Hebrews 4

Division 3. (Hebrews 4:14-16; Hebrews 5:1-14; Hebrews 6:1-20; Hebrews 7:1-28; Hebrews 8:1-13; Hebrews 9:1-28; Hebrews 10:1-39.)Christ as Priest in the heavenly sanctuary, the way into which He has opened by His accomplished work, in contrast with both the priests and sacrifices of the law. The third division of the book is at once the largest and most characteristic of it. In it we have Christ in the heavens, and the sanctuary open for us there by His priestly work. This, however, is really reached only in the third subdivision; and we have as introduction to it, first, the Priest Himself, as called, qualified, and perfected by sufferings; and then, in His resurrection-place, Priest after the order of Melchisedec, and so upon the throne. The second more briefly speaks of the better covenant and more excellent ministry that this implies. The third, and last, occupies the two chapters following. Subdivision 1. (Hebrews 4:14-16; Hebrews 5:1-14; Hebrews 6:1-20; Hebrews 7:1-28.)The Priest upon the Throne. We have first, then, the Priest Himself, in three chapters, of which more than one, however, is an interruption to the argument, made necessary by the slowness of heart accept the setting aside of the Levitical priesthood, and all that is involved in this. No doubt the apostle uses this parenthesis, (which is quite after the Pauline manner,) to speak of other things very necessary to his theme but we are made to feel the intensity of Jewish opposition, and the difficulty which the legal spirit opposes to the truth, even in the believer, by the difficulty of speaking out here what is in his mind, vital as it is to Christianity itself. It would seem probable that Peter speaks of this (at least, especially) when, praising the wisdom of, the epistle to the Hebrews, as what “our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you,” he yet says that in it are “some things hard to be understood.” Paul, as we see here, fully agrees with him; and therefore the earnestness and energy of his language.

Hebrews 4:14-5

Section 1. (Hebrews 4:14-16; Hebrews 5:1-10.)The Priest called of God. The first section then identifies for us the true Priest before God; and there are again three subsections here, the first of which introduces us to two fundamental conceptions in that which follows: a “Great High Priest who has passed through the heavens,” and the “throne of grace.” We may take the latter as characterizing the first subsection. A “throne of grace” is now to Christians, happily, a very familiar thought. It is only here, however, that we have precisely this expression, although we have the thought in Romans; “Grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life.” The blood upon the mercy-seat before God, to which the apostle also refers in the third chapter of Romans, -“A propitiation through faith by His blood,” -put there by the high priest once a year, when, on the Day of Atonement, he entered the holiest, -was the typical rendering of such a thought so far as in the old dispensation it could be rendered. The mercy-seat was the throne of Jehovah in Israel, where He dwelt between the cherubim. Literally, it was the “kapporeth,” or “propitiatory,” the blood being that which made propitiation for the soul, -the witness of divine righteousness, which, now being met by the blood of atonement, vindicated God’s grace in abiding among the people in spite of their sins. All this was typical merely, a shadow, and nothing more. Israel could not really approach, as we know, to this throne of God, and the high priest only once a year, covered with a cloud of incense, and with the blood of atonement. For us the true sacrifice has been effected. The High Priest has passed through the heavens, the antitype to those holy places, and the throne of God is abidingly a throne of grace, to which, therefore, we are but giving honor when we come boldly to it for our need. This really implies for us the veil rent: for the throne of grace is in the holiest of all, and the rending of the veil is what has made for us a “new and living way” of approach there. The verses before us are, therefore, a real introduction to that which follows.

It is the sympathy of the High Priest which we are here encouraged to reckon upon, and this is in connection with His being over the house of God. Thus we see how we are following on in one line of truth all through here. It reminds us of the words of the Lord in teaching us the consequences of His departure out of the world unto the Father: “If ye shall ask anything in My name, I will do it” (John 14:14). How great an encouragement to know that upon the throne of God there is One who can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, and was “in all things tempted like as we are, sin apart”! Sin was to Him no temptation. There was nothing within that answered to it, except in suffering. There was and could be with Him no sinful infirmity; but He was true man, His divine nature taking nothing from the truth of His manhood, living a dependent life as we do, but with no callousness such as the flesh in us produces in a world everywhere racked with suffering from sin and out of joint, the trial of which He knew as no other could. In the garden He faced the awful cup with an agony that required angelic ministry to strengthen Him physically (in no other way) to sustain it. What a world it was for the Son of God to pass through!

Has He forgotten it, or is He altered by being now out of it, and on the throne? No, but the very throne is characterized now as the “throne of the Lamb;” and for eternity will be the “throne of God and of the Lamb.” How well furnished for us, then, is the throne of grace! But we may notice that the apostle here speaks of nothing but “mercy and grace to help in time of need.” Direct reference to any positive failure on our part is here omitted; and this is in the style of Hebrews, in which we find the believer, spite of all his weakness, as “perfected in perpetuity” by the precious blood which has been shed for him. This blood is here upon the mercy-seat, but the thought is therefore of nothing but the weakness which needs help. All sin has been already met. This is only one side, it is true, of a subject such as this; and we shall find another when we turn to the first epistle of John. John gives us the subject of communion, and speaks of our relation to the Father. Paul here speaks of our relation to God as God. The mention of the Father at once assures us of a nearer relationship in which we stand to Him, and which cannot be broken. Sin, indeed, is only aggravated in its character by this very relationship, and communion is necessarily affected by the believer’s sin. Here, therefore, we have Christ in another character, as “an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous,” while, indeed, we are still reminded that He is the propitiation for our sins.

But in Hebrews, as already said, we are seen as creatures before God, and here sin is not contemplated, just because it has been fully provided for. We come to “obtain mercy and find grace for seasonable help.” It is weakness that needs the Priest now. With regard to sin, the precious blood already shed has done all that can be done. The blood is upon the throne; and to that throne, whenever we turn to God, (if indeed, of course, there is true turning to Him,) we shall find an open door and a ready access. 2. The second subsection is a statement simply as to the high priest in Israel. It is important to keep it distinct as that. How far it applies to Christ we find as we go on, but in every type there is an element of dissimilarity, as there is of resemblance; and that because it is a type. How could there have been in Israel a high priest who never offered for himself? It would have falsified everything.

And so with the veil; how could it have been rent under the legal system? But these exceptional contrasts have a purpose, therefore, and do not in the least hinder a careful, spiritual mind from finding Christianity in Leviticus. Of course it needs that we should have learned Christianity first from the New Testament. We should not go to Leviticus as a Jew would, and expect to find the unveiling of the truth of Christ. Moses has always a veil over the glory in his face; but it is there, we have not to put it there, and the veil for us is done away in Christ. The high priest spoken of here is one taken from among men simply, from the common class of men. Such an expression could not be used of Christ, as ought to be clear. What follows makes it abundantly so. He is “appointed for men in things relating to God, that he might offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins.” The sacrifices are thus his ordinary and necessary work, as we see; but we have not come to the application yet; and he is “able to exercise forbearance towards the ignorant and erring, since he himself also is clothed with infirmity.” Here is an infirmity which is not sinless, (as any infirmity that Christ knew necessarily was,) and this is definitely seen in what follows. He is obliged, as for the people, so also for himself, to offer for sins (which Christ never did). “And no one taketh this honor to himself but as called of God, even as Aaron was.” 3. The third subsection gives us the fulfilment of the type in Christ, and here we have three parts: first, His calling, in which we find, also, the foundation of His priesthood; then His sufferings, even to death, and His deliverance out of it; and lastly, having been perfected, His greeting by God in resurrection as the royal Priest, Melchisedec. (1) First, we have the call. The priest must be called of God; as was Aaron, so Christ. As moving only in obedience, He who had come simply to do the will of God in an already marked-out way, glorified not Himself to be made a High Priest, but received His call distinctly to that office. God’s recognition of the Son in manhood is quoted as that which was really this. He glorified Him as such who said to Him: “Thou art My Son; today have I begotten Thee.” The same form of citation is used in the seventh chapter, verse twenty-one: “He with an oath, by Him that said unto Him, The Lord sware and will not repent, Thou art a Priest forever.” The quotation, in the first place, is from the second psalm, which puts it in connection with His claim as Heir to the sovereignty of the nations. God’s Priest and King are one, and the two offices are founded upon the same personal qualification.

Godhead and manhood united in Him constituted Him the true Mediator between God and men. We have seen Him taking flesh and blood for this purpose, “that He might be the First-born among many brethren;” and as the First-born is the Heir, so also has He the right of redemption. Thus He is Priest and King by the same title. Now, if we look at the Gospels to find the open call for the priesthood, there ought to be really no doubt where it occurs. It is after His baptism by John that the Lord is first openly recognized as the Son of God by the Father’s voice from heaven; and the Spirit of God coming upon Him makes Him to be now in full reality the Christ, that is, the Anointed. It answers to the first anointing of Aaron alone, without blood (Leviticus 8:12). John then recognizes Him as the Son of God, as the sacrificial Lamb (John 1:29-34); for this blessed Priest is one with His offering: “He offered up Himself.” This, then, is our Lord’s call to the priesthood. The apostle confirms the fact by a more direct quotation, the force of which he takes up later: “Thou art a Priest forever after the order of Melchisedec.” (2) Immediately now we are called to see Him in the white linen robe of the Day of Atonement. He is in that suffering in which, though Son of God, He had to learn the reality of the obedience which He had voluntarily undertaken. So intense is it that even He makes “supplication with strong crying and tears to Him that was able to save Him (not from death, which was impossible, but) out of death.” That prayer was heard in resurrection. But notice especially what the answer was based upon. “He was heard for His piety, as in the margin of the common version; or, “for His godly fear,” as in the revised. There is the white linen garment with which alone the sanctuary could be entered. The priest is characterized, first of all, as the one able to draw near to God; and the first question involved, therefore, is, Is he such as can really draw near? Is he personally and entirely fitted to draw near to God? That is the question as to the offering: is it a perfect, unblemished one? That is the question as to the priest. Nothing but the white linen will do here. This is what the burnt-offering most strongly enforces. The offering is flayed and rigidly inspected; then the offerer brings it to God, nothing but sweet savor. It is what Christ is as no other offering (certainly not the sin-offering) develops it. Thus day and night the sweet savor of this must come up to God. Here it is the priest who is spoken of, and it shows us why the garments of glory and beauty are not yet upon him: not because he is not yet the High Priest, but because atonement is in question, while the garments of glory and beauty show the acceptance of the work. Here he is being perfected, and, while personally nothing could perfect Christ, we have already seen that as Originator of salvation there must be perfecting. Thus, then, we see Him here. He is in the awful depths from which no other could have emerged, -where His feet alone could have found standing. There, being perfected by bearing the load that was upon Him, He becomes to those that obey Him the Author of eternal salvation. (3) The being perfected is sometimes spoken of as if it were the same as being consecrated, but it should be plain that here there is a deeper meaning. We have already seen that the Originator of salvation was to be made perfect by sufferings; and we have had plainly the sufferings by which He is so. Then He is saluted of God, not merely a High Priest, but a High Priest after the order of Melchisedec. Ordinarily the distinction is not realized between the simple High Priest and the High Priest after this order. It is the same Person all through, and therefore it seems to be thought that this must necessarily follow; but His glories are displayed in due order, one following the other, and it is only in resurrection that He is saluted by God in this character. Notice that it is not exactly “called,” as before.

He is “saluted.” The Priest has accomplished the fundamental work of His priesthood, and is held and acknowledged as having done so. The linen garments are now exchanged for the garments of glory and beauty. His priesthood now assumes manifestly the Melchisedec character; but we shall have, with the apostle, to break off here and take this up more fully in the seventh chapter.