20 - Heb_8:6-13

CHAPTER X X. THE BLESSINGS OF THE NEW COVENANT.

Hebrews 8:6-13. THE Lord Jesus Christ, as our High Priest in heaven, is the Mediator of the new covenant or dispensation, which is based upon better promises. New as contrasted with old means in Scripture that which is perfect and abiding. The old vanishes, the new remains. God gives us a new heart that we may love and praise Him forever. If any man is in Christ, he is a new creature. Old things have passed away, all things have become new. "Behold, I make all things new," saith the Lord; I will create new heavens and a new earth; and in the new creation, all is eternal, perfect, possessed of vitality, beauty, and strength, which can never fade. The old covenant was temporary and imperfect. God findeth fault with it; for although the law was holy, just, and good, yet by reason of Israel’s sin neither righteousness nor life could come through it. And as the purposes of divine love could not be attained by the old covenant, so the character of God, as the God of grace, could not be fully revealed therein. Hence the promise of a new covenant, which in itself proves the imperfection and insufficiency of the old; and this new covenant is represented as a contrast, unlike the old; it is new, that is, perfect, everlasting. God is pleased with it because it shows forth the glory of Jehovah as the God of salvation.

Let us remember that this covenant, announced by the prophet Jeremiah, is to be made first with the house of Judah and the house of Israel. It is a spiritual covenant, yet a national one. To Israel pertain the covenants, both of law and of grace. This is taught by Scripture throughout, and most clearly in the chapters in which this precious promise of the Messianic covenant is contained. No one can read this section of the prophetic word^* and entertain the slightest doubt that literal Israel, the seed of Abraham, and their restoration in their own land, form the subject of divine promise. (^*Jer. 30 - 38.) The prophet Jeremiah, called in early youth by God to announce unto his people the impending judgments on account of their ingratitude and impenitence, seems little fitted, by his natural disposition and temperament, to be the bearer of a message so awful and stern. A character eminently sensitive and tender, shrinking from conflict, almost feminine in his delicacy, was chosen by God to testify against the whole land, the kings of Judah, and the princes thereof, and against the priests, and against the people of the land. The Lord chose this gentle and timid child (Jeremiah 1:6) to be as a defensed city and an iron pillar and brazen walls against the whole nation. The prophet’s heart was overwhelmed with grief; his eyes were filled with tears. His soul was distracted; his heart was faint within him, when he would comfort himself against sorrow. The message, that Israel’s sin and iniquity had so abounded that judgment was inevitable, filled him with anguish. How solemn and touching are the supplications which he pours out before God! While he was thus consumed by zeal for Jehovah and sorrowful love for his people, he had to experience constant and cruel opposition, hatred, and scorn. His life was continually in jeopardy. Persecution, ignominy, and reproach were heaped upon him. Driven to the utmost verge of despair, he ex claimed, "I will not make mention of Him, nor speak any more in His name." But the Word was in him as a burning fire shut up in his bones. He was faithful to God; and with a breaking heart testified against the nation and her false prophets. During forty years Jeremiah stood firm, a solitary witness among a rebellious and godless nation of adversaries and persecutors, led astray and fortified in their opposition by false prophets. He endured insult and mockery; he was beaten and imprisoned. And when the armies of Babylon proved the divine character of his mission and the truth of his predictions, the lofty height to which God had raised him did not separate him from his nation, his previous sufferings did not embitter his heart or blunt his sympathy and affection. He sat down on the ground as a mourner, and his lamentations over Jerusalem are to this very day the expression of the grief of desolate and banished Israel. Is he not a type of our Lord? Were the people, who said that Jesus was Jeremiah, not uttering a truth, which was then daily unfolding? For as Jeremiah announced the first destruction, so Jesus, in the days of Pharisees and scribes, predicted the second destruction of Jerusalem. Jesus wept when He beheld the city. And Jesus is greater than Jeremiah. For in the Spirit Jeremiah called Him Lord. Yet were the tears of Jeremiah in the Spirit of the Christ, who said, "If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now are they hid from thine eyes."

It is in the night of adversity that the Lord sends forth bright stars of consoling hope. When the darkest clouds of woe were gathering above Jerusalem, and the prophet himself was in the lowest depths of sorrow, God gave to him the most glorious prophecies of Judah’s great redemption and future blessedness. The advent and reign of Messiah, the Lord our righteousness, the royal dominion and priesthood of Israel’s Redeemer, the gift of the Holy Spirit, the renewal and restoration of God’s chosen people, the days of unbroken prosperity and blessedness - all the golden Messianic future was predicted "in the last days of Jerusalem, when the magnificent fabric of its temple was about to sink into the dust, and its walls and palaces were about to be thrown prostrate on the ground."^*(^*Wordsworth.)

Thus, while Jeremiah announced the judgments of God, he was sustained and comforted by the promises of ultimate restoration and glory. Israel, the chosen nation of God, could not frustrate the purpose of God’s grace by their unfaithfulness. God’s promise unto Abraham rested upon no condition; it rested only on the electing, sovereign, free, and eternal love of God. "The gifts and calling of God are without repentance." Israel’s sin abounds unto judgment, and even (temporary) national death; but Jehovah’s grace abounds unto resurrection-life, unto restoration and everlasting blessing. Jeremiah predicts the national restoration of Judah and Israel. In most emphatic words the Lord declares, that as the ordinances of the sun, and moon, and of the stars shall not depart from before Him, the seed of Israel shall not cease from being a nation before Him. The prophet describes the prosperity of the cities of Judah, once desolate, and the melody and joy of the streets of Jerusalem, once filled with sorrow and lamentation. But this national and external restoration and prosperity are inseparably connected with Israel’s spiritual and inward renewal. It is the new covenant of grace in the Messiah, even King David, which brings life, strength, and joy to the chosen people. As the promise was of grace, to Abraham and to Abraham’s seed, so the fulfillment of the promise is not through the old covenant, of which Moses is mediator, but in the new and eternal Messianic dispensation. In like manner prophesied Ezekiel at the river Chebar among the captives of Babylon. He also beholds Israel restored; dwelling in their own land, in prosperity and gladness; the temple built in a new and glorious manner, and Jerusalem the city of the great king, whence the glory of Jehovah shall never depart again; for she shall be called Jehovah-Shammah (the Lord is there). For Israel restored and glorified is Israel pardoned, cleansed, and renewed. The blessing is both spiritual and national; the heart within and the land without; thus do all prophets testify, and thus the apostle of the Gentiles explains to us in the light of the intermediate church-dispensation the counsel of God. Israel had once the land without the Spirit; Israel now has neither the land nor the spiritual knowledge of God and His love; but the time is coming when Israel shall possess the land, and receive the Holy Ghost from the Lord, whose feet shall stand upon the mount of Olives; in the liberty of the new covenant they shall worship and serve the Lord their God.

Apply this truth to the condition of the Hebrews, whom the apostle was addressing. The law of Moses, the old covenant, was vanishing; but the Messianic promises never were connected with the legal dispensation; they are rooted in the promise to Abraham; they are fulfilled in the covenant of grace. The relation of law to gospel as regards our justification, and also as regards the rule of life and conduct, is a different question, which is fully solved in the Epistles to the Romans and Galatians, and in the Apostolic Council at Jerusalem. The question which troubled the minds and hearts of the Hebrews was their relation to the Levitical priesthood, and to the old dispensation. The temple was still in Jerusalem, and the Levitical ordinances appointed by Moses were still being observed. Although the Sun had risen, the moon had not yet disappeared. It was waning; it was ready to vanish away. Now it became an urgent necessity for the Hebrew Christians to understand that Christ was the true and eternal High Priest in the heavenly sanctuary, and that the new and everlasting covenant with Judah and Israel was connected with the gospel promise, and not with the law. God Himself hath made the first covenant old by promising the new. And now that Christ had entered into the holy of holies by His own blood, the old covenant had passed away; and yet the promises of God to His chosen people remain firm and unchanged. This is the very question which unbelieving Israel has not been able to solve during the last eighteen centuries. The temple of Jerusalem has been destroyed; the Levitical economy has been taken away; Israel has neither high priest, nor sacrifice, nor altar; it is without temple, and it is, strictly speaking, outside covenant. Where is the old covenant? The sanctuary, with its ordinances of divine service, was intimately connected with the old covenant, with the Levitical dispensation. It has vanished. During all these centuries Israel has not been able to account for their strange condition. When Moses was on Mount Sinai, and the people, in their unbelief and impatience, asked Aaron to make unto them gods which should go before them, they added: "For as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we know not what is become of him." In like manner Israel, since the destruction of Jerusalem, cannot understand the dealings of God. They know not what has become of Moses, the old covenant. It is impossible for them to keep its ordinances. And in this darkness they have formed to themselves a religion of their own traditions and reasonings,¹ human and unauthorized substitutes for the divinely-appointed ordinances of the Mosaic dispensation. How clear is the light-shining from the cross of Jesus and from the heavenly sanctuary, where the Mediator of the new covenant is now enthroned. Moses himself and the prophets testified that communion with God in light and peace, that spiritual life and strength could only come by grace, not through the works of the law, not out of man’s unrenewed heart. The history of Israel abundantly showed that the law was not able to fill them with the knowledge and the love of God; for they remained a disobedient and idolatrous people, they understood not God’s character and ways, and continued not in His precepts.² The purpose of electing grace can only be fulfilled in the gift of Jesus and of the Holy Ghost. The new covenant alone is the complete manifestation of God Himself. It alone is everlasting, because it alone is the fulfillment of God’s eternal counsel, according to which divine love and power accomplish the whole work of His people’s salvation. (^*Modern Judaism (both rabbinical and rationalistic) is not able to account for the cessation of sacrifices and the Levitical dispensation. The former acknowledges that in the destruction of the temple and the present condition of Israel without high priest and offerings, divine judgment on the nation’s sin is expressed: the idea of atonement through a vicarious sacrifice is not quite extinct, as appears in the rite of the cock performed on the eve of the day of atonement, though devoid of all Scriptural authority. Rationalistic Judaism has departed still further from the truth. Rejecting the idea of substitution and expiation in connection with sacrifices, it regards the present condition of Israel as a more spiritual development, misinterpreting the protests of David and the prophets against a mere external view of the ceremonial law. (Psalms 40:7;Hosea 6:6;Jeremiah 7:21-23.) The old has indeed vanished; but according to the will of God, because the true light now shineth, because the substance has come in Christ. )

(²In reviewing the history of Israel before the exile, it is most melancholy to notice that the periods of obedience and godliness are comparatively few; they are rather exceptional brief glimpses of light than the normal condition of the chosen people. The forty years in the wilderness, the age under the Judges and the Kings, are on the whole periods of darkness. There was always a remnant according to the election of grace, the seven thousand, who had not bowed the knee unto Baal; but idolatry and heathenish abominations co-existed beside the true worship and the testimony of the prophets. The reign of David and Solomon is a bright exception. The Law of Moses, with its stern denunciation of idolatry, with its loving and generous consideration of the poor and its requirements of liberality and devotedness, was rarely carried out, as is evident from the prophetic expostulations. Since the Babylonian exile Israel has not fallen into idolatry, but into an external and superficial view of the law, into dead formalism and self-righteousness. How true then, in the light of history, is the assertion of the prophet Jeremiah and of the apostle Paul, that Israel has not continued in the first covenant.)

Thus the apostle confirms and comforts his brethren, who were perplexed and tempted by the outward splendour of the temple, and the outward insignificance of the Christian assemblies. Theirs was the worship in spirit and in truth; they had received the better promises of the new covenant. For now they knew the will of God, not in the form of an outward commandment, but in the power of the indwelling Spirit; not engraven on tables of stone, but written on the renewed heart. Now the knowledge of God, a knowledge full of light and certainty, given directly by God Himself, was the privilege of each believer; they were a congregation of prophets and priests, to whom God revealed Himself, and who could draw near to Him in worship; and these unspeakable privileges are based upon the perfect and absolute forgiveness and remission of sin through the precious blood of Christ.

How great is the contrast between the old and the new covenant! In the one God demands of sinful man: "Thou shalt." In the other God promises: "I will." The one is conditional; the other is the manifestation of God’s free grace, and of God’s unlimited power. In the one the promise is neutralized by the disobedience of man; in the other all the promises of God are Yea in Christ, and Amen in Christ. In the new covenant Christ is all; He is the Alpha and Omega; all things are of God, and all things are sure and stedfast. The blessings of the new covenant are all based upon the forgiveness of sin. God promises to put His laws into our minds, and write them in our hearts, and to be to us a God, because He is merciful to our unrighteousness, and will remember our sins and iniquities no more. The forgiveness of sin is not merely the beginning, but it is the foundation, the source; it is, so to say, the mother of all divine blessings. For as long as sin is upon the conscience, and man is not able to draw near unto God, he is separated from the only source of life and blessedness. In the forgiveness of sin God gives Himself, and all things that pertain to life and godliness. Hence David, in enumerating the benefits God hath bestowed on him, commenced with this fundamental one, "Who forgiveth all thine iniquities." Sin is removed, and we are brought nigh to God, and thus enter into the possession of all spiritual blessings. If we look at this most elementary and simple truth, the first which little children are taught,^* we find it contains the germ of all truths. Hence all our progress in the divine life, and all the consolations of the Christian pilgrim, are rooted in this primary doctrine of forgiveness through faith in Jesus. (^*1 John 2:12.) To know God is the sum and substance of all blessings, both in this life and in that which is to come. Now, although the law manifests to a certain extent the holiness and truth, the justice and unchangeableness, the goodness and bounty of God, the law does not reveal God Himself, the depth of His sovereign and eternal love, the purpose which He purposed in Himself before the foundation of the world was laid. When in Christ we receive the forgiveness of sin, we behold God.

Here is also the source and the commencement, the root and strength of our love to God. "We love Him, because He first loved us." We love much, because much is forgiven unto us. We are now a kingdom of priests unto God, because Christ loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood. When the doctrine of forgiveness in its fullness and freeness is scripturally set forth, it requires no supplemental cautions, restrictions, and additions; for it is the central truth from which all doctrines radiate. The new obedience, the spiritual worship,^* the fight and victory of faith, the knowledge and fear and love of God, have their starting-point in the pardon of sin. (^*ComparePsalms 130:4: "With Thee is forgiveness of sin, that Thou mayest be worshipped.") And this is the new covenant blessing. True, the servants of God always knew this blessing. Of the divine righteousness both the law and the prophets testify. David describeth this blessedness. The sacrifices typified, faith looked forward to the great atonement. But now that Christ has come, and that He died once for all, we receive forgiveness in a full and perfect manner: there is no more remembrance of sins; no repetition of sacrifice is needed; no yearly recurrence of the day of atonement; in Christ we have redemption in His blood, even the forgiveness of sins.

How precious is this emphatic declaration, "Their sins and their transgressions will I re member no more." Our sins are removed and buried in the depths of the sea, and this according to divine holiness, justice, and truth. Here is the righteousness of God. "The gospel of Christ is the power of God unto salvation; for therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith."^* Between God and us, there is now no longer sin; Jesus, and Jesus only, fills our view. (^* Romans 1:16-17.)

It is in giving this perfect pardon that God renews the heart, and writes in it His laws. We must needs contrast law and gospel. Yet let us not forget that the law from the very outset showed its temporary and negative character, pointed beyond and away from itself; sighed, as it were, after Him, who by fulfilling would take it away, and by taking it away would fulfill it in us, and in fulfilling it in us, raise us to the still greater height of the new love! Oh that My people had a heart to obey My commandment! was the language of God in the ancient days. I will circumcise their hearts, was His promise. The law testified that fallen man could not keep it; that written on tables of stone it only condemned, that it had no power to inscribe itself on the hard, unrenewed heart of man. The law commands love, and love never can come out of law. The fulfillment of the law presupposes life and spirit; and by the law dead souls can never be quickened. As the Apostle Paul fully explains in the Epistle to the Galatians, the Holy Ghost is received through the preaching of the gospel, the new covenant, the forgiveness of sins.

Now the grace of God, which bringeth salvation, hath appeared, and teacheth us to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts. The law of God is fulfilled in the believer, in the spiritual man, who trusts in Jesus. Of this renewal of the heart and gift of the Holy Ghost the prophet Ezekiel also testifies.^* May we not say that the whole of the Old Testament points (both as a contrast and a preparation) to this: Jesus saves His people from their sins; for He comes with water and with blood and with the Spirit: He is Righteousness and Life. (^* Ezekiel 36:26-27.)

All spiritual life flows from Jesus as our Saviour. When we believe in Jesus we are not in the flesh but in the Spirit. His precious blood is not merely our peace, but our strength; and our strength because it is our peace. Justification and sanctification emanate from this One Source. When Israel is brought in repentance and faith to the Lord, then shall be fulfilled the gracious purpose of God, which under the law was frustrated through Israel’s sin and disobedience. Although God was a Husband unto them, they break His covenant. But now, forgiven and renewed, Israel will be in actual reality, and not merely in position, God’s people, and Jehovah will be their God. This is the most exalted and comprehensive blessing which was ever promised. Jehovah is not ashamed to be called their God. He identifies Himself with His people. All His glorious perfections are revealed in His relation to them. In them is fulfilled the good pleasure of His will. And because He is God to them, Source of Light and Life, they are His people. Not merely chosen and appointed; not merely called and treated collectively as God’s people; but in reality, according to truth, according to their individual character and experience, the people in whom God’s name is revealed, who show forth His praise, who walk in His ways and obey His will. For of Him shall their fruit be found; God working in them both to will and to do, they shall abound in the fruits of righteousness to the glory of His grace. For then each one individually shall know the Lord. "God is known in Judah," said the Psalmist. God had indeed revealed Himself unto His people. He had taught them and given unto them His Word. In their marvellous history, in the divine messages sent by Moses and the prophets, in the types and ordinances, in the Judges and Kings, God had revealed unto His people His name, His character and will, and His great desire was that they should know Him. How touching is the complaint of Jehovah, that after all the signs which they had seen, and after ail His mighty works of redeeming and guiding love, and after all the words of light and of grace which He had sent them, His people did not know Him! So long had He been with them, and erring in their hearts, they did not know His ways!^* What could be more grievous to the fatherly heart of God, yearning to be known, trusted, and loved? What gives us a sadder picture of the fall of man, of the alienation of the human heart from God, of our utter incapacity to understand and to receive divine things, than the fact that Israel did not know the revealed God, who taught and blessed them constantly, abundantly, and with most tender compassion? But when the Holy Ghost shall be poured out upon them, they shall all know Jehovah, from the least to the greatest; though one shall encourage and exhort the other, yet they shall not need to teach and to say to their neighbour, Know the Lord. (^*Isa. 1; Ps. 95.) In the Church this promise is already fulfilled.¹ Although the apostle John distinguishes between little children, young men, and fathers, he writes unto the whole congregation of believers: "Ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things."² It is true that he sends unto them an epistle, rich in doctrine and exhortation, but, as he expresses it, in full harmony with our passage, "I have not written unto you because ye know not the truth, but because ye know it." "The anointing which ye have received of Him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you." "They shall be all taught of God." This promise, uttered by the prophet Isaiah,³ is regarded by our Saviour as the promise uttered by all prophets;⁴ for it is the great Messianic blessing, the promise of the Father. (¹"And how do I know thee? I know thee in thee! I do not know thee as thou art in thyself, but as thou art to me, and that not without thee, but in thee, because thou art the light, which hath enlightened me. For what thou art to thyself is known only to thee; what thou art to me, according to thy grace, is known also unto me; I know, because thou art my God." -Augustine’s Soliloquia.)

(² 1 John 2:20. Compare the apostle Paul’s words (1 Thessalonians 4:9): "But as touching brotherly love ye need not that I write unto you: for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another." Likewise2 Peter 1:12.)

(³Isaiah 54:13.⁴ John 6:45,έν τοῖϛ προϕήταιϛ) From Jesus, the Anointed, all Christians receive the Holy Ghost; they have, according to their name, the unction from above. Hence they possess the Teacher who guides into all truth. Knowledge is within them. There is within them a well of living water. They, are not dependent on external instruction. There is given unto them the Paraclete, who always reveals the things that are freely given unto us of God. The spiritual man knows all things - all the things of the Spirit, all that pertains to life and godliness. True, he does not know all things actually, or in any given moment; but he knows them potentially. There is within him the light which can see, the mind which can receive all truth. It is for this reason that apostles and teachers give instruction. They teach the God-taught; they present spirit-revealed realities to the spiritual. Human erudition, mental acuteness or profundity, are of no avail here. The youngest and most illiterate, the least gifted and most uncultivated, may possess the wisdom which is from above. And this knowledge, God-given, is full of assurance; it possesses the nature of light, of conviction, of absolute certainty. We know that our Redeemer liveth; we know whom we have believed; we know that we are born of God, and that all things work together for good unto them that love Him; we know the things that are freely given to us of God. Every Christian knows himself individually, and that because he is taught of God; he relies not on the testimony of man; his faith stands in the power of God. This personal knowledge of God is the secret of our spiritual life. It is our safeguard against error, and against sin. It is the great and the constant gift of God, the fruit of Christ’s redemption. We now see and know God and His Son; we know Jesus, because Jesus always knows His sheep, revealing Himself unto them, and giving them guidance and life. This knowledge is nothing less than walking with God, walking in the light, praying without ceasing. The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him. In much darkness, amid many difficulties, and in constant warfare we yet walk in the light of His countenance, until at last we shall see Him as He is, and know even as we are known.

How great is the blessedness of all who are in the new, the everlasting covenant; in the covenant of grace and life, in which God Himself is revealed, and in which all things are of God. Here Christ is to us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption. Our transgressions are pardoned, yea, there is no more remembrance of sin. The heart is renewed, and the Holy Ghost is given as an indwelling Spirit. God works in us both to will and to do of His good pleasure. We are in constant and filial communion with Him. He is our God, and we are His people; He is our Father, and we are His children. And all these blessings have their root and commencement, their vitality and permanence in the redemption, accomplished on Golgotha, they are dispensed from the heavenly sanctuary by the Mediator, who was the Paschal Lamb on the cross. Little children and fathers, young converts and experienced Christians, always hear the voice of Jesus: This is the New Testament IN MY BLOOD.

Hallelujah! I believe!

Now no longer on my soul All the debt of sin is lying;

One great Friend has paid the whole.

Icebound fields of legal labour I have left with all their toil;

While the fruits of love are growing From a new and genial soil.