Yeah, we could do with a bit
more light. Well, we're turning to Hebrews
chapter 9, the passage that Stephen read earlier for us. Paul, I
believe it's Paul, is writing to Hebrew believers, Jewish believers. Maybe there'd been some of them
there on the day of Pentecost when Peter preached, and 3,000
of them who perhaps previously had said, crucify him, crucify
him, were there crying, what must we do? What must we do?
We've realized that we're guilty of the crucifixion of the Holy
One of God. He's writing to them to show
them that their Jewish religion, their Old Testament religion,
and all of the temple practices, and all of the priesthood practices,
all of those things, he's showing them, are past. They're now fulfilled in the
Lord Jesus Christ. You see, the Hebrew believers,
they certainly had a heritage of divine revelation, unlike
any other nation on earth. It says in Romans chapter 3,
what advantage is there in being a Jew? And Paul replies, much
every way. Why? Because to them was committed
the oracles of God. There's no other people on earth.
prior to Christ's coming, to whom the word of God was committed,
the oracles of God. And as Hebrews starts out by
saying, in times past, God spoke to his people by the prophets.
He spoke to the fathers, the patriarchs, the patriarchs of
the Israelites. He spoke to them by the prophets.
He manifested his divine presence to them. There were several occasions,
theophanies we call them, when the pre-incarnate Lord Jesus
Christ, our God manifest, was revealed to people in the Old
Testament, to Abraham, to the parents of Gideon, to the parents
of Samson, all down the ages there were manifestations of
the divine presence. And of course, these Hebrew Christians
in the first century had inherited this backlog of this great weight
of truth from God there in the Old Testament, and they had a
fleshly fear of leaving it. When he's writing to them, they
had a fleshly fear of leaving it. There was a nagging thing
in them, we really ought to go, yes, we know the gospel, we know
the gospel of Christ and the redemption that is in him, but
all of these things must still have value, we must still do
them. You know, it's so typical of the flesh, isn't it? You try
and get somebody who was raised in Roman Catholicism, or Anglicanism,
or even worse, in Islam, you try and get them to renounce
it, and to walk out on it, and walk away from it. and to treat
it for what it actually is now, irrelevant to the state of their
eternal souls, you'll find it a dreadful struggle. You see,
these Hebrew Christians, they feared censure from Jewish zealots. We saw last time in Romans 10,
Paul says he longed for his brethren according to the flesh, the Israelites,
because he was a Jew himself. He longed for them to be saved.
And he said, I bear them testimony that they have a zeal for God.
They're zealots. They have a zeal for God, but
it's misplaced. It's not according to the true
knowledge of God. He says, they very clearly know and understand
lots of things from God. But you see, these Hebrew Christians,
in abandoning that had a fear of censure from those Jewish
zealots. But all of it, in reality, all
of that Old Testament religion, which was coming to an end, verse
13 of chapter eight, that which decayeth and waxeth old. The
temple worship was still going on when this was written, but
it was waxing old, it was petering out, it was ready to vanish away. All of it, in reality, was, as
verse 9 of chapter 9 says, all of it was just a figure, a picture,
for the time then present. It was a figure for the time
then present, limited in duration, because it only lasted a certain
time, from Moses down to the time of Christ coming, it was
limited in duration and it was most certainly limited in efficacy
regarding the achievement of the goal. What is the goal? What
are we talking about? We saw it last week, chapter
8, verses 10 to 12. This is the covenant, this is
quoting Jeremiah in the Old Testament, not the covenant like the one
that I gave to Moses when I brought you out of Egypt, but this is
the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after
those days, saith the Lord. I will put my laws into their
mind, and write them in their hearts. And I will be to them
a God, and they shall be to me a people. And they shall not
teach every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying,
Know the Lord, for they shall all know me, from the least to
the greatest. For I will be merciful to their
unrighteousnesses, and their sins and their iniquities I will
remember no more. That Covenant is fulfilled, as
again I showed last week, when we get to Revelation 21. In Revelation
21 and verse 2, I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem,
coming down from God out of heaven. prepared as a bride adorned for
her husband, and I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, behold,
the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them,
and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with
them, and be their God, and glorious more things are said. That's
the goal, is God's people in intimate communion with him.
But that Old Testament covenant of the animal sacrifices, it
was totally ineffective in achieving that goal. What's the thing that
stops people like us having fellowship with God? It is sin. Your sins
have separated between you and your God, says Isaiah. Your sins. It's our sin. God is of purer
eyes than to behold iniquity and cannot look upon sin. This
is why, this is relevant to us today even. In 2024, this is
relevant to us. Look at Hebrews 10 and verse
22, where we read this. Let us draw near. with a true heart in the full
assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil
conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. It's the full
assurance of faith that we will attain to that eternal bliss
that is pictured in Revelation 21. So Paul shows how the figures,
he said it was just a figure for the time then present, Paul
shows how the figures of the first covenant and Although it's
quoted in this chapter as the first as opposed to the last,
the last covenant is the new covenant, which is the eternal
covenant. It's the covenant that was made
between the persons of the Godhead before the beginning of time.
But in terms of time and its revelation to Moses, this was
first revealed. So he says, he shows how the
figures of that covenant to which the Hebrews were being drawn
back, that they're all past. because they're all fulfilled
in Christ. As I said, verse 13 of chapter
eight, that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish
away. He writes, Paul writes in this
epistle, a New Testament commentary on the Old Testament covenant
and his symbolical people Israel to show that it's picturing and
showing clearly in figures and types how God accomplishes justly
that salvation of his people from their sins that they might
be with him forever. So let's see the tabernacle and
its artifacts. In verses one to five of chapter
nine, we see the tabernacle and its artifacts. And when I say
the tabernacle, of course, it was a tent when it was first
given and throughout the travels, and for a long time, it was just
a tent, but then it became a temple. Now, from the fall in the Garden
of Eden, when Adam knowingly disobeyed God, from the fall,
and God had warned that in the day that you eat thereof, you
shall surely die, but from the fall, sinful men knew God. Sinful men knew God. How can
God look upon sin? He can't look upon sin, but sinful
men knew God. Abel knew God because he came
in the right way with a lamb for a sacrifice. Seth, his brother,
knew God. Enoch walked with God and was
taken. He didn't die. Enoch was taken,
though he was a sinner. Sure, he was a sinner. but he
was taken. Noah was a sinner, but Noah found
grace in the eyes of the Lord. Abraham was in a people of idolatry,
a family of idolaters in Ur of the Chaldees, and God spoke to
him and his father and his nephew and took them out of that place
He communed, Abraham communed with Abraham the sinner, and
we know he was a sinner, the things he did. He communed with
God as a friend, and he received the promises, the promises that
God would save a multitude. in Abraham, all the nations of
the earth would be blessed. And that people, the sons of
Abraham, Isaac and then Jacob and his 12 sons after him, they
went down into Egypt for 400 plus years. And that, which started
out so well, gradually as time went on, and the pharaohs that
then became, forgot Joseph and the good things that he had done,
and they attended a bondage in what was picturing the world
and sin. They were in bondage, they were
slaves. And Moses, God raised up Moses, and the Exodus, and
they came out of that place with the objective of the promised
land, picturing eternal rest in God's kingdom. But they were
weak in the flesh and in unbelief, and as we've seen in previous
chapters, they could not enter into that promised land, that
generation, because of unbelief. Only a handful of them did, and
the children of them that were born on the way. They received
the law at Sinai, the law which had a purpose of constraint on
the people from whom the promised Messiah would come, the seed
of the woman from Genesis 3.15 would come. He would come to
redeem from the curse of the law, the curse of sin, that the
soul that sins it shall die. He would come to redeem, to purchase,
to buy back from that. And so a law was given about
1440 years before Christ came, three and a half thousand years
ago. and in it was a worldly sanctuary. Verse one of chapter nine, then
verily the first covenant had also the ordinances of divine
service and a worldly sanctuary. There was a place, a tabernacle,
a tabernacle where God said he would symbolically dwell with
his people. For 500 years it was a tent and
then Solomon built the temple. Solomon built the temple, and
for about a thousand years, roughly, there was that temple in Jerusalem. It was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar,
but then it was rebuilt by Ezra and Nehemiah and Zerubbabel and
Zechariah. In those days, four or five hundred
years before Christ came, it was rebuilt. And the tabernacle
was about, well I'll give it in meters and in feet, but it
was about 14 meters long by four and a half meters wide by four
and a half meters high. That's 45 feet long by 15 feet
by 15 feet. And it was symbolically the place
where God dwelt in the midst of his people. And it symbolized
heaven because that's where God dwells and that's where his people
are going to dwell with him. It symbolized God's kingdom.
But sinful people could not freely go in and out because their sin
barred them. Verse 2, there was a tabernacle
made the first. The first bit that you came in
was the sanctuary, the first bit. was where the candlestick
and the table and the showbread were. That was the sanctuary.
It was the holy place, the sanctuary. The table of showbread was there. That table was made of shitting
wood, what we would call today acacia wood. It was a rot, as
near as possible, it was a rot-proof wood. It didn't rot. and it was
overlaid with gold. And there was a seven-branched
candlestick, which was always alight, it was never allowed
to go out. And then there was a thick curtain,
and behind that curtain was the second place, which was the holiest
of all. And in there, there was the golden
censer, the thing that had the burning coals and the incense. And there was the Ark of the
Covenant, and there was the Mercy Seat. Now, to these Hebrews,
all down the generations and to these Hebrew Christians, no
doubt. This had mystical significance. It had incomprehensible significance. But it was precious to them. It was precious. It was portraying
in a way that they didn't understand. You know, you'll hear religious
mystics today. They don't understand what they're doing, but they
say, oh, there's significance in this. There's something seriously
behind this. We don't really understand it.
It was portraying the presence of God and communion with him. In John chapter five, see, what
was it all about? What was it all about? All of
these pictures, all of these things defined in the Old Testament,
what was it all about? Well, you know this verse. John
chapter 5, verse 39. Jesus speaking to the Jews, the
Pharisees. He says, search the Scriptures,
for in them ye think ye have eternal life. They were right
in that. If you want life, you will find it in the Scriptures.
The Scriptures, they are they which testify of me. What an
amazing claim for a man before them to make, that this book
of their scriptures testified of him. In Luke's gospel, chapter
24, let me remind you of a couple of verses here, verse 27, to
the disciples on the Emmaus road, beginning at Moses and all the
prophets, beginning at the start of the Old Testament, Jesus expounded
unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.
I don't know how he did it, it can't have taken very long, but
miraculously he enlightened their eyes. Verses 44 and 45 of that
same Luke 24. He said to them, these are the
words which I spake unto you while I was yet with you, that
all things that must be fulfilled which were written in the law
of Moses and in the prophets and in the Psalms concerning
me. Then opened he their understanding
that they might understand the scriptures. Christ is the fulfillment
of all of these things. This is what he's saying. Christ
is the fulfillment of what the tabernacle was symbolizing. How
is Christ the fulfillment of these Old Testament pictures?
Gold-covered shitting wood. picturing a sinless, a sinless
body, a sinless human body covered with the gold of kingship, of
divinity. The lampstand was symbolical
of Christ, who is the light of the world. Jesus spoke again
to them in John 8 verse 12 saying, I am the light of the world.
He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have
the light of life. The showbread was showing that
he is the bread of life. Man shall not live by bread alone,
but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. And what
we must have is the bread of life. He said, I am the bread
of life, which came down from heaven. He is the bread of life,
12 loaves for all of his people, the 12 symbolizing all his people.
There was a thick veil from the sanctuary into the holiest of
all places, there was a thick veil dividing, but Christ is
the door. That inner holiest of all pictured
heaven. Christ is the door into heaven.
He is our God. He is the door. He said, I am
the door. I am the door of the sheep. He
is the door. He is the way in. He is the way,
the truth, and the life. The golden censer had the coals
and the incense, and it speaks of Christ's suffering for sin
and his intercession on behalf of his people. Then there was
the Ark of the Covenant, that mysterious box. Again, shitting
wood overlaid with gold, carried by the priests with staves of
the same wood, covered in the same gold. and only they could
do it. The ark containing the tables
of law on stone given to Moses. Aaron's rod. Aaron's rod was
the one that budded. It was a dead rod, but it budded
to show that in this was the life of God. And Aaron's rod
overcame the rods and the mysticism of the Egyptian magicians. And it was underneath. Oh, and then there was the pot
of manna, a big pot, about three and a half litres of manna. And
it was all covered by this golden mercy seat, all covered by that,
picturing the law broken by sinners, but covered by the mercy seat
of Christ. and sprinkled with blood, symbolising
the blood of Christ that cleanses his people from all sins. The
rod that budded, the quickening power of God, revealing Christ. The manna, the bread of life
from heaven. the Ark of the Covenant symbolized
the Gospel. And so, you know, you remember
from when the Philistines stole the Ark in 1 Samuel, chapter
what, four or five, something like that. And when that Ark
of the Covenant was stolen, it was pronounced Ichabod. Ichabod? Departed glory. You could write
Ichabod over the doorways of most church buildings up and
down this country, indeed up and down the world, because the
glory has departed. Why has the glory departed? They
may have a nice social life, but why has the glory departed?
The glory's departed because they don't preach the gospel.
The gospel has departed. It's only in the gospel. that
we find the way to the presence of God, the communion of God
for eternity. Now he says in verse five, of
which we cannot now speak particularly. So it's not a detailed exposition. It's not a detailed exposition.
Why was it not a detailed exposition? Because verse 13 of chapter eight,
it was ready to vanish away. It was petering out and it was
ready to vanish away. And in AD 70, because I think
that's what that's referring to, This, I think, was written
just before A.D. 70. The Old Testament worship
and the priesthood, there was still going on, but it was petering
out. And in A.D. 70, it was destroyed
by Rome. It was flattened by Rome, as
I said last week. If you want to see bits of the
old temple in Jerusalem, the most likely place you'll see
them is at the Colosseum in Rome, because they destroyed it and
took bits of it there to build it. So then in verses six to
ten, we have the function of the priests. When these things,
look at verse six, when these things were thus ordained, the
priests went always into the first tabernacle, accomplishing
the service of God. But into the second, that was
the outer one, into the second, behind the thick veil, went the
high priest, only him, once a year. and not without blood. It had
to be done in the right way, which he offered first for himself,
because he was a sinner, and for the sins of the people. The
Holy Ghost signifying that the way into the holiest of all,
the way into heaven, the way into the presence of God, was
not yet made manifest, while the first tabernacle was yet
standing. Whilst that was there, it was
only pictures, it wasn't reality. So they offered They offered
inverse, where is it? Verse 9, which was a figure for
the time then present, in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices
that could not make him that did the surface perfect as pertaining
to the conscience. They offered gifts and sacrifices,
as it says in chapter 8 and verse 3. Every high priest is ordained
to offer gifts and sacrifices. Gifts was praise to God, and
sacrifices was payment for sin. In a nutshell, that's what it
was. Divine service is what it was, verse 1 of chapter 9. Divine
service, symbolising that which would make reconciliation between
sinful men and God. And it happened daily, when the
priests went into the first part, the holy place, but then only
once a year, annually, when the high priest went into the holiest
of all. But even that second one had
to keep being repeated, yearly, They were just a shadow, not
the substance. They were just the blueprint,
not the dwelling place that was built according to the blueprint.
Only while the tabernacle, or the temple as it became, was
standing, only while that was standing did these things go
on. But 813, it's ready to vanish away, it's petering out and ready
to vanish away in AD 70. In verse 9 of chapter 9, It says, it was an ineffectual
figure for a limited time. It was a figure for the time
then present, in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices. Look,
that could not make him that did the service perfect. It was
ineffectual. It didn't produce the redemption,
the payment. It only pictured it. It didn't
actually do that which was necessary to purchase the eternal salvation
of anybody. It was ineffectual for a limited
period. In itself, physically, it could
not remove sin that separates God from sinners. It couldn't
do that. It's accomplished only in the
fulfillment of what it symbolized. Christ is the reality. Christ
is the substance. Christ is the power of God in
the gospel unto salvation. The Hebrews, these Hebrew Christians,
were seeking comfort in retained symbols, retained patterns, retained
places, physical places. You know that Jesus had told
the Samaritan woman in John chapter 4 that true worship is not in
a physical place. Just look at it now. In John
chapter 4 verse 19, This is the woman, the immoral woman, that
Jesus met by the well in Samaria when his disciples went into
the town to buy food for them, and he's there resting his weary
body. He was a real man on the wall
of the well, and he asks the woman for a drink, and she says,
you're a Jew, why do you ask a drink from me? We're Samaritans,
you Jews despise us Samaritans. Anyway, going on in the conversation,
verse 19, the woman said to him, sir, I perceive that thou art
a prophet. He'd put his finger on her sin.
Our fathers worshipped in this mountain. She starts to talk
religion. Our fathers worshipped in this mountain. That was the
sin of Jeroboam in trying to set up an alternative to Jerusalem.
Our fathers worshipped in this mountain. And ye say that in
Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. Jesus said
to her, woman, believe me, the hour cometh. when ye shall neither
in this mountain Nor yet at Jerusalem worship the Father. Ye worship
ye know not what. We know what we worship, for
salvation is of the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now
is, when the true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit
and in truth. For the Father seeketh such to
worship him. God is spirit, and they that
worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. Do you
see how clear that is? Religious folk that put great
store by places, or go on a pilgrimage to Holy Island, or go on a journey
to the Holy Land in the Middle East, That land in the Middle
East is not holy, it's no more holy than this room. This room
is more holy than that because the gospel, or at least it's
being attempted to be preached here this morning, the gospel
of grace in Christ is being preached. That's what makes a place holy,
that's what makes a place a sanctuary. So the Old Testament patterns
are fulfilled in Christ, and this is what verses 11 to 15
say. Christ, you see, the priests
couldn't accomplish that which the the Old Testament pattern,
was picturing. It was only picturing. It was
only a type. It was only symbolical. It was
the reality that had to come. And Christ, verse 11, being come
and high priest of good things to come, by a greater and a more
perfect tabernacle. Well, where's that one built?
Ah. It's not made with hands. It isn't made with bricks and
mortar. It's not of this world, not of
this building. It's like the one that Abraham
saw and all in true faith see in chapter 11 and verse 10. Abraham looked for a city. Where is it? What's it built
of? Which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Here, in this world, we have
no continuing city, but we look for one to come. And what is
it? It's a heavenly city. It's a heavenly place. It's a
more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands. And neither,
verse 12, by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood
he entered in once into the holy place. What was it that made
the way into the holy place? It was our high priest. It was
our high priest. The high priest, the Aaronic
high priest, entered once a year, repeatedly, but never succeeded
in making anyone or anything perfect before God. But he pictured
the one who would. He was a priest after the order
of Aaron, of Levi, Levitical. But he pictured Christ, who was
not after the order of Aaron, not of the tribe of Levi. He
is after the order of Melchizedek. He is that divine type. He is the one without father,
without mother, without beginning of days, nor end of days. He's
clearly an Old Testament, appearance of the Lord Jesus Christ to Abraham
in Genesis chapter 14. Melchizedek, I believe, is Christ. He pictured, the high priest
of the Jewish order pictured Christ, our high priest after
the order of Melchizedek, and it pictured him opening the way
effectually, because what is the way? The disciples asked
Jesus, show us the way, what is the way? Jesus said, I am
the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father but
by me, he is the door into the heavenly place. Verse 12, neither
by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood, he entered
in once, not once a year, once for all time into the holy place,
having obtained eternal redemption for us. Once, once, when the
fullness of the time was come, says Galatians 4, verse 4, God
sent his son, made of a woman, made under the law to redeem
those who were under the law. It says, when he died on the
cross, in Matthew 27, verses 50 and 51, Jesus, when he had
cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost, and when
he did, Behold, the veil of the temple, that veil which kept
everybody out of that which symbolised heaven, was torn in two from
top to bottom. And it wasn't achieved with animal
blood, but with his own precious blood. It's the blood of bulls
and of goats and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean
sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh. What we read in
2 Corinthians chapter 3 at the start says, yes, there was a
certain glory in the picture, but it didn't do anything effectual. There was a certain aura that
these Hebrews were called back to, but he says, look, how much
more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal spirit
offered himself without spot, no sin, to God. How shall he
not purge your conscience from dead works? How shall he not
remove your sin from you, so that you might serve the living
God, so that you might be in communion with the living God? Without doubt, there was a mystical
glory in the Old Testament tabernacle worship. As we read earlier,
you can read it again for yourself, 2 Corinthians 3, 7 to 11. The picture achieved nothing.
but Christ's own blood achieved what the eternal purpose was.
The required payment is completed in the blood of Christ. The conscience
is purged from dead works, and thus it accomplishes, look, for
this cause, verse 15, He is the mediator of the New Testament,
that by means of death for the redemption of the transgressions
that were under the First Testament, they which are called might receive
the promise of eternal inheritance. The transgressions that were
under the First Testament, that's the sin against the law of God,
the sin against the justice of God, which keeps us from God.
But it was by means of death that that payment for those transgressions
was made. It was his death that accomplished
it. I know a lot of people believe
that we're made righteous by the righteousness of Christ.
We're made the righteousness of God in him. He makes us the
righteousness of God. It is not his works of obedience
to the law that makes us righteous. It isn't, it really isn't. Why
do I say that? Galatians 2 verse 21. It's not
by the works of the law. It says if righteousness come
by the law, the works of the law, then what did Christ die
for? Christ is dead in vain. It's
by his death that he accomplished the purchase, the redemption
of his people from the curse of the law. And it's for those
which are called, look, in verse 15, towards the end of it, they
which are called, they which are called, the promise of eternal
inheritance is for them. Who are they which are called? Romans chapter eight, verses
29 and 30. For whom he did foreknow, it's these, the ones he did foreknow,
which means the ones he elected, the ones he elected for nothing
other than love and grace. For whom he did foreknow, he
also did predestinate. And if God has predestinated,
it can't be undone. He predestinated them to be conformed
to the image of his son. that his son might be the firstborn
among many brethren, that he might have a people in heaven.
Moreover, whom he did predestinate, them he also called. He called them, and whom he called,
them he also justified from the sins that would condemn them.
And whom he justified, having justified them, what can keep
them out of glory? Them also he glorified. This
is the elect multitude of God. Those that God is for, he's for
them. So who can be against them? If
God be for us, who can be against us, says Paul in that same chapter?
Who can prevent them from attaining to the goal of the everlasting
covenant? Behold, behold, says Revelation
21 verse 3, behold, the tabernacle of God is with men. and he will
dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself
shall be with them, their God. Amen.