We'll look at the first six verses
of Hebrews chapter 8. We'll read them together before
we begin. Now, of the things which we have
spoken, this is the sum. Here's the sum and substance
of what has been said. The summary, if you will. We
have such a high priest who is set on the right hand of the
throne of the majesty in the heavens. a minister of the sanctuary
and of the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched, and not man. For every high priest is ordained
to offer gifts and sacrifices. Wherefore it is of necessity
that this man have somewhat also to offer. For if he were on earth,
he should not be a priest, seeing that there are priests that offer
gifts according to the law. who serve unto the example and
shadow of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God when
he was about to make the tabernacle. God told Moses, he said, See,
saith he, that thou make all things according to the pattern
showed to thee in the mount. But now hath our Lord obtained
a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator
of a better covenant, or testament, which was established upon better
promises. The title of our lesson this
morning is Better, Better, Better. Better, better, better. This
is somewhat of a review of everything that's been said up to this point.
So, we've heard most of this, but we're going to look at this
again, verse by verse, and see. And then we're going to look
at a conclusion of this whole matter. And there's something
we spoke about this some last night when we were visiting,
but I want you to see this from the Scripture. In verses 1 and
2, Now of the things which we've spoken, this is the psalm, we
have such a high priest who is set on the right hand of the
throne of the majesty in the heavens, a minister of the sanctuary. He is set. That means he's seated forever. Can't be moved from where he
is. He's not standing. His work of
purging the sins of His people is finished. When the high priest
went into the holiest of holies, he could never sit down. There was no place for him to
sit. And this showed us that he couldn't accomplish perfection. His work was never done. But
when Christ entered in, he sat down. when He had by Himself
purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty
on high." We saw that back in chapter 1 of Hebrews in verse
3. We're in Hebrews chapter 8. And He is the priest ministering
in a better place, not in the holy place made with hands, Sanctuary in the holiest of holies
in the tabernacle, but he's in the very presence of God in the
in the holiest of holies look over it Hebrews 9 with me in
verse 24 For Christ is not entered into the
holy places made with hands which are the figures of the true But
into heaven itself now to appear in the presence of God for us
Verse 4 here in our text in chapter 8 of Hebrews says, if he were
on earth, he should not be a priest, seeing that there are priests
that offer gifts according to the law. If he remained on earth,
he wouldn't be our great high priest, but he's risen. And he's a priest who's sitting
upon a throne. He's the king priest. He's more than any earthly Levitical
high priest ever was. He's also the king in addition
to being the high priest. And when he died and rose, all
other priests and all other sacrifices ceased. That's the end of them. Look at Hebrews 10 and verse
9. Then said He, the Lord Jesus
Christ, Lo, I come to do Thy will, O God. He taketh away the
first, the first covenant, the old covenant, that He may establish
the second. By the witch will, by His will,
we're sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus
Christ once for all. Now look down with me, verse
18. In verse 17, this is the covenant
that God makes through this Holy Spirit with His people in our
hearts when He writes His law, His Word in our inward part.
Their sins and iniquities will I remember no more. Now where
remission of these is, there's no more offering for sin. Sacrifices
have ceased. Any offerings that we imagine
have ceased. access to God. One way in which
we can enter into the presence of God, and that's in the Lord
Jesus Christ, the Son of God, our great High Priest. He's entered
the sanctuary, the holiest of holies, and he's sat down. His work is finished. He, by
himself, purged our sins. You know what purging is. If
you have something that has a stain on it, a garment that has a stain
on it, and you take some sort of detergent and you rub and
rub and rub and rub and rub on that stain, and when you're finished
washing it, that stain is gone. It's not there anymore. It's
been purged. It's gone, vanished. When He by Himself No help from
anybody else. We don't make it effectual. He
did it. When He by Himself purged our
sins, He sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on High.
That tells us that He's established a High Priest forever. And we've
told that numerous times. We've looked at it numerous times.
He's a High Priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. Now,
verse 2 says in Hebrews 8, verse 2, and he's a minister of the
true tabernacle which the Lord pitched and not man. He's the
minister of the true tabernacle, the better tabernacle, which
God pitched and not man. The true tabernacle is really
Christ Jesus Himself. He's the true tabernacle. The
earthly tabernacle pictured Christ, it typified Christ. Here in verse
5, it served unto the example and shadow of heavenly things. What is it that God was typifying,
shadowing in the tabernacle? When he commanded Moses, he admonished
Moses when he was about to make the tabernacle. And God said,
See that thou make all things according to the pattern showed
to thee in the mount. And there's a reason why this
tabernacle was made exactly as God would have it be made. And
that's because that tabernacle pictured the one in whom God
would tabernacle with His people. In that earthly tabernacle, God
dwelt among His people. In that tabernacle. That's where
He met with His people. In that tabernacle. In Christ. In human flesh, God tabernacled
among us. He came to where we are and tabernacled
among us. In that earthly tabernacle, the
glory of God was seen inside it. There was nothing outwardly
about it that would bring any appeal to your eyes. Nothing
about it would make you desire it. Just as when He came into
this world, He had no form, no comeliness about Him that when
we would see Him, we'd desire Him. But inside, when you entered
in, you saw the glory of God in that tabernacle. That's where
He met with His people, in that tabernacle. Christ, the God-man,
is the one in whom believers, when the Spirit of God shines
His light into the heart of a sinner, it causes us to see His glory. Where do we behold His glory?
In the face of Christ Jesus. In that earthly tabernacle, men
had access to God. That's where they could come
to God, in that tabernacle. That's the only place they could
come to God. And he met with his people in
that tabernacle. And only in Christ, there and
there alone, does God meet with a people. In Christ alone. That's
the only place he'll meet with his people. The people always
look to that tabernacle. It was set up, pitched. Everywhere they went, they pitched
and set up that tabernacle. Everything about it typified
our Lord Jesus Christ. The foundation was made of the
shekel of the sanctuary, the pure, exact, minted shekel of
the sanctuary. And it was melted in the furnace
hot and heated up and melted even as our Lord went to the
cross and laid down His life under the wrath of God satisfying
justice on behalf of everyone He represented as their substitute. And then that silver was made
into a foundation, sockets. And there were 75 sockets that
weighed 100 pounds apiece. And those sockets were laid down,
and God said, that's to show that you were redeemed with a
price out of Egypt. And everything that was done
on that foundation was done on the finished, complete foundation
of redemption. From the foundation of it, all
the way to the outward covering of it, and everything in it,
typified our Lord Jesus Christ. Every bit of it. Let's look over
Colossians 2. Colossians 2, verse 17. It says this in Colossians 2,
verse 16. Let's read both of these verses.
Let no man, this is speaking to those who believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ, Paul is speaking here to the Colossian believers.
Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect
of a holy day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath, which
are a shadow of things to come. That's why they were all given.
But what's the substance of them? But the body, the substance of
those things, is Christ. He's the body. He's the end of
those things. Christ. That's what I'm saying. The people, the tabernacle, sacrificing
and offering thou wouldst not, but a body hast thou prepared
me. And in that body, in that one
who's both God and man, and who satisfied the law, who obeyed
it, and glorified God's holy law, and who went to the cross
and took the sin of those given Him, and He purged that sin,
put it away, and made them, obtained eternal redemption. It obtained
it. He did it in a body, and that
body's risen, and that's the body that is entered in to this
holy place. And that's the tabernacle God
made. He made it. He was born of the Holy Ghost.
He's the body God made. And then it says our high priest
is himself the better sacrifice. Look back at Hebrews 8 verse
3. For every high priest is ordained to offer gifts and sacrifices. We saw that back in Hebrews chapter
5. That's the purpose. That was
why a high priest was ordained, to offer gifts and sacrifices
on behalf of the people. Wherefore, it is of necessity
that this man have somewhat also to offer. He had to offer something
also. The Levitical priests always
came to God with the sacrifice of whose choice. They may have
come with a sacrifice that they chose themselves, as we know
they did later on as they began to disobey God. But, the sacrifice
they were commanded to come with was God's choice sacrifice. A spotless lamb. One without
spot, without blemish. Hebrews 9, look at verse 7. Into the second, the holiest
of holies, went the high priest alone, once every year, not without
blood, which he offered for himself and for the errors of the people."
Look at verse 22. And almost all things are by
the law purged with blood. And without shedding of blood
is no remission. No purging without the shedding
of blood. Verse 23, It was therefore necessary
that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified
with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better
sacrifices than these. For Christ is not entered into
the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the
true. but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence
of God for us, nor yet that he should offer himself often as
the high priest entereth into the holy place every year with
the blood of others. For then must he have often suffered
since the foundation of the world, but now once in the end of the
world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of
himself." His own sacrifice. And that is the choice sacrifice. That's God's choice sacrifice.
He's satisfied with one offering. That's the offering. It's His
Son. 1 Corinthians 5, 7 says, Purge
out therefore the old leaven. The old leaven. That you may
be a new lump as you are unleavened That means you you That truly
trust Christ Jesus the Lord as all your salvation You've been
made Unleavened you've been made the very righteousness of God
For Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us We're not we're not going
to meet this year and offer up a blood of a goat because Christ
is our Passover. He accomplished our salvation
on our behalf. We're not going to meet and offer
the blood of a goat and a ram. And by the same token, we're
not going to put one day above another day because Christ is
our Sabbath. He is our rest. All of those
days, all of those ordinances were for a shadow. They were
to picture, to glorify the Lord of glory. He's the body. He's
the substance. He's the sum and substance of
it. That's where Hebrews 8 begins. Of the things which we said,
this is the sum. We have such a high priest that's
passed into the heavens. He's sat down at God's right
hand. God's satisfied with him. God's pleased with him. You remember
when Peter went up to the Mount of Transfiguration, and there
appeared unto him Moses and Elijah, and the Lord Jesus Christ? And
Peter said, let's build an altar for Moses, and let's build one
for Elijah, and let's build one for the Lord Jesus. He was made to hit his face in
the dust. And when he looked back up, He
beheld no man save Jesus Christ only. Moses represents the law. Elijah represents the prophets.
We don't come to God in the law. We don't come to God in the prophets. We don't come to God based on
any preaching, based on anything that we've done. We come to God
the perfect sacrifice our high priest Christ Jesus and that's
it we come by faith that's all there's no boasting then it's
excluded by the law of works no by the law of faith he's the
end of the lawful righteousness to everyone that believes now
verse 6 back in Hebrews 8 says but now But now has he obtained a more
excellent ministry by how much also he's the mediator of a better
covenant which was established upon better promises. Now listen
to me. Our high priest has obtained
a more excellent ministry. More excellent than what ministry?
More excellent than the law. That's what the whole book's
about. His ministry is more excellent than anything contained in the
old covenant. his ministry, he himself being
the minister of this ministry. He has obtained a more excellent
ministry. Are we going to go dig up something
that God says clearly in his word, it's met its fulfillment
in Christ? We're going to tempt God if we
do. That's what Peter said. Why would you have these men
be circumcised? Why would you put a yoke upon
them which neither we nor our fathers could bear? And he said,
why do you tempt God? That's what we're going to do.
Now, a man may not like it. A man may feel some anger boiling
up in him. God also said, we're enmity against
God. He has to take that away. If
He don't take it away by the power of the Spirit of God and
give us, make us a new creation, born of incorruptible seed, we
won't have it. We'll say we'll come to Christ,
but we're going to come to Him to make up for where we lack
in our pretended righteousness before the law. You can't have
both. You can't mingle works and grace.
You've got to either come owning the high priest as the high priest,
the end of the law, God's one offering, that which the law
pictured and typified and was given for. He's the pattern in
the mount from which that whole law was given. And the law that God gave at
Sinai was given for the purpose of showing us we needed an offering. We needed a sacrifice. We needed
a high priest. Now, if He fulfilled it, and
He is the high priest, and He represented us before the law,
and He says, you are complete in My Son, what are you going
to add to it? What are you going to add to
it? What are we going to add to it? We can't add anything to that. He
is perfection. He is the Lord, our what? Righteousness. If we're going
to come into God's presence, we're going to come robed in
one garment. It's going to be a solid, unbroken garment. It's
not going to be patched up half with Christ's righteousness and
half with something that we call righteousness. We're going to
come in Christ alone. Now, there were many Levitical
priests. We have one high priest. Levitical
priests were temporary. He's a high priest forever after
the order Melchizedek Levitical priests made nothing perfect.
He perfected forever them that are sanctified Levitical priests
ministered on earth, but he Ministers on the right hand of the majesty
on high and the holiest of holies in a glorified body if you and
I believe this message if we believe God's Word and If we
look into His Word and we believe God and we trust God and we say,
Christ is all my salvation. If we say that this morning,
it's going to be because He is seated in Heaven as our High
Priest ministering to us. That's what He's doing through
the Spirit of God. And that's how we're going to
believe on Him. And we're going to come to Him saying, nothing
in me, not anything in me, at all. Salvation is of the Lord. You know what part I played in
it? You know what part I played in
this purpose of God's grace? I sinned against God. End of story. That's the part
I played in it. And you know what God did? In
spite of me, not based on anything in me, good or bad, He put me
in Christ. Christ redeemed me. And the Spirit
of God came and gave me life and faith and repentance and
all the graces of God to behold Him and say, I can rest now. I've seen the Sabbath. I have
seen Him who is everything to me. Him who is all in all. And if a man doesn't believe
that and a man doesn't trust Christ as all, why doesn't he?
Be honest. Why don't we? because we want
to have part in it. We want to be as gods. We want
to exalt ourselves as the Most High. It pleased God that He might
have all the preeminence. His Son. All fullness dwells
in Him. Our High Priest is the mediator
of a better covenant. established upon better promises. Listen to this. That first covenant
promised earthly blessings if man would obey God. That's what
the first covenant said. If you do this, this, and this,
then I'll do this. It was a conditional covenant.
You mean God would give us some sort of a... He would make a
covenant with us that we couldn't keep? Well, that wouldn't be
fair for God to do that. God forbid we say anything of
that nature. He not only did and does, but
that's one of the greatest mercies He had on His people was to give
us a law to show us we could not in any way, please Him shape,
form, or fashion. Because only then do we see that
we need a mediator. We need a Savior. The first covenant
was based on earthly blessings. If a man would obey God, therefore
it could never be established because of the inability of sinful
man to obey it. We couldn't establish it. But
the everlasting covenant made before guarantees the heavenly
blessings because Christ obeyed God on behalf of the people God
gave him. That's right. better covenant
established upon better promises. The first covenant was a promise
to one nation, physical Israel. The everlasting covenant promises
salvation to a people from among every nation under heaven, true
Israel, spiritual Israel. That's a better covenant established
upon better promises. The first covenant was dark in
shadow and ceremony. The everlasting covenant is made
through the irresistible Spirit of God in the hearts of God's
people. That's a better covenant established on better promises. You see, this covenant is better
because it's the everlasting covenant. It's the eternal counsel. You know why Christ is called
Wonderful Counselor? Because all the counsel of God
has its fulfillment in Him. And that's wonderful. That's
wonderful. Now, I want you to notice something
here as I close this lesson. How do we come to this new covenant? We talked about this last night
a little bit, but I want you to see here. Right here in chapter
7, in verse 22, by so much was Jesus made a surety of a better
testament, better covenant. The first place that that word
covenant, testament, is mentioned in the Hebrew book. Everything
up to this point has been the excellency of Christ and Him
alone. Over God's prophets, over the
angels, over Moses, over Joshua, a better inheritance than Canaan,
more rest than the Sabbath could ever give. He's better over everything. All the Old Testament
Levitical priests, better. Why didn't the Spirit of God
start by saying the covenants better? Because the carnal mind
natural-minded man, sinful man, would just as soon turn from
that old covenant and say, well, now we're under a new covenant,
and latch on to it, and try to do this, this, this, and this
in a new covenant, just like we tried to do this, this, and
this under the old covenant, and we still haven't bowed the
knee to Christ the Lord and seen Him as being the sum and substance
of God's covenant. That's why He didn't do it. Let's
listen here. The Lord Jesus is our king and
high priest. The Lord Jesus is seated on the
right hand of the Most High. The Lord Jesus has entered into
the holiest of all. The Lord Jesus Christ is our
tabernacle. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
choice offering of God. The Lord Jesus Christ has obtained
a more excellent ministry. The Lord Jesus Christ is mediator
of God's covenant. And now he tells us, it's a better
covenant established on better promises. Why? Because of the
one in whom it's established. That's what makes it better.
And if God don't reveal that in us, Christ in us, we just
switch from one dead letter to another dead letter. We switch
from an old covenant to a new covenant. And we're still just
as much in legalism and under the law and under the yoke of
bondage as if we had never even turned from one or the other.
What's the everlasting covenant called? In Galatians it's called
the covenant that was confirmed before of God in Christ. When He confirmed it to Abraham.
Abraham wasn't a Jew. Abraham wasn't of the nation
of Israel. God told him he would be a father of many nations. It was a covenant confirmed before
of God in Christ. He said, in your seed, the promised
son, not Isaac. Go back and read Galatians 3.
That seed is Christ. That was where the covenant was
confirmed before of God in Christ. God the Father says of God the
Son, I'll preserve thee and give thee for a covenant of the people
to establish the earth because to inherit the desolate heritages. It's called the blood of the
everlasting covenant. The blood. Life. Somebody gave
their life to make this covenant. Why is it called that? Look at
2 Corinthians 1.20. 2 Corinthians 1 verse 20. It's a better covenant established
upon better promises. For all the promises of God in
Christ Jesus the Lord, our great High Priest, are not, well, yea
and nay. If you'll do this, He'll do that.
their yes and in him amen unto my glory for making his blood
effectual by making my final cast and decide and vote? No,
unto the glory of God by others. Now, I can't make a man rejoice
in that. I can't make these children see
that this is life. I can't do that, but God can. That one who's seated at God's
right hand, that one that God said He's given Him power over
all flesh to give eternal life to as many as the Father has
given Him, He can. He can. You know why He can? Because God's not willing that
any, not a single one, will perish. It'll cost God more than it costs
us if one for whom Christ died perishes. Because He counts the
blood of His dear Son vanity. Isn't that what Paul said? I
do not frustrate the grace of God for if righteousness come
by the law, Christ died in vain. Now if you can stand there, let
that be your conscience and face God with it. All I got to say
is that just shows the height of depravity. That shows the
need of this high priest. That a man would have the audacity
to think he can approach the thrice holy God claiming something
he did. We're gonna come one way. We're
gonna come in the high priest, and that's the only way. If God's
pleased with him, I pray God give us all grace that we be
pleased with him too. All right, amen.