LET US APPROACH
In the dispensation of the law, the word was “stand afar off”. God was hidden behind a veil, and man was shut out. In this order of things God had no pleasure. It was not the will of God that there should be distance between Him and the creature. Man’s sin had created the distance. God has devised the way to remove the distance consistently with His holiness. Christ charged Himself with this work, “Lo, I come … to do thy will, O God”, Heb 10: 7. This involved offering Himself up as a sacrifice to put away sin. The distance has been removed, and believers have boldness to enter the holiest by the blood of Jesus, or in other words to draw near to God in the abode of His holiness. This should not be considered to be something very advanced, or beyond the reach of any simple believer. It is not the privilege of a select few, it is common to all saints. The epistle to the Hebrews was written to saints who were in a state of spiritual infancy; the apostle exhorts them to leave the beginning of the doctrine of Christ, and go on to perfection, or full growth. He would encourage them to take up their privileges.
The holiest is the immediate presence of God, the place where His glory dwells. It is a spiritual sphere of light, filled with the light of the glory of God, now shining in the face of Jesus Christ. Christ fills that sphere as we sing—
’Tis Jesus fills that holy place
Where glory dwells.
The ark made of shittim wood and overlaid with gold represented Christ as Man according to God, the Man answering to all the thoughts of God, holy human nature clothed with all that is divine in character; the One who is the beginning and centre of God’s universe. Then the golden mercy seat, sprinkled with blood, is Christ, as the One in whom God has established the righteous basis on which His universe will be built up. Then the golden censer, and the cloud of sweet incense which filled the holy place and covered the high priest when he entered, spoke of the sweet fragrance of Christ, which ever fills the presence of God. Christ fills that holy sphere where all must be according to God. Nothing else could be brought in there. The apostle in writing to Gentile believers speaks of it in different terms. He says, “We all, looking on the glory of the Lord, with unveiled face”, 2 Cor 3: 18.
In the first place the apostle would encourage us to enter, by shewing that it is the pleasure of God that we should do so. The sacrifices under the law did not accomplish the pleasure of God, because they did not perfect the conscience of those who would approach; the distance was not removed, so that they could not approach. God’s desire was that man should be able to draw near with liberty, be at home in His holy presence. Therefore that former order of things was removed, and a new order introduced by the coming of the Son, One who knew all that was in the mind of God, and could say, “Lo, I come … to do thy will, O God”. “By which will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all”, Heb 10: 10. Christians are a sanctified company, “Holy brethren”. That is, we have been set apart for God by the death of Christ, from all our former associations and condition in the flesh. We cannot approach unless we can take account of ourselves as “holy brethren” apart from all that we are by nature, apart from all that we find in ourselves experimentally. We were not holy brethren by nature. “He that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one”, Heb 2: 11. As Christians we have derived our being and life from Christ, hence in nature and character we are like Him, “as he is, so are we in this world”, 1 John 4: 17. If we are “as he is”, then we are fit to go where He is. It is in this way we are constituted “holy brethren”.
Then we see how the way has been opened for us, a new and living way. Christ has entered in by His own blood, by the way of death. This is the new and living way, opened to us so that we may follow Him. The time has not yet come for us to follow Him in glorified bodies, into heaven itself; we shall do this when He comes. But we can follow Him in our spirits. In doing so we have to abstract ourselves in mind, for the moment, from our bodily condition and from our earthly circumstances and responsibilities. We enter through the veil. The veil is not said to be rent in this epistle. The veil excludes all that is not suited to God. We cannot carry in anything of man, anything which will not bear the light of the glory of God, nothing but what is of Christ.
If we enter in we must do so by the way He has entered, that is, by the way of death, not our own death, but by the appropriation of His death, as separating us from all that is contrary to God.
“Sprinkled as to our hearts from a wicked conscience, and washed as to our body with pure water”, Heb 10: 22. Nothing but the appropriation of His death could clear our consciences. “How much more shall the blood of Christ … purge your conscience”, Heb 9: 14. “But he, having offered one sacrifice for sins, sat down in perpetuity at the right hand of God”, Heb 10: 12. That is the proof that our sins are for ever put away; He could not carry them to the right hand of God. The Holy Spirit is a witness to us, that is, that Christ is at the right hand of God, and that our sins are remembered no more for ever.
Then we need cleansing as to our persons, our bodies washed with pure water. When Christ died, water came from His pierced side, testifying to the cleansing efficacy of His death. We must pass through death to be cleansed; in other words, we must appropriate His death as that by which all our sinful state has been judged and thus for ever removed from the sight of God, so that we might be free from it in the presence of God. We have the figure of this cleansing by death in the case of Naaman the leper. He had to go down and dip himself in the waters of Jordan seven times. There was no other way of cleansing for him, he must appropriate the waters of Jordan. He went into Jordan a leper, Naaman the leper, but when he came out of Jordan he was clean every whit, there was not a spot of leprosy left upon him, his flesh was like the flesh of a little child, it was a new beginning. It was still Naaman, the same individual, but no longer Naaman the leper. His history as a leper had been closed in Jordan. If we have part in the death of Christ, if we have died with Him, the old state has been judged and brought to an end, so that we might live in the life of the One who is risen out of death. In that life I am clean every whit, free from all that attached to me in the life of sin. My history in connection with sin has been for ever closed in the death of Christ, I have begun a new history in connection with Christ. I am the same individual, but in a new life, the life of the One who knew no sin. Thus we are cleansed through death. This gives us fitness to enter the holiest. We enter in by the way, and in the life of the great priest who has already entered in.
All this has been made true for every believer. It is God’s will that every one should know this privilege, but how few of the children of God really enjoy this liberty of access with boldness. Many have never had the truth brought before them. Others have missed it through lack of exercise and desire.
We need first to be established in the spirit of the new covenant, and come under divine teaching. The apostle had already alluded to this in chapters 8 and 9. That is, we must first learn what God is to us, as revealed in the death of Christ, God known in mercy and love. Then we go on to learn what His will is, and this encourages us to take up our privilege, and approach with boldness.
We must remember that however well we may understand our privilege, it is only in the power of the Holy Spirit that we can take it up. We have “access by one Spirit”, Eph 2: 18. Hence there must be the maintenance of a state agreeable to the Holy Spirit. The daily washing must be kept up, “Pursue peace with all, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord”. Every time the priests went in to minister in the sanctuary, they washed their hands and feet at the brazen laver, that they died not. We need to be continually exercised as to our conduct, and as to our associations. The lack of this may explain our want of liberty at times in drawing near. Worldly associations are a great hindrance with many. “Wherefore come out from the midst of them, and be separated, saith the Lord, and touch not what is unclean”, 2 Cor 6: 17. We must not touch holy things with unclean hands, nor walk in the sanctuary with denied feet. “Our God is a consuming fire”, Heb 12: 29.
December 1923
From The Believer’s Friend vol 16 (1924)