The
first title of our Lord in this chapter is connected with the first
part of the epistle; the second, viz., the priesthood, refers to what
follows afterwards. In chapter
1
also we have His qualification for being the Apostle; in chapter
2,
His qualification for the priesthood. He was the Divine Messenger for
the testimony He was to bring to earth; and He is gone up on high to
exercise His priesthood on behalf of a needy people down here where He
has been. “God manifest in flesh, justified in the Spirit…received up
in glory,” referring to His having come down and become man. He must be
in the holy place in order to carry on His work as Priest; but He must
be a man. Therefore what He was on earth fitted Him, as it were, for
this work. There is a third character connected with Christ brought out
in this third chapter; Christ set “over His own House.” In this epistle
we do not get the unity of the body at all; we get a Mediator speaking
to God for us, and speaking from God to us: “Let us hold fast the
profession,” etc. If He spoke of the unity of the body, that is
inseparable; there is one Holy Ghost uniting the members to the
Head,—“ye in me, and I in you.” It is not so here. Therefore,
profession is spoken of, and the
possibility
of that being not true profession; yet assuming it might
be sincere, “we are persuaded better things of you,” etc. (Chap.
6)
There might be all these privileges and no fruit, but falling away.
These Hebrews had made a public profession of having embraced Christ,
and received a heavenly calling. In speaking of the body of Christ, we
know it is perfect—no possibility of a false member getting in; but in
a living congregation, I may address them as hoping they are all
saints, but the end proves. No man can tell the end, whether they will
all persevere; but if there is life we know they will.
“Apostle
of our profession,”—it could not be said Apostle of life. We never can
understand this epistle properly, unless we get hold of this truth. In
Ephesians, where the body is more the subject, I do not get such an
expression as this, “that he might sanctify the people with his own
blood.”
The
character of this epistle not being understood is the reason many souls
are tried and exercised by passages they find in it. They are addressed
with the possibility of their not having life, and so not continuing to
the end. The Church supposes a body in heaven. “Heavenly calling” does
not necessarily imply that, because they are called to heaven, they are
part of the body of Christ. The kingdom and the body are different.
“Head over all things to the Church” is wider, too, than the kingdom.
Kingdom implies a king; a body implies a head. The Church is precious
to God. Everything that Christ has, I have; the same life, the same
righteousness, the same glory.
If my hand is hurt, I say it is I who am hurt. Paul was converted by this truth, “Why persecutest thou
me?”
It
shows what grace has done for us—taken us out of ourselves. The body of
Christ shows out the fulness of redemption, and the purpose of God
respecting it. But another aspect of the people of God is down here in
infirmity, but having this heavenly calling. In this condition I need
One in heaven; and there is not an infirmity, a need, a sorrow, an
ache, an anxiety, but it draws out sympathy and help from Christ. This
draws out my affections to Him. But before the priesthood is taken up,
Moses is spoken of as a type:—“Christ Jesus, faithful to him that
appointed him, as also Moses was faithful in all his house.” The house
is the place where God dwells: and there is another thing here—the Head
of the house administering in it.
God
has met His people according to the need in which they were. In Egypt
they need redemption, and He comes to redeem. In the wilderness they
were dwelling in tents, and He would have a tent too. In getting into
the land they wanted One to bring them in, and there is the captain of
the Lord’s host. Then, when they are in the land, He builds His palace,
His temple. There is rest. We are not come to the temple yet—we have
not rest: we get the tabernacle now, and “there remaineth a rest.”
There was a temple existing when these Hebrews were addressed, but that
was not for us.
The temple is a dwelling for God. There never
was
a dwelling-place for God until redemption came in. Scripture never
speaks of man getting back to innocency, or the image of God. God did
not
dwell
with
Adam; though in the cool of the day He came to talk with him. Neither
did He dwell with Abraham. “The earth hath he given to the children of
men”—“the heaven’s are the Lord’s.” But when redemption comes in, God
is forming something for Himself. Thus, in
Exodus 15:13, “habitation” refers to what they had in the wilderness; verse
17 to the rest at the end. (Ex. 29).
There
were visits to Abraham (Abraham will dwell in heaven), but God could
not have a habitation among men until He had made known redemption to
them. The nature and character of God require it. Love is God’s
character: to enjoy God I must be with Him. Holiness is His nature. We
are made sons of God (“the servant abideth not in the house for ever,”
etc.) In the divine nature communicated to us, we are capable of being
at home in that house of God, and redemption gives the title.
The
individual Christian is a temple now; but the temporary provisional
thing is God dwelling with us. The full blessed thing is our dwelling
with God. (John 14) I go not away to be alone there, but to have you there. “I go to prepare a place for you.” In verse
23
the Father and the Son make their abode with us till we are taken to
abide with them. God’s having a house, as a general thought, is the
consequence of redemption. Here in Hebrews it is rather
alluded to as to administration than dwelling. “Habitation of God,” is the present thing; “temple,” is future in
Eph. 2 It is spoken of in a larger and more vague way in Hebrews, because here
it takes in profession. He that built all things is God. In one sense
creation is His house; in another, Christ has passed through the
heavens, as High Priest, into the heaven of heavens, (through the two
vails, as is represented in the type), into the holiest. In a third
sense the body professing Christianity is His house, “whose house are
we,” etc.—the saints. There may be hypocrites amongst them; but they
“are builded together for an habitation of God,” etc. Christ
administers in it, as Son over His own house. Moses was but servant in
the building. There is immense comfort for us in this; first, because
it is perfectly governed; second, when we look at the house, we may see
all sorts of failures coming in; but though all may be failure, the One
who administers in the house cannot fail. Therefore, though all seek
their own, not the things which are Jesus Christ’s, Paul could say,
“Rejoice in the Lord alway,” etc. There is One whom nothing escapes.
Anyone who has a real care for the Church of God, need never distrust.
Paul, in looking at the Galatians, sees so much wrong that he does not
know what to think of them: he changes his voice towards them. Ye that
are under the law, hear the law. But in the next chapter he says, “I
have confidence in you through the Lord.” Christ is over His own house.
Two things follow then. He will turn everything
to
blessing—Paul in prison, etc.; and there is present good too. When all
the joints and bands do not play as they ought, the immediate ministry
of Christ is more experienced. Christ connects everything with His
glory; and faith connects the glory of the Lord with the people of the
Lord. Moses did so. Faith does not only say, the Lord is glorious, and
He will provide the means for His own glory; but it sees the means for
it. Moses said, “Spare the people,” when with God; and when he came
down amongst them, he “cut off the people,” because he was alive to
God’s glory (in the matter of the calf in the camp).
We
have to count upon Christ for the Church, not upon itself. Thus Paul,
when tried by Nero, passes sentence as it were upon himself; (Phil. 1:23–25) he settles it that he shall be acquitted. Why? Because he sees it is
more needful for them—one single Church. It was divine teaching and
faith in exercise which made him to judge thus.
There
is failure on the part of the Church down here as to responsibility,
but Christ has perfect authority in His Church, and He has interest in
it. We have not to make rules for the Church; it is the Master must
govern the house, not the servants. There is one Master, and that is
Christ. He is over the Church, and not the Church over Him. “Whose
house are we, if we hold fast the confidence,” etc. Ah! people say,
don’t you be too confident, because there is an “if”
But, I ask, what have you got? What he presses is, that you should not let it go. Is
that
to be used to hinder my having the confidence? What did they believe?
That Christ was come—a heavenly Saviour to them, and this far better
than an earthly one. Do not give up that. There is a fear of their
giving up
that
confidence, not of their being too confident. What am I to distrust?
Myself? Oh! I cannot distrust myself too much. But is it Christ you
distrust? Will His eye ever grow dim, or His heart grow cold? Will He
leave off interceding? A proof that I am a real stone in the house is
that I hold fast the confidence, etc. Those high priests under the old
dispensation were continually standing; but He has sat down, because
the work is all done. They needed for every sin a new sacrifice: sin
was never put away. They needed a fresh absolution from the priest
every time sin came up. Now, He says, “their sins and their iniquities
will I remember no more.” If you are under law, it is another thing;
you have not got the confidence. If you talk of distrust, what do you
distrust? If you trust in man at all, it is a proof you do not see that
you are lost. If you give up confidence in yourself, and say, I am lost
already, it is another thing. No one that has really come to
redemption, has in the substance of his soul confidence in himself; and
no Christian will say, you ought to distrust Christ. Our privilege is
to have confidence in Christ as a rock under our feet, and to rejoice
in hope of the glory of God. His righteousness has brought Christ into
the glory as a man, and the same righteousness will bring me in.
Does
another person say, I do not know whether I have a portion in it? You
are under the law: God may be ploughing up your soul—exercising it for
good; but you have not been brought to accept the righteousness of God.
The soul in this state has not accepted the righteousness of God for
it, instead of ours for Him. You are still depending on your own heart
for comfort and assurance. It is a very serious thing to get the soul
so empty of everything that it has only to accept what God can give. It
is an awful thing to find oneself in God’s presence, with nothing to
say or to present. You never get love to Christ until you are saved;
and it is the work of God’s Spirit. The prodigal found what he was by
what his father was. Did the prodigal doubt his interest when the
father was on his neck?
The
remainder of this chapter takes up the people of Israel—the professing
people in the wilderness. They did not get into the land, but their
carcases fell in the wilderness. It is speaking of them on the road.
The “to-day” quoted from
Psalm 95
never closes for Israel, till God has taken up the remnant at the end
of His dealings with them, after the Church is gone up to heaven.
Ver.
14
“Partakers” is the same word as that translated “fellows” in chap.
1
You are fellows of Christ if you are of this company.
This place
with
the fellows is yours if you go on to the end. This kind of statement
does not touch the question of the security of the saints. Both
Calvinists and Arminians
might
say, He will reach heaven, if he holds fast to the end. The certainty
of salvation is the certainty of faith, and not that which excludes
dependence upon God for every moment. I have no doubt that God will
keep every one of His saints to the end; but we have to run the race to
obtain eternal glory. Holding fast the faithfulness of God, it is
important, along with this, to keep up the plain sense of passages such
as the present, which act on the conscience as warning by the way.
There is no uncertainty, but there is the working out our own salvation
with fear and trembling. In
1 Cor. 9:27, personal Christianity is distinguished from preaching to others. It is not a question of the
work,
but of the
person
being
ἀδόκμος
, and this means disapproved or reprobate,
i.e.,
not a Christian. (Comp.
2 Cor. 13) In
Rom. 2 eternal life is spoken of as the result of a course which pleases God.
No doubt, His grace gives the power; but it is the result of a
fruit-bearing course. In a word, it is equally true that I have eternal
life, and that I am going on to eternal life. God sees it as one
existence, but we have to separate it in time. Walk that road, and you
will have what is at the end of it. This does not interfere with the
other truth, that God will keep His own, and that none shall pluck them
out of His hand. Our Father says, as it were, That is my child, and I
watch him all the way, and take care to keep him in it.