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He loved to sing its words. It sounds like music in our ears. The sweetest name on earth.
Hebrews chapter 10 verse 15, whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us. For after they he had said before, This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord. I will put my laws in their hearts and their minds while I write them, and their sins and iniquities while I remember no more.
Now we're a remission of these is there is no more offering for sin.
Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which he had consecrated for us through the veil, that is to say, his flesh. Having a high priest over the House of God, let us draw near with a true heart and full assurance of faith. Having our hearts sprinkled from the evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water, let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering.
For He is faithful that promise. Let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another so much the more, as you see the day approaching. For if we sin wilfully, after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for a judgment, fiery indignation.
We shall devour the adversaries. He that despise Moses Law died without mercy, under two or three witnesses.
Of how much more sore punishments suppose he Chavez he be thought worthy, who has trod it under foot the Son of God, and has counted the blood of the covenant wherewith he was sanctified. An unholy thing has done despite unto the spirit of grace. For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me I will recompense, saith the Lord.
And again the Lord shall judge his people. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. The call to remembrance. The former days in which, after you were illuminated, he endured a great fight of afflictions.
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Partly wise you were made at gain stock both by reproaches and affection, partly while GV came companions of them that were so used. For you had compassion of me and my bonds, and took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that you have in heaven a better and an enduring substance.
Cast not away, therefore, your confidence, which has great recompense of reward, for you have need of patience. But after you have done the will of God, you might receive the promise for yet a little while. And he that shall come will come, and will not tear it, neither just shall live by faith. If any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him. But we are not of them who draw back into petition.
But of them that believed to the saving of the soul.
Yesterday we talked about.
In verse 9 the will of God, and in verse 1011 and 12 The work of Christ.
And now in the verses we've read, it talks about the witness of the Holy Spirit.
So the Holy Spirit is a witness.
And the work of Christ, of course, he's talking to those who are Jewish believers, the Hebrews, and of course to them.
Will apply in the future that new covenant and.
Really, we have to understand that the Gentiles and the church as such is never really under covenant. We enjoy the blessings.
Of the new covenant, which is based on the blood of Christ, just as the Jewish people, their blessing is based on that same thing, but the new covenant is with the let's look back at it and I think it's chapter. Is it chapter 8?
And verse.
10 Right, this is the covenant that I will make with the House of Israel after those days though the.
New Covenant is with the House of Israel.
In the future day, they will be brought into blessing again on that same basis.
But.
We as the Church are never mentioned as being under.
Covenant that was with the House of Israel God is going to.
Bring them into blessing again. Maybe it'd be good to look back at Jeremiah 31, which is quoted here, to see it too. Because there is teaching today that says that God is done with Israel.
And it's called covenant.
Uh, teaching instead of dispensational teaching. It's covenant theology and they say that.
Uh, God is done with Israel, the church has replaced Israel and the church is under the covenant. That's not really understanding the word of God in its entirety. So just to read it here in verse chapter 31 of Jeremiah, notice 3131. Behold, the days comes, saith the Lord.
That it will make a new covenant. With whom? With the House of Israel and with the House of Judah. That's what the covenant, the new covenant is for. Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them out by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, which my covenant they break because it was based on responsibility, human responsibility, although I wasn't husband unto them, saith the Lord. But this shall be.
The covenant that I will make with the House of Israel after those days, that the Lord I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts, and will be their God, and they shall be my people, and they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, No, the Lord, For they shall all know me from the least of them, even unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord, For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember.
Their sin no more.
Now notice the next verses, brother. And this is precious. Thus saith the Lord, which giveth the Son for a light by day.
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And the ordinance of the moon and of the stars for a light by night, which divideth the sea.
When they waved their uproar, the Lord of hosts is his name. If those ordinances depart from before me, saith the Lord, then the seed of Israel shall cease from being a nation, be before me forever. Thus saith the Lord, if the heavens can be measured, and the foundation of the earth searched out beneath, I will also cast off all the seed of Israel for all that they have done, saith the Lord. So just as is, there is day and night.
There will be a nation of Israel that God is going to bring in two blessing. That is His purpose, and nothing can forego that. Now, if the heavens and the earth depart and cease to be, then He will cease His faithfulness toward the nation of Israel. I think that's so important, isn't it?
Hope to engage in in that faulty reasoning that somehow the church.
Has eclipsed the promises to the nation of Israel and to spiritualize those passages or in some way just just come to the conclusion that God has just changed his mind. And and yes, he made all these promises to it, to the House of Israel, but now he has this new thing that he's going to do because if you apply the same reasoning to the promises made to to us sinners of the Gentiles.
And the promises pertaining to the House of God and the Church of God today, could you not do the same thing?
So God not only has given it to in his word, but that very passage to to go back to the security and consistency of creation to establish this fact that he's going to bring the nation into blessing in a future day on the principle of grace. Because if you lined up all the nations in the United Nations and just took stock of them all and then told the whole assembled world that this nation, this little tiny nation here is going to be the head of all the nations.
And I'm going to bless them in a way that no nation has ever been blessed. And I'm going to do that. People would say, well, why would you do? That's not fair. But if you lined up all the boys and girls I grew up with in my neighborhood and you pointed to me and you said that that boy there is going to end up in glory with Christ, that's not fair either.
But God has secured to himself the right to do both of those things.
Because of the work of His Son on Calvary's cross, and he has declared himself now after the long forbearance that he showed, He showed that he was righteous all along in doing so. Because of the work of His Son on Calvary's cross, He's declared himself so wonderfully to be just and the justifier of him which believe in Jesus. So on the principle of grace, you and I are brought into eternal blessing, and God has secured to himself righteously that right to bless that nation on the same principle of grace.
And so Paul could write in Romans 15 that Jesus Christ is a minister of this was a minister of the circumcision to confirm the promises made to the fathers and that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy. So it's a wonderful and and comforting and encouraging thing to see God is going to unfold these wonderful purposes on the earth with this earthly people and we with a heavenly portion and part of this.
Mystery, uh, now revealed to faith, part of the bride of Christ, the church, uh, another and a separate glory that he's gotten to himself.
So what's just been said?
Give further emphasis to a very good point that's just been made, and that is.
Every single individual who has ever lived on the face of the earth has failed in their personal responsibilities to God.
And there's not been a single individual who has ever lived who has a claim upon God on the basis of having fulfilled personal responsibility of any generation or dispensation or any relationship that God has placed them under. And consequently, God is cast upon Himself to act according to His own will and His own purposes in a sovereign way.
Without ever being bound by any man making a claim, you're not fair.
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And it's a very important point for us to recognize in the whole of the Word of God that God is righteous in his sovereignty. He has the sovereign right to do as He chooses, but He also is righteous in the basis on which He does it, and consequently every man of every dispensation.
For blessing is dependent upon the grace of God.
Men never can. The only if I want to say there's an exception to it, yes, in manhood there is. The Lord Jesus Christ is an exception to what I've just said. And in fact, he's the only person who has ever lived which has given God a motive to love him. There's never been a so another individual who's ever lived on this earth that has given God a righteous, true motive to love them.
Uh, but the Lord Jesus could say, therefore doth my Father love me because.
And he did as a man, give God a righteous claim. He had a righteous claim to be loved by God. But for the rest of us, we want to re.
Depend 100 and 203 hundred 1000, whatever you want to say percent.
Our blessing comes directly from what God is from His own heart. Everything flows for good from the heart of God. Nothing flows from man to God in that way. But it all originates. That's why in first John 4, even the matter of love, it says we love.
Because He first loved us all, Divine Love flows originally from His own heart. And if there's Divine Love in our heart, it originated in His. It flowed into us, and being in us, it may flow out to others, but even love itself always originates in His heart. That is divine Love. And so God is the only one and only source of true good.
And we are all the recipients of it. And brethren, if we in some little measure it lays hold of our souls, it helps us to be properly humble.
It's important to see that all blessing, whether it's for us in this dispensation, whether it's for God's earthly people who will be blessed in a coming day, or whether it's for the redemption that all creation is going to feel in the millennial scene. It's all based, as we've been saying, on the work that the Lord Jesus accomplished on Calvary's cross. And it's helpful to see in the book of Hebrews that it's really a broader thought than just our being brought into blessing.
We sometimes lose a little bit in the King James, but just to make our point, you find in the first chapter where it says he by himself purged our sins. That's true. Thank God, he has purged our sins. But if you notice Mr. Darby's translation, it's really a broader sense than that, isn't it? He's made the purification for sin because in the context there, it's by whom? Also, He made the world's and he's going to take it back in the coming day.
Not just on the basis of being the Creator, but on the basis of redemption.
We find in the second chapter that he should taste death, not just for every man, as the King James says.
But for everything, and so for Israel, as we've been speaking, they are going to be brought into a wonderful position of blessing.
In a coming day, they're going to enjoy like they've never enjoyed before. The promise, inheritance. The promises are going to be fulfilled that were made to Abraham and others down through the ages.
But they're going to too, have to recognize that it is on the grounds of redemption.
When they finally recognize that they are the that it was there in outside the walls of Jerusalem, that his hands and his feet and his side were pierced.
But there's also, again, let's apply it to ourselves 1St and then go back to what we're Speaking of with Israel, with everyone of us here who are saved. It's true. It's on the basis of the work of Calvary, the death and the shedding of blood of the Lord Jesus. It's on the grounds of grace. But there also had to be another work, and that is a work in our souls because none of us would have ever responded to the gospel message. We were dead in trespasses and sins.
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And apart from a work of God, a sovereign work of imparting divine life and bringing us to the realization that we were sinners, none of us would be saved. And I believe it will be similar for Israel in the coming day. He's going to, as our verse says, write His law in in their hearts. There has to be a work in the heart of Israel. And let's just go back to Ezekiel for a moment because I think we see it there.
Just to notice some verses in Ezekiel 36.
Speaking of the coming day of blessing for Israel and that work that's going to take place.
Amongst them verse 25 Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean.
And all the filthiness. And oh, I'm sorry, from all your filthiness and from all your idols, will I cleanse you Now notice this.
And a new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you.
And I will make take away the Stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh, and I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes.
And ye shall keep my judgments and do them, and so on. Isn't it remarkable to think that while the Lord, I believe, took this portion and applied it in John 3 individually to Nicodemus, and I'll just say this, that's why Nicodemus should have understood what the Lord He said. Are you a teacher? Aren't you a teacher in Israel? And you don't know these things? If Nicodemus as a teacher in Israel had been studying the Old Testament and reading it with prayer and exercise like he should have been.
He would have understood what the Lord was saying in application. He would have thought in his mind back to this portion.
So he applied it individually to Nicodemus. He must be born again.
But brethren, in its context here in Ezekiel, there's going to be a National Heart transplant for Israel.
When the law was given, it was chiseled on 2 tables of stone. It was a picture of the Stony heart of man.
Israel being just a sample of what was indicative of all mankind.
But it was a picture of the Stony heart of man. No response, naturally speaking without a work of God.
But brethren, Israel as a nation in a coming day.
Is going to have the Stony heart of unbelief taken out of them. They're going to be given a heart.
That is going to respond to himself and he's going to write on that heart, not chisel like was chiseled with the finger of God on the tables of stone. He's going to write on that heart that will respond to himself, his law and there is going to be a response at Sinai they said all of the Lord thy God has said that what we do and they immediately failed in the 1St and greatest of the commandments and set up the golden calf and had an image.
Worship the the golden calf and they're gonna return to idolatry briefly in a coming day when they worship the image that is set up in the temple. But he's gonna take that Stony heart and he's going to give them a heart that is going to respond. What a wonderful thing. And Israel as a nation will never apostatize again. Once there is that work of grace and that work of power that takes out the Stony heart and gives them a new heart and writes the law in their heart, they will never as a nation apostasize again.
What a wonderful day it is going to be for Israel, and it ought to rejoice our hearts, brethren, to think that He is going to accomplish and fulfill those promises that He made to that nation in spite of that nation on the grounds of pure sovereign grace and a mighty work. It is going to be fulfilled.
In this chapter, but I'd like to make a mention of something for, especially for the younger, but uh, for us all in the way that covenant theology is taught that, uh, the church has replaced Israel. This is the reason why Christians today are told to get into the political process. And in the Old Testament, you have been of God who were high.
In the politics, Daniel was high in Babylon, Joseph was high in Egypt. And so they come to you and they say, why don't, why aren't you doing your Christian duty by representing God in the culture that we're passing through? And it sounds reasonable. And we need to understand that the church is a completely separate entity from Israel.
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We have not replaced Israel. Israel is always an earthly people with earthly blessings.
Material blessings. The churches are completely different people with heavenly calling and heavenly blessings. The Apostle Paul lost everything down here and yet he was one of the ones that enjoyed most his heavenly portion. Wonderful to see it even though he'd lost everything. I don't know what they would say, these prosperity gospel preachers today about the Apostle Paul that lost everything.
But, uh, it's important to see that we have a heavenly calling. We are pilgrims and strangers here as pilgrims and foreigners. We respect the laws of those countries that we live in, as any foreigner would do. But we do not get involved in those political processes. That is not our place. We are ambassadors for Christ and an ambassador does not get involved in the political processes.
The Lord Jesus and the Apostle Paul and those.
The first disciples, you never find them getting into political, uh, movements at all. There was a lot of, uh, terrible things done by Nero, the Roman emperor. Do you see the Lord Jesus or any of the disciples protesting against that? Never did it happen. That is not our place, brethren. And so we need to understand that we're completely separate from Israel.
God has formed in this day from Jews and from Gentiles what is called the Church of God. That's our place now. And so in this chapter, although he's writing to those who are Jewish believers that come from that background, these things apply to us because we are, we come under the blessings of New Covenant, even though we are not under the New covenant.
And so we look at these things, brethren, and enjoy them. Verse 17 says their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more. Isn't that amazing to think about? We can say we enjoy that as well.
To think that God will never again thank be thinking about this when we come into God's presence. If I have the idea that the Lord would be thinking about some of the bad stuff I've done in the past, I would not be totally comfortable. But we have a positive promise. He doesn't say I will forget because forgetfulness is human weakness, and God is not afflicted with human weakness.
When you forget something, there's a possibility you might remember it further on. But God has made a positive promise. I will remember no more. Oh brethren, those things cannot come up any longer. The work of Christ is so completely put away sin by his sacrifice that He says their sins and their iniquities will. I remember no more. So my grandmother had.
Brush and I forgive and forget, but I always remember. And that's true, isn't it? Suppose I broke into your house, Brother Bob and I steal some things and you call the police. And later on that night, the police call you up and they say, we have your man, he's down here at the police station, and we'd like you to come down and press charges and pick up the goods that he's stolen. And so you come down and as you enter the police station, you look over on the bench and there's Jim Highland in handcuffs. And you come over and you sit down beside me and you say, now, Jim, we've enjoyed a lot of happy times together in the past, and I'm not gonna press charges.
And I'm gonna forgive you. And not only that, but Jim, why don't you still come over to my house when you're in town and we'll have a meal together and we'll just forget the whole matter? Would I ever really feel comfortable in your presence? Would I feel comfortable to come over on Friday night for dinner? I'd always feel like a forgiven thief. But you know, in Christianity, we're more than forgiven sinners. It's true. He has forgiven our sins. But this expression.
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Vice, our sin, their sins and iniquities I will remember no more. And I know it's referring to Israel in a future day, but as you say, we can apply it to ourselves. It doesn't say He never remembered them. There was a time when our sins were remembered and they were placed on the Lord Jesus. And as you say, God doesn't forget, but He chooses now because they have been taken care of righteously in the work of Calvary. And he bore us my sins in His own body on the tree.
Only a divine person can choose not to remember. I forget the things I want to remember, and I remember the things I want to forget. As you say, that's human nature. But only a divine person can choose not to remember. And I'm perfectly comfortable and will be for eternity perfectly comfortable in the presence of the Lord Jesus, because those sins are gone. But it's not that He just swept them under the carpet. It's not that He just chooses not to. I will remember no more that word.
Those words no more are important. He remembered them once, but now that they're taken care of, he can say I remember them no more. And that is for all eternity.
The apostle contrasts the blessings that Israel had under the law, and he contrasts them with the blessings that they can now have in Christ and this verse 17 contrasts with the.
The verse earlier in the chapter.
Verse 3 For in those sacrifices there is a remembrance again made of sins every year. Now our brother Bob mentioned last night that the word atonement doesn't turn up in the New Testament. Why? Is it because atonement means as God our brother mentioned covering. So what was the situation, shall I say of a believer?
In the Old Testament times where those sacrifices were offered and those sacrifices, reverently speaking, reminded God of the person of the Lord Jesus Christ who was going to come and bear all those sins in his own body on the tree, and on the basis of that, God granted.
Atonement. He covered those sins up so that he could have communion with his creature like our brother was mentioning the night before. And so that is atonement. Now if there was ever a workplace where the word atonement might have been used in the New Testament, it is in the 9th chapter and it's the.
Umm.
12 First, because of the.
Uh, allusion to that great day of atonement. And it says neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood. He entered in once into the holy place, having obtained atonement from us, no eternal redemption and eternal redemption. The debt has been paid. That all those sins that were covered up on the basis of those sacrifices so that God could have communion with his creature, they're all gone. The debt has been paid.
And so we have not atonement, but we have eternal redemption, and it's much better than atonement. We sometimes use the expression the atoning death of Christ now.
What we're doing is we're talking in types and I I suppose it's OK if we do so, as long as we realize what we're doing. But if redemption is far, far better than atonement.
And Adam sinned.
God's eye was now occupied with sin.
After Adam was created.
It says on the end of the 7th day God rested. On the 7th day He rested because he had just finished a work and he could look upon that work with satisfaction in his own heart and there was nothing to disturb his own satisfaction in the work.
But the moment Adam sinned, God ceased to rest, and he's never rested since.
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God cannot rest as long as his eye is upon sin. It is contrary to his nature, it is contrary to his holy beings, and as long as his eye sees sin, he cannot rest. And so when the Lord Jesus was here on earth, he says.
My Father worketh hitherto, and I work. It was an ongoing, continuous dealing with the matter of sin. As long as sin exists, God is forced to be a judge. It's not His desire to be a judge, but as long as sin is before His eye, He's forced into that position of having to make judgments with respect to that which is inconsistent with Himself.
And so in John's Gospel, when John the Baptist looks upon the Lord Jesus, he looks on to something that is God looks on to to this hour. He's still looking on to it. And that is, behold, the Lamb of God, which beareth away the sin of the world. That is, the Lord Jesus is one that is given of God to be one that will remove from God's sight.
Forever.
Send and when that work is in its entirety, uh, complete, the foundation of it is mad at the cross, but they're still sin in, in the creation. And then and only then do we find the expression and he shall rest.
In his love and he will rest in the end result of it. And so the work of redemption as it, as is already really been mentioned, the covering is that which did something necessary, but it did not remove the thing itself from before God having to deal with it. But redemption and its result is that which the blood of Christ cleanses, it removes.
That which is, in God's sight, offensive to him and so unlike.
Jim's illustration where you wouldn't be comfortable, no, it might be forgiven, but it's still there. It's still there to be seen. It's still there in the memory, uh, if you will. But the work of the Lord Jesus is that foundation and that work which God uses so that everything inconsistent with himself.
Can be righteously, perfectly and forever removed from his own sight. And then we go into eternity and eternity remains for God forever. I in connection with this chapter, I want to make one more comment about it as well. The first covenant.
Was based on man and responsibility, and so in that way it was conditional.
You keep these 10 rolls, you live, you break them, you die. There was a condition for man in connection with it, because man was placed in responsibility before God on that, on that ground.
The second covenant and the reason we come under the blessing of it is because it is a covenant that is not based on the same foundation. It is God saying I'm now going to be the responsible one. I am the one that is now going to do work in which I will maintain the responsibility of that covenant forever. And.
God will maintain it.
Forever and so they'll never be 1/3 covenant.
For man, heaven, earth, or otherwise, they'll never be another covenant because when God undertakes to do something on his own responsibility, he does it in perfection with an eternal result connected with it. And so we need a new heart. You haven't talked about our transplant. We we get a new life.
And we've got bodies that have sin in them, but based on the same work, God says, well, I can't have those. I can't, I can't have before my eye the results even of what sin has done, uh, because it still reminds me of sin. So I'm going to change the body and bring it into conformity to my own. And that's for us is glory. But even for the heavenly people it will, I mean the earthly people, it will ultimately have the same results.
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God looks at the creation itself and he says that reminds me of sin.
I look at a tree, I look at a flower, and I see the consequences of sin on that.
And it's been said, there's not a single perfect leaf in the whole of this universe. Every single leaf that exists on the earth at this moment in time, if examined carefully enough, will show something of the effect of sin. It's imperfect, in other words.
But God says, OK, but the work that my son is doing, he's going to remove everything from my sight. And on the same basis that Israel is blessed, we're blessed, the animals are blessed.
Every single creature comes under the benefit of the work and in the end, then as the final step, if you will, to remove all that has to do with it from God's sight, there'll be the last step of the really the, uh, day of the Lord, introducing the day of God in second Peter three that takes us on to future eternity, and that is.
I'm going to replace the heaven and the earth itself, and then I'll never remember sin anymore. The full effect here, it's applied to us as individuals, but forgot it in his thoughts. It goes out beyond that. And he says I'll remove the old creation itself and introduce a new creation, and on the basis of that one work, I'll maintain it forever. We ought to be thankful we don't have to worry about going to heaven someday and sinning.
You know we won't.
And, uh, God, in his purposes of perfection will still be responsible to be obedient. We'll be obedient creatures forever. Uh, we'll never have a time in all eternity where even in spite of grace, we aren't creatures of obedience and dependence. But God will sustain us in that way so that we never break, we're never disobedient again. And, uh, he maintains it in its perfection forever. And blessed be God.
So in verse 18.
Because full payment has now been made, not just atonement, but full payment has been made. There's no more offering for sin. God would be unrighteous if he required another offering for sin. And again, it's another one of those contrasts that our brother David was Speaking of because as we learned earlier, the sacrifices in the Old Testament, not only did they not put away sin, but they only dealt with that atone for that one sin and then they had to bring another and another and another.
And they understood that very clearly, the priests and the Levites and the children of Israel.
But it's important to realize that the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus took care of sins past and sin's future. So as David was saying, the sins of the Old Testament were atoned for or put on account, really, weren't they? And the debt accumulated through the Old Testament, through 4000 years of man's history of sin from Adam to the cross, that debt accumulated the Lord Jesus and the sacrifice of Calvary. He took care of that tat there's been complete remittance made.
But even more wonderful than that, what about sin's future? What about your sins and mine? They were taken care of at the cross, too. He bore our sins in His own body on the tree. And so full payment has been made. What? What would you think of a creditor who received full payment for a debt and then came and tried to force more money out of the person? Why you say that's completely unrighteous. The debt was fully paid.
Oh, the debt was fully met at Calvary's cross. And so in the 17th verse there's no more remembrance of sin, but it's really becau. And so as a result of that, there's no more offering for sin completely taken care. What assurance and confidence that ought to give us, brethren.
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The Lord Jesus paid that price in full. The hand of God ripped that veil of the temple into from the top to the bottom. I've heard that it was probably a very thick.
Veil. But the hand of God opened that up, and I like to think of it in this way. God now comes out into the full light. We know Him as we could never have known him before as.
Israel could never have known him, but not only that. Now we can go in with boldness. Verse 19. Having therefore, brethren, boldness.
Over other than let's let that sink into our souls, the privilege, we don't grasp it properly that we can go at any moment into the very presence of God. We mentioned in these days of how that there was only one person in Israel only once a year and not with confidence. He went into the very immediate presence of God.
Now, because of the work of the Lord Jesus, we can go in with boldness.
Sometimes I'd rather and I I don't think this is really sinking down properly into our souls. No one encouraged the young brother. And it's not a matter of experience and age, the question of priesthood. It's a question of being born into the priest priestly family. In the Old Testament, to be a priest, you had to be born into Aaron's family. In the New Testament, everyone that is born into the family of God is a priest.
A holy priest capacitated to OfferUp spiritual sacrifices.
Of praise and prayer. Why is it that on Lord's Day morning so often a long, long pauses? I'm not saying that there shouldn't be a pause.
To enjoy and meditate on the Lord. But sometimes uncomfortably long pauses. Do we understand where God has brought us? Is there a doubt as to the sufficiency of the sacrifice that has been made? Oh, brethren, it says, having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which he hath consecrated for us through the veil, that is to say, his flesh.
Sometimes we call it holy boldness because as we go into the presence of God, let us never forget there's the veil hanging on one side and another. The veil was rent the price.
Price, president, was costly.
But let's enjoy it. He's won it for us this place before his presence.
And then it says in having an high priest over the House of God.
In chapter 5 it shows that the high priest was there because.
Of men's infirmities and weaknesses.
Do we feel it as we enter into the presence of God?
In our expressions of praise and thanks, do we make mistakes? Yes, we do.
And that's why the Lord Jesus is there as high priest. So don't let fears of our infirmities and weaknesses impede our expression of gratitude, a praise of worship to God. Let's enjoy this privilege. It belongs to us. And so he is there.
And it says in the hymn to all our praise, our prayers and praises, Christ adds his sweet perfume and love. The sensor raises those that are the orders to consume so that the Lord Jesus is there for that purpose, to help us in our weaknesses and infirmities. We should be correct in our expressions to the Lord. But sometimes I've made mistakes.
In my expressions.
Brethren, we can learn and we can do it better next time, but don't let that impede you from coming into His presence. Verse 22. Let us draw near.
00:50:09
He's made every provision. Are you gonna hang back? Are you gonna say I don't feel worthy to participate in the praise and Thanksgiving to him? How can you do that?
It's interesting. We won't go back for the sake of time, but in the Old Testament, when you have Aaron the priest, one of the things that he was to wear was the mitre, and it tells us what the mitre was for. It was so that he could bear the iniquity of the holy things of the children of Israel. Because even in our worship and our praise, it's sometimes checkered with self. It isn't always perfect, as you say.
But we can take comfort that, as you say, by the time the Lord Jesus takes our prayers and praises and presents them to the ear of God, they're perfect. I find that a great comfort. As you say, Bob, we need to be exercised that we are intelligent worshippers because that's what characterizes Christianity. But there's one as our high priest who wears the mitre. And it's interesting that in the 4th chapter of Hebrews.
We're told to approach boldly in another aspect. There we have a great high priest.
Who has been touched with the feeling of our infirmities? And so on. And there we're told to come boldly to the throne of grace.
And you know, we're quick to do that, aren't we? And thank God we are. Thank God for that wonderful provision. And we often enjoy the fact that we can come boldly to the throne of grace, make our requests known. He's living to intercede for us. He sympathizes. He empathizes with us. But what about this, brethren? What about this privilege here? Are we as eager, shall I say, are we as exercised to come in boldly into His presence?
Worshippers, that's what he wants. We're we're priests, as Bob has said, and you get it in, in, in Peter's epistle. We're holy priests to OfferUp spiritual sacrifices. And as we've been saying in these meetings, this is what he wants. But he wants us to come. And not only are the brothers priests, but the sisters are priests too. And a sister's presence in the assembly with her heart full of praise and worship.
It's a tremendous blessing. I think it was mentioned that when Mary poured out her ointment at the feet of Lord, she never said a word.
Not one word, but it had an effect on all those that are there. Oh, brethren, what a privilege we have to come, not with fear and trembling, but to come with holy boldness and confidence on the basis of the blood of Christ, and to pour out our hearts as worshippers and in praise and Thanksgiving.
Collective sense than individual. I was thinking of, not to jump ahead, but verse 25, he gets into the thought of not forsaking ourselves, the assembling of ourselves together. So is is the emphasis here more in our approach collectively than it is individually, or would you include our individual approach as well?
Together, whether individual or collective, these principles apply.
You might say the, uh, 24th verse would be the individual on the 25th, the collective, wouldn't you?
Yeah. So I both are included.
In verse 22 it says, and this is beautiful, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith. Brethren, think about it. What has God omitted in making access into His presence possible for us? Nothing, absolutely nothing. Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience.
That's the sprinkling of the blood and our bodies washed with pure water.
And that is not the water from the labor that the priest washed themselves as they went in on a daily basis to do the service in the Tabernacle. That is the full bath that was given to the priests at their consecration. It's the washing of regeneration. We're brought into a completely new position before God in that work of Christ. That's the voicing that's referred to in verse 22.
00:55:25
Isn't that right, Don?
Mm-hmm.
Comment on the the general principle too, and as it says in verse 19, enter the holiest by the blood of Jesus.
When the Lord Jesus himself.
Rose from the dead, and he came into the presence of the disciples in the upper room.
Where the door was shut for fear of the Jews.
He said to them.
Umm, or it says he showed them.
His hands and his side.
That's what they saw when you and I enter glory for the first time.
That's what we're gonna see.
When we first see the Lord Jesus face to face first time in our.
Existence. We're gonna see his hands and his side.
We're seeing what after sin is removed from the creation and from God's sight, as we had a little while ago.
We'll have that eternal reminder. There won't be when you enter and see the Lord Jesus for the first time, there will not be a single mark of sin upon you.
There will be absolute perfection in your body.
Bought in for him the only perfect body in which sin never entered internally or externally.
It is God's choice, I guess I'll put it that way that the cost of redemption as we see it, we will see in his hands and in his side and and will be forever in awe and worshippers of that. Likewise when he presented himself to them, he said flesh and bones, you see me have and a carefully expressed statement.
That there was no blood in that body.
That blood had been shed on the cross.
And that blood?
God will see.
Forever we see his hands on his side, and it's brought before us to think about it that way. But at the same time, when the high priest Aaron went into the most holy place, into the presence of God, there was the ark and there was the mercy seat on the top of the ark sprinkled with the blood. And on the day of the Passover, he says, when I see the blood.
I will pass over you, and God himself will rest forever with His eye on that blood and all that it means to Him.
As to the one who shed the blood and to the work accomplished through the shedding of that blood, through the giving of that life, and he will rest forever in his own satisfaction in it, in a way that will.
Give rest, if I can put it that way, to the heart of God, that nothing will ever disturb the present state of.
Creation bless in God's sight, because the value of that blood to His eye will remain in its application forever, and nothing can disturb it. And it is really.
For us, you might say in our in a moral sense, let's rejoice in God's eye on the blood, but at the same time rest in the satisfaction of it as God is satisfied as well.
It's a wonderful thing, brethren, to see those two things which will remain for eternity, which in themselves are, we'll say, a reminder that sin once existed.
01:00:20
We sing #70 in the back.
We sang of the realms of the blast, that country so bright and so fair, the glorious mansions of rest.
But what must it be to be there first? For do thou, Lord, pleasure and woe still for heaven our spirits prepare, and shortly we also shall know and feel what it is to be there #70 in the back.
We sing all the roads, all of us.
In the house, so big round wine.
And worries are great.
With anything high.
In the living room that happened to fall over.
Who I am from the earth view of.
01:05:03
Shout Now I'm going to get a fall from here and there's a little it's a blasting to be so.
Hey John, I'm dumb like a child.
On the Doom on the ground.
All right, umm, like when you can so.