Priestly Service In The Holies

by G. Prasher | Category: N/a | Apr 1950

There is a summing up in Hebrews 8. of the things the writer has been saying, and he shows that the Qld Testament prediction of a King and Priest has been fulfilled in the Person of Christ who is a Minister of the sanctuary of the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched, not man. Some have set forth that there is not a real tabernacle in the heavens, but that everything is found in the Person of Christ. This, however, plainly negates the words ~f the Spirit of God in Hebrews 8.2, where we are told the Lord has pitched a tabernacle (skene), which is called the true tabernacle. The word translated pitched is pe~gnumi, to join together firmly, to fasten, frame, consolidate. It is certain therefore that up in heaven there is the greater and more perfect tabernacle joined together, and fastened by the hand that is divine. Therein the Lord Jesus Christ is Minister, (leitourgos, a Person performing a public duty), and ministering in the power of an endless life.

Chapter 9. refers to a first covenant (verses 1, 18), and a first and a second tabernacle (verses 6, 7). Over against these are a new covenant (verse 15), and a greater and more perfect tabernacle (verse 11). Mention is also made of continued services in the first tabernacle, and of the yearly service in the second tabernacle. In contrast to this we have our High Priest, Christ; entering into the holies once for all, having obtained eternal redemption (verse 12); and a holy priesthood having boldness to enter the holies (10. 19), with the exhortation to offer up a sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit df lips which make confession to His name "(13.15). He who came to do God's will has taken away the first convenant that He may establish the second. The covenant, the tabernacle, the priesthood, and t~e services have been changed. While tabernacle and temple were both under the first covenant, the greater and more perfect tabernacle, pitched by the Lord, is in eonnexion with the new covenant.

The earthiy sanctuary, with its priesthood and services, being a pSrable for the time now present, and a copy and shadow of the heavenly things, affords precious lessons for. our day and time; than

*hich there are, perhaps, none more important than the shadows cast by the veil, called the second veil in Hebrews 9. Some of these we wish to emphasize.

God has set forth the arrangement of the tabernacle in this chapter, mention being made of the second veil, beyond which was the second tabernacle, called the Holy of holies. The first tabernacle then was the holy place, and the second tabernacle the Holy of holies. "Now these things having been thus prepared, the priests go in continually into the first tabernacle, accomplishing the services: but into the second the high priest alone, once in the year, not without blood, which he offereth for himself, and for the errors of the people:

the Holy Spirit this signifying, that the way into the holy place (ton hegion, the holies), hath not yet been made manifest, while as the first tabernacle is yet standing" (verses 6-8). That is to say, while there was a holy place separate from the ~ost holy place the Holy Spirit was pointing out that the way into the holies was not yet made manifest.

Thus it was the second veil, that which made the division between these two places, that indicated the way was not yet made manifest. So long as it hung unrent in the sanctuary it betokened a barred way, and the day-by-day services of the sons of Aaron in the holy place were possible only because of that dividing screen. Its materials ~ow forth Christ-the heavenly One, the royal One, the humble One, and the righteous One. Such was He while down here below, but all those perfections could not bring us into God's presence. Rather they could only unite to shut us out. His death was necessary before the way to God could be opened up.

This is true whether we consider the individtsal man drawing near for justification, as in Romans 3.28, or the people drawing near, which is the subject of the epistle to the Hebrews. But mark now the triumph of the death of Christ on Calvary's cross, for as He died the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom. Hereby is betokened a way opened up into the presence of God. The death of Christ and the rending of the veil synchronized. The shadow was on earth, but the substance is in heaven.

We are exhorted therefore to draw near with a true heart in fulness of faith, and with "boldness to enter the holies (by or in) the blood of Jesus, by the way which He dedicated for us, a new (newly slaughtered,

prosp halos) and living way, through the ~veil, that is to say His flesh" (10.19, 20). That is to say, our entrance into the holies is in His blood and throtigh His flesh-the one shed for us, and the other riven for us. It is His cross-work that is here referred to. It has been well said, The same stroke that slew the Lamb rent the veil.

The word through in this instance is dia, with a genitive, indicating through of place or medium, as in Matthew 7.13, "Enter ye in by or through the narrow gate." We come to God through Christ for salvation: we come into God's house through Christ as Lord: and we come to God through Christ to worship.

Within the veil . . . as a Forerunner Jesus entered for us, having become a High Priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek" (6.19, 20). As the Forerunner His entrance within the veil heralds the approach of others to those holy precincts, those "who have fled for refuge " and "lay hold of the hope set before us; which we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and stedfast and entering into that within the veil." Whereas in the Aaronic order the high priest alone could enter within the veil, and the service of the other priests was without the veil, under the Melchizedek order of Christ, as the result of His once-for-all sacrifice, the holy priesthood enters through the veil.

"All Thy people are forgiven

Through the virtue of Thy blood; Bent in Thee the veil of heaven,

Grace shines forth to man from God."

Let us note then that the first and the second tabernacles of the sanctuary that was adapted to this world were the consequence of an unrent veil, and they were compatible with those sacrifices which could never take away sins: but in the heaveuly sanctuary there are no "first " and "second " tabernacles. Nor does the Holy Spirit speak of a" most holy "place there. In that sanctuary where our Lord Jesus Christ is a Minister He speaks of" the holies," "the way of the holies." "By His own blood (Christ) entered in once for all into the holies" (Ia hegia); "For Christ entered not into a holies (hogia) made with hands, like in pattern to the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear before the face of God for us" (Hebrews 9.8, 12, 24).

He who is now ministering in the heavenly sanctuary is coming out again, for He" shall appear a second time, apart from sin, to them that wait for Him, unto salvation." May it really be true of us that we have "turned unto God . . - to serve a living and true God, and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivereth us from the wrath to come!"

G. Prasher | Apr 1950
N/a