and a better the
other. He's a better revealer than angels
and the prophets. He is a better mediator than
Moses. He is a better rest giver than
Joshua. He is a better priest than Aaron. These men were foremost in their
offices in Israel, but the epistle to the Hebrews is showing to
us that Jesus Christ is better than them all. What are we finding
about here? He has obtained a more excellent
ministry in as much as he is also mediator of a better covenant. Now, what is a mediator? A mediator
is someone who stands in the middle between two parties. The two parties are God and men. God will not come to men. He cannot behold sin. So he sends
a mediator, a prophet. The people will not go to God. They're sinners. They need to.
Furthermore, they cannot go to God for God will not accept them.
So God said, I'll give you a priest. So now we have this one who is
the mediator of a better covenant. He has the divine nature. And
God sent him to be his prophet. God has in these last days spoken
unto us by his son. God said, you're also the priest.
So therefore he is the mediator, the prophet sent from God to
represent God to the people, the priest appointed by God to
represent the people to God. He's the mediator. He did it
better than anyone else. He is the better mediator and
a better covenant established on better promises. A better
covenant. Now, which covenant do we here
speak of? Well, first of all, the old covenant.
The old covenant was that covenant that God made with Israel in
the wilderness of Sinai at Mount Sinai about 1441 BC. Right after they'd come out of
Egyptian bondage, God made a covenant with them. He came down on top
of Mount Sinai and the people trembled and quaked. Oh no, God
is here, God is here. That was not good news, folks.
When God comes and there's lightning and thunder in the clouds, Moses,
you go up there and talk to God. because God said, anybody who
touches this mountain will be killed. Moses, you come up. And the people said, yeah, you
go up, you go up. So Moses went up and the Lord
said to Moses, I'm going to make a covenant with these people. It is a conditional covenant. I'm going to tell them what they
will do And I'm gonna promise them that if they do what I say,
I'm gonna bless them like nobody else on this earth is blessed.
So Moses says to the people, that's what God said. Yeah, yeah,
we'll do it. Sure enough, whatever the Lord
says, we will do. Okay. So Moses in God's presence
on Sinai is given a covenant. The covenant is the Ten Commandments. Many people are familiar with
the Ten Commandments and can probably quote them. Few people
are aware that there is a preamble to the Ten Commandments. in verse
one that says, I am Jehovah thy God who brought thee out of the
land of Egypt and out of the house of bondage. You shall have
no other gods before me. That's the preamble. It's the
words of the covenant. The words of the covenant, the
10 commandments. Moses comes down and he says,
this is the covenant. These 10 commandments. You obey
these commandments and Jehovah will bless you like nobody else
in the world has been blessed. You will be the principal nation
of the earth. Sure, yeah, we'll do it. So they
said so. Here we find that there is a
mediator of a better covenant established on better promises.
Why? Verse seven. For if that first
covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been
sought for a second covenant. It was a fault with that covenant.
Now, the fault was not with God, and the fault was not with the
covenant. The fault was with the people
with whom the covenant was made. Look in verse eight. Because
finding fault with them, Jehovah says, behold, the days are coming,
says Jehovah, when I will make a new covenant with the house
of Israel and with the house of Judah, not according to the
covenant that I made with their fathers. In the day when I took
them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, because
they did not continue in my covenant, and so I disregarded them. I
disregarded them. They broke the covenant. That
was the fault with the covenant, not with the man who gave, or
the God who gave the covenant, not with the mediator who brought
it to the people, not with the covenant itself. The fault was
with the people. They would not keep it. It was
a conditional covenant. They had to obey the covenant,
keep the 10 commandments in order to have the blessings God promised
and they never did. So Jehovah says, all right, I'll
make a better covenant, a new covenant. And my people will keep this
covenant because they're going to do it
through my son. My son will obey the requirements
of this covenant in their place instead, as their surety, as
their representative. And I'm gonna give to them all
the promises that I promised to old covenant Israel and they
never received. So it's not according to that
covenant that God made with them. Verse 16, this is being quoted
from Jeremiah's prophecy. Verse 10, I'm sorry, verse 10. For this is the covenant that,
all right, now I want you to notice five times God says, I
will, I will. He's gonna say five times, I
will. I will make a covenant with the
house of Israel after those days, says the Lord. I will put my
laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. Now, do
you see the difference? Where was God's law written under
the old covenant? On tablets of stone. that God
gave to Moses on Sinai. Moses is on Sinai and God wrote
the 10 commandments in tablets of stone, gave them to Moses
and said, take them down to the people and Moses did. The tablets
of stone, that's where God's law was written. What does God
have to say with regard to his law? Now, hold on a minute, let
me look at the tablets. God says, you shall have no other
gods before me. It's written right there on the
tablets of stone. But God says under the new covenant,
I will write my law in their hearts and in their minds. In the tablets of the heart,
that's where God's law was written. someone may come to you and say,
do you know that God's law forbids you to steal? Well, of course I know that.
How do you know? It's written right here in my
heart. I can read it. All the commandments God has
given, they're written in our hearts. When you have done something
wrong, No one has to tell you, you know. You know. God's law
says, you broke this commandment. I will write their laws, my laws
in their minds and on their hearts. Third, I will. I will be my God. Note this, note this. They shall
be my people. They shall. Israel never fulfilled
the promise to become God's people. Later on at Gilgal, God said,
I love them no more. I hate them for what they've
done. And I will, and as he says to one of his prophets, I'm going
to divorce them. I'm done with them. but I'm gonna make a covenant
with the people and I will be their God and they shall be my
people and every one of them will. Every one of God's elect
will become one of his people. Verse 11, none of them shall
teach his neighbor and none his brother saying, no Jehovah for
all shall know me from the least of them to the greatest of them.
The priests under the old covenant had to be teachers of the people
to teach them to know the Lord. I don't have to tell you that
you need to know the Lord. You do. You do know the Lord
if you are in the covenant. You will not have to tell them,
know the Lord. You say, oh, I know him. I know
him well. His law's right here in my heart.
He's my God. Verse 12, fourth I will. I will be merciful to their unrighteousness. I will be merciful to their unrighteousness. And we're full of it. I'm so glad the Lord is merciful
to my unrighteousness. Everybody who came out of Egypt,
died in the wilderness, except for Joshua, Caleb, and Eleazar. In 38 years in the wilderness,
everybody else died in that wilderness. The Lord showed no mercy to their
unrighteousness. Everyone who comes out of the
snare of the devil God's gonna show mercy to their unrighteousness. Every one of them. Fifth, I will. And their sins
and their lawless deeds, I will remember no more. Folks, this is God who knows everything. He's omniscient. He knows everything. And yet, if Satan should come
to the Lord and say, are you aware of the sins that Moose
Parks did yesterday? He would say, I don't remember
them. They're gone from my memory. Now he knows I sinned. He knows
I did everything I did. I sinned in every deed. And yet Jehovah says, because
of the sin, because of the blood of my sin, of my son, your sins
are no longer remembered. Verse 13. In that he says a new
covenant, he has made the first covenant obsolete. Our King James
Version says old. It is more than old. It is obsolete. The Ten Commandments is not our
code of conduct. We have a law in our hearts. And now what is becoming obsolete
and growing old is ready to vanish away and it's gone. We live under
the new covenant. We're not under that old covenant. We're under a new covenant that
Jesus Christ fulfilled for us through the blood of the everlasting
covenant. His blood has cleansed us from
our sins and God says, I remember them no more. That's the joy
that we have in Christ. He took the old covenant away
and brought in the new. and made us to be God's people
and we obey Him.