CHAPTERS 3, 4 AND 5
CHAPTERS 3, 4 AND 5
We get the establishment of the professing system — what is called God’s house down here. Moses inaugurated the system in connection with God’s habitation in the wilderness — so Christ is Son now over God’s house, and He is also the builder. This is the house where the Spirit dwells, and hence you get a remarkable verse following: “As says the Holy Spirit”. He has a warning voice inside the house. The Holy Spirit spoke in the Psalm — now, it is the Holy Spirit in the house, and He warns us not to apostatise. The house was not formed till the Holy Spirit came; it could not be God’s house till God dwelt there. Verse 7 is in principle very like to Revelation 2, “He that hath [p. 417] an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches”.
When you get the house brought in, there are three thoughts connected with it, (1) the Lord, (2) the habitation of God, (3) fellowship.
We have come here to the living voice of God in God’s house, and we have to give heed to the warning. The word of God is really God Himself, the connection is so close. The word of God as often used in the Scriptures is not simply an utterance. ‘Logos’ is moral, and brings you into the presence of God, as He has expressed Himself, and if you turn away from it you turn away from God.
The Old Testament belongs to Israel properly, but the moment you come to the house of God you get “says the Holy Spirit” — that is the living voice, and He uses the Scriptures (see 2 Timothy 3: 16). The warning is against departure. The tabernacle really was a pattern of the universe as God’s house. “Whose house are we, if we hold fast”, is a warning against apostasy. The saints are not addressed here as ‘living stones’ — they are addressed on the ground of profession; and in coming to God’s house they had come to a living God, and the danger was of turning away — this they are warned against. “Whose house are we, if” it is contingent. If we are God’s house, Scripture speaks to us, because we stand in relation to God on the ground of profession. We are come into the circle to whom God by the Holy Spirit speaks.
The apostle is leader, the one who established the profession — so the apostle Paul was a master builder, he was used to found the church at Corinth — Christ is Son over God’s house. He is Lord, has authority; He is over God’s house; the contrast here is with Moses, not with Aaron. Moses was a ministering servant in — Christ is Son over — the thought is God’s house, I judge, all through. Christ’s title to be Son over God’s house is that He made all things (verse 3).
[p. 418] His title will be made good in the universe by and by. He will be supreme over all; now He is supreme in God’s house. If we have a case of discipline we act in the name of the Lord. Moses had the place of a ministering servant, but Christ has a very different place, for He made all things, He is Son over God’s house. There are two cardinal points connected with Christianity; one is, that Christ is Lord, and the other that the Holy Spirit is here. They are correlative. The Holy Spirit here is the proof of the place Christ is in. He has been sent down from heaven to report the glory of the Lord. Christ is Son over God’s house as Man, but his real title to it is that He is divine. The proof that Christ is divine is the place He has as Man, to be such a Man He must be divine.
Another principle comes out in verse 13, that of looking after one another, “exhort one another”. There is danger of a lack of care for one another amongst us; we need to go on ourselves, but we are to care for one another, too. We have to take heed to ourselves first, and then we become concerned for one another. It is exhort one another daily. It ought to be a great grief to us to see marks of defection in another. The beginning of departure is perhaps very small, only a little bit of a chill. “Am I my brother’s keeper?” is a principle totally foreign to Christianity. We are our brother’s keeper, but we are to keep ourselves first, otherwise we are not fit to keep anybody else.
“Departing from the living God” — the light becomes dim. The revelation itself does not become dim, but it may become dim in my soul. Something is allowed that is not judged. Every professing Christian is in the light of the revelation made, but the real point is that it should be light in his soul. If it is so, it brings him into the presence of the living God.
The Son of the living God in Matthew 16 refers to what Christ was as outside the whole scene of death.
[p. 419] It was His generation, so to speak. He was of that order — Son of the living God. “Living God” is in contrast to the state of Judaism; all was dead because they had rejected Christ. It was as dead as heathendom, but in the house of God saints had come to a living God, and the danger was of departing from Him.
I wonder how far we are really as to our spirits in the light of the revelation. Revelation is a proof of His being a living God. He is living whether He reveals Himself or not, but in revealing Himself He comes out to prove to us that He is living. How far are we in our souls in the light of the living God? As the apostle could say, “We both labour and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God”, etc. When Christ was here there was more to come, but when the Holy Spirit came there was nothing more to come; there never was and never will be such a moment on earth as is now. In the millennium there may be the same light, but certainly not the same entrance into it, and the reason is that now we have an indwelling Spirit. The baptism of the Holy Spirit involved everything in Christianity — the love of God shed abroad, the Spirit of sonship, the house constituted, the body formed.
Verse 14 — We get another thing; we are companions of Christ. It is our place of privilege, ‘Thy fellows’, as we get in chapter 1. We are all partakers of the same Spirit, one Spirit of sonship. “Companions of the Christ” is our privilege. I appropriate Christ as High Priest, but that is not the thought here. It is companions of Christ if “we hold ... firm”. It is all contingent so long as we are down here on earth; it is the same in Colossians 1, “reconciled ... if ye continue”. So long as we are here in the place of responsibility we get tested, so we get “if we hold ... firm”. Companions of Christ is present privilege, yet we are tested. It is companions of a heavenly Christ, too. The ‘if’ proves that you are tested. You are in [p. 420] the light of counsel but on the ground of responsibility. The very best thing that can happen to a Christian is to be tested, for it will confirm him; when there is not a real work people turn away. We have to accept the fact that we are tested here, Circumstances test us, many things test us, but if you answer to the testing you are confirmed, you have a better knowledge of good and evil. The real point in the epistle is association with Christ. He is the Firstborn among many brethren; we become companions.
Sin in Hebrews is not the common gross forms of evil, but lawlessness, an unbridled will, and the effect of it is to draw you away from the living God. Verse 14 — we have to go on with the confidence with which we began. People begin with confidence, but often instead of becoming strengthened it is weakened.
A large proportion of persons converted are converted through those lately converted themselves, and that because the latter have confidence. The greatest gift is that of an evangelist; there could be nothing greater than to announce God’s glad tidings to man. It would be no honour to an evangelist to become a teacher. This is not underrating the other gifts. There should be no flagging of energy with us. The character of a man’s service may change, he may sober down, but in the case of the apostle Paul he had as much energy when he wrote in 2 Timothy as at the beginning of his course; there was as much go in him as ever, he had not abated a bit. When people are first brought into fellowship the truth has great interest, all is new. This freshness may fall off, but if the work of God goes on the reality of the truth is deepened, though perhaps there may not be the same excitement about it. The young men have overcome the wicked one, the word of God abides in them. They are told not to love the world nor the things of the world. It is a perfectly healthy state; but what marks the fathers is that they have known Him that is from the beginning. There [p. 421] is not the same danger as to the world with them; they apprehend a completely new point of departure in Christ, and all else is nothing.
The Priest is the first who gets in, and he is appointed to help the others on the road. Christ is the leader of salvation, the first who has entered in, and He is constituted to help us on the road. Christ is Great Priest over God’s house (chapter 10), that is, He orders the house according and suitably to God; high priest is rather a different idea.
While we are in the wilderness we need help and support, still we can be out of the wilderness in a sense, for we have privileges that carry us out, although as to the fact we are there.
Chapters 1 - 6 are introductory. The truth of the new system begins in chapter 7, where you get the new Priest; chapter 8, the new covenant; chapter 9, the new sanctuary; chapter 10, the new worshippers. “Boldness to enter into the holiest”, as I understand it, is that our souls enter into the light of God in that in which God has revealed Himself. The idea in Hebrews is not that of a son, a child of God, but we get sons, children. We have to individualise the truth in coming into it, but the spirit of Scripture as to Christian privilege is not individual. God brings many sons to glory, Christ is Firstborn among many brethren.
We have had the warning of Israel set before us, an example of those who failed of the purpose of God. They failed in faith; they had been delivered from bondage and called out, but failed of God’s purpose. They fell in the wilderness, they never came into the full purpose of God. The purpose of God for them was Canaan; they never entered into it. The secret of it was that the word did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it. I suppose that was the word of His purpose, the glad tidings preached to them. It is a real danger with which we are beset, namely, an evil heart of unbelief in departing [p. 422] from the living God, turning back in heart to Egypt.
The rest of God was rest in reference to creation. It is an allusion to that, as we see in verse 4, “and God did rest the seventh day from all his works”. The rest of God will, I suppose, be realised in the millennium. The divine thought as to Israel was to enter into God’s rest, but even Joshua and Caleb, who entered Canaan, did not enter into God’s rest, so the rest remaineth. “He that is entered into his rest” — that is one who is an enterer — ‘hath ceased from his own works’. This shows that we are not yet entered. The thought in the chapter is God’s rest; that is not rest of the believer’s conscience. The argument is that Israel did not enter, therefore a sabbatism remains. We have not entered into rest yet, otherwise we should not be working; when we have entered in we shall have ceased from our works as God did from His. You are to labour to enter, go on with your works till you enter into God’s rest in actuality. It is God’s rest that is spoken of all through the chapter, God’s rest will take in both the heavens and the earth. It has not simply to do with an earthly people. “Come unto me ... and I will give you rest”, that is, to your souls in all the turmoil of this world. When the heavens and the earth were finished, God rested. His rest was broken in upon by sin, so we get, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work”. The rest of God takes place in the complete subjugation of evil. Then it is that God rests; when all is put under Christ it will be so. Christ is really God’s rest.
The rest of God refers to this creation. The thought is not connected, as far as I see, with the new creation. The seventh day is the sabbath, and the Son of man is Lord of the sabbath. The thought of the sabbath is at the end, it was the rest after six days’ labour, the seventh day. It was given as a sign of the covenant with Israel. When the Lord was here, every reference made to the sabbath was, to the legal man,
[p. 423] a slight upon it, indicating that the covenant was on the point of being broken.
Verse 7 — “saying in David, ‘Today’.” This occurs in the fourth book of Psalms, which presents the coming of the Lord, as the third book brings in the sure mercies of David. There is then a prophetic appeal to Israel in that day, but the Spirit of God takes it up here and applies it to Hebrew Christians in this day, for we may be in danger of not entering into God’s rest. There are millions today professing to be Christians, but profession will not bring you to the rest of God. An evil heart of unbelief turns away. We have to look to it that the heart is exercised in faith, not simply that we believe that the Scripture is the word of God, but that faith is operative and an active principle in us, bringing the light of God into the soul. It is an old saying, ‘a man is governed by what he believes’. If we are in faith we are governed by the things that are revealed.
The argument here is that though Israel had entered into the land, they did not enter into the rest. God had sworn in the wilderness that they should not enter into the rest, and Caleb and Joshua had to share the common judgment of the people. Verse 1 is a warning to those who are in the Christian profession; “lest... any of you”. The Hebrews are addressed as in the place of profession, and the fear was lest they should depart. The whole point of the chapter is a warning against Christians failing to enter into the purpose of God. The danger is of failure in faith to grasp the purpose in the present. We may come into it in result by and by, but that is another matter. The leading saints on to the ground of purpose is the great object of the epistle. When you begin to see that your responsibility has been completely met in Christ, then the purpose of God is presented to you, and this is what tests people, so that we get such chapters as chapter 6. The apostle separates himself from those who would turn back; “we are not of them who draw back”. Constantly, too, he associates himself with those whom he was addressing; “Let us therefore fear”. The point that tested was, were they prepared to accept the purpose of God about them, for if they did they would have to leave man’s ground.
I believe there is a moment in our histories when we are thus tested; then people either go forward or backward, you must be going in one or other direction. God-ward or man-ward; that is, either going in the direction of God’s purpose, or turning back to man. If people do not go on when they get the light of purpose presented to them, they are the most exposed to the enemy; like the two-and-a-half tribes, they would stop short of death. If you accept death with Christ, you will enter on your new place with God; death is the only way by which we can enter on a new position before God while we are down here.
The Lord’s miracles on the sabbath were all miracles of mercy. When the ruler of the synagogue said to the people, “there are six days in which men ought to work: in them therefore come and be healed, and not on the sabbath day”, he never meant that for the people, but for Christ; it was a stab at Him. It is like man! See the hypocrisy of it; the sabbath was an institution for the Jew, but is God going to be bound by an institution? It was the sign of the covenant, and the man who gathered sticks on that day had, under the law of Moses, to be stoned. But the Jews sought to bind Christ by it. The ruler says “there are six days in which men ought to work”. Who work? Was Jehovah to be bound? The Lord speaks in a most scathing way — “thou hypocrite!” It was all hypocrisy.
Going back to the chapter, glad tidings were presented to Israel — the tidings of the land, the report of the spies. The people were guilty by reason of the land being searched and the report brought to them [p. 425] which they disbelieved. In Hebrews 11 the only act of faith recorded of Israel is “they passed through the Red sea”. Moses kept the passover; “through faith he kept the passover”, etc., the faith is not attributed to the people. It is significant that the people had not faith in that which was the basis of everything. The people did it in obedience, but Moses was in the faith of it.
It is very solemn as to the rest of God, that we are not going to enter into it as an earthly people. We have forfeited it, and if we are to enter into God’s rest, it must be in a heavenly position, and this latter we can only have by sovereign grace; and this brings us to the purpose of God concerning us, which is the test of faith. The sovereign purpose of God is to give us the place of sons. If we are to accept the purpose, it must be through death, by the new and living way which He has consecrated for us through the veil, that is to say, His flesh. We must get into it by death. We do not like to accept death to the status and natural prospects of a man down here, to be strangers and pilgrims here, but we can do it as entering into the blessed light of the purpose that we are predestinated to the adoption of sons to Himself. There are two aspects of the death of Christ — first, it closes the door to all here, because Christ died to all here; secondly, it opens the door to all with God. Faith then enters into how completely all is secured for God in Christ, and in that way we who have believed do enter into rest as a present thing.
At the close of the chapter we get two great means which God employs in regard of us. The word of God and the priesthood. It is very important to see that here the word of God is God Himself (verses 12, 13). It explains the passage “the Word was God”. I only quote this to show how intimate the connection is between God and His word. God would be of no avail to us in grace unless He had expressed Himself,
[p. 426] that is, revealed Himself; thus He becomes available to us. At the same time the revelation of God must search us. The word thus finds out what we are about, our most secret emotions are discovered by the light of God, and thus we are led to distinguish between good and evil as in Psalm 139, “Search me, O God”. So here it is we are searched, and it is the revelation of God that searches us. We do not get the help of the priesthood until the word of God has come in to cut down all contrariety. The heart of the Christian rebels sometimes in contrary circumstances. The light of God comes in, and we see that we have reasoned falsely. “I was as a beast before thee”, that is, an unintelligent, unreasoning creature. Like Job and his friends, our reasoning is all wrong. How falsely we judge God when the will is at work! We get sometimes a boiling cauldron in the human heart fretting against God. So long as this is at work — will — we get no good of the priesthood. The word of God exposes all this, it is all false; this exposure of necessity must come in. It is God, but God expressed, and God expressed is the word. It is a word (i.e., the word) the force of which it is difficult to render in English. It is not simply an utterance. We are brought to our bearings by the word of God.
Now we have a great High Priest; we get living bread, One whom we appropriate. We see in this the link with John 6. The High Priest is Christ on our side — that is, we appropriate Him. I appropriate when I see Him as a man. As Forerunner or High Priest He is on my side. It is the appropriation of what grace has put within my reach.
He has passed through the heavens; representatively gone in for us.
It is noticeable how the teaching of this part is built up on two passages of Scripture: one taken from Psalm 2, the other from Psalm 110, two texts which, from what comes out in the gospels, the Jews evidently never understood. “Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee”, and “Thou art priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec”. The first sets aside all fleshly and carnal ideas connected with Messiah, the second sets aside the Aaronic priesthood. He was after the order of Melchisedec.
The Jews looked for Messiah as Son of David, as begotten after the flesh; but in Psalm 2 God claims that He has begotten Him, that He is of His generation.
In Psalm 2 ‘Son of God’ is Christ in incarnation; in Psalm 110 it is Christ in glory. The Psalm begins with “Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool”. The first looks at Him personally; the second, more at what He is officially.
As to the Melchisedec order, the point was that there were in it none of the limitations that belong to the Aaronic order of priesthood. The latter could not minister before or after a certain age, but Christ had neither beginning of days nor end of life, that is as priest, “who has been constituted ... according to power of indissoluble life”.
You do not get the ‘High Priest’ exactly after chapter 7. What you come to after that is “a minister of the sanctuary”, which is proper priestly office in the sanctuary. The priesthood of Christ is based on the establishment of righteousness.
Chapter 4: 14 takes up the thread from chapter 3: 6, “seeing then”. The voice of the Spirit’s warning has been introduced parenthetically between. It takes up again the thought of the High Priest. We get apostle and High Priest of our profession in chapter 3. He had spoken of the apostle, and we are now carried on to the Priest. The priesthood of Christ is based on the fact that sins have been put away by His offering. Still, we are actually down here in circumstances where we need grace and mercy. If we find ourselves in circumstances to which we are not equal,
[p. 428] what we want is mercy. We are to come boldly to the throne of grace because we have a High Priest. The Christian is considered in regard to weakness, so we get mercy. It would be depressing if we did not feel we could count on the mercy.
We are considered with regard to circumstances which might overwhelm us, and thus we are encouraged to come to the throne of grace. The question of sin is not in the line of this part of Hebrews. Priesthood is not in regard to sins; the point is, your being fitted to enter into your calling, which is of God’s purpose. “Great priest” gives the character — ‘great’. Aaron was high priest, but not great priest. Great Priest (chapter 10) is more that He is Son over God’s house charged with the order of the house. The High Priest is the Son of God. He has passed through the heavens, which is a pretty good proof that He came from the heavens. “No man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven”, John 3. The point of it is “let us hold fast our profession”; that is the confession of what we are. It is not the idea of Christian profession, but the confession of what we are as in the calling of God; many sons being brought to glory. We may be good Christians down here, but that is hardly holding fast our confession — it does not go far enough. It is that we have a calling of God in another scene. Christ Himself is at the full height of it. The calling is revealed in the High Priest. He describes the calling. “Having therefore a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast the confession”. He is the first of the company who had entered in — the Forerunner, and then He is constituted High Priest, so that we may be helped and not surrender our confession; the object of the High Priest is that we should not give it up. If persecution came in we might be tempted to surrender.
Now we touch again on what is called ‘appropriation’.
[p. 429] When you come to the High Priest, you come to that which in John 6 is called ‘eating’. When I see Christ on our side, I appropriate Him. I am entitled to all the help He can give me; “he that eateth me, even he shall live by me”. In John 5 He is on the divine side to declare the Father. Chapter 6, He is on my side, and I appropriate Him. The great point (John 6) is that He is on our side; speaking reverently, that He is within the reach of our appropriation. So, too, in Hebrews where we get “high priest” we can appropriate Him. In John 6 Christ will not be king, but He goes up as priest. Feeding on living bread is what forms you constitutionally, that is what appropriating the High Priest is; you will arrive at the same result. John 6 is connected with life. In Hebrews it is to enter into the holiest. John takes the reverse line to Paul. With John it is God coming down; with Paul it is man going up. We want both in order to get a full view of the truth; they all tend to give one blaze of light.
Christ is constituted High Priest for us, therefore I can be urgent to get all the help I need. He has taken up a place in the glory as man where He is the Firstborn among many brethren. Romans 6 is akin to this, “in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord”. He lives to God on ground on which we can live to God; to be dead to sin is the only possible ground on which we can be alive to God, for we were alive in sin. Christ has taken the place of death to sin, so that we may reckon ourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Him.
Verse 15 we get another thought, that the High Priest is sympathetic. It is not compassionate, it is not that He can feel for us, but that He feels with us. Sympathy is not help, but it becomes encouragement [p. 430] to us. The effect of sympathy is that you go to the throne of grace. The thought of the High Priest being sympathetic is very distinct here (verse 15). Christ is out of the pressure — and therefore He can sympathise with us in it. Sympathy means that you feel together with a person; you could not have His sympathy if He had not been tempted. A high priest taken from among men can have compassion.
The point in the “throne of grace” is, the sense that grace is on the throne. It is the supremacy of grace that is the idea: grace is administered through the Lord Jesus Christ; “come boldly” has to do with the apprehension that grace is in the ascendant. People often come to God almost complaining. Take Job as a case in point. He really thought he had a good case against God. We come to a throne of grace and the point is that in coming I should have the sense that grace reigns. If we come to God with a sense that His grace is supreme, then we shall get what we want — mercy and grace. God is the source of everything, but we get all through the Lord Jesus Christ, it reaches us through Him. To us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things. We have to distinguish between divine Persons: sometimes there is a tendency to separate them too much. We cannot come to the High Priest without coming to God, for He is the revelation of God to us; I know nothing of what God is to me except through the Lord.
In the beginning of chapter 5 we get a contrast, a picture of a high priest taken from among men. The one point of similarity is in verse 4. He does not take the honour to Himself. We do not want a self-constituted priest. If we go to God we want One divinely constituted. This shows the great reality of Christ having become man. He did not glorify Himself to be made High Priest.
Verse 9. “Eternal salvation” — the question now is not of temporal deliverances.
Chapter 5 is a wonderful bringing out of the great reality of Christ in manhood. He learned obedience by the things which He suffered. He had to take that path as man. “He offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears”. It was not a question of learning to obey, but of learning obedience; there was no will to be broken as with us, but He had been accustomed to command. Now, He learned obedience in taking the subject place: “Being made perfect” is in view of His being Priest We could not think of strong crying and tears in connection with God; the moment we speak of that we exclude for the moment the idea of God. It is what He is as man: it is the Man who is now at the top who represents us who are not there yet. “Unto all them who obey him”; we are subject to Him, He is Lord. The ‘author’ means the “cause” of eternal salvation: He is a Priest called of God, and thus a man although the Son of God. “Priest for ever” is that His priesthood is intransmissible. Succeeding generations are all helped by the same Priest. We forget the same Priest has helped many others through, but the great idea of the Priest is not helping through, but helping in.