" 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 blood of others; for then must he often have 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. And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment, so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for Him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation.' -Heb. 9:24-28.
What above all things is needed in the reception of divine truths is, the exercise of a faith which gives them a living embodiment to the Soul, and thus takes them out of the region of merely admitted and inconsequential doctrines. Other reception is of little worth. It fails utterly of the end for which they have been given. The end of all revelation is to act on our hearts in the highest possible way by making God and His counsels known. Even when speaking of the salvation of the soul it is said, " This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." And every subsequent step of our progress may be summed up in this-" Increasing in the knowledge of God."
The inspired writer in this chapter is unfolding the difference between the position of believers, in regard to their approach to God, since the full revelation of His mercy in the person and work of His Son, and that which characterized it during the continuance of the ritual and ordinances of the law.
The arrangements of the tabernacle form the basis of his instructions: " When these things were thus ordained, the priests went always into the first tabernacle accomplishing the service of God," &c. Hence there is great vividness in his statements, as he presents this difference in a series of contrasts.
In the first place, the worship of the priests, who had the nearest access to God, was with a veil interposed between them and the holiest of all. The high priest alone once a year passed inside the veil, with the blood which he " offered for himself and for the errors of the people," which was a type, as we learn, of the entrance of the Lord Jesifs into heaven with the blood of his own accomplished sacrifice for sin. But, while this arrangement was in force we are told it gave, in figure, Israel's position under the law; namely, that God's presence was never reached by the worshipper. " The way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest, while as the first tabernacle was yet standing." So far as God had revealed Himself He might be truly worshipped. But what God was in the light was unrevealed, and consequently unknown. The reverse of this is now true. It is the blessed privilege of believers now to come into God's presence without a veil. As it is expressed, we have " boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus." All the necessity there was for man's being kept at a distance from God, because sin and holiness could not exist together, has been removed by the death
of the Lord Jesus. The sin which demanded the condemnation of the sinner in the presence of a God of holiness has been put away by the death of Christ. It was " when he had by himself purged our sins," that the Son of God " sat down on the right hand of the majesty on high." And the perfect love of God is manifested, inasmuch as He gave His only begotten Son to accomplish this work, which no other could accomplish or undertake. There is nothing in the character and claims of God that is now concealed. " The darkness is past and the true light now shineth." Because that which is true of Christ is true of the believer also-true as to life, and position, and acceptance. If we come to God at all now, it must be in the light and without a veil. It was of the highest possible degree of significance that on the death of Christ " the veil of the temple was rent from the top to the bottom." The consummation of man's sin in rejecting and putting to death God's Son, was met by the consummation of God's holiness and love in giving Him to die for the sin which thus reached its crowning act. At the death of Christ the veil was rent, because there it was that holiness and love rose to the height of their manifestation-holiness which received its vindication in the death of the Son of God, for He stood in the sinner's place; and love, that it could thus rise above all that sin had deserved in putting it away. It is beyond all expression a rest and happiness to the soul to know with certainty the ground on which we stand before God. Abiding confidence and peace cannot be maintained without it. It is liberty and rest to know that I am in the presence of the eternal God, because He has given His Son to death to meet the claims of His holiness; and that I am brought as it were face to face with Him on the ground of His own declared efficacy of the work of His beloved Son. I do not see how perfect confidence toward God is possible, except on the ground that we are brought into His presence perfectly in the light. If there could be a thought of horror it would arise from the suspicion that perhaps after all there was something in the character of God that was concealed, something that was yet unknown, that another day might bring to light. But it is not so; " God is light," and " God is love." And both have their illustration in the cross of Christ. " The darkness is past and the true light now shineth." We have " boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus."
The next point of contrast is given in the condition of the conscience of the worshipper now and under the law. While God was hidden by a veil and only worshipped at a distance by means of external ordinances, there was nothing that could set the conscience at rest and at ease. For the law was only a shadow of good things to come; and in its ordinances there was no power to remove guilt from the soul or purge the conscience. But when once the veil is removed, and God's presence in the light is reached, it must be either utter condemnation, or the sense of fitness for His presence by a conscience at rest in the light. And this is accomplished by the work of Christ. For His death for sin, which, Godward, removed the veil from His presence, toward man, at least toward the believer, perfected the conscience. We are called to walk now in the light as God is in the fight, on this simple ground, that " the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanseth us from all sin." On any other ground this would be impossible; for light cannot have fellowship with darkness. But how wonderful is this position, that 1, a sinner, without disguise or palliation, without turning away from the thought of the claims of God's holiness or the greatness of my sins, should still find myself at ease and at rest in His presence, where I am well sure that not a single sin that has ever stained my conscience is hidden, nor a single wandering from God in heart or desire is unknown I No contrast can be greater than that of " the worshipper once purged having -no more conscience of sins," and that of " a remembrance made again of sins every year." But this is the specific difference of the position of the worshipper under the law and under Christ.
The next point presented is the character of the redemption accomplished by the Lord Jesus. " By his own blood he entered in once into the holy place,. having obtained eternal redemption for us." It is no provisional redemption that believers are now made partakers of, as under the law, but one that is perfect and eternal in its character. God dealt with man's whole condition as a sinner in the cross of Christ, and delivered him eternally from it, at least where faith rests on his atoning sacrifice. The entrance of the Lord Jesus into the holy place with His own blood, never to be repeated, was the witness that a true and eternal redemption was accomplished, of which the day of atonement was but a shadowy representation. The Lord Jesus came into our condition in infinite grace; he undertook our cause; His death was the penalty of our guilt; and His resurrection and ascension into heaven was the divine witness of His having accomplished the work he undertook. " He obtained eternal redemption for us."
Another thing is that the believer is now brought into the perfect liberty of serving God by virtue of this same blessed sacrifice. The blood of bulls and of goats, &c., had a certain efficacy in purifying the flesh; that is, by their application external or ceremonial defilement was removed. But it is argued that the application of the blood of Christ has a still greater efficacy in removing defilement from the conscience, and thus giving liberty to the soul in the service of God. " How much more shall the blood of Christ who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?" This is the blessed position in which the redemption of the Lord Jesus sets us in this world as to service. We are delivered altogether from dead works and are brought in perfect liberty to serve the living God. As it is said of the Thessalonians, " They turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God," It is this which gives its spring and energy and freedom to the soul, that God is known, and that He is in a known relationship to the believer; that life is to be spent, not in a round of prescribed duties or dead performances, but in the liberty of a service which is constantly recognized by Him, and which gives the heart the joy of having the witness that we please Him.
But the last contrast presented is between- the often-repeated sacrifices under the law, and the one sacrifice of Christ. " 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 blood of others; for then must be often have 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," &c.
The Whole force of this statement lies in the expression, R now once in the end of the world," or in the consummation of the ages. For it gives, and was designed to give, a probationary character to all God's dealings with man in His recorded history of this world's eventful course, until probation ceased by the rejection and crucifixion on the part of the world, of the Son of God. There is infinite wisdom in this, that the remedy for man's guilt should be brought out only when that guilt had reached its height; and that grace should be seen in its true character by the demonstration that nothing but the absoluteness of grace could avail. There had been many dealings of God with man before the coming of Christ, all of which, more or less, disclosed man's condition before God, as well as God's character toward man. But it is only when all these dealings of God, which the Scripture history unfolds, had proved inefficacious in bringing man back to God, that the last resource of God is brought out and He sends His Son-which issues in the cross. So far from men using these means which God had presented for the purpose of returning to Him, they were the occasion of bringing out more fully the opposition of man's heart to God. So manifestly was this so, that in the ratio of the clearness of God's revelation of Himself to man, was the ratio of man's hatred to God displayed. As the Lord Jesus, who had fully manifested the Father, who was, indeed, God manifested in the flesh, had to say, " If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin; but now they have no cloak for their sin. If I had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin; but now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father." This is what was brought out as to man's moral condition in this " consummation of the ages." And blessed be God forever that it is in this consummation His full and adequate grace takes its character in its presentation to us. My individual experience of sin, however extensive and sorrowful it may have been, does not give the measure of what man's guilt is, that was met by the atoning blood of Christ. To have any just sense of this, I must needs glance at the record of those ages which found their issue and consummation in the cross. It is the use that God would have us make of the history of man which He has given. After the introduction of sin by the fall, man was left to himself without any external restraint, and we learn that in this age lust and violence filled the earth. " All flesh had corrupted its way upon the earth." " And the earth was filled with violence through them." In spite of the testimony of judgment by Enoch, and the warnings of Noah, this age closed its history in the waters of the flood. The world commences from this point its history again, planted on every hand with the beacons of judgment. But there is no change in man's course. There is no fear of God before his eyes. If the world begins its course anew, sin begins its course too. The scattering of the nations at Babel, and idol worship; the separation of Abraham, and the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, are the witnesses of this. Neither the giving of the law nor the sword of the Lord on the inhabitants of Canaan wrought any arrest of sin, even in the nation whom God had redeemed by His wondrous power out of Egypt, and planted in Canaan in place of the nations He had judged. Nay, we learn that the law which taught the people what was right and demanded obedience, only brought out transgression. So far from their availing themselves of the light of the law to walk by it, they, through breaking the law, dishonored God worse than. the Gentiles. So that the practical effect of the law was that " through the commandment sin became exceeding sinful." Prophets were added in the goodness of God; but they killed the prophets, and stoned them that were sent unto them. John calls to repentance, and Christ comes in grace. It is a new test of man's heart. But it issued in their killing John and hating God in the person of His Son, saying, " Not this man, but Barabbas." God's final appeal to man's heart in the way of goodness is given in these affecting words, " Last of all he sent unto them his son, saying, They will reverence my son; but when the husbandmen saw the son, they said among themselves, this is the heir, come lot us kill him, and let us seize on his inheritance. And they caught him, and cast him out of the vineyard, and slew him." There is nothing further to be done. Man's probation ceases here. The highest goodness of God has only brought out the highest hatred of which man's heart is capable. Now, it is plain that either man's sin must conquer God's goodness, and there can be no meeting for him with God but in eternal judgment, or there must be another remedy than that which looks to man's nature to use. It is this remedy that is presented in the supremacy of God's grace. It is " now once in the end of the world [the end of the world as to its moral condition] that Christ appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself."
It is well for the soul to stay on this.
It was not to give the world's history in rounded periods, that God has caused His record of its course to come down to us. No, in these successive epochs of man's history and God's dispensations, to which brief reference has been made, there has been the trial of the principles of good and evil under the hand of God; and the issue of this trial is the proof of the utter and hopeless alienation of man's nature from God, and his absolute need of that grace which has put away sin by the bloodshedding of Christ and brings man to God in a new nature and in the power of a new life, of which Christ, as the second Adam, is the source.
It is too much the habit of our minds to forget the moral bearing of these preliminary dealings with men, on the part of God, and to act as if in the grace of the gospel, we had God's first address to men instead of His final testimony. " God who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in times past unto the fathers by the prophets hath in these last days [or in the end of these days] spoken unto us by his Son." it is quite true that, individually, the first message I hear effectually from God may be that of His infinite grace in the gift of His Son; but I must not forget at what point in the moral history of man this grace has come in. It is " Now once in the end of the world [as to God's moral dealings with it] that Christ path appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself."
But that wondrous work which Christ accomplished in the putting away of sin is often obscured to our apprehensions by the measure which, in our carelessness, we apply to sin. Can I measure what sin is by my own experience only, or by the unhappiness it has wrought in me? Surely not. I must see in it the destruction of the image of God in the first Adam, and his expulsion from Paradise, and all blessed intercourse with God forfeited and gone. I must estimate it by Abel's murder and the call of vengeance from his blood. I must measure its character by the labor and toil it has brought into the world, and the tide of misery that age after age has desolated human hearts. I must read its character in opening the sluices of judgment for the waters of the flood; in the fires of Sodom and the thunders of the law; the rejection of the prophets, and the slaying of God's Son. But what has sin not done? Look at the world through which we are passing. Look at its wars and oppressions, its murder and rapine, its diseased bodies and broken hearts, the corruption to which it reduces, the death it has wrought, and the judgment to which it brings! Now it was to meet this ripened sin of man that Christ came. It was sin in its essence, sin in its character fully worked out in man's sad history, that Christ came to put away. This is what He triumphed over. This is what God's grace in Christ Jesus delivers us from. Not from sin as I may estimate it, in the misery it has wrought me, in the trouble of my conscience and my dread of death; but sin as it has ripened up in man's history under God's gracious dealings, and as it appears in His sight—-Christ came to deliver me from this. " Once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." He came to roll back the tide of evil which was engulfing men, and which was engulfing you and me, if He had not rolled it back.
This, then, is the work which Christ came to accomplish; " to put away sin," in all its pollution and all its consequences, to meet its penalty and to remove its guilt, to fit those who were its victims for the holiness of God's presence, and to reign in life with Him. This is what He came to accomplish. He came " to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." This is the work He accomplished by His sacrifice, and in the power of which believers are now set.
As to the world, this is its position, " It is appointed unto men once to die, and after this the judgment." This is God's original appointment for man as.. a sinner. Nothing in His dealings has ever reversed this. The law did not change it, and the gospel does not modify it. Christ's death has not altered the doom of man. Nothing in the overtures of the gospel, nor in the doctrines of Christianity, touch for an instant this doom of man. The grace of the gospel opens to him indeed a city of refuge, to which he may betake himself from the pursuit of the avenger of blood and be safe. But apart from this, it leaves him to his doom. Whoever meets death without faith in the sacrifice of Christ, meets it as the judgment of God for sin; and whoever thus passes the portals of the grave is held a prisoner by death until claimed by judgment. The course of ages has not altered this. Man's achievements have not set aside this. Pride, luxury, the intense love of life, philosophy, science, development, carelessness of the future, forgetfulness of death, have not in a single instance set aside this, the common doom of man, this appointment for man at the hands of God.
But as to the Christian. What triumph is there in the statement, " As it is appointed unto men once to die and after this the judgment; so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and to them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation." Christ's death, with all its efficacy stands over against the claim death had against me. The very death of Christ is my deliverance from the claim of death. I own as a sinner my part in the common doom of man. I own I had no power to deliver myself from this doom. But it is exactly here that Christ's death meets my case. " When we were yet without strength in due time Christ died for the ungodly." It is no question whether Christ conquered death. For " in that he died he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth be liveth unto God." But then He did not conquer death for Himself. Death had no claim against Him. Death, as we have seen, is the penalty of sin. But in Him there was no sin. He took the penalty for others; and now His death stands to their account by faith. It is their deliverance. And as to judgment, His coming again is to deliver those who look for Him out of it. If we speak of " the day of judgment," and day of judgment there surely is, we are told, in another epistle, that, " Herein is love with us [God's love] made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as he is so are we in this world." Nothing can go beyond this in assuring the soul; nothing can equal it as a display of the perfect grace in which we are set in Christ. Death and judgment, the bitter results of sin which nothing in man can meet, are here utterly changed for the believer. Death is exchanged for life in Him, who conquered death, and the day of judgment is the day of boldness and triumph on account of our connection with Him to whom the solemn awards of that day belong. The saints' boldness in the day of judgment is based on their association with Him who will then appear as judge. " As he is [the Judge of quick and dead] so are we in this world!" Such are the wondrous consequences deducible by the Spirit from our union with the Lord Jesus Christ! Such the life and victory wrought by the death and sufferings of the Son of God!
But in the passage before us the position of the believer is not pursued up to the point of personal union with the Lord; it is the efficacy of Christ's accomplished work before God for us, seen in His first and second coming, and in contrast with God's appointment of death and judgment to men as sinners. That which was accomplished by Christ's first coming was the bearing of our sins, which had brought on us the doom of death: " He was once offered to bear the sins of many." " Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree." That which will be accomplished by His second coming for believers, who are " those that look for him," will be their gathering to Himself apart from all the judgment which His coming will then bring upon the world. He will come not about our sin then. This was what brought Him in His first coming. But when He conies again it wilt be entirely apart from the question of sin 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 often have 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. And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall be appear the second time without sin unto salvation."